Apologies! I am not here in person this morning because I have ‘got me to a nunnery’ – just for the weekend. The Women’s Book Group are visiting the Benedictine Abbey at Jamberoo to join in the silence and prayer, the rhythm of the life of the nuns, as well as have some good conversations amongst ourselves.
I was reading on the ABC website last weekend an article on debutante balls which traced their origins back to the closure of the nunneries in the 16th century. At this time, it said, wealthy families usually invested in one daughter – the one who would achieve the best marriage prospects. Any remaining daughters were usually sent to convents because this was less expensive than raising further dowries. With Henry VII closing the nunneries, however, people had a daughter problem! Debutante balls slowly emerged as one way of showing off (and hopefully marrying off) each daughter. I hesitate to mention Bridgerton in church, but if you might possibly have glanced at Bridgerton, you get the idea!
Which brings me – strangely – to this morning’s passage from Colossians because it is a reminder of just how different household codes have been in different places and different times. But also, how Scripture and theology, still shape us and shape these codes as we give thanks for what church means to us, as we rejoice in suffering as Christ’s church and as we discover the fullness of life in Christ.
Now this sermon is taken from a sermon I preached last year because in Ephesians 5 and 6 you find a very similar passage to this one in Colossians this morning. You also find household codes in 1 Timothy 2:9-15, Titus 2:2-10 and 1 Peter 2:13-3:7, and a lot has been written about them! There is this inherent tension in codifying Christian behaviour in a way that is practical and relevant at one point in time and how Scripture speaks into our lives at every time. And so, these codes are controversial. Even now, as our denomination, as other denominations, wrestle with ethical questions about human sexuality, we have still not resolved issues of gender or our treatment of the most vulnerable.
But despite their difficulties, these texts tell us three things about being the church: firstly, that we are necessarily shaped by our culture, by the life being lived around us; secondly, that we are also – thank God! – shaped by God’s calling, by the life within us, and, thirdly, that we are being shaped by the Spirit of God for a way of life ahead of us.
And this is what we see here. The New Testament household codes were based on Greco-Roman household codes from the teaching of Aristotle and other first century philosophers. Relationships were listed in binary pairs (“The smallest and primary parts of the household,” Aristotle wrote, “are master and slave, husband and wife, father and children.”) and they reflected the view that a man’s authority over his household was critical to the success of society. First century philosopher Arius Didymus proclaimed, “The man has the rule of this household by nature. For the deliberative faculty of the woman is inferior, in children it does not yet exist, and in the case of slaves it is completely absent.”
And there were good reasons for the early church to align itself with these codes. Australian theologian, Michael Bird, writes, “The household codes [were] not ideal, but [were] a necessary way of negotiating a path for Christian assemblies in a world there [they] were viewed with the utmost of suspicion.” And Sharyn Dowd, formerly at Baylor University, observes that this system was included, “because it was the only stable and respectable system anyone knew about. It was the best the culture had to offer.”
Similarly, we are shaped by the culture we are in – for good and for ill. We live in a society that is highly individualistic, that measures human value on wealth and influence, and erodes our sense of responsibility for each other. As Christians, we must resist this pressure. On the other hand, society can exert positive pressure on the church. The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has turned a glaring spotlight on how patriarchal structures allowed abuse to occur and be covered up.
But the household codes also reveal that the church was being transformed by the life of God within it!
In contrast to the Greco-Roman household codes, the New Testament codes address themselves first to those with less power: wives, children, and slaves – probably because these were the people who made up the church! And where Greco-Roman codes asked nothing of heads of households, here they are told to love their wives, to never treat them harshly, to be gentle with their children, to be just and fair to their slaves. These are extraordinary statements!
And all parties are called to re-think their roles and relationships, in the light of their Christian identity, to live their lives in the fear of God; to replace service for others with service for God, to remember we all servants of one Master.
This teaching has had a radical impact on the church. I mentioned last year how, in the mid 1600’s, the Quakers – shaped by the thought that we are friends of God and therefore friends of each other – formed distinctive egalitarian communities, without class divisions and with shared responsibilities between men and women…communities that advocated for causes like the end of slavery and women’s rights. “It all seemed pretty obvious to them: friends did not let friends be held in slavery.”
We can look at other campaigns that have championed workers’ rights or even the Baptist World Aid Ethical Fashion Guide as originating in this passage.
And the shaping of Christian community continues. We continue to grow as the body of Christ (Colossians 2:19), “holding fast to [Christ our] head… nourished and held together by its ligaments and sinews, [growing] with a growth that is from God.” It is a process – learning how to be God’s people – and as part of that process we are learning, as Ephesians 5:21 says, how to, “be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ.”
I am so glad of that because I am aware we have a long way to go, in our relationships with the vulnerable, with those who are exploited, with children and our attitudes to gender and gender roles within the church.
The sad reality is that family violence is very present within church communities. According to some surveys, it is present to the same degree it is outside the church, with church attendance having very little reductive impact.
There is however more attention to this issue and some excellent resources have been produced by A Just Cause, our Baptist agency, and Common Grace, and BaptistCare have some excellent services. There are links to these in our bulletin this Sunday.
How do we keep being shaped into the people of God?
It’s not a new household code, but psychologist Kylie Pidgeon has these practical suggestions for churches working towards modelling mutual equality and respect:
- Provide equal encouragement and opportunity to women, as to men, to develop preaching and teaching roles. This is something Canberra Baptist obviously has done!
- Develop a public procedure for the ideas and concerns of women to be prioritised on the church agenda. I look back at the quotas this church introduced in1992 for the diaconate – action that inspired the motions we are taking to the November Assembly about under-representation of women in Baptist leadership – as evidence we are doing this.
- Give deep thought to the inclusivity of all people within the life, direction, and leadership of the church. We need everyone to be part of this thinking.
- Train and appoint multiple female (and male) pastoral carers who know how to respond well to the dynamics of family violence. We are fortunate to have many wonderful caring men and women on our pastoral care team. If you would like to know more about this, please speak to me.
- Change who does the behind-the scenes work. Encourage women to do church building maintenance and financial management. Equally consider men for roles such as morning teas, cleaning, and event coordination. We have made some progress here, but there’s still more we can do. It might be time for a man to coordinate the morning tea roster!
- Be specifically inclusive of those on the margins within the church. Consider those with disabilities, divorced or unmarried members, and those who identify as LGBTIQ. We need to keep pressing into this – because we know from the story in last Sunday’s sermon from Ella’s church – that this care, this welcome and affirmation, speaks volumes about the love of God.
We continue to grow as the body of Christ. We continue to work out what care for one another, what being subject to one another looks like in our household codes. And, as the wonderful Shirley Murray hymn says:
God will delight when we are creators of justice and joy,
Yes, God will delight when we are creators of justice, justice and joy.
Let’s sing this together.