Generally churches holding women back from eldership or other leadership roles cite two controversial New Testament passages for their view to do so: 1 Corinthians 11:3 and 1 Timothy 2:11-12. But they take a narrow view on those verses and don’t give adequate weight to a number of other Scriptures that
do support female leadership in the church and elsewhere. It makes no logical sense that a woman could lead the board of a Fortune 100 company, be the President of the United States, or be endorsed as a high-level spiritual leader in the Bible, but not serve as an official leader in a church. Yet there are many Christian men and women who have high regard for women and still believe the Bible teaches that church elders/leaders should be restricted to men.
In 1 Timothy 2:11-12 Paul says, “A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent.” (NIV)
Similarly, in 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 he says, “Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.” (NIV)
A straightforward, literal reading of these texts, does seem to support that a church should not have women pastors or elders.
But many evangelical Christian church denominations do
not interpret these Bible passages to restrict women from leadership; they ordain women as pastors and install them as elders or overseers: Presbyterian, Methodist, Assemblies of God and other Pentecostal traditions, Friends (Quaker), certain Baptist and Lutheran groups, some nondenominational churches, Evangelical Covenant, and the Reformed Church in America (RCA).
Evangelical Christian Biblical scholarship of Dallas Willard, N.T. Wright, Scot McKnight, and others suggest that spokespersons for Christ who keep women from church leadership using 1 Timothy 2 and 1 Corinthians 14 are misinterpreting these texts and neglecting to give sufficient weight to other relevant Bible passages. These scholars make a strong case that by studying the Biblical and cultural context of those verses, along with drawing on the whole counsel of God’s Word, to show significant support for qualified women being given opportunities to serve in church leadership.
In the complementarian view, the Bible teaches that men and women are unique and designed differently by God. They are considered of equal value and status but they have different functions in the family and church. Men are created by God for headship (which they define as leadership) roles and women for submissive (supportive) roles. While women may assist in a decision-making process the ultimate authority rests with the man. In these families typically the father is the wage-earner and the mother is more focused on the children. In most conservative Bible churches the complementarian paradigm is on display. The pastors and elders are all men because women are not eligible to serve in these roles. Even the guest speakers are always or almost always men. Or if a missionary couple is introduced or makes a report at the church the man is the designated leader and does all or most of the talking. Wives are in a supporting role.
The main contrasting view to complementarian male and female roles is the egalitarian view. There is the belief that God’s plan and the Bible’s teaching is that men and women are equal not only in value and status but also in the work they can do
. They have equal authority in decisions and any role in society, including church, is open to either. Male and female distinctions are still honored, but that doesn’t limit either’s opportunities to serve in particular leadership roles or to exercise authority.
For churches operating with an egalitarian paradigm, you’ll regularly see gifted women preachers bringing the Word of God to the church. The lead pastor may be a woman and in larger churches, some of the pastors, executives, and elders will be women. When a missionary couple is invited onto the church stage to be prayed over the women might be a co-leader with her husband or the called leader who is being supported by her husband.
Understand that Peter’s teaching on spiritual leadership in church ministry (“overseers”) in 1 Peter 5:1-11 applies to men and women humbling themselves under Christ and being servant leaders for the sake of the church and its ministry to the surrounding community. Peter focuses elders not on governing or ruling the church, but on
ministry to people. In
some churches, elders run the church like the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain. They have power over the pastors and the governance of the church (and possibly micromanaging the church staff and operations), even though they’re not directly involved in servant ministry to people in the church and community. Their qualifications for leadership are mostly about giftedness, business success, money, and powerful personalities.
Dallas Willard has some common sense wisdom to offer on this issue:
All through my young life [growing up in Baptist churches in Missouri] those who had taught me most “at church” were women. Actually, I knew that, in many cases, there would have been no church at all if it hadn’t been for women; and, beyond church, life in my environment was mainly anchored in strong and intelligent women who — often with little or nothing in the way of “credentials” — simply stood for what was good and right and directed others in the way of Christ. Of course I knew that in
my church the “official” pastors were men, but the issue of women teaching men and “preaching” had not hardened in that time and place, and, if need required — as was frequently the case — certain women could do very well at “bringing the message.” Also, I was fortunate to be in significant contact where women were in leadership roles — quite “officially.”
Dallas indicated that as he grew older and studied the Bible it became clear to him that the Biblical passages that seemed to prohibit women from preaching were not giving general principles for us today. He said it is “a very weak hermeneutic” to use these passages to deprive women of leadership opportunities. Instead, in these texts, Paul is primarily teaching that Christ-followers are to be “all things to all people” (1 Corinthians 9:19)
in order to bring salvation to as many people as possible.
Women as Pastors, Elders, and Leaders in Bible-Based Churches - Soul Shepherding