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    Beyond Gender: An Essay with Sermons on Women
    Beyond Gender: An Essay with Sermons on Women
    Beyond Gender: An Essay with Sermons on Women
    Ebook126 pages1 hour

    Beyond Gender: An Essay with Sermons on Women

    By M.R. Hyde

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    About this ebook

    Does God call women into traditional and non-traditional ministry? Can they preach? How have women been used by God in the past? Read an essay on the role of women in Christian history and how the discovery of these women expanded the understanding of the role of women in the Church for the author. Then read sermons about women to further your Biblical understanding of the role of women in Christian leadership.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherM.R. Hyde
    Release dateOct 17, 2015
    ISBN9781310646287
    Beyond Gender: An Essay with Sermons on Women
    Author

    M.R. Hyde

    M.R. Hyde celebrates and explores the known and spiritual world by writing for Christian religious purposes and by penning fiction for the sheer joy of words. She is also an active artist.View the online gallery now at https://www.redbubble.com/people/mrHydeArt/shop.

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      Book preview

      Beyond Gender - M.R. Hyde

      BEYOND GENDER

      An Essay with Sermons on Women

      M. R. HYDE

      2015

      Copyright 2015 M.R. Hyde

      Smashwords

      Edition

      ISBN: 9781310646287

      Other Books by M.R. Hyde

      Non-Fiction

      Exploring the Nicene Creed

      Exploring the Lord’s Prayer

      6 Verses for Preaching: A Primer for New Preachers

      Who is God? A Devotional Journey Through Genesis and Exodus

      Who is Jesus? A Devotional Journey Through the Gospel of Matthew

      Who is the Holy Spirit? A Devotional Journey Through the Book of Acts

      Fiction

      She: Stories of a Woman

      Mercy and Truth: A Collection of Short Stories

      Wife of Lappidoth: A Mountain Tale

      Tall Pauley

      Pockets and Other Unusual Stories

      Smashwords Edition, License Notes

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy.

      Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 Biblica. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved. The NIV and New International Version trademarks are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica.

      Use of either trademark requires the permission of Biblica.

      Other Books by M.R. Hyde

      Non-Fiction

      Exploring the Nicene Creed

      Exploring the Lord’s Prayer

      Who is God? A Devotional Journey Through Genesis and Exodus

      Who is Jesus? A Devotional Journey Through the Gospel of Matthew

      Who is the Holy Spirit? A Devotional Journey Through the Book of Acts

      6 Verses for Preaching: A Primer for New Preachers

      A Courageous Life and the Book of Hebrews

      Fiction

      She: Stories of a Woman

      Mercy and Truth: A Collection of Short Stories

      Wife of Lappidoth: A Mountain Tale

      Tall Pauley

      Pockets and Other Unusual Stories

      Contents

      Forward

      Beyond Gender

      My Context

      My Personal Journey—A Narrative of the Beginning

      An Investigation Begins

      A Definition of Culture

      Christianity as a Belief System

      The Role of Scripture

      The Transmission of Sin

      The Cultural Milieu

      Historical References or Stories

      Jesus and Women

      Concluding Questions

      Sermons on Women

      Invisible People (Hagar)

      God’s Love for Children (Hannah and Children)

      For Such a Time as This (Esther)

      An Example of Holiness (Mary)

      Rhoda’s Story

      A Mother in Israel (Deborah)

      Extreme Makeover: God Edition (Mary – Christmas Theme)

      Woman of Truth

      Wonder Woman: Proverbs 31

      Bibliography

      Endnotes

      And afterward,

      I will pour out my Spirit on all people.

      Your sons and daughters will prophesy,

      your old men will dream dreams,

      your young men will see visions.

      Even on my servants, both men and women,

      I will pour out my Spirit in those days.

      ~ Joel 2:28-29

      Forward

      The Beyond Gender essay was written while I was doing graduate religious studies. I was wrestling with my own understanding of what it means to be a woman called by God into what I thought of as traditional ministry. Whether you understand or believe in specific calls to ministry, I was called to preach. It was a simple command given to me many years ago and one that I have sought to fulfill while serving in a variety of ministry roles—administrative support of ministries, Christian educator, Bible Study leader, associate and lead pastor, radio preacher, blogger and now writer.

      As I was reviewing some of my work, the Holy Spirit kept prompting me to publish this essay. I am publishing it nearly as it was when it was first written in 1995, as it seems important to understand where I came from and how I got to the place where I am now—free to do God’s bidding beyond gender. Much has been written since that time on women in Christian leadership. This is no attempt to respond to those writings or to make my mark in Christian history as a woman minister. It is rather an offering that may help someone else wrestle with or understand why God calls women into ministry. Or perhaps it may help someone else come to terms with their own call.

      A short account of an early incident in my life may help us understand how cognitive dissonance can live in relation to women in ministry. A short two weeks after I accepted the call to preach, I was walking toward my home and a utilities man was coming to read the meter. He saw that I had a Bible in the crook of my arm and decided that I was a safe person to talk with on a very troubling matter to him. As I stood on my porch, and he down by the meter, he turned his troubled face up toward me and began to explain that on a previous Sunday his male pastor had allowed a woman in the congregation to preach from the pulpit. He was dumbfounded by this and expressed his anxiety over whether his pastor had disobeyed God by permitting such a thing. With all the openness of a trusting child, he asked, What do you think? Should I leave my church because of this? I was then equally dumfounded. There I was—a Christian woman and a complete stranger to him—standing on my porch and he was looking to me for an answer about women in ministry. For a brief moment I was almost amused. Why would this man ask a woman for the answer? I prayed instantaneously for the Holy Spirit’s guidance. Then I answered that he needed to ask the Holy Spirit for guidance, search the Scriptures and speak with his pastor. I advocated that he stay in his fellowship of believers. He then read the meter and returned to his truck, still somber and concerned.

      When I have been in moments of agitation regarding my lack of access to traditional forms of ministry, the Holy Spirit brings this occasion to mind. And then I thank the Lord for all the non-traditional and traditional ways He has allowed me to minister for Him. What a great privilege to be obediently yoked to my Savior in His great and hard work!

      Despite the fact that I have had incredibly supportive family members, friends and church leaders, the road has not been easy. Subtle, and not-so-subtle, messages of rejection and bias have been ongoing depending on the congregation, town, state or country. The cultural battle is, without question, still very much up hill.

      But I am not in this to do cultural battle. I am in this because my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ asked me to preach. And therefore I do so at every station of my life in whatever way God sees fit. I would respond in this same way if I were a man, because God’s call, purposes and salvation operate far beyond gender, age, economic status, racial heritage or any other limit that society puts upon His children. God wants every effort expended to reach His lost sheep and to guide the ones who follow him daily.

      In Him and for Him,

      Rev. M. ReeAnn Hyde

      a.k.a M.R. Hyde

      2015

      Beyond Gender

      A Personal Essay on Women in Christian Leadership

      There are many important questions regarding the place of women in Christian leadership. Some important ones have been asked and a large number have been denied or avoided throughout history and in current culture. Are there elements of service or leadership that are exclusively gender oriented? How do women employ leadership without disallowing the functions, roles and purpose of others (men, youth, elderly, minority)? How have women done this in the past and retained their inherent essence of being a woman? What has been accomplished for the Kingdom in spite of cultural roles and rules? In what respects do we need to pay attention to the role of the Fall in the relations between men and women? What do fallen roles have to say about the way we relate to one another? How do I function first as a child of God (genderless) and then as a woman in a world that is still broken, and in many ways, still misogynistic?

      My Context

      In 21st century America, we live in a post-feminist and rising fundamentalist culture. The more particular culture where I participate in a worshiping congregation can be identified as Protestant, Evangelical, Wesleyan-Holiness and The Church of the Nazarene denomination. While the belief systems of this denomination are clearly not fundamentalistic¹ by most standards, they are morally very conservative. I simultaneously live in a national culture with expanding female leadership and in a smaller, distinctly religious culture with a spotty

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