Pastoring Women: Understanding and Honoring Distinctness

There’s safety in homogenization. If you treat men and women as the same, you don’t risk offending anyone. Or limiting anyone. Or hindering anyone. But what if God created men and women differently? What if it’s not a question of limitations but a matter of distinct divine purposes for different parts of the body? The egalitarianism of Western culture, for all its good purposes, leads to the homogenization of men and women. To unisex clothes, colognes, roles, and lifestyles. The lovely and distinct color palettes of men and women mush together into a gray-brown muck. You can have that if you want it. But we think God intends something better.

That’s why this issue of the 9Marks Journal is dedicated to how to distinctly pastor women. We want to reflect on what he uniquely and wonderfully intends for women in the life of the church, and how to specially pastor them. Articles by myself (Jonathan Leeman), Deepak Reju, Bob Johnson, and Owen Strachan unpack theological foundations and practical implications of pastoring women. And articles by Susan Hunt, Jani Ortlund, and Tom Schreiner explore the unique and distinct ministry God has given to women in the local church.