Mostly, Tamar does us no favors here in the feminist world, am I right? She is obviously displaying everything we women are trying to fight against.

First, she is a black widow, killing helpless men left and right. With no husband alive, she ends up living on Judah’s dime. So annoying. Driven crazy by her desire to have a husband and a baby—always the driving force of every deranged woman—she resorts to womanly manipulation and her feminine wiles.

The black widow dons the wicked camouflage of a prostitute in order to seduce her poor father-in-law.

And to make sure she can prove exactly whom she seduced, she takes his staff and cord. Tamar, having accomplished what she wanted, disappears with Judah’s stuff!

And men, be careful of women, because you could just be walking along, minding your own business, and they will jump out, seduce you, and take your honor. Because you are a man, you are helpless to stop it.

Then, yes, most admit that when Judah finds out Tamar is pregnant, he is hypocritical when he wants her killed. But how embarrassing for him when she exposes her devious plan to take him down. Having been caught, Judah comes clean.

Tamar does everything we are trying to prove women don’t do...

…or does she?

The Misogyneutics Maneuvers

What happened in your heart when you read my version of Tamar’s story? Did you nod along, saying, “Damn straight, this woman is a hot mess”? Or did you rail against it, looking for the comment button to roast me because you saw the misogyny already? Do you hope Tamar is not as bad as you’ve been told but don’t really see how it could be read any differently? Or are you somewhere in the middle?

This is where the Misogyneutics maneuvers become important. Like a football player jumping through an agility ladder, Misogyneutics hops, skips, and jumps over a few things to keep the story reading the way it wants it to.

Misogyneutics protects the presumed moral authority of the man in the story. When the text places a man in the wrong and a woman in the right, the interpretation has to find a way to restore the expected hierarchy.

The first option is to rehabilitate the man. His wrongdoing can be minimized, contextualized, excused, or treated as an unfortunate lapse in the life of an otherwise honorable man.

But sometimes the text makes that impossible.

When the man simply cannot be made righteous, Misogyneutics has another option: make him the victim of the woman.

His actions can still technically be called sinful, but responsibility for those actions begins to migrate toward her. She seduced him. She tricked him. She manipulated him. She tempted him. She entrapped him. She used her feminine wiles against him.

The man can therefore be both guilty and victimized in the retelling. He sinned, yes, but she created the circumstances that caused him to sin. (See their interpretation of Genesis 3—they conclude that if it weren’t for Eve, Adam would have been fine.)

One of the functions of Misogyneutics, then, is the redistribution of moral agency. Male wrongdoing is softened or explained, while female agency is amplified until the woman bears responsibility not only for her own actions, but for his.

And that is how a story can become a warning to men:

Men, beware of women like Tamar.

But is that the story Genesis 38 actually tells?

Tamar—Trollop or Truth Mirror?

Much of the following discussion comes directly from A Woman’s Place Is in the Story: Seeing Women in the Biblical Narrative, by Dr. Sandra Glahn. In lieu of footnotes, I will simply put page numbers in parentheses so you can find Dr. Glahn’s specific verbiage.

To understand as best we can, we have to approach the story of Tamar just like any other narrative we read: Who are we reading about, and what is the setting (p. 15)?

We are in the midst of a vignette that begins in chapter 37, described as, “This is the account of Jacob’s family line.” This family line is important because of the lineage of Jesus. Judah and Tamar are the biological connection to Jesus (p. 41).

Jacob is the son of Rebekah and Isaac, and he has twelve sons: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, Joseph, Benjamin, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, and Asher.

The story of Jacob’s family line focuses on Joseph for much of the narrative, but think of a camera that suddenly flashes to a screen that says, “Meanwhile...” and someone else becomes the focus for a bit.

Jacob loves his son Joseph the best (Technicolor Dreamcoat sound familiar?), and his brothers hate this so much that they plot to kill him. Through a series of events, Joseph ends up being sold, eventually landing in Egypt.

We are reading about Jacob’s sons, and the tension in their relationships is part of the setting. The brothers engage in violence, sell their brother, and participate in an elaborate cover-up. Their relationships are fractured, and this affects the setting because Judah distances himself from the family (p. 44).

Meanwhile…

At that time, Judah left his brothers and went down to stay with a man of Adullam named Hirah. —Genesis 38:1

This is where we meet Tamar.

Judah marries Tamar to his first son, Er. Er dies—not because of Tamar, but because Er is wicked (p. 45).

Tamar then marries Judah’s second son, Onan, according to the family custom of levirate marriage, to provide offspring for his deceased brother (more on this levirate situation later). Onan also dies—not because of Tamar, but because what Onan does is wicked (p. 47).

Judah has one son remaining, Shelah, but he is not yet old enough to fulfill the obligation of levirate marriage. So Judah sends Tamar back to her father’s house to wait, similar to Naomi telling Ruth and Orpah to return to their families, releasing them from the levirate custom.

But Judah does not release Tamar from her marriage obligation. She is legitimately a widow but betrothed to his youngest son; he does not free her to find another partner and build another life. She is held in limbo. Without the protection and provision of a husband or children, Tamar is in an incredibly vulnerable position. Security comes through a husband or children (p. 50).

Then Shelah grows up.

And Judah does nothing.

Tamar knows Judah. A woman knows the ins and outs of her in-laws, am I right? Tamar has spent enough time around this family to know Judah has some flaws. She removes her widow’s clothes and goes to where she will cross his path. She knows the assumption he will make when he sees a single woman on the road (p. 51).

Okay, But What Was She Wearing?

Here is where the story gets especially interesting.

Tamar does not dress up like a prostitute (p. 52).

She disguises herself so that Judah will not recognize her.

Judah ASSUMES she is a prostitute.

And you know what happens when people assume—they make an ass out of u and me.

Judah sees her. Judah makes the assumption. Judah approaches her. Judah willingly engages her in something forbidden within his culture (p. 53).

But through Misogyneutics, a little perspective shift is made. The story becomes, “Tamar dressed up like a prostitute,” instead of, “Judah thought she was a prostitute.”

Tamar then becomes painted with the stroke of seductress, not only here but everywhere else she is mentioned in the Bible.

But Tamar disguised herself and simply allowed Judah’s character flaws to be his guide.

Tamar demands identification as collateral. Judah promises her a young goat and gives her his seal, cord, and staff until he can send payment.

Tamar also knows what will happen if she becomes pregnant. Judah has left her stuck in a partially married limbo. She is still bound to his family, but he has refused to give her his remaining son.

She is holding up a mirror for Judah to see his flawed character (p. 59).

And she is right about what Judah will do.

When Judah discovers that Tamar is pregnant, he wants her brought out and burned.

Then Tamar shows him who made her pregnant.

And the mirror she holds up is his belongings.

And Judah looks at himself in that mirror.

Then he admits that Tamar is the righteous party.

He Said, She Said

This point matters because we do not intuitively understand levirate marriage. Polygamy is not acceptable to us. The social and marital world of Genesis 38 is foreign to us, and we do not have to pretend otherwise.

We may not get it. We may not be able to fully understand the customs and laws, but the narrator helps us understand what happened in that world. The narrator tells us Tamar is the one acting righteously (pp. 55–56).

The narrator says, “Judah recognized them and said, ‘She is more righteous than I, since I wouldn’t give her to my son Shelah.’”

Tamar is the righteous one.

And Tamar’s story is not merely an interruption in the Joseph narrative. It becomes a pivot point in the story of Jacob’s family and, specifically, in Judah’s character arc (pp. 57, 62).

Before Tamar, Judah is the brother who proposes selling Joseph. He participates in the deception that devastates his father.

Then he encounters Tamar.

Tamar holds up that mirror...

His assumptions are exposed. His hypocrisy is exposed. His self-righteousness has become his downfall. He is confronted with evidence of his own wrongdoing, and he admits that he is wrong.

He does not help himself to Tamar’s body; it says he never sleeps with her again (p. 57). This shows a change in Judah’s character in that he could claim a right to enjoy her body—he already did in this story—but he chooses to honor her and not violate her in that way. In a world we do not understand, one of levirate marriage and women needing a male to keep them alive, this is a shining light for Tamar.

When the camera flashes back to the story of what Joseph is up to in Egypt, the Judah we see is very different.

When Benjamin’s life is threatened, Judah does not sacrifice another brother to save himself. He offers himself in his brother’s place. When confronted by Joseph, Judah openly recounts what has happened and accepts responsibility for Benjamin.

Genesis 38, then, may not be an embarrassing sexual detour interrupting the “real” story of Joseph.

Tamar may be essential to understanding how the Judah who was willing to sell one brother becomes the Judah who is willing to offer himself for another (p. 58).

And the woman who has so often been portrayed as the manipulative prostitute who threatened Judah’s honor may actually be the person through whom Judah begins to learn what honor and righteousness look like (p. 62).

Ladies, Keep It Tight Or…

Thankfully, I do not carry the baggage of the 1990s purity culture movement. This movement put the onus on women to “not cause their brother to stumble” by wearing spaghetti straps.

Who knew the power of a spaghetti strap?

But I do carry the baggage of the 2010s focus on male addiction to pornography.

My husband is one such victim of pornography. He struggled for years to hide it, and when his addiction was finally exposed, we sought help from our church to heal our marriage and set him free.

The view at the time was that men were turning to porn because they were unhappy with their sex lives and tired of being disrespected by their wives.

And I wholeheartedly agreed.

Without actually asking my husband why he turned to porn, I took it upon myself to make myself the most available, respectful woman so he would not have the desire to turn to porn ever again.

Tamar’s story was used to scare me. She was used to show me that men cannot control themselves and that women are so desperate for a man they will do anything to entice them.

I was warned, “You better bring the heat in the bedroom and look hotter than any woman he may see in his day-to-day life, or else porn will turn into a full-fledged affair because he must get his needs met.”

Those bitches, I thought.

How dare these loose women try to steal my man! They probably are wearing spaghetti straps in broad daylight, just like women of the night are wont to do!

I’d let myself go a bit in the wake of having our son. So I dieted and got breast augmentation to get everything back where it belonged. I held my tongue to avoid sounding like a nagging wife. I think I spent probably about one million dollars at Victoria’s Secret to have a hot-bod nighttime wardrobe.

I worked so hard.

Imagine my heartbreak when I found out he was still addicted to porn.

Now I know porn was never about me. Porn served to nurse the brokenness Jesse was dealing with. Jesse overcame porn, not because he was getting the best sex of his life whenever he wanted it, but because he made a choice to follow Jesus and allow the Spirit to cultivate self-control in him.

Men are not pigs following their noses around looking for spaghetti straps. This characterization of men does them a huge disservice and assumes they cannot control their lust.

Remember what happens when you assume...

And the use of Tamar to scare me into belittling my role as a wife to lust absorber dishonors the beauty of womanhood.

First and foremost, when you read her story free of Misogyneutics, she is not a threat to Judah. Judah is responsible for himself.

But how many times is this story used to say, “If his wife was doing her job, he wouldn’t have even noticed Tamar”?

Not true.

Men are responsible for their own ish, just like women are responsible for our own ish.

And the other terrible outcome of this view of Tamar is what it does to inter-woman relationship dynamics. It pits women against each other in a zero-sum game of who can keep the man.

This is what misogyny assumes of us—that we are all just out here in these streets trying to collect men.

And remember what happens when you assume...

If a man decides to stray in the marriage, how many times do we say, “Well, she wore that pencil skirt and low-cut top to work. What was he supposed to do? Also, his wife has obviously skipped her Weight Watchers meetings—who wants to sleep with someone who jiggles?”

We put it on women.

Why?

Because misogyny shapes our imagination to put the onus on women.

We are supposed to be the pure ones, never tempting men. We are the ones who should say no, while simultaneously being condemned when men do not desire us.

What the F, people? Pick a freaking lane.

In this atmosphere, other women become the enemy, when in reality, they are not. But misogyny needs us to keep fighting amongst each other because if we are busy doing that, they can stay in power.

But enough is enough.

Tamar did not dress up like a prostitute—Judah assumed she was one and propositioned her.

Tamar was not out to manipulate him into giving her a baby—she was desperate and in limbo and needed him to act honorably so she could survive.

And so, we can’t change everything all at once, but this is my encouragement to you:

If you hear Tamar taught this way, hold in your heart that it is not true. Speak up when you can.

Wear the spaghetti straps.

Love your sisters and friends.

Your husband’s lust is on him, not you.

Victoria’s Secret is not our secret to hold.

If you have been stuck holding the weight of a man’s sin like I was, I pray you feel me cheering you on to set it down.

Much of the Bible comes to us through narrative, and Scripture as a whole tells a story with the supernatural power to change us. Much like a book engages and develops your imagination, the Bible engages and develops your theological imagination. I think this is exactly how God intended it. Under the tutelage of the Holy Spirit, our interaction with Scripture grows our understanding of who God is and who we are in light of Him.

But we are thousands of years removed from the original authors, languages, cultures, and audiences. Careful work is required to understand the text as closely as possible to how its authors intended it to be understood.

Translation and interpretation are undertaken by people who have spent their lives engaging in this work. Our modern translations are trustworthy because scholars work diligently to communicate the original text as faithfully as possible. The Bible you hold in your hand can be trusted.

Interpretation, however, is not the same as translation.

Hermeneutics—the study of how we interpret Scripture—asks us to engage with Scripture on its terms, allowing the original authors to say what they wanted to say in the way they wanted to say it. Interpretation takes the text and asks: What is the authorial intent? What was the intended effect on the original readers? And what should we, two thousand years removed, do with it?

It is the difference between asking, “What did Paul say?” and asking, “Why did Paul say that?”

Well-rounded hermeneutics helps prevent us from making Scripture say something it doesn’t intend to say. It also asks us to acknowledge that we all come to the text with biases, assumptions, and gaps in our understanding.

And this is where things get complicated.

Because narrative engages our imagination, sometimes our preconceived notions fill in what the text leaves unsaid. We assign motives. We hear tone. We decide who the hero is and who the problem is. Sometimes we don’t even realize we’re doing it.

God can handle that. He is the one who chose to communicate so much truth through story.

Scholars work hard to account for these limitations—seeking multiple points of view, noting disagreements over translation and interpretation, and acknowledging places where judgment is required. The goal is to allow the text, as much as possible, to shape our theological imagination rather than allowing our theological imagination to reshape the text.

However…

…what happens when the imagination we bring to Scripture has already been shaped by misogyny?

This is the question at the center of much of my work.

I believe our theological imagination has been shaped in such a way that gender hierarchy—the dynamic where men lead and women submit—can seem as though it is God’s ideal.

I am one who has seen and experienced it.

And because I prefer a life where everyone is mad at me all the time, I have chosen to advocate against misogyny in the interpretation of Scripture and call us to reconsider interpretations that undermine the shared commission God gives women and men in Genesis: together, bearing God’s image and exercising dominion over creation.

To help identify what I see as wrong with this approach to Scripture, I’ve coined “misogyneutics.” This is where misogyny and hermeneutics collide. When employed, the interpretation subjugates women and forces us into a gender hierarchy that I do not believe is God’s ideal for humanity.

I believe misogyneutics uses tactics that shape our theological imagination in ways that bolster gender hierarchy and control over women. Not every man who interprets Scripture engages in misogyneutics, which is why I call it misogyneutics and not dudeneutics. Internalized misogyny, outright hostility toward women, and a desire to be in control can all lead to misogyneutics.

And so, one who constantly points out what is wrong is then obligated to offer a solution that corrects the problem and brings fruitfulness to the body of believers.

What I offer is an invitation to join me as we attempt to reshape our theological imagination with a corrective hermeneutic.

For many of us, our theological imagination has been skewed to see Scripture in a way that suits misogynists. What we need is to notice the ways and tactics employed to shape our imagination, hold those before God, and ask, “How did you intend me to imagine this?” Then, through the power of the Holy Spirit, we stay steadfast or adjust our alignment so we are in step with God.

Reconsider: Notice + Consider + Align.

And you may ask, “Gosh, Sarah, this seems like a fool’s errand. How ever will we start?”

And I would say, “Gosh, I am so glad you asked. I have a plan.”

Dr. Sandra L. Glahn to the Rescue

Her new book, A Woman’s Place Is in the Story: Seeing Women in the Biblical Narrative, coming out on August 25, is where we are going to start noticing where our theological imagination is skewed. Through careful and thorough research, she shows us how women’s stories have been shaped in ways that diminish their roles, besmirch their character, or use them as warnings to women that they better shape up or ship out with that Jezebel spirit.

Dr. Glahn begins by reminding us what narrative is. In the chapters that follow, she shows how reading women in the biblical narrative with a hermeneutic that rightly considers how narrative works can restore to the plot the vibrancy these women were intended to have.

She walks us through the stories of Tamar; Shiphrah and Puah; the woman who saved Moses; Abigail; the five named daughters; the woman of Shunem and Job’s daughters; Jezebel; and the woman of Samaria at the well before leaving us with a vision for moving forward.

She is the one who taught me that if you are going to point out a problem, you should also offer a solution, so it seems fitting that she models what she asks of others.

Now, I need to confess something to you.

This book is dedicated to me.

And I am not ashamed to say that this is the greatest gift that has ever been bestowed on me. When you see, “For Sarah G., Zealous Promoter of Good…” that is me. I’m that Sarah, and I’ll be happy to sign your book for you.

I’m kidding. Obviously this book is a product of Dr. G’s hard work, and I know that…

Mostly.

I bring that up, not only as a humble brag, but to fully disclose my bias. But honestly, I want to tell you, and not just because it is dedicated to me, Dr. G’s book is the greatest book you will ever read, next to her other greatest book, Nobody’s Mother: Artemis of the Ephesians in Antiquity and the New Testament. (These titles are two of hundreds of other titles she has written—all equally the greatest books you will ever read.)

But I also bring it up to tell you that if Dr. G had not shown me that my theological imagination was skewed to support gender hierarchy, I would not have stepped into the gift of being a Zealous Promoter.

Like the Woman of Samaria, who spoke to Jesus and then took off running to tell everyone about Him, I’m a Zealous Promoter. When I learn something, discover something, or meet someone whose work has brought me closer to Jesus, I run through my town—literally and metaphorically—telling everyone about it. I want you all to know about anything that has helped me move toward a better understanding of God.

But that Zealous Promoter got squashed when her theological imagination was shaped to see the woman at the well as a pitiful, loose woman who’d been found out by Jesus and, in her thankfulness that Jesus deigned to speak to her, ran through town telling everyone that he knew about all her relationships.

She was not held up like a hero or an example of open honesty. She was displayed as a hot mess running around like a crazy woman. And that interpretation shaped my imagination to see her actions as distasteful, not honorable, and I changed my behavior to match.

I’d like to journey through Dr. G’s book together; it will help us reconsider these stories and reshape our theological imagination so we can see what place these women actually hold in the story.

So, by way of a heads-up—and holding this loosely enough that I don’t overpromise and underdeliver—many of the upcoming posts will follow along with this book.

Dr. G’s book will be our guide as we notice what we’ve been taught to imagine, consider what the text actually gives us, and stay open to where the Holy Spirit may ask us to realign. Order your copy now so you get it on August 25th!

Let’s reconsider together.

Abject panic rises in me; I try to count off and match up the classmate to the paragraph, attempting to predict which paragraph will be mine. I need to read it like the world’s best orator to avoid being made fun of for the rest of my school career.

But in my counting, I’ve lost track of where we are. And now my frienemy, Stacy Buss, who sits right in front of me, is reading aloud as if she were born to do so, with a beautiful lilt to her voice.

I think, “I’m dead in the water; I’m going to have to tell the whole class I lost my place.”

Resigned to my fate, when Stacy stops speaking, I look up and open my mouth to confess when I hear the teacher say,

“Thank you, Stacy. Sarah, you will pick up at the subtitle: ‘ Cells: The building blocks of life,’ after lunch.”

The subtitle.

That BLESSED subtitle.

It saved me.

That blessed indicator of a change in topic saved me from humiliation.

(Ugh, I am sweating just from telling that story, are you? Was anyone else subjected to that kind of horror in school?)

But those are not the kind of subtitles I want to address right now. Blessed as they may be at times, some subtitles are sneaky ways of shaping our theological imagination and interpretation of Scripture.

Also, this is the second month of me writing about Mary and Martha, and you may think,

“Good Lord, she is beating a dead horse here.”

What can I tell you? It’s the section I chose for my Greek class this summer, so I’m taking all of you along for the ride—this horse is still alive and kicking.

If we’re going to ask whether subtitles shape our interpretation, the obvious question is: Did Luke write them?

It’s All Greek To Me

The NT is written in an ancient language called Koine Greek. The authors wrote in all capital letters with no spaces. Why? Partly because writing materials were expensive and because continuous script was the normal writing convention. This means that translators became experts at reading the puzzling text. It looked like this:

Image: Codex Sinaiticus (Luke), courtesy of the Codex Sinaiticus Project. Accessed July 26, 2026. Codexsinaticus.org

As Koine Greek became less familiar to readers and the cost of materials went down, scribes, editors, and eventually printers and translators started adding subtitles for ease of navigation. By the 13^th century, we see many of the subtitles appear in manuscripts that we still use today—but Luke did not write those.

Today our Bibles have section headings, section titles, headings, and chapter summaries that all make it easier for us to navigate through the Bible. And thank God for that because it still takes me five minutes to find the book of James; imagine if we had no navigation tools.

But as English readers, we have to be aware of the power subtitles have over us. From childhood, we’ve been trained to treat them as signals that one thought has ended, and another has begun. I can’t be the only one who reached a section title in a textbook and silently congratulated myself for making it to the next subtitle. That same instinct doesn’t disappear when we open our Bibles.

The problem isn’t that subtitles exist. The problem is that sometimes they persuade us to stop reading before Luke has finished making his point.

Subtitles: They're Just Trying to Help

So, in the year of our Lord 2026, Luke 10 in the NIV looks like this:

Jesus Sends Out the Seventy-Two

10 After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go…

Sarah’s summary: Luke tells the story of how Jesus says to them that the purpose of their travel is to go ahead of him and tell people that the kingdom of God is near. They should only make this announcement to the people who welcome them in, and for these people they may perform the miracles that accompany the announcement of the coming kingdom; healing the sick, casting out demons. If they find they are not welcomed, they should move on because those people are rejecting Jesus. Upon the return of the seventy-two, Jesus praises God for the way the news of the coming kingdom has moved among people who have eyes to see and ears to hear.

And the passage ends with…

Then he turned to his disciples and said privately, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.”

And then the subtitle…

The Parable of the Good Samaritan

On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

“What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”

“You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”

But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

In response, Jesus tells the story of the Good Samaritan.

Sarah's summary: a man is robbed, beaten, and left for dead on the side of the road. A priest and a Levite pass the man without rendering aid. A Samaritan provides aid to the man and cares for his needs so he can be healed.

And the parable ends with Jesus saying this…

“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”

The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”

And then the subtitle…

At the Home of Martha and Mary

As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him.

How do we know whether the subtitles are affecting how we read this passage? I’ve got one word for you: Conjunctions.

Conjunctions: So Much Cooler than Subtitles

Since there were no visual headings to separate thoughts, Luke used grammar to show how his ideas connected.

And now that I’ve discovered these little beauties, I love them. I think conjunctions are wildly underappreciated. Most lexicons barely mention them because they’re like, “Well...yeah, of course there’s a conjunction there.”

I’m afraid we’ve hurt conjunctions’ feelings.

So, I’ve started a campaign called Connections for Conjunctions.

Conjunctions are not self-supporting, so I’ll be launching a GoFundMe soon to make sure they get the representation they deserve.

(Good grief...a grammar joke? Who even am I anymore?)

At the end of the section about the Seventy-Two going out to proclaim the kingdom of God, Luke records Jesus saying, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.”

Then Luke introduces the next character with a conjunction. He uses Καὶ ἰδοὺ—literally, “And behold!”

What if Luke is showing us, “And behold! One who wants to hear but does not and wants to see but does not. Because the expert in the law comes to test Jesus, not celebrate him. I think the subtitle, The Parable of the Good Samaritan, causes us to lose the connection between the story of the seventy-two and the illustration of one who is rejecting Jesus.

After the subtitle At the Home of Mary and Martha, there is a Greek conjunction, δέ. It functions as a logical conjunction that can join ideas or mark a new development. It’s usually translated as “and now” or “then.”

And so, if we fight to hold Luke’s train of thought, despite the subtitle, and with a more literal rendering of the Greek conjunction, we would read: “Then Jesus told him, ‘Go and do likewise.’ And then Jesus and his disciples were traveling, and they came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him.”

Jesus himself became a traveler. As seen in the parable Jesus has just told, anytime anyone traveled, they faced the threat of violence. But Jesus did not meet violence on the road because the woman Martha welcomed them when they reached her village. Martha took “Go and do likewise” to heart.

Instead of a woman flipping out about making dinner and hosting a group of people, Luke presents Martha as an example of, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind;’ and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” If Luke intended Martha’s action to be merely a lesson about dinner, why use a conjunction before her story? Why not use, “Ugh, check out this chick Jesus met when traveling…” I’m just asking.

Don’t Think Misogyneutics Missed Out on the Action

My issue isn’t with subtitles. My desire is to follow Luke’s train of thought, fighting my brain, which has been trained from childhood to treat subtitles as markers that one thought has ended, and another has begun.

Luke had conjunctions available to him that could have clearly signaled the end of one story and the beginning of another. He could have used an inferential conjunction to conclude his point (”therefore...”), or a temporal marker to indicate a new scene (”after these things...”). But he doesn’t. Instead, he connects these short narratives together, and I think that means he intended one to inform the next.

I think disregarding Luke’s use of conjunctions causes us to lose the literary structure of his argument: story, example, story, example. Jesus teaches. Luke illustrates. Jesus teaches again. Luke illustrates again.

When we isolate the Mary and Martha account from what comes before it, it becomes much easier to read it primarily as a lesson about Martha’s domestic shortcomings. The flow of the chapter begins to look something like this:

• The seventy-two go out on mission.

• Jesus tells the story of the Good Samaritan.

• Then we have what appears to be a side story about a woman who complains that she has to host Jesus and feed a crowd.

But if Luke intended us to keep reading through the conjunctions instead of stopping at the subtitle, another possibility emerges. Martha is no longer a rabbit trail about women’s work. She becomes Luke’s first illustration of someone doing exactly what Jesus has just commanded: “Go and do likewise.”

This is exactly the kind of interpretive move I call misogyneutics. It isn’t changing the Greek text. It isn’t even a mistranslation of a word. It happens when editorial decisions, translation choices, and interpretive assumptions quietly reshape the picture we form in our minds until a story about discipleship for everyone becomes a story primarily about correcting a woman’s domestic attitude.

I’m not suggesting subtitles are bad. I’m suggesting they deserve the same careful evaluation we give every other interpretive aid. If Luke’s conjunctions invite us to keep reading, then perhaps we should resist letting a bold heading interrupt an argument that Luke himself never stopped making.

What do you think? Are you team subtitle or team conjunction?

Our conversation turned to church, and he shared something he had noticed that he could no longer reconcile. It had led him to reconsider how women are treated in many churches.

He said,

“We’re in Texas. What’s one of the biggest things we teach men here? We teach them to make sure people respect women. If a man is out and someone disrespects his girlfriend or wife, he’s expected to step in and command respect for her. We teach our kids to respect their mother. We tell them to obey her and treat her with honor. But one Sunday, I was sitting in church listening to a pastor talk about women’s place in the church, and I suddenly noticed how disrespectful it sounded. I realized I didn’t want anyone talking to my wife the way he was.”

Now, I know I’m biased because I’ve known this kid for more than half his life, but damn y’all... isn’t that one of the most insightful observations you’ve ever heard?

As Dayne talked, I couldn’t stop thinking about Jesus and how often I have watched Him create this exact kind of moment in Scripture.

People notice something.

They wrestle with it.

Then they work on alignment.

Jesus had a remarkable way of entering a culture, speaking in language people understood, and gently exposing places where what they believed no longer lined up with the heart of God. He rarely started with condemnation. More often, He invited people to notice.

Let me show you what I mean.

In Luke 10, an expert in the Law approached Jesus and asked, “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

Instead of immediately answering, Jesus asked him a question.

“What is written in the Law? How do you read it?”

The expert answered correctly:

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind,” and “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Jesus affirmed him.

But the expert still had a wrinkle to iron out.

“So... who exactly is my neighbor?”

(Quick sidebar: The Jews and Samaritans hated each other. That’s a massive oversimplification, but it’ll work for today. Think Hatfields and McCoys.)

Now imagine the expert’s face as Jesus begins telling a story and makes the Samaritan the hero.

Jesus never really answers the man’s question.

Instead, He reframes it.

The issue was never, “Who qualifies as my neighbor?”

The issue was, “Will I become the kind of neighbor who shows mercy?”

Loving people mattered more than deciding who deserved to be loved.

When Jesus finished, He asked,

“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”

I imagine there was a fair amount of reconsidering happening before the expert finally answered,

“The one who had mercy on him.”

Jesus replied,

“Go and do likewise.”

We never hear about the expert again. Personally, I like to imagine he reconsidered and became a really good neighbor. Whether he did or not isn’t actually the point.

The point is that Jesus didn’t simply hand him an answer. He helped him notice something that didn’t line up. Then He invited him to reconsider.

I think that’s one of the primary ways Jesus disciples people.

Not by humiliating them.

Not by bulldozing everything they believe.

By helping them notice where their understanding no longer lines up with the heart of God.

And I don’t think that pattern ended when Jesus ascended. I think He made sure it continued.

Divine Help to Notice ➡ (Re)consider ➡ Align

Jesus knew He would no longer walk beside His disciples in the flesh, so before His crucifixion, He promised them Someone who would.

In John 14:15-17, He says,

“If you love me, keep my commands. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to help you and be with you forever, the Spirit of truth.”

A few verses later, He continues,

“But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have said to you.”

The Greek word translated Advocate is paraklētos. It carries the idea of one who comes alongside another. An advocate. A helper. An encourager. Someone who walks beside you.

I love that image. Because I think that’s exactly how the Holy Spirit has worked in my own life. He comes alongside us and quietly shines a flashlight into corners we’ve walked past a hundred times.

“Have you ever noticed this?”

“What do you think Jesus meant by that?”

“Does this line up with My character?”

The Spirit doesn’t simply dump information into our heads.

He teaches.

He reminds.

He convicts.

He helps us notice.

And once we’ve noticed, He gives us the power to adjust our alignment.

I think that’s exactly what we see happening throughout the book of Acts.

The early church found itself facing a problem no one had anticipated. Jewish believers and Gentile believers were trying to become one family while bringing two very different cultures with them.

Some Jewish believers insisted that Gentile converts should continue following the Law of Moses.

Gentile believers understandably wondered if Jesus hadn’t already fulfilled the Law and were not interested in the minor surgery on a certain sensitive part of the body that the Jewish leaders were calling for.

So the apostles gathered in Jerusalem to wrestle with the question together.

Notice what Acts 15 says.

“The apostles and elders met to consider this question.”

I love that Luke chose that word.

They considered.

They listened.

They debated.

They searched.

Peter reminded the council that God had already welcomed the Gentiles through faith.

Then James stood and offered what became the church’s path forward.

They did not bulldoze Jewish culture.

They didn’t bulldoze Gentile culture either.

They reconsidered together.

They looked for the heart of God in the middle of the tension and asked, “What is the Holy Spirit doing here?”

Jesus Didn’t Come on a Bulldozer

It took me a long time to realize that.

For years, I thought growth meant demolition.

Then one day, I pictured my younger self standing in the middle of the rubble.

She had an open heart.

She loved Jesus.

She trusted the leaders discipling her.

She was building the only house of faith she knew how to build with the materials she’d been given.

Then years later, I climbed into a bulldozer.

As I searched Scripture, revisited beliefs I once held, and relived parts of my story in therapy, I became so angry that I started to bulldoze everything down.

Then I looked over and saw her standing in the dust.

Hard hat.

Tool belt.

Blueprints rolled up under one arm.

Completely heartbroken.

She looked at me and yelled,

“What the hell? I did the best I could with what I had. Why are you destroying everything I built?”

From the cab of the bulldozer, I yelled back,

“You should have known better.”

She didn’t even hesitate.

“But I didn’t know better. I thought I was following Jesus, and I was genuinely excited to do it.”

I shouted,

“You gave away your agency to a bunch of dudes! What kind of idiot does that?”

She fired right back.

“I didn’t know I was giving away my agency! I wanted to become more like Jesus. Our life was a hot mess, and some of it actually got straightened out under their discipleship. For example, Miss High and Mighty, do you not remember Jesse becoming a believer? Do you remember our marriage being saved?”

Picture me sitting in the cab of the bulldozer trying to hide my Crap... she’s right, face.

Trying to recover, I asked,

“Yeah... but why didn’t you just walk out of that meeting when they told you that you couldn’t serve until you learned to be more submissive? It crushed you. How could you let it crush us like that?”

She threw her arms up.

“What would you have had me do? I was doing what I sincerely believed was right. Besides, if we hadn’t basically gotten excommunicated, we never would have been bored enough to consider seminary. And if you’ll remember, it was the first month at seminary that God showed you the kind of leadership we had fallen victim to. Academia is where you found the space to rethink so much of this. And by the way, smarty pants, don’t you now spend your days writing, speaking, and teaching people everything you’ve learned there? It’s basically your whole personality now, nerd! So why are you tearing down what I built?”

She is right, and I parked the bulldozer.

Well, mostly, I still keep it around. (I’m looking at you misogyneutics)

She and I stopped fighting and agreed to do some serious remodeling.

As Taylor Swift writes in Cassandra,

“I was in my new house placing daydreams, patching up the crack along the wall.”

Now I picture us walking through the house she built. The Holy Spirit walks beside us as the Paraclete Jesus promised. Every so often, He shines His flashlight into another room.

“Have you ever noticed this?”

When I notice something, I stop and try to reconsider it. Sometimes my alignment needs adjusting. Sometimes my alignment is balanced. Sometimes I don’t know what to do with something I’ve noticed.

That’s when I realized why the word reconsider has become so important to me. Because it gives me space to adjust my alignment, or not, and admit that sometimes I don’t have an answer.

Some people describe their journey as deconstruction. I understand why. For many, especially those leaving spiritually abusive or cult-like environments, demolition is exactly what surviving feels like. The anger is real. The grief is real. If that’s your story, I would never tell you you’re using the wrong word.

It just isn’t the word that best describes mine.

Because every time I picture my younger self standing in the rubble, I realize she wasn’t my enemy.

(Spoiler: Misogyneutics... It’s you, hi! You’re the problem, it’s you.)

She wasn’t stupid.

She wasn’t weak.

She wasn’t trying to rebel against God.

She was trying to follow Him.

She built faithfully with the materials she had.

So instead of dishonoring her by bulldozing what she built, I want to honor her.

I want to thank her.

She met Jesus and found Him beautiful.

She didn’t keep following because she understood everything. She kept following because she tasted and saw that the Lord is good, and she believed in the blessing promised to those who take refuge in him.

And all along, the Paraclete walked beside her, patiently leading her one faithful step at a time.

He empowered her to reconsider and change, and that is why I am here now.

It was His faithfulness.

Reconsidering doesn’t dismiss my pain. It doesn’t excuse spiritual abuse. It doesn’t whitewash tombs. It holds abusive systems accountable while refusing to make my younger self the villain of the story.

She survived it.

She carried us through it.

She deserves my compassion.

As I continue building today, I do it with one eye on the future.

Am I a little afraid my future self might crank up the bulldozer?

Yeah... kind of.

If that happens, we’ll have a screaming match, and then the Paraclete will call us once again to:

Notice.

(Re)consider.

Align.

Because Jesus didn’t come on a bulldozer to bowl us over, He walked alongside us and helped us notice things.

The passage reads;

Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.”

But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:39–40 ESV)

Based on sermons, teachings from women’s events, and my own reading of the story, I was convinced that Jesus praised Mary’s quiet devotion and corrected Martha for griping about preparing a meal for him and the disciples. This created a big problem for me.

I hate to cook. Like, hate it. Nothing I set out to make ever turns out right. I end up burning myself every time. I drink a bottle of wine just to get through it. I never get the timing right between cooking and serving, so the food is always cold. It makes me invent new curse words.

Every post-meal come-down leaves me wondering, “How do the Marys across the US make dinner for their families with quiet devotion?” Nothing about my cooking process could be described as quiet, and I feel so much shame because I’m just a griping Martha with a bad attitude…

…until I learned that the story of Mary and Martha is so much more than Jesus giving an attitude check to a woman griping about having to cook dinner.

Let’s look at how I think Misogyneutics spun this story to keep women from complaining about the work assigned to them and to silence them when they voice concerns.

Is Martha Griping or Grappling?

When Martha speaks to Jesus in this story, her question is not unique. In fact, it echoes the questions of other disciples. Let’s break down what she is asking Jesus:

1) Martha asks whether Jesus cares that she is upset. She asks this in the same way the disciples ask Jesus, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” in Mark 4:38. He then acts on their behalf to calm the storm and save them. Jesus does not rebuke them for asking whether he cares; instead, he uses the opportunity to show his disciples that he sees their distress and will act on their behalf.

2) Martha questions Jesus about Mary in the same way Peter asks about John. Martha says, “Jesus, tell her to help me!” Jesus answers, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing [Jesus] is necessary.” In John 21:21, Peter asks, “Lord, what about him?” Jesus answers, “If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you? You must follow me [Jesus].” In both instances, he invites them to focus on following him rather than worrying about what the other disciples are doing.

But I feel Martha’s question gets spun into a cautionary tale about a woman griping about her sister not helping her make dinner. Why? If she is asking the same questions as the other disciples, why is her question used to caution women against speaking up and voicing concerns? Why are those same questions from the male disciples not framed as rantings of weak men?

I’m afraid the spin on Martha’s question is convenient for misogynists to use to keep women silent. In my own life, I remember going to a leader and telling him I was upset about a task I had been given because it would take more than 40 hours to complete. I felt it was more than what should be expected of a volunteer. In response, I was told that my discontent showed the spirit of Martha. I was also cautioned, “Don’t forget, Jesus corrected Martha’s bad attitude and praised Mary’s quiet devotion.”

How many times has Martha been used as a cautionary example? I’m not even sure we fully grasp the tragedy of it. She should be a woman we celebrate for being brave enough to communicate authentically with Jesus. Because of her raw question, we have an example of what we should do when we feel overwhelmed by our ministry—be authentic in our prayers and focus our energy on Jesus.

Let me show you another way Misogyneutics spins this passage.

Is Martha Complaining About Making Dinner?

Misogyneutics interprets scripture to reinforce the gender hierarchy they claim is God’s ideal for the sexes. They’ve made titles like pastor, elder, and deacon offices in leadership that only men can hold. In step with Misogyneutics, the book Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, by John Piper and Wayne Grudem, says, “Luke 10:40 records Martha attempting to get a meal ready for about fifteen persons (p. 195).” But where do they get that information? As I’ve looked at it, the number of people and Martha attempting meal prep are nowhere in the text. Let me show you what I have found and some concerns I have.

The Greek word behind serving is ‘diakonia,’ from the root ‘diakonos,’ meaning to serve the community in an intermediary role. This form appears 35 times in the New Testament. In our English Bibles, it’s translated as service, ministry, helping, servant, and minister, and it’s the source of the word deacon.

Paul uses it this way…

“However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of spreading the good news of God’s grace.”

When Paul uses diakonia, it shows the breadth of its meaning. Paul understands that he has been given a task by Jesus, and he serves the wider community as he carries it out.

However, this word is translated as “hospitable service” only once. You guessed it: the only time this word is used in reference to cooking a meal is here, where it describes what Martha is doing. Why?

My theory is that, because this word is closely tied to the role of deacon, which Misogyneutics claims is a role only a man can perform, they must interpret it here, in reference to Martha, as referring to ‘women’s work’ and nothing to do with leadership.

Whatever Martha is doing here, whether cooking a meal or leading the church in her home, we should insist on a consistent hermeneutic rather than ‘diakonia’ meaning one thing when used in reference to men and another when used in reference to a woman.

Undoing the Misogyneutics Spin

I don’t want to spin this story in the opposite direction of Misogyneutics to justify my dislike of cooking. (I’d really like to, though.😜) My call is for a consistent hermeneutic in our approach to passages about either sex.

And I sense that many of my sisters feel offended because they believe hosting and cooking are their ‘diakonia’ and that I disregarded the importance of hosting. To you, please hear me say, “Yes! That is something this word absolutely supports.” It is holy and sacred work. But my caution is that just because this story communicates something about hosting and serving by a woman, it is not the only story that affirms your ‘diakonia.’ Your holy calling can be seen in the way men in Acts serve those in need in the early church. Misogyneutics shrinks it down to ‘women’s work’ set aside only for women, but it is sacred and holy work that both sexes are called to perform for the greater good of God’s people.

In my view, if a consistent hermeneutic were applied to this story, we would understand that the weight of the task Jesus had given Martha (diakonia) was so great that she went directly to him to ask whether he cared about her. Instead of a complaint hurled at Jesus by a griping woman, we would sympathize with a devoted disciple who was experiencing the kind of distress that led the disciples, panicked by the fear of drowning at sea, to ask the same question.

I don’t think we should use this story to pit the sisters against each other. Jesus does not say he prefers Mary because she didn’t ask a question. He invites Martha to focus on him, as her sister does. He unifies them rather than making one bad and the other good. We see him act the same way when Peter questions Jesus about what John is doing. We know Jesus did not pit the men against each other to make the story’s reader pick one over the other. Jesus built the church on Peter and called John his beloved disciple.

We should not accept a perspective that silences women through translations crafted to serve Misogyneutics. Sadly, this passage is often misused to convince women that their place is solely in the home and to silence those who express distress.

If Martha has been used against you, I am sorry. You were brave to voice your concerns, but this verse was used to silence you.

The good news, well, not ‘good,’ but the news is that you are not alone. I’m trying to create a community where we can hear and affirm one another for whatever gifts we bring to the table… But again, I will not be bringing the food; someone else should do so to spare us all a disastrous attempt at cooking in my kitchen. We’ll leave the cooking to one of you precious sisters who is a chef—I’ll bring a darling tablecloth and the wine.

Sources:

Arndt, William, Frederick W. Danker, Walter Bauer, and F. Wilbur Gingrich. in A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000.

Dr. Lynn Cohick, conversation with professor, June 23, 2026

Holmes, Michael W. The Greek New Testament: SBL Edition. Lexham Press; Society of Biblical Literature, 2011–2013.

Piper, John, and Wayne Grudem, eds. Recovering Biblical Manhood & Womanhood: A Response to Evangelical Feminism. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2006.

During a visit to San Domenico Church in Orvieto, Italy, I first clocked Aristotle as someone who required my attention. Let me paint the scene.

This happened after the “Chestnut incident of January 1^st” (you can read that harrowing tale here), which left Shena and me in high spirits, counting ourselves lucky to be alive. Just as you enter, Domenico Church honors Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274 CE) with vignettes just inside the front door. This place has the most beautifully carved stone church pews. We gathered for a lecture, taking seats on these beautiful pews. It felt cold—most churches there don’t have heating or cooling. Let me say, COLD. The beautiful carved pews were cold too, so cold they started to drain every ounce of warmth my body created. My internal dialog, strategizing how to survive this hypothermic state, distracted me so the words of Dr. Cohick, explaining how Aristotle influenced Aquinas, tripped right over my head, until…

To paraphrase my prof: Aristotle gave us many good things; however, he gave us some very bad philosophy on the biology of women. Unfortunately, Aquinas took that misinformed view of women and brought them into his theology. We can be thankful for the writing and teaching of Thomas Aquinas and acknowledge that, where women are concerned, he has it wrong.

I immediately picked up my phone to Google what Aristotle said about women—international data plan be damned! To my horror I found this:

“The male is by nature superior, and the female inferior; and the one rules, and the other is ruled, (Aristotle, Politics 1.5, 1254b13–14).

And “The courage of a man is shown in commanding, of a woman in obeying (Aristotle, Politics 1.13, 1260a21–24.)

Boys Rule and Girls Drool

In the same way we Americans fawn over A-list movie stars like Brad Pitt, ancient Romans fawned over Aristotle. His philosophy struck a chord with people. He said many good things like:

“Without friends, no one would choose to live, though he had all other goods” (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 8.1).

So true, my man.

I have since read more of Aristotle’s thoughts on women, in collections translated into English, and I have to say I’m not impressed.

But the contemporaries of Aristotle, the Roman Brad Pitt, so admired and respected him that they internalized everything he said and carefully preserved his work throughout the centuries. But the misogyny lacing his work got preserved right along with it.

Over 1,500 years later Aquinas appreciated Aristotle so much that in Summa Theologica he calls him “The Philosopher,” with a capitol P, (Summa Theologica I q.1 a.4). We see the internalization of Aristotle’s teaching in Aquinas’s writing.

Aristotle: “The female is, as it were, a mutilated male, (Generation of Animals 2.3, 737a27–28).”

Aquinas: “As regards the individual nature, woman is defective and misbegotten (Summa Theologica I, q. 92, a. 1).”

As a theologian, Aquinas runs into trouble here. He cannot fully deny that God made man and woman in his image—equal before God. To get around this, Aquinas affirms that firstly, the image of God reside in both male and female, and he quotes Genesis 1:27. But he goes on to say in the same section, “But in a secondary sense the image of God is found in man, and not in woman: for man is the beginning and end of woman; as God is the beginning and end of every creature, (Summa Theologica I q.93 a.4). He cannot get around Genesis 1: 27 as a follower of Jesus, but to adhere to his internalized conclusion that women are defective, he adds that the image of God is found in man only, and the image of man is found in women. That math does not math, folks. It welcomes the teaching of a philosopher who denounced God into Christian theology. It further secures the misogyny we often see in theology today.

Theo-bro’s Club

If Aristotle was the Brad Pitt of his day, Aquinas was the George Clooney of his era. Theologians internalized his teaching because he thought through complex doctrines of God and explained them well. So much so that on seminary campuses everywhere you will see, “I love Aquinas,” pins on everyone’s backpack. (Just kidding, but you get my point.)

This means that his faulty view of women remains in the hearts of many theologians today.

In their seminal work, Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (RBMW), John Piper and Wayne Grudem, along with their contributors, use biology, social science, scripture and history to prove the following definition of biblical manhood and womanhood.

At the heart of mature masculinity is a sense of benevolent responsibility to lead, provide for rand protect women in ways appropriate to a man’s differing relationships (RBMW, p. 36)

At the heart of mature femininity is a free disposition to affirm receive and nurture strength and leadership for worthy men in ways appropriate to a woman’s differing relationships (RBMW, p. 46)

They unwittingly show us how they internalized Aquinas’s wrong view of women, thereby also internalizing Aristotle’s incorrect view as well. Throughout the book they state God created men and women with the same dignity and standing before him, but, (there is a big but coming), God created men to lead, and women to follow. They parrot the same internalized misogyny present in Aristotle’s and Aquinas’s works.

You can see this in how they speak of masculine and feminine complementarity, “This is the way God meant it to be before there was any sin in the world: sinless man, full of love, in his tender, strong leadership in relation to woman; and sinless woman, full of love, in her joyful, responsive support for man’s leadership” (RBMW, p. 52. Emphasis mine).

Can you see it? They ignore the command in Genesis 1:27–31 that states man and woman were created in the image of God to rule the earth together. In RBMW they claim God created man to lead woman, and woman to submit to man. In a hierarchy like that, clearly one sex is greater than the other. Nearly a straight quotation from Aristotle’s statement: “The male is by nature superior, and the female inferior; and the one rules, and the other is ruled, (Politics 1.5, 1254b 3–14).” And don’t you dare tell me that Aristotle is just affirming God’s gender hierarchy, because he did not believe in God.

The danger here is that, if Aristotle was the Brad Pitt of his day, and Aquinas was the George Clooney of his day—and that our respect for their excellent (and faulty) work causes us to internalize it—how much more respect do we give to Piper and Grudem’s excellent (and faulty) work? They roll up into evangelical spaces like Tom Cruise and Harrison Ford, and you can’t help but internalize what they say.

Misogyny + Hermeneutics = Misogyneutics

We humans tend to follow a total agreement or total disagreement stratagem when deciding to consume and internalize. By this I mean, because I disagree with these men about their view of the biology and dignity of women, I feel tempted to throw all their work into my fire pit in the front yard. I said tempted! I’m not that catty most of the time.

I have a question. Can we be mature enough to admit that we can respect the work and lives of these men and still call them out on their internal misogyny? Can we hold them responsible for teaching out of a blind spot? I think we have to, as Christians, avoid cancel culture. But I also think if the fruit of a theologian’s teaching is allowing misogyny to flourish in churches, we must address it. Piper and Grudem see the abuse their doctrine creates. In their book, after they call for men to lead and women to submit to male leadership, they include 30 pages warning men to refrain from abusing their power over women. God’s principles for humanity bring flourishing; wrong doctrine brings destruction.

I want to call us all to dig deep into our own thoughts and see if we have inherited misogyny masked as “faithful” teaching. Through study, community, and prayer, God will give you the answer. As someone who dug through internalized misogyny, I’ll admit it sucks. Especially because once you realize the fruit of your interpretation, that what you taught other people caused abuse and pain, your heart breaks—I see the face of a young woman who came to me for advice. Her husband demanded she have sex with him when he wanted. She spent her day chasing 3 kids around, so by evening she felt exhausted. She resented her husband because he came home from work and watched TV while she, already drained, made dinner and put the kids to bed. She did not want to be intimate with him because he wanted to bring what he’d seen in pornography into their sex life, and it made her uncomfortable. She told me that the leadership of our church told her that her husband was the leader of their home and as a woman she should submit. They promised her that if she did what he wanted when he wanted it, he would reciprocate by helping around the house and would refrain from watching porn. I looked that broken-hearted woman in the eye and said, “They are right, if you submit to him when he wants sex, he will then do what you want him to with the kids and stop watching porn.”

The fruit of my advice to this woman: she remained trapped in an abusive marriage hoping that if she was submissive enough, offered her body enough, things would get better for her. She lived in a paradigm of sexual coercion that bolsters rape culture. And I won’t lie to you: it is gut wrenching to know I played a part in that. I’d give anything to go back and tell her, “Girl, pack those kids up and come stay with me until we get this sorted out.” This gut-wrenching pain fuels my desire to come forward and ask us all to reconsider internalized misogyny.

Some will say, “But that does not prove your point, because that man was not acting with “biblical manhood.’” My response? Then why did we put the onus on that young woman instead of the elders correcting that young man? Why do we let men slide when they ignore their wives and demand to be treated like heroes just because they came home from work? Why do we tell women that if her husband watches porn, it’s because she is not making herself available or sexually interesting enough? Why do women feel like if they say no to sex with their husbands, God will be mad at them because of their lack of submission? Take the temp of the men and women in your life. How would they answer these questions? Because I can almost guarantee that as you read those questions some part of you thought, “Well yeah, what is a dude supposed to do if his wife doesn’t want to have sex, his only option is porn.”

We must stop this internalized misogyny from continuing to fester. It creates what I call “misogyneutics.” This is where hermeneutics + misogyny meet. People approach the Bible unwilling to acknowledge the possibility of internalized misogyny, and—surprise, surprise—their interpretations further install internalized misogyny.

Widespread Flourishing—SIKE!

In RBMW, the authors promise not only the flourishing of men and women if they adhere to what they call biblical gender hierarchy, but that it will fix the damage done to the church by feminism. Contrary to their promise, the #churchtoo movement in the late 2010s made the public aware of women who had suffered abuse at the hands of leaders affiliated with the SBC. Believing the promises made in RBMW, evangelicals at large recoiled from the movement that supported victims. In an investigative report, The Houston Chronicle made the public aware of 700 victims who reported allegations of abuse, then received threats that kept them silent. They believed the SBC employed a complex system to cover up the abuse and protect the perpetrators. But many evangelicals believed the victims and could no longer believe that gender hierarchy produces flourishing for women.

Due to external pressure from victim advocates and the press, the SBC formed the “Southern Baptist Convention’s Sexual Abuse Task Force.” This task force hired Guidepost Solutions, an independent investigation firm, to perform an organization-wide investigation. Guidepost looked at how the organization handled the abuse claims and subsequent mandatory reporting. Guidepost released their findings in 2022. The 250+ page document shows that not only were there so many more victims, but that the perpetrators were protected—in some instances moved to different congregations, in others victims forced to be silent through threats of repercussions. The report gives evidence of emails between leaders, at the highest level of the organization, spelling out the language that should be used in the press to undermine the credibility of the victim advocates, claiming they just wanted 15 minutes of fame. And they give evidence of a “hidden hard drive” kept secret by the SBC that contained names of perpetrators and the allegations made against them, none of which had been reported to the authorities. All proof that many women experienced anything but flourishing under the leadership of men associated with the SBC.

Instead of self-reflecting and making changes that would protect women, the SBC claimed that Guidepost Solutions was too secular and did not understand that God himself called men to lead and women to follow. They claimed their actions were nothing more than a biblical faith organization leading men and women to uphold the gender hierarchy instituted by God—something not understood in the secular world or by feminists. The Southern Baptist Convention’s Sexual Abuse Task Force promised to implement education for people to learn how to deal with abuse, but the implementation cannot be measured and appears spotty at best. For instance, the task force promised to create a perpetrator database. However, as of writing this post the SBC has not populated that database, stating that they prefer to focus on education. The task force was disbanded in 2025.

The new leadership stated that the investigations into the abuse was more about introducing secular ideals into the SBC and called for reform. Last week the SBC voted on a motion called the Truth and Unity Amendment, which would formally declare that churches are not in “friendly cooperation” with the SBC if they affirm, appoint, or employ women as pastors. This amendment passed with 75% of the voters affirming it. Evidence of this kind of organization-wide ban on women in leadership should force us to reconsider misogyny masked as faithful teaching. The vote in the SBC shows that internalized misogyny, passed down from Aristotle, is still alive today. They have clearly articulated that men were created to lead and women were created to follow.

What concerns me about their actions last week is that instead of taking the opportunity at such a convention to make the changes necessary to protect women from abuse, they doubled down on gender hierarchy. Some women will find themselves unemployed so that their church can stay in good standing with the SBC. I find that the promise of flourishing under the gender hierarchy described in RBMW to be false. It only further installs internalized misogyny. It loudly communicates that the leaders of the SBC will give the lip service of, “men and women were created equal before God,” but their actions show us that they feel women are inferior to men.

It must stop. Reconsider with me.

Thank you to Lynn Cohick whose lecture that night lit a fire in me strong enough to keep me from freezing to death.

I’ve said this phrase a lot. You might have too. Or you may have heard it taught in your church.

Other variations include:

“If God said it, I believe it.”

“I don’t need commentaries. I just need the Bible, Holy Spirit, and a cup of coffee.”

Or my personal favorite:

“The Bible means exactly what it says, full stop.”

Alongside these phrases is often the idea that you can approach Scripture from a neutral place—that you can somehow “empty yourself,” set aside your assumptions, and simply let the Bible speak for itself.

The problem is that no one actually reads the Bible that way.

Not really.

Because the moment you open your English Bible, you are already interpreting.

You bring your worldview, your church background, your assumptions, your culture, your experiences, and everything you have been taught to a collection of texts written thousands of years ago in languages you do not speak natively.

Our approach to interpretation does matter. Let me explain a few approaches. We’ll look at literal translation, literalism, and literary criticism.

A literal translation attempts to take the original Hebrew or Greek seriously by translating the words as closely as possible into English while still accounting for grammar, semantic range, idioms, and meaning.

Literalism takes a literal translation and turns it into a literal interpretation, with the major focus on the text and what it literally says. Those who hold this approach often fear that bringing literary criticism into the text may take the force of the words away from the Bible. Literalism says: “The meaning is obvious. I can just read the words on the page.”

Literary criticism of the Bible takes the literal translation and asks questions about context:

· How does genre shape meaning?

· What did the author intend to communicate?

· What did the original audience understand?

· What was happening historically and culturally?

· What does this text mean for us now?

This is how we approach every other kind of literature we read, and I have come to believe Scripture should be treated with at least that much care and more.

Having been a literalist myself, I came to the point where I had to admit the arrogance of thinking I could pick up ancient letters written to real communities, in real historical situations, and somehow read them without context, culture, genre, history, or literary awareness.

And this is my challenge to us all. Without employing literary criticism alongside our literal translation, it’s as if we take the Bible, the greatest book of all time, and choose to ignore the author’s intent, disregard the original audience and thereby risk misunderstanding what it means for us. We take the greatest story of all time and reduce it to an email from God.

Hey Humanity, Check Your Inbox

Let me show you what I mean. Read the following text that I took out of a book written in this century in English and try to take meaning from the words alone.

Dear Snuffles,

Hope you’re okay, the first week back here’s been terrible, I’m really glad it’s the weekend.

We’ve got a new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Umbridge. She’s nearly as nice as your mum. I’m writing because that thing I wrote to you about last summer happened again last night when I was doing a detention with Umbridge.

Were all missing our biggest friend, we hope he’ll be back soon.

Please write back quickly.

Best,

Harry.

Harry Potter fans, if you know, you know, am I right? If you are unfamiliar with the phrasing and words you are probably looking at this going, “What the hell?” And let’s note that this series is written in English in our century and you still don’t get it if you are not familiar with the series.

To make sense of this letter we need the answers to the following questions:

1. Who is Snuffles?

2. First week back where? And why is it terrible?

3. What is Defense Against the Dark Arts?

4. Who is Professor Umbridge?

5. How nice is Snuffles’s mum?

6. What happened last summer?

7. Why was Harry in detention?

8. Who is this “biggest friend?”

Without these answers, we would never be able to decipher the truth—that Harry is telling Sirius Black that Umbridge is the worst, his scar is hurting like it did last summer, and Hagrid is missing.

My friends who are more comfortable with literalism are scared to death right now, just like I was. Take a breath and hear me out.

In his letter to Timothy, a leader of the church in Ephesus, the author Paul instructs Timothy about marriage in this way:
“So I counsel younger widows to marry, to have children, to manage their homes and to give the enemy no opportunity for slander.”

In his letter to the church in Corinth, Paul instructs the church about marriage in this way:
“Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do.”

If we apply literalism with these verses—taking the text literally, full stop—here are the instructions from these two letters:

Paul tells one group to marry, and another group to stay single.

And literally, which is right? Should people marry or stay single? We need to know and choose the correct one if we believe the Bible should shape our lives. Are we planning weddings or renting one-bedroom apartments for ourselves? What are we doing? I need to be sure I have the right outfit.

Like Literally What is Happening Right Now

But what if we take the literal translation, the literal words, and apply literary criticism?

Let the genre shape the meaning because it’s a letter between the sender and the recipients not a spam email.

In our selected verses Paul, the author, seems to be communicating his thoughts and instructions about marriage to his recipients.

What did the original recipients understand from Paul’s letter?

· Timothy opened and read as a son would understand a letter from his father. There are inside jokes, language familiar to both without added explanation, and shared history that influences their communication. Think of the Harry Potter letter from above; through familiar language Harry communicated to Snuffles in a way that is almost unintelligible to us. And for our purposes Paul is communicating to Timothy his thoughts about marriage in the context of Ephesus.

· The Corinthian church, because of their relationship to Paul, would have accepted the authority of what Paul was instructing them to do. We can read over Paul’s shoulder and surmise that the tone of this letter is different from the one to Timothy. Evidently Paul is needing to regulate, through a letter, the shenanigans in Corinth. The Corinthians would have understood why Paul was telling them to stay single.

Why did Paul say these things? What did the people reading his instructions do with it? We’d have to know what was going on in day-to-day life. This requires research into 1^st Century history and culture. For us, dear reader, this is a project for another day because it requires much study and reporting and this post is already long enough. But I will link some resources below if you’d like to dig deeper.

With these very basic literary criticism questions, we already know that we are not required to pick the “correct answer” from the “email from God to humanity.” Instead, we can see that Paul is speaking specifically to each church in a specific way that speaks to their specific context. Trust me, Paul is saying these things for specific reasons—not just to kill the dating apps for one group and support the wedding venue industry in the other. And trust me, even though Paul does not address these letters, “To the American church in 2026,” these letters mean so much more for us than just a spam email from God.

Misogyneutics My Ol’Friend

Rejecting the “Email from God to Humanity,” style of bible reading is important because, in my opinion, misogyneutics thrives in a literalist interpretation.

Divorced from its context, a person approaching the Bible with the desire to control and oppress women can say things like, “Don’t be mad at me, the Bible says women cannot lead the church, take it up with God.”

The misogyneutics crowd says things like, “I approach the Bible with a neutrality, I empty myself of my own opinions and let the Bible shape my thoughts.” Then they use a select number of verses to support their very obvious preconceived worldview. Meaning; to secure control over women and ultimate leadership of the church; they point to 1 Timothy 2:11, where women should not have authority over men. But rarely do they bring focus to Mary who, in John 20:17, is instructed by Jesus to preach to the apostles that Christ had risen (which means Jesus gave her authority over the men). If you are approaching the Bible as an email to humanity, and you are steeped in misogyny, some verses are more useful to oppress women, and some are in need of ignoring.

My challenge to us all is this: We need to employ all these approaches to the Bible, not just one. We need people to work hard to literally translate the text from its original language. But not just one group of people — a group of diverse people who have studied the languages of the Bible deeply. Translation has historically been done by highly educated wealthy white men, who will inevitably employ semantic range in similar ways, where someone coming from a different vantage point may offer more clarity. We need to employ literalism in the sense that the text of the Bible is of utmost importance and that what the Bible communicates should shape us. But we cannot shrink it down to an email; we must get comfortable with literary criticism when it comes to the Bible. I believe this approach to the Bible gives it the breadth to speak to its fullest.

So, demand more from your interpretation. The Bible can take it and won’t lose its power. It may correct damage done by misogyneutics, and you just might find the Bible becomes more powerful in your life.

Sources and Resources

• Scripture as Communication, 2nd Edition: Introducing Biblical Hermeneutics, by Jeannine K. Brown. https://a.co/d/02jWZ1Nr

• Nobody’s Mother: Artemis of the Ephesians in Antiquity and the New Testament, by Sandra L. Glahn. https://a.co/d/0hP8PXyg

• Women in the World of the Earliest Christians: Illuminating Ancient Ways of Life, by Lynn H. Cohick. https://a.co/d/0hbdF03v

• The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became the Gospel Truth, by Beth Allison Barr. https://a.co/d/0885dtpZ

• From Genesis to Junia: An Honest Search for What the Bible Really Says About Women in Leadership, by Preston Sprinkle. https://a.co/d/0cavSgLh

I’ve landed on this phrase: Flocking Family.

Let me explain.

We are a flock of sheep following our Shepherd, Jesus. But we are also a family that becomes tight like a pride of lions under the rule of the Lion of Judah. (Think less Mufasa and more Aslan)

Flock + Pride = Flocking Family

The phrase does two things.

1. It communicates that we are sheep who need a Shepherd to guide us.

2. It reminds us that, as we grow toward acting more like Jesus together, we become bonded like a pride—learning to survive and flourish as a communal “y’all” instead of isolated individuals.

If you’re skeptical of my illustration, let me explain.

Self-Destructive Sheep

Jesus moved in and around a deeply agrarian culture. Often the illustrations he uses made perfect sense to those first-century farmers and ranchers, but don’t always translate well into our modern urbanized context.

You won’t believe this, but I actually have an undergraduate degree from Texas Tech University in Agricultural Economics. As an Ag major, I took a wide range of classes from “meat judging” to “price theory,” and was a paddle-carrying member of FarmHouse, the Ag college fraternity. (“Paddles” are a thing in Texas, I can’t really explain it.) I had visions of becoming a prosperous horse trainer. (An oxymoron, if there ever was one.)

Now, I have never raised sheep, but I have kept horses, and I currently have goats. Sheep, goats, and horses function similarly enough as herd animals that, for the purposes of this illustration, they’re basically the same thing. Tomato, tomahto.

Let’s use horses as our illustration.

Horses live with a herd (or flock) mentality, and that means a few things.

1. A herd’s only defense is to run away from danger. When one horse sounds the alarm, the entire herd immediately stops what it’s doing and stands at attention to assess the danger gearing up to flee. One nervous system becomes everybody’s nervous system.

2. Left to their own devices with free time on their hooves, horses are looking for creative ways to hurt themselves. They are good at many things. Self-preservation is not one of them. They need a shepherd to keep them safe.

Illustrative story time.

One day I walked out to check on the horses in the paddock to find one of my horses attempting to reach a patch of grass growing just outside his paddock fence.

He had bent down onto one knee, giraffe style, and craned his neck under the bottom rail, twisting his head sideways to reach farther with those weirdly articulate lips horses have.

The fence creaked under the pressure.

The noise scared him.

At that point, he attempted to flee the terrifying danger he himself had created, forgetting that he had twisted his head sideways to fit under the rail. His head got stuck. He panicked, ripped his head free with enough force to tear down the entire fence line, launched himself over the fence carnage, and sprinted down the road, seemingly congratulating himself for surviving the ordeal.

When I finally caught him, he needed stitches in three places.

(The grass is always greener and all that.)

That disaster aside, as their shepherd, I spent hours trying to create an environment where they could safely flourish. I planned ahead for heat waves with extra water and box fans. I prepared bran mash and blankets during cold snaps so they’d stay warm and hydrated. I searched stalls and fence lines for anything they could hurt themselves on.

And honestly, after a day of riding them, feeding them, grooming them, cleaning stalls, and checking legs and hooves, there are few feelings more satisfying than hearing them contentedly munching hay, satisfied and settled in their stalls. You shut off the lights, close the barn door, and pray they don’t discover a new and inventive way to injure themselves before morning.

And there is no better way to start the day than by pulling the barn door open and calling out,

“Good morning, my happy horses! How are we doing today?”

…and hearing the whinnies and nickers answering back because they recognized the voice of the one who fed and cared for them—their shepherd.

And this is precisely why the shepherd-and-flock imagery in John 10 matters.

Right before Jesus calls himself the Good Shepherd, he heals the man born blind in John 9. The Pharisees are outraged. They interrogate the man and his family because they cannot accept that someone who violates their carefully constructed Sabbath rules could possibly be from God. Jesus didn’t fit the mold.

Jesus points them toward the multiple prophecies he is fulfilling as proof that he is who he claims to be. But they cannot accept it.

They are more comfortable living in the constricting rules they believe honor God. (Sound familiar?)

Meanwhile, Jesus is trying to lead them into a spacious place of becoming. He wants them to see that if the rules prevent a sheep from flourishing—as in the blindness of the man—the rules do not align with the Shepherd who cares for his flock.

So, in John 10, Jesus describes himself as the Shepherd. He leads his sheep away from thieves and robbers who place their rules over the flourishing of the flock. Jesus cures ailments and sickness that prevent the flock from flourishing. He brings the flock into a spacious pasture so they can become.

And his sheep recognize his voice when he calls out:
“Good morning, my happy humans! How are we today?”

Jesus the Shepherd does not burden the flock with rules. He gathers them, protects them, tends to them, and ultimately lays down his own life so the flock can live.

And so, under our divine Shepherd, we learn to function together as a flock—assessing threats, watching out for one another, and helping each other follow the voice of the Shepherd so we avoid hurting ourselves.

But flocks create messes.

Stalls get dirty. Fences get broken. Sometimes stitches are required.

The Shepherd cares for the flock through whatever trouble the sheep have managed to get themselves into. Under our Shepherd the flock can flourish.

Locked-In Lions

But church is more than a flock. It’s also a close-knit family, just like a pride of lions.

So, what does a pride of lions teach us about the strange, beautiful, chaotic machinations of church family?

Quite a lot, actually.

A pride of lions thinks in terms of “us.”

Or, in Texan:
“Y’all.”

That communal mindset is what allows the pride to survive.

Lions use their collective strength so the entire pride can weather feast and famine together. When one catches a meal, they all eat. When prey is scarce, they all go hungry together. The survival of the group matters more than the comfort of the individual.

(We could discuss the fact that the females do much of the hunting while the males often eat first, but that is a different post for a different day. Wink wink.)

The pride organizes itself so protection extends to the entire family. Cubs are raised communally. Young lions are not left to figure out survival alone; they are guided into maturity by the pride itself. They are taught how to use their strength for the flourishing of the group rather than against it.

Where most large cats live solitary lives, lions live in the same pride generation after generation. New members are brought in to introduce a larger gene pool, but the pride sticks together.

Lions identify strengths in each other and use them for the betterment of the pride.

The church was never meant to function as isolated people pursuing private spiritual achievement. Scripture consistently imagines the people of God as a communal body learning how to survive and flourish together.

In Acts 2, believers shared food and possessions with one another like a pride making sure the entire family survived.

In 1 Corinthians 11, Paul rebukes the Corinthian church because some church members were feasting while others went hungry during communal meals.

And when Paul writes in Philippians 1:6,
“He who began a good work in you…” the “you” is plural. He is addressing, “y’all.”

God is working in y’all, as a communal group. A veritable divine pride. A lion pride thrives together; so too, we followers of Jesus thrive together.

And the leader of our pride is the Lion of Judah, Jesus.

In Revelation 5, the Lion of Judah is declared triumphant and worthy to open the scroll—the symbol of authority and judgment over all creation. Throughout the Old Testament, prophets like Hosea, Amos, and Joel use roaring lion imagery to describe God’s strength, protection, and fierce devotion toward His people.

But unlike earthly kings of the jungle that use strength to dominate, the Lion of Judah uses his power to protect, gather, and defend the pride.

And under the Lion’s leadership, the pride becomes a family that reflects their submission to the Lion of Judah.

We become Jesus-like together. We weather what comes our way together. We do not merely survive together—we learn how to love each other so every member of the pride thrives.

This Flocking Family…

One Sunday, sitting in my new beloved church, I ruminated (like sheep do while digesting food) on the flock and family. Lost in thought, I looked up and noticed a stained-glass window in our sanctuary with half the face of a sheep and half the face of a lion.

I just sat there staring at it.

A sheep and a lion. The flock and the pride. The Flocking Family.

And honestly, it felt like God gently affirming the picture forming in my mind.

Because I feel this is what the church is meant to be:
a flock following the voice of the Shepherd,
and a pride fiercely devoted to one another under the Lion of Judah.

I pray you find a community like this.

You cannot do this alone.

I know because I tried.

And maybe, like me, you’ve been hurt by members of the flocking family—maybe deeply. Sometimes one sheep shoves another away from the hay bin. Sometimes lions bite too hard while roughhousing. We have to be honest and admit that sometimes the flocking family will annoy each other, misunderstand each other, or accidentally wound each other in the messy process of learning how to follow like a flock and love like a lion.

(And yeah, I’ll say it. Sometimes there are wolves hiding in the flock, or predators looking for the weak link in a pride’s phalanx. They seek to abuse or harm the flocking family. There is another word for them that starts with an F; F_ _ _ _ _ _ , but I’ll let you fill in the blank.)

But there are communities that will stitch up your wounds. Communities that welcome you into the flock and teach you how to live as part of the pride. Communities that help you become more fully yourself in your relationship with Jesus, instead of smaller. They are not perfect, but they are trying to become a healthy flock and tight-knit pride.

And when the inevitable happens—when someone annoys you, disappoints you, accidentally hurts your feelings, or metaphorically poops manure in your clean horse stalls—pause for a moment and think to yourself:

“Ugh, this flocking family…”

Which sounds suspiciously like a swear, but I promise it’s a term of endearment.

The phrase doesn’t excuse harmful behavior. But it does acknowledge that members of the flocking family can accidentally hurt others.

I think this illustration lands when it comes to communicating the messiness of church life. And in fairness, many of the constricting molds I’m asking the church to cast off often begin as attempts to keep the flocking family from hurting each other.

Let saying, “Ugh, this flocking family…” help you blow off some steam when you are annoyed or angry.

Let the phrase remind you that the sheep are still learning to follow the Shepherd and the lions are locking in under the guidance of the Lion of Judah.

Messy as it may sometimes be, my challenge to us all is this: When we strive to operate as the flocking family, thinking in terms of “y’all,” our church community could become the safest flock and most loving pride. Truly the kind of place where people become.

Bent over our copious notes, Dr. G and I discussed what we’d just learned. Dr. G said something I cannot stop thinking about.

She expressed concern that my social media message fell short of reflecting the healing that has taken place in my relationship with the church. She said, “I watched you lead worship last week and sensed how you loved being there, singing to God and leading his people. You love being part of the church now, but I’m not sure that change comes through in your storytelling about yourself.”

She wasn’t critiquing me. She was inviting me to share a deeper part of myself in the midst of speaking truth to power.

Sarah Perry was talking about writing honestly, but in a way that consoles. Not just telling the truth, but telling it in a way that lets people breathe. As I’ve mulled over Dr. G’s and Sarah Perry’s words, I realized something.

If you only knew me from my posts, you might think I love Jesus but don’t want to hang out with his people—or at best that I merely tolerate them in public but talk smack about them with friends. I talk smack about a lot of things—but that is not one of them.

So let me clarify. I see two kinds of faith communities on opposite ends of a spectrum.

One, which we’ll call “the church,” insists on gender hierarchy, lords power over people by enforcing rigid gender roles, and does not acknowledge the internalized misogyny in its practice or hermeneutics.

The other we will call “The Church,” with capital letters to acknowledge the flock of believers who exist locally and globally. This group operates like a healthy Spirit-led family. No one hoards power over anyone. As a family, they help each other see their blind spots. As a flock, they follow Jesus the Shepherd, doing the best they can to build each other up and encourage each other to grow in Christlikeness. This flock loves each other and acknowledges that together we thrive best. The Church fosters the spirit of becoming a flock and a family.

I have been hurt in a church. Deeply. Traumatized, even. But the church is also where I have been healing. It’s where I’m learning I don’t have to shrink. It’s where I’ve stopped performing for approval. It’s where I’m becoming.

Becoming…

In counseling, we started using that word—becoming—because for most of my life I thought if I could just jump through the right hoops, say the right things, and keep everyone pleased, then life would work out okay. When I became a believer in 2010, I just rolled that thought process into my faith. That meant I outsourced my agency to whoever seemed most spiritually in charge.

That system will gut you like a fish.

Becoming…what?

So I started untangling and rebuilding. I posed questions to God like:

• If I don’t do another good thing on this earth, do you really delight in me?

• If you are grading, is there going to be a curve, and is it an open-note test, or are you serious about me already passing?

• Are you sitting there watching me, waiting to flick me on the head when I fail, or do you watch with anticipation at what your daughter will do next, delighted no matter what?

• Do you want me to impress you, God, or are you just asking me to follow my inner Spirit-filled voice?

Always one for a good checklist, I had to buck up and face the facts. Life with God is not about a list or a mold to fit into. I needed better language. So in counseling, Dana helped me find becoming. And now becoming is my jam.

Becoming looks like standing up, stretching out, using what I’ve been given, and living with wonder instead of fear. Becoming means growing into a person who is certain of God’s love and certain of her worth. It means being able to recognize when something—even something dressed up as “biblical”—is trying to make you smaller, and then standing firm against it.

That’s the tension I live in.

Misogyny out. Becoming in.

I hate what misogyny has done to women in the church. I hate the way “biblical gender roles” have been used to silence, limit, and spiritually disorient women. But I love The Church, the one that desires to become a flock and family. That great theologian Taylor Swift says, “I want to be known for what I love, not what I hate.” So let me tell you what I dearly love about the flock and family I have found—even as I still hate misogyny.

• I love that the pastor at the church I now attend stood in the pulpit and said plainly that abuse and subjugation of women is wrong and that it breaks God’s heart.

• I love that my worship pastor prayed over me when I felt trapped in my own body, like I couldn’t even sing to God anymore because of words spoken over me by men who wanted me small. I love that when I said, “I want to feel free to sing,” he didn’t correct me—he cried with me.

• I love that my church is equipping women to use their gifts, not in tiny corners of ministry where their gifts have been relegated, but for the whole church.

• I love that, though we are deep in the heart of Texas, in what often feels like hierarchy-complementarian ground zero, my church exhibits gender parity every Sunday.

• I love that I am part of a church that is helping me heal.

And what I want for my wounded-by-the-church sisters is to find that same kind of space. A spacious place. Not a tight, monitored life where you’re constantly adjusting yourself to fit someone else’s definition of “biblical womanhood,” but a life where you can stand up, stretch out, and see what God might do through you. I am willing to say the hard truths, but I trust it is for the woman stuck in molds that don’t fit. I love them and The Church too much to stay silent.

Hear Me Out

Take a look at this photo from 2016-ish.

Since a picture is worth 1,000 words, my posture in this photo attempts to communicate my desire to shrink myself to fit under my man’s ‘headship’ over me, making it an excellent example of so-called biblical womanhood. A few problems. I weigh more than Jesse in this photo. In heels, like I’m wearing here, I’m taller than him. And I am doing all the work to communicate our ‘biblical’ manhood and womanhood because Jesse refuses to play along. He won’t try to be bigger than me or strike the ‘I am the head of my woman’ pose, fully secure in his manhood and not feeling the need to be bigger than me. He’s just happy to be there with me at a fancy dinner, standing in front of a Dallas-themed neon sign.

So, here’s my “hear me out” moment.

What if we just tried something different instead of asking women to shrink down? What if instead of assigning roles based on gender, we actually paid attention to how people are gifted? What if a man who is wired for service is celebrated in that calling, bringing meals and caring for people in ways that quietly hold the church together? What if a woman who is gifted to teach is equipped and released, not gatekept, and her voice becomes the thing that finally helps someone hear the gospel clearly? What if we stopped managing outcomes and started trusting Holy Spirit?

Let go of your pearls, hear me out.

Let’s say we try it for five years. Worst-case scenario, hell opens up under our churches and they burn down into a smoldering heap. We panic, assuming God has abandoned us for a more obedient universe because we let women off the chain. Totally fine. All us ‘Jezebel’ women will sit down and shut up so we can invite God back into our midst. The men can grab the fire extinguishers, reclaim the church from the ashes, and rebuild it with proper safeguards, maybe even gates around the pulpit and locks on the elder meeting space doors, perhaps with gender scanners so they only open for men.

But what if that’s not what happens? What if it changes everything?

Jesus didn’t build a hierarchy to protect. He formed a family and leads a flock. In his family, power isn’t hoarded, it’s given away. In his flock, he provides the care we need to thrive.

So yes, I speak loudly against misogyny in the church, because I have tasted what healing feels like when I am gathered with the flock and the family. Because I have experienced what it means to become.

And I want that for every woman I know. (And God does too.)

Like… roasted.

I posted something meant to encourage women who feel like their options in church are limited to casseroles and hospitality. My point was if your gift is casseroles, COOK girl! And if your gift is leadership, LEAD girl! The point was follow your gifts and don’t feel like you have to fit in a pigeon hole, because when you actually read Scripture, women are doing everything.

Scholarly as I am (said no one), I listed a few examples.

And I included Junia.
As an apostle.

And wow.

The comments came fast and hot.
Not thoughtful disagreement.
Not curiosity.

Vitriol.

About a gender and name.

About whether Junia was a woman.

Now, I’ve heard the argument. I’ve studied it. I know that some claim Junia was actually a man—“Junias.” But even a basic glance at the scholarship shows that’s just not true anymore. The evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of Junia being a woman.1 That’s not fringe. That’s consensus.

And yet…

There it was in my comments.
Anger. Certainty. Pushback that felt way out of proportion.

So let me just say this clearly:

Junia.
Pronouns: she/her.

Why Is This Such a Big Deal?

That’s the question, right?

Why does this matter so much?

Why does a single woman being named an apostle create this level of reaction?

Let me introduce a word I’ve been working with:

Misogyneutics.

What Is Misogyneutics?

Let’s break it down.

Misogyny is the desire to control and contain women—to keep them in their “proper” place: at home, following men, not getting too big for their britches.

Hermeneutics, as Jeannine K. Brown defines it, is, “The study of the activity of interpretation; specifically how texts communicate, how meaning is derived from texts and/or their authors, and what it is that people do when they interpret a text.”2

So what happens when those two collide?

Misogyneutics:

The study and practice of interpretation where texts—separated from authorial intent and context—are read through a lens of misogyny, resulting in interpretations that reinforce and justify the subordination of women.

Its quieter cousin? Patriarchalneutics who often isn’t trying to cause harm. He’s enveloped in the patriarchal culture of the church and has not had the opportunity (or the time) to examine the interpretations he inherited.

But misogyneutics?

Misogyneutics is out for blood. Women’s blood, in particular.

A person engaging in gracious hermeneutics comes to the text with humility:
aware that the biblical world is not our world, aware of their own assumptions, open to correction, committed to community, and seeking what the author meant and what the original audience heard.

They let the text shape them.

A person engaging in misogyneutics comes to the text already knowing the answer:

Men lead.
Women follow.

So they go looking for verses to support it.

They are not interested in context, language, history, or scholarship that complicates things.

Because in their minds?

The interpretation is already finished.

And because Scripture is without error…

their interpretation quietly becomes untouchable too.

Which leads to this:

Women—go home.
Step out of leadership.
This is not your place.

And This Is How Junia Became a Man

Junia didn’t start as a problem.

Paul just says:

“Greet Andronicus and Junia… They are outstanding among the apostles.” (Romans 16:7)

No disclaimer.
No controversy.

Just a woman… named… as an apostle.

But later?

That became an issue.

So, Junia became Junias and “among the apostles” became “well known to” to cover their tracks.

Not because the text demanded it.

But because the system did.

What Do We Even Mean by “Apostle”?

Part of the problem is that we’ve loaded the word apostle with way more rigidity than Paul did.

When Paul talks about apostles, he’s not describing a closed, all-male executive board.3

He’s describing people who:

• encountered the risen Christ

• were called and sent by Jesus

• carried the gospel into the world

• endured suffering, mission, and ministry

That’s how Paul defends his own apostleship:
“Have I not seen Jesus our Lord?” (1 Cor. 9:1)

Apostleship is about:

calling + sending + witness

Not gender.
Not hierarchy.
Not control.

And here’s where it gets interesting.

The Catholic Church—not exactly known for being reckless with titles—has, in recent decades, formally referred to Mary Magdalene as:

“Apostle to the Apostles.”4

Why?

Because she witnessed the risen Christ and was sent to preach (yeah, I said it) the resurrection to the other disciples.

Sound familiar?

So Why Does This Word Get So Tight Around Women?

Because titles carry power.

And misogyneutics is deeply interested in protecting a very specific power structure.

So what happens?

Titles get guarded.

Apostle → must be male
Elder → must be male
Deacon → must be male

Even when the text itself pushes back.

Because Romans 16 is sitting right there:

Junia → apostle (Romans 16:7)
Phoebe → deacon (Romans 16:1)
Priscilla → teaching Apollos (Acts 18:26)

Paul is handing out recognition like:

Look at these women. They are doing the work.

But Here’s the Twist

Paul’s favorite title for himself isn’t apostle.

It’s servant (Romans 1:1).

So while we’re busy building systems around titles, authority, and who gets to lead…

Paul is over here saying:

“I’m a servant.”

So What Happened in My Comments Section?

I don’t think people were trying to be cruel.

(I included this statement to sound like a gracious woman. IRL, I 100% think people were trying to be cruel and if Insta included addresses, me and my BFF would have spent the night driving around slashing peoples tires. But, I digress.)

I do think they were trying to be faithful to what they have been taught from the pulpit.

But sometimes…

We defend what we’ve been taught…
more than we examine what the text is communicating from 2000 years ago.

And when something like Junia shows up—clear, inconvenient, and hard to explain away—it exposes the gap between the authority of Scripture
and our imperfect interpretation of it.

Final Word

Junia doesn’t need me to defend her, the burden of proof is on misogyneutics to come up with a new argument, or, gasp, get over the fact that God gifted women as leaders too.

Paul already named her.

The early church recognized her.

The question is whether we’re willing to see what’s been there all along.

So again, just to be clear:

Junia.
Apostle.
Pronouns: She/her

A few weeks ago I’m at my Doctor of Ministry program week-long intensive at Lanier Theological Library. One day we’re called into the chapel for a worship service. I get my times wrong, so I walk in late and sit in the back. I can’t really see any of the people leading the service, but someone says,

“Our friend here will lead us in King of Kings…”

I LOVE this song. It’s a Brooke Ligertwood song—my favorite worship singer/songwriter.

The piano rings out with that gorgeous intro.

And when the woman playing begins to sing, I freeze.

Because she sounds exactly like Brooke Ligertwood.

Like, exactly.

In my head I’m like:

“Damn! This woman is NAILING this song.
She sounds exactly like Brooke.
Wow!
They could be vocal twins.
Who is this?
Do I know her?
Which cohort is she in?
She is NAILING this.”

I join in singing with all my classmates.

The service ends.

While chatting with my cohort friends, I try to casually glance over at the piano to see who led us in worship. Like, I’m being super nonchalant about it. I see other people talking to her. She’s wearing a blazer, jeans, and super cute shoes. The blazer is perfectly styled—business-y but also the epitome of 80’s fab. I can only see the side of her. And I’m like, “She looks so familiar… where do I know her from?”

Then some people move.

She turns.

And it’s BROOKE LIGERTWOOD.

The real life Brooke Ligertwood. Just here in the wild, milling around with us students at Lanier Theological Library.

What is she doing with all of us nerds? We are not cool enough for her.

But here she is.

Sitting at an unremarkable piano when we all know she deserves full production.

My brain starts to short-circuit and thoughts swirl:

What is happening?
Is she in this Doctor of Ministry program at Houston Christian University?
How do I get in her cohort? How fast can I drop out of my cohort and get into hers?
If I’m in her cohort, are we in a band now? Will I take the soprano or alto part?
I need to order new clothes immediately for our tour.
Do I need to order a tour bus?

And then the dawning realization:

Oh no.

I’m going to go up to her and say something weird and torture myself for the rest of my life for being such a dork.

Because that’s what I do.

Seriously—it is lore among my friends. I am teased mercilessly for it because most of them have witnessed me make my way to someone I admire and make an absolute fool of myself. I’m certain there are at least a few security guards somewhere who have my photo on a BOLO list.

I just want the person to know that I love everything about them and that they are the coolest. And I’d like them to be sure that they have a friend in me—whether they want it or not.

And now this fangirl is about to be let loose on Brooke Ligertwood.

Thanks be to God, circumstances prevent such an embarrassing meeting.

I’ve thought a lot about this sequence of events in the past few weeks.

Mostly, I laugh at the thought of what my face must have looked like when I realized it was actually Brooke.

But on a deeper level, I find myself asking God:

What is this?

Why can’t I just be cool?

Why the need to gush?

And I think I’m starting to understand.

There is a little girl in me who remembers not getting picked for the kickball team on the playground. There is a middle school girl who longs to be in the popular crowd. There is a high school version of me doing whatever she can to fit in.

All those “pick me” moments left a mark.

And somewhere along the way, I learned that instead of risking rejection, it feels safer to gush—to put people on a pedestal and hope proximity equals belonging.

And that, my friends, is called giving away your agency.

I make this joke sometimes, and it never gets enough laughs, so I’m going to say it again here because we all know the key to humor is repetition:

I am a cult follower looking for a place to cult.

Funny, right?

What I mean is this:

My desire to belong can override my good sense and leave me vulnerable to being controlled by others.

I would rather be included than be rejected.

And that is… not good.

On my journey of healing from spiritually abusive leadership, one of the hardest steps has been taking ownership of this part of myself. Yes, leadership used coercion and fear. I’m not excusing that. But I also had to sit with God and face the truth that I gave my agency away because I wanted to belong.

And now, when those feelings rise up again, I try to do something different.

I take the hand of that younger version of myself and bring her back to the truth.

You belong to God.
You are a perfect fit.
You are safe.

Thank you God for loving me.

And do you know who put thoses truths into songs that I can sing when I need to remember I belong to God? Brooke Ligertwood, thats who. Thank you God for Brooke and her songwriting.

I pray God keeps using these ridiculous situations I find myself in as part of the healing process so I can become someone who no longer gives her agency away just to feel included.

If any of this resonates with you, I pray the same for you.

I walk into the ski shop.

I come upon a group of bro ski bums–said with affection.

I can feel the energy change from chill bro vibes to, “Crap, a customer is here and it’s a chick.”

In the blink of an eye, my Bro-mode activates.

I’m still me on the outside, but on the inside I turn my hat around backward, sag my jeans a bit, change into an R.E.M. T-shirt, and layer it with a flannel. I start thinking in terms of, “Oh yeah, boi!” or “Bro you better not play!”

I lock down all the femaleness and get on Bro level.

Not “chick here to ruin everyone’s fun” energy.

“Yo! Give me a beer to shotgun,” energy.

I hear myself say, “Hey! I just need to buy some ski boots real quick. I’ve been skiing my whole life so I kind of know what I’m looking for.”

(Why do I say this? I have been skiing my whole life, but I’ve been renting skis for the last twenty years.)

One of the ski bum dudes says, “Cool, yeah we can get you outfitted. What kind of skiing are you planning on doing? What kind of performance are you looking for?”

I reply, “I need boots that react well down the blacks, you know, because why would I even go out if I’m not heading to the top of the mountain? Am I right, dude? I’m not hanging down at the bottom with the ski bunnies.”

(What? I’m here to follow my kids down the runs they want to go down. The ski bunnies hang out close to the bar, and that is exactly where I would like to be. I do not have the quads for the blacks.)

The guy says, “Cool, let me grab you a pair to try.”

He comes back with the boots.

“They should feel tight,” he says.
“Tight is good.”

So I try to put them on and it’s nearly impossible. But I can’t show weakness because supposedly I’m going down black diamonds tomorrow and am basically a professional. Not a wimpy chick.

The dudes start laughing and one of them says, “Oh man, breaking in new boots is the worst. It’s going to suck for like three days and then it gets better.”

And I’m like, “Right? I’m totally going to have to tough it out! I might have to do some tequila shots to get through it!”

(What? I don’t shoot tequila. What am I, 21? Tequila must be safely tucked into a margarita mixture in order for me to survive it.)

Once the boots are actually on, my feet immediately tell me they are too tight. Instantly painful. All I want is to get them off.

So I say, “Bro, these are really tight.”

And he replies, “Then they’re perfect. I’ll throw in some custom footbeds and they’ll be great. It’ll be a tough few days breaking them in, but then you’ll love them.”

Out loud I say, “Dude, can’t wait. I can totally tough it out. I’m super tough.”

In my head I’m aware I’ve lost contact with my feet due to lack of circulation. I have tears in my eyes while he shoves my foot in there to “form” the custom footbeds.

I pay and walk back to my condo.

The Bro-mode subsides.

And I think,

What the hell was that? These better feel less painful tomorrow or I just spent a bunch of money on ugly boots I can’t even wear with my cute outfits.

The next day we go skiing.

Instead of black diamonds we spend two hours on greens and blues and then go to the bar/snack bar.

So I am not asking much from the boots performance-wise. And yet my feet hurt so badly I can’t think about anything else. I keep unbuckling and buckling them, trying to find a comfortable spot.

And I keep thinking, “I really am such a wimp. Tough it out, girl. You’ve had two babies and eight surgeries. Surely you can get over this.”

I really don’t want to go back to the ski shop and admit that I can’t tough it out.

But eventually I have no choice.

I cannot walk.

My right foot has been so squished that I’ve lost feeling in two toes. Lost feeling as in even after the boots are off and circulation returns, I still cannot feel them. And despite that lack of feeling, I cannot put weight on my foot because the pain is shocking.

I am at the point of facing the bros and admitting what a girly girl I am.

I gird my loins and head back to the shop. A different ski bum is working. He is helping a guy buy new ski boots. He brings out several pairs for the guy to try. He measures his foot. He checks the fit. He asks him to move this way and that and asks how the movements feel. He asks him to walk around.

Then he says, “They should be tight, but not painful.”

And I know I have been duped.

I didn’t get measured like that. I didn’t get to walk around. I was told it should hurt.

I am so mad I just walk out.

Jesse is sitting at the bar. (The bar is a major theme and setting in this story.)

I tearfully tell him the boots I just spent all that money on do not fit. I tell him I just watched someone get the fitting I never got. Then I ask him if he will come back to the shop with me and tell the ski bum he needs to take these boots back, re-measure my foot, and get me boots that actually fit.

We go back to the shop.

The ski bum approaches and asks how he can help. I get about two words out before I start crying.

What. A. Chick.

But Jesse carries on for me.

The ski bum jumps into action. He apologizes, measures my foot, and immediately knows the boots I was sold were too small. He brings out new boots that fit beautifully, takes the others back, apologizes again, and we head out.

The next day on the slopes I am not in crippling pain.

And slowly but surely, I start getting feeling back in those two toes.

This ordeal has stuck with me since our trip.

I became aware of something that motivates me—and probably a lot of women—in a new way.

Where does Bro-mode come from?

Who told us women need to act like men?

Years of male philosophers, doctors, and psychologists. That’s who.

For centuries, conclusions have been drawn that stoicism—often displayed by men—is a sign of maturity and stability. Meanwhile, emotions—often displayed by women—are read as instability or irrationality.

FYI: Jesus weeps bitterly. He drives people out of the temple with a whip. He openly communicates when he is sad.

So either we need to send Jesus to get a lobotomy, or we need to rethink our view of stoicism versus emotion.

In a patriarchal economy, women learn how not to be “that woman.”

Don’t want too much.
Don’t cause a problem.
Don’t be a pain in some dude’s ass.

I don’t know about y’all, but I do this without even realizing it.

Hence Bro-mode.

This way of existing actually has a name: internalized patriarchy.

Women learn how to move around men to avoid being labeled a bitch, a whore, a problem, or a crazy woman on her period.

It never even occurred to me that the ill-fitting boots might not be a me problem.

Why?

Because internalized patriarchy quietly teaches women that we are the problem. Our emotions. Our needs. Our bodies. Our inconvenience.

Somewhere along the way—and maybe this is just me—I learned that if something is wrong, it’s probably me that’s wrong.

So when the boots hurt, I assume the problem isn’t the boots. The problem is me.

I’m still shocked at how convinced I was that the problem was me. Why did I clam up when I should’ve stood up??

Is this just the way it is and all that?

You know what? If my daughter came to me and said, “These boots hurt so much that I can’t ski,” I’d march with her into that ski shop and make those ski bums WORK until she had a pair that fit. And I’m just a crazy woman who loves her kid.

Jesus teaches in Matthew 7 that a desire like that in me—to make sure things are ok for my kid—reflects the love and care God holds for us. I believe Jesus when he says this. Which means I CANNOT buy the idea that God created women as women and then asks us not to act so “woman-y.”

God never asks this of us.

This is a product of the world we live in.

Patriarchy is not the ideal in God’s economy. It is something we should be pushing back against.

And when you read Scripture carefully, you start to see something interesting.

God repeatedly gives women a voice and space to be fully who they are.

• Deborah judges Israel.

• Mary proclaims the Magnificat.

• The Samaritan woman evangelizes an entire town.

• The first witnesses to the resurrection are women—even though their testimony is considered unreliable in that culture.

He never says, “Girl, your woman is showing, you might want to tuck that back in.”

Which means the instinct to silence ourselves is not coming from God.

It is coming from culture.

It is coming from internalized patriarchy.

And apparently it can even be exposed through ill-fitting ski boots.

At least in my life anyway.

How does it show up in yours?

I was happily engaged in something else entirely. Coming out of a season where I wondered if I could be of any use to God, I had found a community that welcomed me with open arms. In academia, I loved studying, reading, and writing papers. I was the intern of my favorite professor and personal mentor. The world was my oyster.

And then, I was saddled with cancer.

I joined David’s melody in Psalm 88:14:

“But I cry to you for help, Lord; in the morning my prayer comes before you. 
Why, Lord, do you reject me and hide your face from me?”

As in, picture me sitting working hard on my Hebrew flash cards. My phone vibrates and I pick up the call. I’m told to buckle up because the cancer rollercoaster has left the station. Immediately, I felt like God had forgotten me or did not see the effort I was putting into my studies, and the diagnosis made me feel like he was hiding his face from me.

And a month later, entombed in the bowels of an MRI machine, I joined Job’s poem in Job 23:8-9:

“But if I go to the east, he is not there;
If I go to the west, I do not find him.
When he is at work in the north, I do not see him;
when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him.”

“The world is my oyster” was replaced with “WTF?!”

I believe David and Job felt the same confusion and anger toward God. Because of our vantage point, their words don’t hit us as hard as they did their contemporaries. David’s buddy who first heard those lyrics probably clutched his pearls at how David spoke to God. But David was being honest about what was stirring in his soul.

For me, that anger and confusion led me to this song by Taylor Swift. It’s called Down Bad.

(I am posting the clean version, but to maintain my authenticity you need to know I did not listen to the clean version)

In hopes that it might help you process confusion and anger you may have toward God, and inspired by the honesty David and Job practiced, I want to share some of my journal entries from the season when I was trying to make sense of losing the “the world is my oyster” life I loved and accepting “cancer is my toxic boyfriend I can’t kick out.” The lyrics gave words to what I was feeling and fueled conversation between me and God.

Verse One

Did you really beam up
In a cloud of sparkling dust
Just to do experiments on
Tell me I was the chosen one
Show me that this world is bigger than us
Then send me back where I came from
For a moment I knew cosmic love

God, I don’t understand what you are trying to teach me or what you are disciplining me for. You lifted me into a world of study and imagination—academia, comedy, advocacy, the sense that I could help women like me. You showed me that I could become something meaningful. And now you rip it away. Are you just doing experiments on me? Were you taunting me? Testing me? Are you a God who shows his daughter a big world and then swipes it away? Because I don’t understand a God who is sovereign over everything and either drops the ball on preventing cancer or sends cancer to his child. God, you know how much I love school, and now my calendar is full of doctor appointments, scary tests, and surgery.

Read “Him” as the “life is my oyster” path I wanted to keep walking down.

Read “Down bad” as the soup of my fear, confusion and anger that held me down.

Chorus

Now I’m down bad, crying at the gym
Everything comes out teenage petulance
“🤬it if I can’t have him” 
“I might just die, it would make no difference” 
Down bad, waking up in blood 
Staring at the sky, come back and pick me up 
🤬it if I can have us 
I might just not get up I might stay down bad 
🤬 it if I can have him 
Down bad 
🤬it if I can’t have him

God, everything I say to you sounds horrible. I hear other Christians telling me that I need to trust you and that you will redeem this. They say that you are good, that you love me, and that I shouldn’t be mad at you. But I don’t care. If you are over everything, why did you not stop this from happening? And not just to me—I see the fear in my husband and my kids. How can you do this to them? Come back and pick me up. I don’t want cancer. I don’t want to give up what I was doing. I am so angry at you. I find myself saying, Fine—🤬 it all if I can’t have what I thought you were handing me. And it makes me feel like if this is the kind of bait-and-switch you do, then 🤬 it all. I’ll just go back to not caring about you. I’ll disappear from academia. I’ll become another statistic—someone who once was zealous for the Lord, whose roots died. What is the point of fighting if this is what I’m going to have to survive?

Verse Two

Did you take all my old clothes? 
Just to leave me here naked and alone 
In a field in my same old town 
That somehow seems so hollow now
They’ll say I’m nuts if I talk about the existence of you. 
For a moment I was heaven struck

God, what is happening? Last week I was dressed in intellectual excitement—deep creative stores ready to be used, bravery to help people. For the first time in my life, I felt like I was celebrating the gifts you have given me. But now I feel naked and hollow. Life feels too familiar, stripped of sparkling color and potential. You saved me from this. You took me out of this “same old town,” and for a moment I was heaven-struck. Now I feel left naked and alone because I can’t tell anyone how mad I am at you or how untrustworthy you feel to me right now. And maybe, because I feel those things, you and I never really had a real relationship. Maybe I’m nuts for thinking you’re real.

Bridge

I loved your hostile takeovers 
Encounters closer and closer 
All your indecent exposures 
How dare you say that it’s– 
I’ll build you a fort on some planet 
Where they can all understand it 
How dare you think it’s romantic 
Leaving me safe and stranded 
🤬it I was in love.

God, I loved that you took over my life—that my music, books, and conversations reflected you. I was almost hostile in my evangelism, insisting people know who you are and that you had become my life because of the way you revealed yourself to me. But now I feel like some indecent side of you—or of life with you—has been exposed through this diagnosis. People say I shouldn’t talk like that, but it’s true. Is life on earth just suffering? Is the Bible really telling us that life is terrible and then you die? Can I only expect peace in a fort on some planet in eternity? If that’s true, why am I telling people about how you want to redeem their lives? Why does it matter if I love people? Some say to me, “Don’t worry, God is writing a redemption story through your cancer.” And to that I say, “How dare you think it’s romantic to leave me stranded.”

Refrain

Taylor Swift added “Down Bad” to the Eras Tour, giving me an even more concrete picture of how I felt. She sits on a moving platform—what Swifties affectionately call her roomba—a spotlight beaming down on her like a “Beam me up, Scotty” ray of light connecting her to a spaceship hovering above the stage. She stares into it and sings, begging to be taken back.

Over and over, I begged God to beam me out of cancer and back to the path I wanted. I was in love. I loved studying God. I loved imagining a world where women like me could breathe and belong. I had given myself to that vision, and now it felt stolen.

And I sat there in that posture for a long while. What I will say for myself is this: although I was hostile and petulant, I was honest. And that honesty gave God space in my soul to cook. There is no way to connect the dots in any linear fashion, but much like Taylor being driven around by her roomba, God steered me toward the parts of him that I misunderstood. Maybe this is just me, but along the way some truths about God commingled with junk—assumptions I had filled in myself. This happens with a God who is knowable and also unknowable.

I sensed God saying (in my soul and through my friends):

I didn’t leave you anywhere.
I didn’t write this for your life.

You don’t need to be beamed out of this.
This is a tragedy—and I’m going to be right here with you the whole time.

Dissonance

I believed, without realizing it, that God worked with a stop-start system. That he beamed you up when you did it right and put you in time-out when you didn’t. That suffering was God-leveled discipline. That cancer was a consequence of something I had done wrong. (I did fail a lot of Hebrew quizzes😜) And because I believed this, even unknowingly, I passed this distortion of God on to other people. Consider yourself notified: I was wrong.

Life with God isn’t a punishment–reward cycle. As my therapist Dana, (a fan favorite around here), says, life with God is a becoming.

Not linear.
Not perfect.
Not interruption-free.

It’s growing and stretching and being formed with God inside a broken world—not escaping it.

The path is still sparkling dust.
It’s still bigger than us.
It’s still cosmic love.

But God is not running experiments on us.
He does not author “down bad.”
He does not leave us naked and alone.

Reverberation

We often imagine God’s sovereignty like a massive Risk board—our names on tiny pieces, moved around at will, assigned suffering or success as he plays to win. That is not the sovereignty Scripture describes.

Acts 17:28 says,
“For in him we live and move and have our being.”

Our very existence flows from God. What kind of God would breathe out a creature whose being is held in him—and then inflict cancer on that being? That wouldn’t be sovereignty. That would be cruelty. Although I spent months questioning God about this, I can confidently say the God I know and love does not treat his creation that way.

God did not choose a broken world for us. We did. And he chose not to abandon it. At times we wish he would beam us up out of here, but his promise is that he is coming back here—to his creation.

So now I walk forward. After cancer, life is never the same. I had to grieve and give up the season I loved so much before cancer. I try to remember that God is holding me, and that no matter what, my becoming never stops—and it never will.

Am I scared cancer will come back? One hundred percent.
But I no longer believe God inflicted it on me.

I may find myself down bad, crying at the gym again.
But he didn’t drop me there. He’s spotting me as I lift weights.
He’s with me there. And he’s with you too.

It’s January, the month I commit to becoming a person who works out every day and does not eat like a child. I set my sights on living on the lean side of my BMI. In preparation for my new commitment, I have cultivated a workout wardrobe to die for. (I’m only in anything for the clothes.)

This is likely why I got the eye roll.

But I catch their eyes, smile, and try to pass myself off as a daily gym-going woman. They don’t know my truth. Maybe I just moved here over Christmas break. Maybe I’ve been rehabbing a torn Achilles from the last Ironman I did. And I join in rolling my eyes at all the people who show up in January to start a New Year’s resolution.

Gosh, quit crowding my gym, man.

However, when the class starts, it becomes harder to hold the mystery. My wheezing lungs, red face, and sweat-soaked body prove the ink is still wet on my gym membership contract. As I gulp water from my cute water bottle, the charade dissolves.

We all know I’m going to quit coming in February.
We all know the soreness will make going to the restroom a logistical nightmare.
We all know the gym will charge my credit card for months because, for some reason, the only way to cancel a membership is by fax.

And we all know that after a year of body-shaming myself and berating my lack of discipline, I will muster the energy to make another New Year’s resolution and do it all again next January. (At a different gym, of course, because I cannot have those ladies knowing I am not a gym regular.)

And so on and so on.

I think I buy into New Year’s resolutions because I love goals, and I love to grow and mature. But in the exhaustion, overstimulation, and feasting of the holidays, I get swept up in the pressure of a New Year’s resolution. I start to believe my life is not good enough and that I need to become a “different” person. I end up making a resolution for a life I do not live.

I do this all the time with clothes. I’ll see an amazing cocktail dress and think, “I really need that.” Then it sits in my closet and watches me wear sweatpants most days, interspersed with jeans and a cute top. I buy a cocktail dress for an aspirational life I do not live.

The problem I have found with these cyclical processes is that, in addition to contributing to the January gym overcrowding problem, I spend a lot of time at the beginning of every year feeling ashamed of myself for not being able to keep a New Year’s resolution designed for a life I do not actually live.

Reader, I’m going to cancer-juke you for a moment. I’m sorry, but it’s necessary for the story.

In January of 2024, my New Year’s resolution was quickly cleared from my plate because I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Cancer has a funny way of relieving pressure that humans impose on themselves. I never want to have cancer again, but it did reveal the places where I was carrying pressure that was unnecessary.

Living with cancer felt like having a 300-pound barbell on my shoulders at all times. I could not set it down. My body was forced to carry something heavy and immovable.

So when some dumb, pressure-inducing thing came up, such as, “Oh my gosh, I did not write a thank-you note for the flowers and now they will think I am a horrible person,” that cancer barbell was right there saying, “For the love girl, I will crush you if you take that stress on too.”

That clarity changed me.

It made me something of an anti-pressure activist. I am out on all the fake pressure of things like New Year’s resolutions. I am also out on the pressure of the Christmas season, for the record, as documented in a previous post. I invite you to join me.

I am not saying we should ignore growth and stop improving as people. I am saying God has placed you into a specific life, at a specific time, and we can celebrate that.

Maybe you do need a cocktail dress for events every week. If so, please stop by my closet. I will give you my aspirational cocktail dresses and pat you on the back for the life you live. You can pat me on the back for finding the perfect sweatpants to match my Taylor Swift Life of a Showgirl sweatshirt. Win, win.

My point is this: we can trust God with the life we live. We can trust Him to bring attention to areas that need care or maturation. We can celebrate what we have and release the pressure to be someone else.

Side note: I laughed out loud as I typed that because, good grief, this is still a pothole for me. But, this is me trying to be my authentic self.

We can trust the people who love us to love who we are right now, not pressure us into some aspirational cocktail-dress-wearing avatar. We can cling to the truth that we are fully loved by the God who created us and brought us to life in this specific time. He applies no pressure for us to be anything more than His dearly loved creation. God’s got a Wi$h Li$t, He just wants you.

You will not find in the Bible: “And on January 1st, make a New Year’s resolution that is impossible to sustain. Do this in remembrance of me.”

No one was making New Year’s resolutions in the upper room.

If this has found you in a place of pressure, whether from the holidays or from New Year’s resolutions, this is your permission slip to write it off.

We can do it together.

He sang,

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire.

Jack Frost nipping at your nose.

Yuletide carols being sung by a choir,

And folks dressed up like Eskimos.”

Those choice lyrics painted a picture for me of people all vibing together in Christmas-time splendor. I’d join them wearing my most fetching cold-weather outfit, enjoying roasted nuts while the sound of a beautiful choir filled the air, causing warm feelings to bubble over in each of our hearts.

Lies.

Let me tell you the truth about chestnuts.

Last year, I spent part of the Christmas season in Italy on a trip with other scholars. And let me tell you—scholars are going to scholar. After a long day of observing, searching for, and recording the things we were studying, I looked at my friend and roommate on the trip, Shena, and said, “I just need to chill and not think for a while.”

So we decided to walk back to the monastery where we were staying in Rome, instead of riding the bus back. We decided we would vibe with the Italians. Like really vibe. Walk through the markets. People-watch. Be one with the people.

While walking through one of these markets, we saw chestnuts roasting on an open fire. I’m not sure who said it first, but we decided to buy some because:

1. Nat “King” Cole—basically Father Christmas himself—wrote about these fire-roasted nuts.

2. We were one with the Italians.

The vendor offered us the small size, and I said, “No sir, we will take the large one, because we are vibing.”

I paid the eight euros, and we walked on, each popping a roasted chestnut into our mouths, fully prepared to absolutely fall in love with this Christmas icon.

Lies.

We’re walking along, delighted with how deeply immersed we are in Roman life, when suddenly the nut I’m chewing turns into sand. My mouth and tongue are saying, hey, dumbass, you are choking, while my brain is saying, shut up, you dumb American mouth and tongue! Stop being basic.

Then my lungs chime in: hey y’all, we’re going to need some air pretty quickly here.

This is when Shena saves our lives because her internal dialogue is much more aware than mine.

Remember—we’re vibing with the people of Rome. And the people of Rome have places to be. They walk quickly and will absolutely walk over you if you stop in the middle of the sidewalk.

Shena spots a six-inch-wide stoop and yanks me onto it. She yells, “Get my water bottle out of my bag, and I’ll get yours. Water. Now.”

By this point, the sand had turned into a thick, muddy paste. I’m pretty sure it took two gallons of water to dilute it enough to make it down my violently protesting throat.

Gasping, we looked at each other in utter disbelief. How could the world be so wrong about chestnuts? How could Nat “King” Cole lie to us like that? Like, are chestnuts a joke that everyone is in on but us?

We regrouped, rejoined the moving throng, and I lobbed that eight-euro sand trap into the first trash can I saw.

Now listen—if you love a nut that turns into sand, great. I can 100% recommend chestnuts. I don’t understand you, but I will pray for you because you will most likely choke at some point.

As for me and my house, we will not be believing the chestnut lies anymore. The only chestnut allowed in my home is my favorite hair color highlight.

I tell you this story to remind myself, and to make you aware that we believe a lot of things that are sold to us, especially at Christmas.

I used to believe my Christmas family gatherings needed to look like a nostalgic holiday movie. I worked so hard to manufacture magical memories. I drew up schedules to enjoy hot cocoa and sing carols. I set an alarm on my phone to move Elf on the Shelf every night. I even matched my wrapping paper to my Christmas tree decorations—something I am sure Jesus deeply cares about.

My family started referring to my Christmas gatherings as Sarah’s F-ing Christmas, because by the time Christmas Eve rolled around, I was in such a frazzle that I yelled the F-word about everything.

It was… joyous.

Lies.

I pray you don’t feel trapped by nostalgia like I was.

Also, Elf on the Shelf should come with a warning label that reads:

You have no idea the pressure this dumb elf will put on your life. Good luck with the lifelong trauma your child will carry if you forget to move it at night. Also, your neighbor—who is wildly creative—will have their elf skiing down a toilet-paper mountain. Your kids will discover how fun their elf is and what a deadbeat yours is. And the disappointment in their faces will haunt you forever.

My point is this:
I’ve lived through every Christmas posture.
– Christmas without God, driven purely by marketing.
– Christmas with God, where everything had to be only about Jesus and don’t you dare mention Santa.
– And now, trying to live somewhere honest in the middle.

The pressure of it all, plus the church hurt previously documented on my Substack, ruined Christmas for my family and me.

So here we are: just the four of us in Colorado. I’m sitting in the cutest little coffee shop you’ve ever seen. Earlier today, while walking out of our cabin, I said to my kids—ages 18 and 21—“Y’all better put that Lego tree together, or we won’t have a tree this year.”

The grunting responses suggest we may, in fact, have no tree.

If you have little kids, you can’t get where I am yet. I’m pretty sure CPS gets involved if you don’t participate in full-scale Yuletide engagement.

This last semester I came across something N. T. Wright has said many times in his teaching. He writes:

“Take Christmas away, and in biblical terms you lose two chapters at the front of Matthew and Luke—nothing else. Take Easter away, and you don’t have a New Testament; you don’t have Christianity; as Paul says, you are still in your sins.”
—N. T. Wright, paraphrased from public lectures and interviews (cf. Surprised by Hope)

That’ll make you think, won’t it?

Why does Christmas carry so much emotional, cultural, and spiritual pressure, while Easter feels like, oh good, I can wear my white shoes again?

How did Christmas become if you’re not gathered with everyone singing carols, your life is a failure, while Easter became pass the Cadbury eggs?

I don’t have a neat answer. But I can invite you into the same truth-finding mission I’m on.

Look for the lies—like chestnuts—and toss them in the trash.

At its heart, the beauty of the manger story is this: when we needed saving from the horrors of the world, our Savior did not arrive as a warring king adding to the violence. He came in humility, as a baby, born to be our King.

We continue to observe Advent—what most of us just call Christmas—because although our King inaugurated his reign on the cross, creation still waits for its full restoration. As subjects of that King, we wait too. In Advent, we give thanks that Jesus reigns, we lament the brokenness all around us, and we long for his presence to make all things new.

I may be sitting in front of a half-assembled Lego tree this Christmas. Some might call that blasphemous. I call it paying attention—refusing to assume that something is good and holy simply because I’ve been told it is. That is how people end up clinging to life on a six-inch stoop, hoping the water will flush the sand out. Decidedly not the vibe.

Here’s what has been happening with me.

A couple of weeks ago, I survived my first “intensive week” for my Doctor of Ministry program at Houston Christian University. Turns out they rightly call it intensive. That word perfectly describes the week. To be sure, intense in all the right ways. I got to sit under the teaching of Dr. Scot McKnight and his class on Kingdom Theology. Picture me taking notes in one tab on my laptop and ChatGPT open in the other inputting things like, “My professor just said _____ and it relates to so-and-so, who is that and remember that so I can look it up later.” I got really good at an enthusiastic nod, when asked, “Have you heard of so-and-so and his book about whatchmacallit,” and saying, “Yeah, totally love that book.” Fake it til you make it, am I right?

Secondary Curriculum

But the intensive was intense for more than academic reasons. I’ve learned that every class about God comes with what I call a secondary curriculum. That is the divine syllabus you did not know you were assigned from God.

My divine curriculum included lessons that continued my healing from past abusive leadership.

Whenever I enter a setting where someone has authority over me, as in professors, pastors, and leaders, my high alert alarm blares in my ears. I instinctively shrink to dim my light so no one thinks I’m “too much.” No jokes, no talking too much, no drawing attention. Just behave, blend in, and fly below the radar.

But as I entered this program, I made a promise to show up as my whole self. Still, that’s hard when the old fear whispers, “You’re not submissive enough…not Christian enough to belong here. And you are such a dummy compared to everyone else.”

To be clear, no one in my new program has ever made me feel that way. This is old baggage,the mixtape given to me from past leadership.

And now for the part where God has jokes.

Picture this: Dr. McKnight is handing out gift bags—all blue and one bright orange. He gets to my row, pauses, holds up the orange bag, and says, “You look like you can handle this one.”

The whole class laughs. Someone says, “You must be special!” and I’m sitting there, internally screaming, “Nooo, I was trying NOT to stand out!”

I don’t know what about me made Dr. McKnight think, “She can handle the orange one,” but I couldn’t stop laughing inside. It was like God saying, “Sarah, you’re not meant to hide. Even when you try, I’ll find a way to make you glow orange.”

PS. Taylor Swift’s new color theme for The Life of a Showgirl is orange.
Coincidence? I think not.

My Offering This Week

After the intensive, I went home to my awaiting reading assignments. I sat down to read The Kingdom of God in the Teaching of Jesus by Mark Saucy. I had to look up the second word of the book and realized this would be no light reading. I had to look up so many words in order to keep up. This is my only offering to you this week. I’ve done the heavy lifting, and I thought I’d share so we can all sound super smart at dinner parties.

Compendious—concise but comprehensive, giving all the necessary information in a clear, brief from.

Use it like this: “The book claims to be compendious, bit it took me a full week to read, so…”

Tendentious—showing bias or promoting a particular point of view.

Use it like this: “Your tendentiousness is showing, could you tuck that in a bit before you make me mad.”

Periphrastic—roundabout or indirect expression.

Use it like this: “I really try to be periphrastic, but sometimes a throat punch is necessary.”

Nondiscursive—not expressed through logical argument but through symbol, art, or experience.

Use it like this: Do you remember when Prince was so nondiscursive that he became known as a symbol instead of his name? That was such a compendious move.

Apodosis – the “then” clause in a conditional sentence (if/then structure).

Use it like this: If you want to use apodosis, then you will cause me to wonder why this is even a word.

Enjoy! I did not bother to look up if those words are adjectives, verbs, or nouns, so you may want to check that out before you put them into your rotation. This could be why my vocab is limited.

I will be back soon so we can tackle the stories of the women in scripture that, when handled wrongly, leave us wondering why God hates women so much.

My old church friend set her coffee down and exhaled. Her arms tensed and color rose in her neck and face; she squared her shoulders. Tears were in her eyes, but that jaw set like a steel trap communicated she wasn’t going to let them fall.

She said, “After everything the church did to me, I don’t want anything to do with God. I can’t trust him. How could he let this happen?”

Boy, oh boy, I got that.

I drew my theology gun to defend God and said, “You have to understand God sees your pain and wants to bind up your broken…”

She snapped, tears loosed. “I’m so sick of hearing that God doesn’t want this for women. If that were true, he would have made it clear in the Bible. But he didn’t. And you putting yourself back where you could get hurt is stupid. I’m not doing it.”

A Lice Outbreak

In my rush to smooth things over between her and God, I forgot how long it had taken me to straighten my own matted mess. In the last few years, I’ve run my snarled theology through a delousing process. I dragged the nitpicking comb through my understanding of God and the beauty of the church. I painstakingly picked out the leadership lice who want women controlled and groomed into a tidy box labeled “Open only when you need kids raised or dinner made. Caution: Easily deceived and tends toward trying to lead instead of following. Also, it looks like she has lice.”

I’m sorry for that illustration (and all our heads will itch for the rest of the day), but it perfectly describes the process of shifting to holiness from hurt. Freed from the parasitic lies, you see God clearly again, and see he is safe. You return to his love. You see the beauty of the church. You bravely step into the gifts and plans God has for you because you see that God does not dole them out based on your gender. With enough nitpicking and pyrethrine, I promise, you will heal.

So over the next few weeks I want to pick out a few examples of interpretive “lice eggs.” The poor habits/practices/scholarship (pick a word) used to relegate women to certain roles based solely on gender. Scripture affirms women, over and over and over. Imagine what could happen on Earth through the church when every member of our family uses their gifts to guide, love, and support its members. Her beauty would shine!

Come with me. We’ll sit beneath the lice-suffocating shower cap, pour on truth like pesticide, and pull out the nits that cling to these women’s sacred stories.

These are some of the women dragged through the mud. Let’s stand them up, clean them off, and let them speak again. (I’d push the lice metaphor further, but I feel like the women would be like, “Girl, no, you are making it worse for us.”):

• Easily Deceived Eve: Get This Woman A Babysitter Quick! (Genesis 1–3)

• Veto Vashti: All Her Husband Asked was to Entertain His Friends (Esther)

• Brazen Bathsheba: If You Got It Flaunt It (2 Samuel 8–15)

• Proverbial Perfect Partner: Ancient Rise and Grind To-Do List For Women (Proverbs 31)

• Tolerated Tart: She’s Just Lucky To Be Included (The Gospels)

• Thirst-trapping Man-eater: What Kind of a Woman Gets Married That Many Times? (John 3–5)

• Corinthian Styled Coiffure: I Do My Hair Toss, Check My Nails. (1 and 2 Corinthians)

• Entitled Eve in Ephesus: We Told You To Hire A Sitter (Ephesians and 1 and 2 Timothy)

• Embellished Exiles: You’re Not Walking Out That Door Dressed Like That! (1 and 2 Peter)

• The Minimized Matrons: Absolutely Not An Apostle, Get the Eraser! (Romans 16, Luke 10–11)

Let’s unpack them completely, leave no question, change every patriarchal mind, and no one will have any corrections. (You should be laughing)

My real aim is to share how seeing these stories through a different, contextualized light helped me see that God is a feminist and never intended us to be relegated to the sidelines.

Squeaky Clean Tendrils

I grabbed my coffee, hoping Jesus had turned coffee into wine, and slurped it while I gathered my thoughts, then turned back to the woman who had come for a fight. I asked her, “What specifically do you feel like God left out when it comes to women?”

She said, “Gah, you name it. He tells women to be silent in church, tells people to be careful because women are easily deceived, and basically says they have to be babysat by the men in leadership! How can we love a God who says things like that? If he loves women, he should have said the opposite of all of that. It’s safer for women in corporate America!”

I said, “Yeah! Those are classics! I’m about to tell you something that blew my mind as I sought for answers for why God seemed so leery of women. I mean, he created us, what gives? I hope your mind is blown too! Let’s start in Genesis . . .”

Swifties know the power of a bridge. Yes, we know the words—and yes, we’ll prove it. (That was the very challenge Taylor started the Eras Tour with.) But a bridge isn’t just the high point of a song; it’s also a way of connecting things that might otherwise stay apart. That’s what this devotional is about: building a bridge between people who love Taylor Swift and the love God has for them. I’m not saying her songs are anointed Scripture, but her storytelling and emotional honesty highlight real human longings that only God can fully meet. If he could use a donkey in the Old Testament, he can certainly use a pop song. So as a seminary student and a Swiftie, I’m connecting the heart behind her lyrics with the hope and wholeness found in God’s love.

Anti-Hero

Common Chord:

I have this thing where I get older but just never wiser

Midnights become my afternoons

When my depression works the graveyard shift

All of the people I’ve ghosted stand there in the room

I should not be left to my own devices

They come with prices and vices

I end up in crisis (tale as old as time)

I wake up screaming from dreaming

One day I’ll watch as you’re leaving

‘Cause you got tired of my scheming

(For the last time)

It’s me, hi, I’m the problem, it’s me

At tea time, everybody agrees

I’ll stare directly at the sun but never in the mirror

It must be exhausting always rooting for the anti-hero

Holy Harmony:

Romans 7:21–25a

The Apostle Paul says in Romans,

“So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

The Bridge

Say it with me: “It’s me, hi, I’m the problem, it’s me.”

And the problem is you. And me. We Christians often act as if we are the heroes, but we are the problem that created the need for a hero. We are an army of anti-heroes.

But God sent us his hero: His name is Jesus.

I’ll say it, I’m an anti-hero who would really like to be the hero. I mean, I don’t want to die on a cross for the sins of the world like Jesus did, but maybe I could be a second-tier hero? I’d love for people to look at my life and say, “Wow, she’s amazing!” Then they’d come to me begging, “Teach me your ways.” And I would, in all my faux humility, descend heroically to their level and help them fix their lives.

Sounds foolproof, right? Except it’s the sexiest lie from hell. It ends in scorched earth every time (see the hundreds of church leaders who have fallen from grace due to mistaking themselves for Jesus).

As Paul described in the section of Romans above, we feel the desire to do good. We see what’s good and we’re like, “Yeah, let’s do that good thing, don’t do that bad thing.” And as Pavlovian as the claps in the theme song of “Friends,” we do the bad thing. Anti-heroes.

When we remember we are the anti-heroes, and that any good work we do happens because of the true Hero, we flourish and share God’s love with others. As the song above says, “I should not be left to my own devices, they come with vices and prices, and I end up in crisis.” And God says, “Um, yeah, I know, that is why you have Jesus.”

So sing this song with me as a way to glorify God by declaring we are the anti-hero, and he is our hero.

Reverent Refrain

God, You are the hero. Oh, how our hearts want to have the power of being the hero. Protect us from the illusion that we can step into that role, but direct us to being your anti-hero. We overflow with thankfulness that you have welcomed anti-heroes into your family. We love you, God.

Podcast

I recently had the opportunity to join Todd Agnew, chair of the Media Arts & Worship department at Dallas Seminary, and host Kasey Olander for a podcast conversation about tying culture to faith. We dug into what the Taylor Swift phenomenon can teach us about why people are drawn to her—how her lyrics and community building create space for wide-ranging, authentic feelings. As people of faith, we know those needs are ultimately met by God alone, and our calling is to help build the bridge that leads there. You can listen here:

New to Taylor Swift’s songs? Here’s a playlist I made for you to dip your toes into the Swiftie waters.

Swifties know the power of a bridge. Yes, we know the words—and yes, we’ll prove it. (That was the very challenge Taylor started the Eras Tour with.) But a bridge isn’t just the high point of a song; it’s also a way of connecting things that might otherwise stay apart. That’s what this devotional is about: building a bridge between people who love Taylor Swift and the love God has for them. I’m not saying her songs are anointed Scripture, but her storytelling and emotional honesty highlight real human longings that only God can fully meet. If he could use a donkey in the Old Testament, he can certainly use a pop song. So as a seminary student and a Swiftie, I’m connecting the heart behind her lyrics with the hope and wholeness found in God’s love.

This Is Me Trying

Common Chord:

I’ve been having a hard time adjusting

I had the shiniest wheels, now they’re rusting

I didn’t know if you’d care if I came back

I have a lot of regrets about that

Pulled the car off the road to the lookout

Could’ve followed my fears all the way down

And maybe I don’t quite know what to say

But I’m here in your doorway

I just wanted you to know

That this is me trying

I just wanted you to know

That this is me trying

Holy Harmony:

Matthew 26:31–35 (Peter declares nothing will stop him from following God)

Then Jesus told them, “This very night you will all fall away on account of me, for it is written:
‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.’ But after I have risen, I will go ahead of you into Galilee.”

Peter replied, “Even if all fall away on account of you, I never will.”

“Truly I tell you,” Jesus answered, “this very night, before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times.”

But Peter declared, “Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you.” And all the other disciples said the same.

Matthew 26:69–75 (Peter denies knowing God)

Now Peter was sitting out in the courtyard, and a servant girl came to him. “You also were with Jesus of Galilee,” she said. But he denied it before them all. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

Then he went out to the gateway, where another servant girl saw him and said to the people there, “This fellow was with Jesus of Nazareth.” He denied it again, with an oath: “I don’t know the man!”

After a little while, those standing there went up to Peter and said, “Surely you are one of them; your accent gives you away.” Then he began to call down curses, and he swore to them, “I don’t know the man!”

Immediately a rooster crowed. Then Peter remembered the word Jesus had spoken: “Before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times.” And he went outside and wept bitterly.

John 21:7–14 (At God’s invitation, Peter swims to him)

Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” As soon as Simon Peter heard him say, “It is the Lord,” he wrapped his outer garment around him (for he had taken it off) and jumped into the water. The other disciples followed in the boat, towing the net full of fish, for they were not far from shore, about a hundred yards.

When they landed, they saw a fire of burning coals there with fish on it, and some bread. Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish you have just caught.” So Simon Peter climbed back into the boat and dragged the net ashore. It was full of large fish, 153, but even with so many the net was not torn.

Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” None of the disciples dared ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord. Jesus came, took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. This was now the third time Jesus appeared to his disciples after he was raised from the dead.

The Bridge

Peter goes through a cycle that, when you walk with God, becomes all too familiar. His church camp high after the Last Supper overflows into declarations about his faithfulness to God. Then, during the crushing circumstances of Jesus’s arrest, Peter throws aside his previous declaration of faithfulness to deny even knowing Jesus. These actions break Peter’s heart. His disgust sends him back to the life he knew before Jesus, fishing. But when he realizes that the man hollering to him from the shore is Jesus, he hurls himself into the water and swims back to the one he promised to follow. Peter then takes his place at the breakfast campfire and says, “Jesus, I’m sorry, this is me trying” (the Sarah Griffith translation).

Last week was hard. I felt the rug pulled out from under me, feared the impending fall, and reached for a helpful railing. I bypassed God’s extended hand because it didn’t feel helpful enough at that moment. I found (fake) steady ground through my old friend, Mr. Eating Disorder. This coping mechanism tricks me into thinking I have righted myself when, in reality, I end up worse off than before.

After about a week of falling back into these harmful habits, I woke up. I couldn’t believe it. I’d promised God, with Peter-like emphatic statements, I would never bypass his hand in favor of my eating disorder ever again. I’m such a hypocrite! I’m a seminary student, studying God full-time! I write every day about my devotion to God. And yet, just like Peter, I did exactly what I declared I would never do.

I do not talk as if, once we take our seat in God’s family, our actions can get us tossed out. I refer to the times when circumstances overwhelm us and instead of grabbing God’s hand, we return to the things that offer temporary solace.

When I woke up from my deception, God, as he always does, waved from the shore. I metaphorically jumped in the water and kicked and paddled with all my might to get back to him. When I reached the shore, I looked up at him with tears in my eyes and a heavy heart, and whispered, “I’m sorry…this is me trying.” And in that moment I sensed him say, “I know. Nothing you can do will separate us. I love that you are trying. Keep going!”

That’s why I love this Taylor Swift song. It gives me words to sing when I’ve lost my way, when I need to face God after doing something I promised him I would never do again.

From my perspective, this is the Christian life, friends. “Really?” you ask. Yep, we have to try, and when we fail, we have to try again. And in the beautiful combination of devotion, repentance, and return, we embrace our failures and say, “This is me trying.”

Reverent Refrain

God, we feel grateful for the way you open your arms and welcome us back when we fail. Thank you that our relationship with you is secure in who you are instead of how we act. We raise our hands and hearts to you, saying, “This is me trying,” and you say, “That’s what I ask of you. When you try, you worship me.” Thank you, God.

Podcast

I recently had the opportunity to join Todd Agnew, chair of the Media Arts & Worship department at Dallas Seminary, and host Kasey Olander for a podcast conversation about tying culture to faith. We dug into what the Taylor Swift phenomenon can teach us about why people are drawn to her—how her lyrics and community building create space for wide-ranging, authentic feelings. As people of faith, we know those needs are ultimately met by God alone, and our calling is to help build the bridge that leads there. You can listen here:

New to Taylor Swift’s songs? Here’s a playlist I made for you to dip your toes into the Swiftie waters.