A Minister’s Husband

“You should learn how to play the piano or something… since you’ll be a minister’s wife someday.”

An older gentleman said this to me as we were walking along toward the Sunday school class, where my husband Sam and I were to share about our missionary experiences. When we were single, Sam and I had both individually heard God’s call and confirmation to be long-term missionaries, and both of us had taken steps of faith on short-term trips to answer that call. And though they had invited my husband to be the speaker that morning, as equal partners in all things, Sam of course wanted me to share my story as well. Sadly, the assumption was that Sam was the minister and I was the minister’s wife!

The gentleman’s comment left me dumbfounded and speechless. I wanted to laugh because it was so absurd and cry because I knew he wasn’t joking. It was assumed that because I was a married female, I was no longer a missionary (I was a missionary’s wife), and furthermore, there was no way I would be the minister — but the minister’s wife.

But God is not gender-biased. He gives spiritual gifts according to His sovereign prerogative. To me, He gave the gifts of teaching and shepherding. To Sam, He gave the gifts of service and music. So… in our family, if anybody was to be the piano player, it would be Sam, and if anybody were to be a minister’s spouse, it would be him. But a “minister’s husband”, whoever’s heard of that? As we move forward in proclaiming the message of Biblical equality, may a woman’s call to ministry be as readily accepted as a man’s.

testing, testing… just thoughts on scatch paper

First thing’s first. I’m an egalitarian. I believe in Biblical equality. I believe that women can be pastors — preachers, teachers, elders, deacons, professors of seminaries, missionaries on the mission field; they can be apostles who prophesy, church planters who start churches… there is no limit to what God might call women to — as there is no limit to what God might call men to.

I am a woman and I believe that God has called me to be a preacher, teacher, pastor, shepherd, discipler, missionary, church planter. As I live and breathe, teaching is something I can’t help but do. I WRITE in order to fulfill God’s call for me to teach – in a world where there are not enough opportunities, platforms and encouragement for women to teach. I don’t teach because I know it all (far from it) but rather it’s as though I am swept along by the current of His unrelenting revelation to me which demands to be voiced in one form or another. I am a mouthpiece for the living God, who urges me with deep conviction that if I do not speak, then I am robbing the world of a piece of His heart and thoughts which He wants to be made known.

There are many Christians who say that a woman cannot teach or preach or be a pastor. They really believe that a woman’s place is in the home. Her highest calling is to be a wife and mother. Everything else is secondary –even being a follower of Jesus (though they would never outrightly say it). They believe that for a wife to follow her husband’s call and be her husband’s ‘right hand man’ is God’s will for her life. Period, end of sentence. Forget whatever call He might’ve been leading her to prior to His leading her to her husband. I disagree with all of this and feel sad for these women who live believing that they have less value than their husbands as their whole lives are centered around serving and supporting his needs and his opportunities. They don’t realize (as Lynne Hybels so insightfully points out) that Scripture might call them to die to the self-will, but it never calls them to die to the self that God created them to be (their gifts and passions).

Christ’s resurrection means a new life of freedom for all. It’s a freedom from the bondages of sin and human limitations and discriminations of race, class and gender. It means equality before God. It means receiving an inexplicable inheritance that is for all people. This gospel message is powerful and radical — so much so that it will start a revolution. I want to be on the frontlines of this revolution.

These here are my scratch paper thoughts for this revolution.