Church

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Faith at Home, Part 2: The B-I-B-L-E!

I grew up on the Bible. I was in AWANA for 10 years and could quote large swaths of Scripture at one point in my life. I’ve maintained my super church-nerdy party trick of being able to say all the books of the Bible in order… each testament in just one breath.

But in leaving the evangelical church and finding a new home in a mainline denomination, I realized that we mainliners tend to struggle with biblical literacy. 

And I get it. When I started seminary, my kids were 1, 3, and 5 years old. I had already deconstructed my theology to the point that I no longer believed every word of the Bible was inerrant and I no longer claimed to accept a literal interpretation. My new hermeneutic was that that the Bible is true and is an authority, but not that it was historically factual nor the only authority.

photo of child reading holy bible

Photo by nappy on Pexels.com

That presented a problem; I wasn’t sure how to teach about the Bible to my kids, whose brains were not developed enough to consider nuance and abstract concepts like “true but not fact.” I remember in my very first Bible class, full of exasperation, I said, “So what do I tell my kids?!?! How can I teach them these Bible stories as true, if they didn’t historically happen? What do I do?!?!”

And my professor, Dr. Jerry Sumney, gently replied, “You still teach them the stories. They’ll understand more as they get older, but your job isn’t to wait. Teach them Scripture now, and nuance will come later.” 

He was right. Just because I don’t believe that David factually, historically killed Goliath with one small pebble doesn’t mean we can’t learn about facing giants that seem too big to defeat.

I heard it once said (by whom, I can’t remember) that some of these Bible stories are “more-than-true.” They aren’t fairy tales or myths, but they also aren’t historical records of fact. They are more-than-true. They embody the great stories of our faith, our God, and our humanity. 

A few years ago I used Sparkhouse’s Echo the Story with the youth group I was leading, and that’s when I started to wrap my mind around this. These stories that are now in our Bible — and particularly Hebrew Scriptures (what we sometimes call the Old Testament) — were verbally passed down from generation to generation, not recorded for hundreds of years. Imagine a family sitting around a fire: a tired mom and dad from a hard day of labor, kids everywhere, and a loving grandmother who spent each night telling bedtime stories, stories of their people and their God. About giants and towers and a talking snake and a great flood. 

Ever since then, I’ve used adapted prompts from the Echo the Story material every time I approach a text, whether for sermon preparation, personal use, or with my own kids:

What does it teach us about God?
What does it teach us about ourselves, individually?
What does it teach us about humanity?
Why was it important enough to write down? 

In the previous Faith at Home post, I wrote about talking to your kids about congregational worship. But what if we took some of those same ideas and practiced them throughout the week?

When my kids learned to read, we gave them each their own Bible (not story Bible). If they can read chapter books, they can read the Bible! Maybe you could even read together as a family – either out loud in the same room, or follow the same reading plan and have one night set aside each week to talk about what you’ve read (using the questions above as a guide) over dinner. 

That said, the Bible is intimidating. It isn’t a story from start to finish; there are dozens of authors and multiple genres. So where to start?

The Gospels – Mark is the shortest and most action-packed; Luke is my favorite because of his emphasis on women. 

Genesis – Why not start at the beginning? The first 11 chapters or so are particularly interesting and full of well-known stories. 

Look up some other stories you already know and read them straight from Scripture! 1 Samuel 17 tells the story of David and Goliath. The book of Jonah (only 4 chapters) tells the whole story of the great fish. The resurrection of Tabitha/Dorcas is found in Acts 9:32-43. Want to know where to find something? Google it!

Compare the same story in different Gospels. For example, Jesus walking on water is in Matthew 14:22-34, Mark 6:45-53, and John 6:15-21. Compare and contrast how the tellings of the story are different. (For a fun activity, think of a memory in your family, of a vacation or special event. Ask everyone to write the story down without talking about it, then take turns reading them out loud. This helps explain why each author includes different details or might have had a different source about it!)

Reread the Sunday School or sermon Scripture throughout the week. No teacher or pastor can talk about everything in the text, so explore it some more as a family! 

Just for Fun… My favorite story that people have no idea is in the Bible is found in Judges 3:12-30. If you have a kid who loves “bathroom humor,” they’ll love this one…

That last one brings me to a point worth mentioning: The Bible is full of violence and vulgarity. As a parent, I am very intentional with what media my kids consume, and let me tell you, there are things in the Bible that are not G-rated! That’s one of the reasons it’s so important to talk with them about what they’ve read, and read along with them — but don’t use that as a reason to avoid Scripture altogether! As an adult, it can even be interesting to read some of the details that Sunday school material conveniently leaves out! (Read Genesis 9:18-28 and try to remember if you were taught that part of Noah and the ark as a kid…)

We can all experience the love of God through Scripture — about a Teacher who gathered children close, about a Spirit of Comfort who is more powerful than our fears, about how we always have hope.

And those are stories worth hearing, no matter our age. 

 

** My next post will be a list of children’s bibles and translations I recommend. In the meantime, I’ll say that for kids, my favorite translation is the Common English Bible!

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Faith at Home, Part 1: Talking about Worship

In this Faith at Home series, I will be sharing some of the ways Jonathan and I have intentionally parented our kids (currently ages 7, 9, and 11) in a way that centers our Christian faith and faith-based values. My philosophy of pastoring and parenting is “That church would be an integral part of the life of the children, and that children would be an integral part of the life of the church.” Each article will focus on one way we strive to embody that philosophy.

Screen Shot 2019-05-15 at 3.49.12 PMI grew up as a pastor’s kid in a family with ritual Sunday dinner: Once everyone washome from church, we would gather at the table with pot roast, potatoes, biscuits, gravy, and all of our stories from the morning to share. I learned life-long lessons around that table, about the flow of worship, about how to handle unexpected things gone wrong while on the platform, about dynamics of church people and church leadership. I learned that I was a participant in church, not a spectator, even from a young age.

While the ritual in our family looks different, we have similar conversations with our own kids, so it is no surprise that they are actively engaged with worship. As a pastor’s family, we discuss openly the ins-and-outs of church life, particularly around the worship service itself. And, when we visit other churches, we do the same thing: we talk about the service and sermon extensively — the things we appreciate… and the things we don’t. (Lest you think we only critique other sermons, my kids are quite quick to tell me if they disagree with something I’ve said!) This also helps the transition out of children’s church into “big church” (more on that in the future!). 

One of the reasons we do this is because, when our kids grow up and leave the house, we want them to be able to visit a church and have the tools to discern whether it is a good fit, based on more than just whether they “liked” it! We would not send our kids out in the world without teaching them how to operate a stove or a washing machine; we would not expect them to ace college statistics without having fourth-grade math to build on. And yet, sometimes that’s what families seem to expect our kids to do with their faith communities: we hope they’ve absorbed what’s important over the years, but we never really check in to see what’s sinking in and how they experience it. Talking about what happens at church on Sunday morning offers our kids a lens to participate in a faith community throughout their lives. 

How do Jonathan and I talk to our kids about church? Here are some practical conversation-starters in our family, that you can use or adapt to integrate into your own family. It’s never too late to start! And though it might seem awkward at first, the more you return to these questions, the more freely the conversation will flow. I’ve also found that, when the kids know they’ll be talking about it later, they engage with the service as it is happening. 

  • Ask open-ended questions about worship. Instead of asking “Did you like it?,” ask “What was one thing that surprised you?” “Was there anything that confused you or you didn’t understand?” “What did you feel when the pastor said _____?” “What did you feel during the special music/anthem?” “What did you learn or hear about God today?” Then — here is the most important part — really listen to their answers! They might surprise you with some of the things they come up with! **
  • Ask them to tell you their Sunday School or Children’s Church Bible story. There is no better way to learn than to teach, so asking them to re-tell you the story they learned is a fantastic way to cement it in their minds… and to open doors to talk about things they might have misheard or misunderstood (like when one of my kids said they needed to get an idol, because the people in their Bible lesson had idols…) .
  • Ask other questions about the morning. These might be the same questions you’d ask after school or other activities:  “What was your favorite song we sang?” “Who did you talk to or play with today?” “What excites you about next week?”
  • Share your own thoughts and experiences! Kids model what we do. Integrating faith into our families is not one-sided; we never have it all figured out and need to share what we learn! Church is a community, where people of all ages are equally important. You might say something like: “You know, when the pastor said ____ I thought/felt/observed that ____.” “I connected with this sermon because ___ has been going on at work recently, and I could see that situation in a different way.” “I disagreed when the pastor said ____” (yes, that’s okay too!). “During communion I wondered about ___.” “I’ve never thought about ____ in that way until this morning.”
  • Connect your own faith story. For example, if you sang a song that you remember from your childhood, share why that song was meaningful for you. If the sermon text was a Scripture that comforted you in a difficult time, tell your kids about that! Do your kids know why your faith matters to you? This is a natural, wonderful way to talk about it.


What other ideas do you have? What are some of the ways your family discusses and decompresses your Sunday morning worship experiences? Share in the comments! 

 

** The thumbnail photo in this post is a notes-taking sheet for worship services I created – it is suitable for kids but not for kids only! I’m happy to email a .pdf of it to you; leave a message here or email me at revsaranavefisher (at) gmail (dot) com and I’ll pass it along! 

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Joanna’s Story

It’s early in the morning.

Still dark. 

selective focus photography of tree leaves

Photo by Egor Kamelev on Pexels.com

The alarm goes off – she tiptoes around the house, gathering her things, so as to not wake the men and children. 

She pours a cup of coffee, leans against the counter, and closes her eyes, one last time as she prepares herself to face the day.  

It’s early in the morning. 

It’s still dark. 

And there’s work to do. 

She double-checks her basket for the perfumes, spices, and oils she’ll need.

She smiles to herself – she had overheard someone say that when the wise people had visited him after his birth, they had brought similar gifts. 

Her breath catches, as the macabre irony of that thought settles in…

She checks on the kids – still sleeping. She quietly leaves and sets off, toward the tomb. The streets are silent, except some crickets chirping in the distance. She walks carefully so as to not trip over a root or a rock in the road.

As she gets closer, a dread sweeps over her. 

She was hoping it was a dream, that she would wake up and everything would go back to normal, to the way it was supposed to be. 

It’s early in the morning. 

It’s still dark. 

She’s almost there when she meets them on the path: Mary, the other Mary, and some friends of theirs. Women they had met along the way of following Jesus in the past few years. They had been through so much together, and here they were together once more.

Walking in silence, side by side. 

Early in the morning.

While it was still dark. 

Sure, some told them they were foolish. Yesterday – the day after IT happened – their friends at the well had told them they’d be better off washing their hands of that man and moving on with their lives. For a moment, she wondered if they were right. 

Her heart started racing as she got closer. Her eyes welled with tears but she bore down with the grit and resiliency that this group of women all shared. They were ready to do the work. 

She began rehearsing in her mind what needed to be done – they’d need to work together to roll the stone away, then they’d each take turns with the fragrant perfumes. Head to toe. 

She wasn’t sure what would happen after that – they all had chores to do, of course, but she imagined they’d gather at one of their homes for some fresh coffee and figs before they went on with their da——

Her thoughts were interrupted. As they approached the tomb she realized that this was not how it was supposed to be — this was NOT how it was supposed to be – the stone wasn’t there but she knew they were the first ones to arrive!

Her heart raced faster, her mouth ran dry, her palms got sweaty as she entered the tomb and stared.

He wasn’t there. 

There was no body. 

Then she heard someone speak. She turned to see two men sitting there — had they rolled the stone away? —  she looked down in fear. 

“Why do you look for the living among the dead?” they asked. 

Then she remembered his words – those words that didn’t make sense at the time but now she understood.

He is not here – he is not here!

For he is… risen. 

———–

Luke 24:1-12: The Women Find the Empty Tomb

 

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Decoding Discrimination (or: How to Discover What Your Church Really Believes)

I’ve spent my life in church.

I’m a bit of a church nerd, actually. I love business meetings and conferences; ecclesiastical conversations are my FAVORITE conversations; and, well, I use words like “ecclesiastical” on a regular basis (ecclesiastical = churchy stuff). 

I care deeply about church — and I care deeply about churches being honest. Which is why the very-public nature of the Chris Pratt/ Ellen Page/ Hillsong Church conversation lately has deeply disturbed me, though not at all surprised me.

arco + KEVINSee, I often read websites of churches and other Christian organizations, and am keyed in to the coded language that clouds reality. Some churches are very upfront about what they believe – and I really appreciate that, even when I disagree with their conclusions.

But I have a huge problem with churches who hide their theology in the fine print, apparently so those who disagree still fill their pews — and their offering plates. 

If people would leave your church if they read the fine print, then you probably need to rethink your theology, your congregation, or both. 

I’ve heard people say that they think their church doesn’t discriminate because “all are welcome!” — but there is a huge difference between not turning people away at the door, and inviting people into all aspects of church life (from membership to ordination, and everything in between) regardless of their gender, orientation, or identity.  

A friend of mine once served a church that welcomed a lesbian couple with open arms – and because they were so welcoming, that couple invited their friends. Within a few months, there were several queer couples attending worship there, and the congregation was kind and loving to them, never mean or judgmental. Some of the visitors had been hurt at previous churches and were so glad to find a place where they could worship, without being shamed every time they entered the doors. 

Until, of course, that first couple wanted to join the church and teach Sunday School, at which point they were notified by the pastor that the church actually believed they were living in sin because of their unrepentant same-sex relationship, and they were not welcome into membership. All of these queer people then realized that the church that had been “welcoming” to them saw their identity as a sin to overcome, not a part of their wholly, perfectly, created selves. Their straight friends who attended with them never had any idea that the church wasn’t affirming, because, well, they never needed to ask and just assumed, because again, they were all really nice. 

And this reveals the privilege of people who are cisgender and heterosexual. There’s never a *need* to find out, to seek clarity. When the system works for us, we have no need to question it.

I’ve known so many people who are personally affirming — they advocate equal rights and equal protections for everyone… and yet, they go to churches that are not. But what’s sad to me — and what the Hillsong conversation reveals — is that often, churches who hold that leadership is reserved for men, and deny equality to people who are LGBTQ+ — do so with a veneer of acceptance, without really being honest. 

Thankfully, Church Clarity is helpful in discerning where churches stand, but according to their own website, they are backlogged right now – and even then, not every church in the country is on their list. 

So, if you attend a church and you aren’t sure what they really think, let my years of church nerdiness and ability to speak coded church language help. 

First, a caveat. I am not saying that what follows is a test that a church “passes” or “does not pass.” There are reasons why faithful pastors and congregations do not have written policies on inclusion — but since discrimination often masquerades as silence, we cannot let silence be interpreted as affirmation. And, really, that’s the whole point of this list: Because so few churches say explicitly what they believe and practice, we must be more diligent to seek out answers. Maybe you’ll discover that, while your church has never made a statement of inclusion, they are working toward it and actively seeking justice; maybe you’ll discover that while your church seems like they treat everyone equally, no woman has ever stood behind a pulpit. Maybe you’ll discover you’re exactly where you need to be; maybe you won’t. 

Also, I have never known of any church that welcomes gay men into leadership, but not straight women. If you know of one, I’d love to hear about it. And often trendy churches are just as avoidant of their discrimination against women as they are their discrimination against people who are LGBTQ+, so I’m including women into this discernment list. 

Go to your church’s website. Don’t rely on what you think you know about the church, because as we’ve seen time and time again, often the people in the pews have no idea how discriminatory actual policies and theology are. If you can’t find the information on the website, ask the pastor for clarification; don’t assume that because you have a gay couple in the pews, or the pastor just seems really cool, that they treat LGBTQ+ people – and women – equal to straight cis men. 

~ Who are the pastors? Are there any women? Any LGBTQ+ people? Have there been in the past? 

~ Who makes decisions? In many churches, these are elders, deacons, trustees, board members, session members, or something similar. Are there any women? Any LGBTQ+ people? If no, why not? 

~ Do they use heavy masculine language for God? (He/Him/His, Father, etc) I hesitated including this question; there are a lot of reasons faithful Christians use masculine language. However, in my experience, often churches that rely exclusively on masculine language about God and humanity tend to be less inclusive in other ways as well. 

~ Look at the statement of faith/ “What We Believe” (often found in the “About Us” section of a website), policy papers, and the church’s constitution. Does it include anything about gender, orientation, gender identity, or marriage? (Look for words like “biology,” “God-given gender,” “natural,” and “biblical marriage.”)

~ Where the constitution speaks to leadership (pastoral or lay), does it specify that those positions are reserved for men? 

~ Will the church ordain women and/or people who are openly LGBTQ+ (without requiring celibacy)? 

~ Will the church marry people who are LGBTQ+? 

~ Will the church preclude people who are women and/or LGBTQ+ from any ministry role? 

~ Will this church celebrate the identity of people of all genders and gender identities? Some churches are open to gay, lesbian, and bisexual people, but not people who are trans, nonbinary, or genderqueer.

These questions aren’t exhaustive, but it’s a good place to start, and should, at the very least, invite some honest conversation about why your church believes and practices what it does.

Now for church leaders who want to be fully affirming:

~ Would people who are seeking a safe place to worship (without being viewed as sinners due to their identity) be able to find confirmation of that on your website? 

~ If you see yourself as egalitarian but don’t have any women in decision-making leadership, what is one next step you can take toward inclusion of women?

~ If you see yourself as affirming people who are LGBTQ+, but the congregation has not done the work to make that explicit, what is one next step you can take toward inclusion of all orientations and gender identities? 

I’m not saying you should immediately leave churches that aren’t fully affirming. Each of us has different things we’re comfortable with, different things that are dealbreakers, different experiences and convictions. But what I am saying is that, if equality is important to you personally, don’t give your church a pass just because they say “all are welcome.” 

Because until “all” really does mean all, it’s up to us to press toward the goal.

 

 

Beth Moore & Benevolent Sexism
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Beth Moore & Benevolent Sexism

I’ve never been a huge fan of Beth Moore. The reasons for this shifted as my faith and theology did, but I’ve always found a reason to be skeptical of her.  Most recently, she had fallen off my radar, as my list of followed theologians grew beyond common evangelical household names.

Until today, when Beth Moore bravely published a letter to “her brothers” in which she describes what her life has been like as a conservative woman in the evangelical public spotlight.

Spoiler Alert: It has been rife with sexism.

I give her credit: She raised up an entire generation of evangelical women and told them they could actually study the Bible. She took Ladies Bible Study groups from fluffy books barely tied to the Bible to in-depth Scriptural analysis. Don’t get me wrong — I disagree with many of her conclusions, and the last time I participated in a Beth Moore Bible Study I remember wanting to throw the book across the room.

But what she reveals in this post betrays the image she portrays on the platform:

As a woman leader in the conservative Evangelical world, I learned early to show constant pronounced deference – not just proper respect which I was glad to show – to male leaders and, when placed in situations to serve alongside them, to do so apologetically. I issued disclaimers ad nauseam. I wore flats instead of heels when I knew I’d be serving alongside a man of shorter stature so I wouldn’t be taller than he. I’ve ridden elevators in hotels packed with fellow leaders who were serving at the same event and not been spoken to and, even more awkwardly, in the same vehicles where I was never acknowledged. I’ve been in team meetings where I was either ignored or made fun of, the latter of which I was expected to understand was all in good fun. I am a laugher. I can take jokes and make jokes. I know good fun when I’m having it and I also know when I’m being dismissed and ridiculed. I was the elephant in the room with a skirt on.

This sounds more like a scene from The Handmaid’s Tale than the actions of people who claim to be following the ways of Jesus. It reeks of uneven power dynamics used to oppress. These men shroud their sin in “theological interpretations” and seem justified, pious, godly. They point to a text and convince themselves — and others — that their bias is holy and ordained by God.

See, the men in Moore’s stories — the ones who refused to speak to her (following the Billy Graham Rule, to be sure), the ones who expected her deference (didn’t you know God created Adam first?), the ones who commented on her appearance instead of her call — they didn’t see themselves as sinning through their actions. If anything, I am certain they saw themselves as embodying Godly Manhood.

When I was in college, a well-loved professor came to my floor for a Q&A about Complementation Theology. I dutifully took notes, but I could not ignore the knot in my stomach that got tighter and tighter as the night went on. I only remember one specific thing he said: “As a woman, you never lay your cards on the table first in a relationship. He needs to be the first to tell you how he feels, the first to tell you where God is leading you as a couple. Only after he has shared with you, may you share your feelings with him.” At face value, it doesn’t sound bad — maybe a little dated, but not harmful.

 

image.pngBut what that communicated to me, a 19-year-old woman, was that my feelings did not matter as much as a man’s, that my only responsibility was to allow the man to speak first, so that I could affirm him. That my feelings and thoughts couldn’t be trusted, and if a man didn’t feel compelled to have this conversation, I just needed to wait for him. And wait. And wait. And never tell him what I thought or felt. But maybe pray. Then wait some more. We plastered the Bible verse “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart” all over our floor and vowed to follow our wise professor’s instructions.

This conversation was only one of many, and I believed the lie that I couldn’t trust myself and that my thoughts and feelings weren’t valid I believed that I couldn’t fully live into my calling without a husband, and even then, my future husband’s desires and decisions would always take precedence. Which is exactly why, for most of my life, I pushed my own gifts aside and lived inauthentically. That is an ungodly and miserable way to live.

The tricky thing is that the overwhelming majority of men I’ve known entrenched in benevolent sexism actually are… not jerks. I enjoyed them and have been (and am) dear friends with them. They aren’t bad people. They aren’t creepy and certainly not predatory. They’re the types of men you want to be around, the types of men you trust to do what is best.

And this is precisely the problem with benevolent sexism: It masquerades as kindness, it masquerades as love — in my experience, it is often done from a place of good intentions… but it is no less harmful to women than overt sexism. Instead of a flash of pain that might compel a victim to seek a different path, this variety is more like lifelong gaslighting, slowly eroding a woman’s self-worth until she never questions another way. Benevolent sexism is often done unintentionally and ensnares men as much as women, but women pay a much higher price. And it’s done in the name of God.

This sort of sexism is a sin of omission: Where women aren’t, what women aren’t allowed to say, who women aren’t allowed to say it to. But all for their own good, of course. It creates an echo chamber that privileges men’s voices and experiences to the point that — in the case of Beth Moore — they won’t even speak to a woman in the room.

Beth Moore is brave, because she named that sexism as what it is: Sin. It isn’t just a different interpretation or theological understanding… it is sin, and it breaks our relationships with each other and with God.

As far as we know from Moore’s letter, no man touched her. No man tried to coerce her into sex. No man was violent toward her. But is that the best we can ask? To NOT be assaulted? There must be a better way. In fact, there is a better way, and it is treating all people the same, not separating and excluding based on gender. It means asking if our reasons for gender roles are actually theological, or if, maybe, just maybe, we’ve never considered an alternative.

I applaud Beth Moore for standing up today, because too many women do not or cannot. As someone with power, privilege, and resources, she knew she is going to face backlash for her words, and she chose to say them anyway. She’s using her voice and her God-given gifts to speak up so that the women who come behind her might have a slightly easier path.

I still don’t agree with all of her theology, and that’s okay. She’d still be welcome behind my pulpit any Sunday —  even in heels.

Finding Junia

JuniaJunia was the first person in the Bible who lied to me. Well, to be fair, it wasn’t really
Junia who lied to me; it was the other people who lied to conceal her from me. 

I had been struggling with the issue of women in ministry for years. I come from a background that not only doesn’t ordain women, but doesn’t allow women deacons and elders, which does not allow women to collect offering or teach men older than 12. When I was in elementary school and people would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I had an answer all prepared: “A pastor’s wife.”

See, I felt the call to ministry at a young age. I mean, very young. I was four. I have a distinct memory of sitting in the pew during a Sunday evening service, listening to a missionary presentation. I thought, “I want to tell people about Jesus!” From that day until this day, I’ve never questioned that I was called into vocational ministry; I just knew.

But the only way available to me was to be a pastor’s wife, and that’s what I did, by marrying an Army chaplain. I checked the boxes and was living the life to which I was called. 

Except, things are rarely that easy, are they? What followed was a life that didn’t line up with what I thought life would be like. I began seeing the cracks in my theology, in a version of Christianity that said to women: We don’t want to say you’re second-class, but…

I knew – I KNEW – all of the biblical reasons why women were created to be helpmeets. I could use my apologetics skills to articulate the role of women to support the headship of men better than most men I knew. I would tell you that Timothy’s mother and grandmother were influential in Timothy’s life only because the men in his life slacked on the job (because, clearly, whenever God uses a woman, it’s always Plan B…). I would tell you about the requirement of elders to be The Husband of One Wife and could explain both sides of the debate about whether single men and/or divorced men were excluded.

I had all the answers…

                   …until I didn’t.

Junia first exposed that maybe, just maybe, some of my answers were flawed.
She is an apostle named in Romans 16:7. Let that sink in. Junia, a woman, is an apostle – an esteemed apostle, at that! The more I read, the more disheartened I was. See, a couple hundred years after Romans was written, church leaders decided that this apostle couldn’t have been a woman (at best; at worst, it was a deliberate deceitful choice…)… so they added an s to her name and made her male. For centuries, the Bible was translated hailing Junias – a man.

The first time I read about Junia, I felt like I had been punched in the gut, as though I was a victim of some 2000-year long conspiracy. My well-read Bible had failed me. How could I have been lied to all this time? How could they get away with literally replacing the name of a woman with the name of a man? I started questioning all the proof texts I “knew” about women in ministry. The more I learned, the more I realized that there was not just one “correct” way to look at any text – particularly those which have been used to oppress populations for centuries.

That’s when I knew I needed to follow my calling, not as the “plus one” on my husband’s ministry, but on my own. 

There was more to my decision than just Junia, of course. But when I saw Junia liberated, without that s that made her someone she wasn’t and kept her from being who she was, I knew that I could be who I was as well. 

May 17, the day I write this, is the Feast of St. Junia, a day we commemorate her contributions to Christianity, this esteemed apostle.

On this day, I remember all the other women whose contributions were erased from history because of their gender – or the women who were never allowed to make contributions because men would not let them. Today, I gather in my living room with women from my church, talking about faith and love, about church and community. I celebrate the young woman who is graduating from high school, who stood in my church’s pulpit two days ago and preached. I continue to work toward ordination and fully am who God has called me to be.

I think Junia would be proud.

by

On Being People of the (Red) Cup

“It’s called the ‘Christian Churches – Disciples of Christ.’ Chalice_High-2You might have seen our churches before; our denomination’s logo is a red chalice with St. Andrew’s Cross”

The other person stares at me blankly. I sigh.

“Ok, really, it looks like a red wine glass with a big white X on it…”

They say, “OOOOHH, yes! Now I know what you’re talking about. I’ve seen that before!!”

I find myself repeating this conversation often. Since my husband is an Army chaplain, I meet Christians of many stripes who frequently ask about our denomination; they’ve heard of Baptist and Methodist and Lutheran, but oftentimes aren’t as familiar with the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). I love taking the opportunity to share about this denomination and about my church.

And that’s why THIS red cup matters.

The red cup means that the Table is our focus. This red chalice – representative of what was used by Christ during the Last Supper – shows that we are people of the Table. We have differing interperetations of the Bible, and have differing ways of living out our faith, but the Table unifies us. By partaking of this meal together, we remember the life and teachings of Christ; we are woven together, continuing the story of God’s people on earth. Disciples churches celebrate Communion every time we gather in worship. I used to think that the frequency would make it meaningless; on the contrary, it has become the most meaningful part of my week. As we partake, we are fed and filled and sent forth into the world. And because of that… 

The red cup means that ALL are welcome to the Table. We welcome all to the Table as God has welcomed us. There is no ten-page doctrinal statement to sign, no list of rules by which we must abide. We require no proof or documentation to partake. We do not tell anyone they aren’t good enough – or anything enough – to celebrate the Lord’s Table. Our value of inclusion does not end at the Table; as a woman, in the Disciples I am able to use all my gifts from God for God’s people and the church. Here, I am welcome. We take this from our doorsteps into the ends of the earth because…

The red cup means that we are a movement for wholeness in a fragmented world. As an Army wife, I am ever aware of the fragmentation of our world, of the conflicts that cause blood to be shed, families to be torn apart, and people everywhere to draw lines in the sand about who is in and who is out and why. People are hurt by the church; people suffer with loneliness and suffer because of oppression. Disconnection leads to all sorts of tragedies. We are continually fragmented from the earth and the interconnectedness of all life. And yet, as people of God, we are called to bring wholeness. We are called to live into God’s realm in the earth today, not only waiting for some future hope, but making that hope a reality now. I cannot think of any greater identity statement for a denomination. Which is why…

The red cup means that I am home. Brand recognition matters. Driving through a new community, a sign that says “Christian Church” could mean almost anything. But when I see that little red chalice with St. Andrew’s Cross? I know I’m home. As I’ve written before, my husband and I have only been Disciples for about six years now, and making this shift was an intentional and prayerful decision. We’ve been to Disciples churches all over the country, and each is remarkably different. And yet, in each, we are welcome; in each, we worship God together; in each, we celebrate communion every Sunday; in each, we are home.

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We are diverse, we are faithful, we are God’s people but not God’s only people. We are the Disciples of Christ: People of the (Red) Cup.