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Book Review: Paul, Women, and Wives
by Captain Stephanie Larrick
USA East, Medina, Ohio Corps Officer
Paul, Women, & Wives: Marriage and Women’s
Ministry in the Letters of Paul
by Craig S. Keener
As I, along with half of the rest of the
country, rediscovered C.S. Lewis this past December, I was
disturbed to discover that he did not believe women should be
part of the war. Research shows he was intentional about
giving his female characters weapons that kept them away from
the real battle. He thought women and war were an ugly
combination.
So I questioned, “If dear old C.S. Lewis thought it and wrote
it, could it be right?” Was I in the war out of my own
desires, my own self-serving feminism, rather than to please
God? To disagree felt like spitting on my own grandpa.
Then my personal battle-mate, my dear husband, tossed a book
in front of me and said, “You’ll like this one.” It was Paul,
Women, & Wives: Marriage and Women’s Ministry in the Letters
of Paul by Craig S. Keener. The overall theme seems to be:
good exegesis is all that stands between a passive,
let-my-husband-preach, damsel in distress and hard-fighting,
God-called-me-too, warrior princess.
To understand the classic, “controversial passages,” is to be
empowered to preach and live as God intended His servants to
do. Keener carefully dissects each passage, weighs the pro’s
and con’s of the more common interpretations in light of
historical facts and research, and comes to logical
conclusions for each. Keener shows that as a woman, I am not
called to cover my head because of my natural inferiority to
my male counterparts, but rather exercise modesty in worship
that will help others completely focus on God.
As Keener cuts through these passages which stand between
women and empowerment like Sleeping Beauty’s prince cutting
through the entangling branches in the evil forest, we can
clearly see that he is not cutting through them for the sake
of the princess herself, but in order to bring the other half
of the army into battle for his King.
This book is not light reading, but it is important reading. I
have recommended it to people of other denominations, and I
recommend it to you as a way to better understand God’s plans
for women in the war.
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