It would be amusing, if it were not so distressing, to note that evangelicals are by no means exempt from the danger of misrepresentating one another.
One such instance involves Andrew Bartlett, author of Men and Women in Christ: Fresh Light From Biblical Texts, and Sharon James, in her review of that book.
…‘According to James: “Throughout his book, Bartlett uses ‘patriarchy’ … as a smear word”. But I don’t use the term “patriarchy” at all.
Vaughan Roberts, in ‘Together in Faith and Love?‘:-
The difference between the moral instincts of contemporary society and the traditional teaching of the Church flows from two different worldviews, both of which could be called gospels, because each claims to present good news which offers an alternative path to freedom and fulfilment. The gospel of ‘expressive individualism’, to use the sociologist Charles Taylor’s term, prizes authenticity as its core value. Jonathan Grant has expressed it well:
…‘Modern authenticity encourages us to create our own beliefs and morality, the only rule being that they must resonate with who we feel we really are.
What are we to make of the Old Testament texts that speak of slavery? They do not offer any outright condemnation of it. So, are we to reject those texts out of hand?
One answer, favoured by many who wish to uphold the authority of Scripture, is to regard these texts as less-than-ultimate in themselves, and pointing towards (without themselves arriving at) the ultimate.
These texts, in other words, are on a trajectory, the end point of which is reached in ‘the law of Christ’, which is the ‘law of love’, and, eventually, to the abolition of slavery.…
It has long been recognised that Paul, in 1 Corinthians, sometimes quotes his opponents before giving his own response to their objections and protestations.
It is generally agreed that Paul has written an earlier letter to this church, and is now addressing issues they have raised in response to that letter. He is, it is thought, voicing their questions and objections back to them in at least the following verses: 1 Cor 6:12, 13; 7:1; 8:1, 8:4; 10:23; and 15:12.…
I have found that egalitarians, and those leaning towards that position, tend to agree that ‘of course, men and women are not identical in every way’, yet seem reluctant to spell out what they think the real differences might be.
Andrew Bartlett (who, though reluctant to be considered either a complementarian or an egalitarian inclines towards the latter position) has in his nearly 400-page Men and Women in Christ less than one page dealing with the question ‘What it means to be male or female’.…
22:6 Train a child in the way that he should go,
and when he is old he will not turn from it.
This well-known proverb has been understood in a variety of ways.
In popular Christian thinking, it is thought to constitute an unconditional promise to parents. It is taken as a guarantee of the success of early training of children. But not a few parents find that, despite their best efforts at bringing up their child ‘in the way he should go’, when he is old he does turn from it. …
Distinguished biblical scholar Walter Brueggeman certainly thinks so.
On the question of human sexuality (and homosexual practice in particular) he finds ‘texts of rigor’ such as Leviticus 18:22, 20:13 and Deuteronomy 23:1 to be incompatible with ‘texts of welcome’ such as Isaiah 56, Matthew 11:28–30, Galatians 3:28 and Acts 10.
One of the problems with Brueggemann’s position, as Ian Paul has pointed out, is that the supposed contradictions are not only between disparate parts of Scripture and different authors. …
Richard Hays points out that the Bible contains no texts about abortion. Those texts which are claimed to be pertinent to the question (Ex 20:13; Deut 5:17; Ex 21:22-25; Psa 139:13-16; Lk 1:44; Gal 5:20 and Mt 19:14) are more or less irrelevant.
However, a broader survey on the biblical material relating to pregnancy and childbearing would yield the following conclusion:
…‘Children are a great blessing from God, and childlessness a terrible affliction. Children are seen as a guarantee of posterity and as a source of economic blessing and security.’
Richard Hays, in his discussion of homosexuality, urges that no discussion of the biblical material can rest content with the few texts which refer directly to it.
We must consider, he says, how Scripture frames the discussion more broadly. At least the following factors should be taken into account:
…(A) GOD’S CREATIVE INTENTION FOR HUMAN SEXUALITY From Genesis 1 onward, Scripture affirms repeatedly that God has made man and woman for one another and that our sexual desires rightly find fulfillment within heterosexual marriage.
Disclaimer: I am not a linguist. But I know (mainly through their writings) a number of people who are. So, obviously, I am relying heavily upon their expertise in what follows.
1 Cor 6:9-11 ‘Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! The sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers, passive homosexual partners, practicing homosexuals, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, the verbally abusive, and swindlers will not inherit the kingdom of God. …
