Shawna Atteberry

Writer, Teacher, Baker

Want to Know More About Your Spiritual Foremothers? DO NOT watch Lifetime's Women of the Bible

Epiphany by Janet McKenzie.

Epiphany by Janet McKenzie.

I recorded Lifetime’s Women of the Bible last night. I thought it would make a fun blog post to correct everything they got wrong about the women in the Bible. I was wrong. It would take a freaking book to correct what was wrong in this two hour special, and it was not fun to watch. Thankfully my Facebook friends were there to help me keep my sanity as I watched this train wreck of a special on some of my favorite women in the Bible. As it would be a Herculean effort to correct the absolute wrongness and inaccuracy of this special I will leave you with my Facebook posts as I live blogged watching the two hour melodramatic claptrap about the women of the Bible. Grab a bottle of wine (you’ll need it) and enjoy.

Recorded Lifetime’s Women of the Bible last night and watching it now. Roma Downey likes her melodrama. And her definition of Biblical “scholars” and mine are drastically different. Oy vey.

Who does Roma Downey think the most pivotal women in Judges are Samson’s mother and Delilah, not Deborah and Jael. Of course Deborah and Jael weren’t immediately connected to a man, so naaahhh they couldn’t be THAT important, now could they? Not sure I can sit through another 1.5 hours of this schlock. Ugg.

Oh and did I mention that Victoria Osteen is one of the so-called “biblical scholars” on the show. *face palm*

Lainie, I think I need to put Lifetime’s Women of the Bible on hold until you can come watch it with me with lots of Josefina Pink Syrah, and we can make fun and tear apart this melodramatic claptrap that Roma Downey has invented about our foremothers of the faith. The woman thinks Samson’s mother and Delilah are the two most important women in Judges! Aaacccchhhh!

And we skipped from Delilah to Mary. I’m terrified to see what Lifetime’s Women of the Bible does to Mother Mary.

Oh. My. God. Gabriel is dressed like a Roman soldier in the Annunciation scene. Need. Booze. Now.

And we have broken out the Josefina Syrah over one of the “biblical scholars” claiming that Mary was the first women to have the responsibility of carrying the Word of God. Of course it has to be the literal Word of God. I guess they’ve never heard of Miriam or Huldah or the Jewish tradition that Huldah was a scribe that first started compiling the Hebrew Scriptures. And they are taking this far too literally. I am becoming absolutely terrified of what they are going to do with Mary of Magdala. I might be drunk by the time this is over.

And the Wise Men just showed up at the stable. Yep that’s some biblical scholarship.

Now Roma Downey has cast herself as Mother Mary for the Crucifixion. I should just bring the bottle of wine into the living room.

Oh and I should mention that the only woman of color to play a Middle Eastern woman in this show about the (Middle Eastern) women of the Bible was Samson’s mother. I think the only reason they did that was so they could cast Samson as an angry black man. Another face palm. Everyone else (except Pharaoh) has been lily pad white, including white boy Jesus–but he does have brown eyes instead of blue….

My favorite woman in the entire Bible has now taken the stage: Mary of Magdala. Get ready for the sarcasm to ratchet up a few more levels.

OK so far so good on the Mary of Magdala front: she was possessed by seven demons (they don’t claim she was a prostitute), and that she was a wealthy woman who supported Jesus’ ministry financially and traveled with Jesus and his entourage (which included more than the 12) (see Luke 8:1-3). They fail significantly when they say she was “essentially” an apostle. She was an apostle. Also the 12 disciples look like a white boy band.

They did cover that Mary was not a prostitute, and that there is no Biblical support for it. But the claim is made that Mary being called a prostitute was a “mistake.” It wasn’t a mistake. It was slander to discredit and minimalize the leadership role she had in the Early Church.

We’re heading for the Crucifixion. Can’t wait to see what heights the melodrama hits now. Why yes, I will have some more wine.

And of course Mother Mary and Mary of Magdala have seats front and center for the slow-mo, over-the-top melodramatic flogging.

And of course Mother Mary is able to run out onto the Via Dolorosa when Jesus fell to comfort him and for Jesus to tell her not to be afraid, this is how it has to be. John cries out: “Let her through. She’s his mother!” [Here’s a theological reflection on the women at the cross to balance out the melodrama of this show: The First Shall Be Last: The women at the cross and tomb.]

Oh. My God. Jesus was being flogged at Golgotha, and as it was happening he crawled to the cross then laid on it. Can we say Predestination taken to the melodramatic nth degree?

Oh the melodramatic substitutionary theory of atonement in all it’s gory detail!

Not just the curtain in the Temple tears in this version of the Crucifixion. Oh no, the entire Temple shakes and things fall over and break! Judaism wrong! Christianity good!

Because Mary of Magdala’s word was not enough, Peter must proclaim that the resurrection happened at the tomb when he entered and suddenly believed without seeing Jesus! That’s right boys and girls in this version of the “gospel” Peter believes without seeing Jesus! Jo, I think you’re right. We need a Bechdel test for women in the Bible.

OK I am quite literally laughing my ass off as a breeze blows Mary of Magdala’s hair off her face while she speaks in tongues in slow motion about the resurrection of Christ. Oh Mary, I’m so sorry for this hokey depiction of your apostleship and leadership in the Early Church. Forgive them for they know not what they do.

In the wrap up one of the biblical “scholars” just said that Jesus “states very clearly for him it’s neither male nor female, Greek nor Jew.” Sigh. That was Paul “biblical scholar” that was Paul.

Thank God it’s over. Thank you Facebook friends for sharing my pain and my horror. I owe all of you a drink of your choice at your favorite watering hole.

Yeah for an NCIS marathon! Leroy Jethro Gibbs save from bad theology and shoddy “biblical scholarship”!

And there you have it dear readers:  Women of the Bible live blogged in excruciating detail, so you don’t have to suffer. You’re welcome.

If you would like to get to know your spiritual foremothers as they actually appear in the pages of the Bible, and with far more historical accuracy, buy my book What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School: Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down. It makes a great gift! (I am a biblical scholar, and I have the degrees to prove it.)

Sermon: Not Taking No for an Answer (Part 2)

I preached on the story of Jesus and the Canaanite Woman twice this summer. Once for a conference and the second time at my church. With the two different audiences I needed two different applications. Here is how I took the same Scripture passages and interpretations, but came up with two different applications specific to each audience.

This sermon was preached at my home church, Chicago Grace Episcopal Church on August 17, 2014.

Not Taking No for an Answer

Matthew 15:21-28 (Mark 7:24-30)
Year A, Proper 15 (Year B, Proper 18)

Jesus left that place and withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. A Canaanite woman came out. “Have mercy on me, Lord, son of Bathsheba and David!” she cried. “My daughter is severely oppressed by a demon!”

But he didn’t say a thing.

His disciples came and begged him. “Send her away,” they said, “because she bothers us.”

He answered, “I wasn’t sent to anyone but the lost sheep of Israel.”

But she approached and bowed to him. “Lord, help me,” she said.

“It is not right to throw the children’s bread to the dogs,” he answered.

“Yes, Lord,” she said, “but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.”

Then Jesus answered, “Woman, your trust is great! What you want will be done for you.” Her daughter Was healed that very hour (Matthew 15:21-28, New Testament: Divine Feminine Version).

4.2.7We read about two women in the Gospels who talked back to Jesus: Martha, the sister of Mary and Lazarus, and the Canaanite or Syro-Phoenician Woman in this passage. That these two women stood up to Jesus and talked back to him is usually explained away, if it’s even acknowledged. In one scene, Martha was tired from cooking; in the other, her brother had just died: of course she’s snippy, and Jesus is patient. In this scene, the Gentile woman knows that Jesus is just teasing her, and she plays along. Martha and this woman’s backbones are covered up, their nerve shoved into a corner. Neither of these women thought silence and submission was the way to go.

We have two very different stories about this women in the Gospels. We heard Matthew’s version, now let’s look at Mark’s:

Jesus left that place and went to the region of Tyre. He went into a house and didn’t want anyone to know it, but he couldn’t escape notice. A woman whose little daughter had a corrupting spirit heard about him and immediately came and fell down at his feet. She was a Greek, born in Syrian Phoenicia. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. Jesus said to her, “Let the children eat first, because it’s not right to throw the children’s bread to the dogs.”

“Lord,” she replied, “even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”

He said, “For saying that, you may go. The demon has left your daughter.”

She went home and found the child lying on the bed. The demon was gone (Mark 7:24-30, NT: DFV).

What is the biggest difference you see between these two accounts? Matthew adds the disciples. They don’t appear in Mark’s account. After seeing the way Jesus comes off in Mark’s account of this story it’s not hard to see why Matthew added the disciples and made them the bad guys. After all when you trying to convince a Gentile audience that Jesus in the Savior of the world, it doesn’t look good for that Savior to ignore a Gentile in such great need.

In Mark’s account Jesus had been healing and teaching. He fed the multitude of 5,000. He had been debating (fighting) with the religious leaders. He came to a totally pagan, Gentile area to get away from everything. He was here for a break. He was not here to teach, to heal, or to fight. No one knew him here. He could sneak in, get some rest, and sneak out again. Or so he thought. Since Jesus was trying to stay incognito, we don’t know how the woman knew he was in the neighborhood. I grew up in a small town where everyone knew everyone else’s business, so my guess is she heard it through the local grapevine. She found out a great healer was in town, and she decided to act. She went to the house where Jesus was keeping a low profile, and there she fell at his feet begging him to heal her daughter, who was demon-possessed.

Based on everything we’ve previously read about Jesus in the Mark, we expect Jesus to act immediately. We expect him to get up and go with this woman to her daughter, like he did with Jairus in the previous chapter. We also know from chapter 5 Jesus had no qualms about healing Gentiles in Gentile territory: he healed the Gentile demoniac in the country of the Gerasenes. His first healing in Mark was healing a man with leprosy by touching him. But what we expect does not happen in this story.

Instead he told the woman, “It’s not right to throw the children’s bread to the dogs.” At this point (if we are honest with ourselves) our jaws drop, and we wonder “What happened to Jesus?”

A dog. Jesus called her a dog, a term of derision for Gentiles. But this woman is quick-witted, and she’s not going to take no for an answer. She let the insult slide over her with this incisive retort: “Yes, but even the dogs get to lick up the crumbs on the floor.”

Because this woman did not take no for an answer, because this woman did not submit–even to the Son of God–because she stood her ground, Jesus changed his mind. He had not come here to heal. He didn’t want to heal this woman’s daughter. But in the end he did heal the daughter. He did because of the woman’s retort. This woman’s daughter was healed because she talked back to Jesus, and didn’t assume her place was one of quiet submission. She didn’t take no for an answer, not even from the Son of God himself.

In Matthew’s version of the story, Jesus is passive, but he’s not the only one who is telling her no. The disciples—the representatives of the church are. And thanks to a man I met a few years ago who grew up in the Middle East, we have a different way to interpret this passage where Jesus uses the woman to help teach his disciples, his church, a few lessons.

Reverend Nadim Nassar, an Anglican priest, grew up in Syria and went to school in Lebanon. He now lives in London. There is a very cultural thing he grew up with that explains perfectly what is going on in Matthew if we know Middle Eastern culture. In the Middle East when the eldest son marries, he still lives at home with his parents, and his wife comes to live with the family. This is because as the main heir, the eldest son is expected to take care of his parents in their old age.

When the mother-in-law doesn’t like something the daughter-in-law is doing, or doesn’t think the daughter-in-law is treating her with enough respect, the mother-in-law does not tell the daughter-in-law. She complains about it to a neighbor in the daughter’s-in-law hearing.

“Miriam, do you know how my daughter-in-law treats me? I tell her every night, dry the dishes with a towel, don’t air dry them! But does she listen to me?”

“Abraham, have I told you how my daughter-in-law doesn’t respect me? I told her to water the garden this morning. Bah! Just look at my poor tomatoes withering away in this harsh sunlight!”

You get the idea. Now take this idea and apply it to the story. Jesus is the mother-in-law. The disciples are the daughters-in-law. The Canaanite woman is the neighbor. So what does that mean Jesus is doing in this story? In Mark’s story Jesus is the one who’s being exclusive, showing the members of Mark’s community that even Jesus was corrected when he thought the gospel was just for the Jews. In Matthew, the disciples want Jesus to send the woman away, and he takes a minute to teach the disciples (Matthew’s community) the gospel was not just for the Jews.

Jesus: “Look at my daughters-in-law thinking God is just for them. You called me ‘Son of Bathsheba and David.’ You know I can’t take the kids’ food and feed it to the dogs who come wandering in.”

Woman: “Oh you poor thing. Such disrespect. But you know even the dogs get the crumbs the children leave behind.”

Even in this context I think the woman surprises Jesus with her retort. Jesus: “Woman you have great faith. Go. Your daughter is healed.”

(Exegesis and interpretation is taken from my book What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School: Women Who Didn’t Shut Up and Sit Down, ch. 3.)

I like this interpretation because it uses women’s roles and experiences to interpret Scripture. How often does that happen? Even about women in the Scripture? I always wondered what Matthew’s female listeners felt when they realized their life experiences were being used to proclaim the gospel.

But in the end two things remain constant in these two stories: Exclusivity is the first. Jesus, the disciples, and people in Matthew and Mark’s communities thought that God’s grace was limited, that it wasn’t for everyone. The other constant in this story is this woman telling Jesus, the disciples, and the Christian community NO—grace is always inclusive, and God’s healing power is for everyone. This woman does not take no for an answer when that no marginalizes her and limits God’s grace. In Mark she doesn’t take no for an answer from Jesus. In Matthew she doesn’t take no for an answer from the church. We have a lot to learn from this woman and her spiritual children.

Sometimes those who see where the church is failing in loving inclusively are those who are outside our doors. Those we fail to love. And my challenge to us is this: that we listen to them. That we listen to the children of this brave Canaanite woman who looked the Son of God in the eye then looked at the church standing behind him and said, “No, you will not exclude me and my daughter from God’s love and grace.”

It’s a hard thing to do. To listen to where we are failing our neighbors, confess, repent, and then do what must be done to love our neighbors—all of our neighbors—as ourselves. But Jesus did it. He realized he was wrong. In the end he listened to this woman, and he healed her daughter. This woman taught Jesus that salvation was not for the Jews alone.

I have a hard challenge for us. The next time we hear someone outside of our faith criticize the church, we listen. We don’t jump to defend our beliefs. We don’t start formulating responses while they are still talking. But we listen. And we ask ourselves: is what they are saying true? Are we failing in this area to show God’s inclusive love just at The Canaanite Woman showed Jesus were he was failing to show God’s inclusive love? Is the person complaining her spiritual child calling us to a deeper understanding of God’s mercy and grace? I don’t know how the conversation will go from there, but it can’t help but go in a better direction when we can honestly tell someone you’re right: we’ve screwed up there. How can we do better? Then listen to the answer.

And if you have one of these conversations, please tell the rest of us about it. Bring it back to the church, so that we, as the body of Christ in the South Loop of Chicago, can learn to be more loving, more grace-filled, more merciful, just like our Mother in heaven.

Sermon: Not Taking No For an Answer (Part 1)

I preached on the story of Jesus and the Canaanite Woman twice this summer. Once for a conference and the second time at my church. With the two different audiences I needed two different applications. Here is how I took the same Scripture passages and interpretations, but came up with two different applications specific to each audience.

This sermon was preached at the Christian Feminism Today’s biannual conference The Gathering 2014 on June 29, 2014.

Not Taking No for an Answer
Matthew 15:21-28 (Mark 7:24-30)
Year A, Proper 15 (Year B, Proper 18)

Jesus left that place and withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. A Canaanite woman came out. “Have mercy on me, Lord, son of Bathsheba and David!” she cried. “My daughter is severely oppressed by a demon!”

But he didn’t say a thing.

His disciples came and begged him. “Send her away,” they said, “because she bothers us.”

He answered, “I wasn’t sent to anyone but the lost sheep of Israel.”

But she approached and bowed to him. “Lord, help me,” she said.

“It is not right to throw the children’s bread to the dogs,” he answered.

“Yes, Lord,” she said, “but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.”

Then Jesus answered, “Woman, your trust is great! What you want will be done for you.” Her daughter Was healed that very hour (Matthew 15:21-28, New Testament: Divine Feminine Version).

4.2.7We read about two women in the Gospels who talked back to Jesus: Martha, the sister of Mary and Lazarus, and the Canaanite or Syro-Phoenician Woman in this passage. That these two women stood up to Jesus and talked back to him is usually explained away, if it’s even acknowledged. In one scene, Martha was tired from cooking; in the other, her brother had just died: of course she’s snippy, and Jesus is patient. In this scene, the Gentile woman knows that Jesus is just teasing her, and she plays along. Martha and this woman’s backbones are covered up, their nerve shoved into a corner. Neither of these women thought silence and submission was the way to go.

We have two very different stories about this women in the Gospels. We heard Matthew’s version, now let’s look at Mark’s:

Jesus left that place and went to the region of Tyre. He went into a house and didn’t want anyone to know it, but he couldn’t escape notice. A woman whose little daughter had a corrupting spirit heard about him and immediately came and fell down at his feet. She was a Greek, born in Syrian Phoenicia. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. Jesus said to her, “Let the children eat first, because it’s not right to throw the children’s bread to the dogs.”

“Lord,” she replied, “even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”

He said, “For saying that, you may go. The demon has left your daughter.”

She went home and found the child lying on the bed. The demon was gone (Mark 7:24-30, NT: DFV).

What is the biggest difference you see between these two accounts? Matthew adds the disciples. They don’t appear in Mark’s account. After seeing the way Jesus comes off in Mark’s account of this story it’s not hard to see why Matthew added the disciples and made them the bad guys. After all when you trying to convince a Gentile audience that Jesus in the Savior of the world, it doesn’t look good for that Savior to ignore a Gentile in such great need.

In Mark’s account Jesus had been healing and teaching. He fed the multitude of 5,000. He had been debating (fighting) with the religious leaders. He came to a totally pagan, Gentile area to get away from everything. He was here for a break. He was not here to teach, to heal, or to fight. No one knew him here. He could sneak in, get some rest, and sneak out again. Or so he thought. Since Jesus was trying to stay incognito, we don’t know how the woman knew he was in the neighborhood. I grew up in a small town where everyone knew everyone else’s business, so my guess is she heard it through the local grapevine. She found out a great healer was in town, and she decided to act. She went to the house where Jesus was keeping a low profile, and there she fell at his feet begging him to heal her daughter, who was demon-possessed.

Based on everything we’ve previously read about Jesus in the Mark, we expect Jesus to act immediately. We expect him to get up and go with this woman to her daughter, like he did with Jairus in the previous chapter. We also know from chapter 5 Jesus had no qualms about healing Gentiles in Gentile territory: he healed the Gentile demoniac in the country of the Gerasenes. His first healing in Mark was healing a man with leprosy by touching him. But what we expect does not happen in this story.

Instead he told the woman, “It’s not right to throw the children’s bread to the dogs.” At this point (if we are honest with ourselves) our jaws drop, and we wonder “What happened to Jesus?”

A dog. Jesus called her a dog, a term of derision for Gentiles. But this woman is quick-witted, and she’s not going to take no for an answer. She let the insult slide over her with this incisive retort: “Yes, but even the dogs get to lick up the crumbs on the floor.”

Because this woman did not take no for an answer, because this woman did not submit–even to the Son of God–because she stood her ground, Jesus changed his mind. He had not come here to heal. He didn’t want to heal this woman’s daughter. But in the end he did heal the daughter. He did because of the woman’s retort. This woman’s daughter was healed because she talked back to Jesus, and didn’t assume her place was one of quiet submission. She didn’t take no for an answer, not even from the Son of God himself.

In Matthew’s version of the story, Jesus is passive, but he’s not the only one who is telling her no. The disciples—the representatives of the church are. And thanks to a man I met a few years ago who grew up in the Middle East, we have a different way to interpret this passage where Jesus uses the woman to help teach his disciples, his church, a few lessons.

Reverend Nadim Nassar, an Anglican priest, grew up in Syria and went to school in Lebanon. He now lives in London. There is a very cultural thing he grew up with that explains perfectly what is going on in Matthew if we know Middle Eastern culture. In the Middle East when the eldest son marries, he still lives at home with his parents, and his wife comes to live with the family. This is because as the main heir, the eldest son is expected to take care of his parents in their old age.

When the mother-in-law doesn’t like something the daughter-in-law is doing, or doesn’t think the daughter-in-law is treating her with enough respect, the mother-in-law does not tell the daughter-in-law. She complains about it to a neighbor in the daughter’s-in-law hearing.

“Miriam, do you know how my daughter-in-law treats me? I tell her every night, dry the dishes with a towel, don’t air dry them! But does she listen to me?”

“Abraham, have I told you how my daughter-in-law doesn’t respect me? I told her to water the garden this morning. Bah! Just look at my poor tomatoes withering away in this harsh sunlight!”

You get the idea. Now take this idea and apply it to the story. Jesus is the mother-in-law. The disciples are the daughters-in-law. The Canaanite woman is the neighbor. So what does that mean Jesus is doing in this story? In Mark’s story Jesus is the one who’s being exclusive, showing the members of Mark’s community that even Jesus was corrected when he thought the gospel was just for the Jews. In Matthew, the disciples want Jesus to send the woman away, and he takes a minute to teach the disciples (Matthew’s community) the gospel was not just for the Jews.

Jesus: “Look at my daughters-in-law thinking God is just for them. You called me ‘Son of Bathsheba and David.’ You know I can’t take the kids’ food and feed it to the dogs who come wandering in.”

Woman: “Oh you poor thing. Such disrespect. But you know even the dogs get the crumbs the children leave behind.”

Even in this context I think the woman surprises Jesus with her retort. Jesus: “Woman you have great faith. Go. Your daughter is healed.”

(Exegesis and interpretation is taken from my book What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School: Women Who Didn’t Shut Up and Sit Down, ch. 3.)

I like this interpretation because it uses women’s roles and experiences to interpret Scripture. How often does that happen? Even about women in the Scripture? I always wondered what Matthew’s female listeners felt when they realized their life experiences were being used to proclaim the gospel.

But in the end two things remain constant in these two stories: Exclusivity is the first. Jesus, the disciples, and people in Matthew and Mark’s communities thought that God’s grace was limited, that it wasn’t for everyone. The other constant in this story is this woman telling Jesus, the disciples, and the Christian community NO—grace is always inclusive, and God’s healing power is for everyone. This woman does not take no for an answer when that no marginalizes her and limits God’s grace. In Mark she doesn’t take no for an answer from Jesus. In Matthew she doesn’t take no for an answer from the church. My sisters in Christ, we have a lot to learn from this woman.

Intelligent daughters of God. Strong daughters of God. Inspired daughters of God. How often do you take no for an answer?

Loving daughters of God? Presevering daughters of God? Gifted daughters of God. How often do you take no for an answer?

Can I make a confession? I take no for an answer far too often. In my ministry. In my writing. In my life. After all we have been brainwashed into believing that’s what, we as women, should do. Basically anything beyond marriage and children: we are told no. And all too often we accept that answer and adjust our lives accordingly.

I’m ashamed to say I do this everyday.

Yes, we have a lot to learn from our Canaanite sister. We have a lot to learn from this incredible spiritual foremother who stood her ground, looked the son of God in the eye, looked at the church standing behind him, and said, “No” back.

“No. I am not a dog.”

“No, I am not worthless because I’m a Gentile.”

“No, you cannot ignore me because I’m a woman.”

“No, you will not walk away. You will heal my daughter.”

No.

There are two things we as women are taught about the word no. The first is we should take it as an answer. The second is that we should never say it. It’s amazing how one little two letter word can rob us of our agency. Our autonomy. Our sovereignty.

My challenge for us as we leave this holy place and journey back to our daily lives is that we will take the Canaanite Woman with us, and we will let her teach us two very important lessons: How not to take no for an answer. And how to say no in response to those who would limit us.

Where do you need to stop taking no for an answer? Where do you need to start saying no to those who would limit your choices? Your career? Who you are?

As we get ready to return to our normal, everyday lives, I challenge us, yes me included—I challenge us to let this incredible woman walk with us and teach us how to stand up for ourselves and stand up to those who would limit us. I pray she will teach every, single one of us how to stop taking no for an answer.

Come see me at the Printers Row Book Fair this Saturday!

Photo from www.planet99.com

Photo from www.planet99.com

 

I will be selling and signing books at the Printers Row Book Fair this Saturday, January 7, 2:00-6:00 p.m. at the Chicago Writers Association Tent. The CWA tent will be set up in front of the Transportation Building between Polk and Harrison. Stop by and say hi!

Spend Lent with the Women of the Bible

W&S Cover 2Today is my birthday! Today is the last day to enter to win a $25 Amazon.com gift card! You have until 5:00 p.m. CDT today to buy my book and email me (shawna@shawnaatteberry.com) your order number to get your name in the drawing. Good luck!

Is one of your Lenten goals to spend more time studying the Bible? Have no idea where you’re going to start? Why not spend Lent with some incredible biblical women? What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School: Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down is a 9 week Bible study that will introduce you to women like:

  • The five daughters of Zelophehad who stood up to Moses when they thought the Law was unfair, and God said they were right.
  • The Wise Woman of Abel who saved her town from a besieging army.
  • The woman who would not take no for an answer, even when the no came from Jesus.

Get reacquainted with women, whose whole stories you may not of heard:

  • Deborah the judge and military leader, who led Israel’s armies into battle.
  • Career-woman Priscilla who was a tent-maker missionary and teacher with her husband.
  • Phoebe, a pastor and patron in the New Testament church, whom Paul entrusted to deliver his letter to the churches in Rome.

Women both now and in the Bible wore multiple hats and had many different roles to balance. Having complicated lives is nothing new! This Lent listen to these women’s stories of how they found and obeyed God in the midst of very complicated circumstances in very complex lives. What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School can be used for individual and group Bible studies as well for your devotions. This book will guide you through a self-directed Bible study of each woman, and at the end you will find suggestions and resources for continuing to study the women of the Bible. It is available in paperback and Kindle versions.

If you order What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School between now and my birthday, March 26, your name will be entered in a drawing for a $25 Amazon.com gift card. Email me (shawna@shawnaatteberry.com) your order number from Wipf & Stock Publishers or Amazon.com, and I will put your name in the hat. I will announce the winner on my birthday.

If you live in the Chicagoland area and would like me to speak at your church, Bible Study, or schedule a book signing, please Email me.

Lydia: Buisness Woman and Home Church Pastor

Every Lent I take part in Lent Madness. Instead of picking basketball teams to win a championship, we pit saints against each other to see who will win The Golden Halo. Today’s match-up includes one of my favorite women in the Bible: Lydia.

We set sail from Troas and took a straight course to Samothrace, the following day to Neapolis, and from there to Philippi, which is a leading city of the district of Macedonia and a Roman colony. We remained in this city for some days. On the sabbath day we went outside the gate by the river, where we supposed there was a place of prayer; and we sat down and spoke to the women who had gathered there. A certain woman named Lydia, a worshipper of God, was listening to us; she was from the city of Thyatira and a dealer in purple cloth. [God] opened her heart to listen eagerly to what was said by Paul. When she and her household were baptized, she urged us, saying, ‘If you have judged me to be faithful to [God], come and stay at my home.’ And she prevailed upon us (Acts 16:11-15, NRSV).

Lydia is a biblical woman you probably didn’t learn about in Sunday School. Lydia does not fit the “traditional Biblical woman” model that some claim a woman should be: married, at home with children, and submissive. Lydia was not married. She didn’t have kids. She was a business woman who had her own household which she managed and ran. She was the perfect person for God to lead Paul to for the start of the Christian mission in Europe.

When Paul and his traveling companions arrived in Philippi, there was no synagogue for them to attend for worship. They decided to go to the river on the Sabbath where there was a place of prayer. Lydia was at the river. She was “a worshiper of God,” and listened to Paul’s teachings. In fact, we are told God “opened her heart to listen eagerly to what was said by Paul.” In the next verse she and her household were baptized, and she urged Paul and his travelers to stay in her home. Lydia was the first convert to Christianity in Europe.

Lydia was a businesswoman, “a dealer of purple cloth” from Thyatira. Purple dye was a symbol of power and honor in the ancient world, and it was the most expensive and sought after dye in the Roman world. Thyatira was the capitol of the industry and renowned for its purple dyes. One had to have plenty of capital to deal in purple dye and the making of purple garments for sale. Lydia was a career woman, rich, and the head of her household. She was also quick to show hospitality to Paul and his companions by inviting them into her home. By the end of Acts 16 a new church was meeting in Lydia’s home. In most New Testament home churches, the head of the household was the leader of the people who gathered under their roof for worship. This could mean that Lydia was the overseer or pastor of the first church plant in Europe. With her connections from her business in purple cloth, she probably carried a great deal of influence with those in the upper echelons of society, and could champion the Christian cause to them. She probably traveled quite a bit, which meant she could be a missionary in her travels as Paul was. God knew what she was doing when she led Paul to this hospitable, influential woman to further the cause of Christ in Europe and throughout the Roman Empire.

This month for my birthday I am going to give away a $25 Amazon.com gift card to a lucky person who buys my book, What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School by March 26 (my birthday!). Lydia isn’t the only woman who doesn’t fit the cookie cutter image of a “biblical woman” you probably didn’t learn about in Sunday School. There were the five sisters who stood up to Moses, the wise woman who saved her city from a besieging army, and the woman who didn’t take no for an answer–even from Jesus! Spend Lent (or Women’s History Month) getting to know your incredible foremothers of the faith. You can order What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School: Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down from Wipf and Stock publishers or Amazon.com. After you’ve ordered email me (shawna@shawnaatteberry.com) your order number, and I’ll put your name in the hat for the gift card. The lucky winner will be announced on March 26.

And join in the Lent Madness! It’s not too late to start learning about both our mothers and fathers in the faith, vote them to The Golden Halo and get to know some incredible people along the way. Read the comments! There is always a great discussion going on about the voting for that day.

Huldah: Authenticating the Word of God

How did she feel as she held the scroll in her hand?

What did she think of the high priest and these other men from the temple who wanted to know if these words were true?

Did Huldah have any idea what she started when she proclaimed that the scroll she held was the word of God? Did she know one day centuries later her proclamation would end in a canon of Scripture?

Did you know that it was a woman who first declared that a piece of writing was the word of God? Did you know it was a woman who started us on our way to having written Scripture?

Huldah is one of the incredible women in the Bible you will get to know in What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School: Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down. You will learn she was a prophet living in Jerusalem. She was respected enough that the king of Judah sent the high priest of the Temple to get advice from her. Did you learn about this incredible woman in Sunday School? Or Bible study? Have you ever heard a sermon about her?

It’s time to bring Huldah out from the shadows along with equally incredible women who populate the pages of our Bible. What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School is a nine week Bible study that will introduce you to women who didn’t take no for an answer, even from Jesus. From now until March 26 (my birthday!) when you buy What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School, your name will be entered into a drawing to win a $25 Amazon.com gift card. After purchasing your book at Wifp & Stock Publishers or on Amazon.comemail me (shawna@shawnaatteberry.com) your order number, and I will throw your name into the hat. The winner will be drawn on March 26. Travel with some extraordinary women through Lent, and find out the powerful and amazing ways God can change the world through a woman just like Huldah, a woman just like you.

The E-book and I Are Making the Rounds

If Sandi or Monnette’s blogs have you sent you my way: Welcome! I’m delighted to be featured on both of their sites.

Today on Deva Coaching, I am in Sandi Amorim’s Featured Spotlight. Sandi is my business coach, and she made me answer the questions, so I could finally get my Hire Me page done. I answered the questions, and the Hire Me page is now live! I’m very happy about the forward movement.

Monette Chilson on Sophia Rising has reviewed my E-book, What You Didn’t Learn in Sunday School: Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down. I am very happy with her favorable review. Monette blends Christianity, the Divine Feminine and yoga on her blog, Sophia Rising, and I will be happy to review her book when it comes out next year.

Sandi mentioned on her site that I interviewed her about Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down. I interviewed four people on their responses, and here are all four podcasts:

Mark Mattison and I talk about how passages in 1 Corinthians are interpreted to keep women silent in church and submissive to their husbands. We talked about the many different ways these verses can be interpreted that make women equal with their husbands and equals in church, preaching and praying in their congregations. How many people know about these different interpretations? Not many.

Catherine Caine and I talk about how the traditional Christian views affect people who aren’t Christians. Catherine is a secular humanist in Australia, and she talks about how the traditional view of women can influence business as usual on an unconscious level. She also loved how earthy and action-oriented the women in the Bible were. She loved how they made decisions and did what needed to be done without any drama or hand-wringing.

Sandi Amorin talks about her experience growing up in the Catholic Church and how her questions about “Where are all the women in the Bible?” went unanswered. Sandi was amazed that she had never heard about most of these women in church. Sadly that’s not unusual. Women in the Bible who go against the “traditional” view of women are ignored and marginalized. We don’t hear their stories because they were anything but submissive and quiet.

Lainie Petersen and I talk about how the lie that Godde made women to be quiet and submissive leads to the abuses we see throughout the church today: domestic abuse, sexual abuse, and the reality that churches are much more likely to blame female and children victims than to hold male abusers accountable for their actions. The consequences of this horrible theology are brutal, and no one in the church likes to talk about it, much less do anything about it.

If you stop by please feel free to introduce yourself in the comments. I would love to get to know you. I hope everyone has a Happy Friday!

Why I Keep Harping on Biblical Women, Equality, & Women Working

Rev. Laura Grimes officiating Mass

There’s a reason why I keep harping on the subjects I do. There’s a reason I’m writing a book called Career Women of the Bible. And there’s a reason I wrote the E-book, Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down. There is a reason why I keep blogging about women in the Bible who were:

  • Religious leaders
  • Secular leaders
  • Business women
  • Merchants
  • Entrepenuers

It’s because I keep reading things like this:

I believed the “Beautiful Girlhood” spiel. I did it everything the “right way”. I stayed at home, I submitted to my father, I skipped college, I prepared to be my husband’s helpmeet, and I regret it. I had years of my life go by where I was little more than an indentured servant to my parents. My husband and I were forced into thousands of dollars of debt working for an abusive employer that we could have thumbed our nose at if I had been able to get a job. While I was without the commitments of marriage and children, I could have easily gained an education that could have served me and my husband well in early marriage. All those years living as a quiet submissive housekeeper, I could have been discovering interests, and developing as a person.

Why I Wish I Had Gone to College by Young Mom

It’s because I keep reading about lies like this on the Are Women Really Human? blog:

YOUNG LADIES MUST PREPARE TO BE HOMEMAKERS…Prepare to Marry Young If God’s Will; Don’t accept cultural norms and practices…Don’t Assume College or Career:

  1. Be aware of serving the cultural idol of education and career.
  2. Be willing to lay aside the pursuit of higher education if marriage comes early.
  3. Be willing to lay aside a career when married.
  4. Think of a non-paying (but very rewarding and important) “career” in the home related to your husband and children.
  5. If unmarried, consider a “feminine” vocation or job that will benefit family later.

Detwiler further divides reasons married women work outside the home into “necessary” reasons and “wordly” reasons. The only “necessary” reasons are a husband’s unemployment or disability, or to save up money or pay off debts. The clear implication is that any woman who works outside of the home when her husband is also employed is sinning if her work is not indispensable to family finances. Meanwhile, worldly reasons for a woman to work outside of the home include:

6) Identity and fulfillment primarily in work outside the home. Not content with obscurity of being a wife, mother and homemaker… [my emphasis] 8 ) Husband and wife may think she can work outside home with little or no harm to the marriage and family. 9) Realization by a woman that it may be easier to work outside the home than in the home as a wife, mother and homemaker.

There’s an obvious disdain here for women and especially mothers who have outside employment. Detwiler clearly implies that such women are lazy, self-absorbed, and unwise parents. He clearly associates a woman working outside the home with “harm” to her marriage and family. He states that there is “lack of biblical support” for women to work full-time outside of the home.

It’s because The Council for the so-called “Biblical” Manhood and Womanhood just released a curriculum for kids and teens with this warped view of the creation stories in Genesis:

While God created men to be generally oriented toward work, God created women to be generally oriented towards relationships of helpfulness and companionship.

This is God’s good design.

A design for male headship — leading, protecting, and providing for the woman.

A design for female submission — submitting to and helping the man; a companion-helper ‘fit for him.’

Some will be doubtful … even upset by this teaching of God’s good design for men and women.

Yes I am upset about this. But not because it’s Godde’s good design. I’m upset because it’s one big, fat lie. If you want to see a drastically different way to interpret these same verses read this: Does It Really Mean Helpmate?

So yes, I keep harping on Women, the Bible, and Equality.

Women’s & Men’s Work

Of course what these people fail to tell you is that not only is there a “lack of biblical support” for women outside of the home, there is also a lack of support for men working outside of the home in the Bible. That’s because EVERYONE worked at home during biblical times. In ancient agrarian societies the home was a self-sufficient farm where everyone worked to make sure the family had shelter, clothing, and food. Few people left the home to “go to work.” The same was true for merchants at that time. If you lived in a town or city and sold merchandise, you lived above or next to your business, and the whole family worked in that business. The only people who worked away from home were traders and soldiers. That’s it. Everyone else worked at home.

The biblical model of family was not destroyed when women started working outside of the home. The biblical model of family was broken when men started working outside of the home at the beginning of the Industrial Age.

Not only did women work to financially support their families: women’s work drove ancient economy. Women’s work–spinning and weaving–making textiles to trade fueled the ancient economy, so different tribes could trade for precious metals and exotic foods. In Women’s Work: The First 20,000 Years, Elizabeth Wayland Barber shows the monetary value of women’s work for their families. She also shows the power and autonomy women had as textile makers and traders in the Middle East. Women have always worked to financially provide for their families. They’ve also made, bought and traded. It’s nothing new. What is new is this ridiculous modern idea that man goes to work, leaving his family behind for the better part of the day, then comes back home with money. That’s new. Not women working. (For an excellent overview of the work women did do in the Bible to support their families and bring in money see Sunzanne McCarthy’s “Women’s Orientation to Work” blog series, starting here.)

This is a totally foreign concept to most people although it describes well over 90% of our history. (History did not begin with the Industrial Age, the Victorian Era, or 1950s suburbia.)

What the Bible Really Says

photo © 2006 Dale Gillard | more info (via: Wylio)Women working in the Bible, bringing home the bacon, and being leaders is also a foreign concept to most people. Again and again I heard from readers who were amazed at what women did in the Bible after reading Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down. They were amazed to find women judges, military leaders, and women who wouldn’t take no for an answer from Moses, Jesus, or Godde. They were amazed to find a woman negotiating with a general on behalf of her city, and most of them were flabbergasted that Tamar was praised for disguising herself as a prostitute to insure she would have children for her husband’s family through her father-in-law.

They were amazed to find out that the quiet and submissive woman the women in the Bible were supposed to be is nothing but a caricature. It’s what men who have interpreted the Bible for centuries want women to be. It’s not what Godde created women to be.

And that’s why I keep doing what I do.

The time for lies is over.

That’s not what the Bible says.

It never has been. It never will be.

Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down Podcasts

Want to hear about what four of my readers said about the women they met in the Bible in Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down? Here is what we talked about in these four 30 minute podcasts:

Mark Mattison and I talk about how passages in 1 Corinthians are interpreted to keep women silent in church and submissive to their husbands. We talked about the many different ways these verses can be interpreted that make women equal with their husbands and equals in church, preaching and praying in their congregations. How many people know about these different interpretations? Not many.

Catherine Caine and I talk about how the traditional Christian views affect people who aren’t Christians. Catherine is a secular humanist in Australia, and she talks about how the traditional view of women can influence business as usual on an unconscious level. She also loved how earthy and action-oriented the women in the Bible were. She loved how they made decisions and did what needed to be done without any drama or hand-wringing.

Sandi Amorin talks about her experience growing up in the Catholic Church and how her questions about “Where are all the women in the Bible?” went unanswered. Sandi was amazed that she had never heard about most of these women in church. Sadly that’s not unusual. Women in the Bible who go against the “traditional” view of women are ignored and marginalized. We don’t hear their stories because they were anything but submissive and quiet.

Lainie Petersen and I talk about how the lie that Godde made women to be quiet and submissive leads to the abuses we see throughout the church today: domestic abuse, sexual abuse, and the reality that churches are much more likely to blame female and children victims than to hold male abusers accountable for their actions. The consequences of this horrible theology are brutal, and no one in the church likes to talk about it, much less do anything about it.

Stop listening to the lies

Most of all: don’t believe the lies anymore.

  • Women were made in the image of Godde.
  • Godde calls women to be both religious and secular leaders.
  • Godly women have always worked and financially supported their families.
  • In the Bible women not only worked–they had careers too.

Don’t listen to lies. Buy Women Who Didn’t Shut Up & Sit Down and learn what Godde and the Bible really say about women by clicking the button below.
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