a woman pastor? did Jesus redeem that curse of subordination, too?

It took me years to accept the beautiful call of God on my life. Most likely, a lot of the ministry-family-shtuff I witnessed growing up dissuaded me... hmmm...PLUS, there's the issue of women pastors.
To hear Jesus through the not-so-silent screams of 'HERESY' was a painful obstacle for me, and nearly for every other human within reaching distance. Thankfully, my family and close friends had already arrived at redemptive conclusions about women in ministry.

Redemptive? Just take a look at Genesis up till the curse and try to find evidence that women were intended to be subordinate. Remember, that the particular Hebrew word for 'help' for the man in the phrase 'help meet' is a word used almost exclusively as help from God alone...like God was providing a divine conduit for blessing, wisdom and power through the woman. Doesn't sound too subordinate...at a minimum it sounds like a pretty powerful co-equal.

As a related side note, I've been attending some community gathering events focusing on addressing poverty in our area. The groups are attempting to bring diverse clergy members together (I think being a Vineyard/woman/pastor makes me pretty diverse :). We 'clergy' are attempting to partner with secular organizations, hoping that the common ground of concern for poverty will be powerful enough to make a difference. I love this. But I don't love it that I'm the only female pastor in the room. It's interesting sitting around the table with all male pastors. (not too sure if all of them think I'm legit...thatsokay)

At least I have my Vineyard pastora girlfriends. Yep, I said girlfriends. We can be pastors and still refer to our friends as girlfriends. It does not diminish what God is doing. (not even a little bit :)))
I'm beginning to find a peaceful rest in what God has taught me about his intentions and these teachings rest with the redemptive trend of scripture. So, to go back to this redemptive topic, I thought it might be helpful to share a bit more with you. To clarify some things, the 'traditional perspective' is that it's doable to read, understand and live out a 'literal' translation of the Bible. Word for word, not contextualizing or remembering that our best translations are limited...also not admitting that Jesus sacrifice redeemed us from the curse.

My new friend, Scot McKnight, professor and writer, briefly explains the wonder and challenge of the redemptive trend hermeneutic:

"Does the redemptive trend hermeneutic — which asks us to see movement in the Bible and beyond and to take that movement into mind when we apply the Bible –, so: Does the redemptive trend take the Bible from the lay person’s hands or does it make explicit what we (and the Church) have been doing all along? How many of us think it is wrong to wear clothing of two different kinds of material (Lev 19:19)? How many of us think Jesus’ statement to sell our possessions and give to poor (Luke 12:33) is permanent? How many of us think women need to cover their heads (1 Cor 11:6-7)? Now I don’t want to debate specifics, but I do want us to grapple with how we treat such statements and why we treat them the way we do and to ask if we don’t already have a redemptive trend hermeneutic at work but are just uncomfortable with applying it to women in the Church? (I know, that’s a long question.)"

I like Scot. :) I like what the Holy Spirit is doing to blow some dust off our old paradigms. We know people that need Jesus just as much as we do, and it's time for woman who are called and gifted to step up to the plate, lay aside our fear of man, and obey God.