“We gloss over difficult passages like 1 Timothy 2:15, attributing them to an unenlightened age,” my friend Sarah Arthur writes in Christianity Today. (Are Women Really Saved through Childbearing? Mother’s Day, infertility, and redemption. [May 10, 2013].)
1 Timothy 2:15 (NIV)
15 But women[a] will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.
Footnotes:
a. 1 Timothy 2:15 Greek she
“We owe it to women,” writes Arthur, “and to the truth, to explore the complexities of such a verse and be sensitive to teachings and practices that relegate or ignore the women in our midst who struggle to bear children, no matter how much they desire and pray to.”
Sarah explores this complex Scripture in thoughtful and nuanced ways. Read the full article here.
For the record, I am “the friend in small group,” referenced so kindly and graciously by Sarah. I think of this piece at this time of year and I revisit it with gratitude for the light it shines on an issue that will always be not only close to, but a part of, my and many women’s heart.
Sarah Arthur is the award-winning author/compiler of more than twelve books. Her current book, Year of Small Things: Radical Faith for the Rest of Us (Brazos Press), is co-authored with Erin F. Wasinger. Together, Sarah and her husband Tom, and Erin and her husband Dave, embarked on a yearlong experiment to implement twelve small practices of radical faith. One church. One city. One year. Twelve small but radical changes.
saraharthur.com
Patricia Alderman 