NXR Podcast - QUESTIONS - Can Women Be On Church Staff With Men Reporting To Them?
Aired: 2022-06-30
Duration: 08:31


=== Women As Office Administrators (07:22) ===

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[00:00:21]  Regarding church staff, is it biblical for a woman to be in a lead role such as communications director or other ministry within the church and have men, others, report to her?
[00:00:33]  Yeah, yeah, got you.
[00:00:34]  So, no, I would say no.
[00:00:36]  And this is why, and this is something that guys are trying to do again and again and again.
[00:00:40]  I'm not saying you're trying to do this coffee with ranch hands.
[00:00:43]  I wish I knew your actual name.
[00:00:44]  It feels weird addressing you.
[00:00:45]  Dear coffee with ranch hands.
[00:00:47]  But I don't think you're trying to do this, but a lot of people are.
[00:00:50]  What they try to do is there's two prohibitions, two things that Paul clearly forbids, prohibits in 1 Timothy 2, verse 9 through 15.
[00:01:00]  And a lot of people are trying to combine them and make it one.
[00:01:03]  They're trying to truncate Paul's.
[00:01:05]  Prohibition and say there's only one thing that Paul prohibits.
[00:01:09]  He prohibits a woman to teach with authority, and that is a clear misreading of the text.
[00:01:17]  The text doesn't say, I forbid a woman to teach with authority.
[00:01:19]  No, Paul says, I forbid a woman to teach or exercise authority.
[00:01:24]  Not one prohibition teaching with authority, but two prohibitions teaching or exercising authority.
[00:01:31]  Teaching or exercising authority.
[00:01:33]  So if a woman is not an elder, It sounds like we would agree on that, that women shouldn't be elders.
[00:01:39]  That's clear in Scripture.
[00:01:41]  And I would hold to a male diaconate as well.
[00:01:44]  I don't think that there's any biblical evidence whatsoever.
[00:01:47]  And that has been the historic position of the church until about 15 minutes ago when everyone became a feminist.
[00:01:53]  All of a sudden, oh, now we have the right reading of Scripture.
[00:01:56]  No, I think you're just feminist.
[00:01:57]  But male eldership, male diaconate, in terms of officers, ordained officers of the church, those are reserved for men.
[00:02:06]  Teaching.
[00:02:07]  It sounds like you would agree, like, okay, yeah, and also, if a woman can't be a deacon and she can't be an elder, she also doesn't need to be preaching on the Lord's Day.
[00:02:15]  And that's not contradicting what I said earlier.
[00:02:16]  Well, I thought you said, Joel, that within Reformed Baptist polity, you don't have to be an elder to teach.
[00:02:20]  Yeah, but you have to be biblically qualified.
[00:02:23]  You may not have the office, the title, the ordination, but you have to be biblically qualified.
[00:02:28]  And one of the biblical qualifications is maleness.
[00:02:32]  That is one of the qualifications.
[00:02:33]  It's not just doctrinally sound, it's not just able to teach, it's also man.
[00:02:39]  Man of but one wife, right?
[00:02:41]  So that's part of the qualification.
[00:02:42]  So you can't be an elder, you can't be a deacon.
[00:02:45]  You also cannot teach.
[00:02:46]  So then the question is, but can you be in a leadership role exercising authority over men?
[00:02:51]  And I would say no, because Paul says, I do not permit a woman to teach or exercise authority.
[00:02:57]  I think that these roles, even if it's a non ordained role, right, it's not an elder, it's not a deacon.
[00:03:03]  So it begs another question Should a church employ on staff people who are not ordained officers of the church?
[00:03:11]  Someone who is a non deacon or a non elder, but still on staff with the church.
[00:03:16]  Yes, I think biblically that is permissible.
[00:03:18]  I'm not saying you should do it.
[00:03:19]  I'm not saying it's ideal, but yes, it is biblically permissible, right?
[00:03:23]  Like you could have a janitor, right?
[00:03:25]  If your church is huge, you know, I think the church is smaller than everybody just pitch in and clean up, right?
[00:03:30]  But if your church is huge, a thousand people and all those, okay, you can have a janitor on staff with the church, and that could be a full time job with a church that size.
[00:03:39]  And that person could be a woman.
[00:03:42]  Or a man, and it would not contain any teaching role or any authority.
[00:03:48]  And, you know, but a communications director, part of my problem in answering the question is I don't really know what the heck a communications director is.
[00:03:57]  Nathan, what is a communications director?
[00:04:01]  Just an office administrator?
[00:04:04]  Do you think that's what he's getting at?
[00:04:06]  Or she's getting at?
[00:04:09]  Yeah, I just, so the example that you gave, and I'm sorry, I'm trying to understand your question.
[00:04:13]  I'm not saying it's your fault, but the communications director, that just could be so broad, you know?
[00:04:19]  And even the word director, you know, it seems to invoke a sense of authority.
[00:04:25]  You know, in the same way that, you know, on our church website, we would use the word pastor for anyone who is an elder.
[00:04:30]  Well, what I've done in the past is I've also used the word director for anyone who's a deacon.
[00:04:36]  So if you're a deacon over this ministry or whatever, I say you're the such and such director.
[00:04:42]  And likewise, if you're an elder with this, you're the such and such pastor.
[00:04:46]  And so communications director just seems big, it seems broad.
[00:04:52]  That person could be in charge of curating and also editing and being the gatekeeper for the theological platforms of the church with social media or.
[00:05:05]  Recorded.
[00:05:07]  I don't know, all these different things.
[00:05:09]  But I know your main question is saying, okay, it's a team lead, somebody who has other people either working underneath them or volunteering underneath them.
[00:05:18]  Yeah, I just think it depends.
[00:05:20]  It depends on the nature of the work, right?
[00:05:22]  So, again, back to the thousand person church, you know, let's say a woman is the lead janitor, right?
[00:05:28]  But let's say it's such a big church that she needs an assistant.
[00:05:31]  Can she have an assistant who's a man?
[00:05:33]  Well, I mean, if they're in the church, a guy and a girl together, and the church is nobody else is there, I would just, again, I'd say that's not a good idea.
[00:05:39]  Just by virtue of, we don't want an empty church building with two members of the opposite sex with nobody present.
[00:05:46]  That's just, you know what I mean?
[00:05:48]  That's just a bad idea.
[00:05:48]  But in a hypothetical situation, blah, blah, blah, would it be okay for a female lead janitor and a male assistant janitor who reports to her?
[00:05:59]  Well, she's exercising authority, but the authority that she's exercising is hey, could you clean the bathroom and could you use bleach?
[00:06:06]  It's just different.
[00:06:07]  That's different than communications director that could be just an office administrator.
[00:06:12]  You know, helping to schedule the pastor's week, you know, when people ask to meet with him or this or that.
[00:06:18]  So it just depends what you mean.
[00:06:19]  Do you mean an office administrator?
[00:06:21]  Again, same kind of disclaimer that I gave a second ago.
[00:06:25]  If there's going to be times where the pastor and this office administrator are up at the church alone, nobody else is there, yeah, it shouldn't be a woman.
[00:06:32]  I think that's dangerous and inappropriate.
[00:06:34]  And we're called to avoid even the appearance of evil, whether or not something actually inappropriate happens.
[00:06:40]  But assuming that there's a large staff and all this kind of stuff, and there's Plenty of accountability, and they're not sharing an office, and blah blah blah.
[00:06:45]  And there's open door policy, and you know, all those kind of things, right?
[00:06:49]  The Mike Pence model, which I think is a good model, all those things.
[00:06:53]  If office administrator is just, I'm scheduling things for the pastor, I'm not really exercising authority over anybody, I'm just an office administrator, I'm an administrator, yeah, then I think that that could be permissible.
[00:07:06]  But it sounds like what you're talking about is people would report to her, be working under her, and communications director sounds broader.
[00:07:15]  Like it has authority over more things than just an administrator, a secretary.

=== Men Must Direct People (01:08) ===

[00:07:22]  And so, in that case, I would say, Yeah, no, I don't think that's a good idea.
[00:07:25]  I think you should have a man to direct people, to be a director.
[00:07:30]  All right.
[00:07:31]  Because all that being said, 1 Timothy 2, verse 9 through 15, the prohibition that Paul gives is not one, teaching with authority, but two, teaching or exercising authority.
[00:07:43]  And so, however you apply that, I think at least the principle, I hope you go away with the principle.
[00:07:49]  The principle is it is inappropriate in the mind of Paul for a woman, even if she's not teaching, publicly teaching men, it is still inappropriate just to be exercising authority over men.
[00:08:04]  And obviously, there's a spectrum there of cleaning the toilets with bleach versus, I don't know, whatever.
[00:08:11]  There's a spectrum there, but that's the principle, that's the big idea.
[00:08:14]  Thanks so much for listening.
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