Describing the two offices that are found in the New Testament, elder and deacon, Wood asked whether both men and women are meant to serve in both of those offices.
“Most theologians would argue or agree that there were women who served as deacons,” Wood said, mentioning that Phoebe was a deaconess.
Therefore, the question is whether a woman can serve as an elder, Wood proposed. “Our interpretation of the New Testament is that the role of eldership, according to God’s design, is that’s a role reserved for men.”
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“But within that,” Wood continued, “a man who is the leader—our elders here at Saddleback are all men—a man who’s an elder can empower women and mobilize women to use their spiritual gifts in the local church.” Wood said that this is seen from a “descriptive angle all throughout the course of the New Testament.”
Wood’s Elder Description Differs From Warren’s
Although they agree on Saddleback Church’s elder structure, Wood’s description of the office of elder being reserved for only men seems to differ from the view expressed by Rick Warren, the church’s former pastor, during his recent appearance on “The Russell Moore Show” podcast.
Moore asked Warren (15:55 minute mark), “So after the last three years, you would support men and women as elders, a senior pastor, as everything within the church?”
Warren emphatically replied, “I would! I would! But because I have to say this is my interpretation. I have to say with humility, it doesn’t bother me if you disagree with me.”
Later in the interview, Warren clarified that Saddleback had made the determination that “the senior pastor is to be a man—a married man of one wife. But I wouldn’t kick somebody out over that. I think that’s, again, a secondary issue.”
What About 1 Timothy 2:12?
Wood later addressed Paul’s first letter to Timothy, in which the apostle said, “I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet” (1 Timothy 2:12).
Some theologians believe that the Apostle Paul is saying that women cannot teach in the local church, Wood expressed. “To which I would say, that is not how Paul led in the local church. In fact, he commends Priscilla and Aquila, this couple, that was a woman who was teaching in the local church.”
So the Apostle Paul doesn’t mean a woman cannot teach in the local church, Wood argued. Instead, he means that a woman is not permitted to “seize authority, to teach and seize authority over a man.”
“So my interpretation and the interpretation of our elders and many Bible-believing theologians is that what Paul is talking about is the condition—the behavior—of a woman as she exercises the spiritual gifts, as she exercises her functions in the church,” Wood believes.
Just as the Apostle Paul’s instruction for men to be the head of the household prohibits a woman from seizing that role from the husband, Wood said, “So when a woman teaches in a local church, she’s teaching in conjunction with the authority of the Church. She’s not trying to overtake that authority. When she uses that spiritual gift, she’s using it under the authority of the eldership or the leadership of that local church.”
“Here at Saddleback, we have a group of elders who are all men, we have women who will teach on our stage [and] all the men elders in our church are in full buy-in to women teaching and exercising their spiritual gifts,” Wood explained.
, Saddleback Church lead pastor Andy Wood released a video responding to the Southern Baptist Convention’s (SBC) recent decision that the denomination's largest church is no longer “in friendly cooperation with the Convention.”){kind=link}