Even if you’re only paying half-attention, there is a lot of news, content and awareness on the poor treatment of women right now. Frankly, it’s difficult not to be sensitive to what’s happening. Bad news is bad news but what’s even worse is to not learn from these hurt-filled moments so that people can be helped now and that pain can be limited or even avoided in the future. 

To recap the context I’m working through:

Back in April, news broke of 200 school girls in Nigeria were kidnapped in one day. Some have escaped, while the whereabouts of most are still unknown. As a result, the #BringBackOurGirls campaign was born (and shown to be effective). But we ask ourselves, how do we live in such a world? This is absolutely mind-boggling to an outsider like me.

Two weeks ago we read reports from Egypt of women who were sexually assaulted during the inauguration celebration. Make no mistake, these sexual attacks are political statements which brings back the question, what kind of a world do we live in?

Stateside, our heads are spinning from the news of Bob Jones University faculty telling a rape victim to repent of her sin. The link is to a story about a young woman who was assaulted at her summer job, then began college, shared her story, and was advised by faculty to repent because there’s “sin under sin.” Stupid advice is sinful too.  [Read more…]

[Been out of pocket this week – a few belated postings going up in the next few days.]:

Most days I feel like a good father but I’m just being humble. It turns out, I’m actually “The #1 Daddy.” My six year old confirmed this for me in writing and I can produce this document at a moment’s notice.

I’m tempted to set it all on cruise-control but in a moment of self-awareness, I thought maybe I’d reflect on the goodness and the challenges of fatherhood.  I’m thinking about my personal joys, I’m thinking of two friends celebrating their first father’s day among a few other scenes featuring fathers and grandfathers playing out in my head.

This Father’s Day, I was surrounded by my family, my wife, my children, my own father and mother, brother, sister and her husband and kids. We’re vacationing together and it all fell on Father’s Day weekend. We all live in different parts of the country now so these days are special.

If we’re local or Facebook friends, you know we just announced that Susan and I are expecting baby number 4. If you don’t know us, we’re a couple who spent 6 years in fertility treatments, quit them and adopted our first [Read more…]

My least favorite excuse these days is the “slippery slope” argument. It goes something like, “If you bend or change your mind on this, then you’ll have to do the same for everything else. And then you’ll end up in chaos and destruction. Therefore it’s best to avoid the slippery slope.” In my mind is a particular context that I want to be sensitive to. It affects people I agree with, people I disagree with and I have friends on both sides. Still, I feel the need to call it out.

First, the slippery slope feels like a modern day boogieman for adults who, pardon my saying so, are afraid to change their minds. I’m struck by how unhelpful a Google search of “slippery slope” turns up. From my perspective, It’s a lot fear language preached from a loftier and often overly-conservative position.

[Read more…]

I had the opportunity to write our church’s small group study this week. We create every other week based on the text the sermon will be preaching and while the study is not always sermon centric, the guide aims to study the passage through small group discussion. We’re big believers in the importance of Scripture in community.

Also, it must be mentioned, the sermon this past Sunday was incredible. Our pastor, Bryan, gave one of the clearest and strongest messages for the egalitarian position that I’ve heard. He includes his “conversion” from complementarianism to egalitarianism, his look at I Timothy 2:-15, and a fantastic historical understanding of evangelicalism and the role of women. I had no idea how mindful early evangelicalism was to include women in leadership and am shocked at its regression. Here’s the link to the video or if you prefer, audio only.

So the text for my study was the infamous 1 Timothy 2:1-15 and here are a few of my reflections from [Read more…]