I finished Women’s Ministry in the Local Church by Ligon Duncan and Susan Hunt a few weeks ago, but it is hard to know how to condense everything I’d like to say about it. I typed out many of the quotes I marked so I could have them handy to refer to without flipping back and forth through the book, and just those quotes took up almost three pages, which is much too long for a blog post! So I think I’ll just give you a brief overview of the book and then mention a few things I really liked about it and a couple I didn’t like so much.

The authors first set out the need for such a book to help women to teach other women as Titus 2 instructs, to present the Biblical role of womanhood as opposed to the feminist view promoted by the world, and to promote the necessity and nobility of women’s roles. The authors had found resources teaching many aspects of a woman’s relationship to Christ and women’s groups a para-church organizations, but not one integrating the women’s ministry to the church ministry as a whole. Furthermore, in some churches which do have some type of women’s ministry, that ministry is “event-, task-, or personality-driven. An inherent danger is that any ministry that is not Biblically informed will eventually become competitive and divisive” (p. 31). Ligon Duncan has an excellent section on “Why a Church Needs a Women’s Ministry” in pages 37-42.

After discussing the need and motives of women’s ministry, the authors lay out the foundations and tasks of a healthy women’s ministry and the relationship of the women’s ministry to the rest of the church.

The authors promote a complementarian position, the view “that God created men and women equal in being but assigned different — but equally valuable — functions in His kingdom, and that this gender distinctiveness complements, or harmonizes, to fulfill His purpose” (p. 32), and part of that distinction is “male spiritual leadership in the home and believing community, the Church” (pp. 32-33). A couple of quotes I especially appreciated along these lines were:

Submission has nothing to do with status. Submission is about function. Equality of being and differentiation of function characterize the Trinity. The Persons of the Godhead are ‘the same in substance, equal in power and glory,” but each has a different function in the accomplishment of our salvation (p. 73).

Submission does not restrain women. Submission frees us to accomplish our kingdom purpose (p. 78).

Domestic duties are not a hindrance to sanctification; they are essentials of the common life. The family is a context in which to develop godly character that will qualify women for service beyond hearth and home. When love for Christ is the matrix of domesticity, those duties become an aroma of Christ, the fragrance of life (2 Corinthians 2:15-16) (p. 106).

Since I’ve started sharing quotes, let me see if I can pick out a few of the most pertinent from the three pages I gleaned:

When young women learn more about womanhood from TV, movies, magazines, and the Internet than they do from mature older women, they will often make unbiblical decisions. (p. 53)

Christ, not womanhood or the women’s ministry, must be the reference point. Unless a woman’s ministry is an overflow of the gospel, women will become hinderers and nor helpers in God’s Church. Those who plan for and implement a women’s ministry must be intentional in maintaining a gospel orientation in their hearts and lives (p. 58).

Paul put heavy emphasis on sound doctrine. Sound doctrine is the antidote for error. Sound, which is the key word in these letters, is translated from a Greek word that means whole or healthy. “Christian doctrine is healthy in the same way as the human body is healthy. For Christian doctrine resembles the human body. It is a coordinated system consisting of different parts which relate to one another and together constitute a harmonious whole. If therefore our theology is maimed (with bits missing) or diseased (with bits distorted) it is not ‘sound’ or ‘healthy'” (pp. 59-60).

Titus 2:3-5 instructs the pastor to equip older women to train younger women. If this mandate is disconnected from a biblical perspective of discipleship, it can easily become purely a relational model that magnifies relationship rather than God’s glory, or an academic model that elevates knowledge over the application of the gospel into life (p.60-61).

Without in any way discounting the regular pulpit ministry of the church, we should recognize that there are certain matters more aptly addressed and applied in the context of a specific discipleship of women, whether in large groups, in small groups, or in situations of confidentiality, as women minister to women (p. 84).

The goal is not to get every woman to participate in the women’s ministry, but for the women’s ministry to serve and encourage every woman in the church (p. 111.)

Commenting on Psalm 144:12b: “that our daughters may be as corner stones, polished after the similitude of a palace”: These corner pillars were both beautiful and functional. They gave grace and dignity to the structure even as they supported it. If these pillars weakened, the structure was in danger. David considered these corner pillars to be gifts from God…Unless corner pillars stand on a firm foundation, they will topple. p. 138.

At the end of each chapter is a short testimony from pastors or women about some aspect discussed in the previous chapter. One of the most interesting and enlightening to me were a couple from women in reference to being in a church that did not see the importance of a women’s ministry, or, in some cases, did not even seem to love women:

How are women to love the church when they feel unloved by the church? I have found the answer in Scripture’s admonition to women who are married to unbelieving or disobedient husbands. The failure or weakness of male leadership does not absolve us of our responsibility. We are to run to the Author and Perfecter of our faith with our hurts, wounds, and disappointments. We are to see this season as part of our individual and corporate sanctification offered by our sovereign God who loves us steadfastly. (p. 52-53).

When women are scorned and disrespected by the philosophies of ministry that denigrate the design, calling, and roles of women, we are tempted to react with militant defensiveness. Scripture calls us to remember that Jesus, the King of the Church, delights in us. We are not called to defend ourselves but to defend Christ’s Kingdom through prayer and service. (p. 53).

The “militant defensiveness” stood out to me because I know of a handful of women who have that exact tone in pointing out perceived errors in the church and their voices and tone have become so shrill and bitter that they are doing much more harm than good. If the church is a family, a body, then dealing with problems is not best handled by “militant defensiveness.” That doesn’t mean those problems don’t need to be addressed, but there are better, more restorative and Christ-honoring ways to do it.

There are appendices in the back discussing some practical aspects of women’s discipleship ministries and Bible studies.

There were just a few things I either did not agree with or care for.

• On page 75 a quote from a Dr. George Knight that “”Eve…brought herself into transgression by abandoning her role and taking on that of the man.” I don’t think that was her sin or even what led to her sin necessarily: her sin was simply disobeying God’s clear command; her motives: the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life.

• This one is perhaps a minor point, but on pages 102-103 there is a section about widows which interprets I Timothy 5:3-10 as referring to two different groups of widows, those who receive church help and those who are a group qualified to minister to others. I had never heard that before, but I don’t see a distinction between two groups there: I believe it is all one group of widows and the lists actions there show what they have done, what they are being honored for, not what they are signing up to do (not that older women should not keep ministering in some way as long as they are able, but that’s another post I am thinking about).

• On page 140 the authors say, “Bible studies should equip women to pass on the legacy of biblical womanhood to the next generation and should offer opportunities for them to have hands-on experiences in discipling one another.” I agree, but I don’t think that means Bible studies among women can only cover these topics or the passages that relate directly to women. I think studying books or other topics can be covered and is part of the foundation on which women’s ministry rests, and principles of womanhood can be brought out. Later they warn against a “prideful pursuit of knowledge…that stops short of true discipleship that moves from knowledge to wisdom — to the application of truth into life. They have perfected some Bible study skills, but they do not know how to love as godly, chaste single women, or love their husbands, or care for the sick and oppressed, or support the male leadership of the church…” and more (pp. 140-141). I do think that’s a valid concern.

• Related to the above point, there is a section where a pastor compliments the women’s Bible study ministry in his church for coordinating with the pulpit ministry. For instance, when he preached a series on “David: A Man After God’s Own Heart,” the ladies’ Bible study ministry did a study on “A Woman After God’s Own Heart.” I think that’s really neat when that kind of coordination occurs, but again, I don’t think the ladies’ Bible study should be restricted to that kind of coordination any more than the Sunday School classes or children’s ministry or men’s meetings should. Sometimes it’s helpful when every aspect of the church is focused on a particular truth, topic, or section of the Bible, but in most cases it is helpful when the different groups study different parts of Scripture: it’s part of studying the whole counsel of God and balancing the different parts of Scripture. I’ve found that helpful even in my own Bible study or reading: if I am in a particular “heavy” section, like Job or the prophets, it helps to read a Psalm or something from the epistles as well.

• I was surprised to find little mention of hospitality in the book. It’s implied but not really discussed much. As I mentioned in Mentoring Women, I think it hospitality is a primary way women can disciple and minister to each other; I don’t know that Paul primarily had classroom instruction and retreats in mind when he penned those verses, though I think it’s fine to use those.

• Susan’s writing can be a bit clinical sometimes. I felt this way in her chapters of Becoming God’s True Woman as well (which I thought I had reviewed, but looking back, I just referred to it a number of times.)

• This last point is one I want to be the most careful with because I don’t want to cause offense. Let me say first that, though I am in my particular denomination because I feel it best represents my understanding of what Scripture teaches, I know no denomination is flawless, and I can get along fine with people from other denominations if we agree on the major points: the Deity of Christ, the inspiration of Scripture, salvation by grace through faith and not by works we do, etc. Many blogs and books I read are by people from other denominations than my own. I can understand that good people can differ on some areas of teaching and application and still do everything they do as unto the Lord and be in right standing with Him.

One of those differences in some denominations is looking at God’s dealings with people through either a covenantal or a dispensational lens. This post is too long already to explain those two views and you can easily find them elsewhere, so I won’t go into all the differences. I can actually see elements of both: there are covenants God made with people throughout history that affected people for years to come, and the New Testament does refer to God’s relating to us through a “new covenant.” But, though God is always the same and people have always been saved by faith, there are different times in the Bible God had different specific requirements for His people. For instance, in our day we don’t have the same command as Adam and Eve not to eat of a certain tree, or the same requirements Old Testament Israel did with the ceremonial law. So while I would probably lean toward a more dispensational view, I certainly don’t discount the covenants and can see Biblical history through that lens as well. I can read books and blogs with those differences without a problem at all.

But this book is very, very, very heavily covenantal. Susan uses the phrases “covenantal community” and “covenantal consciousness” multitudes of times throughout the book to refer to the relationship believers in a church should have with each other. Those phrases are probably infused with meaning to her, but to me they just leave me a little cold. Just taken at face value, a covenant is a binding agreement between people. So relating to each other based on an agreement just doesn’t carry the same meaning to me as the Scriptural metaphors of the church being a family and a body, with different parts and functions all working together in a harmonious whole. Those metaphors are mentioned but not emphasized in the book. Susan  urges women’s ministry leaders to use those phrases to remind and emphasize to women their covenant relationship with each other, but the overuse of them in this book seemed to me to be an irritant and a shoving of the concept down the throat. I wouldn’t have had as much of a problem with it if she simply stated her view of the church as a covenantal community at the beginning and then went on without using those phrases so very often.

The time and space to explain all of that might seem to give it more weight than intended: it’s not really a major objection and not even an objection, really: I just think the emphasis of the type of community and relationship we’re to have with each other as believers would be better served with the more Scriptural phrases of the church being a body than the denominational phrases of “covenant community” and “covenant consciousness.” I think Susan probably means the same thing by those phrases, but to someone outside a covenantal type of denomination, it just doesn’t come across the same. Her writing is so heavily denominational, it might be off-putting to those from different denominations, but there is much good to glean if you don’t let that phraseology bother you.

It might look like I objected to more than I agreed with, but that is not really the case: it just took a bit more to explain the disagreements, and I didn’t bring out every single point I did agree with. Overall I found the book to be a rich resource and agreed with the great majority of the teaching and application. I would recommend it to anyone contemplating women’s ministry in the church.

(This review will also be linked to Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books.)