This week I picked up Neither Complementarian nor Egalitarian again in an attempt to finish it. I completed the Part 1 (Gender in Evangelical History) which gave an overview of the different ways cultural movements have impacted the body of Christ in regards to these questions. It was interesting and I learned some new things. 

I started on Part 2 (Reframing Gender) and realized it was a total waste of my time. I don’t say that as a reflection on the author or book. I say it as a reflection of where I find myself.

I don’t need to keep reading. I might even say I no longer care enough to keep reading. 

As I wrote in Patriarchy, Complementarianism, and Egalitarianism Are All Wrong, each view has glaring blind spots, inconsistencies, and/or ignores parts of Scripture. 

As I flipped through the rest of the book and skimmed the “Final Thoughts” and “Afterward,” I realized there was nothing any author was going to say that was going to change anything for me. 

And I know I’m not alone. 

So I’m writing this post for the soft complementarians and soft egalitarians who feel alone, misunderstood, adrift, and sad. The Christian women who show up at their institutional church each week because they love Jesus and don’t want to quit, but go home feeling empty because their gifts and needs are so different from what is offered. 

At the end of the post, I will tell you what I would do if I were younger. 

The Unsolvable Problem of Women in the Church 

So why did I not finish the book?

Because I think this is largely an unsolvable problem given the time and place in which we live. 

I’ve chased this question around for the better part of 30 years through prayer, reading, observing, conversation, and personal experience. I’ve come to the conclusion that for most Christians (broadly speaking) your ecclesiology (theology of church) will by default determine your theology of women using their gifts.

Consequently, Christians must choose where they will err and, in some cases, pick their poison.

I realize that might sound like I am speaking negatively of God’s Word and the body of Christ. I’m not. I’m speaking of our current lack of ability to deal with these questions in an honest and consistent manner. 

So let me explain the conclusion I’ve come to. I recognize I may offend some people who read this in the coming months and years. 

However, I think if people approach the rest of this post objectively, they will see the truth in what I am saying even if they don’t want to agree with my conclusions. 

Let me start by giving you two pictures that will give you some idea of where I fall on the women in the church continuum.

• One, a woman has been made Archbishop of Canterbury for the first time. Even as someone who has very reluctantly called myself an “egalitarian” at times for lack of a better label, I am repelled by that action. I feel physically, emotionally, and spiritually repelled by it when I watch the video. 
• Two, I experienced great joy in years past when teaching mixed adult Sunday School classes. My classes were well received. I find it absurd to suggest that I exercised any authority over the men who were in the classes.

So maybe that gives you a bit of a picture of where I am. If that’s not sufficient, there are currently 148 posts under the category of Men and Women in the Body of Christ on this website where I have attempted to hash this out over the years.

Pick Your Ecclesiology Carefully 

Several months ago, I concluded that your ecclesiology will determine where you ultimately land on the issue of how women may or may not use their gifts in the body of Christ. Why?

Because your ecclesiology sets up a sort of decision tree that is impossible to ignore if you desire to be biblically faithful and theologically consistent.

My conclusion?

• If you believe Jesus intended to create a hierarchical church government structure (Presbyterian, elder board, Episcopal, etc.) in an institutional church, then you have to end up complimentarian in order to be consistent. There’s no way around it. If you believe in God-ordained and biblically-required hierarchy, you have to end up with at least one man (pastor) at the top. Otherwise, you can’t put together a coherent argument.
• If you believe Jesus set up the ekklesia to function as a house church or organic church where everyone participates in the gathering, you can be a consistent egalitarian or mutualist. 

But what about this? What about that? That’s not true of my local church!

I can hear the arguments from both sides. I get it. That’s why I said broadly speaking and that ultimately you have to choose which errors you want to live with. That’s why there are so many posts on this website. I know most if not all of the arguments. 

If you want to be in an institutional church, then your decision tree will eventually lead you to something like Grudem’s list of what women can and can’t do in the church. I find that list absurd. I truly do. However, the truth is that Grudem was attempting to be consistent with his ecclesiology and decision tree. But even looking at it briefly should compel an honest Christian to admit it is truly absurd to believe this is what Jesus Christ had in mind when He established His church on earth as a living temple.

Look at the mental gymnastics John Piper will go through to justify his theology of women. It’s absurd. But that’s what you are signing up for when you land in one of these churches. That’s the poison you pick and the errors you have to live with. For years. 

So as Grudem’s list illustrates, if you are a very soft complementarian or lean toward egalitarian and are committed to being in a biblically faithful institutional church, you will have to decide what you can live with. My experience is that soft complementarians and egalitarians committed to the Scriptures have very few options when it comes to finding a healthy body of Christ in which to participate – and they get fewer all the time. 

You will find yourself in a situation where you cannot use gifts you know you have. You will be expected to do certain things in the life of the church simply because you are a woman. For example, you will be encouraged to teach small children even though you are a mature believer, gifted teacher, and student of the Bible who should be discipling adults. You will be encouraged to “do things” in the way that fits with the church structure, even if it is simply being busy for the sake of being busy with “important things” and has nothing to do with your gifts.

You are not allowed to question it because once you sign up to sit under it, you’ve surrendered that option. If you push back, you will be seen as divisive and not submitting to leadership (one of the great sins in an institutional church). So your only option is to work within the parameters of the errors you decided to accept or leave.

Both options stink and can be soul-crushing. I know this from personal experience. 

What Is the Ekklesia Really? 

The more David and I have studied, especially eschatology (the theology of last things), the more convinced I am that Jesus never intended to establish an institutional church. The ekklesia we see in the New Testament looks nothing like what we call church today. It didn’t function the way churches today function. 

To be sure, the institutional church structure we see all around us can be efficient and keep people busy. But I don’t think it develops healthy, mature disciples the way it should. In fact, I would say most churches fail spectacularly in that regard. People are kept on milk for years with little to no opportunity to use their gifts or participate in the gathering of the church in any meaningful way. We show up on Sunday, go through the motions, and go home. It looks nothing like what Christ established. The gathering of the body is supposed to be about mutual edification. Now throw in what women are (not) allowed to do in that setting and it becomes even more depressing. 

So some Christians look for a home church or organic gathering because they believe it better reflects the reality of the mutual edification of the ekklesia in the New Testament. 

If you are able to find a home church or organic church, you have to hope the one you find has members who have been able to set aside all of the institutional church thinking they have absorbed for probably decades. This includes the thinking of how women should not freely participate. 

(If you watch videos about establishing or being a part of a home church, one of the biggest challenges they face is shaking off the institutional church indoctrination of how the ekklesia should function. It’s one thing to want to do it. It’s another thing to do it well.) 

Many posts could be written about the ekklesia. 

Denominational Roadblocks

I’ve written recently about the problems related to denominations in:

• Theologically Trapped By Denominational Confessions and Creeds
• What is Heresy? When Guardrails Become Guillotines 

The issue with some denominations is that they can’t seem to figure out how to not capitulate to the culture and also study the Bible to figure out what it truly says about important issues. So they either ignore Scripture and accommodate the culture OR they take a reactive stand against the culture even if it means being contrary to Scripture.

The inconsistency is the thing that drives me nuts. 

There are denominations like the Christian Reformed Church (CRC) that will literally drive the denomination into the ground over 30+ years because they refuse to just pick a theological lane and stay in it. They equivocate and research and nuance and pacify and refer an issue into oblivion so that it almost doesn’t matter any longer because they’ve lost so many members on both sides of the argument. 

So the hold denominational structures have on doctrine should not be overlooked. Pastors are bound to support the denomination. Most won’t take a risk to push back, even if they know the pushback they would offer is biblical.

Denominations move at the speed of a glacier (except if it’s about George Floyd or locking your church down). Your life passes quickly. Unless you feel compelled by God to stay in a denominational fight, I would give it a hard pass. 

What I Would Do If I Were Young

I’m almost 59 at this point. I feel like I’ve probably missed my opportunities related to these things. But you don’t have to. You have options available today that weren’t available in the past.  

Here is the advice I would give to someone younger who is reading this and is either a very soft complementarian or soft egalitarian. (You know if this is you. You aren’t hardcore in either direction and you feel like you never fit in.) 

If your ability to freely use your gifts is important to you and your husband, make the hard choice now and ditch the institutional church. I think this is especially important if you don’t have children yet or they are very young and won’t know the difference. If you have children who are more aware, it might make it more complicated. But many families – MANY – have already made this choice. And the numbers are growing. 

I also think this is important because as we head into the First Turning, I expect that the already complementarian institutional churches and denominations will become even more hard-core in their beliefs and practices. Some will move straight to patriarchy. 

Invest your time and energy in finding or starting an organic or home church. Ideally, be on the ground level of setting it up so it’s clear from the beginning that women will function freely in the gathering. 

Yes, this is the harder path. It’s so much easier to walk into a building on Sunday. But when you do that, you are choosing the poison that will be slowly injected into you week after week, month after month, year after year. And not just you, but your children as well as they grow up. 

I honestly don’t think it’s possible (in the time and place in which we live) for a very soft complementarian or soft egalitarian to be happy long-term in a complementarian institutional church. You will always feel like a part of you is dead or dying. You will constantly run up against inexplicable inconsistencies that leadership will just pretend make perfect sense. You will be told either directly or indirectly that it’s all in your head and if you would just submit a little harder to God’s Word you wouldn’t have these struggles. You will always be the problem because everyone else is perfectly happy with the status quo.

I know this from first-hand experience. I know this from talking with other women. I know this from reading what women write online. 

My recommendation is pray. And then do the hard thing if you and your husband feel led in that direction. 

God gives spiritual gifts to His daughters for a reason. Ultimately, we answer to Him for what we do with them.

Not a denomination or church board. 

So think carefully before you put yourself into a situation where their doctrines overrule what God has generously given you.