Created to Be One

I thought a great deal about the topic of mothers, but it should also be no surprise that probably isn't what we're going to talk about this morning. Needless to say that motherhood and mothers and mothership and everything else that we might have is of tremendous significance and importance. And there's much that the Bible has to say about it. And I could have really gone strong in that direction. But it's either obey your mother or obey the Lord. Generally, they go hand in hand, but this time the Lord really impressed me that I was to follow a little different direction. But I know how indispensable mothers are, and sometimes they're so indispensable that it. Makes you wonder about fathers. The other day, and I know that some of you are thinking that I set my two sons up here. I didn't. But I know that if I hadn't. Let Jonathan pray after David, that we would have had a major battle up here, and that would have blown everything right. But the other day, just to show you how indispensable mothers are, Jonathan can't quite reach the door handle on the front porch. And the other two had come in. And he comes over, and we still. Have the glass in there. And he comes and he pats on the glass door. And I walk over to let him in, and I open the door and he stands out there, and he has this long face, you know, his lips down. I said, well, come on. He said, no, Mommy. I said, what do you mean, no, Mommy? I couldn't figure out what he was saying. And here it turns out that he wouldn't come in the house unless Mommy opened the door for him. I think that's great for mommies, but it doesn't do much for daddies. So I know that moms are indispensable, and I thank the Lord for them. And if you feel a little bit used today, moms, it's only because I think the Lord would have us to speak about a little broader subject, and that's the subject of women. Women and their role in the life of Northway Christian community. I wanted today to address a subject that has, in recent times, probably caused as much bitterness and confusion and fracture and division in the Church of Jesus. As any other subject. It's amazing that that would happen. But it has, I'll quickly say, and you know, this is so sensitive when a man speaks about women. Would you permit me to lay down my defensiveness here and not have to worry that some of you are going to take the most diligent notes you've ever taken and come running up here afterwards, I want you to feel free to challenge any of the points that I make today based on the word of God. And I know I'm open to criticism, but I may slip somewhere along the line and say something that just doesn't ring exactly true to your experience, and just allow me that benefit for a little bit. But I want to say that that. In speaking about the subject of women, I felt it was really necessary to address that subject here at Northway in our early stages. One of the brothers asked me, he said, jay, do you really think that we should spend that time on that subject when there are so many other. Things that we need to learn together? And I started thinking about that, and, you know, I really believe it's important. Not only is it a numerical reality, the fact that we have more women. Than men, but it's such an important subject because of the fact that if we launch out in a new direction. Kind of assuming we all think we know what we think about the role of women in our body, that we. Could find ourselves on down the road and have to back up a long way. I don't believe God would have us to do that, but rather to establish some direction and have some firm footing. Upon which to stand as we begin our life here at Northway Christian Community. It's very possible that you are part of the reflection of the confusion today that exists about the role of women. The media is constantly bombarding us with women's issues and women's problems and women's rights and women's victories and the whole bit. And the secular media has done its job in informing us about the situation and women's issues today. But the church has not been exempt. And I dare say that some of you are seated here at Northway Christian Community today because of your reaction to women being in local churches. Now, I'm not one at this point to get off in a long dissertation about the rightness or wrongness of women preachers. We are not today going to get into the subject of women elders. We're not going to talk about women's roles in marriage and in the home. That is a great deal more content than we could possibly cover in a half an hour. But what I do want to address today is the basic attitude that we as a community will bear toward the involvement of women in our fellowship. And I pray that we will not fall suspect to the leading of the world and that we will not allow the spirit of the world to dominate our thinking toward women. And the Role of Women in our body the emergence of women's ministries in the last decade has been phenomenal, but it's always been there. The imposition of women's ministries in some cases has been very disheartening because of the division that it's caused in different bodies. But the primary problem that we bear as Christians in relation to the women's issue is the fact that we have adopted the world's mindset rather than taking our cue from Scripture. What I want to do for you this morning as much as possible possible, is to use the Word of God as the authority upon which we are going to function in building our attitude toward women's roles in our midst. I pray to God that we are all open to a refreshing of our heart in this subject. I pray that we are not victimized by some sort of closed minded, predetermined. Attitude, that women's roles are to be in the background doing nothing but supporting their husbands, but rather that God would. Free us all to take a fresh look at the creative intent of a masterful Creator and the role of women. In our body of believers. Today I'm going to deal with four misconceptions and offer four alternative pieces. To take their place. And I've asked Brother Gene to put those up on the overhead so that if you're taking notes, you can jot that down. It helps a little bit to keep the flow together. The first thing I want to address is the misconception. That's not the misconception, by the way. The misconception is this, that man was created in the image of God and. Women in the image of man. In the creative order of things, man. Was created in the image of God and women in the image of man. And I'll tell you where that comes from. In First Corinthians 11 it talks about. Man is the glory of God and woman is the glory of man. But that's not talking about the created image. And we won't have time today to deal with that. But I will at some future point. If you're not already at Genesis 1, let's begin at verse 26. Then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth. So God created man in his own image and the image of God he created him. Male and female he created them. Look at verse 27. So God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him. Male and female. He created them. A couple of little introductory points to make here. First of all, when it says let us, what do you think happened there? When God said let us, what was he doing? Was it the council of the Godhead, Maybe Father, Son and Spirit? Was it the council of the heavenly realm would come together to hear the decree of God? The word Elohim for God that's seen here is a plural word. And so grammatically it makes sense to say let us. But I do believe that it has something to do with the council of the Almighty. A technical point, but it's something a lot of people ask about. Let us make man. Now, the Hebrew word for man there is Adam, a D, a M, or Adam as we would pronounce it. And that word means human being or mankind. You want to note that, because if. You don't understand that right off, you're in trouble. Adam means human being or mankind. We'll see later on that the Hebrew word for man as a gender is ish. Ish. So I'll be clear all the way through here to try to point out to you that here it's Adam or Adam, which means human being or mankind. Now, God said, let us make Adam in our image. What is the image of God? How many of you have ever been to Walt Disney World or Disneyland? You walk into that. What is it, the hall of the Presidents or whatever that is, and they have the animated figures of Abraham Lincoln. I think Abraham Lincoln does the show. I'm not sure the name. It's been a few years since I've been to Disneyland, but I don't know about you, but I remember how startled. I was at how true to life that image was. In all the pictures I've seen of Abraham Lincoln, this. This figure was an exact replica of what that picture of Abraham Lincoln was like. And of course, the way they can. Make his lips move and his eyes blink and his heart pump and all that kind of thing is really amazing to me. But that would be, in our minds, an image, wouldn't it? And we say somebody's a spitting image of their parents, and we think of their facial features and their bodies and all the rest of the. But when it comes to God, his image has nothing to do with his physical features because God is a spirit. When we talk about the image of God, we talk about the nature of God. His nature, his character, his inner qualities, the unseen dimension of his being. That's the image in which we've been created. That which is unseen of us is what is created in the image of God. Now we know in the Bible that the nature of God is a father nature. It is indisputable. I started to list the scriptures. You can jot down a couple of them. Turn first of all to Deuteronomy 32. 6. It appears many times before this. Just turn there in case you're unsure. Deuteronomy 32. 6 says this. Do you thus requite the Lord, you foolish and senseless people? Is not he your Father, who created you? Who made you and established you all the way back? The Father created you. Isaiah 64:8 1st Chronicles 20:9. I think we ought to just move along rather than look these all up. But they all say that God is our Father. And Jesus came along and said later he dealt with God as his father. John 8. 19 talks about the fact that the Pharisees had not seen His Father, but he had seen his Father. He had come from his Father and was going to return. And so we see Jesus continually referred. To God as His Father, the Father nature. God is indisputable in the Scripture. Now God as the Father had the one driving concern that I believe. Impels. The creative role among our society today, among creation today, that the Father nature. Yearns to beget creatures of its own likeness. The Father nature yearns to beget creatures of its own likeness. Practically every man I know wants a son. It's not to say if you had all girls that you were a failure. It just says that deep inside of us we yearn to see someone like us. It's part of the Father nature. Now for us, the way that we. Go about doing that is we get. A wife that sounds. I know, back up. We find someone that God has for us and we get married. That's one of those things I ask room for. So we join together in marriage and we have children. And we know how we do that. And there we are with a little son in our image. But God didn't have the problem of finding a wife because inside of Himself, in his own nature were male and female. God was able to create within himself that expression of himself. And so we think of God as our heavenly Father. There is no way that we say our Mother who art in heaven. But. But let me say very clearly that God is our mother. And the mother nature of God is implicit in the Scriptures. I want you to turn this now. Whereas Father comes through loud and clear. I want you to see, and I just offer this this is something that you can check out on your own. I'm not going to say to you that this is an ironclad argument, but I want you to see something in the original language, Genesis 17:1. You don't need to turn there, but it says, when God appeared to Abraham. He said, I am God, the Almighty, or in Hebrew, El Shaddai. El Shaddai. Most of you know, or many of you may know, that El Shaddai means God the Almighty, or the God who is all sufficient, or the God who is more than enough. A beautiful name that God only uses in that context to describe his character. But as you break that name down in the Hebrew, El means powerful. And Shaddai is from the Hebrew word, the root word, shad, Shaddai, Shad S H A D in transliteration, which means literally female breast. That's what the word means in Hebrew. It appears Genesis 49, 25, Psalm 22:9, and Song of Solomon a number of different times. And the root word indicates that God, the all sufficient one, is all sufficient. From within himself, so that he feeds those who come to him by his own nature, by drawing them to his own breast and supplying them with the milk of life. And God reveals to him his children. That he is the one who sheds forth life from his own being. He is all sufficient. His nature is more than enough. Don't we see that every physical thing has a picture in the spiritual realm, then ages long after that in Revelation 1. And you may want to turn there. Revelation chapter 1, verse 13. First of all, look at verse 8. Here is Jesus appearing to John the Revelator. And he says, I am the Alpha and the Omega says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come there it is the Almighty. And then look over at verse 13. Begin verse 12. Then I turned to see the voice of that that was speaking to me. And on turning I saw seven golden lampstands. And in the midst of the lampstands, one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden girdle around his breast. And the word in the Greek for breast that's used there is exclusively used in the New Testament for the female bre. Somewhere implicit in the nature of God and clouded over, as we'll see later, by the failure of man, is the idea is the truth, the reality of God as male and female. I just urge you to meditate on the truth of God's provision. You see, everything that we know came from God. God, right. Colossians 1:16 says all things were in him, in him and have come from him. So male and female have come from him. Man was created in the image of God, male and female. Praise God. And in that spiritual Adam of Genesis 1, there was a perfect unity of male and female. There was a perfect oneness that God had brought forth from his own loin, from his own being, from his own inner man. God brought forth a perfect unity, male and female, in his image. Now, some of you say, well, doesn't it go on to say later in Genesis 2 that God took woman out of man, and doesn't that make man superior? And so on and so on. Without going way into it, I just want to say this, that as you study, that the Hebrew word, as I said, for man is a gender is ish. The Hebrew word for woman is a gender is isha. I s h a the word woman is really from the Latin word womb, man. So that literally what this is saying. Is that this is a she man. God does what we do not understand. In a way we don't understand. All we know how to do is confuse the issue. As I thought about an illustration of this, and there's some cultural overtones here that I hope you'll pass by, for the truth of the illustration is that man and woman, man and woman are like two sides of the same coin. Their nature is the same, but they are different. Or their nature is the same, but they are different. And without either one, the coin isn't complete. Their expressions are different, but they are part of the same. Well, you said. Well, doesn't it say that God created Eve as a help meat? You know, in the original that help meet is two. There are two distinct words. Help is the word that's used 29 times in the Old Testament for God's divine help. And the word meet there has to do with a complementary unity. And so really, what that's saying is. God is divinely helped, uniting, a divinely united one. The emphasis on all this is what I'm trying to get to is that in God's order, there was equality. In the created order of God there was equality, not superiority. Okay, the second misconception. Just a second, Jim. The second misconception is that God gave man dominion over all things, including women. Okay, the affirmation is Genesis 1 again, Verse 28, and God blessed them and said to them, be fruitful and multiply. Or look at verse 126. Let us make men in our image after our likeness in verse 26, and let them have dominion over the Fish of the sea and the birds of the air, let them have dominion. You see, dominion is rulership. One of the exciting things about growing in Christ to me, is that rulership is part of our destiny. That God. You know, you've heard the story about the heavenly harps, right? And I don't know how many of you are looking to find your harp in heaven and go to it, but I have a feeling there's going to be a lot more activity up there of a productive nature than strumming the harps. Because we are created for rulership. We create. We are created to have dominion over the rest of God's creation. And we're going to share in that together. We're going to rule together. But in God's order, that rulership and that dominion and that fruitfulness and that multiplication was a joint affair. God did not say, I create man and he's to rule over everything, including women. No, he said, men and women are to share what in that creative order of dominion and of creativity and of fruitfulness, not him. God created them to rule together. Now again you say, gee, this is. Hard for me to understand. But think about the image later on in the New Testament about Christ and the bride. If this one's tough for you, think about Christ. And we are called his brain bride. And we are multiple upon multiple. And if we get real hung up in the sexual language, here we have female brides and male brides, you see? But spirit transcends that simple sexuality. And God says that we will all. Be collectively his bride. And what is his bride going to do with him, beloved? Revelation 3:21. He who conquers I will have to sit where? On the throne with me. The picture of rulership and dominion, you say? Well, doesn't it say later on that man was to have dominion over the woman? We're going to talk about that in a second. But I want you to see that in God's creative intent, we're still talking about what God first did and what he was saying in that initial act. Look at Genesis 2:20. Even after. By the way, I don't know if I said this, but those two creation accounts have had various sundry interpretations. Personally, it seems to me that the first One in Genesis 1 is the spiritual Adam coming forth. And then the following one where it says that he formed Adam and eve in Genesis 2 is the. Is the physical and fleshing of what he had done in the Spirit. Okay, we could develop that in a whole hour. But that's the basis upon which I'm working. Look what he says here in 2. 24. Therefore, a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife. And they become one flesh. You see, one flesh implies again that unity. Even after God had made Adam and. Eve man and woman, Ish and Isha, they were still to be one flesh acting in unity, to have dominion, to share rulership, to be fruitful. I want to say one last thing. About this point about being fruitful and multiplying. Take a look at that again. Would you look at 126 or 128 rather. What kind of grammatical instruction is the word to have dominion there? I'm sorry, let me start. Verse 28. And God blessed them. And God said to them, be fruitful and multiply. What form is that? English teachers it's an imperative. That is a command. And I want to say to young couples, before you determine that you're not to have children because it interferes with anything else you're to do, you better deal with that. Because it's a command of God to. Be fruitful and multiply. It's a creative ordinance. That's not to say God would never say to a couple, don't have children. A lot of in our society. I was talking to someone yesterday about buying a home, and they said instead, no wonder that young people today don't want to have children because they can't afford it. I'll tell you, we can't afford to usurp the creative ordinances of God. I want to urge you young people, young, married, and those who are about. To be married, deal with this before the Lord before you just arrive at the inconvenience factor that our society would say children are okay. Third misconception. The present order of things as we know them today with man and women. In an inequal relationship has always been that way. The Bible says, Genesis 3:16, your desire shall be for your husband. And that word from God. In my Bible, this is noted. The curse on Eve. The curse of God on Eve. It was the fall of Adam and. Eve that brought forth the inequality that. We today are laboring under. It was the fall of Adam and Eve that changed the course of God's created intention and has lowered us into a different realm. It was the. The fall of Adam and Eve. They're giving in to the temptation of the serpent that has caused the pain of childbearing in women and has caused their desire to be for their husband. That word for desire there. Means, you. Shall be subject to or under the dominion of Your husband. What a tragic thing The Paul was. 2nd Corinthians 11:3 says, look at it. Let's turn back there. 2nd Corinthians 11:3. Paul's saying, but I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. Now, in the King James, it's translated from a simplicity that's in Christ. And that word simplicity, or here it's translated, sincere and pure devotion is the. Word for singleness that we see in Luke 11:34 about the singleness of our eyes. You see, before the Fall, there was. A unity, a singleness between God and. Man, between Adam and Eve and the Lord. But after the fall, there was disunity. And the one tragic thing about the fall was that it separated man from God. And the byproduct of that was that it separated man from woman. Did you get that? The fall separated man from God, and the byproduct was to separate man from woman. And ever since then, we've been laboring under this inequality, this subjection of men and women all through the ages, the headship of men. I want you to hear this because. It'S going to be foreign to some of you. The headship of man was a result of the curse, and the submission of women was a result of the curse. Not in the creation, creative intent of God. And all through the ages, women have been laboring under this. Do you know, I'm sure you women do, that you have it made in. Comparison to women around the world today, and much more so in comparison to women through the ages. Just one illustration. Back in the Roman times, they had a law called patria potestus, patria, the word for father, and potestis, which is. The word for possession. And do you know that a woman was the man's possession? That a woman had no rights at. All, that the woman or the wife never walked in the same side of. The street, never sat in the same room unless she was home, never said anything unless she was given permission. In fact, if a woman committed a. Crime, the husband was brought in. I wasn't all that bad. Total ownership. And it helps me to know that the context of the New Testament was that kind. Of.