{"id":257,"date":"2012-07-10T13:57:17","date_gmt":"2012-07-10T17:57:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/?p=257"},"modified":"2019-03-24T07:17:25","modified_gmt":"2019-03-24T11:17:25","slug":"i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/","title":{"rendered":"I Do Not Wish We Had Women’s Ordination"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back in June, Rev. Matthew Harrison, president of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod, had a Q&A session<\/a> at the Northwest district convention.\u00a0 One of the questions (starting at 34:50)\u00a0 was how he would explain the LCMS’ refusal to ordain women as pastors to a daughter and whether we would one-day see women’s ordination in the LCMS.\u00a0 His response centered around three main points.\u00a0 1) He wishes women could be ordained, 2) but an honest reading of scripture prohibits it, and 3) in order to address the broader call to ordain women, we should work hard to put as many women as possible in non-pastoral offices (which he has personally done).<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, I don’t think this is a particularly good answer.\u00a0 I mean this with all due respect to President Harrison; though I do not know him, he is very well-respected by a great many people I respect.\u00a0 Nevertheless, the answer he gave was, in my opinion, a poor answer I’ve heard elsewhere, and I think it needs to be discouraged.\u00a0 As such, my purpose in writing is not to call into question President Harrison himself or even his views, but simply his response as it was delivered.<\/p>\n

There’s a big problem with simply saying “I would very much prefer that we did have women’s ordination… but I can’t get away from the text” and then “the response to women pastors is… to open up [women’s service in the church] to give women every possible opportunity to serve.”\u00a0 It reminds me of a husband saying “I really wish I could have a few mistresses on the side, but the Bible doesn’t let me, so I just want to surround myself with attractive women and come as close to having an affair as possible without taking my clothes off.\u00a0 I’ll “harmlessly” flirt with women, have a roving eye, and view whatever extent of pornography I can rationalize with my look-but-don’t-touch attitude (from Victoria’s Secret catalog to Playboy to strip clubs, etc), but I won’t actually have an affair because the Bible says that’s wrong.<\/p>\n

Now President Harrison’s response does have good points and could indicate other unspoken good points behind the statement.\u00a0 For one thing, “I want women’s ordination but God’s word forbids it” is much<\/strong> better than “I want women’s ordination, so I’ll twist God’s word until it agrees with what I know is right.”\u00a0 That it is against God’s word is the<\/strong> reason to oppose it.\u00a0 It’s also important to remember the human tendency to fall into error by overreacting against another error.\u00a0 Because of that, I believe it is indeed possible to encourage the women’s ordination crowd by treating women badly.\u00a0 They then overreact to the problem and think the only way they can “save” women from the Church is by rebelling against God and ordaining them.\u00a0 Inasmuch as President Harrison sought to communicate that in his comments, I’m completely on board.\u00a0 Likewise, we must remember that our sinful desires are legitimate desires that have been corrupted.\u00a0 When a husband lusts after other women, the problem isn’t that he shouldn’t desire sex, it is that his desire has been twisted by sin.\u00a0 In the same way, it’s entirely legitimate for women to desire to serve God’s people or to want them well-pastored, and that desire should be encouraged.\u00a0 The problem is when sin twists that desire towards what God has not given us.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, with all that said, attempting to half-satisfy sinful cravings does not make the cravings go away–it only whets our appetite.\u00a0 It’s not as though a man who wants an affair is going to be completely satisfied with flirting, or being near attractive women, or making a habit of glancing down blouses.\u00a0 None of these things are the sexual fulfillment he’s seeking.\u00a0 As a result, the more he gets into the habit of trying to satisfy his desires in small ways, the more he is going to look for additional small ways.\u00a0 The satisfaction will never be met, and the quest will continue.\u00a0 Even small dalliances add up to affairs after awhile.\u00a0 Trying to look but not touch just sets him up for a procession of failures that will tempt him to look harder until his eyes are at their limit and he will need to use other members to start getting closer still.\u00a0 There’s a reason Bill Clinton found himself publicly making what everyone else recognized as a ludicrous claim that oral sex doesn’t really count as adultery.\u00a0 This doesn’t just happen overnight.\u00a0 In the same way, trying to get women as close as possible to the pastoral office by putting them in as many offices as possible without actually ordaining them is never going to satisfy those who want women to be ordained.\u00a0 No matter how appealing those offices might be, it is not ordination.\u00a0 Worse yet, after years of such practice, we will all be in the habit of working to get them ever closer–the next step will always be easier.\u00a0 \u00a0 All we’ll end up with is pulpits ever more frequently occupied by laity until the only distinction left is a job title–and even that distinction will pass away as people realize that job titles make no real difference anyway.<\/p>\n

But there is a better way:\u00a0 God is good.\u00a0 He loves us enough to have died for us.\u00a0 We can therefore be sure that when God tells us that he does not call women to be pastors and does not allow His Church to help women pretend otherwise, we can be confident that he is not doing women (or anybody) an injustice.\u00a0 When we find ourselves thinking and saying “I wish we could have women’s ordination, but the text doesn’t allow it” that highlights a sinfulness of our own which needs to be repented.\u00a0 Publicly wishing we could have something God has explicitly forbidden in any context other than a confession is not a good apologetic because it is fundamentally sinful.\u00a0 Furthermore, it harms our neighbors because it reinforces others who have confidence in those same sinful desires.\u00a0 Just as a man commits adultery in his heart when he looks at a woman lustfully, we commit heresy in our hearts when we desire women’s ordination.\u00a0 Like lust, this desire is something to be repented of rather than indulged in a piecemeal fashion.<\/p>\n

Rather than whetting our sinful appetites in a misguided attempt to hold them at bay, I believe a better solution is to explore and discover how God is being loving towards us by forbidding women from becoming pastors–to teach our people why we should be glad <\/em>that God does not call women in such a way.\u00a0 It’s easy to complain, but it’s time for us to take on the more challenging task of finding the good in what God has gifted to us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back in June, Rev. Matthew Harrison, president of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod, had a Q&A session at the Northwest district convention.\u00a0 One of the questions (starting at 34:50)\u00a0 was how he would explain the LCMS’ refusal to ordain women as … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34,9],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nI Do Not Wish We Had Women's Ordination - The 96th Thesis<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"I Do Not Wish We Had Women's Ordination - The 96th Thesis\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Back in June, Rev. Matthew Harrison, president of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod, had a Q&A session at the Northwest district convention.\u00a0 One of the questions (starting at 34:50)\u00a0 was how he would explain the LCMS’ refusal to ordain women as … Continue reading →\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The 96th Thesis\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-07-10T17:57:17+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2019-03-24T11:17:25+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Matt\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@matt_e_cochran\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@matt_e_cochran\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Matt\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Matt\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/026b49396f19b6940e8bb4a68d94b5fa\"},\"headline\":\"I Do Not Wish We Had Women’s Ordination\",\"datePublished\":\"2012-07-10T17:57:17+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-03-24T11:17:25+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/\"},\"wordCount\":1137,\"commentCount\":2,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/026b49396f19b6940e8bb4a68d94b5fa\"},\"articleSection\":[\"Feminism\",\"Lutheranism\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/\",\"name\":\"I Do Not Wish We Had Women's Ordination - The 96th Thesis\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2012-07-10T17:57:17+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-03-24T11:17:25+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/i-do-not-wish-we-had-womens-ordination\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"I Do Not Wish We Had Women’s Ordination\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/matthewcochran.net\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"The 96th Thesis\",\"description\":\"The Devil Never Sleeps; 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