Cameo women

On 27th January each year, the Episcopal Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America celebrate the life of Phoebe. "Who?" I hear you ask. Yes, Phoebe, that well known deacon of the 1st century church in Cenchrea, near Corinth. Well, perhaps not so famous after all? The Church of England, known for having Saints' days dedicated to quite a lot of obscure characters, doesn't even mention her in its calendar. So who was she?

Phoebe is one of many women given honourable mentions in their cameo Bible roles. She was, as I've mentioned, a church deacon - the same role that Stephen had. We know that only because Paul mentions her in his letter to the Romans, which he wrote from Corinth: "I commend to you our sister Phoebe, who is a deacon of the Church in Cenchrea. Receive her in the Lord in a way worthy of the saints, and help her in any way she needs. She herself has helped many, including me." (Paul's letter to the Romans, chapter 16, verses 1,2). The rest of the greetings at the end of this letter are to people in Rome; no one else is mentioned as going to Rome to be specially received, although she may or may not have taken a few companions. It seems that Phoebe was probably being sent there by Paul, presumably with his letter, in which case she was being entrusted with an important task. Paul may also have been implying that she would take on some sort of role in the Roman church, in which she was to be supported.

In the Early days of the Church in Jerusalem, when it was a few thousand strong, seven men had been selected as deacons. These were the high profile administrative and logistic leaders, chosen because they had a good reputation, and were full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom. We know that Stephen, for example, was also a good apologist and preacher. Phoebe is in that bracket. Equally the people that Paul mentions sending to places or calling from places include Timothy, Titus and John Mark. Again, Phoebe was probably being entrusted with a task at that kind of level, although her role was deacon rather than apostle. There are no photographs of her, but today she could be pictured as above, ready to leave the church office in Corinth to catch the next plane (probably ship in her case) to Rome, under her arm the original manuscript of what was set to become one of the most famous letters in history.

Phoebe is just one of many women in the New Testament who can easily be seen just as a name in one or two verses. However, they are mentioned because they were significant people in the Church. Another, mentioned by Paul in the same chapter of his letter to the Romans (chapter 16, verse 7) is Junia, who is referred to as an apostle, having been a Christian longer than Paul. She was in Rome at the time, a prisoner for her faith. Again, the other apostles mentioned by Paul include Timothy, Titus and John Mark, as well as the otherwise unknown Andronicus in this verse. Further examples are Jesus' core 12 disciples and Barnabas. These are all men who endured hardship and danger for the sake of the Gospel and stuck their heads above the parapet. Junia ended up in prison for doing the same.

Let's not ever think that women didn't play key and major roles in the early Church or that they shouldn't now. They were essential to its development at all levels; there's just less written about them in the Bible. Women, like men, were gifted and courageous church leaders then and still are today.

A bad start

If we were producing a film about the young Saul of Tarsus, we would be looking at casting someone good at villainous roles. From a Christian perspective he was really evil, although the Jewish authorities thought that he was the best thing since their equivalent of sliced bread. To start with, he was a Pharisee, one of the pedantic religious group who wanted everyone to obey all the old laws and then invented new ones to make life even more difficult (Paul's letter to the Philippians, chapter 3, verse 5). Then he wasn't just a recruit to the party, but had been born into it (Acts chapter 23, verse 6). Moreover, he'd been trained by one of the top rabbis in the country (Acts 22:3). He had a bright future ahead of him indeed.

Saul had been there when the Jews had stoned Stephen to death - the first martyrdom of the fledgling church. He hadn't got his hands dirty: that was beneath him. No, he had guarded the cloaks of those who wanted a bit more freedom of movement in their arms for the stone throwing, and just stood their and watched (Acts 7:58). Unfortunately for the Jewish leaders, the death of Stephen led to a persecution of the church which caused the Christians to scatter, taking the gospel message with them. Now the spread of the Church was getting out of control (Acts 8:1). So Saul asked the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem for authority to go to Damascus and work with the synagogues in the region to hunt down and arrest any Christians found there (Acts 9:1,2). They were to be thrown into jail in Jerusalem - and this was before any concept of prison reform - followed, presumably, by at least harsh questioning and threats, if not torture and perhaps death.

Saul was not a good man. He was useful to the authorities because he was providing a sort of secret police and rendition service. He had no thought for the people he was arresting, other than that they were undermining his cherished religious beliefs - and that needed to be stamped out by whatever means necessary. Later in life, when he was known as Paul, he referred to himself as the worst of sinners (Paul's 1st letter to Timothy, chapter 1, verse 15). We might think, "Come on Paul, you're one of the most famous and most dedicated followers of Jesus that ever was. Why are you putting yourself down like that?" Yet actually at this point he was indeed one of the worst of the worst: cold, calculating, full of hatred and deliberately fuelling a persecution.

Jesus isn't concerned about our past - that can never hold us back because he's dealt with it on the cross - he's more interested in developing our future.

Then one day, when Saul was on the road to Damascus to carry out his task, Jesus turned up in a blaze of light and spoke to him (Acts 9:3-7). Crazy, or what? Surely Jesus should be turning up to support and comfort those being persecuted, not this evil enemy of the Church. But Jesus knew that something had been triggered inside Saul, perhaps at Stephen's murder, which made him realize that he was who the Church said he was - the Son of God. All this anger being vented on the Church was out of frustration that he was losing his beloved Judaism, with all its beautiful rules and ceremonies. Jesus asked him, "Saul, why are you persecuting me? Why are you resisting what I'm doing in you?" Saul rather lamely asked who this was that was speaking out of the dazzlingly bright thin air, so Jesus stated clearly who he was. He wasn't up for theological debate though: Jesus was saying what was going to happen from then on. Saul was given instructions and set about following them.

He ended up blind (Acts 9:8,9), perhaps to teach him vulnerability, or perhaps to make it difficult for him to change his mind. So he had to be visited by one of his Christian enemies, of all people, to heal him (Acts 9:10-19). Then he gave his life fully to Jesus and was baptized into the Christian faith that he had been trying to destroy. After this he went away to Arabia for a while (Paul's letter to the Galatians, chapter 1, verse 17), to be alone with God, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Even if we're devout Christians it's easy to resist God at times. He has a habit of wanting us to surrender bits of our lives to him that are rather personal to us. Saul seems to have pretty much surrendered everything early on after meeting Jesus on the road, although we learn from his writings that even he had struggles in this area (Paul's letter to the Romans, chapter 7). He knew though that Jesus, when on the cross, had overcome our past and set us free to follow him, unencumbered by any guilt or shame (Romans 8:1,2). The more we grasp this and hand over our lives to Christ early on in our Christian walk, the more peaceful and effective those lives will be.

If you're in the same position as Saul was on the road to Damascus, resisting Jesus' call to follow him, then now would be a good time to take the same step that Saul did, and give in to God. This link will help to guide you through that process. If you're already a Christian but finding it difficult to go along with what God wants of you, you can take comfort in Romans 7, but the answer is in the following chapter: Jesus has set us free from everything that would hold us back, so that we can follow him without reservation.

When it all goes pear-shaped

A lot happens in the second chapter of Luke's Gospel. We see Jesus born in Bethlehem because of a Roman census. A few days later he's named and circumcised and, at the beginning of the next month, presented by his parents in the Temple in accordance with the Jewish religious Law. This has all been about obedience. Mary and Joseph had to go to Bethlehem because the Romans required it, but in so doing they fulfilled the prophecy that the Messiah would be born there (Micah chapter 5, verse 2). They were blessed with a safe birth, even though it couldn't be in a house or inn, but presumably in a stable - that's where you find mangers, after all. There was also the visitation by the shepherds sent by angels. It was necessary to circumcise the boy on the eighth day and of course they were going to give him the name commanded by Gabriel. Taking him to the Temple in Jerusalem when he was 40 days old was also a religious duty, requiring the sacrifice of two doves or pigeons, but this time a couple of prophets turned up to confirm yet again who Jesus was and what he would do. It seems that every time his parents (Jesus was effectively adopted by Joseph) did what was required of them, some form of clear blessing resulted. Obviously, God in Heaven was going to look after his son, just born on Earth a few days ago, and his family.

We don't know much else about them for 12 years, other than that Jesus became strong and wise, and that the grace of God was upon him (Luke chapter 2, verse 40). We can, though, probably safely assume that God the Father and the Holy Spirit continued to guide and support Mary and Joseph as they brought up Jesus in Nazareth. In fact, we know from Matthew's Gospel (chapter 2, verses 13 - 23) that before they finally settled in Nazareth, God guided the family through angelic dreams on more than one occasion, to keep them safe as they travelled to Egyp and back. They must have had an enviable relationship with God. Anyway, Luke skips over those 12 years and next recounts an event that took place in Jerusalem when the family went there for the feast of the Passover (Luke 2:41-52).

When things go wrong, God is still in charge - we need to trust him to show us the way back.

Joseph and Mary had presumably taken all their children to the feast in the capital and Jesus had become engrossed in discussions with the religious leaders in the Temple. When it was time to leave, his parents probably counted up, "James, Judas, Simon, Joses and, yes, there are the girls. Jesus must be with his friends; we'll find him later." Of course, a day later they still hadn't found him, turned back for the day's journey to Jerusalem and then spent three more days looking for him. Why didn't God, who must have been looking after the family closely, not let Mary or Joseph know that Jesus wasn't with the party travelling back to Nazareth? Why didn't he tell them where to go when they reached Jerusalem? Why did they have to wait until he had been lost for five days before finding him? Did they panic and forget to pray for guidance? Do we do that when circumstances seem to be going wrong? It's so easy to just start trying to fix the situation rather than taking the time to listen to God first.

Maybe I've done Mary and Joseph an injustice there. Perhaps they did pray and perhaps Jesus' real Father in Heaven wanted him to be alone in the Temple with the leaders for a few days. Maybe he wanted Mary and Joseph to learn to trust. Sometimes we seem to be doing everything right, walking closely with God and obeying him in all that he asks of us. Life is great, we can see where we're going - or rather where we think God is taking us - and peace and joy abound. Then perhaps it all seems to go wrong, as if the rug's been pulled out from under our feet. "We've lost the Son of God! Have you seen him? Well, yes, he's our boy, he looks a bit like me," says Mary, "but he's also God's son, so it's rather serious." We don't know how they tried to find him, or what they said to people in the city, but they must have been thinking something along those lines. He was their boy and he was God's boy, and he was 12, alone lost in the capital city - what could be worse?

Had they done something stupid? Had they been negligent? Perhaps so, but probably not. Sometimes God lets things go wrong and we understand why; at others, though, he seemly allows them to go pear-shaped for no good reason. At those times we have to trust him. There's nothing that we can do to set right what wasn't wrong in the first place. It's God that's up to something. Is there something that you don't understand about your life at the moment? If so, God does understand. Panicking serves no purpose, but trusting him to explain in his time and in his way is where the power lies to bring you into what he has prepared for you.