1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,370 What does it mean to live the Christian life as a man or as a woman? 2 00:00:06,090 --> 00:00:10,470 Does whether we are men or women make any difference to living as a Christian 3 00:00:11,130 --> 00:00:15,060 and seeking to be a godly person in response to the gospel of Jesus Christ? 4 00:00:15,390 --> 00:00:22,920 Does godliness look any different for men as it does for women, or, for that matter, for young people as opposed to old people? 5 00:00:24,330 --> 00:00:27,150 These kinds of questions can sometimes cause controversy. 6 00:00:27,150 --> 00:00:32,760 (Well, let's be honest: they can often cause controversy!) But they're also hard to avoid if we reflect 7 00:00:32,760 --> 00:00:39,480 honestly on our experience as men and women, and if we reflect open-heartedly upon the Scriptures. 8 00:00:40,560 --> 00:00:44,520 I'm Tony Payne, and on today's episode of the Centre for Christian Living Podcast, we're talking 9 00:00:44,520 --> 00:00:49,950 with Moore College lecturer Paul Grimmond about these complex and very important questions. 10 00:01:04,900 --> 00:01:05,300 [ Music] 11 00:01:05,350 --> 00:01:06,670 Well, hello everyone. 12 00:01:06,670 --> 00:01:09,190 Welcome to another edition of the Centre for Christian Living Podcast. 13 00:01:09,190 --> 00:01:10,120 I'm Tony Payne. 14 00:01:10,120 --> 00:01:12,520 It's really great to have you with us here today. 15 00:01:12,550 --> 00:01:15,490 And we bring biblical ethics to everyday issues. 16 00:01:15,490 --> 00:01:17,740 That's what the Centre for Christian Living does here at Moore College. 17 00:01:18,280 --> 00:01:23,560 And today I'm talking with Paul Grimmond about an everyday issue that we all think 18 00:01:23,560 --> 00:01:27,040 about and talk about a lot, which is what does it mean to be a man and a woman? 19 00:01:27,040 --> 00:01:29,170 What does it mean to live in a household? 20 00:01:29,440 --> 00:01:33,850 Is the nature of the Christian life differentiated and different, depending on 21 00:01:33,850 --> 00:01:36,789 whether we're men and women, or young and old, or different kinds of people? 22 00:01:37,240 --> 00:01:41,165 Paul, first of all, just tell us a little bit about what you do here at Moore College—what your role is. 23 00:01:41,315 --> 00:01:41,645 Yeah, sure. 24 00:01:41,855 --> 00:01:44,705 So, look, I work in the Ministry Department here at Moore College. 25 00:01:44,765 --> 00:01:49,835 My job is I'm trying to teach young ministers of the gospel how to integrate the Bible 26 00:01:49,835 --> 00:01:53,885 and theology into their practice of actually loving people with the truth of the gospel. 27 00:01:54,365 --> 00:01:55,055 Fantastic. 28 00:01:55,115 --> 00:01:59,215 And, Moore College, as I'm discovering (I'm sort of a newbie here: I've been on the team 29 00:01:59,215 --> 00:02:03,025 for about two months), there's lots of different things we do here at Moore College. 30 00:02:03,205 --> 00:02:04,465 There are lots of moving parts. 31 00:02:04,465 --> 00:02:09,995 Lots of moving parts, and one of them is one of the other Centres of the College—the Priscilla & Aquila Centre, which 32 00:02:10,015 --> 00:02:15,295 kind of thinks about women's ministry and promotes Complementarian kind of partnership in ministry between men and women. 33 00:02:15,834 --> 00:02:21,754 And at the conference, the annual Priscilla & Aquila conference in February, you gave an address, which I found very stimulating. 34 00:02:21,754 --> 00:02:26,185 It's just kind of the precipitating cause of me getting you to come and have a conversation. 35 00:02:26,484 --> 00:02:31,855 And the title of your keynote address was, "Is godliness Complementarian?" 36 00:02:32,185 --> 00:02:35,815 Now, of those three words, "is" and "godliness" are sort of understandable. 37 00:02:36,175 --> 00:02:41,755 "Complementarian": just for those who maybe might not be familiar with that word, maybe you've heard it and wonder what that means. 38 00:02:41,995 --> 00:02:42,655 What does it mean in 39 00:02:42,655 --> 00:02:44,719 that title—"Complementarian"? 40 00:02:44,769 --> 00:02:49,600 Yeah, so for me, it's just reflective of the fact that I think the Bible talks about men 41 00:02:49,600 --> 00:02:55,870 and women being completely equal before God, made in God's image, but also differentiated. 42 00:02:56,079 --> 00:03:02,500 So we are created differently, and in certain places and relationships and times, we're given different 43 00:03:02,500 --> 00:03:09,925 roles or responsibilities to work out how we live faithfully under Jesus according to how God's made us. 44 00:03:10,315 --> 00:03:13,645 And I guess complementarian—"complement" in the way that it's spelt with an "E"— 45 00:03:13,705 --> 00:03:15,235 Yes, it's not about saying you're a nice guy. 46 00:03:15,335 --> 00:03:16,205 No, that's a shame. 47 00:03:16,505 --> 00:03:19,755 But it's going together to make up the whole—complementary of one another. 48 00:03:19,805 --> 00:03:27,300 Absolutely—that we both need each other, we complement life in a household, in our churches, and our differences are good for each other. 49 00:03:27,600 --> 00:03:34,320 And your focus—you spoke from Titus, which is a wonderful book in the New Testament, which is a lot about godliness in Titus, right? 50 00:03:34,350 --> 00:03:34,884 It's a lot. 51 00:03:34,944 --> 00:03:36,684 It's kind of almost the main theme of the book. 52 00:03:36,684 --> 00:03:41,904 In fact, last millennium, when I helped to author a Bible study on the Book of 53 00:03:41,904 --> 00:03:46,938 Titus, it was called "The Path to Godliness", because godliness is all over Titus. 54 00:03:46,938 --> 00:03:50,528 But in many parts of Titus, it's got nothing to do with whether we're men or women or anything, does it? 55 00:03:51,008 --> 00:03:52,128 No, you're absolutely right. 56 00:03:52,128 --> 00:03:57,558 So if you look at the structure of Titus, Paul goes, "Look, I've been set apart by God. I'm an apostle, 57 00:03:57,558 --> 00:04:03,378 and my apostleship is for the knowledge of God's elect, which accords with godliness." And the whole first 58 00:04:03,378 --> 00:04:08,988 chapter is about appointing true and faithful leaders of the church, because there are false teachers. 59 00:04:09,228 --> 00:04:14,148 And so godliness is just a character of life, or ungodliness causes you to distort the truth. 60 00:04:14,508 --> 00:04:17,778 And the elders and leaders have to be godly people. 61 00:04:18,018 --> 00:04:20,508 Godliness needs to mark their character, otherwise they— 62 00:04:20,688 --> 00:04:22,698 Absolutely: a fundamental characteristic. 63 00:04:22,698 --> 00:04:27,348 If you are working out who to appoint as a leader, godliness is non-negotiable. 64 00:04:28,278 --> 00:04:35,358 And then in chapter 2, you get some of the differentiated stuff, but then you come back in chapter 3 and he basically addresses all people and 65 00:04:35,358 --> 00:04:41,957 says, "Look, you've been washed by the Spirit, and you were people who were sinful, and you've been saved by nothing that you, yourself did. 66 00:04:42,078 --> 00:04:44,298 And therefore don't grumble. 67 00:04:44,298 --> 00:04:47,087 Treat all people with absolute respect and kindness and grace. 68 00:04:47,087 --> 00:04:47,538 So— 69 00:04:47,598 --> 00:04:48,748 Devote yourself to good works. 70 00:04:48,858 --> 00:04:49,578 Absolutely. 71 00:04:49,668 --> 00:04:49,968 Yeah. 72 00:04:50,418 --> 00:04:55,347 So the life that fits with—accords with— the gospel, and it flows out of the gospel 73 00:04:55,347 --> 00:04:59,033 and is response to the gospel—is, in many ways, the same life —a single life. 74 00:04:59,033 --> 00:05:01,943 In the sense, it's one kind of life that we all seek to live. 75 00:05:01,943 --> 00:05:03,143 It is, absolutely. 76 00:05:03,143 --> 00:05:05,933 And if you think about the general witness of the New Testament, right— 77 00:05:05,933 --> 00:05:06,983 That it would be much the same, right? 78 00:05:06,983 --> 00:05:11,573 You are being renewed in the image of your creator, as Colossians puts it. 79 00:05:11,663 --> 00:05:11,873 Yeah. 80 00:05:11,873 --> 00:05:12,053 Right. 81 00:05:12,053 --> 00:05:13,853 So who are we all becoming like? 82 00:05:13,853 --> 00:05:15,803 We're all becoming like Jesus. 83 00:05:16,013 --> 00:05:21,708 And there's lots that just applies whether you're old, young, male, female, whatever station in life you are in. 84 00:05:21,993 --> 00:05:26,553 There are lots of things the Bible says that are just about us following Christ, honouring God— 85 00:05:26,553 --> 00:05:26,903 As people. 86 00:05:26,903 --> 00:05:27,343 As human beings. 87 00:05:27,363 --> 00:05:27,423 Yeah. 88 00:05:27,603 --> 00:05:28,773 As renewed human beings. 89 00:05:28,803 --> 00:05:28,953 Yeah. 90 00:05:29,373 --> 00:05:33,363 But here in Titus 2, and it's not the only place, of course, you also have 91 00:05:33,603 --> 00:05:38,073 godliness being described in a sort of differentiated, variegated kind of way. 92 00:05:38,343 --> 00:05:43,508 Chapter 2 starts by saying, "Now teach what is in accord with healthy or sound doctrine." 93 00:05:43,508 --> 00:05:43,668 Yep. 94 00:05:43,888 --> 00:05:48,123 And you almost expect him at that point to start teaching some theological truths or something. 95 00:05:48,123 --> 00:05:54,003 But he then goes on to list a whole kind of different characteristics of life that Titus is 96 00:05:54,003 --> 00:05:59,103 to urge different groups within the congregation—within the community—to leave out and adopt. 97 00:05:59,103 --> 00:06:02,613 There's older men, older women, younger women, younger men, slaves. 98 00:06:03,123 --> 00:06:08,013 And amidst that differentiation, some of that when we read it, it's just all pretty straightforward. 99 00:06:08,013 --> 00:06:10,923 In fact, there's some common words that pop up in some of the different categories. 100 00:06:10,923 --> 00:06:11,013 It's— 101 00:06:11,013 --> 00:06:13,323 Like self-control occurs many times through the passage. 102 00:06:13,323 --> 00:06:13,383 Yeah. 103 00:06:13,383 --> 00:06:16,103 So each category of people is supposed to be self-controlled. 104 00:06:16,323 --> 00:06:16,503 Yeah. 105 00:06:16,503 --> 00:06:17,343 And learning self-control. 106 00:06:17,403 --> 00:06:18,963 That's something we all definitely need. 107 00:06:19,353 --> 00:06:26,233 And some of the differentiation—the fact, for example, that for the younger men, I think isn't self-control the only thing they're told to do? 108 00:06:26,233 --> 00:06:28,023 It's the only thing that he says to them. 109 00:06:28,023 --> 00:06:29,673 Wonder about why that could possibly be. 110 00:06:30,143 --> 00:06:32,303 Well, I mean, it's interesting, isn't it? 111 00:06:32,363 --> 00:06:32,663 Yeah. 112 00:06:32,663 --> 00:06:37,463 It is just perhaps, possibly, until we've got that sorted out, it's not worth talking. 113 00:06:37,763 --> 00:06:39,293 We don't need to talk about any of the rest. 114 00:06:39,293 --> 00:06:44,573 So perhaps younger men can only cope with one instruction at a time, and the first one they need to hear is self-control. 115 00:06:44,783 --> 00:06:45,493 Who knows, who knows. 116 00:06:45,493 --> 00:06:45,803 Possibly. 117 00:06:46,073 --> 00:06:51,983 But the one that kind of sticks out like a sore thumb for us, or, "Ooh," we kind of—almost jars us when we read it as 118 00:06:52,243 --> 00:06:59,688 21st-century people—are the instructions for the older women to teach the younger women to love their husbands and children, 119 00:06:59,688 --> 00:07:05,658 to be submissive to their husbands and children, to be busy at home, to work in the home, and to be godly young women. 120 00:07:05,988 --> 00:07:10,488 It's those verses that kind of jump out at us, and it's interesting that they do. 121 00:07:10,758 --> 00:07:14,273 Why do you think those instructions jump out at us? 122 00:07:14,393 --> 00:07:17,753 Why do we find them almost like a sore thumb in the passage that sticks out? 123 00:07:17,873 --> 00:07:24,623 I mean, I think it's particularly intriguing, given the shape of the whole letter and given the shape of what unfolds in Titus 2, right? 124 00:07:24,703 --> 00:07:30,608 So he starts by saying, "Teach them what's in accord with sound doctrine." And then in verses 11 to 14 of that chapter, 125 00:07:30,608 --> 00:07:36,218 he explains that all these instructions that he's just given are related to the fact that the grace of God has appeared in 126 00:07:36,218 --> 00:07:44,108 Jesus, and it trains us to say "No" to ungodliness and "Yes" to upright and holy lives, precisely because Jesus' death and 127 00:07:44,108 --> 00:07:51,423 resurrection was designed to basically redeem us from lawlessness and to purify us to be a people who are zealous for good works. 128 00:07:51,503 --> 00:07:56,483 The theological foundation for all the instructions that I've just given is that this is exactly 129 00:07:56,483 --> 00:08:00,713 what God was trying to do through the death and resurrection of Jesus to reshape you as people. 130 00:08:00,713 --> 00:08:01,823 So this is big stuff. 131 00:08:01,823 --> 00:08:04,313 So in terms of the context of Titus— 132 00:08:04,313 --> 00:08:04,553 Yeah. 133 00:08:04,868 --> 00:08:10,868 —you read all of those instructions, and there's nothing in particular that causes you to differentiate one set from another. 134 00:08:11,078 --> 00:08:15,398 In terms of the logic of Titus, these things are all deeply connected with what 135 00:08:15,398 --> 00:08:20,768 Paul sees as being the right way of loving God and honouring Christ, right? 136 00:08:21,278 --> 00:08:25,058 And yet, some of those things feel very uncomfortable for us. 137 00:08:25,568 --> 00:08:30,643 And I think that we need to keep remembering that is true of biblical injunctions 138 00:08:30,643 --> 00:08:34,903 across Scripture at different times and in different places with different people. 139 00:08:34,962 --> 00:08:35,383 Yes. 140 00:08:35,383 --> 00:08:35,742 Right. 141 00:08:35,802 --> 00:08:40,782 So my illustration of this, I remember preaching a number of years ago on 1 Timothy 142 00:08:40,782 --> 00:08:45,822 2 and the instruction about women remaining silent in church and not teaching men. 143 00:08:46,633 --> 00:08:52,723 And I was really wrestling with that and I was talking to a brother who was pastoring a church from another kind of ethnic background. 144 00:08:52,813 --> 00:08:57,223 And I talked to him a bit about my struggles and he said to me, "Oh, we did that passage recently. 145 00:08:57,433 --> 00:09:00,763 That verse didn't rate a single mention and nobody asked a question about it. 146 00:09:01,033 --> 00:09:07,043 Their questions were all about being not attired with gold or pearls or silver jewellery, but actually 147 00:09:07,043 --> 00:09:13,123 with good deeds appropriate for women who profess the knowledge of God." And it just struck me, "Ah. 148 00:09:13,467 --> 00:09:15,417 Scripture's always controversial. 149 00:09:16,227 --> 00:09:23,068 But what makes it controversial is where it pokes against you and your place and time." Some bits of the 150 00:09:23,068 --> 00:09:26,937 Bible we just skip over because we go, "Well, that's a nice idea, and we all agree with that and that's 151 00:09:26,937 --> 00:09:34,532 lovely." And here's another idea that's contested at my point in history, in my place, in my specific context. 152 00:09:35,123 --> 00:09:39,833 And in a sense, the joke we just made earlier when we joked about young men is kind of a case in point. 153 00:09:40,183 --> 00:09:45,113 There'd be very few people who get deeply offended or be bothered or even take much time to stop and think that 154 00:09:45,593 --> 00:09:50,933 young men as a group of people, urging them to be self-controlled would seem to be self-evidently a good thing to do. 155 00:09:50,933 --> 00:09:51,103 Yeah. 156 00:09:51,293 --> 00:09:53,752 It's an issue that you young men struggle with and always have. 157 00:09:53,783 --> 00:09:53,903 Yeah. 158 00:09:54,203 --> 00:09:56,153 It'd be one of those verses we go straight past. 159 00:09:56,603 --> 00:09:57,653 But this one we don't. 160 00:09:57,923 --> 00:10:03,233 So what is it about our culture, do you think, and where we are now, that means this one 161 00:10:03,233 --> 00:10:08,163 pulls us up in our tracks and makes us notice and feels out of place to us—challenges us? 162 00:10:08,553 --> 00:10:10,023 I mean, that's such a complex question. 163 00:10:10,023 --> 00:10:10,953 That's a huge question, I know. 164 00:10:10,953 --> 00:10:11,943 It's a massive question. 165 00:10:11,948 --> 00:10:12,578 Well, we've got half an hour. 166 00:10:13,058 --> 00:10:16,122 I think that there are things that—things at different levels. 167 00:10:16,392 --> 00:10:22,302 I do think that we are at a moment when, very helpfully, we live in a culture where people 168 00:10:22,332 --> 00:10:26,742 have become more aware of significance around things like abuse and domestic violence. 169 00:10:27,432 --> 00:10:36,667 And we have become aware that some of these verses like this are used by evil people to create control, to 170 00:10:36,667 --> 00:10:41,947 bring coercion, to reinforce their own sense of power, to get other people to do what they want them to do— 171 00:10:42,037 --> 00:10:46,877 Almost as a power move to justify what is otherwise just evil, controlling behaviour. 172 00:10:46,897 --> 00:10:50,177 Oh, rank ungodliness and deeply evil behaviour. 173 00:10:50,707 --> 00:10:54,577 But sin is so sinful, it can call black "white" and white "black", right? 174 00:10:54,577 --> 00:10:58,087 Like we know that from Scripture and from our experience of life in the world. 175 00:10:58,187 --> 00:11:02,927 So I think that's one of the reasons that we are really sensitive and, at one level, rightly sensitive to these. 176 00:11:02,927 --> 00:11:03,437 Yeah. 177 00:11:03,437 --> 00:11:04,307 I think that's fair enough. 178 00:11:04,337 --> 00:11:04,547 Yeah. 179 00:11:04,847 --> 00:11:13,827 I think there's another level though, at which I wonder whether what we value as a culture has shifted quite significantly. 180 00:11:13,827 --> 00:11:20,157 So one of the things that really struck me in the research was how much, for example, the household and the home 181 00:11:20,577 --> 00:11:27,827 was just honoured at an incredible level in ancient Roman and Greek society, as well as in biblical writing, right? 182 00:11:28,067 --> 00:11:35,567 The home is a precious place, and what happens there in terms of the raising of children, and the creation of character, 183 00:11:35,567 --> 00:11:41,507 and formation of people, and whatever, that is almost as prized a thing as you can think of doing in the world. 184 00:11:42,122 --> 00:11:48,662 Whereas I think on this side of the Industrial Revolution, which has separated the public and the private—and I don't think 185 00:11:48,662 --> 00:11:54,632 it's just the Industrial Revolution; I think that philosophically as well, we've been through this kind of space where 186 00:11:54,842 --> 00:12:03,792 that move towards rank individualism, and everything is what the world means for you, and a thoroughgoing nominalism. 187 00:12:04,002 --> 00:12:06,192 There's nothing given in the created order. 188 00:12:06,192 --> 00:12:08,232 There's nothing objective that I can say about it. 189 00:12:08,232 --> 00:12:13,272 It's just whatever I choose it to be and to mean is the thing that I have and take it to mean. 190 00:12:14,047 --> 00:12:21,637 But when you connect that with ideas of oppression and distrust of authority, because we are profoundly distrustful of authority, 191 00:12:22,327 --> 00:12:29,047 because those distinctions have been used at times by authority to create oppression or to reinforce the power of those who are in power. 192 00:12:29,207 --> 00:12:35,267 So we have this dialogue that's going on at so many different levels that just affects all of us. 193 00:12:35,267 --> 00:12:41,867 Our innate response to anybody who tells me there's a particular thing that you should do because you 194 00:12:41,867 --> 00:12:48,307 belong to this class of person, that is anathema, really, in our place and at our moment in history. 195 00:12:48,577 --> 00:12:56,497 And it hurts us or strikes us particularly strongly, because, culturally, in the complex of all those factors you mentioned, and it is complex 196 00:12:56,497 --> 00:13:04,863 and it's easy to do sweeping gen—I'm very good at those sweeping generalisations and I'll resist the temptation—but amidst the complex mix of 197 00:13:04,863 --> 00:13:10,682 factors that have made us who we are and how we think about these things now, two of the things you mentioned there are very significant, I think. 198 00:13:11,192 --> 00:13:17,853 One, that the household, which, in the Bible, is kind of like the centre of the action, if I can put it that way. 199 00:13:18,212 --> 00:13:20,343 It was a larger extended unit. 200 00:13:20,627 --> 00:13:27,287 It was the place of protection—the place of where I belonged very strongly, the place of my identity, in that sense. 201 00:13:27,617 --> 00:13:30,557 It was the economic unit: you lived and worked in your household. 202 00:13:30,557 --> 00:13:34,757 You didn't leave the household to go out to work and do your significant work in the world. 203 00:13:35,297 --> 00:13:37,367 The household was where everything happened. 204 00:13:37,367 --> 00:13:43,218 And in a sense, this goes all the way back to the Old Testament and debate of the house of the father. 205 00:13:43,277 --> 00:13:45,568 That was the basic unit of Israelite society— 206 00:13:45,588 --> 00:13:45,858 Absolutely. 207 00:13:45,858 --> 00:13:49,017 —and in many respects—in many respects, in the ancient world. 208 00:13:49,578 --> 00:13:58,988 And so when we hear that older women are to teach and train the younger women to be busy at home, we hear, "Oh, to be withdrawn from the 209 00:13:58,988 --> 00:14:07,747 world—withdrawn from anything significant—and to be trapped at home, wearing a frock and baking for their husbands, and doing nothing 210 00:14:07,747 --> 00:14:15,338 significant at all, doing drudgery, menial, meaningless work while the men go out and do all that's meaningful out there in the world", 211 00:14:15,547 --> 00:14:22,272 that whole set of categories is quite foreign to this passage and to the way, generally, I think the Bible thinks about the household. 212 00:14:22,272 --> 00:14:23,952 It's completely foreign, isn't it? 213 00:14:23,952 --> 00:14:25,392 Like, totally foreign. 214 00:14:25,602 --> 00:14:29,412 And I think that there are a number of factors that are deeply at work there. 215 00:14:29,802 --> 00:14:38,262 The fact that we have been able to separate the household as a menial task and to talk about what's prominent and 216 00:14:38,262 --> 00:14:44,937 significant in the world, represents, I think, at one level, a commoditisation of people and things and stuff, right? 217 00:14:44,937 --> 00:14:48,327 So even if you think at an educational level, right? 218 00:14:48,447 --> 00:14:51,147 My daughter did very well in the HSC. 219 00:14:51,837 --> 00:14:57,117 She decided that she would really love to teach primary school children and to be an educator. 220 00:14:57,207 --> 00:14:58,627 Oh, what a waste of her high mark. 221 00:14:58,627 --> 00:14:59,047 Is that what she got? 222 00:14:59,047 --> 00:15:07,232 Well, can I— the number of people who said to her, like, actually said to her face-to-face, "Couldn't you do better?" That represents— 223 00:15:07,252 --> 00:15:08,002 Yeah. 224 00:15:08,212 --> 00:15:10,502 So I get a bit grumpy about this. 225 00:15:10,607 --> 00:15:11,607 I was flabbergasted. 226 00:15:11,627 --> 00:15:13,877 But what does that represent value-wise? 227 00:15:13,897 --> 00:15:20,267 Like, if we are not investing in these little people as they grow, what possible 228 00:15:20,267 --> 00:15:24,637 resource in the world do we have that is more precious than these little people? 229 00:15:24,977 --> 00:15:25,977 Look, lots Paul. 230 00:15:25,997 --> 00:15:33,877 You could be a business consultant that teaches people how to desire a new kind of toothpaste and buy more of that toothpaste and—hang on a second. 231 00:15:33,877 --> 00:15:35,377 That's completely trivial and meaningless. 232 00:15:35,377 --> 00:15:36,157 Let me think of another one. 233 00:15:37,597 --> 00:15:38,887 But that's what you end up swapping. 234 00:15:38,887 --> 00:15:39,817 It's so fascinating. 235 00:15:39,817 --> 00:15:39,937 Yeah. 236 00:15:39,937 --> 00:15:40,147 Yeah. 237 00:15:40,237 --> 00:15:42,987 So power is about economics. 238 00:15:43,197 --> 00:15:51,047 It's about having the ability to influence decision-making, even if it becomes about banal and silly and ridiculous things—your 239 00:15:51,067 --> 00:15:56,522 ability to make money for other people, your ability to shape the way that people think about something or whatever else. 240 00:15:56,952 --> 00:16:07,177 Whereas, the actual work of being in relationship with little hearts and minds, and training them to actually know themselves and to 241 00:16:07,177 --> 00:16:15,397 live well in the world, and to act with character and to know God, those things are actually radically diminished within our worldview. 242 00:16:15,487 --> 00:16:16,177 Very much. 243 00:16:16,237 --> 00:16:20,977 And it's not even just the raising of children, which is, you'd think, well, is there 244 00:16:20,977 --> 00:16:26,767 a greater calling than shaping the life of another human being profoundly and deeply? 245 00:16:26,982 --> 00:16:31,782 Caring, nurturing teaching and raising them to be a fully formed independent person who contributes. 246 00:16:31,782 --> 00:16:35,262 Is there anything more brilliant to do with your life than to do that? 247 00:16:35,592 --> 00:16:36,972 And say, no, what a marvellous thing to do. 248 00:16:36,972 --> 00:16:39,162 This is why motherhood is just the highest calling, right? 249 00:16:39,222 --> 00:16:40,722 And why parenthood is the highest calling. 250 00:16:41,562 --> 00:16:48,412 But it's also that the household, I think, as the Bible thinks about it, it's not just that, "Oh, you raise your kids and 251 00:16:48,412 --> 00:16:56,752 they're wonderful people." It's that your household is the centre of your activity as godly humans, and from your household, 252 00:16:57,082 --> 00:17:02,872 brimming over and reverberating out from your household, is the service and work you do in the world for other people. 253 00:17:03,442 --> 00:17:08,242 So the household is not just the, "I need to build my household so that my kids are 254 00:17:08,242 --> 00:17:13,722 fantastic." It's the venue and sphere from which, and out of which, we serve our neighbours. 255 00:17:13,722 --> 00:17:14,922 We serve our communities. 256 00:17:15,012 --> 00:17:15,702 Do you know what I'm saying? 257 00:17:15,992 --> 00:17:18,822 And I think as you read, Proverbs 31, right? 258 00:17:18,822 --> 00:17:21,162 That picture of the woman in Proverbs 31. 259 00:17:21,882 --> 00:17:23,262 Who is she known for? 260 00:17:23,442 --> 00:17:24,762 She conducts business. 261 00:17:24,762 --> 00:17:27,042 She's looking after the poor and the downtrodden. 262 00:17:27,282 --> 00:17:29,982 She's selling cloth, she's buying land. 263 00:17:30,222 --> 00:17:38,302 She's in charge of—like, it's not like she was some kind of weak-willed, stuck at home, unable to do anything woman. 264 00:17:38,492 --> 00:17:44,912 She was a woman who was actually creating a household, which was acting as a blessing to her entire community, 265 00:17:45,152 --> 00:17:51,182 because here was a place where all of the truth and righteousness and goodness of God had been played out and 266 00:17:51,182 --> 00:17:57,042 enacted in a way that this house didn't exist for its own being, but actually existed for the sake of others. 267 00:17:57,042 --> 00:18:04,332 And you even think—I mean, I hear the previous generation to me talk about the shift in architecture from the small house 268 00:18:04,332 --> 00:18:09,672 with the big verandah that looked out onto the street and the children played in the street, to the massive house with 269 00:18:09,672 --> 00:18:16,662 the walls around all of it, and we all sitting inside and try very hard not to be interrupted by anybody else out there. 270 00:18:16,692 --> 00:18:17,262 Yeah, very true. 271 00:18:17,262 --> 00:18:17,322 Yeah. 272 00:18:17,322 --> 00:18:21,612 That's a massive shift in our experience of what we think household is about. 273 00:18:21,662 --> 00:18:26,252 But household is a place of hospitality and welcoming in and blessing outward. 274 00:18:26,642 --> 00:18:33,962 But all of that has shifted because of, I think, a foreign worldview that has pervaded us and that we've bought hook, 275 00:18:33,962 --> 00:18:39,452 line, and sinker without seeing the goodness and blessings of what God's talking about in terms of household in Scripture. 276 00:18:39,807 --> 00:18:43,827 And it's difficult to tease out all the different filaments of that worldview. 277 00:18:43,887 --> 00:18:49,388 You've mentioned some: the Industrial Revolution; the technological revolution; the way work has changed; the way we think 278 00:18:49,388 --> 00:18:56,138 about ourselves and what makes us significant has changed; the nature of economics; us as sort of economic man and that's what's 279 00:18:56,138 --> 00:19:01,953 really important about us; the different way we think about family; the sort of smaller size of family that's happened as a 280 00:19:01,953 --> 00:19:08,013 result of a whole series of factors—social and economic—such that the family now is a small unit, rather than a larger one. 281 00:19:08,372 --> 00:19:10,713 And so it's hard to kind of tease all these things apart. 282 00:19:10,713 --> 00:19:18,273 But there's no question it puts us in a certain frame of mind, such that when we see Paul saying that the godly woman—older woman—teaches and trains 283 00:19:18,273 --> 00:19:28,587 the godly younger woman to be the beating heart and manager and worker within this household, whereas in their context, that's a self-evident good. 284 00:19:28,647 --> 00:19:35,457 Of course, that's what a young woman should dream of doing, and what better thing it would be to life than to be the beating heart of her household. 285 00:19:35,627 --> 00:19:39,277 For us, that's not just a second-class option, but kind of like a 10th-class option. 286 00:19:39,277 --> 00:19:40,057 Yeah, absolutely. 287 00:20:07,372 --> 00:20:12,832 The need for Christians to take the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ to the world is greater than ever before. 288 00:20:13,672 --> 00:20:20,572 For over 165 years, Moore Theological College has been training men and women for a lifetime of 289 00:20:20,572 --> 00:20:26,783 vocational word ministry so that they can proclaim this gospel and nurture others to grow in the faith. 290 00:20:27,757 --> 00:20:32,227 If you've been considering theological education, come and discover what life and 291 00:20:32,227 --> 00:20:38,077 study at Moore College could look like for you at one of our May 2025 Open Events. 292 00:20:38,737 --> 00:20:45,878 On the evening of Tuesday 13th of May, we will be hosting an information and Q&A session that will also be livestreamed. 293 00:20:46,358 --> 00:20:51,037 Then from Wednesday 14th of May to Friday 16th of May, you have the opportunity to 294 00:20:51,037 --> 00:20:57,018 join us in person to tour the campus, participate in chapel and even sit in on a class. 295 00:20:57,558 --> 00:21:06,538 Find out more and register your interest on our website: that's moore.edu.au/open. 296 00:21:06,738 --> 00:21:08,778 And now let's get back to our program. 297 00:21:08,838 --> 00:21:13,383 We started by asking "Why does it stick out to us?" and I think we've explored some of those things. 298 00:21:14,358 --> 00:21:20,787 I guess the other angle or other side of this—so the way we think about household and the whole social structure causes it to leap out at 299 00:21:20,787 --> 00:21:29,082 us, but also the way we think about men and women, and the degree to which men and women are similar, the same or different/differentiated. 300 00:21:29,392 --> 00:21:36,862 I think that has also shifted from the time in which this text was written and the prevailing biblical worldview, which 301 00:21:36,862 --> 00:21:42,472 in your talk you pointed out, is not just here in Titus; it's actually something that pops up in many places in the Bible. 302 00:21:42,712 --> 00:21:47,033 Before we think about our problems, how would you describe that biblical worldview that kind of 303 00:21:47,392 --> 00:21:52,582 describes what's different about men and women/what's the same about men and women as men and women? 304 00:21:52,632 --> 00:21:58,152 The explicit statements in places like Genesis—that God made them male and female. 305 00:21:58,693 --> 00:22:07,812 So that biblical understanding that how we have been created biologically affects who we are and how we function as people in the world. 306 00:22:08,443 --> 00:22:10,062 I think that's really significant. 307 00:22:10,062 --> 00:22:14,568 And then that idea gets played out in so many different places in the New Testament, right? 308 00:22:14,568 --> 00:22:20,838 So perhaps one of the reasons that he encourages older women to instruct younger women, rather than 309 00:22:20,838 --> 00:22:24,947 saying, "Oh, you older men: you should instruct the younger women", is that there is a reality about 310 00:22:24,947 --> 00:22:31,338 being human and having lived and experienced life in that space that means that you have wisdom to share. 311 00:22:31,727 --> 00:22:35,568 Because of all that you've been through and how you have worked at putting the word of God into 312 00:22:35,568 --> 00:22:42,108 practice in your context, that gives you real wisdom to actually pass on to the next generation. 313 00:22:42,437 --> 00:22:48,258 And the bloke has a different set of wisdom, because of who he is and where he's been functioning and how he's been working. 314 00:22:48,768 --> 00:22:54,047 But to realise that the Bible is unashamed to speak in generalisations. 315 00:22:54,378 --> 00:22:58,953 It was a fascinating experience for me, actually: a number of, well, I reckon it would be close 316 00:22:58,953 --> 00:23:04,273 to a decade ago now, I spent quite a bit of time with a brother from Eastern Europe/Russia. 317 00:23:04,503 --> 00:23:11,913 He was Russian, but had done ministry in Eastern Europe, and he was saying, "Look, the weird thing about you guys in the West is you 318 00:23:11,913 --> 00:23:18,687 can't say anything general about anything." He goes, you just—"Wisdom doesn't exist as a category, because as soon as you say something— 319 00:23:18,897 --> 00:23:21,187 You have to qualify it 37,000 times— 320 00:23:21,207 --> 00:23:21,477 Exactly! 321 00:23:21,477 --> 00:23:23,487 —and apologize to everybody you've just offended. 322 00:23:23,547 --> 00:23:24,507 Yeah, absolutely. 323 00:23:24,807 --> 00:23:30,687 Whereas he says, the Bible's full of general statements that are generally true and hold all sorts of wisdom in them, but 324 00:23:30,687 --> 00:23:38,238 we basically almost discount Proverbs as a category, right, because Proverbs says real stuff about particular, but general 325 00:23:38,238 --> 00:23:43,213 things in the world, and we all go, "Well, that's not right for that reason and that reason and that reason and that reason." 326 00:23:43,263 --> 00:23:43,513 It might—yeah. 327 00:23:43,513 --> 00:23:44,003 Yes. 328 00:23:44,208 --> 00:23:46,668 I know someone who's different from that in this particular circumstance. 329 00:23:46,668 --> 00:23:46,938 Exactly. 330 00:23:46,938 --> 00:23:47,148 Right. 331 00:23:47,178 --> 00:23:50,988 Which is the problem of using proverbial wisdom as commands or as laws. 332 00:23:51,408 --> 00:23:56,958 That's—part of our problem is that sometimes we read the Bible a bit flat like that, as if a statement about the way 333 00:23:56,958 --> 00:24:02,673 the world is, and therefore the shape of human life and what you should expect and how you can navigate your way through 334 00:24:02,673 --> 00:24:08,283 this complex thing we are living, general wisdom and guidance that really helps you in different places is sometimes 335 00:24:08,283 --> 00:24:13,893 for us becomes like a command: you have to implement that at every moment of your experience, and it's not like that. 336 00:24:14,313 --> 00:24:18,973 And so we really quickly turn a passage like this one into a, say, okay, what does it look like? 337 00:24:19,033 --> 00:24:19,903 What are men allowed to do? 338 00:24:19,933 --> 00:24:21,013 What are women not allowed to do? 339 00:24:21,013 --> 00:24:21,763 Gimme the rules. 340 00:24:21,793 --> 00:24:28,878 But it's also that "What are we precluding by this activity?", rather than asking, "What's good? 341 00:24:28,997 --> 00:24:29,838 What's helpful? 342 00:24:29,838 --> 00:24:30,558 What's real? 343 00:24:30,558 --> 00:24:32,838 What expresses actually some of what God loves? 344 00:24:32,838 --> 00:24:36,048 What expresses some of the way that God has made the world", even right? 345 00:24:36,048 --> 00:24:44,267 So the precious nature of loving husband and children, which is not an innately easy activity for sinful human beings. 346 00:24:44,867 --> 00:24:48,467 I'd say the same things to husbands loving your wives and your children: that's not simple. 347 00:24:48,677 --> 00:24:50,717 It's not easy as a sinful person. 348 00:24:50,897 --> 00:24:55,727 I need the instruction of God and the encouragement of my brothers and sisters in Christ to work out how to do that. 349 00:24:56,387 --> 00:25:00,197 But it will take different forms in different places at different times. 350 00:25:00,467 --> 00:25:03,767 But there's no doubt that is a good, do you know what I mean? 351 00:25:03,767 --> 00:25:08,237 Within the biblical framework, that is an absolute good that you cannot deny. 352 00:25:08,747 --> 00:25:12,347 But we will have—all of our conversation will not be about what is the good of 353 00:25:12,347 --> 00:25:16,787 that thing, but will be rather about how is that messing us up—getting us wrong? 354 00:25:16,787 --> 00:25:17,567 What are we missing? 355 00:25:17,597 --> 00:25:18,503 How is it constraining us? 356 00:25:18,503 --> 00:25:18,952 Exactly. 357 00:25:18,977 --> 00:25:24,437 How is it stopping me from being and becoming the person I wish to be? 358 00:25:25,118 --> 00:25:31,777 And in a way, I was thinking about this after your talk, the word "feminism" is just such a massive, loose category and raises 359 00:25:31,777 --> 00:25:37,537 so many emotions in people, it's almost not worth having that discussion or raising it around that term, I sometimes think. 360 00:25:37,747 --> 00:25:43,428 But you can say there's been certainly a philosophical and ideological move in our culture: over the past 50, 60, 361 00:25:43,428 --> 00:25:49,972 70 years, it's been building, of what some have called "expressive individualism"—of autonomous individualism. 362 00:25:49,972 --> 00:25:51,082 I want to be me. 363 00:25:51,082 --> 00:25:53,872 I don't want anyone stopping me being me. 364 00:25:54,292 --> 00:25:59,002 And if I think about things within the feminist movement, really broadly considered, that I find 365 00:25:59,002 --> 00:26:05,032 objectionable, or cut across the biblical story and the biblical teaching, it's that impulse. 366 00:26:05,362 --> 00:26:10,507 If men in some way are going to stop me being me, then so much the worst for men. 367 00:26:10,507 --> 00:26:14,327 If motherhood and family life is going to get in the way of me being the actualised 368 00:26:14,347 --> 00:26:18,157 me I really want to be, then let's downgrade motherhood and family life. 369 00:26:18,217 --> 00:26:25,082 And if even my body as a woman and my reproduction cycles and who I am as a woman is going to get in the way of me being the 370 00:26:25,082 --> 00:26:30,482 person I want to be, pursuing the job I want to pursue, that I'm going to suppress and change that as well chemically too. 371 00:26:30,482 --> 00:26:36,302 And of course, that's the very striking argument of Mary Harrington and her work about feminism and 372 00:26:36,302 --> 00:26:40,622 the use of the pill and how the pill was foundational in modern feminism and the problems that led to. 373 00:26:40,622 --> 00:26:41,942 But that's another whole story. 374 00:26:42,332 --> 00:26:43,982 But it is striking, isn't it, Tony? 375 00:26:43,982 --> 00:26:53,118 Like even the argument that exists between feminism and the trans world about to what extent biology creates something 376 00:26:53,118 --> 00:26:59,297 about our experience and commonality and who we are as human beings that we just notice in lots of different places. 377 00:26:59,297 --> 00:27:05,807 I had—one of my children did an Arts degree at Sydney Uni, where gender was a construct. 378 00:27:05,807 --> 00:27:06,647 Purely a construct. 379 00:27:06,647 --> 00:27:13,817 Purely a construct, and a son who has done sciences—life sciences—in exercise physiology. 380 00:27:14,057 --> 00:27:19,367 And if you are not taking someone's biology into account in terms of flexibility and strength and 381 00:27:19,367 --> 00:27:23,567 ligaments and how they work and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, you can actually end up damaging or 382 00:27:23,567 --> 00:27:28,547 injuring people by not helping them to exercise appropriately according to how they're wired to be. 383 00:27:28,547 --> 00:27:37,483 So we both have this world that says, who you are biologically has a really big impact on you, and it has nothing say about you. 384 00:27:37,483 --> 00:27:38,773 We can ignore it completely. 385 00:27:38,878 --> 00:27:47,308 And then we kind of bounce between those two sets of realities, depending upon what argument I want to make at any one particular time. 386 00:27:47,368 --> 00:27:49,928 Which of those things is more important or more significant? 387 00:27:49,928 --> 00:27:58,237 Whereas the Bible really wants to say there are things about the created order that are deeply reflective of the nature 388 00:27:58,237 --> 00:28:04,507 of God and his purposes for the world and what he wants for us, and you actually need to read those into each other. 389 00:28:04,507 --> 00:28:06,517 And the Scripture does that all the time. 390 00:28:06,818 --> 00:28:13,527 But for us to say that at our time and place cuts across certain societal values that makes it very complex. 391 00:28:13,527 --> 00:28:13,588 Yeah. 392 00:28:13,977 --> 00:28:17,548 Ideological values—things that we've come to believe about the world and— 393 00:28:17,548 --> 00:28:20,098 At a really visceral, deep sea there. 394 00:28:20,102 --> 00:28:26,122 We've been taught them so often and so much, and at every level we've been taught them explicitly in schools, but also we're taught them and 395 00:28:26,122 --> 00:28:34,312 discipled in them—in the way we live, the way we dress, the way we relate to each other, the way we work, the way our cultural products come to us. 396 00:28:34,312 --> 00:28:41,132 It's a different vision of men and women and of the created order that sits pretty deeply with us, and it means that even if 397 00:28:41,132 --> 00:28:45,602 we can talk and think our way through a passage like this, there's still an emotional reaction to it because it's so deep. 398 00:28:45,693 --> 00:28:46,803 Absolutely. 399 00:28:47,193 --> 00:28:51,693 And it's so interesting, isn't it, because the thing that we've been taught that we are reacting 400 00:28:51,693 --> 00:28:58,382 against is a kind of caricature of, perhaps, a western wife and mother in the 1950s or whatever that is— 401 00:28:58,382 --> 00:29:00,392 Which historically is a very unusual— 402 00:29:00,728 --> 00:29:04,658 Well, it's a very thin sliver of the history of humanity, isn't it? 403 00:29:04,658 --> 00:29:11,898 Like, you talk to any woman who has come from a different cultural background from somewhere in Africa or somewhere in Asia or whatever, and 404 00:29:12,348 --> 00:29:19,508 that stereotype doesn't particularly kind of ring any bells for them in terms of their history or experience or any of those kinds of things. 405 00:29:20,003 --> 00:29:25,102 We are reacting really strongly to that, and I've set up a set of categories to react strongly to that. 406 00:29:25,553 --> 00:29:29,183 I just want to say, if you read your Bible slowly, thoughtfully and carefully, it's 407 00:29:29,183 --> 00:29:35,153 just a totally different worldview that imbues those realities in very different ways. 408 00:29:35,483 --> 00:29:44,733 But it helps us to realise when I call someone to be working at home in a Titus 2 sense, I am not calling on her to bake and wear a 409 00:29:44,733 --> 00:29:52,622 frock and do X, Y and Z. Those things are so far from the centre of what that's actually on about that we've completely missed the point. 410 00:29:53,162 --> 00:29:54,423 Look, that's very helpful, Paul. 411 00:29:54,572 --> 00:29:59,943 I'm tempted not to go this next step in the discussion just because it's potentially a longer discussion. 412 00:30:00,753 --> 00:30:04,473 But it really teases out what you're just saying, because the passage talks about 413 00:30:04,533 --> 00:30:08,193 older men, younger men, older women, younger women, but it also talks about slaves. 414 00:30:08,733 --> 00:30:14,583 And in your address at the Priscilla & Aquila conference, you tease that out in some detail to talk about what does it mean that 415 00:30:14,583 --> 00:30:22,322 a household in the ancient world had slaves, and the slaves were to work out their godliness in the context of their slavery? 416 00:30:22,803 --> 00:30:29,673 And without reproducing the detailed and really helpful work, and I believe if you want to chase this up and listen to that talk, is it available? 417 00:30:29,733 --> 00:30:30,723 These will be online. 418 00:30:30,723 --> 00:30:32,283 They're not yet, but they will become available. 419 00:30:32,283 --> 00:30:32,553 Okay. 420 00:30:32,553 --> 00:30:36,753 That's at the Priscilla & Aquila Centre website, which you can find through Moore College. 421 00:30:36,753 --> 00:30:37,562 So look out for that. 422 00:30:37,832 --> 00:30:43,233 Probably by the time this podcast is released—we're recording this, but it won't be released for quite a few weeks—it may be up. 423 00:30:43,233 --> 00:30:45,303 And you can chase your stuff in more detail. 424 00:30:45,303 --> 00:30:48,488 But can you briefly talk a little bit about the slaves and masters angle? 425 00:30:48,488 --> 00:30:51,338 Because for some people, that undercuts the argument that you're making. 426 00:30:51,668 --> 00:30:52,838 I mean, it's so interesting, isn't it? 427 00:30:53,048 --> 00:30:58,958 We as evangelicals hold it a matter of honour and pride that it was our ancestors who fought 428 00:30:58,958 --> 00:31:04,418 against the slave trade on the basis of the gospel, because the gospel makes all men equal. 429 00:31:04,418 --> 00:31:08,918 What happened in slavery in the slave trade was absolutely abhorrent, and we fought it until 430 00:31:08,918 --> 00:31:13,628 it's basically been eradicated as a thing in our part of the world and our experience of life. 431 00:31:13,628 --> 00:31:16,898 So the gospel has led us to get rid of this thing. 432 00:31:17,473 --> 00:31:24,133 Surely the gospel, which says that you get the famous Galatians 3 verse about, "in Christ, there is neither male nor 433 00:31:24,133 --> 00:31:30,433 female"—hasn't the gospel done exactly the same thing to our understanding of gender as it has to slaves and masters? 434 00:31:30,633 --> 00:31:33,503 So why have we gotten rid of one but hung onto the other? 435 00:31:33,993 --> 00:31:34,828 That's the big question. 436 00:31:34,828 --> 00:31:35,928 That's the argument. 437 00:31:36,418 --> 00:31:42,388 And I think the thing that was really helpful for me, actually, was digging into the details of that and noticing how 438 00:31:42,388 --> 00:31:47,818 very differently the Bible talks about slavery in comparison to the way that it talks about being male and female. 439 00:31:48,358 --> 00:31:53,547 So interestingly, I—and you can chase this down through a number of different sources: Pete Orr 440 00:31:53,567 --> 00:31:57,678 has some really excellent material through the P&A Centre where he goes into this in detail. 441 00:31:58,307 --> 00:32:07,618 But actually, slavery was always seen, even in the Old Testament, as a social institution that was to be managed and dealt with appropriately. 442 00:32:07,978 --> 00:32:13,258 The Old Testament doesn't see the need to eradicate it, but it has ridiculous laws in its own context, right? 443 00:32:13,678 --> 00:32:20,308 So in Israel, for example, if you have a runaway slave, and we assume they've probably run away from another country, rather than from the bloke 444 00:32:20,308 --> 00:32:28,182 next door, you are not to return them to their master, but you are actually to provide for them and to give them a home amongst you, right. 445 00:32:28,273 --> 00:32:31,213 And that's because you lived in slavery in Egypt. 446 00:32:31,213 --> 00:32:32,148 You were one slaves. 447 00:32:32,148 --> 00:32:33,143 You knew what it was like. 448 00:32:33,143 --> 00:32:34,533 You've been released from that. 449 00:32:34,533 --> 00:32:41,463 You know how badly they've been mistreated and you know that they belong, in some way or another, to the same God that you belong to. 450 00:32:42,033 --> 00:32:51,633 So when the Bible speaks about things like slavery, it goes, "Here is a thing that needs to be spoken to through the lens of who God is." 451 00:32:52,243 --> 00:32:59,033 I think, and I found this really helpful, there's a fascinating discussion between Thabiti Anyabwile. 452 00:32:59,053 --> 00:33:00,583 I don't know if I'm pronouncing that correctly. 453 00:33:00,583 --> 00:33:01,124 It's pretty good. 454 00:33:01,124 --> 00:33:02,856 Yeah, I know Thabiti and that's pretty good. 455 00:33:02,856 --> 00:33:08,037 —and Doug Wilson, where they come to have some very different positions on this. 456 00:33:08,457 --> 00:33:16,887 But the two of them agree on two particular things, which is that the whole shape of Scripture is profoundly anti-racist, and that the 457 00:33:16,887 --> 00:33:24,807 actual structure of the gospel and what it means about the equality of human beings will lead a society in which the gospel has been at work 458 00:33:24,807 --> 00:33:34,411 over time to get rid of slavery, because, and I think Philemon's kind of really helpful here, who is this slave who is returning to you? 459 00:33:34,411 --> 00:33:36,432 He's not your slave; he's your brother. 460 00:33:37,101 --> 00:33:46,891 And so every slave culture ends up dehumanising people in the slave class in order to be able to ethically cope with what happens in slavery. 461 00:33:46,947 --> 00:33:53,302 And the gospel just says, "You cannot hold any of those tenets." You actually have to believe that's another 462 00:33:53,302 --> 00:33:59,121 person created in the image of God from who Jesus has died, and therefore you must treat them differently. 463 00:33:59,242 --> 00:34:04,776 And so Old Testament and New Testament, both outlaw slave trading categorically and absolutely. 464 00:34:05,691 --> 00:34:09,346 So it's not a slave trading situation that's being addressed in Titus, right? 465 00:34:09,346 --> 00:34:09,707 It's not— 466 00:34:09,707 --> 00:34:10,108 That's exactly right. 467 00:34:10,108 --> 00:34:13,381 It's not someone who's been kidnapped and is now in enforced servitude. 468 00:34:13,402 --> 00:34:21,022 It's someone who has entered the household sometimes, often voluntarily, because it was a way of working off debt, or it was an economic situation 469 00:34:21,022 --> 00:34:28,221 you are in in order to provide service for your livelihood, be part of this economic unit—in a sense, sit under the protection of this economic unit. 470 00:34:28,822 --> 00:34:33,197 And in a society where there's no welfare state, if you find yourself completely— 471 00:34:33,256 --> 00:34:35,806 Well, if you're on the verge of destitution, right? 472 00:34:35,897 --> 00:34:36,376 Yes. 473 00:34:36,376 --> 00:34:41,657 I would much rather become a servant in your household than continue in my destitution. 474 00:34:41,657 --> 00:34:42,827 Than die in destitution. 475 00:34:42,827 --> 00:34:43,726 Absolutely. 476 00:34:43,817 --> 00:34:49,006 And even significantly so I can't remember whether it's Deuteronomy or Exodus; you need to check the actual references. 477 00:34:49,456 --> 00:34:58,256 But in Old Testament law, if an Israelite makes themselves a slave because of their economic circumstances, after six years, you are responsible 478 00:34:58,256 --> 00:35:04,587 for providing them enough money to actually reestablish their freedom, and you're actually supposed to do enough to help them back onto their feet. 479 00:35:05,216 --> 00:35:10,227 And again, utterly different to every other culture around about them at the time. 480 00:35:10,466 --> 00:35:16,811 And this is the sense in which, for me, as I was pondering this when you were giving your address, it was very stimulating—very good—the way you dug 481 00:35:16,811 --> 00:35:22,481 into the details of what sort of slavery's being talked about, what sort of bondservant kind of situation here, and chattel slavery and different 482 00:35:22,481 --> 00:35:32,051 forms of slavery, and the impetus of the gospel to treat people as people and to liberate slaves—it did strike me that there is an aspect to 483 00:35:32,051 --> 00:35:39,411 the way the slaves and masters are referred to often in the New Testament that does reflect the reality of life in the created and fallen world. 484 00:35:39,411 --> 00:35:40,731 It's an ongoing reality. 485 00:35:41,151 --> 00:35:47,661 That is, there will always be people who, for some reason or other, because of their own disadvantages or misfortune or bad choices, 486 00:35:48,021 --> 00:35:55,582 find themselves in destitution or servitude in a disadvantaged economic state vis-a-vis you, where you have power over them. 487 00:35:55,582 --> 00:35:55,852 Correct. 488 00:35:56,031 --> 00:35:57,892 And they're dependent on you for work. 489 00:35:57,922 --> 00:35:59,482 They might be bonded to you for some reason. 490 00:35:59,482 --> 00:36:00,862 They might be working off a contract. 491 00:36:00,862 --> 00:36:07,522 They might have to—and what happens when there's an economic imbalance within a household—where there are workers within a household or within 492 00:36:07,522 --> 00:36:14,962 a broader community who are economically disadvantaged and placed in a vulnerable position of servitude and others who are more powerful? 493 00:36:14,962 --> 00:36:20,886 Now that's, I would say, in this world, an almost universal human experience, even though the 494 00:36:20,886 --> 00:36:25,866 categories and structures of slavery have kind of died away, thankfully in most places in the west. 495 00:36:25,866 --> 00:36:28,747 Well, it's interesting: we had a conversation over morning tea with the 496 00:36:28,747 --> 00:36:32,676 faculty about do we think that there's actually any of this still in existence? 497 00:36:33,026 --> 00:36:35,057 But you look at things like the gig economy, right? 498 00:36:35,486 --> 00:36:41,227 I mean, the guys who ride Uber Eats bikes around the city, they are basically doing the only job that they 499 00:36:41,227 --> 00:36:46,821 can get in a place where all the advantage stands with the employer and almost none of it stands with them. 500 00:36:47,271 --> 00:36:49,521 Their workforce work ridiculous hours. 501 00:36:49,551 --> 00:36:51,952 There's not a lot of safety and security in the work. 502 00:36:52,372 --> 00:36:57,682 It's not identical, but there's certainly a massive imbalance that goes on that many of 503 00:36:57,682 --> 00:37:01,952 us benefit from, because we all enjoy the fact that I can ring up at 9:00 PM and get it— 504 00:37:01,952 --> 00:37:02,671 And send something— 505 00:37:02,671 --> 00:37:03,901 —whatever it is sent over. 506 00:37:04,051 --> 00:37:06,841 So we're all happy to be part of the economic system that provides that. 507 00:37:07,031 --> 00:37:09,131 But there's a massive imbalance there. 508 00:37:09,851 --> 00:37:12,281 So the gospel keeps addressing us as Christians, right? 509 00:37:12,281 --> 00:37:15,702 If you are an employer in any of those situations— 510 00:37:15,707 --> 00:37:16,997 If you're a master in that sense— 511 00:37:17,176 --> 00:37:17,357 Yes. 512 00:37:17,747 --> 00:37:24,317 Are you going to treat people with respect and care and dignity and hang what the award says? 513 00:37:25,217 --> 00:37:29,777 Are you going to treat them genuinely as human beings and love them and respect them, and yeah. 514 00:37:29,807 --> 00:37:33,257 And if you're a worker, are you going to still, even though you're in a disadvantaged 515 00:37:33,257 --> 00:37:36,257 position, you're going to work hard, you're going to be honest you're going to— 516 00:37:36,317 --> 00:37:37,096 Absolutely. 517 00:37:37,337 --> 00:37:42,866 Even as a Christian in that context, that adorns the gospel by your attitude of service and your godliness. 518 00:37:42,926 --> 00:37:43,376 Absolutely. 519 00:37:43,526 --> 00:37:48,656 And because in a way we've separated work so much from the household, the sense that 520 00:37:48,656 --> 00:37:52,556 all this might be going on within a household is less the case for us these days. 521 00:37:52,556 --> 00:37:52,826 Correct. 522 00:37:52,976 --> 00:37:54,536 But it still, I think, does go on. 523 00:37:54,536 --> 00:38:01,491 And I think because the Bible keeps kind of directing and teaching us how to think about reality and about the world 524 00:38:01,491 --> 00:38:06,832 we all live in, even though the kind of details and contours of the world keeps shifting as times and history changes. 525 00:38:06,832 --> 00:38:09,602 It's the same world, but the same realities and relationships. 526 00:38:10,112 --> 00:38:14,392 And so even the slave one, which is kind of very different in a way, it does still does teach us how to 527 00:38:14,752 --> 00:38:20,582 think about economic disparity and servitude, and how to be generous and godly within those relationships. 528 00:38:20,702 --> 00:38:28,052 Well, and interestingly, it also keeps speaking to the nature of power and authority and stuff within our social structures, right? 529 00:38:28,132 --> 00:38:32,542 The world wants to say the way that we solve all these problems is by denying all power. 530 00:38:32,542 --> 00:38:36,052 There is no such thing as authority, and I don't let anybody else be the boss of me. 531 00:38:36,142 --> 00:38:36,352 Yeah. 532 00:38:36,652 --> 00:38:42,986 But as much as everybody keeps saying that that's what's true, it just turns a blind eye to the reality that that's all of our 533 00:38:43,046 --> 00:38:51,046 experience most of the time—that there are people in authority over us, and there are often people under us in some way, shape or form. 534 00:38:51,496 --> 00:38:53,866 And the Scriptures, rather than saying, "Oh, you can forget all that. 535 00:38:53,866 --> 00:38:57,346 You're all actually exactly the same as each other and there's no difference, and authority doesn't really exist, 536 00:38:57,346 --> 00:39:02,837 'cause it's a social construct and a figment of your imagination", it says, "No, authority is real." And actually, 537 00:39:02,837 --> 00:39:08,537 if you are someone in authority, you have a deep responsibility to God and to other people who are made in God's 538 00:39:08,537 --> 00:39:16,616 image to work out how to enact that authority with grace and wisdom and kindness and generosity and faithfulness. 539 00:39:17,606 --> 00:39:25,557 And if you live under authority, you're actually called not to just denounce it or push it away, or ignore it or avoid it, but actually to work 540 00:39:25,557 --> 00:39:35,171 out how to live faithfully and wisely, not by becoming a non-human or suppressing your reality, but choosing to acknowledge where God has given 541 00:39:35,171 --> 00:39:44,231 responsibility, and choosing to use your gifts, wisdom and capacity in ways that respect and encourage and help that relationship in good ways. 542 00:39:44,801 --> 00:39:47,321 That is a deeply counter-cultural reality, isn't it? 543 00:39:47,461 --> 00:39:51,421 It's one Paul raises later in Titus when he encourages them to be subject to the authorities. 544 00:39:51,421 --> 00:39:51,841 Absolutely. 545 00:39:51,901 --> 00:39:53,641 And elsewhere in, in the New Testament as well. 546 00:39:54,236 --> 00:39:55,586 This has been a wonderful conversation. 547 00:39:55,586 --> 00:39:59,966 Thanks for coming and being part of it, Paul, and driving it really with the work and research you've done. 548 00:40:00,477 --> 00:40:09,016 But it strikes me as we kind of draw it to a close that what we're really saying is that the Bible, for all, that it sometimes feels like a book 549 00:40:09,016 --> 00:40:18,256 from another place in time and says things that jump out and strike us, that's some of the best parts of the Bible for us, because the Bible is God 550 00:40:18,256 --> 00:40:25,816 speaking about the reality he's created and in which we live, and the reality that's been redeemed in Christ, in which we've been redeemed in Christ. 551 00:40:26,146 --> 00:40:30,676 And there's so much wisdom that this gets us to stop and think about our whole lives and the way we 552 00:40:30,676 --> 00:40:36,406 maybe have adopted ways of thinking and being that maybe don't fit with the reality that God's created. 553 00:40:36,676 --> 00:40:42,666 And that godliness, for all its kind of unitary nature—we're all striving to be godly and like Christ—it 554 00:40:43,636 --> 00:40:47,776 does reach into our individual lives and different circumstances, and challenge us in different ways. 555 00:40:47,836 --> 00:40:49,036 And it calls us, doesn't it? 556 00:40:49,397 --> 00:40:54,526 When you notice that you are reacting, how do you become curious at that moment? 557 00:40:54,917 --> 00:41:02,116 How do you stop just rejecting out of hand or throwing the shutters up or whatever, but going, "Wow, this feels really different and I'm feeling 558 00:41:02,116 --> 00:41:10,727 really uncomfortable here." What does it mean to slow down and actually let the whole of the biblical worldview inform me, and put pieces 559 00:41:10,727 --> 00:41:17,731 together here in a different way that might actually create a much better vision of what it means to be human and in relationship with God? 560 00:41:17,912 --> 00:41:18,811 What a fantastic thought. 561 00:41:19,142 --> 00:41:22,381 How about we pray just before we finish—for those who are listening and for 562 00:41:22,381 --> 00:41:25,421 the content of your talk at P&A and the effect that it might have had as well. 563 00:41:25,841 --> 00:41:28,081 How about I pray for us and for you before we close on. 564 00:41:28,081 --> 00:41:28,531 Thanks, Tony. 565 00:41:28,892 --> 00:41:32,791 Father, we do thank you for your word and for the way that it does challenge us. 566 00:41:33,122 --> 00:41:37,801 We read it, and so often, it resonates, and we say, "Yes, that's exactly the way our world is, and that's 567 00:41:37,801 --> 00:41:44,241 exactly who I am." But at times, it challenges us that we don't really understand ourselves or our world. 568 00:41:44,751 --> 00:41:51,892 And if we are curious and we tremble at your word and we want to find out what you want to say to us, it drives us to stop and rethink. 569 00:41:52,071 --> 00:41:58,551 And when we come to passages like this one that often jump out at us, we thank you so much, Father, for the way you speak to us through them. 570 00:41:58,551 --> 00:42:01,731 And thanks for the opportunity to have that conversation about those things today. 571 00:42:02,386 --> 00:42:07,546 For Paul, Father, in his role at Moore College, we pray for him and for his work as the Head of the Ministry 572 00:42:07,546 --> 00:42:13,616 Department, and for the students that he teaches, and pastors, and for the work of the Priscilla & Aquila Centre that 573 00:42:13,636 --> 00:42:19,756 conducted that recent conference: we do thank you for that; for Veronica Hoyt, the new head of that Centre; and for 574 00:42:19,756 --> 00:42:24,857 the work that it's continuing to do to help us think through these issues, especially with regard to men and women. 575 00:42:25,366 --> 00:42:27,647 We thank you for all these things, Father, in Jesus name. 576 00:42:28,031 --> 00:42:28,452 Amen. 577 00:42:28,716 --> 00:42:29,006 Amen. 578 00:42:43,962 --> 00:42:48,702 Well, thanks for joining us on this episode of the Centre for Christian Living Podcast from Moore College. 579 00:42:49,182 --> 00:42:53,591 For a whole lot more from the Centre for Christian Living, just head over to the CCL website. 580 00:42:53,591 --> 00:43:02,767 That's ccl.moore.edu.au, where you'll find a stack of resources, including every past podcast episode all 581 00:43:02,767 --> 00:43:08,877 the way back to 2017, videos from our live events and articles that we've published through the Centre. 582 00:43:09,667 --> 00:43:13,386 And while you're there on the website, we also have an opportunity for you to make a 583 00:43:13,386 --> 00:43:18,216 tax deductible donation to support the ongoing work of the Centre here at Moore College. 584 00:43:18,787 --> 00:43:26,476 We'd also love you to subscribe to the podcast and to leave a review so that people can discover our podcast and our other resources. 585 00:43:27,106 --> 00:43:31,636 And we always love and benefit from receiving your feedback and questions. 586 00:43:31,636 --> 00:43:32,686 Please get in touch. 587 00:43:32,986 --> 00:43:37,006 You can email us at ccl@moore.edu.au. 588 00:43:38,536 --> 00:43:44,296 Many thanks to Karen Beilharz from the Communications Team here at Moore College for all her work in transcribing and 589 00:43:44,386 --> 00:43:51,796 editing and producing this podcast; to James West for the music; and to you, dear listeners, for joining us each week. 590 00:43:51,856 --> 00:43:52,696 Thank you for listening. 591 00:43:53,176 --> 00:43:54,016 I'm Tony Payne. 592 00:43:54,406 --> 00:43:54,796 Bye for now.