A question to protestants

Strong in Him

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He certainly is capable, but He may choose not to step in. As history shows, He doesn't step in every time we are inclined to think He should do.

No, but my feeling is that if women were seeking God's will, wanting to serve him and asked him to clearly show them if ordination were right - particularly if they didn't want to do it and were looking for a way out - that God would show them and guide them directly.
I am pretty sure, also, that if a woman were standing in the pulpit and blatantly lying about God - i.e saying "he has called me" when she knew full well that he hadn't - that God would at the very least rebuke her. Especially if a woman being a vicar/minister was a sin and dishonouring to him.
That's what I meant. I see God working in this way today; calling women to be ordained and minister to his church. If he had clearly forbidden it in Scripture, I don't think it would be happening - not only would the women themselves be going against his word, but all the male clergy and theologians, and church members who saw no problem with this calling would be showing disobedience.

I think the women you spoke of are called by God, but this is not the same as to think there is a proof this is so which everyone will have to accept on logical grounds.

No; if someone interprets/understands that the Scriptures are forbidding any woman from being ordained, what God is doing today in appointing female clergy, will not persuade them - and it shouldn't. If that's what they sincerely believe the Scriptures say, they have to hold to that and find a church which believes, and teaches, that also.
I disagree that Scripture clearly says that God forbids women to do this, but if someone sincerely believes otherwise, they have to follow it.

It's not a salvation issue, and the likelihood is that we'll all meet in heaven.
 
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Strong in Him

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Well, he did say something about that:
Mk 10:11 And he said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her,
12 and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

I was looking at the verses from Matthew 5:31-32, so thank you.

The verses you thought about are suited to the then Jewish culture, where a woman had no opportunity to divorce herself or to act against being divorced: So while it is adultery when she marries again, it is not her fault (she needs a husband to survive), it is the fault of the man that divorced her, he has to be blamed for her adultery.
Mk 10:11 is aimed at the Roman situation, where a woman could divorce here husband legally. And I am quite sure that every hearer with some brain perceived that Jesus hinted at a famous case: Herodias divorcing her husband in order to marry Herodes Antipas. If she ever heard about this, she would certainly being not amused that there was some who repeated the accusation of John

I've always read that as Jesus saying that if a woman divorces her husband ....... but Jesus' listeners would have known that women couldn't divorce their husbands, so it just re-emphasised the point. Maybe by the time Mark was writing, things were different.
But that was informative, thanks.

The only question one might raise is whether these words are meant for people divorcing in order to marry another partner, or whether they also apply if one divorced marries after a long time.

I only quoted that example to show that sometimes Scripture says something that was normal for the culture of the time - that doesn't mean it wouldn't be different today. Another example would be all the times that older versions of the Bible write the word "men" - all men have sinned, all men are wicked, the Spirit gives gifts to men, and so on.. I don't believe there is anyone who would take that literally and say that women were perfect, not sinners and do not receive any gifts from the Holy Spirit. If we can read where Scripture says "men" and realise "yes, that means women too", then surely we can read a verse about a deacon having one wife and realise, if the deacon is a woman, that clearly means she should have one husband.
 
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Strong in Him

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Bear in mind that that verse, even if it tortured until it is made to say what it doesn't mean, is only one of a number of pieces of evidence that bear upon the matter.

The thing is that there are a number of other pieces of evidence that bear upon the matter.
The fact that a woman was judge over the whole nation - i.e in a position of authority over men.
The fact that Jesus chose and allowed women to speak for him and proclaim his message.
The fat that female prophetesses in the OT and NT gave God's word to men - told them what God was saying and what he wanted.
The fact that many men say, and have said, that there is no Scriptural reason why God can't call women to minister to others and proclaim his word.
The fact that God is calling women to do just this today.
The fact that, in may places, men have ultimate authority over female deacons/Ministers/vicars.
The fact that no woman says, on her own, God has told me to do this, you have to agree. Anyone who says they are called to ordination has that call thoroughly tested, and it is church leaders, and congregations, alike who affirm that a candidate's call is from God and they will accept that person's ministry, pray for and support them.
Most important of all, the fact that isolated Scriptures are taken out of context and used to "prove" that God forbids this. It seems that opponents don't even agree on these verses - some say that women are allowed to preach and teach, but 1 Tim 2:12 says they cannot be Ministers; others seem to not want women even to read the Scriptures in church.
 
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Albion

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The thing is that there are a number of other pieces of evidence that bear upon the matter.
The fact that a woman was judge over the whole nation - i.e in a position of authority over men.
The fact that Jesus chose and allowed women to speak for him and proclaim his message.
The fat that female prophetesses in the OT and NT gave God's word to men - told them what God was saying and what he wanted.
None of those was a pastor, presbyter, bishop, or any kind of clergyperson, though. I already said that many churches (the ones that have the correct perspective according to my own view) do not exclude women from being in all sorts of leadership positions, even though they think it wrong to admit them to Holy Orders (ordination).

The fact that many men say, and have said, that there is no Scriptural reason why God can't call women to minister to others and proclaim his word.
The fact that God is calling women to do just this today.
That is what women who aspire to ordination say, but how they feel about it doesn't negate either scripture or church history...or so the churches that decline to ordain women contend.

The fact that no woman says, on her own, God has told me to do this, you have to agree. Anyone who says they are called to ordination has that call thoroughly tested, and it is church leaders, and congregations, alike who affirm that a candidate's call is from God and they will accept that person's ministry, pray for and support them.
If the church in question has a policy of ordaining women, that is certainly so. But if that is not permitted by the church's rules as framed by its understanding of scripture, then such a claim will not be accepted.

Most important of all, the fact that isolated Scriptures are taken out of context and used to "prove" that God forbids this.
It's really the proponents of women's ordination who have to do that.
 
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helmut

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I had this same issue...
No. What prodigal son wrote, was about orthodoxy in the sense of "correct teaching", not of "Oldest Church which exists up to now".

With sola scriptura and refusing women to serve the Lord, there are plenty "right wing" protestant churches he can go to, he will not come to Orthodox Church.
 
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helmut

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I was addressing the idea that any concept of leadership in the church, any hierarchy, any distinction between laity and clergy, etc. is bogus.

It's impossible to reconcile such an argument with the New Testament.
Well. I don't say what you refuse here, and I'm not sure whether those you spoke to did.

There is a concept of leadership in the Church there should be leaders, whether they were called like leaders of a Hellenistic society (episkopoi) or leaders of a Jewish synagogue (prebuteroi) or with another term (e.g. proistamenoi in 1.Ts 5:12). And there are other services that ought to be respected, like evangelist, or apostle.

What he New Testament does not offer is a theory that there is a strict hierarchy between the services (the only hierarchy to be found is "1. apostles, 2. prophets, 3. teachers, etc." in 1.Cor 12:28ff, which AFAIK no-one takes for an hierarchy as you have in mind.

The NT is quite clear that every true believer is a priest, indeed he should learn everything Jesus had taught to the Apostles (Mt 20:18-20). I can't find the term "layman" in the NT, not in an English translation, and can't see which Greek NT term should be rendered as such, and the term "spiritual man" is certainly not restricted to holders of a service in the church. So where do you derive the notion that a distinction between laity and clergy is not "bogus"?
 
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helmut

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What you are saying is that the same word is used for both deacons and deaconesses, not that there are female deacons. And the proof of this is found in how the first churches separated the duties of the two.
Please explain the difference between deaconesses, and female deacon. Not the difference in modern usage (which may vary between churches), but in NT times.
Or do you want to call later churches (2nd half of 2nd century or later) the "first" churches?
 
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helmut

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I agree with you that women should not be pastors but not every Protestant (Or Christian for that matter) will agree with me. It's been a belief in Christianity since pretty much the beginning of the Christian church.
Well, you should notice that this is often told in a one-side manner. The maskuline plural served for groups of of mixed sex in Greek, as it does in languages like German (though there are attempts to change that). Just see how the masculine plural for "apostle" is used in Rom 16:7 to denote a (presumly married) couple of Apostles. So much of the evidence cited for "male only" is none.
I once read of a tombstone of a elder (presbuteros, masc.) of a Christian church, which by name could be identified as a woman. I can't find it again in the net (search machine seem to prefer references to modern people), but I found a rather short list of female elders (and others) in Early Evidence of Women Officers in the Church.
Even RCC researcher say there were many instances of female elders, as I could read in a German website. There is a tradition suppressing the service of women in the church (sometimes with the argument is was "montanist"), but this is not the earliest stage.
Your belief turns out to be an early addition, not original.
 
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helmut

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I've always read that as Jesus saying that if a woman divorces her husband ....... but Jesus' listeners would have known that women couldn't divorce their husbands, so it just re-emphasised the point.
There was a well-known example (I told you) of a woman that had divorced her husband, and most of the listeners (if not all) knew about it.
 
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helmut

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None of those was a pastor, presbyter, bishop, or any kind of clergyperson, though.
Well, such clergy persons are absent of much of the NT. Just think of "1. apostles, 2. prophets, 3, teachers, ..." (other services in the church are not numbered, so there seems to be no "hierarchy among them). The "top positions" are held by roles not mentioned by you.

So where is the basis of your "clergy"? Some picked verses, not weighted against other instances that show a different picture.
 
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All4Christ

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Catholics only are entrenched in killing women’s voices still. But if you say that Eastern Orthodox do the same also ... if you’ll take notice that is what the bash thread is about.
I haven’t seen Catholics being entrenched in killing women’s voices or for that matter Orthodox Christians. Also, the persecution you mentioned wasn’t specific to women and isn’t continued today in the RCC, so it isn’t indication of the overall history of the Catholic church.

It seems, however, that the subject the OP presented has gone in a tangential direction. The OP didn’t ask for a debate about whether it is or is not right for women to be ordained. It seems like the direction of the thread is a disservice to its original purpose. My response earlier was in relation to the OP’s question.
 
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Strong in Him

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None of those was a pastor, presbyter, bishop, or any kind of clergyperson, though.

No, but it shows there is inconsistency in applying the verses from Timothy and 1 Corinthians.
If it is wrong for a woman to teach, have authority over men or even speak in church - as many have said that these verses teach - then it was wrong of God to have appointed Deborah, given his word to Huldah and have her tell the male priests what he was saying, choose Mary Magdalene to be the first witness to the resurrection, and so on.
These show that in male dominated societies, where women had almost no rights at all and were almost disregarded, God still called, and sent, those he wanted; that despite what the world, society and even religious leaders say, God will appoint those who love him and whose heart is for him, to serve him.

I already said that many churches (the ones that have the correct perspective according to my own view) do not exclude women from being in all sorts of leadership positions, even though they think it wrong to admit them to Holy Orders (ordination).

That, in my view, shows inconsistency, and it's hard to see on what grounds they do that. They can act how they like though; it's between them and God after all.

That is what women who aspire to ordination say, but how they feel about it doesn't negate either scripture or church history...

Firstly, I can't see any reason to say that the testimony of a sister in Christ may be a lie. Secondly, I am certain that it is a lot more than a feeling - some I know have said that it was the last thing in the world they felt like doing, but when God calls, and repeatedly confirms his call, it's impossible to ignore. Thirdly, history and Scripture are no reason to say that God cannot do something. When Jesus was born and the Word became flesh, how many times in their history had the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob come to earth and lived among his people? How many times had God offered his own Son as a sacrifice for sin and paid the price for us? The Pharisees etc were expecting a Messiah who would do certain things and behaved in certain ways, and no doubt they would have quoted Scripture to prove their point; how many rejected Jesus because he did not act in the way their history and understanding of Scripture demanded that he should act? Isaiah told those in exile that God was going to do a new thing for them; later, Jeremiah prophesied that God would make a new covenant with them, Ezekiel prophesied that God would put his Spirit in his people, and Joel prophesied that his Spirit would be poured out on all.
Paul later wrote that we are temples of God's Spirit; the Israelites once carried God with them in the tabernacle, then God "lived" in the temple, today he can live in the hearts of his people.

If the church in question has a policy of ordaining women, that is certainly so. But if that is not permitted by the church's rules as framed by its understanding of scripture, then such a claim will not be accepted.

No, the church will be acting according to its understanding of Scripture, and so it should. That doesn't mean that it is right, nor that the women don't have the freedom to go elsewhere and find a church that will take seriously, test and then accept, their call from God.

It's really the proponents of women's ordination who have to do that.

Obviously not; obviously there are churches who listen to, pray with, talk to women who believe they are called to this ministry, ask him to confirm it, believe they are led by his Spirit and that his word does NOT forbid such a calling, and go ahead and ordain them.
 
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Barnabas2

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Hi. I grew up in a Catholic family, lived an atheist life of sin and returned to God through Catholicism. I knew nothing about other denominations.
My big issue was with Marion devotion, my parents being Portuguese are devoted to Our Lady of Fatima. But when I inquired about it in a Catholic forum I was labelled a Protestant.

"What is that?" So I looked into it. I always thought that Catholics where the original religion which held the bible sacred and then the denominations split off with new books, dogmas and doctrines. I was shocked to learn that its the Catholics that have a heap of other stuff besides the bible.

I learnt about "sola scripture" and that the protestants adhere to the bible and so began to wonder if I was even a Catholic anymore or a Protestant now as I believe in sola scripture and not the opportunity for humans to add doctrines to it without any bible foundation.

So now I"m surprised to learn that there are female priests in the Protestant priesthood.

"Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; the woman was deceived and became a transgressor." Timothy 2:11-14 ESV

Scripture is quite clear on that topic, what happened "sola scripture" in this case?

Brother, thank you for you post. A genuine Christian is one who has repented of their sins, trusted Christ and His atoning work on the cross for their salvation and by God's grace seeks to walk in humble obedience to His Word in the gospel.
Jesus said, the way to heaven is straight and narrow and few there be that find it. Not everyone who goes to Church belongs to the Church. A person is not a Christian outwardly but inwardly with a heart devoted to Christ and which seeks to daily honour God by humble obedience. Denominations are not recognized in heaven brother. James says, Chapter 1:27, "Pure religion and undefined before God the Father is this, is to visit the fatherless and orphans in their distress and to keep oneself unspotted from the world".
It's the 'Fruit Test'. Jesus Himself said, "Why do you call me 'Lord' when you don't do what I say?". If our roots are truly in Christ then the fruit of loving obedience will be evident. The first rule of a disciple of Christ is obedience from the heart.
An illustration:
A family was about to have dinner one day and father called them all to the dinner table. One daughter stood to eat. Her father said, "sit down, we eat our meals sitting down". "But I want to eat standing up", she replied. "Sit down!" her father demanded to which she obeyed. During the meal she spoke to her father and said, "Father, I am sitting down on the outside but I am standing up on the inside!".

Many people go to Church, talk the talk but refuse to walk the walk.

Your privilege and responsibility and mine is to both talk the talk and walk the walk. Be doers as well as hearers of God's Word. Let others choose to do whatever, we are not their judge, God alone is. Let us be true to our Lord and Saviour and our Heavenly Father. Find a group of believers who exemplify this life style and join them and play your part as faithfully as you can. God will bless you.
 
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helmut

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It seems, however, that the subject the OP presented has gone in a tangential direction. The OP didn’t ask for a debate about whether it is or is not right for women to be ordained.
He did ask how ordaining women can be compatible with sola scriptura (lit.: "What happened to sola scriptura"?). So it is indeed off-topic to talk whether Churches that reject sola scriptura and thus reject women as leaders are right or not. But it is definitely not off-topic to discuss whether sola scriptura allows women ordaining or not.
 
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All4Christ

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He did ask how ordaining women can be compatible with sola scriptura (lit.: "What happened to sola scriptura"?). So it is indeed off-topic to talk whether Churches that reject sola scriptura and thus reject women as leaders are right or not. But it is definitely not off-topic to discuss whether sola scriptura allows women ordaining or not.
It has deviated from that to solely talking about whether it is or is not right.

We can agree to disagree though.
 
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Neostarwcc

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Well, you should notice that this is often told in a one-side manner. The maskuline plural served for groups of of mixed sex in Greek, as it does in languages like German (though there are attempts to change that). Just see how the masculine plural for "apostle" is used in Rom 16:7 to denote a (presumly married) couple of Apostles. So much of the evidence cited for "male only" is none.
I once read of a tombstone of a elder (presbuteros, masc.) of a Christian church, which by name could be identified as a woman. I can't find it again in the net (search machine seem to prefer references to modern people), but I found a rather short list of female elders (and others) in Early Evidence of Women Officers in the Church.
Even RCC researcher say there were many instances of female elders, as I could read in a German website. There is a tradition suppressing the service of women in the church (sometimes with the argument is was "montanist"), but this is not the earliest stage.
Your belief turns out to be an early addition, not original.

Yes it's been debated for a long time whether or not women should be pastors probably ever since Paul's letters were added into scripture. In fact it wasn't even until the 1500's that the first female rabbi even existed so why should Christianity be any different? I believe that you cannot be a rabbi as a woman anymore either.
 
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helmut

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In fact it wasn't even until the 1500's that the first female rabbi even existed so why should Christianity be any different?
There is archeological evidence (e.g. tombstones) for female church leaders. Do you really think this can be refuted with a reference to Judaism?
 
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All4Christ

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helmut

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Are you referring to Sola Scriptura as originally intended - or Solo Scriptura?

Sola Scriptura vs. Solo Scriptura | Ad Fontes
Solo Scriptura cannot be done thoroughly, because you need to interpret the Scripture. Every church has a tradition (whether explicitly called so or not) that is used to interpret the Bible.

But since sola scriptura says that every tradition has to bow to Scripture, this means there is no tradition, however old or widespread, can (at least in theory) can be replaced when it is found out that it contradicts the Bible.

Therefore, there is a gradual transition from having "tradition II", as your website calls it, and "solo scriptura" in the sense that one interprets Scripture arbitrary.
 
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