Men, Obey God and Lead
W hen people talk about the role of women in the church—in particular in leadership positions—we frequently hear them mention Deborah. The argument is that since Deborah was a judge then women can be preachers. I don’t want to take anything away from Deborah because she is a very important figure in the history of the Jews, but I don’t believe we can extrapolate from what Deborah did that what Paul said with the inspiration of God is wrong. The Bible never says that everything Deborah did was right or was what God saw as ideal. It just says that is the way it was. Many who invoke the name of Deborah do so outside the context of her story, saying only that Deborah was a judge. In Judges 4 (That in itself should tell us to be careful. The judges all had questionable natures.) we find Deborah under a palm tree, where the children of Israel came up to her for judgment. Clearly she was a respected woman, but in the narrative we see that this wasn’t supposed to be Deborah’s story at all. S...