Morning Meditation: Women and Church Leadership

Dear Father, open my eyes this morning to see what the religious experts in Luke 10 could not.

When a lawyer asked Jesus who counted as a neighbor, Jesus told a story that must have made the room go quiet. The hero wasn't the priest. It wasn't the Levite. It was the Samaritan — the one everyone had already decided didn't belong at the table. Jesus looked at centuries of exclusion and said, "That's the one who got it right."

Now consider Priscilla, who taught Apollos the full gospel when his theology was incomplete. Consider the women at the empty tomb, commissioned as the first preachers of the resurrection while the men hid behind locked doors. Consider Phoebe, whom Paul called a diakonos — a servant-leader — and entrusted with carrying his letter to Rome. The early church didn't just tolerate women's gifts. It depended on them.

Lord, forgive us for every time we have walked past someone's calling the way the priest walked past the wounded man on the Jericho road. Forgive us for choosing comfort over obedience, tradition over truth. Give us the courage to recognize Your Spirit at work — not according to who we expect, but according to the fruit we can plainly see.

Today, look for the Priscilla in your congregation. Listen for the voice you've been trained to overlook. The Kingdom of God has never advanced by silencing the people the Holy Spirit has already anointed to speak. It advances when we have the humility to say, as Peter did at Cornelius's house, "Who was I to stand in God's way?"