As far as I can remember I have never been against ordaining women. For all the early years of my life it was not even on my radar. I don’t remember any teaching or serious discussions on it during my Seminary years in the sixties. In my first parish in Auckland in the seventies I remember there being one or two women clergy in our “fraternal,” but it never troubled me because they weren’t Lutheran. By my second parish in New Zealand more women had joined our clergy ranks. I don’t remember being troubled or even discussing the ordination of women. What I do remember is what fine women they were, and how they really added normality and compassion to our clergy fellowship and to the ministry of the church to our city. Normal men and women of God were ministering to the men and women of our city, bringing the different gifts and insights that men and women have.
In the mid 80s the issue must have been appearing on the horizon because I remember studying it at a Pastor’s Conference in New Zealand. The visiting Luther Seminary lecturer helped us see things in the “two key passages,” that I had never noticed. He showed us that the word “quiet” addressed to women in I Tim. 2:11, was the same word “quietness” in 1 Tim. 2:2, asking God to give people in general peaceful lives. This may seem a very small discovery, but it opened my eyes to see how we overlook things, and can easily misread the meaning of words. In the 30 plus years since that conference I have been led to see that many of the Bible verses that relate to women are not as clear as people have often supposed. When people say “just do what the Bible says” I need to ask: “what does the Bible actually say?”
In my third parish, in the nineties, pastors and people were asked to do many more studies on women’s ordination and I was led to see that the arguments against it were nowhere near as clear as many believed. I sat on CTICR during this period and listened to most of the positions for and against the ordination of women. I was led to see the many roles women played in the Old and New Testament, and particularly how Jesus included women and elevated them. I also began to learn a lot more about how churches around the world, including most Lutheran Churches had been ordaining women for many years. At LCA Synods I heard the same debates, and grieved with the women of the church in their pain who felt so crushed. Praying with these hurting women was one of the saddest moments of my ministry.
In this period I was suddenly confronted with an unexpected challenge. A member of my congregation in Perth returned from a trip to Germany and said he had invited a young female German vicar to come to Perth and work in our parish, especially amongst the German members. He said she was arriving in a few weeks and would I pick her up from the airport. I was not impressed because I thought of the many ramifications; what will the church say if I have a woman vicar? Will she expect to be paid? My wife, Joy, and I went to the airport and despite my initial misgivings, Anke immediately found her way into our hearts. She faithfully visited the elderly, and she preached to the German congregation in Perth. I checked her sermon and it was great! I took her with me to a call meeting in a conservative country parish, and invited Anke to introduce herself to the people. Through meeting her and hearing her speak everybody now seemed to think it was fine for a woman to be a pastor. Often our experiences influence how we see the ordination of women!
I spent the fourth decade of my ministry in Adelaide, and sadly it was here I encountered the most opposition to women’s ordination, though by now I had also become fully in favour of it. Here I also met Maria, the second young woman who turned up from Germany. Maria was an 18 year old backpacker travelling around Australia. She walked into Bethlehem Lutheran Church on a Friday, was welcomed with open arms, invited to worship on Sunday and came to her first Lutheran service. Praise God! She was deeply touched, and soon after asked to be baptised. Maria was the keenest student I had ever taught. She read and understood the Word of God like I had never seen. She was hungry for God. When she was baptized some months later the whole congregation rejoiced, and when her story was featured on the cover of The Lutheran the whole LCA rejoiced! One day I took her to visit an elderly lady in hospital. I invited Maria to pray for her. She knelt beside the bed, took the lady by the hand, and prayed a passionate prayer. The lady recovered and was so grateful for Maria. I was blown away as I saw Maria do ministry in a way I never had or could do it.
I saw how personally and affectionately one woman can minister to another woman. I learnt so much that day. But I was to learn much more.
On the way back to Maria’s unit she turned to me and said, “God is calling me to be a pastor.” The way she said it I knew it was true. She didn’t say, “I think God is calling me to be a pastor.” She said, “God is calling me to be a pastor.” Now, fourteen years later, she is even more sure that God is calling her to be a pastor, and so am I. And if God is calling her to be a pastor who am I, or anyone else, to say that God is not calling her to be a pastor?
We say there are three things we need to be a pastor. 1. The call of God. 2. The gifts of God. 3. The call of the church. If God has so strongly given the call and the gifts, how can the church refuse to acknowledge that and refuse to issue the call of the church?
In my retirement I attended my last General Pastor’s Conference. I felt so ashamed to be in a group of all male pastors debating whether women could be pastors. Pretty much all the same repetitive arguments were covered. So much talk about why women can’t be pastors; so little talk about how we can best spread the Gospel in a time when the church is rapidly losing members, and the world is even more rapidly losing touch with Jesus, the only Saviour of the world.
Two years ago, long after my retirement, my wife, Joy, and I followed in the footsteps of Paul through Turkey and Greece. The tour was led by a Baptist woman pastor and scholar. We were the only Lutherans on the tour. Among the places we visited were the homes of the two churches Paul writes to about the role of women in the church, Ephesus and Corinth. To stand amongst the ruins of these great cities of the past and be taught about the context and times into which Paul spoke helped us greatly understand why Paul said what he said. Ephesus was dominated by the Goddess Diana and her female priestesses and cult prostitutes. No wonder Paul guided Timothy the way he did in 1 Tim. 2. Corinth was dominated by immorality. No wonder Paul gave such precise directions for orderly worship in 1 Cor14, including respectful husband/wife relationships in worship. The amazing thing was that we were in Corinth and being taught these things on the day Synod once again rejected the ordination of women. I was so angry and my wife, Joy, wept, as did so many women throughout the LCA. Maybe we could paraphrase Matthew 2:17 a little: A voice is heard in the LCA, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her daughters and refusing to be comforted, because they are not permitted to be pastors.
Since then I have read another twenty or so books which have led me to see more strongly that women can be ordained as pastors. Most of these books are written by men and women who are not just sitting in their offices, but are actively involved in spreading the Gospel and building dynamically worshiping and growing Churches by the power of the Holy Spirit. God is so good and he wants all people to be saved. St Paul says he is prepared to use all possible means to save as many as possible, and Paul welcomed so many women to work with him to spread the Gospel. I believe we are unfaithful to God and his passion to save all people, when we deny over half the church permission to be engaged in this mission and ministry as ordained pastors.
Come, Holy Spirit, reform, renew, refresh, and revive your church; begin with me. Amen.
