We are home.

This weekend, a Christian leader at a conference, recorded and publicized, told another Christian leader to “Go Home” in large part because she is a woman.   

This behavior, demonstrated by the highest levels of respected teachers within the faith, is RAMPANT. Taking pot shots at other believers over disagreements and minor doctrinal issues has become a popular past time of those who claim to be faithful.   Wake up!  We cannot afford to send ANYBODY home.  We need every single faithful spirit-filled believer out on the front lines proclaiming the gospel so that MANY will come to know Christ.  

While I could write an entire blog about how/why God calls women into ministry, and that is an important issue, it is the subtext of this blog and not the main focus.  A few thoughts to ponder on your own: 

1.    Nothing in the flesh qualifies anyone to be a teacher or servant leader (which btw is the one of the only words used to describe pastors, Greek: Diakonos, in the New Testament and is also used to describe Phoebe) 

  

2.    Only the indwelling of God’s Holy Spirit gives any of us the ability to do anything worthy or worthwhile.  Not our maleness or femaleness.  

3.    Galatians 3:27-29 ESV   ^"For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slavenor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise." 

There is a study here on heirs and how property was passed from father to son in Israel.  Study how women were heirs -Old Testament – daughters given a portion of the land of Israel – and how they were not typically heirs.  Once you understand the custom Paul is describing, you begin to understand the weight of him saying that there are no longer male and female – but both are joint heirs with Christ. 

I've seen the hashtag #notgoinghome a few times since Monday in reference to the comments made - but perhaps a better one would have been #WeAreHome!

4.    There is a great video by Ravi Zacarias that also addresses the idea that women are somehow less, second class citizens in God’s eyes.  https://youtu.be/MD3CsFfLxlo  

But let’s just push pause on the whole “Can women teach?” question.  Can we just talk about the make-up of our churches these days? 

In a church – let’s say there are 100 adults.  Of the 100 adults 60 are women, 40 are men.  34 of the men are married to 34 of the women.  

Now consider children. Each married couple has 2 – so 68 more congregants, but a large portion of the additional 20 women who attend are either married to a partner who will not attend church or are single mothers. Fully 18 have children – so that’s another 36 congregants.  

Our church is shaping up nicely with 100 adults and 104 children.  – that’s an above average sized congregation of 204 people.  (The average church serves just 184!) 

Now with 40 men to serve the congregation – this little flock should be doing really well – but let’s look at those 40 men

68% are watching pornography – and they are watching it regularly.  Engaging in a sexual sin that totally disqualifies them from church leadership.  Shockingly, there is a 50/50 chance the pastor is also hooked on porn. 

Between 7- 10% of those men are involved in some sort of domestic or sexual violence. (that’s WITHIN the church, not a general population statistic) 30% of murdered women in Georgia, who were victims of domestic violence, had strong connections to their local church! 

Between 10-15% of parishioners have a serious issue with alcoholism or drug abuse  (men and women) 

Even if we say that all of these things are co-occurring, we decrease from 40 men who could serve down to about 12 who could serve.  Yet, if these things occur independently , and at the highest possible rates, we are down to a mere 2-3 men who are qualified to serve in the local church.  

Taking all of this into account -we should not be surprised that 38% of all marriages within the church are ending in divorce.  (BTW that is one of the lowest stats I could find, others place it closer to 50% and still others cite cohabitation as a reason it is not higher)

So how is our church shaping up?

40 men:

27 need significant male accountability and recovery focused programs.

65 women: 

25 have severe marital struggles, likely something to do with abuse and addiction. 

18 are single mothers or married to an unbeliever and need significant support

104 children:

Nursery and preschool programming during services is fairly typical

Sunday School, VBS, Awana and teen programs would be highly beneficial for these children

50 – 60 are growing up in a home with some sort of addiction

36 are growing up in a home that has only one parent or only one faith focused parent

AND:

Some congregants are older shut ins, they need help with basic things like mowing the grass and getting to the grocery. 

Some congregants are severely ill, in the hospital, and need a visit. 

Some are pregnant or have had a recent birth in the family and need help. 

Some have experienced a recent loss of a loved one and need comfort. 

Not to mention the overall State of the Church report released by Barna (https://www.barna.com/research/state-church-2016/) which reports that fully 56% of “chistians” state they have no responsibility to share the gospel.  

Considering all of this, is it any wonder why God is calling faithful women to serve him?   At the very least, the wives of faithful men need to active in serving the congregation!

And I come to the point – and perhaps it is a bit belabored and long winded and too full of facts and figures, but please hear me.  There is so much work to be done.  For the people in the back who still think this is about women teaching or some theological debate – THERE IS SO MUCH WORK TO BE DONE. 

Can we please stop taking cheap shots at each other and just be co-laborers in the kingdom?  

Isn’t there more than enough to keep every single one of us busy.  Isn’t there enough hurt and heartache and brokenness without trying to tear down good faithful ministry leaders? Have you not seen enough suffering and hurting people that you can stop finding fault with every ministry and person in ministry over something as foolish as whether or not they were born male or female and maybe instead spend your time trying to win souls?  Isn’t there enough here to keep the faithful busy for quite some time? I think there is. 

Blessings, 

Amanda

References:
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/04/06/christian-women-in-the-u-s-are-more-religious-than-their-male-counterparts/

https://conquerseries.com/why-68-percent-of-christian-men-watch-porn/

https://www.ministrymagazine.org/archive/1988/11/alcoholism-what-pastors-can-do

https://lifewayresearch.com/2018/09/18/pastors-more-likely-to-address-domestic-violence-still-lack-training/

https://rts.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/201106-Saul-Steven.pdf

http://www.soc.duke.edu/natcong/Docs/NCSIII_report_final.pdf

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https://www.focusonthefamily.com/marriage/divorce-rate-in-the-church-as-high-as-the-world/

Each child is vastly different

My boys were little and playing in the living room.  They were small enough to climb up and jump off the arm of the couch.  One grabbed a cape and leapt "I'm Batman" he cried.  Another jumped and said "I'm little red riding hood."  We still laugh about that to this day, and in his defense it was a red cape, but this story illustrates just how different two kids can be! I began realizing just how different they each were as we began homeschooling!

My youngest had a speech delay and dysgraphia.  He literally could not do the work necessary to learn to read. For this child we had to find some outside help in the form of speech therapies, glasses, tutoring and testing.  He would become very frustrated with himself if he couldn't complete things as quickly as his older brothers.  This would lead to melt downs and crying because he literally could not do what we were asking of him.   As a young homeschooling mom, I ended up sending him back to the public school for a year because they offered lots of "free" therapy for him and I felt completely ill equipped to teach him.  After a year, he still could not read and his speech had not improved.  I brought him back home and accompanied him to  a local speech therapist and tutor.  By attending his sessions with him, I learned how to help him correct his speech and how to better tutor him myself.  This one on one time with mom and professional helpers greatly aided him and he eventually grew out of his speech and reading/writing issues.   The methodology was different, but the foundation was the same.  We focused on math, reading and writing while doing fun things at our local co-op to support casual science and history learning.

My middle son loved school work.  I could hand him a workbook and he would finish the assignment and then work ahead until he lost interest.  We focused on the big three - math, reading and writing, but by February of the school year he had completed an entire years worth of curriculum.  I frantically called my homeschooling friend and asked what to do.  She suggested the library and allowing him to focus on "delight directed learning."  Delight directed learning is allowing the student to choose the topics they will learn about.  So off to the library we went and found ourselves in the children's non-fiction section.  He carefully selected some books after expressing his absolute delight that I would teach him about anything he wanted.  First we studied Native Americans... we checked out 30 -40 books and over the next month he devoured them learning all kinds of interesting things.  I even found him playing with his new imaginary best friend, Squanto.  The next month we learned all about sea life, crustaceans to dolphins, the Mariana Trench to the coral reef.  Then we learned all about Shakespeare and he even participated in a local community theater children's production.

My oldest son... I love him.  He is grown now and turned out OK, but goodness sakes there were days I thought I was going to lose my mind!   He didn't do his school work, not because he wasn't able, not because he needed a love of learning, but because he was a very strong willed child who did not want to, period. We tried diet changes, counseling, tutors, unit studies, delight directed learning, therapy, trainings for me, co-ops - you name it... nothing worked. Public school didn't work either - he was just as disobedient and unruly there.

You know what worked? Good old fashioned, hard core, consistent structure and discipline. Each day we had a schedule and we stuck to it -up at 7am, school by 8am, lunch at noon and afternoons outside playing, not on a screen, or inside playing with toys if the weather was bad. The weeks work was written on a whiteboard that he could see and read. We only did Math and Reading at this age - all science and history was field trips and fun stuff at a co-op. The morning was divided into 30 minute sections, for each 30 minutes that he worked and didn't throw a fit he got 5 minutes of screen time. (so the most you could earn was 40 minutes a day)  We, mom and dad together, sat down and explained the rules.

It took about 6 months to get him into this routine, but I had to be on it every single day. Always have things written on the board, always keeping the minutes tracked, always keeping us on schedule, and keeping my cool even when he was melting down. If he did melt down he went to his room to regain control, this usually took 10 - 20 minutes so he lost the opportunity for those 5 minutes of screen time. There were days he earned no screen time, but most days he earned most of it, and some days he earned all of it. After 6 months it was only occasionally that he wouldn't earn all of his screen time - maybe once every few weeks. Then after another year - he almost always earned it all. This was the only thing that worked for him.

The point is - there is no one right way to homeschool children, they each need something a little bit different and as a homeschooling parent you have the ability to custom fit your student's education to exactly what is best for them.   Even within the same family, what works well for one child may not work well for the others.  Flexibility, grace (including with yourself) and persistence were a few of the keys that unlocked a love of learning in my children.  Don't be afraid to ask for help, change up your schedule, or even look for parenting classes and trainings to help you on this journey.  They surely helped me to educate three very different boys.

Blessings,
Amanda