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Dr. Denny Wayman

dwayman@fmcsb.org

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THIS ONLINE DISCUSSION IS PROVIDED BY THE STUDY COMMISSION ON DOCTRINE – SCOD. In the life of the church there are three levels of authoritative documents. Within the Free Methodist Church we define the three levels in this way: First Level is the BOOK OF DISCIPLINE: Official documents approved by the delegates at the General Conference. Second Level is the STUDY COMMISSION ON DOCTRINE: Guidance provided to the church by those assigned the task. These are not personal opinions, but are vetted by scholars who have various expertise. Though not binding on the church, they are meant to be helpful scholarly works. Third Level is this FREE METHODIST CONVERSATIONS. This online discussion is where various individuals express their own opinions about a variety of issues. These are not authoritative, nor are they necessarily meant as guidance, but God may use them to do so. There are SCOD documents on this site and the members of the SCOD will be participants. We are inviting the entire church to join the discussion. Our intention is not to limit discussion but to elevate it by assuring that God’s love and respect is always expressed. We will therefore post those comments which further our mutual understanding and assure that every person is being treated with dignity even when disagreement is being voiced. Specifically: 1. The SCOD encourages respectful, intelligent and impassioned discussion and debate. 2. The SCOD encourages a Wesleyan method of looking at the topic from a Scriptural perspective as well as that of Reason, Tradition and Experience. We recognize the Revelation of God in Scripture is our primary source of truth, with Reason, Tradition and Experience serving as supportive resources. 3. Any personal attack will keep the entire comment from being posted. This includes not only attacking others within this SCOD conversation but anyone within the larger secular or Christian world. 4. Any libelous, defamatory, profane, vulgar, threatening, harassing abusive, hateful, racially or ethnically objectionable comments will not be posted. 5. Any invasion of another’s privacy or any post that emulates or pretends to be someone else will not be posted. 6. This online conversation is not to be used to solicit or advertise personal blogs. 12. The SCOD, in our sole discretion, retains the right to remove individual posts or to revoke the access privileges of anyone who we believe has violated any of these standards. For more informal conversations with Free Methodists: LIGHT AND LIFE CONVERSATIONS – Facebook page LIGHT AND LIFE MAGAZINE – Facebook page – Online Issues FM RADIO – Facebook page or iTune episodes If there are any questions contact our moderator, Dr. Denny Wayman: dwayman@fmcsb.org.

Browse category by WOMEN IN LEADERSHIP

WOMEN IN THE EARLY CHURCH

April 15, 2017 By
The Neglected History of Women in the Early Church A number of prominent leaders, scholars, and benefactors of the early church were women and—despite neglect by many modern historians—the diligent researcher can still uncover a rich history.

By Catherine Kroeger

 

Women were the last disciples at the cross and the first at the empty tomb. they remained integral to the work of the church in its early centuries. Catherine Kroeger scours historical data to compile an impressive collection of stories about noteworthy women in the early church.

One of the best-kept secrets in Christianity is the enormous role that women played in the early church.

Though they leave much unsaid, still, both Christian and secular writers of the time attest many times to the significant involvement of women in the early growth of Christianity.

Celsus, a 2nd-century detractor of the faith, once taunted that the church attracted only “the silly and the mean and the stupid, with women and children.” His contemporary, Bishop Cyprian of Carthage, acknowledged in his Testimonia that “Christian maidens were very numerous” and that it was difficult to find Christian husbands for all of them. These comments give us a picture of a church disproportionately populated by women.

Why? One reason might have been the practice of exposing unwanted female infants—abandoning them to certain death. Christians, of course, repudiated this practice, and thus had more living females.

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RUTH IS NOT A ROMANCE TALE

April 9, 2017 By

In a fascinating article at MISSIO ALIANCE  the author explores how a male pastor exhibits a clear misunderstanding of the purpose and focus of the biblical book of Ruth.  It is written by Carolyn Custis James, the author of THE GOSPEL OF RUTH.  The multilayered value of this article includes the fact that male patriarchal society turns a woman’s faith journey into a romance novel using a Cinderella hermeneutic.  Misunderstanding both the motivation and cultural setting, pastors can easily miss a great opportunity to teach the true word of God.  As Carolyn James says it:  “Driscoll needs to realize that the Bible is not a Disney movie, but an earthshaking existential confrontation with the deepest issues of life in a fallen world and of the hope that is Jesus.”

in part she writes:

…Abandoning Cinderella for a Better Love Story

Within the patriarchal culture, a woman’s chief contribution in life was to produce sons for her husband. Women in the Bible are desperate for sons. None of them are begging God for daughters. Under patriarchy, a woman’s value is gauged by counting her sons. Sons are essential for family survival. The fate the ancients feared most was for a man to die without a male heir to perpetuate the family for another generation.

So when a post-menopausal Naomi loses her husband and both her sons, she plummets from the status of an honored mother of two sons to a zero.

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GENDER WAGE GAP

April 6, 2017 By dwayman

Due to our FMC value of treating men and women with equality, some of this generalized study of the pay gap may not apply.  However, there is much that does.  Here is the conclusion of the article:

“Finding church-wide solutions

In that vein, Simmons encourages churches to intentionally include women in those committees and councils and denominational efforts. “If they have a diaconate, another board, a finance board, board of elders—make sure that there are women who are part of the human resource effort,” she says. “Make sure that there are women there who can make the case: not women who will agree with the men, but women who will make the case. . . . You don’t see enough women in those positions that determine salaries and bonuses and work hours and how you get ordained. You don’t see women in those positions. And until that changes, much of this will never change.”

According to Simmons, another key step in the path to change concerns awareness and discussion among male clergy and staff—not just female. “You have to do both,” she says. “You have to talk to women, but you certainly have to talk to men.”

In her interactions with male pastors, Simmons has “help[ed] them understand what is just, what is fair, and—when their budget increases—who to take care of first, because these are the people who are doing the heavy lifting.”

Ultimately, however, “until women are willing to join the fight for their own liberation and proper pay,

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JUNIA PROJECT

March 31, 2017 By

The Junia Project is led by two Free Methodist women:  Gail Wallace and Kate Nunnelly.  It is a resource for great articles on Women in Leadership.  You can find their website here.

Here is their greeting:

ABOUT THE JUNIA PROJECT
Welcome, and thanks for dropping in!

We are a volunteer community of women and men advocating for the inclusion of women in leadership in the Christian church and for mutuality in marriage.

We believe that when interpreted correctly, the Bible teaches that both men and women are called to serve at all levels of the Church, and that leadership should be based primarily on gifting and not on gender.

 

 

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WOMEN’S SERVICE IN THE CHURCH:The Biblical Basis

March 28, 2017 By

NT Wright in his article here sums up his exegetical study of Scripture with this conclusion:

“I believe we have seriously misread the relevant passages in the New Testament, no doubt not least through a long process of assumption, tradition, and all kinds of post-biblical and sub-biblical attitudes that have crept in to Christianity. Just as I think we need radically to change our traditional pictures of the afterlife, away from the mediaeval models and back to the biblical ones, so we need radically to change our traditional pictures both of what men and women are and how they relate to one another within the church and indeed of what the Bible says on this subject. I do wonder, sometimes, if those who present radical challenges to Christianity have been all the more eager to make out that the Bible says certain things about women, as an excuse for claiming that Christianity in general is a wicked thing and we ought to abandon it. Of course, there have been plenty of Christians who have given outsiders plenty of chances to make that sort of comment. But perhaps in our generation we have an opportunity to take a large step back in the right direction.”

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WOMEN IN MINISTRY — Some Hermeneutical Reflections

December 20, 2016 By

Introduction

Almost everyone believes and allows women to be in ministry. Even those who will disagree with my views on the matter do, in fact, recognize not only the privilege but duty of women to be in ministry (where would the church be if throughout history women had not served in nearly every form of ministry!) The first question is: what limitations have been paced on the leadership of women in ministry and why? The second question is: are these limitations general and universal or specific and contextual? I will return to these questions at the conclusion of this paper.

How We Treat The Bible

I begin with several assumptions I make about the Bible. First, the Bible is the Word of God and is therefore the final authority for Christian believing and living. The Bible is not so much a single book as it is a library of books — different kinds of literature, written over long periods of time, for different life settings of the people of God. Despite all these differences, however, we believe the Bible is unified in its witness to the one true God and reveals His plan for the world and humanity.

These assumptions are critical to our discussion. Let me explain. It is not enough to find a verse or passage that teaches something and accept that as the only or the most important word on the subject. We must rather seek to get a sense of the flow of Scripture,

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