Tomboys, Patriarchy, and Women as Leaders in the Church--Part 3

I hope everyone is still buckled up for this last topic in the title:  Women as Leaders in the Church.  I also hope that the caveats and disclaimers and affirmations that I presented in the first installment are still front and center in readers' minds.  

Please consider what one of my Facebook friends who lives in a Pacific Island country said recently:  “The idea that male/female are two halves of a whole is Greek philosophy.

Rather, "For in Christ lives all the fullness of God in a human body. and in Christ you have been brought to fullness." (Colossians 2:9-10)” - Rebekah Mui

I think she's right to direct our thinking to the idea of each individual being complete (a full person)  in Christ.  The people around us are not half-people in any of the roles they fill as Christians, regardless of whether or not they are male.   In other words, in God's economy, there are no job openings for half-people--only whole people.  Whole-hearted commitment to Christ is truly the first and most basic qualification for being effective in Kingdom work.  Complementarianism (the idea that in the church men and women have separate but complementary roles) may need to move over at least enough to make room for this whole-person reality.  

Tomorrow evening I expect to listen to a sister from our church talk about the church in China.  She has lived and worked in China for many years.  She teaches English to university students, including to some who will likely occupy prominent positions in their country's government some day.  I remember an earlier report when she lamented the fact that so few men are involved in church leadership.  I don't remember the reasons for this, but I do remember praying that the need for male leaders would be supplied.  

Did she or do I think that the women who were apparently involved in leadership in the Chinese church were doing a poor job?  I doubt that this was the case.  I'm guessing that they were hardworking and faithful women who may have felt overwhelmed  sometimes with the responsibility that they had shouldered. Perhaps their other duties were demanding enough to make their added investment in church work almost too much to manage.  Maybe the men were lackadaisical when it came to serving in the church.  Maybe there really are few Christian men in the population.  More likely they were simply not able to step up.  Over the years, many Christians have been imprisoned.  Maintaining a low profile is safer.  Maybe my guesses are way off.  I'll try to update this part of my speculation after tomorrow evening when I'll have a chance to learn more..

I wonder if the apostle Paul wished too for more male help with leadership when he looked at and spoke of leadership in the early church.  Maybe he saw that the women who served with him were overworked and overwhelmed.  In Romans 16, Paul named many of his co-workers.  The majority of them were women.  Among them was Junia, a woman who was prominent among the apostles.  Another was Phoebe, a deacon.  From this distance, and from inside a patriachal society, this seems strange.

Beth Allison Barr writes that the patriarchal society of Rome very quickly was adopted as a model for the early church. In doing so, the fledgling church abandoned its earlier practice of male/female egalitarianism.  Read her article here and see what you think.