Featured Should I leave my Baptist church because of woman pastor/elder?

Yes. Absolutely.

It is also important to note that in the NT all elders were appointed.

Now I have pondered the process that of a congregation selected candidates who then underwent some type of doctrinal/leadership questioning as an ordination appointment, or just how that worked for Timothy and Titus.

But,could it be that a new pastor/elder shouldn’t be “elected” to the church as some consider a campaign is waged, but appointed by the men of the church who have thoroughly checked and can embrace the qualifications and leadership.

As such the men set as the ultimate elder body, and are the same group who can with just cause shown of one disqualified dismiss the overseer(s).

 

I know this questions wasn't to me, but I'll bite.

My answer is, "It depends." I am not really a fan of having the church as a whole vote whether to call a pastor or not because I don't really a strong basis for it in Scripture, but I don't have a strong case that it's improper, either.

The church where I am a member has a team of elders who determine who can be installed/ordained as an elder. The model we use is that nominees are presented to the congregation to request prayer for them as well as to give the church the opportunity to present any concerns directly to the elder team, which can then investigate and/or address the concerns. To put a man in a pastoral position who is not already on the elder team, the elders would have to come to unanimous agreement before they would add him to the team and appoint him to that position. Reassignments of responsibilities for existing elders I believe are also handled with unanimous consent, but I'm not 100% sure on that part.

As far as I know, the only time the church has to "vote" is on legal matters of property acquisition, etc.

For property acquisition and other legal matters, I have no issue with a woman voting.

For calling a pastor, I think it's less clear-cut, but if it's a broad-based, congregation-wide vote, I would hope that the vote would be such that individual votes wouldn't make much difference anyway. I would view it more as a matter of measurement of general discernment. It's therefore not as big of a deal, practically speaking, whether or not the vote is men-only or men and women, but I can see both sides.

If we are talking about a smaller group that is deciding, then that group needs to be men only because it is definitely exercising spiritual authority.

Where I think the ground is shakier is on "pastoral search committees." In many churches, the congregation-wide vote is little more than a rubber stamp of what the search committee has already endorsed. I think that it's questionable for the search committee to include women, but I'm not convinced it's definitely wrong. That being said, I think the search committee process itself is massively flawed, so it's hard for me to determine the proper way to do something I don't think is proper anyway.

 

Obliquely, not directly. In a sense voting for a pastor is voting for a man who will be entrusted with spiritual authority. If we are trying to draw a dotted line from our vote to spiritual authority it gets murky. While I am sure there are cases where the husband and wife have dissenting votes, those occasions are probably a minority. Single women or widows in the church would obviously be voting on their own. Again, unless we are talking about the fringe Patriarchy movement, most Baptists would not have a problem with women voting in church business meetings or on a new pastor. Unless I can come up with a direct link between spiritual authority and voting, I will not oppose it.

 

Was it a Baptist church?

 

All the elders were appointed in the NT? The NT seems mostly silent on that issue. We don't have Apostles to appoint elders. Who appoints the elders?

 

Think spiritual authority among we Baptists usually refers to items such a spreach and teaxching the scriptures, and administrating the ordinances.

 

Well said!

 

so, 1689er Benjamin Keach is fringe?


Benjamin Keach: "The Sisters are not to vote in the Church."

in The Glory of a True Church, and Its Discipline Display'd: Wherein a True Gospel-Church Is Described (Keach's treatise on scriptural church government, was reprinted not long ago as part of the 9Marks Ministries' Polity book compiled by Mark Dever!)

 

I'm going to address the theology later, but the pastor is clearly using a high pressure tactic. I encountered those in Charismaticism. If you were me I would run at this point. I think a polite explanation of your theological position and uneasiness with how the pastor handled this would be best.

 

It is on the general order of the church, which includes how women should act in church. As to the point on women exercising gifts, only two things were mentioned: prayer and prophecy. To add to this without clear evidence elsewhere in scripture is to add to Paul the apostles rules, a bad thing.

As to the stuff on 1 Timothy, that gave me a literal headache to read through. They are obfuscating.

I would definitely leave if I were you since the basic principle seems to be that you must trust your elder and teacher to teach and disciple you rightly. This is liberal theological talking points, I should know I was training to be a pastor seven years ago at a liberal seminary. Before flushing 10s of thousands down the toilet to be biblically accurate and a conservative theologian.

 

If you there isn't another church in your area that aligns with truth then I would first try going to your pastor and have him reconcile female elders with Romans or maybe just ask him to lead you in a Bible study in Romans and pray that he recognizes Gods will for wen in the church. But if he refuses then you need to try to find a good church avoid padeobaptist they tend to like sacraments and don't believe in faith alone in Christ alone.

 

Your pastor is a liar. Paul explains his teaching on women being silent and not having authority over men has to do with creation and the fall, not with the culture. Besides, the culture argument is misogynistic and trades on worst stereotypes of women.

Are you talking about v26, "What then, brothers? When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation." Do you see the word "brothers"? Paul is addressing men, not men and women, or at least you can't assume he's addressing both. And v26 is within the context of v35 where Paul says women should keep silent in church. You're being dishonest if you think you can use v26 to trump v35.

Again, Paul's teaching on the position of women has nothing to with culture. But, does Paul's ban on braided hair have to do with culture? Do you assume that some pagan girls had braids and therefor Paul taught that Christians women shouldn't have braids? How does your your argument not strike you as stupid?

"Women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel, with modesty and self-control, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire." Paul doesn't forbid braided hair, gold, pearls, or costly attire. He's making a point about being respectable. Fancy outward ordainment counts as nothing toward character.

[/quote]Well first of all-it can't be that a woman is never to teach (...obviously...) and Timothy was actually taught by women(2 Tim. 3:14-15 and 1:5) (...what?).[/quote]

I'm not going to read any more of your post. When you're pointing to verses about someone's mom having faith as proof that women should be pastors, you remove the last bit of my doubt, I know you know you're full of bull. That's okay. Not all people can accept the word of God. Salvation isn't for everyone.