BillyS noted in response to Leading *is* serving that Christ only washed his disciples’ feet once:
…Jesus washed their feet once, not throughout His time on the earth!
Cane Caldo advised against changing the subject in this way:
I recommend not quibbling with complementarians or egalitarians over how many times Jesus washed feet. That is a trapdoor into a room with no exit where you are not even Jesus and who knows how many washings is too many for a sinner like you?
Keep the focus on the truth that leading well IS serving. Make them defend the idea that Jesus didn’t serve God and His people while He was leading them.
Cane is right.
Complementarians start with the false assertion that a husband can either lead or serve. The frame here is that Christian husbands want to lead instead of serve. This false frame is easily destroyed by pointing out that leadership is service.
Changing the subject to foot washing, and especially complaining about foot washing, is a reframe back to the original complementarian error. In essence, if you do this you are asserting:
But I want to lead, not serve!
I have yet to meet a Christian husband who feels this way, but the internet is a huge place. So it is possible that this really is BillyS’s sentiment. However, I suspect this isn’t really his perspective. My guess is that BillyS is so used to being bombarded by the complementarian frame that he finds it difficult to leave it behind, and slipped back into it inadvertently.
Reposting from that thread:
If a woman tells you washing feet is leadership, just ask her to wash your feet.
[D: This is the same mistake.]
Dalrock and Cane are correct. If the argument is about foot-washing, you have already lost. Because then the argument focuses on the nature of foot-washing, and not the nature of leadership.
The battle here is over the nature of leadership. Nothing more, and nothing less. And as Dalrock and others have pointed out (I believe I have been one of them in the past), leadership is itself a form of service.
Keep the debate focused on leadership, otherwise you cede ground to the foe which cannot be afforded.
Pingback: Self inflicted reframe. | @the_arv
I defer to Dalrock then. There’s something to be said for treating a risible footwashing argument with contempt, but I’ll accept that at the end of the day it’s probably better to stand firm on what leadership actually is and that it is, in itself, service.
Well said.
They come at it from a power dynamic not a Christian one. Christ can serve and lead at the same time. His leadership is service. Husbands can occupy the same role. So a husband should not quibble about which he is doing. Just lead and try to lead like Christ. You will end up doing lots of “service” because that’s what a leader does.
If we take this to heart…it’ll reduce the amount of time you have in debates with those people.
Have the mindset that leadership and service is not an either/or situation.
This makes perfect sense to me but in practice it has not been so straightforward. I can establish a target lock on the main idea, that service *is* leadership, and explain how that works fairly well in practical terms or at least I think so, and have done it a few times. But I can’t think of a time when I wasn’t immediately counterattacked with foot washing.
I’m not bringing it up, it’s the complementarian like a dog with a bone. This is his bedrock for serving your wife by doing household chores and ensuring she can pursue her other callings whatever those may be. Usually, they are prepared to die on that position.
Given that, I see where it is useless to quibble with them about how many times or what it really means, but unless I become a more convincing orator this discussion ends every time at stalemate. Maybe he goes home later and thinks about it.
Well I think there is a ‘service’ in most things we do when other people are involved, removing of course the bad things humans do to each other. Our daily interactions are filled with providing helpful information and humour. Our work is a service to the community, to the customer and leadership is just another piece of work that has to be done.
However, Leadership at its most base is decision making. It’s taking action and ordering those people under your authority to do certain tasks. It makes the unmanageable, manageable through coordination. Taking unruly and disorientated subjects and turning them into focused individuals working towards a common goal.
That decision making leads to outcomes, a leader resolves himself to understand these outcomes; how to prepare for the bad and how to take advantage of the good. That is the ‘service’ a leader provides, this service frees others to focus solely on their given tasks and not fret about ‘what ifs’. It saves time and resources to have a leader. A husband who leads his family is better than a woman who tries to lead hers, each and every time.
In the end, the washing of feet was a benevolent act by a leader. It’s something leaders do to show they care for their subjects. It’s not the crux of leadership though, the control, the authority and the responsibility lie with the leader, that is the purpose of leadership. A leader must make the call, with or without input from subjects, they must discipline unruly subjects, the leader has to decide where the future lies and how to get there. They are the head, the rest of the subjects are the body.
Lost Patrol
I’m not bringing it up, it’s the complementarian like a dog with a bone. This is his bedrock for serving your wife by doing household chores and ensuring she can pursue her other callings whatever those may be. Usually, they are prepared to die on that position.
That’s gynocentric, taking the whole “weaker vessel” idea and turning it into a non-negotiable.
Really, that’s feminism. Oh, sure, It’s conservative feminism of the “I oppose abortion and gay marriage so I’m not a feminist! So there!” type, but it is still feminism. Because it puts the woman’s wants first. Not her needs, her wants and even her whims ahead of everything else, such as the actual good of the family.
It is taking the good will humoring that men have had towards women for centuries and making it into a no-negotiable requirement. When I was a boy / young man a woman in our neighborhood took up painting (acrylic and then oil) and got pretty good at it. Her works were easily as good as anything you see in corporate waiting rooms or chain hotels. Her husband was a small businessman and displayed some in his business, she won some little prizes at the regional fair, maybe sold a few to other housewives. He indulged her hobby out of his love for her. Their children were in high school so she had more free time.
Should every other man in the neighborhood have been required to do the same, regardless of circumstances? Of course not. Because a mandatory gift is not really a gift.
Complementarians focus on leading as well
they say you lead by foot washing
not by making decisions
you lead by running the home so your wife is free to flourish….
that is how the sneak in the role reversal
Demanding the gift of footwashing is backleading.
Another example of figureheadship.
Missing Yoda I am.
@Lost Patrol
Right. This is the hill they want to fight on. They will want to bait you into going against John 13:1-20. But you don’t need to attack it, and in fact it would be wrong to do this. Jesus washing the disciples’ feet is a truly beautiful image of service. Who could read it and not be deeply moved? Jesus Himself tells us that He is setting an example by doing so, and clearly this includes Christian leaders. But John 13:1-20 isn’t at odds with the verses that teach headship as active leadership. So you don’t need to argue with them, you just need to focus on the fact that they want to put headship in as small a box as possible, in direct contradiction to Scripture. They see the active leadership part of headship as not service, but this isn’t true. So they want to in essence ask you if you want to serve your wife or lead her. The correct answer is yes. You want to serve your wife in all ways a husband should, from washing her feet to washing her in the water of the word.
Exactly. Realistically you aren’t going to change anyone’s opinion on something deeply held by the force of your argument. But for some at least you can surprise them by showing that what they thought was a strong position is actually quite difficult to defend. Over time they might consider it and one day come back and present to you what is (in their mind) entirely their own idea (which happens to be the position you argued). And if you can’t persuade the person you are discussing it with, you still might get an onlooker thinking. At the very least, by poking at the weak argument you might get them to stop making it around you.
It isn’t that it is easy, but that we should avoid the temptation to pull the pin and jump on our own grenade.
The thing about leadership (said to the follower) –
You are supposed to be behind the leader, wherever he is.
He is not supposed to be out in front of you, wherever you are.
(using the universal “he” here).
But why this discussion about leadership?
God created a situation where there were only two: the help and the helped.
Based on a clear-cut definition of both of those words, which one is supposed to issue instructions and which one is supposed to carry out those instructions.
That is the situation God created and expects his followers to adhere to. Which did God create to be the help? Which did God create to be the helped? The answers are in Genesis. There is nothing to argue over, regardless of whether feet ever get washed..
Unless all you actually want to do is argue.
It just struck me that asking a complementarian their own implied question would be a great way to break them out of their own frame:
It is their trap, but they likely haven’t considered that it is a trap. When you pose it directly to them they might become suspicious and look for the trap. If they outsmart you (by outsmarting the trap you just laid for them), they will answer correctly that leadership is a form of service, and the question is a false dilemma. If they don’t outsmart you, you can follow up by asking if they want to wash their wife’s feet or wash her in the water of the word.
‘It just struck me that asking a complementarian their own implied question would be a great way to break them out of their own frame:
Do you want to serve your wife or lead her?’
If anything it’ll certainly reveal which side they are on. I doubt they would think ‘yes’ is the correct answer.
What gets me with all these “pastors” instructing men on how they are failing, they are always laying into married men. They tell them how they are failing (in an epic manner) in role as husbands. But you don’t see “pastors” spending much time instructing bachelor men on how to be better husbands in the event that they eventually marry. Oh no. They pretty much steer clear of the bachelors because everything that they are saying to the married men, it is akin to “….look, we already got you. You signed on the dotted line, your wife has the power of the state. You are trapped in a marriage that may make you miserable. So here are all the things you can do to further prostrate yourself in doing her bidding in the hopes that she might let you f— her at least once a month.” Give that message to a bachelor, and he’ll never marry. LOL!
IBB @ February 3, 2018 at 7:00 pm:
“But you don’t see “pastors” spending much time instructing bachelor men on how to be better husbands in the event that they eventually marry.”
Actually, I have seen this and it’s pretty common, if not imaginatively produced. God forbid a pastor ever teach a man how to live without women… but they shoot themselves in the foot with the “you’ll make a great husband someday” timeline.
“But I need sex NOW!”
“Pervert! Wait your turn! Oops.”
Did you forget this?
Anyone who wants a perfect example of how cuckservatives just preserve ‘feminist’ gains while appearing to disagree with only the most recent advances, see this :
https://nypost.com/2018/02/03/a-male-backlash-against-metoo-is-brewing/
‘Kyle Smith is critic at large at National Review’.
He supports all ‘feminist’ claims, such as ‘how women are oppressed in the tech industry’ and ‘men should do more to advance the feminist cause’, while protesting only against the ‘man-o-sphere’ backlash against #MeToo.
This is classic cuckservatism. National Review and the NYPost are indistinguishable, at this point.
@Kevin
”They come at it from a power dynamic not a Christian one.”
It actually is a power dynamic. Jesus undeniably remained Master and Lord whilst washing feet. Not in an act of submission but of mastery even whilst serving his people. His disciples still obeyed him and prostrated themselves before him. He is no figurehead.
I mean for sociologists its quite apparent that in the Gospels he was the “Alpha Male”
http://sociological-eye.blogspot.com.au/2014/04/jesus-in-interaction-micro-sociology-of.html
I’m put that on face book. The question Do you want to serve your wife or lead her ? Do you want to wash her feet or wash in the water of the word and see what my response is. Dalrock what is your take on Ephesians 5:25 – many men point to this to prove that a man should love his wife sacrifically but all men love sacrifically atheist and tribal people men love this way. How then does Christ love the church ? I think Christ loves the church with out need just like the cardenal rule of relationships.
Another thing about the footwashing thing is that he did it of his own volition and no disciple demanded of him to do so. Which they have no right to do.
Matt Chandler mentioned in one of his sermons “to men” a few years back: If you as a man are not going to bed exhausted every night from serving your wife and family the minute you get home, you’re not a real man!”
Never mind that guy who does physical labor all day here in the hot California sun. Never mind that he provides a home for them, or does all he can for them…..no……he works all day, has little or no extras for himself. Lives in humilty and does without so the kids can have piano lessons or can go to summer camp…..so the wife can have nice place to go crazy in………..but that just aint enough. He had better come home and be prepared to do laundry, cook dinner, clean, baby sit the infant while wife has a “girls night out” and “recharge” session.
I can’t recall arguing with any complementarians recently, so my view is not the same as yours Dalrock.
I argue the truth, for better or worse. I have gotten into some hot water here at times for that, but it is what it is. I also believe in considering the whole picture, including how common something is, when weighing Biblical truth.
That is why I would still note that the footwashing was only once and was never proclaimed as an ongoing modern Church practice, for those who would try to make it that. (Just like I would note that the Church in Jerusalem only had very limit requirements on Gentile believers in their commands to them in response to Paul’s bringing the issue before them.)
That is sure to make some argue whatever, but I really don’t care much. I won’t waste much time arguing with anyone these days. Most people do not want the truth, so wasting time arguing about it is fruitless.
I will still stand for principles and gladly discuss core issues with those who do want to listen and learn, but that is a far smaller and different audience.
I have been in churches that had “footwashings” in the past, though I can’t recall ever participating in one. I don’t expect to do so in the future. I would focus any discussion of that on the entirety of the passage, where Jesus was coming against their self-aggrandizement. It had nothing to do with marriage in the first place, so applying it to husbands is a category error.
I also find the argument of mutual submission to be a far more common heresy preached today. Speaking against that is far more important, but often just as fruitless.
I would still note my point if someone really wanted to know, but I would not waste any time debating issues with them if they wanted to try and twist things. I have too many other things to do in life.
Perhaps I am being anal. That wouldn’t be a surprise and would fit my personality, but my personality is what it is at this point and is not likely to radically change.
That’s true…the representation was more about the priesthood.
Do you want to serve your wife or lead her?
As the carrier pilots say, “Roger Ball”.
Earl,
Not at all. Driscoll’s screed is directed only at bachelors who live “in sin” with their girlfriends, girlfriends who are desperate to marry but their boyfriends refuse to marry them. So they settle for living in sin. That must be some tiny percentage of his bachelor followers. The majority of them, his screams did not apply to them because they are not living with their girlfriends (if they even HAVE a girlfriend.) Those guys just shrug their shoulders knowing that they have done nothing to warrant his stupid outrage. So, no, not really what I was mentioning Earl.
Pingback: The issue with Leadership is Trust | Christianity and masculinity
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Matt Chandler mentioned in one of his sermons “to men” a few years back: If you as a man are not going to bed exhausted every night from serving your wife and family the minute you get home, you’re not a real man!”
You have to remember that flatulence-belching pastorbators like Chandler wouldn’t recognize an honest day’s labor if it stared them in the face. Indeed, being forced to do even one day of real work in a real job would probably kill him. This is why losers like him bloviate so cavalierly about “manning up.” They couldn’t do it if they tried, and they know it. The poor schlub with a high school diploma who works on a road construction crew in blazing summer head and freezing winter cold in order to feed and house a wife and kids is one thousand times the man that a seminary-indoctrinsted cresm puff like Chandler will ever be.
Keep the focus on the truth that leading well IS serving. Make them defend the idea that Jesus didn’t serve God and His people while He was leading them.”
This strikes me as a good tactic, but it also occurs to me now that you could pull even more from the story of Christ’s foot-washing to really drive the point home. After all, what happens when Jesus steps up to wash His disciples’ feet? Peter objects, saying he will never allow Jesus to wash his feet. Not entirely unlike a wife who tells her husband she won’t allow him to tell her what to do.
HER: “All you want to do is give me orders. But Jesus was God in the flesh and he chose to wash his disciples’ feet. He was a servant leader!”
YOU: “That’s right. It’s all about serving. Washing feet. And now I’m going to wash you by telling you exactly what we’re going to do next as you follow my lead.”
Then level your gaze directly at her as you swipe a line and say, “And unless I wash you, you have no part with me.”
The implicit wrong assumption with power/authority=abuse that those “complementarians seem to imply is that similar arguments can be applied to knives which can cut and kill or fire which can be used to burn people.
Should we ban knives and fire just because it was used to harm?
Yet fire saved people from freezing to death and knives cut up food to be eaten. Same thing with Power/Authority. What should be required instead is that such power is used responsibly which is amply expounded by the Apostle Paul.
@BillyS
If such heresies are fruitless. Isn’t it about time that God brings down the hammer on this? I mean I think those churches are ripe to have their candles taken away.
I wash my feet in the tears of feminists.
@seventies Jason
so many Christian men happily do this
all the Christian men under forty with wives work- come home and run the home while the wife sits on Facebook or hangs out with friends and posts online on what a serving husband she has who looks after the kids.
Asking your wife to have the house looked after is sinful and not serving in these guys eyes.
Then what’s the point of having a wife?
I’m single and I have to work and take care of my place. I want a helpmate not a welfare recipient.
the point of having a wife is Sex
this is why the men lose and become wimps
they would rather disobey Gods word or manipulate it to justify their wimpyness so that they can get sex.
and where I come from the girls do look after themselves and isolate women who are overweight.
you will notice that even churches that talk about a woman’s role it is always in the context of a mother never of a wife.
I hear so many men complaining about how much work kids are and marriage is- too me it sounds like he is insulting his wife
Marriage is mean’t to be a blessing…..
the thing is Pastors convince them that if a man is not exhausted he is not Godly enough
( Chandlers sermon is not unique)
total opposite to the bible that constantly indicates of the numerous blessings of a Godly wife.
It seems the reality is they get less sex with their wife going that route.
this is why the men lose and become wimps they would rather disobey Gods word or manipulate it to justify their wimpyness so that they can get sex.
Actually, it is because of disobedient, sinning wives, and churches not addressing this sin:
when you’re married, you have sex as soon as ONE of you indicates he or she wants to have sex. 1 Co 7:4 “For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.”
It’s funny that is mentioned Earl……..whenever a sister comes by my apartment……..usually its the “Oh wow….man that actually knows how to clean” snarky remarks. If a brother drops by its “Do you pay someone to do this? Does it always look like this?” I shoot a look of “don’t ask stupid questions, of course I keep this place up”
“Oh wow….man that actually knows how to clean” snarky remarks
The response to which is “can I offer you some lessons?”
The “washing the feet” argument actually seems to come from “I want to just be seen serving b/c I’m afraid to lead” as often as the other way around.
No: it’s a false equivalence to say that service is leadership even though true leadership is service. Leadership is one aspect of service, just as married consummation is love but love is not sex. Neither is love God, but God is (among other things) love.
It seems one argument is to focus on the church’s pastor.
The pastor leads the church.
The pastor serves the church.
A husband leads his wife.
A husband serves his wife.
@infowarrior
I disagree. The entire concept of power dynamics is a modern one. It’s obsession with who is in charge of who. It’s jockying for position. It’s not Christian
But the foot washing is a two edged sword that is far sharper towards them than us but if Christ is the exampler he washed feet and he far more often e demonstrated crystal clear lines of authority with teaching, direction, exhortation, and correction. No one questions who was the leader of the group when Christ was there. His headship of the Church was acknowledged by all.
Like Jason, I pack my own gear. I learned a long time that if you want something done right you either have to do it yourself or spend the time and energy to properly investigate and properly qualify another who will as so many simply will not.
And in the case of the latter they do move away, change companies, etc… forcing you to repeat the investigate and qualify process which can be time consuming depending on what you’re looking for.
The truth is that most people will take the path of least resistance with respect to what you need as your needs aren’t very important to them. It’s often more efficient and effective to “pack your own gear” if you have the competency in that area to do so and like to work. I like work, preferably with a double espresso and select Internet radio talk news or music in the background.
I enjoy working hard all day long, have a great deal of education in many competencies and find I need little from others. Those things I need, I find good people with a similar work ethic that are competent in a particular area which I am not and pay them fairly to assist. Mostly, I save a lot of money doing things myself and ensuring that they get done right.
Dalrock is right. Leadership is serving, and we may even add that feet washing is a part of leadership. Jesus did not wash the disciples’ feet to make them feel good, or to “give them a break” for the night. He washed their feet in order to teach them to wash one another’s feet. In other words, while washing their feet, he was still actively leading them. It is like a father who washes the family car while his son watches him, so that the son can learn how to wash the car by himself.
I disagree. The entire concept of power dynamics is a modern one. It’s obsession with who is in charge of who. It’s jockying for position. It’s not Christian
At the bottom of this whole issue of marital headship is this:
– “Christian” wives don’t trust their husbands.
– They don’t trust their husbands because they don’t respect them.
– That they don’t respect their husbands means that a functional, Christ-centered marriage is impossible.
Conclusions:
– That “Christian” women refuse to obey God’s command that they respect their husbands means that they are consciously and deliberately refusing to obey God.
– “Christian” women shouldn’t marry at all if they can neither trust nor respect any man enough to lead them as a husband, or if they cannot compel themselves to follow God’s instructions to them on wifely submission.
It really is that simple.
O/T for brevity. Everybody’s all like “washing feet and leadership are not mutually exclusive” and I’m over here dealing with a couple of brothers who stick together no matter what.
https://americandadweb.wordpress.com/2018/02/04/punishment-fail/
Do I serve my family when I provide for them?
Do I serve my family when I drive my kids to places they need to go?
Do I serve my family when I BBQ a tasty meal for them on the weekend?
Do I serve my family when I wipe my toddler’s poopy butt?
Do I serve my family when I maintain the family vehicles?
Do I serve my family when I build a cat tree for my daughter’s stupid cats?
Do I serve my family when I build my wife a new set of shelves?
The obvious answer to those questions is; “yes”.
Are any of those actions in any way unusual? Or are they the kinds of acts of service that married Christian fathers take on EVERY SINGLE DAY?
Obviously, married Christian fathers are already serving their families. The problem is twofold.
1. The church refuses to give married Christian fathers any credit for the myriad acts of service they take on EVERY SINGLE DAY. And, because the church refuses to give them any credit, their wives also give them zero credit.
2. Most married Christian fathers aren’t leading – not because they don’t want to – but because the church, and their wives, will accuse married Christian fathers of abuse if they do lead.
There is one fatal flaw to the footwashing red herring: Jesus was not a husband.
At no time did Jesus interfere with Peter’s marriage, and Peter was married (we know this because Jesus healed his Mother-in-law). Other disciples had wives, and at no time did Jesus instruct any of his married disciples to wash their wive’s feet. A woman actually washed HIS feet with her tears.Whenever Jesus addressed women in the New Testament, He did so according to the laws and rules of the Old Testament. I stand to be corrected if I’m wrong on this, but I don’t think I am.
Those commenting here that the footwashing argument is a power play are dead right. It is basically about what Jordan Peterson* says is the average man’s power: his competence.Women fear competence because they have to defer (submit) to it and it terrifies them. Thus, girlfriends will take detachable hipster losers for boyfriends. Female bosses will hire men less competent than her, so the business will sputter along in a mediocre fashion but it will never prosper, because the workers are sub optimal. Ditto when she is a CEO and hires staff around her. Wives, while wanting a competent man to earn an income, will use stealth to emotionally cripple him and render him at least partially incompetent, so that she has power in the relationship.
When it comes to God’s people, the problem is that cultural Marxism is woven into the fabric of tertiary teaching, so pastors and the educated who run the churches don’t see the problem for what it is. It is far easier to parrot away the pop-psychology seen in a popular book by a Christian author, than it ever is to listen intently to what men are saying and why men are alienated from the church.
*refer to the now-famous interview with Cathy Newman.
earlthomas786 says:
February 4, 2018 at 6:46 am
Asking your wife to have the house looked after is sinful and not serving in these guys eyes.
Then what’s the point of having a wife?
I’m single and I have to work and take care of my place. I want a helpmate not a welfare recipient.
Awesome line, Earl!
Permission to use it?
@Kevin
”I disagree. The entire concept of power dynamics is a modern one. It’s obsession with who is in charge of who. It’s jockying for position. It’s not Christian”
You are wrong. Power dynamics always existed people were Masters and disciples, Kings and subjects. And who is in charge of who is important. Do you think the relationship between parents and children isn’t a power dynamic?
Jesus had power over his church. And that is as crucial as loving his wife as his own body.
This complication is due to rebellion that makes headship just a figurehead position.
@Kevin
”But the foot washing is a two edged sword that is far sharper towards them than us but if Christ is the exampler he washed feet and he far more often e demonstrated crystal clear lines of authority with teaching, direction, exhortation, and correction. No one questions who was the leader of the group when Christ was there. His headship of the Church was acknowledged by all.”
This is an example of power dynamic that was expounded.
Jhn 14:15 — “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”
Luk 6:46 — “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you?”
@Kevin
I think you meant to say is that Christian headship isn’t simply just about power. Which I do not disagree with.
What I do disagree with is that it doesn’t apply in Christian headship. Unless the Husband has the power the Husband is not Head.
If Christ is powerless over the church doesn’t that make him a figurehead? It is as crucial as using said power to love one’s own wife as one’s own body and to wash her in the water of the word.
@Feeriker
That “Christian” women refuse to obey God’s command that they respect their husbands means that they are consciously and deliberately refusing to obey God.
I agree with your conclusions, but I also recognize that not all comes from consciously and deliberately refusing; part of it is due to prevalent culture and Church teachings instructing women to do otherwise.
I might add the following to this; the Greek of Eph 5:33 which is in many translations translated as “respect” is related to “fear”, as in “fear of the Lord”, or as in Eph 5:21 “in reverence of Christ”.
That makes “respect/fear” and “submission” to husbands very similar to “respect/fear of God” and “submission to God”. The focus is hence not on the “respect”, but on the obedience, out of the proper attitude.
If from experience we know how awful it is to deal with unsubmissive, unrespectful, and disobedient wives, how much harder it must be for God to deal with unsubmissive, unrespectful, and disobedient people. Maybe we can thus feel more about the coming wrath of God upon unrepentant sinners.
Is it a coincidence that now that less churches are talking about God’s upcoming judgment as well as on the need to fear Him and obey Him, that the number of wives that are submissive to their husbands is also diminishing?
Now, now, let bishop Oprah take the lead here!
@Paul
That picture put my mind directly on these passages. And I’m not sure I even want to know the deal with the guy on the right……..
Luke 20:46
“Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and love respectful greetings in the market places, and chief seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets”
Matthew 23:5-7
“But they do all their deeds to be noticed by men; for they broaden their phylacteries and lengthen the tassels of their garments.“
guy on the right……..
Wait…….is that ALL women in that picture???? Wow.
Uh…..speechless. Wow. My mistake.
Well, at least they ARE wearing a headcovering!
@Paul, that pic looks like a feminist Christmas play – the 5 wise women came to the birth.
In other news, men and women are fully equal in every way, except when it comes to doritos.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5352455/Doritos-launch-lady-friendly-crisps-quieter-crunch.html
Jesus washed his disciples feet to teach them a spiritual truth. In John 13:10 he says “He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit.” The disciples had been justified, but they still sinned daily and needed cleansing. Jesus cleansed them that day, but did not imply that they were not already justified before God. All of us need the daily renewing of the grace of God, but our failures should not make us question our salvation.
Jesus asks them “Know ye what I have done to you?” It had a spiritual meaning that not everyone can understand. Only those who have been truly forgiven can learn to forgive in kind. “For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you.” We are to daily forgive one another, even as he has forgiven our debts. He is so long suffering with us, to cleanse us daily. Shall we not forgive our debtors daily, again and again?
Jesus calls us not to literally wash each other’s feet, to to imitate the moral essence of what he did.
The essence is not just “lowly and ministering love” but rather in the kind of love that humbly works towards the moral purification and cleansing of others. Following Jesus’ example, we are to serve one another with a view to moral purification, and we have this promise “If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them.”
This is not set forth as the pattern of leadership. Rather, all Christians are to exercise this kind of love toward one another, regardless of station. The greatest among us is not above this kind of love.
If your wife is a Christian, then God has justified her and cleansed her from her sins. But she still sins everyday and needs her feet washed with the Word. “Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word. So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies.”
Forgive your wife for her faults, remembering that Christ forgives you all the time. Set a good example, and teach her the Word for her sanctification. In doing so you wash her feet, even as your Lord and Master has washed your feet.
Infowarrior,
Possibly, but His schedule is far different than ours. I thinking He is already letting many churches reap what they sow, which is why it doesn’t look pretty.
Remember that Ancient Israel (the northern Kingdom) was VERY prosperous shortly before it was taken captive by the Assyrians.
@Dalrock
Yes, exactly. This is what I meant when I wrote, “Make them defend the idea that Jesus didn’t serve God and His people while He was leading them.”
What I would add is that this is a way to win this particular argument, but it is not a way to change people’s minds or change their worldview; certainly not on its own. Momma-boys and women already accept that leadership is service when a woman does it. Women who arrange the potluck are praised for their leadership and service. The Flower Guild is praised for their service and leadership. The leaders of the local chapter of The Daughters of the King are praised for their leadership and service.
Cleaving men’s leadership from men’s service is not a fundamental misunderstanding. It is about giving women a big pink key to the vehicle of civilization.
“l’m single and I have to work and take care of my place. I want a helpmate not a welfare recipient.”
Nailed it. If a woman wants to be around you but not do her duty, what do YOU want her for? Sex?
Paul …
1. With what “church” are those female bishops affiliated?
2. How to you embed photos?
I have seen that picture before. I believe that those women larping as Bishops are members of the Episcopal Church (1.5 million members and dropping like a rock).
There is an Episcopal Church in my town, where the new pastor is a women. Not coincidentally (I believe) the parish’s membership plummeted after her appointment while a new Greek Orthodox parish’s has mushroomed. A few also defected to the local RCC parish (which dwarfs it in size)
“2. How do you embed photos?”
If you right-click on an image already on the Net, it sometimes give you the choice of “copy image address”. Copy & paste. If it’s protected or not on the Net then you need to upload it first. I couldn’t post memes until I started my blog.
Yeah, Episcopal Church. And to make matters worse, recently the Washington DC diocese has voted to NOT addressing God as Father anymore. Just as the Church of Sweden (yes, that’s the WHOLE of Sweden)
[https://juicyecumenism.com/2018/01/29/dc-episcopalians-opt-open-borders-transgenderism-eschew-gendered-pronouns-god/]
“Having studied much feminist theology in my masters’ degrees, I wrote a thesis on liberation and freedom and non-equality in feminist theology and existential counseling,” Calkins told the convention. “And I am still waiting for the Episcopal Church to come to the place where all people feel that they can speak God’s name. Many, many women that I have spoken with over my past almost 20 years in ordained ministry have felt that they could not be a part of any church because of the male image of God that is systemic and that is sustained throughout our liturgies. Many of us are waiting and need to hear God in our language, in our words and in our pronouns.”
“Many of us … our language … our words … our pronouns.”
So apparently women have their own language, their own words, and their own pronouns. I was not aware English was owned by anyone… Typical feminist distorted babble.
“Many, many women [..] have felt that they could not be a part of any church because of the male image of God”
I’m almost left speechless by that… It speaks of an enormous hate of men, to the point where even thinking of God as male triggers this hate.
Let’s be honest about feminism; at it’s core it is not about equality for women, but about hate for men. I find it appalling that someone calling herself a Christian can foster so much hate for men, even against the Creator of men and women.
I am so reminded of the excellent Polish sci-fi movie Sex Mission (1984). In that film our heroes protest to the women (who rule everything – spoiler alert – or so they think) that it was thanks to men that we have so many wonderful things and they then name a number of the men responsible. The screeching response being ‘Leonardo was a woman’, ‘Michaelangelo was a woman’ and so on. At the time it seemed ridiculous but even the scriptwriter did not go so far as to turn Jesus female.
It has of course been coming for sometime. When I was in America which was now a long time ago I listened to a female Pastor proudly holding forth about what we now call sexist language and how some literary Mangina in her congregation had one day come to her with a more neutral, that is to say washed out and bland re-write of a much loved hymn (I see from the net that she now involved herself with rights for cross-dressers and Homosexual-ists). She was hot-ish in those days but though I was angling to unfasten her cassock I am quite sure that Hell (is Satan perchance also female) would have frozen-over before the hopeful and hopeless hymn re-writer ever got within a cassock’s thread of connubial-bliss with the Pastoratrix. Desire cannot be negotiated and her desire was then surely in my direction (I am told that your women cannot resist an English accent) and not that of the male-feminist. I nexted.
@Paul
Really it’s about envy. Hate is a symptom.
Chivalry: A conceptual code of social behavior with a separate set of specific privileges and responsibilities for each gender.
Equality: A conceptual code of social behavior with the same privileges and responsibilities for each gender.
Feminism: An obligatory code of social behavior in which women demand all the privileges of chivalry and equality and pass all the responsibilities of both to men who are too stupid to know they’re being manipulated.
Really it’s about envy.
Envy based upon a completely distorted/twisted perception of reality.
Current SJW propaganda holds that it is gravely offensive to a person not to use the pronouns that person has chosen for oneself. God has clearly and repeatedly indicated that the First and Second Persons, at any rate, of the Trinity are to be addressed as “He” and “Him”. Therefore the SJW-converged Episcopal ‘church’ offends God deliberately and with full consent, according to their own stated principles.
@Pokesalad
True.
Embracing Reality
Chivalry: A conceptual code of social behavior with a separate set of specific privileges and responsibilities for each
gendersex.Equality: A conceptual code of social behavior with the same privileges and responsibilities for each gender.
“Gender” and “sex” are not synonyms. “Gender” is a construct (linguistic), “sex” is biology. Using the words of feminism leads to unclear thinking.
craig
Therefore the SJW-converged Episcopal ‘church’ offends God deliberately and with full consent, according to their own stated principles.
C’mon, are you really expecting them to live up to their own rules? Get serious!
What I haven’t seen is a decent description of what leading is.
Seriously google it and it gets self referential. It tends to be vague as it trys to apply to everything and nothing. Things like “a leader is the person who leads.” And it tends to lack specifics, being overly general.
If our honored host and blog owner wanted to take a swing at it, I’d happily read what he says. I might find it no more illuminating, but I’d be happy to read his thoughts and peoples responses.
Clearly feet washing isn’t a specific example of leading. Unless we are supposed to wash feet.
I personally think it is being used by the complimentarians and others as a way of saying “he isn’t doing it right, I’m going to do it my own way.” But hey sin of rebellion and all. Now to go eat something like an apple off that tree 😉
Anonymous reader,
Since the word “sex” can be applied to animals as well do you suppose the readers here might have assumed I was referring to humans instead of hedgehogs had I used the word, instead of gender?
Can you direct me to the “words of feminism” dictionary? Webster’s has multiple definitions for both “sex” and “gender” and doesn’t specify which is commonly associated (in your mind) with the social/political movement lossely known as “feminism”.
Perhaps you can enlighten us all by publishing your own red-pill dictionary of non-feminism-words, there.. Genius..
“Really it’s about envy”
I agree in part. Don’t forget about the filthy greed and laziness though.
Have you ever realized that when Jesus washed some people’s feet , there were no women involved ?
You know , the female psyche is not male psyche at all !
If Jesus as a male individual did that to other men , those men could still respect him.
But men , try to do that to a woman and see what happens !
Women do not and cannot respect men who are at her feet . Women only respect dominant men.
OK , Jesus was still leading when he did that , but do you know exactly how a woman would have perceived it if this thing had been done to her ?
Who knows women better than the Creator , who recommend men to treat us as a weaker vessel , not as an “equal” ( 1 Peter 3) ?
Men who treat women as equals implicitly think that women see things the way they do . Hence all the misunderstanding and confusion of our post modern era.
The Truth is , the more a man kneels down to us , whether physically or psycholigcally , the more we disrepect him (which is not true the other way round).
Those spiritual quacks who teach husbands to wash their wives’ feet just teach men to play with fire until they get burnt.
The difference between Jesus and his disciples (ie only male confrontation) and man/ wife is that the disciples would not as men regard Jesus’s position at that moment as emasculating . But do you know how a woman would feel ?
If she feels her husband is is an emasculating position , she will start to lose respect and play with him like Play Doh.
Good luck with that .
Embracing Reality
Since the word “sex” can be applied to animals as well do you suppose the readers here might have assumed I was referring to humans instead of hedgehogs had I used the word, instead of gender?
No idea. What difference does it make?
Can you direct me to the “words of feminism” dictionary?
Try any common discussion of modern issues on any mainstream website or other channel.
Webster’s has multiple definitions for both “sex” and “gender” and doesn’t specify which is commonly associated (in your mind) with the social/political movement lossely known as “feminism”.
“Gender is a social construct” – who says this, and what does it lead to?
Feminists prefer the term “gender” because it enables them to insist that their blank-slate mindset has some correlation with reality. “Gender” is one of the wedge words that has resulted in girls on fire trucks and pretending to be on fire teams. “Gender” is how we wind up with social media sites that accept dozens of “genders”, “gender” is how we wind up with boys being medicated in K – 12 to act more like girls, and so forth and so on.
The words that we use shape the way we think. This is not a new discovery, Orwell’s “1984” illustrated it, probably Aristotle knew it. Using milktoast words like “gender” makes for unclear thinking.
Perhaps you can enlighten us all by publishing your own red-pill dictionary of non-feminism-words, there.. Genius..
Or I can try to teach men one on one. Perhaps you could stop being so butthurt about a simple suggestion and think about how feminists have misused words for years, then choose your own words with more care?
Isabelle
Those spiritual quacks who teach husbands to wash their wives’ feet just teach men to play with fire until they get burnt.
“Spiritual quacks” – that’s a new one. I like it. Fits well with “churchian” and “cuckservative”.
It’s why I cringe when I see women up there when the priest recreates that scene on Holy Thursday. Fortunately I’ve only seen that once…most churches ask men to do it and I make sure to accept if I am asked.
I can accept a 5 year old boy getting his feet washed but not a woman.
How old to you think the word gender is? Because the word “feminism” didn’t appear in the language before 1970. Maybe you should stop letting feminist define the meaning of words? They certainly don’t define them for me. You should be stronger than that. That’s all the schooling I have time for.
Anonymous Reader says:
February 6, 2018 at 4:52 pm
Absolutely.
Gender, when not being deliberately hijacked, refers to the masculine or feminine. Sex refers to male or female. Feminists started misusing the word to propagate their ignorant theories pertaining to the “evil Patriarchy” and social constructs. Doesn’t anybody remember the big push to declare the differences between men and women simply due to social constructs? That is exactly how, when, and why “gender” started being misused in place of “sex”.