CBMW leader to college students: Jesus’ gender a theological necessity

The fact that God sent His eternal Son to redeem a fallen world in the person of a man has massive theological significance, a significance none of the contemporary feminist answers arrive at, Randy Stinson, executive director of The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW) told a group of college students recently.

Is there theological significance in the fact that the incarnate Jesus Christ was a man instead of a woman?

Did God make Jesus a man simply because He was sending His Son to minister amidst a heavy-handed patriarchial culture as egalitarian author Rebecca Groothius argues?

Did males wind up with a lion’s share of the power because of the fall, forcing God to send the Messiah as a male as Mimi Haddad, the leader of Christians for Biblical Equality (CBE) has asserted?

Or is Jesus merely God’s ‘feminine side’ as moderate Baptist author and teacher Tony Campolo posits?

Should Bible translations be updated to say that Jesus was made like His brothers “and sisters” in every way, as the recently released gender-neutral Today’s New International Version articulates Heb. 2:17?

The fact that God sent His eternal Son to redeem a fallen world in the person of a man has massive theological significance, a significance none of the contemporary feminist answers arrive at, Randy Stinson, executive director of The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW) told a group of college students recently.

Speaking at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary’s fifth annual “Give Me An Answer” Collegiate Conference on Feb. 19, Stinson said Jesus’ masculinity has profound implications for the Christian faith.

Understanding the second person of the Godhead as being intentionally masculine by the wisdom of the Father holds implications for the home, parenting, the church, Bible translation, the gospel, and the character and attributes of God Himself, Stinson said.

“This debate has never been merely about who can preach on Sunday mornings,” he said. “This debate covers and impacts several areas…Most importantly, this is about God. It is about worship, about how we address God.”

Though many contemporary voices want to do so, Christians may not address God as “mother,” because this is completely foreign to the way Scripture conceives of God, Stinson said. There is vital theological significance in the fact that Jesus was a man, Stinson said. He unpacked four reasons why Jesus had to be a man:

(1) Jesus is the eternal Son of the father. John 5:18-30 makes it clear that Christ’s Sonship is not temporary. “This is a huge biblical and theological fact,” Stinson said. “The designation of ‘Son’ as it is placed on Jesus is not just a temporary designation for the purposes of His incarnation. This is an eternal reference to His relationship with His eternal Father…He is the Son before He is sent…And he is the Son in eternity future.”

(2) Jesus accomplished His work of redemption in specifically male roles. Jesus came as a Prince, a King, and a Great High Priest, all roles Scripture assigns to males. Exodus 12:5 asserts that the Passover lamb must be both spotless and male, therefore Christ-the True Passover Lamb-had to be a male to fulfill the requirement, Stinson said.

(3) Jesus is the second Adam. Though Eve took the fruit and ate it before giving it to Adam in the Fall, God holds the man culpable for the sin. Rom. 5:12 teaches the “in Adam all die.” The man is held accountable for the sin of the first family which means he is the spiritual head of the home, Stinson said. As the second Adam who bore the sins of His people and rendered perfect obedience where Adam disobeyed, Jesus had to be a man to parallel the first man, Stinson said.

(4) Jesus comes as the Son–and not the daughter–of God. Jesus is the Son of God in eternity past and future, thus His masculinity is clearly set forth by Scripture. Further, Stinson pointed out that the Bible always refers to Christ using masculine pronouns such as ‘He’ or ‘His’ despite the unwarranted revisions of some modern “gender-neutral” English translations. Another argument often made by contemporary feminists is that asserting Jesus’ manhood means that He is able to redeem men but not women. This is both a logical and unbiblical fallacy, Stinson said.

“This is the whole point of Galatians 3:28,” Stinson said. “That is, in Christ all are equal in their inheritance before God. Does Jesus have to experience childbirth to be able to redeem women? Does Jesus need to experience anything that is exclusive to women in order to be able to redeem women?

“No, not any more than Jesus had to experience a broken jaw because I broke my jaw 20 years ago in a car accident. We don’t argue that Jesus had to experience every single possible heartache and ailment and problem that human beings face…There are a lot of things that Jesus didn’t individually experience, and yet, the Bible says He is a man acquainted with all of our sorrows.”

God made Jesus a man in His own infinite wisdom and humans have no warrant to quibble with or revise God’s plan, Stinson said.

“There is something theologically consistent here,” Stinson said. “It is the humanness of Jesus that is fundamental (in the incarnation) but there is still this theological necessity that He be made a male and that theological necessity doesn’t hurt women. It doesn’t harm His act of redemption. It makes it good for men and women because it is part of God’s design and it says something about God.”