Men and women are different but equal.  Women’s ministry is a unique and distinct ministry to nurture and train them not to cause the word of God to be blasphemed.  This ministry does not exist for itself but for the whole body of Christ.  In other words, there is an understanding that the WoH is to minister to a specific group of women in church.  And at the same time, the WoH ministry promotes the unity of the church.  The nurtured Christian women build their homes to be godly and spiritual, and they contribute to the sound and healthy growth of their church.  It requires the WoH members to consider a few qualities they may want to nurture.

Biblical and Spiritual perspectives for the WoH ministry

When we think of church fellowship groups and ministries, we may employ different perspectives to promote and build them up.  First, some people have a wrong concept and attitude that the ministries need to be personality driven.  This wrong thought and attitude could be implemented and shown both consciously and unconsciously.  Some people have strong personalities.  The strength of strong leaders receives the main focus and driving force behind the ministry.  The focus is on the leader.  A problem is that such leadership and such personality is not transferable.  Unless there is a particular personality driving the ministry, nothing works for such a ministry.  A personality driven ministry can easily become divisive if its leader disagrees with church leadership.  If a women’s ministry is this sort, it will not edify the church and inevitably women will be forced to choose sides.  If a strong character consciously leads the women’s ministry to be under her control, though it conflicts with church leadership, she disunites and disintegrates the body of Christ.  She needs a better understanding of the purpose of her ministry.  In such a case, she receives an opportunity to become a learner to be a good leader.  Strong leaders usually have strong views and opinions, and their views and opinions are not necessarily wrong.  However, when they become opinionated people and stop listening to the church leaders, they privatise their ministry instead of integrating it to be a part of the whole church ministry.  In particular, if a leader of the women’s ministry is not biblically well grounded, her leadership may not be sound, though her intention is good and commendable.  If she is not spiritually mature and not submissive to church authorities, then she is not able to build up an edifying ministry for women and subsequently for the whole church.  An important point we must learn here is that the ones in the leadership positions are also the learners.  God has given them privileges and opportunities not only to serve Him by serving other women, but also to mould their own characters by being humble in service.  If this opportunity was not given to them, they would never learn the lessons they should have learnt.  They have opportunities to be conformed to the image of Christ.  God wants to mould them, other women, and the whole church in the process.  Only to God be the glory!

Second, the WoH ministry is to help and assist women in church (those in a specific age group and life stage) to fulfill their callings and to experience spiritual growth.  God created both male and female (Genesis 1:21) and instructed people according to their callings and stages of life.  Thus, old men and women, and young men and women, do receive instructions accordingly.  Each and every one of us has purposes of life as God endowed, and we all work together as one corporate body to build up one body in Christ.  Thus, (1) the WoH ministry is a “people oriented”, not “program oriented”, ministry.  Programs are necessary to bring everyone into the same activities and ministry, but we do not have to be program centred.  Programs exist for people, not people for programs; (2) the WoH ministry is to offer learning opportunities to improve relationships.  It may sound a bit strange to many of the readers.  Well, I need to bring your attention back to Titus 2:4-5 and encourage you to find the key agenda from it.  In fact, I said it already in the previous article that it is about “relationships” – relationship within the family and within the church community, which could be easily extended to all other social relationships.  I lived and studied in a city which is a part of the so-called Bible-belt region.  There are still many churches in the Bible-belt region, and overall these cities and states are more conservative than other cities and states.  One shocking and surprising finding was that the divorce rate in the Bible-belt region was not lower than non-Bible-belt regions.  Problems in Christian families were not less visible than in non-Christian families.  (a) The WoH fellowship can encourage young women to learn and follow biblical principles.  They could encourage the discouraged and pray for one another.  Mature and spiritual Christian women could be guest speakers to share their thoughts, experiences, and biblical teachings with them.  The WoH ministry will be able to provide such learning and teaching opportunities for family relational issues.  Relationship problems between husband and wife, and between parents and children, are real.  Educating and teaching young women on such issues is a duty of their church.  (b) The WoH ministry promotes cooperative work and spirit.  Its members share their time and efforts for common activities like helping the sick and visiting the shut-ins, and for common goals like growing in prayer life and spiritual understanding.  For such cooperative ministries, they will need to learn to work together.  They come with their own ways of thinking, preferences, or values, with desires to serve the Lord together with others.  Soon they find that their ways are very different from others’ and begin to experience disagreements and conflicts with them.  Some are temperamental, some argumentative, some passively angry, some stubborn and wayward, some meek and humble, some non-decisive, some talkative, some intro-or-extroverted, some shy, some extremely private, some arrogant, some greedy, some timid, some strict, some reliable or not so reliable, some impatient, some distanced from all, some not interested, some sarcastic, or some que sera sera!  Whew, they are so different!  Then, what shall we do?  Should we quit?  The most immature and self-centred choice is to quit and to do nothing, of course. 

How can all of them come together and do something with one mind?  What a good question?  It is intentional and purposeful that God saved all of them and brought them into one body, not only one Universal body but also one local (community) body, His church.  The Twelve disciples of Jesus were all different.  Their characters were different, and sometimes they fought amongst themselves.  However, interestingly very often in the New Testament the apostles of Jesus are called “the Twelve,” as if they were one united team.  Though they were different in many aspects, they grew into being one in Christ.  There was a superseding factor that blurred all of their differences and caused them to cling to one another and to promote oneness among themselves.  It is a Christian spirit, commanded to all followers of Jesus, that is to love one another as Christ loves them. 

Christian women do not learn to love by books, theories, or deep thinking and at the same time by choosing to be alone, isolated from others.  The aged women must teach young women “how to love their husbands” and “how to love their children”.  While every member of their families is together with them, though there are noises, clashes, conflicts, fights, or emotional upheavals, after all they can learn to love one another.  God has put women of different characters and personalities, which is His wisdom not His mistake, in His church.  We all know that there are some people who are a bit difficult to hang out with.  Or, we may be the difficult people making others’ life difficult. 

To be continued …. 

Lovingly,

Your Pastor

More Lively Hope

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