When I was involved within the Word of Faith movement I was ordained as a Woman Pastor. Specifically, I was a Minister of Music. I was employed at a Word of Faith church in 2006 through 2009. Most of my life, I had felt called to be in some form of ministry, and even as a teenager, I’d desired to be involved in music ministry using my talents for the Lord. Having grown up within the Pentecostal church for the first 16 years of my life I had been rightly told that I could not be a Pastor. However, not all the teachings that I’d grown up hearing about women and their roles was correct and biblical. Many of the teachings I’d heard were legalistic and confusing so I never really understood what I could and could not do as a woman in the church and no one ever taught me.
At the end of 2003, I read a book called “10 Lies that the church tells women”, written by J. Lee Grady who is the editor of Charisma magazine. At the time, I thought this book was revolutionary! It seemed to open the doors to many ministry opportunities that I’d long desired to have, and I was finally validated in my pursuit of my ministry endeavors. This book made me feel important. I came across this book at a dark time in my life when I was being completely rejected by my husband (now my ex) and I’d just had a baby a few months prior. I was completely unloved in my marriage, and I was desperately searching for validation from someone and from anywhere. Honestly, it was a perfect set up for me latch onto false teaching, and that is exactly what I did. This book would later become the foundation of why I thought it was okay for me to be a woman pastor.

In March of 2004, I moved to Panama City Florida and began attending a Word of Faith church. It wasn’t long before I was thrust onto the stage and being mentored by the woman worship leader in that church. She retired in April of 2006. Despite my husband being extremely abusive and rarely attending at all, the church leadership felt it was okay for me to be in a leadership role and in early 2006, I began leading worship at that church. In Sept 2006, I began Bible college through AFCM International which was accredited through Rhema Bible Institute. In October 2006, I was brought on staff to replace the former Worship Pastor who had been falsely accused of sexual misconduct. In 2008, I graduated and was ordained as a Pastor in my church, although I never used the title. Despite me being egalitarian in my views at that point, I still had this nagging sense that I shouldn’t be a senior Pastor, nor should I use the title of Pastor. It was only on rare occasions, in arrogance, that I used the title at all, but I certainly had no qualms about speaking to mixed crowds and preaching from the pulpit. I did that regularly. I even did a twelve-week bible school video series on the topic of healing that was sent out to third world countries to train ministers. I regularly prayed, prophesied, and gave mini sermons as I lead worship in the church. I firmly held to the false belief (thanks to Grady’s book) that Galatians 3:28 “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” meant that I could stand in the office of pastor and prophet within the church. That scripture, ignorantly taken out of context, was one that I quoted often as justification for my rebellion. As you’ve probably gathered, I no longer feel this way. Just like with everything else in my life, the more I studied scripture in context, the more my life was aligned with scripture. At one point, I had to sincerely repent of my false beliefs and my rebellion against God’s clearly defined roles for women. Women cannot be pastors.

Over the years, I’ve heard a lot of poor excuses to defend women pastors. I’m not saying that women can’t teach, minister, or spread the gospel. There are many examples of women doing just that in scripture, but what you never see anywhere is a woman being a pastor. There’s a single brief reference about Junia in Romans 16 as a possible apostle, but when you really research that out in the Greek, a better translation would be “Well known to the apostles”. Nowhere in Romans 16 does it indicate that any of the women mentioned were pastors. Also, when we look at the very clear texts in 1 Corinthians 14 and 1 Timothy 2 about the order IN CHURCH, both passages command women to be silent in the church. In 1 Timothy 2 it even explains why, citing the order of creation. Then immediately, the context of 1 Timothy 3 goes into the qualifications of Elders/Pastors, and it is extremely clear that role is for men only.
One thing I noticed when refreshing my mind with the contents of Grady’s book, was that when addressing the issue of women pastors, he completely avoided the passage in 1 Timothy 2 and chalked it up completely to cultural issues in the Ephesian church. He completely ignored the fact that this pastoral epistle was passed around as instruction and scripture to more than just Timothy himself. He used the personal instruction of using wine for Timothy’s stomach as a strawman argument to ignore the other commandments of the Lord in that book. He also missed the context in 1 Corinthians 14 and skipped verse 33 entirely which would have inconveniently disproved his assertion that both passages were cultural only.
The end of verse 33 reads like this, “as in all the churches of the saints”. Remember that punctuation isn’t included in the original manuscripts and was added later. So, the passage could be read two different ways. Either way it completely refutes Grady’s claim that women being silent in the church was only a cultural issue for the Ephesian church and the Corinthian church. Grady makes the claim that it was women involved with pagan religions or Gnosticism trying to disrupt the church services in both churches. He also made the claim that women were uneducated back then and would interrupt the service to ask questions of their husbands. While historically, there may have been issues of Gnosticism and the uneducated women being disruptive, it doesn’t negate the clear meaning of the text in both passages. So, let’s take a look at the passage in 1 Corinthians 14 from verse 31 to the end of the chapter.

31 For you can all prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be encouraged. 32 And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets. 33 For God is not the author of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints. 34 Let your women keep silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak; but they are to be submissive, as the law also says. 35 And if they want to learn something, let them ask their own husbands at home; for it is shameful for women to speak in church. 36 Or did the word of God come originally from you? Or was it you only that it reached? 37 If anyone thinks himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things which I write to you are the commandments of the Lord. 38 But if anyone is ignorant, let him be ignorant. 39 Therefore, brethren, desire earnestly to prophesy, and do not forbid to speak with tongues. 40 Let all things be done decently and in order.

So, if we read the last part of verse 33 as the beginning of verse 34, it makes it pretty clear that this is the practice as in all the churches! Plus, it is reaffirmed in verse 37, that these things, the order of the church are the commandments of the Lord. There’s no arguing with that. Grady, in his book stops at verse 36 conveniently. Then he goes on to argue that Paul was quoting the Corinthians and somehow refuting the Corinthians. I’ve heard this refutation argument before and in light of 1 Timothy 2, which is a clear passage on the order of the church, it doesn’t hold water. Plus, when the Apostle Paul is arguing in other passages of his epistles, he always goes on to explain why they are wrong. He doesn’t rebuke them and then just leave it so ambiguous. Clearly, the meaning of the text is the text, and this is to all churches (vs 33) and it’s a command of the Lord (vs37). You honestly have to be willfully ignorant to read those two passages and ignore the clear meaning of the text. Which, I have to admit, at one time I was just that. It took me a long time to come around on that particular issue and not once did I have a pastor explain it to me. I wish they had because I probably wouldn’t have attended some of the churches that I’d attended which led to more instances of spiritual abuse. I know that I’ve said this in past posts, but biblical churches have biblical leaders. If your church has women pastors, then that’s not a biblical church!

I know that I can’t cover every question in one blog post about women in ministry. I personally hold to the KIS method of things. KIS stands for Keep IT Simple. The simple truth is that women can minister, evangelize, spread the gospel, teach, practice hospitality, and preach to other women and children. No one is prohibiting that. Although Grady goes into extremes in his book claiming that Complementarians want women subjugated and silent about spiritual matters even outside the church. But here’s how I keep it simple: since the passages about women being silent are in the Context of IN CHURCH, I govern myself accordingly. That’s it! It is not that hard. I still teach women’s bible studies, teach youth and children, serve by singing on stage and play the piano, evangelize and minister praying for people outside in the world. Me not getting the opportunity to preach in the pulpit in no way hinders my ability to minister. I minister almost daily apart from the pulpit. I don’t pray out loud in the church service, nor do give the call to worship despite me being the main singer and only lead instrument in my church. I’m pretty much quiet the entire service. Although, I’ll say this, my singing voice is pretty loud even without the microphone. My musician friends nicknamed me Pipes McGee. I don’t know why they nicknamed me that, but hey, I can sing loud. My point is that I still use my gifts to serve in the church. My husband, who is the pastor, makes all decisions regarding the music ministry and everything goes through him. He’s the Leader, not me.

I’ll say this for all the women who, like me at one time, have taken those passages of scripture out of context, been willfully ignorant, refusing to acknowledge the truth, I’d rather be in submission to Christ than to have my own way. A woman in submission to Christ in her God given role is more effective in ministry than a woman in sin and rebellion. I encourage you to really search this out. Galatians 3:28 is about salvation for the Jew, the Greek, the slave, the free, for men, and for women. It is not a blanket verse to mean any gender is qualified to Pastor and hold authority over men. Actually, nowhere in that passage does it mention Pastors at all. Instead, it is a wonderful passage about Salvation to all despite their birth, their heritage, or their gender. That’s freedom right there! I pray that you’ll bow your knee to Christ in submission and repent like I did. It’s never easy acknowledging your sin and turning from it, but He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Amen!