John
I would agree that we should not make non-essentials essentials. However, like Pilgrim said this particular issue is an essential. I know otherwise conservative Christians who would completely disagree with me on that. However, given the ramifications of this doctrine (which Pilgrim touched on), I believe they are seriously in error.

Out of curiosity, does DeYoung believe that this issue is a non-essential?
Most egalitarians that I know seem to believe that if roles (such as elder) in the Church and family can’t be done by both men and women. Then by necessary consequence, it makes women inferior to men. In one conversation I had with an egalitarian I showed from Scripture and a RC Sproul article that this wasn’t the case at all. Given that God is a God of order and even within the Trinity, all three members have different roles to play; yet they are equally God.
Yet even this argument doesn’t hold any water to them and I got the idea (though I am not certain on this) that they disagreed that all three members of the Trinity had different roles to play.
An example of an argument I have heard a few times by egalitarians is to use Gal. 3:28 to prove that both male and female have the same role in the body of Christ. It doesn’t seem to make a difference to these egalitarians that the context of the text is clearly salvation.
I could go on and on about other silly arguments I have heard coming from egalitarians and I am not just talking about Arminian egalitarians.

Something that puzzles me about this matter is how could someone who has such a good hermeneutic when it comes to other essential issues, get it so wrong in this issue. If they used the same hermeneutic principles they use to become egalitarian. I am almost certain they would not come to the a proper understanding in other essentials. scratch1

Tom

Last edited by Tom; Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:34 PM.