We want to hear from you!  What kind of issues would you like for us to talk about on our blog?

We are hearing a lot of positive feedback on our T-Shirst that made their debut at CBF National in Memphis this year.  See the picture below.  We have heard great feedback as people have been wearing them everywhere.  Passport Camp’s staffs said they usually saw one a week!  We’ve had several who have been asking about sizes for their children (even babies!).  I wore mine to a baseball game, and got a great combination of stares, and “You go preacher-lady” from a few of the people who worked at the stadium.

What do you think?   What has been the most surprising reaction you have received for wearing your shirt?  We’d love to hear about the responses you are getting!

This is what a preacher looks like!

Baptist Women in Ministry celebrates the twenty-fifth anniversary of its founding this year. I sometimes wonder if the founders of BWIM realized back in 1983 what a historic step they were taking in founding an organization for women ministers. Surely, the founders could not have known that the very next year the Southern Baptist Convention would pass a resolution denouncing the ordination of women. And surely, the founders could not have known that Southern Baptist seminaries would soon shut their classroom doors to keep out women who expressed a calling to pastoral ministries. But then again, the founders also could not have known that within twenty-five years, over 100 women would be serving as pastors or co-pastors of “southern” Baptist churches. And surely, the founders could not have known that within twenty-five years some 2,000 Baptist women would be ordained and that many of them and many non-ordained women would be serving on church staffs, ministering in hospitals and prisons, proclaiming the gospel on the mission field, working among the poor and disenfranchised, and regularly preaching from Baptist pulpits.

But then again, maybe they did know! They were certainly visionaries, and they surely had caught a glimpse of the probabilities and the possibilities! They were also people of great hope, and I imagine that while they might not have correctly predicted with regard to the statistics, they surely dreamed of a day when a Baptist woman ministering in her church or in her community would be an accepted, commonplace occurrence. As we celebrate BWIM’s twenty-five years, I am most grateful for those founders and for their vision, their hopes, and their dreams! ~Pam Durso

What I wish for women in ministry (or what I wish people knew ABOUT women in ministry) in the New Year….wow! Where do I even begin?
I thought about emailing all the women I know and asking them one thing they would wish for women in ministry this year. This would mean that (1) more voices would be heard and (2) I would write less. But that seemed a bit like a “cop out” and I still didn’t know how I would allow my own voice to be heard. So, I asked myself what I really wanted to see happen, to be heard, to make known…and I remembered.
I remembered the Sunday when, in the midst of preparing the sanctuary for the evening service, I watched a little girl playing in the pulpit. This little girl, we’ll call her Katie, was having fun standing by the microphone talking and gesturing with her hands. I turned to Katie, and with a smile on my face, asked her if she wanted to be a pastor when she grew up.

“No,” she shouted, “No way.”
Shocked, (and, to be honest, a little afraid of what her answer would be, given how many stories I have heard from other women about little girls being told they couldn’t be pastors simply because they were, well, girls), I asked her, “Why?” “Too much work,” she shrugged—then jumped off the platform and ran to play with her friends.
“And a little child shall lead them….” There is nothing like truth from a seven-year-old. My wish for the world is that we could all be like Katie, where gender isn’t even a question or thought when it comes to determining who is called to serve in God’s Kingdom…and where we all realize and appreciate that ministry is really hard work.
And I would like for all the different voices to be heard—regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, or level of experience. What do you think? What do you wish for women in ministry?
Michelle

Changing Her Mind

This week, my church lost one of our great matriarchs. Mrs. Trudy, died at the age of 91 after living a full & active life. Her absence from our community will be missed by all, young and old.
Through the five years I have served at Peachtree Baptist Church, Trudy and I have shared many memorable experiences together. One of the most memorable experiences for me of how much Trudy was open to change happened about three years ago. Trudy invited me to go to lunch and we found a date. She was ashamed that I had never been to the Colonnade Restaurant and so that’s where we went. Over the course of lunch, she asked me about my calling. She wanted details… How did I end up in seminary? Did I ever imagine God would call me to do preach?
As I finished my story, Trudy began hers. She talked about her life growing up in church and what that was like. She talked about her faith and how it had been shaped over the years. And finally she said, “I have to tell you that I’m sorry. I used to say that if we ever called a woman to preach at Peachtree, I’d leave. I just didn’t believe in that. But, I owe you an apology. You can preach and God has shown me that I was wrong.”
Since that day, Trudy has been one of my biggest supporters within our congregation. She extended arms of grace and support to other female ministry students, interns and ministers on staff at Peachtree. She loved hearing (what she could hear with her limited hearing!) different voices from the pulpit proclaiming God’s love for all people.
At the age of 89, Trudy learned to discover something new about how God works in the lives of people. I feel blessed to have been a part of her new discovery. She will be greatly missed among our community, especially each time one of our women preaches from the pulpit.

LeAnn

After much anticipation, Baptist Women in Ministry as a group has a place to communicate and for you to respond–a blog!   We want to keep you up to date with what’s going on in the ministerial world of women, ask questions, connect with one another, and have a space for us to hear back from you about real issues, real lives of those women in ministry (or those who support them) within Baptist life (though we will gladly encourage others of you from differing denominations to participate).

So to start the conversation, here’s food for thought.  One of my friends was telling me about a service of communion that her friend had taken her to at a nearby church with a female pastor.  the service was held outside, and as my friend told me about the service, something she said struck me.  “There was something about the whole thing that was distinctly feminine, though I can’t quite put my finger on it.  All I know, is when I came to the table, I knew something was different.”  In this case, I think this pastor brought a relational element to the communion table, which she had not experienced in this way before.  It was very powerful in communicating the relational element of God’s presence in this sacred act.  What are some ways you may have experienced a feminine presence in church, or some other holy moment, to help you see a different side of God?

Amy