Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
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What a crass put down and assumption of bad motive! You think that women who sense the Holy Spirit’s call to pastor a congregation are seeking to "lord’ it over them? As if exercising their gifts and callings and having the church recognize such is tantamount to a power grab?
Let me ask you some questions. When a man is called to ministry and ordained, is that also done out of the desire to “lord” it over the church? If not, why not? Is it simply a chromosomal issue or difference: being male means the motivation of a servant heart, being a woman means being motivated by a lust for power? Should men serve and slave for the congregation to prove their calling first, as well? If not, why not? If both prove their intentions, motives, and spiritual calling through such an attitude of service, should men then only be fully recognized by the church to pastor? If so, why? If not, why not? If the former, how is that not discriminatory practice?
Be interested in your answers.
Frank
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This article is helpful because it explores the practical consequences of the “united but not equal” policy. It is time to expose the mixed messages being sent to women training for ministry. It’s like having a door within a door. (think pet door.) Men get bigger door; women get a smaller door, with limitations. While I appreciate the NAD’s goal of 1000 women pastors, I really don’t see this filtering down through the field. By the way, are we half way there? And my final point, if I were one of the 80 women enrolled in the MDiv program, what would my chances (sorry, God’s call to a church) be assigned a church, even with the incentivizing three-way split.
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I think you’re very off center on this topic and based on your posts you sound like you think you are quite superior to women.
It is attitudes and teachings like your statements embody that are driving young and woke people from the church.
Congratulations!
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Then, what PRECISELY is ordination?
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James –
Then what Precisely is ordination?
GREAT QUESTION!!
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If you think that ordination is equivalent to lording it over the church…and I’m not saying that this is necessarily a wrong view…then get rid of the whole practice, regardless of gender. Find another way to equally recognize and utilize all who have the pastoral gift, also regardless of chromosomal makeup. The Spirit makes no such distinctions in gifting.
This would avoid the exclusive good ole boys club. Otherwise, we’re perpetuating discrimination.
Frank
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Oh, I dunno, that’s a bit unfair. I’m not young or woke or hip with the times. I’m an old crank (or at least, I feel like one). Even I’d be embarrassed by obnoxiously condescending comments being dictated from a pulpit.
(Which basically happened to me today, but never mind that. Sigh. No uplifting Christmas sermon for me!)
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As you know, this is a major diss for any woman called by the Holy Spirit to the Gospel ministry. It’s also apparent you are not personally acquainted with women called to the ministry of spiritual leadership.
They do, James. You do not know any of these women, do you?
What are you talking about? Is this how you picture our Godly women around the world who preach the Gospel? Women in China establishing churches? Pastors in churches every Sabbath preaching about Jesus?
Your negative biases are really showing.
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@niteguy2, @frank_merendino, @harrpa …
The church adopted its principles of governance from the world, inventing a hierarchy of authority and conferring on some central body the wherewithal to grant credentials to those seeking employment within its domain.
It is now difficult to distinguish and extricate any “call to ministry” from a desire to pursue a career in denominational work. An equation, unfortunately, has been drawn permanently between self-worth and title + status + remuneration. Just as in the world, the flow of human resource tends towards the sea: the wealth of nations, the mirage of fame, fortune and ease.
Ministry is no longer spending time with the brokenhearted, the depressed; but now spending time with the brokenhearted and clinically depressed at the going rate of $50/hr, browsing through the ads and seeing that in Australia, the rate is $55/hr and thinking seriously of moving to Sydney. “God is calling me down under,” they testify; and leave.
Eventually Christians are going to drift so VERY far away from the model of Christ, that when He returns, “will He really find faith on the earth” at all?
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Why do you say that? I’m the fairest person in all the land; and the wisdom of Solomon is mine.
One thing I find very strange is that women, like yourself, boisterously shout for women to put themselves under the hand of men who then pay them to do what they want them to do. RATHER, should you not be encouraging women, at least, to be entrepreneurs, to start independent ministries?
- Youtube, for example, is fertile ground for reaching the world.
- Websites are a dime a dozen to develop.
- A Bible Study group of friendly neighbours is right before the eyes
- etc., etc. …
DO NOT CONFUSE SPIRITUAL MINISTRY WITH A SALARIED BISHOPRIC.
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You seem to forget the roots of our church. For refreshers, we are an offshoot of the Protestant movement. That should sum it up.
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OH, yes, you’re right. This sort of condensing misogynistic attitude impacts more than the young and the woke. I stand corrected.
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So, it is OK for MEN to seek (demand) ordination but it is not OK for WOMEN, right? I surely can see why… 
What do I think? I think that using a biblical verse followed by a paragraph like that is completely disingenuous.
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You put it all in just one paragraph! Brilliant!!! 
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That’s a shallow view of the subject matter, because in order to become clinical psychologist one would almost inevitably have to go through 8 years of school and rack up a mountain-high debt. Do our Adventist institution sponsor and produce free psychology certifications? No.
We are operating in a scope of market economies. So, if we collectively sponsored psychogists like we sponsor theologians today, then certainly that could be a viable reality. But we don’t. We leave it up to them to struggle through their medical education, and when they get there… You do what? You accuse them of overcharging to make a living 
?
That’s brilliant!
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Well, speaking PRECISELY:
Ordination is a non-biblical ceremony that has been used BY MEN to project an imagine of authority and superiority so that they assure that power and control remains only in MEN’s hands. Used this way, it is used as a tool to maintain discrimination of women alive and well in the Church. Disgusting, stone-aged practice!
PRECISELY!
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It doesn’t matter what the policy books say. I’ve given you examples of what’s happening today.
BTW I forgot to add that the North American Division stewardship director is female. And I know of one NAD vice president who was NOT ordained and when he was hired. Please understand that several entities don’t strictly follow GC policy. Speaking of GC policy, according to your statement, the GC didn’t follow its own policy when Ella Simmons was elected.
The truth of the matter is this. If a conference, union, or division, believes that the time has come to ad females to their leadership team, they will do it, regardless of policy.
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Oh no, that’s not true. I just heard the POTUS saying that other day. And the POTUS comes first. Therefore, you may be the second fairest in all the land, which is certainly a high probability, sure! 
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Then comes the 3,000 hours of supervised practice before being able to take the National AND State Boards - which is another nightmare!
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