In Palin, they merely see political victory, that’s why they can “justify” their support of her. (Their support of her is also quite utilitarian, when you get right down to it.) Then, of course, they must invent a reason why such justification is justifiable :-). Which is this supposed separation of church from the rest of society. I agree that it’s inconsistent. It’s inconsistent because of what’s truly motivating them — a desire to “right” the world, and use whatever means they can. I am certain that if there were a male candidate with Palin’s values, they would have supported him over her.

“Even though the Bible reserves final authority in the church for men, this does not apply in the kingdom of this world.” –CBMW

I would have to ask, as you do, WHY? When they say it’s because the church is eternal and this world is passing away, they are misunderstanding the eternal/temporal split, and seeing it somewhere where it’s not. The form of the church will not continue into eternity, though the souls of the saved (the real church) will. There will be a different order altogether in the Kingdom of God. (The temporal church is by no means “pure”; it is tainted by worldliness as well.)

Thank you so much for your encouragement!  Also welcome to this blog and I hope you find the material and the comments and those who comment here to be very encouraging.

We are hoping that somehow we can cause people to realize the contradictions so that they start to think instead of just following man’s traditions.

Hey! Now that makes sense!

The Danvers Statement was a response to the CULTURE. CBMW has been culture driven since day one. This latest position, with Palin, is more of the same: A response to the culture of Obama.

How medieval.

Just ask the British how well they got along under Margaret Thatcher.

Or, just for fun, Queen Victroria - leader for 64 years, and one of the most flourishing periods in English history.

Trying to make the best of a lost cause by saying, “OK out there, but in the home and in the church, we’ll keep you in a virtual burkha”, doesn’t help even a little.

So Gov Palin, should she get to be VP, would be expected to come home after a hard day helping run the country, and start scrubbing the floors, and bring Mr Palin his coffee and slippers.

I don’t think so.

It is a lost cause.

Over at Kruse Kronicle you wrote, “…This is the time to rethink these hard passages of scripture on the issue of women…”

I posted a link there to Kenneth E. Bailey, “Women in the New Testament”, where (in my opinion) he leaves that tired old argument in the dust. 

And it’s a bit disappointing to hear that these arguments are going on in mainstream churches.  I would expect them from the snake-handlers, but not from educated Christians.

BTW I didn’t change the title as it is meant to be a hook.  I used to advertise short questions/statements in a local newspaper for the phone messages that I prepared for JW’s.  People found the questions to be enticing and I learned how to draw people in so that they would listen to what I had to say.   One JW lady couldn’t stop calling in and listening to the 5 or 6 minute sermons that I had.  She finally left a message that her elder had told her to stop reading my questions in the newspaper.  He said that if she stopped reading the questions that were drawing her in, then she would be able to stop calling and listening to the messages.  Because I received almost 100,000 calls mostly due to the questions that I posted, I have learned that a title doesn’t have to be blah or explain everything you are going to debate.  It just needs to catch the attention.  That is my reasoning and it has worked for me in my ministry to the attention of JW’s and I use it here too with women in ministry.  Make sense?

Thanks for the comments on “piling on”.  I liked “My Cousin Vinnie”.  Very funny and lots to learn about persistence!

Don,
I sent off a couple of emails so will see if anything comes of that.  I also removed the reference to Webb.  I will set that aside and do a separate post another time so that this post remains on one issue alone.  Thanks for the suggestions.  I am always willing to listen and learn and submit to a brother in Christ.

1. The Title is somewhat confusing.  Just say something about consistency in the 3 realms of home, church and society.

2. I think it is useful to keep this discussion about the 3 realms.  You show how CBMW tied them all together in the past, now they are separating one out.

3. I think the discussion of Webb and homosexuality is distracting.

4. What I think REALLY happened was the CBMW wanted to be a “big tent” and get all the non-egals together.  In order to do that, they try to “hint at” the more extreme non-egal views without explicitly stating them and they also try to “hint at” the non-egal view of society, without explicitly saying this is what the Bible commands.  That way they include both the more extreme and less extreme non-egals in their “tent”.  However, some of the more extreme non-egals have now left the CBMW tent and  this freed them from balancing the tent as before.  About the same time, the Rep ticket is more to the liking of many evangelicals than the Dem ticket, BUT for folks that follow CBMW, there could be a concern about voting for Palin, esp. as she has just had a special needs baby.  So they want to remove any possible obstable to for a CBMW follower to voting Rep.

In other words, what they have done is respond to culture and change their theology; this is EXACTLY what they accuse others of doing, which is why they are so sensitive to the claim of inconsistency.