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Erving the Lord JUNE, 1990 Women erving The Lord "Half of my ancestors were women..." PAGE 162 Proverbs 31: Idealism, Realism and Grace PAGE 164 Women's Privileges and Prohibitions PAGES 169 & 182 Women in the Early Church, and Missionaries through the centuries PAGES 173 & 176 Songs amid Sufferings: Frances Havergal PAGE 178 S.O.S. from Honduras PAGE 185 Hymns by Frances Havergal LIKE A RIVER GLORIOUS Like a river glorious is God's perfect peace, Over all victorious in its bright increase; Perfect, yet it floweth fuller every day, Perfect, yet it groweth deeper all the way. Hidden in the hollow of His blessed hand, Never foe can follow, never traitor stand; Not a surge of worry, not a shade of care, Not a blast of hurry touch the Spirit there. Every joy or trial falleth from above, Traced upon our dial by the Sun of Love. We may trust Him fully, all for us to do; They who trust Him wholly find Him wholly true. Stayed upon Jehovah, hearts are fully blest; Finding, as lie promised, perfect peace and rest. THOU ART COMING, O MY SAVIOUR Thou art coming, O my Saviour, Thou art coming, O my King; In Thy beauty all resplendent, In Thy glory all transcendent- Well may we rejoice and sing. Coming! in the opening east Herald brightness slowly swells; Coming! O my glorious Priest, Hear we not Thy golden bells? Thou art coming, Thou art coming; We shall meet Thee on Thy way; Wc shall see Thee, we shall know Thee, We shall bless Thee, we shall show Thee All our hearts could never say. What an anthem that will be, Ringing out our love to Thee; Pouring out our rapture sweet At Thine own all-glorious feet. O the joy to see Thee reigning, Thee, my own beloved Lord! Every tongue Thy name confessing; Worship, honor, glory, blessing Brought to Thee with glad accord. Thee, my Master and my Friend, Vindicated and enthroned; Unto earth's remotest end Glorified, adored and owned. THE WORD AND WORK 'Declare the whole counsel of GocT Alex V. Wilson, Editor The Word andl Work (USPS 691-460) is published monthly except December under the auspices of the Portland Ave. Church of Christ, Inc., Louisville, Ky. Subscription: $0.00 per year; bundles of 10 or more to one address = $5.50 per subscription. Address correspondence to Word and Work, 2518 Portland Avenue, Louisville, KY 40212. Second class postage paid at Louisville, Ky. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Word and Work, 2518 Portland Ave., Louisville, KY J10212. Vol. LXXXIV JUNE, 1990 No. 6 In This Issue Theme: WOMEN SERVING THE LORD Editorial - Alex V. Wilson - - - - - - - - 162 Who Can Find a Virtuous Woman? — Daniel Sheard - - 164 Women in the Assembly of the Saints — Gordon Linscott - 169 The Position and Work of Women in Church Meetings — S i i m u e l A l e x a n d e r 1 6 9 Women in the Early Church —Jan Rake ----- 173 Heroines: of Faith: Some Great Women Missionaries - R u t h W o o d W i l s o n - - - 1 7 6 Frances Havergal, Suffering Singer — Warren W. Wiersbe - 178 Questior s Asked of Us — Carl Kitzmiller 182 "Of Veils and Virgins" —Everett Ferguson 184 V O I C E S f r o l n t h e F I E L D S - - - - 1 8 5 Hosea, The Heart and Holiness of God—"Unconscious Decay o f a N a t i o n " — E . E . L y o n - - - . 1 8 7 Mission to C liina — from Open Doors with Brother Andrew - - 190 N E W S A N D . N O T E S - - . - - - 1 9 1 161 THEME: TV omen S&witty t&e Jdond Alex V. Wilson Every now and then a friend of mine will quip, "Since half my ancestors were women, I have the right to change my mind once in a while." Ladies, please excuse the male chauvinist oink at the end of that statement; it's the first part I want to think about. Yes, half of our ancestors were women. And women outnumber men in the world's population. And they outnumber men in almost every church I've ever known about. For these and many other reasons, women are important. So this month's theme centers on women, specifically our sisters in God's family. As Usual, Avoid the Extremes This subject arouses strong reactions, doesn't it? At one end of the spectrum, ultra-feminists shriek that women should be allowed to do everything that men can do in the church. "Anything you can do, I can do better," seems to be their attitude. They demand that they be appointed elders and share equally in governing the congregations. They insist that women are just as eligible as men to teach God's word to the whole church as "pulpit ministers." Times have changed and so must we, they say. On the other hand, many Christians who think they uphold Biblical teachings about women actually just enforce human traditions. They want to limit women to tending the nursery, cooking the fellowship dinners, and teaching Sunday school classes —but nothing more. Everything else is taboo. I found myself in an unexpected situation one time when we were missionaries in Manila. The church had designated one Sunday morning as a. youth emphasis day. The plan called for our most experienced young man to present the sermon, another young brother to lead at the Lord's Supper, and others to lead the singing, the prayers, etc. On Friday our youth leader told me, "The girls are asking why we call it Youth Day if only the boys get to do anything? They've requested that they be allowed to pass the Lord's Supper emblems and collect the offering during that service." "Oh no," I cringed inwardly, "the radical women's liberation movement has pen etrated our churchl" I squirmed and stammered, feeling I should say no but realizing the request came from the whole group, not just one or two, and that they would want reasons if we turned them down. But I didn't know what scripture to quote at that moment. So I finally promised to discuss the matter with other leaders and give the answer the next day. To our surprise, the more we reflected on the Bibles teachings, the smaller our objections grew. Would passing the Lord's Supper be teaching or having authority over a man? (1 Tim. 2). Obviously not. Would it violate-remaining "silent in the churches"? (1 Cor. 14) 162 No way. Were there any other Bible commands or principles that would prohibit women from assisting in the Communion or the offering? Ncne we could discover. The young ladies would be serving the otaer believers, that's all. Then why should we turn down the request? Well, er, uh, because it just didn't seem right. We'd never done it that way before, and it might rock the boat. In other words, it was human tradition pure and simple that was influencing us. What we had considered Biblical turned out to be merely custom ary. But custom and human tradition are not sufficient bases for church decisions. So we bi: the bullet and said yes to the young ladies. Guess who objected the 1 audest afterward? Two older women! But their protests were based pi 1 uncomfortable feelings, not Biblical teaching. We tried to point out the difference to them. Principles and Examples from Gods Word Now let':: notice the example of our Lord Jesus. In several ways He refused to comply with first century Judaism's prejudices. He mixed freely with women, talked with them in public and even per mitted them :o accompany Him on His travels, as part of His band of disciples (John 4; 11; Luke 8; etc.). In all this He was a non-tradi tionalist and non-conformist, which should surely make us squirm and wriggle if our decisions are based only on 'We've never done it that way before." Yet despite all the above, Jesus never chose a woman to be one of the twelve apostles, the leaders of His new people. Every one was a man! And when the apostolic churches chose elders/overseers, by divinely inspired command they chose men and men only (Tit. 1:5-6; 1 Tim. 3:1-2). These precedents, among other things, seem to demolish the arguments of the ultra-feminists. Yet some of our common attitudes and practices today may not be entirely Biblical either. We usually think of evangelism, for example, as something to be done by men, especially our preacher" inside the walls of a church building. THREE GREAT ERRORS are mentioned in that one sentence! Paul mentions two women who "labored side by side with le in the gospel" or "worked hard with me to spread the gospel" (P 4:3). There's a good precedent. Let's ponder it for awhile Realizin that sharing God's good news is mainly to be done apart from Meetings held to edify Christians, why shouldn't women as well as men proclaim Christ as Savior, and tell their testimony in home meetings, ov;r the radio, at luncheons, in public lectures, at chapel programs at Christian: camps and maybe even schools, etc.? Yes, I mean to mixud audiences! But I am not talking about what we call the sermons in church meetings. Repeat: I am not advocating women sermonizing "in the churches..
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