Let’s Not Rush To Roles

It seems nearly impossible in our current Christian context to discuss male and female personhood without hastening to our roles. “Yes,” we’re often told, “we know that men and women are co-image-bearers and equal heirs of salvation in Christ, but you must ‘land the plane’! What about our roles?”

We devote much time and attention to questions like these: How (if at all) do males and females function differently in the home, in the church, and in the world? Did God appoint males to lead and females to submit? Are women to nurture while men provide and protect? What does “equal but different” look like when it comes to the responsibilities and roles inside and outside the home?

These are all valid questions, and the plane, at some point, must land on the runway of the practical. We certainly need to examine God’s Word, do our due diligence in interpreting its teaching in context, and then make appropriate applications regarding how we relate to and serve the opposite sex in marriage, in the church, and in society at large. But as a woman who has been involved in some aspect of parachurch and church ministry my entire adult life, I beg us to take in the view at 30,000 feet before we put down our landing gear.

Let’s not rush to roles.

Emphasize Design Before Doing

Unintentionally, women can feel undervalued in churches in which only a nod is given to their equal dignity and standing, while significant focus is placed on which roles are (not) open to them. God addresses both design and doing. From Genesis to Revelation, he provides an abundance of passages and stories that reveal his vision to use both men and women to accomplish his great purposes.

God addresses both design and doing.

We must give the same weight to teachings on women’s essence, value, and usefulness as God does. When we pass over these truths on our express path to who should or shouldn’t do what, we risk women (and men) missing the significance and worth of both genders in God’s sight and his plans to use them both for his kingdom aims.

Believers should be taught that from the beginning, God created a pair, two image bearers. He blessed them equally and created them so that both are indispensable in imaging him and carrying out his creation mandate (Gen. 1:28). Both are heirs of the grace of life (1 Pet. 3:7), both are to give and inherit a blessing (v. 9), and both, “in Christ Jesus,” are “sons of God, through faith” (Gal. 3:26).

Expect to Find Gifted Women

Too often, when our teaching stresses roles over identity, we undervalue spiritually mature women within the body of Christ. In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, God explains that his church will only be rightly built up as all believers use their varying gifts in bringing one another to maturity (Eph. 4:15–16). We need to remind all believers that each person has a necessary part in growing Christ’s body (1 Cor. 12:4–31), regardless of his or her role.

This means that church leaders should seek out—and expect to find—women and men gifted by God. Leaders then need to provide training and give women and men opportunities to teach, serve, exhort, help, lead, give, and more, commensurate with their gifting and, yes, within their biblical roles. But too often, church leaders only study half the congregation, looking to fill the positions of elder or deacon, and they miss the gifted other half whom God has also called to serve his church and to whom he has given equal standing in bearing his image.

Embrace Interdependence

Another danger in centering our biblical discussions about men and women on their roles is that we neglect the foundational glory God instilled in our interdependence. Aside from a few directives to one or the other gender, all the Bible is for all of us. God expects us to learn from one another and to help and support each other.

He has lessons for men in Ruth and Esther, and he teaches women through Hosea and Joel. We must all learn from Abigail helping David (1 Sam. 25:14–39) and from Deborah and Jael relieving Barak and rescuing Israel (Judg. 4).

Throughout the New Testament, both women and men are heralded as examples of faith through grueling circumstances (Heb. 11). The apostle Paul, notorious in some minds for hindering women, highly commends many of his female coworkers for their hard work and service in the gospel (Rom. 16).

Too often, when our teaching stresses roles over identity, we undervalue spiritually mature women within the body of Christ.

We see in Jesus’s interactions with women that his priority wasn’t their roles. On the contrary, and counterculturally, he addressed women as he did men (Luke 7:11–15, 44–48; 13:10–13; John 4:1–43; 11:17–44), included numerous females in his band of followers (Luke 8:1–3), and gave women “first dibs” as witnesses to his resurrection (Matt. 28:1–10).

We too can give faithful women greater involvement, visibility, and public acknowledgment for their service. It’s essential that we take the time to underscore the interdependence of men and women alongside their differences and the unique roles they fill. When we don’t, the wonder of God’s image displayed in a complementary pair is obscured.

Enjoy God’s Good Design

God doesn’t need any of us. But in his love and grace and divine purposes, he made us male and female to be, in some inexplicable way, like him—but definitely different from him—and unquestionably dependent on him. And he made us male and female to be somewhat like each other—but definitely different from each other—and unquestionably dependent on one another. As Paul explains in 1 Corinthians 11:11–12, “In the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman; for as woman was made from man, so man is now born of woman. And all things are from God.”

So let’s linger in the skies and take in the view of what it means to be two different but equal genders created by God, in his image, after his likeness, before we hurry to practicalities. Let’s circle around and teach the truths that we were made male and female to harmoniously glorify God together in the home, in the church, and in the world. Let’s take the time to see, appreciate, and enjoy the richness and splendor of our Maker’s design and the beauty of our interdependence.