The above pic is from a classic episode of the classic “I Love Lucy” TV show in which Lucy and Ethel take a job in a candy factory. Watching them trying to keep up with the conveyer belt is hilarious.  
Watching John MacArthur’s response to a question at the “Truth Matters Conference” held at his church October 16-18 is distressing.  

The very influenctial pastor, leader, author, was asked to give a gut reaction to a one- or two-word phrase.   The phrase was “Beth Moore,” the name of a well-known Southern Baptist Bible teacher.  MacArthur’s response was “Go home. ” 

The attendees at the conference “Amened” applauded and laughed their approval of his response.  

MacArthur went on to accuse the Southern Baptist Convention of no longer believing in biblical authority because they were, in his opinion, taking a “headlong plunge” toward allowing women preachers at its annual meeting this summer. 

Oh my. You can read more about his statement here.

Christians have been beating up each other and others for centuries. But for MacArthur to pick a fight with the SBC kind of makes me laugh – maybe to keep from crying.  The SBC and MacArthur’s organization are two of the most conservative Christian groups on the planet.  I guess the SBC isn’t conservative enough for John MacArthur.  

I don’t see the SBC allowing women preachers. Maybe I should not be so pessimistic.   They did, afterall, abandon their views on slavery.   On the matter of women-preachers/pastors, right  now, the following views of these SBC leaders represent, I think, the view of the SBC.  

“For a woman to teach and preach to adult men is to defy God’s Word and God’s design,” wrote Owen Strachan, professor of Christian theology at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Mo. 

R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky, piped in with, “There’s just something about the order of creation that means that God intends for the preaching voice to be a male voice.”  

So, I don’t get the beef MacArthur has with the SBC.  I guess he just really, really, does not like Beth Moore preaching.  

From this whole, sad mess, let’s create something happy and helpful. Let’s approach it with the philosophy of Bob Ross: “We don’t make mistakes, just happy little accidents,”

The “happy little tree” that comes out of this for me is a new way of determining my ethics. 

Some friends and I were discussing this morning through our “Theology through Texting” group my teaching from yesterday in which I spoke of the evolved ethics regarding Domestic Violence.  I showed pictures of print-advertisements that were horribly offensive yet, in the 50s, must have been perfectly acceptable.  

We’ve evolved. Thankfully.  

Tragically, much of the misogynistic views and subsequent treatment of women came from a “biblical ethic” – an ethic that sees women as property, as “under” a man (1 Corinthians 11:3), who is to “obey” her husband (1 Peter 3:6) in the same way that slaves “obey” their masters (Ephesians 6:5) or children “obey” their parents (Ephesians 6:1). It is a view that women are “not to have authority over a man” (2 Timothy 2:12).  

Most of culture has evolved beyond this ethic.  Much of western Christianity has not.  Why not?  

Why have Christians been so slow to evolve in regard to science, in condemning and abolishing slavery, in embracing the equality of the races and gender equality?  

Here’s a thought.  Just a thought.  Christianity – at least the Protestant version of Christianity – has been shaped by a book more  than a spiritual connection with God within, the spirit.    We see it in phrases such as “Biblical worldview” “Biblical authority” and so many other things to which the prefix “biblical” is attached.

Maybe there’s a better way.  The way of the Spirit.  

In his conversation with Nicodemus, Jesus tells him that “the spirit moves (blows, changes) where it wishes (wills, desires, wanting what is best)” – John 3:8.  The Spirit moves –  is fluid – is active.  The Greek of John 3:8 is literally, “The pneuma pnei.”  “The spirit spirits.”  “The wind winds.”  

The spirit (wind) moves.  

A book is stagnant.  It sits on a shelf.  

Maybe that’s why the writer to the Hebrews says the Word is active – living (Hebrews 4:12).  The “word” here is not a book.  It is the Christ of John 1:1.  Still speaking of the “word” in 4:13, the writer uses the masculine pronoun and says, “no creature is hidden from him.” The word is not a book.  The word is Jesus (see also 4:14-15).

If Christians took their cues from the spirit rather than a book, maybe we’d be quicker to evolve (move, blow, change).

 I have 7 of MacArthur’s books in my library that I purchased, read, and from which I preached in what seems to be another life.  I liked him.  But today, I’m sad. I’m sad for him. I’m sad for the state of Christianity. 

I want to evolve.  To move with the spirit.  To change with the spirit.  To, as Paul says to the Galatians in 5:25 of his letter, “keep in step with the spirit.”  The spirit is moving.  Am I keeping up?