On this weblog, I have posted several times on my concern that the evangelical church, on a whole, seems to be losing its moorings on central issues such as God’s design for men and women. Some churches move towards egalitarian positions on matters such as women in leadership in the name of cultural progress, following arguments such as those developed by William J. Webb. Others, such as City Church in San Francisco, CA, are moved more by more traditional evangelical feminist arguments. An example of an articulate scholar of this persuasion is Dr. Ben Witherington.
Wayne Grudem, whom many regard as today’s foremost complementarian scholar, responds to Webb’s trajectory argument in Appendix 5 of his outstanding tome, Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth. He responds to Witherington’s reading of I Timothy 2 in chapter 8 of the same tome.
Another hot-button issue related to gender and the church is whether (and to what degree) there is a connection between evangelical feminism and liberalism. In chapter 13 of this same Grudem volume, the correlation between evangelical feminism and theological liberalism is explored. There is a disturbing trend between denominations that move toward egalitarian perspectives on the ordination of women and those that reinterpret “headship” in Ephesians 5 to make the husband-wife submission Paul is discussing entirely symmetrical (meaning there is no real sense in which the husband has primary leadership responsibility in his home). Further, it seems that egalitarian churches have been more likely to abandon the historic position of biblical inerrancy. These churches also exhibit a trend toward the denial of anything being uniquely masculine. Next, there is a tendency to calling God Father or Mother. (For example, we’ve seen the PC(USA) discuss alternate titles for the Persons of the Trinity.) The final step seems to be the approval of homosexuality. Grudem cites not only the PC(USA) but also the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America and the Christian Reformed Church (which many still believe to be largely evangelical). Again, it is not being suggested that there are no evangelicals in these denominations. But the denominational trends are certainly important and disturbing, as it puts remaining evangelicals in a collision course with their own leadership.
Much has happened since 2004 when Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth was published. Wayne Grudem has now further developed his insightful commentary on this important subject in a new book entitled Evangelical Feminism: A New Path to Liberalism? The book is available in just a month from Crossway, and can already be pre-ordered.
Also on this topic, Roger Overton and Amy Hall of the A-team are blogging through Wayne Grudem’s Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth every Friday (about a chapter at a time).