Dear Dad… Does God Dis By Rev. Dwight Hellmers
y beloved daughter, you have asked me a hard question. When you were in grade school, you began to observe that the boys in your class were usually stronger, taller, and faster than most girls. In confirmation class, you learned that God is the Creator of all people and you wondered why He seems to have put women at a disadvantage.
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Even in the church, we say that women can’t teach or have authority over men and they can’t be pastors. The Bible says that women are “the weaker sex”and are to be “subject to their husbands.”“How unfair,” you say.“Isn’t God discriminating against women?” As your dad, I want to assure you that I love you. My imperfect love for you is but a reflection of the perfect love of your heavenly Father who cared so much for you that He sent His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, to live, suffer, die, and rise again for you. When did He start loving you? Before you were born—when He determined that you would have an earthly life, so He formed you in your mother’s womb to be the person you are—including your gender. He also wanted you to have an eternal life by means of your Baptism wherein He gave you faith in Christ and He nourished that faith by means of His Word. It is by that Word of God, our Bible, that you know your Savior Jesus. It is by that Word that you know what purpose God has for your life. He who made you to be His child also made you to be a woman. As a child of God by Baptism and faith, you have equality with any man insofar as the most important things are concerned. Although you are a sinner, you have the complete and full forgiveness of God which Jesus bought for you on the cross and conveys to you in His Absolution and His supper. Because of His love for you, He will treat you as His child and an heir of heaven. As a woman, He created you to be different than any man.Through you He may choose to bring new life into this world, that is, to bear a child. God enables you to think differently than a man; scientifically we know that the brain of a man and a woman are “wired”differently.What is sometimes referred to as “a woman’s intuition”is actually her ability to consider, all at once, a wider ranger of factors than a man does. God made you with skills and abilities which complement those skills and abilities He gave to men.
