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By Elizabeth Prata
Last week I asked Do You Like or Dislike Podcasts? I'd admitted that my toleration level for any and all auditory stimuli is low, due to my autism. Therefore if I'm going to listen to something I'd rather it be a sermon or soft classical music (very calming).
The title question is a paraphrase from a Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood article which asked the men "Dude, Where's Your Gravitas?"
Gravitas is a Latin word meaning dignity, seriousness, or solemnity of manner. Bible teachers, speakers, and podcasters are handling the word of God. They are conveying or teaching doctrines or concepts related to theology and its application to Christian living.
Sadly, many podcasts by both men and woman sink into silly behavior from the podcaster, especially when there are two or more hosts, or a host and a guest. There's so much giggling, laughing, and off-topic, random chats that I usually reach my limit within just a few minutes, and turn it off or move the dial to something more productive. I also think it's asking a lot of the podcaster to expect busy moms and outside the home working women to devote their limited time listening to their tee-heeing and non-productive repartee.
Quite often when I publish an essay regarding false doctrine brought by a false teacher, I receive angry comments and emails telling me to 'judge not' and the like. But strangely, the angrier emails and comments I receive come when I publish an essay urging women to behave biblically. My, how so many women resent being urged to behave like biblical women!
But the Bible demands certain behavior from all of the faithful in every age group. We women, we are told to be a graceful pillar
May our sons in their youth be like plants full grown, our daughters like corner pillars cut for the structure of a palace; (Psalm 144:12).
Pillars, ladies, Not a braying donkey.
A friend sent me a link to an Elisabeth Elliot talk on Youtube. Elliot (1926-2015) was a missionary along with her husband to the unreached group the Auca of eastern Ecuador. After what seemed a successful first few contacts, the Auca massacred her husband and four other missionaries with him. Elliot remained in Ecuador after her husband's death for two years as missionary to the tribe members who killed her husband. She remained in Ecuador overall until 1963.
Elliot was a popular speaker and author. Many of her talks to women about wifelihood or missionary life were recorded, as the one my friend sent.
Something one notices immediately upon listening to Elliot is her demeanor. She speaks slowly, carefully, soberly. (Titus 2:3,5). I think of someone like Beth Moore, where her speech patterns are so frenetic that when Chris Rosebrough introduces a segment about her he plays "Flight of the Bumblebee". Or Christine Caine, who, at Passion 2019, yelled a lot and never stopped striding around the stage (in a track suit). A Bible teacher's demeanor like Elisabeth's will cause one to stop, listen, and take what is said more seriously because of the gravitas inherent in the woman. She spoke of heavenly things with respect for heaven.
The following is from Council of Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, it says of gravitas in men (change the pronoun to woman)-
The Bible says of women,
Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled. (Titus 2:3-5).
From Strong's,
The word honor as used in the Proverb here means 'of a woman'. It's used elsewhere to indicate-
a doe (Nahum 3:4); a precious stone (Proverbs 5:19); of ornaments (Proverbs 17:8; Proverbs 1:9; Proverbs 4:9; Proverbs 3:22.) Source, Strong's.
One thing that Phil Johnson and Todd Friel remarked upon when discussing a "teaching" clip from Beth Moore was that her demeanor strayed from teaching the Bible with reverence and gravitas, to performance as a stand-up comedian. Dear sister, speaker, podcaster, ladies, if we are blessed with the gift of teaching and undertake that endeavor, do we want to point to ourselves in performance, or do we revere the subject matter enough to speak about our subject with not only skill and clear doctrine, but reverence and self-control?
If women are going to teach on Bible subjects, shouldn't we act like the Bible says to act?
Just some thoughts. Let me know what you think.
-----------------------------------------------
Further reading/listening
Podcast by The Thankful Homemaker: Cultivating Self-Control. Contains good thoughts on approaching Christian life and holy things with reverence, which includes self-control.
Equipping Eve by Erin Benziger is a good podcast for content, and also to demonstrate a woman with gravitas in handling the subject matter well.
Michelle Lesley is a Christian blogger, speaker, teacher, and vlogger. She projects a demeanor of joy without silliness. Both the theological content and her speaking style are, in my opinion reverent, and self-controlled. Check out her Youtube channel here
Last week I asked Do You Like or Dislike Podcasts? I'd admitted that my toleration level for any and all auditory stimuli is low, due to my autism. Therefore if I'm going to listen to something I'd rather it be a sermon or soft classical music (very calming).
The title question is a paraphrase from a Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood article which asked the men "Dude, Where's Your Gravitas?"
Gravitas is a Latin word meaning dignity, seriousness, or solemnity of manner. Bible teachers, speakers, and podcasters are handling the word of God. They are conveying or teaching doctrines or concepts related to theology and its application to Christian living.
Sadly, many podcasts by both men and woman sink into silly behavior from the podcaster, especially when there are two or more hosts, or a host and a guest. There's so much giggling, laughing, and off-topic, random chats that I usually reach my limit within just a few minutes, and turn it off or move the dial to something more productive. I also think it's asking a lot of the podcaster to expect busy moms and outside the home working women to devote their limited time listening to their tee-heeing and non-productive repartee.
Quite often when I publish an essay regarding false doctrine brought by a false teacher, I receive angry comments and emails telling me to 'judge not' and the like. But strangely, the angrier emails and comments I receive come when I publish an essay urging women to behave biblically. My, how so many women resent being urged to behave like biblical women!
But the Bible demands certain behavior from all of the faithful in every age group. We women, we are told to be a graceful pillar
May our sons in their youth be like plants full grown, our daughters like corner pillars cut for the structure of a palace; (Psalm 144:12).
Pillars, ladies, Not a braying donkey.
Elliot was a popular speaker and author. Many of her talks to women about wifelihood or missionary life were recorded, as the one my friend sent.
Something one notices immediately upon listening to Elliot is her demeanor. She speaks slowly, carefully, soberly. (Titus 2:3,5). I think of someone like Beth Moore, where her speech patterns are so frenetic that when Chris Rosebrough introduces a segment about her he plays "Flight of the Bumblebee". Or Christine Caine, who, at Passion 2019, yelled a lot and never stopped striding around the stage (in a track suit). A Bible teacher's demeanor like Elisabeth's will cause one to stop, listen, and take what is said more seriously because of the gravitas inherent in the woman. She spoke of heavenly things with respect for heaven.
The following is from Council of Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, it says of gravitas in men (change the pronoun to woman)-
"That is a man of gravitas. There is a solemn weight to the way he carries himself. He believes in truth. He walks in love, joy, passion, and conviction. There’s an undeniable winsome seriousness evident in his character, his words, his thoughts, and his motivations."
The Bible says of women,
Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled. (Titus 2:3-5).
From Strong's,
A gracious woman gets honor, and violent men get riches. (Proverbs 11:16)
- reverent in Titus 2:3- means, befitting men, places, actions, or things sacred to God, reverent
- self-controlled in Titus 3:5- sṓphrōn ("acting in God's definition of balance") makes someone genuinely temperate, i.e. well-balanced from God's perspective. True balance is not "one-size-fits-all" nor is it blandly static. This root then reflects living in God-defined balance.
- The root is the root of "diaphram," the inner organ (muscle) that regulates physical life, controlling breathing and heart beat.
- The whole word-family comes from sōos "safe" and phrēn "what regulates life", which is the root of the English term "diaphram".
- Example: An opera singer controls the length (quality) of their tones by their diaphragm which even controls the ability to breathe and moderates heartbeat. Hence it regulates ("brings safety") to the body, keeping it properly controlled.
The word honor as used in the Proverb here means 'of a woman'. It's used elsewhere to indicate-
a doe (Nahum 3:4); a precious stone (Proverbs 5:19); of ornaments (Proverbs 17:8; Proverbs 1:9; Proverbs 4:9; Proverbs 3:22.) Source, Strong's.
One thing that Phil Johnson and Todd Friel remarked upon when discussing a "teaching" clip from Beth Moore was that her demeanor strayed from teaching the Bible with reverence and gravitas, to performance as a stand-up comedian. Dear sister, speaker, podcaster, ladies, if we are blessed with the gift of teaching and undertake that endeavor, do we want to point to ourselves in performance, or do we revere the subject matter enough to speak about our subject with not only skill and clear doctrine, but reverence and self-control?
If women are going to teach on Bible subjects, shouldn't we act like the Bible says to act?
Just some thoughts. Let me know what you think.
-----------------------------------------------
Further reading/listening
Podcast by The Thankful Homemaker: Cultivating Self-Control. Contains good thoughts on approaching Christian life and holy things with reverence, which includes self-control.
Equipping Eve by Erin Benziger is a good podcast for content, and also to demonstrate a woman with gravitas in handling the subject matter well.
Michelle Lesley is a Christian blogger, speaker, teacher, and vlogger. She projects a demeanor of joy without silliness. Both the theological content and her speaking style are, in my opinion reverent, and self-controlled. Check out her Youtube channel here
Yours is such an important post for the 21st Century Church. Because I am not a woman, I would like to point out the actions of one of false-Christianity's foremost personalities. There is a YouTube video in which Ken Copeland is participating in the so-called Toronto Miracle in, I believe, Toronto. The late Kenneth Hagin was walking around, confronting people with his so-called holy laughter. He stops in front of Kenneth Copeland, starts his bowl-full-of-jelly routine and, of course, Copeland collapses in laughter. Then the camera's attention drifts to other activities. A few moments later, the came returns, inadvertently or otherwise, to Copeland. He has stopped his laughter. He is obviously confused and is looking around. He realizes something is wrong. I don't know exactly what he realized, but his face and demeanor are clear that he knows something is not right. But instead of acting in wisdom and withdrawing from or leaving the session, he continues on but, I think, without the madcap laughter and histrionics. Thank you for pointing out the cheap gimmicks and embarrassing behavior of Beth Moore. I believe we need to keep the behaviors of all false teachers before us as we realize who they are and what damage they are capable of. (I believe that many who died in Jonestown were aware of the atrocious, outlandish behavior of Jim Jones, but they were afraid to say so, because they were afraid of being labeled as unfaithful Jones followers.)
ReplyDeleteSo good to hear the truth in such a kind way! Thank you, thank you, thank you!
ReplyDeleteYou are very welcome! :)
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