Tolerance

Whether or not you agree with the consecration of women as bishops in the C of E, surely any right-minded, tolerant person would want to provide for those who do not agree with this innovation. The following are just some of the reasons for providing alternative episcopal oversight for those who hold that headship in the church should be male:

1. It is taught in the Bible. You may think that this no longer applies, but you have to admit that this is the teaching of Paul (e.g. 1 Cor 11:2; 1 Tim 2:11-15), that submission was a quality of the Son of God and that the Father directs the Son (e.g. John 8:42; 12:49f; 14:31; 15:10; Mt 26:36-46). It is this submission of the Son to the Father which is mirrored in human relationships. Therefore, those who hold to make headship do not demean or disctiminate against women, but desire to uphold a testimony to the Trinity.
2. Those who are now ordained, were ordained into a church that did not consecrate women as bishops. They should at least be allowed to continue in that integrity.
3. Those who have been installed in a parish and swore the oath of allegiance did so on the understanding that the succession of bishops would be male. 
4. Those who want to change the system agreed, when they were ordained, to be ministers in a church which did not consecrate women. They knew the score and could have chosen to be ministers in a church in which women were given positions of headship (e.g. the Methodist church).
5. Does not the tolerance which these people so espouse mean that they themselves should be tolerant of those who disagree with this innovation. 
6. It is an innovation. This is new. The proponents could be wrong. Do they not have the humility to admit that?

In light of all this, please consider signing the petition to retain "Clause 5 (1) c". You can find the petition and an explanation of it here:
http://www.change.org/petitions/the-house-of-bishops-of-the-church-of-england-keep-clause-5-1-c-in-the-consecration-and-ordination-of-women-measure

If you want a detailed explanation go to John Richardson's blog

Active righteousness

If God forgives us every sin, why not carry on sinning? After all, the more I sin, the more it highlights God's kindness and the more he is glorified! That's the question at the beginning of Romans 6.
We, of course, would never dream of deliberately sinning so that God's grace would be magnified! Rather, we'd agree with what Paul says in Romans 6:11-13(a):

In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness,

We don't want sin to reign in us, we try to avoid sin. But I wonder if we conveniently forget the second half of Romans 6:13,

but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness.

Paul says that we all have two possibilities in the way we live our lives. We can either use our lives as 'instruments of wickedness' or as 'instruments of righteousness'.
Mankind has invented some amazing things, which can either be used for evil or for good. The same instruments which can be used to save lives in the hospital theatre or give shelter by building houses or haul life-giving water from a well, can also be used to maim and kill in the torture chamber.
So it is with our lives. We either put them to serving wickedness or to serving righteousness. And yet, all too often, we think that not doing evil is the same as doing righteousness. It's not. It's no use if a surgeon leaves his instruments in a drawer. They must be used to treat and to heal. It's no use a builder leaving his tools in the van. He must use them to repair and to build. It's no use leaving a bucket, rope and pulleys in a heap on the floor, they must be used to pull water from the ground.
So with our lives. Too often we leave our lives in the drawer, in the van, in a heap on the floor, avoiding evil, perhaps, but certainly not actively doing good. We're ready to count ourselves 'dead to sin' but not to be 'alive to God in Christ Jesus'.


(Elsewhere in the NT, this word for 'instruments' is translated 'weapons', and perhaps this more vividly creates the image of activity. So we could say that we can either use our lives as weapons for wickedness or weapons for righteousness).

There's only one way to find out... FIGHT!!!

Today, the press has its eyes on the meeting of The General Synod of the Church of England because it's at this meeting that a decision will be made about the possible consecration of women as bishops (btw, bishops are not 'ordained', they're 'consecrated').
Of course the press only wants a good story, and they interview only the people who'll give them a story in dumbed-down, bite-sized, tasty morsels. So this morning on the BBC we hear from a woman desperate to see women bishops because, after all, God created us all the same, and from a man who thinks 'priests' should be men because Jesus only called men and because he was a man.
But which is right? "There's only one way to find out... FIGHT...!!" (as Harry Hill would say). Of course the truth is more complicated, and neither are right. But that won't stop the fight nor the ensuing damage to the name of the Lord Jesus, his church and the gospel message.
The liberal pro-consecration of women are wrong because they fail to recognise that human relationships between men and women should reflect and testify to the glorious relationships in the Trinity (1 Corinthians 11:3 cf John 10:18; John 12:49f; John 14:31; John 15:10 etc.). The anglo-catholics are wrong because they think that the ordained minister (the 'priest' or 'bishop') stands in the place of Christ and his apostles in some kind of royal succession and so deny the sufficiency of Christ as our one High Priest and his church as the priesthood of the new covenant (1 Peter 2:4-10; Hebrews 7:11-8:13; Hebrews 19:1-18).
But which is worse - to deny the glory of the submission and obedience of the Son of God or to deny the glory of the sufficiency of the priesthood of the Son of God? If I had to choose, I think I'd say that the latter is worse because it keeps people away from direct contact with God by placing human priests between us, whereas the former, while it removes a testimony to the glory of Jesus and denies men and women their full humanity, doesn't keep people away from God.
Of course what we really want is a church that fully proclaims free access to the Father through the Son and the full glory of the submission of the Son to the Father.