Can women be pastors?

No. The Bible doesn’t allow a woman to be a pastor or an elder, or to preach to the church. That has nothing to do with women being worth less. God made both “in his own image... male and female created he them” (Genesis 1:27). He gave them different roles. Two videos lay this out: NeedGod.net’s “Are Women Pastors Biblical? Responding to Cliffe Knechtle” and Matt Mason of Lion of Fire Ministries in “Women Pastors Are NOT Biblical.”

What the Bible says

“But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression” (1 Timothy 2:12-14).

“Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law” (1 Corinthians 14:34).

And the qualifications for a pastor assume a man: “A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife... apt to teach” (1 Timothy 3:2). Never “the wife of one husband.”

It isn’t about culture

The most common way around this is to say it was only for that time and place. Cliffe Knechtle argues that in Ephesus there was worship of the goddess Diana, and that women weren’t allowed to get an education, so Paul didn’t want uneducated people teaching.

But look at the reasons Paul actually gives: “Adam was first formed, then Eve” and Eve was the one deceived. Those go back to creation and the fall, not to Ephesus. Matt Mason adds that Paul gave the same instruction to Corinth, where there was no Diana worship, and that Jesus’ own disciples weren’t educated men. Nothing will ever undo the order of creation.

It isn’t just Paul’s opinion either. He wrote, “If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 14:37).

What about Deborah, Priscilla, and Phebe?

Matt uses a simple picture. A father tells his daughter she can’t drive his car to the store, so she rides her bike. That doesn’t mean she can drive the car. Doing a different thing doesn’t open up the forbidden thing.

• Deborah, Miriam, Huldah. They led in Israel under the Old Testament. The command is about the church.

• Priscilla taught Apollos. She and her husband “took him unto them, and expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly” (Acts 18:26), privately, together. That isn’t preaching to the church.

• Phebe. The KJV calls her “a servant of the church” (Romans 16:1). The Greek diakonos means servant, the same word used of Jesus serving.

• Philip’s daughters prophesied (Acts 21:9). Prophesying isn’t holding authority over the church.

• “There is neither male nor female” (Galatians 3:28). That’s about being equal in salvation, not about having the same roles.

What women can do

A lot. Older women are told to be “teachers of good things; That they may teach the young women” (Titus 2:3-4). Women can lead Bible studies, serve in youth and music, evangelize, and run a business. The only lines Scripture draws are preaching to the church and being an elder.

One commenter wrote that her pastor is a woman, so her family stopped going, and that it’s hard to find a church in her rural area that preaches the Bible. If that’s you, How do I test a preacher? has help for finding one.

Say it like this

“God made men and women equal in worth, but He gave them different roles. Paul says, ‘I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man,’ and he doesn’t give a cultural reason. He points back to creation: Adam was formed first. A pastor has to be ‘the husband of one wife.’ Women can serve in a hundred ways. Preaching to the church and being an elder isn’t one of them.”

Keep reading: How do I test a preacher? · Isn’t the Bible full of contradictions? · Isn’t Christianity a cult?