Two weeks ago, I listed twenty commands found in the Bible and challenged you to decide whether they were meant to be applied to every culture in every time or whether they were only meant for the particular cultural context in which they were written.  As hard as that task was, I think the harder task was to provide an answer to the “why” question – if you don’t believe a command is meant to be taken literally today, why do you believe that? 

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Do you ever wish God had been a little more clear about life and faith in the Bible?  I mean, there is a lot of material in the Bible, wouldn’t you say?  So why does it seem to leave so many questions unanswered?  Sometimes I think that if I were God, I could have done a better job putting together the most important book ever written.  I mean, did we really need 1&2 Chronicles AND 1&2 Kings, when they cover so much of the same material?  And what about Judges?  When was the last time anyone really read Judges and had a life-changing experience?  I think that if I had been in charge, I would have taken out Judges and replaced it with a much more important book – “How to Know my Will.”  And, with all the space I would have saved cutting out 1&2 Chronicles, I would have had room to include two other crucial books: “How to have a Perfect Marriage” and “How to Raise Perfect Children.” 

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Somewhere along the line you’ve probably heard someone say that “People can make the Bible say whatever they want it to say.”  And unfortunately, there’s a lot of truth to that.  Over the years, people have used the Bible to defend everything from spousal abuse to slavery and to argue everything from a flat earth to the sun revolving around the earth.  One person will defend capital punishment by quoting Genesis 9:6 – “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man”, while another will quote Jesus in Matthew 7:1 – “Do not judge, or you too will be judged” – to argue that it should be abolished.  You have some Christians who are convinced that God wants us to be rich - “for your sakes [Jesus] became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich” (2 Corinthians 8:9) – while others sure that a true Christian will avoid wealth at all costs – “Sell your possessions and give to the poor” (Luke 12:33).

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Last year, when our church was appointing elders, the question was raised whether or not women could be elders at NewLife.  Historically, our church has only allowed men to be considered for the role of pastor or elder.  In this decision, we have stood with many other evangelical churches in how we have interpreted the Biblical texts about church leadership.  Last year, however, the elders wisely decided that this interpretation was worth a closer look, and as a result I will be preaching through a series on what the Bible really says about men and women beginning the week after Easter.  My hope is to deal with not only gender roles in church, but the role of a husband and wife in marriage, as well as anything else the Bible has to say about gender roles. 

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