Phil Sanders

I Timothy 2:11-14

“Let a woman learn in silence with all submission. And I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man, but to be in silence. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression.”

While women may teach or have authority over other women and children (Tit. 2:2-4) in spiritual matters, they are not permitted to teach or have authority over a man. Many women are quite talented and have responsible roles in life outside of the Lord’s church, but this passage declares the will of the Lord for the activity of his church. Women are not to preside over the assembly or to teach men, rather they are to “learn in silence and with all submission.” The apostle Paul gives God’s reasons reaching back to creation, “For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression.”

Paul explains more plainly, “But I want you to know that the head of every man is Christ, the head of every woman is man, and the head of Christ is God...For man is not from woman, but woman from man. Nor was man created for the woman, but woman for the man” (I Cor. 11:3, 8). As a result of the sin of eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, God said to the woman, “Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you” (Gen. 3:16).

Christ chose men to have places of authority in the church; the twelve apostles were all men; and the seven servants chosen in Acts 6 were all men. While women were given various praiseworthy roles of teaching and service in the New Testament (Acts 18:37; Rom. 16:2; Phil. 4:2; Tit. 2:3-4), they were not given permission to teach or have authority over a man in the church. Everett Ferguson noted, “The prohibition of exercising authority over men, therefore, is not a general principle applicable to any situation, but has a specific reference to the assembled church. These instructions then prepare the way for I Timothy 3, which gives the place of a bishop to a married man with a family.”

Where the Spirit Leads

Shane Hughes, preaching minister for Highland Church of Christ in Abilene explained what led the congregation in Abilene to have female elders. “It seemed good to us and good to the Holy Spirit that not only men but spiritually gifted men and women could and should serve as elders at our church. There’s no judgement on any other church. This is just what’s right for us” (Abilene Reporter-News).

Progressive churches often make decisions after periods of study of the Bible, prayer, and contemporary norms. They believe the Holy Spirit will lead them to do what they perceive is right. Hughes does not explain how the Spirit communicated it was right for them to do what they chose to do. When Hughes says, “This is just what’s right for us,” he is admitting Highland’s choice to have women elders was not acceptable to all. Interestingly, Ferguson clearly states in the history of the church in the second to fourth centuries, “Women were not appointed as elders, nor did they take public speaking roles in the assembly as prophets, teachers, or leaders in the assembly” (Kindle Edition).

If the Holy Spirit led churches to appoint women as elders, surely the early church would have known and practiced it. There is no commandment for wives to serve as elders in the New Testament. There is no evidence of any woman serving as an elder in the New Testament or in the early church. There is a clear, inspired passage of Scripture prohibiting women from having authority over men in the assembled church. One must wonder how the Holy Spirit could say one thing in the first century and lead people to a different conclusion in the twenty-first century.

The Lord Jesus promised the apostles in John 16:12-13, “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.” Since the Holy Spirit led the apostles into “all truth,” we cannot imagine the Holy Spirit leading churches into an activity contradicting what the Holy Spirit first revealed. If indeed the Holy Spirit taught the apostles “all things” (John 14:26), then one would see no reason to think the Holy Spirit is speaking something different today. If the apostles and the early church knew nothing of women as elders, then the practice of appointing women as elders is not part of the “all things” and “all truth” the Holy Spirit revealed in the first century.

As to what the Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit speaks, we should take note of their limits. The Lord Jesus said in John 12:49-50, “For I have not spoken on My own authority; but the Father who sent Me gave Me a command, what I should say and what I should speak. And I know that His command is everlasting life. Therefore, whatever I speak, just as the Father has told me, so I speak.” If the Lord Jesus would not speak on His own authority, and if the Holy Spirit would not speak on His own authority, what right do church leaders today have to speak or to act on their own authority?

REFERENCES

Ferguson, Everett (2015). Women in the Church: Biblical and Historical Perspectives. Desert Willow Publishing. Kindle Edition.

Jaklewicz, Greg. “Elders at Abilene’s Highland Church of Christ no longer just male,” Abilene Reporter-News, March 4, 2023.

http://www.wherethespiritleads.org/gender_inclusive_churches.htm. Accessed April 11, 2023.