I read your latest Blog entry regarding the vitriolic reaction to biblical patriarchy from Rev. Sandlin, and I was truly confounded. I have also received and read a copy of Rev. Sandlin’s article and can see that you have in no way exaggerated his words or misrepresented their context. The quotes from Rev. Sandlin were so shocking that it sounded like something made up. It certainly had nothing to do with what I have heard and read from your materials in all the years I have known you — and I attended the first “Back to Patriarchy” Conference in 1996.

Rev. Sandlin’s criticism of biblical patriarchy does not contain any Scriptural exegesis on the passages modern patriarchs use as foundations for their views. At best, all we hear is a weak “argument from silence” — a very strange position coming from someone who says he believes that the Scripture speaks to all areas of life.

The teachings contained in your materials on patriarchy are not new and would be considered very mild had they been promoted even 100 years ago. If Sandlin thinks you are promoting totalitarianism and legalism, what must he think of the Reformers? I seem to recall that Martin Luther believed birth control was equivalent to murder. Many mainstream 19th-century Reformed pastors believed having pipe organs in church was heretical and popish. Would Rev. Sandlin dare use the kind of ad hominem attacks against these great men of Church that he so flippantly uses against you and other teachers in today’s Church?

But the most disappointing part of Rev. Sandlin’s attack on biblical patriarchy is the condescending, highbrow, and obnoxious rhetoric he employs. Clearly, such tactics are meant to inflame — not to exhort. Sandlin seeks to make people angry at advocates of patriarchy by creating outrageous straw man arguments. These tactics are purely reactionary and never constructive towards building a godly Church.

I hope and pray that whatever ecclesiastical order he belongs to will exhort him to repent and to seek reconciliation with his brothers. I am truly grieved.

This is all the more astonishing because it is coming from a Christian brother. I expect it from the feminists; I just couldn’t have imagined it coming from a Reformed pastor who says he believes in classical biblical exegesis.

And this is the horrible “between a rock and a hard place” we full-time homemakers now find ourselves occupying. We know the world hates God’s created order and the roles He assigned at the beginning. We expect career women to misunderstand us or think of us as ignorant rubes. But now when we look to the Church for support, we find the same attitudes in the pews all around us. When we hunger for the instruction and exhortation of godly Titus 2 women, we find that they’ve all flown the coop to pursue careers now that they have an empty nest and (obviously) “have nothing to do.” When we look around for precious young ladies who might want to help out with the housework or children (learning as they go), we discover that their parents have shoved them out the door to earn money so they can get into college and jump into the career track as soon as possible. When we long for real parish life (a vibrant, warm, hospitable, helpful Church community), we find we live in a veritable ghost town where answering machines are the most we can hope for when we call a sister in the Lord.

The despair many Christian homemakers feel today doesn’t come from a lack of support from their husbands as much as it does from a severe sense of loneliness when they look for like-minded friends and godly older women. I hear this all the time from lovely Christian moms who feel like rowboats anchored in the middle of the ocean. God created us to need the community of His Body. When Christians pursue individualistic goals, the Body atomizes itself and we lack the strength (or even the vision) to bring about the cultural renewal we claim to seek. I fully admit I am no superwoman. I cannot do everything alone; I need the support of Christ’s Body. I need my older, godly mentors to exhort me in love when I fail. I need the servant-hearted young women who come to clean my house when I have the flu. I am no island, nor should any woman be expected to function as one. But this new anti-scriptural take on the woman’s role is creating this very problem — isolation in the midst of the Church.

I must say that I continue to be perplexed by the RazorMouth crowd and their apparent unhealthy view of Christian Liberty. While there are many on the other end of the spectrum that are unbalanced with legalistic views on Christian morality, Sandlin and others seem to have backed into a ditch on the other side of the road. Vehemently opposed to what they call “legalism” they apparently have rushed to the other extreme and it seems that many of their writers glorify smoking cigars and the indulgence of alcohol at every opportunity. I find this rather curious and, in my humble opinion, a distorted view of our liberty in Christ - “Fire up a Cohiba, mix the martinis, and crank up the latest Coldplay CD” ??? I think not. The Scriptures teach balance (Prov. 3:3-4) in truth and mercy. I detect a spirit of arrogance and lack of discernment in many of their writings. This is unfortunate as Mr. Sandlin, and many in his camp, are extremely bright and have written some excellent articles in the past. We should all be leery of the Antinomian imbalance towards liberty that creates the same straining of gnats as does the legalism of the Pharisees. There are ditches on both sides of the road.