Edward Heerema, retired pastor living at Cape Coral, Florida begins a series of articles dealing with what promises to be a major issue at the next Christian Reformed synod—the issue of women in church office.

An hour of decision for the Christian Reformed Church is due in June 1981. Then the synod is scheduled to settle the question which in 1978 was wrongly presumed to be settled, namely, the matter of opening the office of deacon to women. Perhaps we ought to say that the Synod of 1981 will be faced with the larger question of opening the special offices in the church to women, that is, the offices of minister, elder and deacon, for it is no doubt correct to say that the opening of the office of deacon to women means the opening of all the offices to them. This is especially so because of our common practice of having deacons sit with the elders and minister on the ruling council of the congregation.

From 1970 On

The issue of women in office first came before the Christian Reformed Church in 1970. It did not arise out of the life and concern of the church itself. It ca me by way of a recommendation from the Reformed Ecumenical Synod that synod appoint a committee “to examine in the light of Scripture the general Reformed practice of excluding women from the various ordained offices of the church.” (Note the delicate prejudice in the word excluding.) It is significant that the Reformed Ecumenical Synod (meeting in 1968) decided by a close vote (25-22) that “it is the plain and obvious teaching of Scripture that women are excluded from the office of ruling and preaching elders.” It is also interesting to observe that the Reformed Ecumenical Synod decided that “member churches should be cautious to proceed in the direction of the entrance of women into the diaconal office“ (Acts of Synod 1970, p. 346). Synod 1970 decided to appoint the committee asked for in the recommendation rising out of the Reformed Ecumenical Synod.

The committee appointed in 1970 reported in 1973. This committee in its recommendations to synod declared that “the practice of excluding women from ecclesiastical office cannot conclusively be defended on biblical grounds.” But synod, following the lead of its advisory committee, felt that the report left too many important questions unanswered, and so decided to appoint a new committee to report in 1975.

The new committee, reporting in 1975, recommended that synod adopt the following: “Biblical teaching is not opposed in principle to the ordination of women to any office that men may hold in the church.” But synod’s advisory committee, subjecting the report to a thorough analysis, judged that “the material of the report does not support the conclusions which are drawn from it.” Synod 1975 then declared that “the practice of excluding women from the ecclesiastical offices recognized in the Church Order be maintained unless compelling biblical grounds are advanced for changing that practice.” Synod further decided that “sufficient biblical grounds have not been advanced to warrant a departure” from the present practice of the church. (It should be noted that 31 delegates had their negative votes recorded on the first declaration of synod, but only 8 delegates recorded their negatives votes on the second more substantive decision.)

Synod’s advisory committee (in 1975) pinpointed a problem that seriously affected the interpretation of biblical material bearing on the issue of women in office, especially in the case of statements by the apostle Paul. The problem is this: What in Paul’s statements bearing on the place of women in the church is conditioned by the culture of his time and what in his statements is expressive of enduring divine teaching? Synod accordingly appointed a committee “composed of Old Testament and New Testament scholars to undertake a study of the hermeneutical principles which are involved in the proper interpretation of the relevant Scripture passages. . . .”

This committee on hermeneutical principles reported in 1978, and concluded its report with the recommendation that “consistories be allowed to ordain qualified women to the office of deacon.” A minority report recommended the same with the added clause, “provided that their work is distinguished from that of elders.” The recommendation of the minority report was adopted. Synod also adopted an amendment to Article 3 of the Church Order in line with the opening of the office of deacon to women, with the understanding that the amendment “be ratified by the Synod of 1979.”

An Avalanche of Protest

Synod 1979 received an unprecedented avalanche of overtures on the decisions of 1978, most of them taking issue with the decision to open the office of deacon to women. Many of the overtures also expressed disfavor with the failure of Synod 1978 to make clear that no implementation of its decision could take place until the churches had opportunity to reflect on the change in the Church Order (as called for in Article 47 of the Church Order), and the change had been ratified by the next synod. In response to this storm of protest from the churches, Synod 1979 appointed a new committee to “review without prejudice the 1978 report on ‘Hermeneutical Principles . . .’ and the decision of the Synod of 1978 regarding the ordination of women as deacons.” The committee was instructed to report in 1981.

Worthy of special note is the decision of Synod 1979 to “defer decision with respect to ratification of the proposed wording of Church Order Article 3 and its Supplement, and instruct consistories to defer implementation of the 1978 decision, until the study committee has rendered its report to synod, and the churches have had opportunity to consider its recommendations.” We assume that everything after the word “until” in that decision refers to both parts of the action to “defer.” If that is the case, final action can probably not be expected until 1982. But Synod 1981 will have to take some decisive action.

What Will Synod Say – To The World?

What action will Synod 1981 take? What will the Synod say? That is the question to which this article in part addresses itself and to which three subsequent articles will address themselves. The question is sub-divided as follows: What will Synod 1981 say—to the world, to women, to the church, to God?

Does synod concern itself with the world in seeking to deal with a matter such as whether the church should ordain women to the special offices in the church? Isn’t this simply and exclusively the church’s business? What does the “world” have to do with this question?

To be sure, as the church wrestles with a pressing issue and seeks to arrive at a biblical answer it is not particularly concerned about what the world may think of the decision in the case. Nor, on the other hand, are we to think that the world is waiting with bated breath to hear what the church has to say on the matter of women as deacons. However, we can be assured that segments of the secular media will take note of the church’s action in this matter, largely because of the current preoccupation in the media with women’s rights and “woman’s lib.”

There is more to be said at this point. The church does not exist in a vacuum. It exists in the world, the world to which it is called to be witness. The church must be light and it must be salt in the world as that world may present itself at any point in its history. The church would do well always to remember this, also in its decision-making in the assemblies.

The church today exists in a world in which there is much cultural and social unrest with the attendant brokenness and pain. Following the example of our Savior and Lord, the church must ever have a deep feeling of compassion for a world thrashing about in a welter of problems of its own making. Like Christ let His church feel deep compassion for these masses of men that are so much like sheep without a shepherd.

Two Points of Testimony

In coming to a decision on the question of women in the office of deacon how will Synod 1981 witness to the world? What kind of testimony will it raise? Will the Synod raise a testimony that can be just a bit helpful to a culture beset by all sorts of social and personal problems? There are at least two matters that are at the center of much current unrest, matters on which Synod 1981 can raise a positive testimony by its decision on women in office. These two points of testimony are as follows:

1. Will Synod make clear that there is a sure, infallible and authoritative guide by which people can walk with certain step and clear direction through the maze of life, in the 1980’s as well as in hundreds of years gone by? 2. Will Synod say that this sure, infallible and tested guide gives to society’s basic unit, the family, a structure and character by means of which it can operate in such a way that all involved can live their lives in orderly fulfillment, to the blessing of mankind?

More discussion on these two matters is to appear in future articles. At this point we ask whether Synod 1981 will clearly enunciate the infallible, authoritative character of the Bible. Or will synod say that the Bible has been so affected and so conditioned by the cultural forces prevalent in the day in which it was written that its teaching on the place of women in the official life of the church is no longer to be understood to say what that teaching so clearly seems to say to the average devoted reader? If synod says the latter it will reinforce the worldling’s assumption that the Bible is a relic of a less enlightened past, and his flounderings in the sea of relativism and existentialism will become just a bit more frantic and a bit more hopeless.

Or perhaps synod, while maintaining the authoritative infallibility of Scripture, will make that avowal without substance for many by asserting that one cannot understand the Bible’s teaching such as that bearing on women in office unless he has knowledge of a sophisticated theory of biblical hermeneutics that really only a select number of advanced Bible scholars are privy to. Such declaration by synod would compromise the church’s cherished positions on the perspicuity (clarity) of Scripture and the universal priesthood of believers, would in effect remove the Bible a long step away from the grasp of the “little people” in the Kingdom, and would tend to make distribution of the written Word to unbelievers an exercise in futility.

 

Synod 1981 and the Family

The family, the basic and most important unit of society, is under heavy attack from all sides today. Easy and frequent divorce, single–parent situations by choice, cohabitation without the legal and moral sanction of marriage ceremony, sexual promiscuity, facets of the woman’s lib movement, undue stress on individual rights, economic pressures, a flood of morally tainted television fare—these are just some of the many forces at work today undermining the family. Will Synod 1981 in dealing with the issue of women in office, after ten years of reflection, say something that will be supportive of the family? Or will it in some measure add to the forces damaging the family?

Central to the whole issue of women in office is the matter of “headship,” as the discussions of the past ten years amply show. Synod 1978 seemed to be saying that women cannot be elders and ministers because their being such would violate the headship of the man over the woman. Therefore that synod decided that consistories could ordain qualified women to the office of deacon “provided that their work is distinguished from that of elders.” But this well-meant proviso did not solve the problem, but rather called attention to the depth of the problem. It seems evident that within the present system of church government in force in the Christian Reformed Church women cannot be ordained as deacons if regard for the headship principle is to be maintained. If women are to sit on the church council they must inevitably participate in forming many decisions having to do with the ruling of the congregation. In actual practice there are situations in which deacons have as much to say as elders about matters of church government.

Will synod’s decision in 1981 come down strong and clear on this matter of headship? Or will it render only lip–service to this important biblical principle? If the Synod speaks with clarity and firmness on this issue, it will be raising a testimony to a world in which support for the family structure is desperately needed. That testimony cannot, of course, bear on all aspects of the erosion of the family today. But such clear, positive testimony could be helpful to those many who are voicing their concern over the breakdown of the family and who are asking for stronger families. Such testimony can be helpful to those who are calling for a strong father-figure who can do his part in a proper family structure to supply that loving discipline so widely seen as sorely lacking, a father–figure who also can do much to help growing children achieve that sense of personal identity that is wanting in so many of today’s troubled youth. Will Synod 1981 raise such a clear, positive testimony?

Edward Heerema is a retired Christian Reform ed pastor living at 619 S.E. 32nd St., Cape Coral, Florida 93901,.