Wednesday, October 18, 2006

is it a 'gospel' issue?

Picking up on David's comment in the previous post, I thought I would ask the question: Is it a gospel issue when women preach/teach/lead biblestudy in a mixed setting?

By this I mean, is a woman sinning when she teaches a man?

I have heard it taught that it is a sin. That in fact it is sin in the same way that Eve sinned in the garden, ursurping the God-given order of creation.
I feel the tension. The jury is out in my decision making, but surely if it is a sin, then it is a gospel issue.

And what do we mean by gospel issue anyway?!

And if it is a gospel issue, how does that work itself out? Can a woman lead a service, read the bible in church or even pray in church? what about leading singing in church, is that teaching? and what about youth ministry?

2 comments:

byron smith said...

Why does sin = 'gospel issue'? I would have thought that a gospel issue was something worth dying for, something without which one is no longer a Christian. Something like the resurrection, the trinity, the incarnation. Aren't there a huge range of mistakes where one can be even sinfully wrong and yet this not threaten the gospel (except in an indirect way that all falsehood threatens all truth)?

-bw said...

Good point Byron, and I have done some more thinking on this since then.
I suppose when people are asking whether it is a 'gospel-issue' they are being cautioned not to continue living a life of sin.

If someone deliberately lives a life of sin, does that threaten their salvation and as such it is a gospel issue?