Biblical Womanhood Is Not House Arrest

From Gospel Translations

Audio Transcript

For men and women who have a heart to minister, that is Christian men and women who have a heart to save souls, heal broken lives, resist evil, meet needs — the fields of opportunity for a woman or a man with a heart like are simply endless.

If you ever say, “Well then what can we do if we can’t be elders?” then I want to say: thousands and thousands of opportunities await a woman and a man with a heart to want to serve people, love people, meet needs, resist evil, build up people, save people. There are endless opportunities around the world for all the gifts in biblical ways of expression. This means that nobody — man or woman — stays at home watching soap operas or ball games while the world burns.

Don’t ever buy into the criticism that complementarians have the wildest, nutty notion that women can only glorify God as mothers or housewives. What? The thousand single women in this church can’t glorify Jesus? What kind of nutcase is that talking? Well, there are people who just want to defame the truth — a beautiful truth.

This is a call for men and women to realize that it is a grand thing to be created in God’s image as a male or a female. It is a grand thing to be a man and to be a woman in the image of God.

But since primary responsibility lies with the men, let me close with an exhortation to the men. Men:

• Do you have a moral vision for your family if you’re married? Do you have a moral vision for what this family is and where you want it to be and to go?
• Do you have zeal for the house of the Lord? Do you have a magnificent commitment to advance the kingdom in your sphere?
• Do you articulate a dream for the mission of the church? Do you have a tenderhearted tenacity to see all of this through?

If you don’t, you can’t lead a godly woman. She’s a grand thing. There are many of them in this church, aching for men to rise to the kind of leader she wants, needs, delights in, and would flourish with.

So men, bite this bullet and grow into this. There are hundreds of men like that in this church, and I rejoice over it. And there need to be more, just like there need to be more godly woman.

When the Lord visits this church, or let’s just say his church globally. When the Lord visits the global church, and a mighty army of deeply spiritual, humble, strong, Christlike men committed to the word of God are raised up in this kind of leadership, I believe a vast army of women will rejoice over that leadership. And these men and those women will link arms and a joyful partnership will have tremendous power. It will be a grand thing.