"More Courageous than the Men"

By now, you've probably heard about or seen a video making the rounds in which a group of male pastor-types are yukking it up for the enjoyment of their audience by disparaging Beth Moore and all other women preachers, not to mention taking a jab at #MeToo.  As a United Methodist elder who happens to be a woman, I just want to point out a few things.

(1) Jesus thought women could be trusted to be the first to report on his resurrection, which is at the heart of the gospel proclamation, so who are you to say otherwise?

(2) Jesus never told women to "go home" and not to worry their pretty little heads about such weighty matters as theology.  In fact, there were women disciples who traveled around with him and who were part of the 70 who were sent out on a mission.

(3) Women in ministry, including preaching ministry, are part of the early fiber and fabric of Wesleyan Methodism, partly because of the wise example of Susanna Wesley and lived out in the lives of women like Sarah Crosby, Sarah Ryan, Mary Bosanquet Fletcher, and many others.  John took a little persuading but came to see that their ministry of preaching was an "extraordinary call" from God.

(4) The Wesley hymns that were sung and used for meditative and devotional purposes were part of the soundtrack of Methodism and shaped the theology and practices of the folk who sang them.  So consider this: Charles Wesley did not hesitate to extol those female witnesses to the resurrection as more courageous than the male disciples, as filled with grace, as proclaimers of the good news, and as teachers of the other apostles in this verse of the following hymn:

More courageous than the men,
when Christ his breath resign'd,
Women first the grace obtain
Their living Lord to find,
Women first the news proclaim,
Know his resurrection's power
Teach th' Apostles of the Lamb
who lives to die no more!

So, my sisters, keep preaching, keep teaching, keep proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ with holy boldness!  You are not alone; you are filled with grace, and the very Spirit of God dwells within you!