My Gender Role Journey

Part 1 of My Gender Role Journey

In 2020, I enrolled in seminary because my husband and pastors identified my giftedness and encouraged me to get more theological training. The leadership had just recruited me to join the church staff as Director of Adult Discipleship. Investment in me was to be one of the markers to prove they valued women despite being a complementarian church. Some might have said our church was “one of the good kind of complementarians.” We had female deacons and during Sunday service women read scripture, led worship, and prayed publicly. Despite this, women were not permitted to teach adult men in any context. However, discussion began about what constituted “teaching.” Did hosting a small group discussion count? What if a female missionary “shared” in the worship service? To clarify the church’s doctrinal convictions on gender roles, our young new associate pastor wrote a position paper. He asked me and other elders’ wives for feedback on his first draft. Once ratified, the elders announced women could perform any ministry activity that did not require the authority of a pastor or elder, reversing the former prohibition. Then, “to put their money where their mouth was,” they hired me, and I began teaching Sunday School and joined the pastors on a ministry leadership team. I was nervous and questioned how my teaching fit in with Paul’s prohibition in 1 Timothy 2. Although I was conflicted, I trusted my leaders and knew I was called to submit to them.

Beginning seminary was exhilarating and intimidating. I was the only woman in my first class. Undaunted, I devoured the material and thrived in my studies. Thankfully being the only woman in a class was a COVID anomaly and I would go on to meet many other wonderful female seminarians and professors. However, with every class I saw new things in scripture that exposed holes in my complementarian armor. I had become convinced of complementarian doctrine in my 20s and for two decades I held to my convictions that God had good and different roles for men and women in the church. However, as I read from broader perspectives, I realized much of what I had been told about egalitarians and their theology was neither true nor charitable descriptions of their work or beliefs. Concerned and confused, I told my pastors I wanted to explore the issue more and they gave me their blessing and assurance that, since it was a secondary doctrinal issue, I could continue working there even if I ended up landing somewhere differently than they did.

A few months later, I realized I had uncovered too many issues to continue to affirm complementarianism wholeheartedly, but I wasn’t ready to embrace egalitarianism either (I don’t change my mind quickly). In the past, I had only read books by complementarians, but I needed to openly explore the topic from different angles to satisfy my logical brain. Because I was worried about falling down the “slippery slope to liberalism,” I kept my pastors informed of my progress so I could stay tethered to them for safety. One sleepless night I wrote a short article about needing to explore the topic from a neutral position and how that required a figurative “leaving” of complementarianism. I thought the article might eventually become the first post of a blog series functioning as a metaphorical “trip report” on my journey. I shared it with the pastors and three weeks later one said he would give me six months to “land the plane.” Asking what that meant, I understood he was saying that if I didn’t return to complementarianism, I could not continue my job. I reminded him of the assurance he’d given me a few months prior, but he did not remember that conversation similarly. Instead, a week later, they made my termination effective immediately.

Despite this crushing blow from my shepherds, The Good Shepherd confirmed I should continue in seminary by providing a Teaching Assistant job I had not even applied for. Seminary has been a space where I have experienced a lot of healing and community. Many of my fellow female classmates and professors related similar experiences in their ministry contexts and helped me to see I am not alone. However, thinking about women’s roles in the church is a trigger for that trauma. Returning to the same subject that caused our family to leave our church community of 20-plus years is painful and I have avoided it for many months. However, I think now is the time to heed God’s calling to write on these topics and share my story. This summer I am taking a directed study course called, Women in Missions, Ministry and Leadership. My hope is that I can pick up that abandoned project and write those articles I’d dreamed of. You can follow my gender role journey by subscribing below.