dalrock

dalrock

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9 years ago @ http://lorialexander.b... - Going Viral: The Virus... · 0 replies · +1 points

Part 3:

Second, the Egalitarian/Feminist outrage is driven by women's envy of men, not by any real imbalance of workload/difficulty between women and men. This is why only making the husband do the work the woman associates with being a woman will scratch the itch, and even this is fleeting. The more you scratch it, the more it itches.
I am also not referencing the source of the feminist resentment, but the resentment felt by a wife who feels frazzled with a home, with a brood to manage, while feeling her husband is not helping her enough. Each individual marriage situation will determine if the husband is truly at fault or if her heart is at fault, but either way the prescription for dealing with her husband remains the same. She is to win him by her godly behavior.
Of course it is about feminist resentment. Go back to the very example you gave in the beginning of the post. Lori was happy, until the harpies started whispering in her ear "Why doesn't he do more"? Do you really not understand what they were doing? Moreover, do you not see the feminist revolution all around us, driven by this very same envy, by an attempt to scratch an itch that only grows more maddening the more feminists try to scratch it?

This is a frequent conversation my own wife has with other Christian wives/mothers: They go through a laundry list of all of the chores they want to assign to their husbands. "I have five kids, and he won't help!" When my wife suggests that two or three of those children are old enough to help with the cooking, laundry, ironing, cleaning, etc, the wives lose all interest. Enlisting the kids doesn't scratch the itch! Likewise if my wife points out that parts of what they are so discontent about don't really need to be done. Setting aside unessential work doesn't scratch the itch! 99% of the time this has nothing to do with too much work, and everything to do with feminist resentment.

9 years ago @ http://lorialexander.b... - Going Viral: The Virus... · 0 replies · +1 points

(Part 2)

But the afterthought correction doesn't solve another fundamental problem. Not only do you still refer to the husband as disobedient (because he did not meet her expectations), you tie every other husband's hands by telling their wives what a husband solving their problem looks like:
Certainly husbands, especially godly husbands, owe it to the marriage to be attentive to their wife's frustrating and time consuming daily routine, and get in there and help. How much help and what kind of help needs to be worked out between the two of them, as a husband tries to please his wife, and she in turn tries to please him.

...use the prescription that God gives you to win your disobedient man by lowering the expectations and showing him by your loving behavior that he should jump in and help more.
First, this is the Egalitarian model. They both decide together how much housework the husband should do to solve the problem of her being unhappy. I had no idea you were in the Egalitarian camp, which is why this post surprised me so much. Contrast this with the biblical headship model, which would go something like:
Certainly husbands, especially godly husbands, will want to be attentive to their wife's frustrating and time consuming daily routine, and provide direction to resolve it. This might mean instructing his wife to better enlist the children in helping with the workload, directing his wife to stop worrying about tasks which aren't essential, or even moving the family to a smaller (less prestigious) home. In other cases the husband may (also) decide it makes sense for him to pick up specific tasks.
But this won't work, because this post is a defense against the Egalitarian outrage over Lori's Facebook post, and your defense is that her Facebook post really is Egalitarian if you look at it closely.

Continued in part 3.

9 years ago @ http://lorialexander.b... - Going Viral: The Virus... · 2 replies · +1 points

@Ken
I am not quite sure I understand your full objection Dalrock, but have clarified that my reference is indeed to the man disobedient to God's Word, and who may not have the servant leader's heart that a husband should have.

I have tried to clarify things by adding the following sentence:

What Lori did say was, if you expect your man to help more around the home, and your expectations go unmet, don't allow this to destroy your relationship, as so many young wives have a tendency to do. Instead, use the prescription that God gives you to win your disobedient man by lowering the expectations and showing him by your loving behavior that he should jump in and help more. You may also discover that your husband is not the cause of your upsets, but instead it is your own unsubmissive heart that God desires change by His Word, to make you and your marriage more like Jesus.
The extra sentence is somewhat helpful, but it still strongly implies that a dissatisfied wife is evidence of a husband sinning. To truly rework it you would need to do more than add an afterthought message that maybe the husband isn't to blame after all. You've already called him disobedient because he didn't make her happy.

You describe in the post a period where other women were whispering discontentment in your wife's ear. Yet you are doing the same thing with this post. Wives are programmed to hear this message, and it is coming from all sources. This goes all the way back to the Serpent whispering discontentment in Eve's ears: "Why doesn't that mean God fellow want you to enjoy this tasty fruit and have this knowledge which will make you like Him"? Eve's discontentment wasn't due to God failing, and post fall we should understand that this signal is only stronger. Your message is more subtle: "Be patient with your husband when he is disobedient to you." Don't get me wrong, I'm all for the patience part.

Continued in part 2.

9 years ago @ http://lorialexander.b... - Going Viral: The Virus... · 16 replies · +1 points

if you expect your man to help more around the home, and your expectations go unmet, don't allow this to destroy your relationship, as so many young wives have a tendency to do. Instead, use the prescription that God gives you to win your disobedient man by lowering the expectations and showing him by your loving behavior that he should jump in and help more.
This isn't scriptural. Not even close. The source of feminist resentment isn't a husband's "disobedience" to his wife's wishes.

9 years ago @ http://lorialexander.b... - Be Careful Who You Lea... · 1 reply · +1 points

They argue that Paul wasn't saying that women are more easily deceived than men (meaning the historical reading is wrong), but that he was cryptically referencing creation order again, as he did overtly in 1 Tim 2:13:

28. Do you think women are more gullible than men?

First Timothy 2:14 says, “Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner.” Paul gives this as one of the reasons why he does not permit women “to teach or have authority over a man.” Historically this has usually been taken to mean that women are more gullible or deceivable than men and therefore less fit for the doctrinal oversight of the church. This may be true (see question 29). However, we are attracted to another understanding of Paul’s argument. We think that Satan’s main target was not Eve’s peculiar gullibility (if she had one), but rather Adam’s headship as the one ordained by God to be responsible for the life of the garden. Satan’s subtlety is that he knew the created order God had ordained for the good of the family, and he deliberately defied it by ignoring the man and taking up his dealings with the woman. Satan put her in the position of spokesman, leader, and defender. At that moment both the man and the woman slipped from their innocence and let themselves be drawn into a pattern of relating that to this day has proved destructive.

If this is the proper understanding, then what Paul meant in 1 Timothy 2:14 was this: “Adam was not deceived (that is, Adam was not approached by the deceiver and did not carry on direct dealings with the deceiver), but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor (that is, she was the one who took up dealings with the deceiver and was led through her direct interaction with him into deception and transgression).”

In this case, the main point is not that the man is undeceivable or that the woman is more deceivable; the point is that when God’s order of leadership is repudiated it brings damage and ruin. Men and women are both more vulnerable to error and sin when they forsake the order that God has intended.
The above is from the FAQ in Chapter 2 of Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: A Response to Evangelical Feminism. They also have a specific chapter devoted to 1 Timothy 2:11-15 written by Dr. Moo. Dr. Moo reinforces the same point, that 1 Tim 2:14 can't mean that women are more easily deceived by men, because if this is the case the CBMW's assumption that 1 Tim 2:12 only applies to women teaching men is incorrect:

If the issue, then, is deception, it may be that Paul wants to imply that all women are, like Eve, more susceptible to being deceived than are men, and that this is why they should not be teaching men! While this interpretation is not impossible, we think it unlikely. For one thing, there is nothing in the Genesis accounts or in Scripture elsewhere to suggest that Eve’s deception is representative of women in general. But second, and more important, this interpretation does not mesh with the context. Paul, as we have seen, is concerned to prohibit women from teaching men; the focus is on the role relationship of men and women. But a statement about the nature of women per se would move the discussion away from this central issue, and it would have a serious and strange implication. After all, does Paul care only that the women not teach men false doctrines? Does he not care that they not teach them to other women? More likely, then, verse 14, in conjunction with verse 13, is intended to remind the women at Ephesus that Eve was deceived by the serpent in the Garden (Genesis 3:13) precisely in taking the initiative over the man whom God had given to be with her and to care for her.
I go into this in more detail on my post here. But in short, if you want to argue for women's ministries, you have to find a novel meaning for 1 Tim 2:14. You don't have to make the same creation order based argument the CBMW makes, but you do have to hold that Paul wasn't saying the reason for the teaching prohibition in verse 12 is that women are more easily deceived than men.

9 years ago @ http://lorialexander.b... - Be Careful Who You Lea... · 0 replies · +1 points

Hi dalrock, Welcome,
Hi Ken. Thank you.

I do not see Biblical grounds for forbidding women from teaching other women, nor for that matter placing all the teaching ministry of the church on the men's shoulders, even the teaching of the children in Biblical matters. Just because women are more easily deceived does not mean that all will be deceived, or that none should be teaching. But a woman cannot teach if the teaching is in authority over a man in the Church.
The question is what did Paul mean in 1 Timothy 2:12:

But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence"
This can then be broken into two questions regarding women teaching:

What kinds of teaching does this prohibition apply to. We know from Titus 2 that older women are to "admonish the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands." But clearly there is some form of teaching which Paul is saying women are not to do.
Does "over the man" apply also to teaching or only to authority?

Point two is what I'm focused on here. The Bible scholars at the CBMW and I agree that in order to answer this question we need to look to the verses immediately following which tell us why women have these restrictions. This then boils down to what Paul meant by:

And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.
If you believe that Paul is saying the reason is that women are more prone to be deceived, then it makes no sense that they should only be prohibited from teaching men. So far Drs Moo, Grudem, and Piper are in agreement. Where we diverge is how we read 1 Tim 2:14.

Continued below:

9 years ago @ http://lorialexander.b... - Be Careful Who You Lea... · 0 replies · +1 points

Thank you. I'll hold my response for Ken then.

9 years ago @ http://lorialexander.b... - Be Careful Who You Lea... · 7 replies · +1 points

Many of these women stand in front of men and women and teach the Word? Is this what they are called to do? "But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence" {1 Timothy 2:12}. Oh, but many will say, "They are in an auditorium and not in a church. This verse is for the church only." Well, guess what, the Church isn't a building; it is a body of believers, therefore, no woman should ever teach men the Word anywhere.

God doesn't want women teaching men His Word because we are the ones more easily deceived.
This makes no sense, because the argument that women are permitted to teach other women relies entirely on the assertion that Paul wasn't stating that women are more easily deceived in 1 Timothy 2:14. This is the foundation of the entire "women's ministry" argument; you simply can't adopt the traditional reading of 1 Tim 2:14 and argue that 1 Tim 2:12 only pertains to women teaching men.

In fact, if you agree with the plain reading of 1 Tim 2:14 (as I do, and you indicate you do as well), having women teach the Word to other women is even more dangerous than having women teach men. As Dr. Moo explains in the CBMW founding book:
But a statement about the nature of women per se would move the discussion away from this central issue, and it would have a serious and strange implication. After all, does Paul care only that the women not teach men false doctrines? Does he not care that they not teach them to other women?

14 years ago @ Big Government - #OccupyBaltimore Disco... · 0 replies · +1 points

FYI, after doing my own blog post on the topic I found what looks to be the same memo on the Occupy Baltimore website. You might want to take your own copy in case they pull it: http://www.occupybmore.org/comment/92