Women, Go and Tell It
The Spirit of Triumphant Voices
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The original idea for this project emanated as I struggled to find myself in the sermons delivered to a congregation, which was about eighty percent females. As a faithful worshipper, I expected to find identity in the message. There was none. The messages were for men about men taken from a male attitude, and centered on male issues. I asked, "Where am I in this sermon?" I was not there as an individual. Women are expected to absorb themselves in the language of masculinity.
While women struggle to identify and find themselves in the worship service and in the sermon delivery, they are totally excluded. However, in reality, women are there in the text. We play a primary role in the Bible as the dramas unfold. Although we are disproportionately portrayed as after- thoughts or asides from the dominant characters, this project places us on center stage without deviating from the basic nature of the biblical message.
Given the negation that is opposing women as leaders in the Church and in the community, we need to know that there are positive female role models in the Bible. There is an alternative to modeling our lives after the men in the Bible. This project is imperative to expose the positive religious images of women in the scriptures. It is essential to foster the confidence in women that God gives us the same amount of attention as men. Therefore, we discover a real need to depart from the traditional realm that presents women in the Bible as inferior and docile, and to connect to a realm which bestow skillfulness and industriousness upon them. God did not create us with inferior spirits. Our inner selves desire to be unshackled. Reclusion and subordination are learned behaviors that are demanded by the dominant trendsetters. With subtle manipulation, some women oblige and bow out to husband, son, father, uncle, or whoever is proclaiming to be the authority figure.
Women, both Christian and non-Christian, are an oppressed culture, yet we have emerged as leaders for millenniums. Women need a vehicle to move them into a sense of freedom, and an appreciation of self-worth and self-actualization. Women, Go and Tell It purports to become that vehicle. It will present women in the Bible in a fresh new role as they speak to us from within the scenes in a contextualized ethos.
We should see each other in a positive personification in order to know that we like ourselves because God created us for a divine purpose. We were privileged with the salvation message first. Women must cease from imitating biblical men and begin to emulate positive biblical women. This book is the prerequisite that offers such role models as a mirror to image the divine symbol: God. God is definitely not male, and assuredly not female, but all God in spirit and in truth.
This project is also required to help check the second-hand, unconscious, hand-me-down, and unreflective assumptions concerning the role of women in the Bible and the Church. If we research these assumptions, we will discover that there are numerous erroneous presuppositions that are deeply rooted within the church culture. Many people in the Church insist on relegating women to the laity only, the mission and the women's department. This kind of behavior is referred to as "adopted."
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About the Book
Humanity has entered the twenty-first century and some people in the Church continue to perpetuate the lies of God's prerogative to elitism - God is a snob. These kinds of thought patterns are absurd and ludicrous. Women, Go and Tell It highlights some of the intellectual talents of women in the Bible. It will integrate the contributions of women in the church today, with the gift of women in the Old and New Testaments. Thus the readers of this book will see their parallel talents and begin to grasp a more compassionate God.
The challenge is to those who profess to be the great heads of all women while they forget that Christ is the Head of the Church. This kind of profession fails to consider the prototype and archetype that Jesus designs for disciple making. Jesus is the model for the Church on the issue of male and female ministers. For this reason there are questions born concerning women, and the traditional beliefs on the call to ministry of God's women, and her rightful place with her sovereign Lord. This book addresses the way women view themselves in relationship to God and the theocentric views of the Church on women. The thesis of my work maintains that the salvation message was first given to women. So, notwithstanding the development of feminist and womanist literature already in circulation, this book will reach out to women who are found in neither of the two camps. For this reason alone, there remains so much debris to clear away because of the way women are presented in the Bible.
This book aims to satisfy the desire of the single-eyed reader. These seekers want to read snappy and bouncy chapters within thirty minutes to one hour maximum. The chapters in this book are short, inviting, and frisky. They are tightly packed with sharp lessons that will jolt the reader into amazement. The reader will not become exhausted and bored with the material. The language is clear enough to move readers through the chapters without difficulty. Each chapter is a direct encounter with some issue today's church-going women struggle with. This subculture is not interested in reading too much scholarly literature. They will, however, attack a snazzy little book which can be read in a few days.
While the content is scholarly enough to move the reader into a fresh new thought on the cited scripture, it is intelligible enough to be reader friendly. It is also shrewd enough to cause women to question the position of the status quo, that being, God does not call women to pastor, or perform in the role of priest in the sanctuary of the most high God.
About the Author
The Reverend Yvonne White-Stevenson is the former Pastor of the Metropolitan Baptist Church located College Park, GA. Was the first licensed, ordained female pastor to serve on the ministerial team at the historic Mount Zion Second Baptist Church in Atlanta, GA. Currently, serves as Associate Pastor on ministerial team at the Greater New Life Missionary Baptist Church in Riverdale, GA. Has toured the Middle East, including the Holy Land; Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Nazareth, Jericho, and others. Toured Amon, Jordan and Damascus, Syria where a great portion of the Bible has its roots. She has traveled around the world to Athens, Greece. Toured Mars Hill, where the Apostle Paul preached to the Aereophgus; climbed atop the Acropolis where the Parthenon is located. Invited to visit with the first mayor of Cape Town, South Africa. Engaged in a round table group discussion with the university of Cape Town students and their professor, Professor Dr. Welile Mazamisa, who, at that time, was the director of the Institute of Biblical and African Studies in Southern Africa. Participated in panel discussion with the Zimbabwe Council of Churches. Has been in company with the Honorable Nelson Madela, former President of South Africa. Engaged in discussion on women's issues with professors at the University of South Africa, where she was invited to return. Was the only student in her tour group to be invited to the professor's lounge at the University of Stellenbosch. This group of educators was observed to be most conservative in nature, in that, professors did not socialize with students. Was greeted by the University of Zimbabwe's Professors in the Theology and Biblical Studies Department. Brought greetings to the University of Natal in Durban, South Africa. Has spent at least two decades preaching and teaching on platforms and pulpits in churches within the Progressive National Baptist Convention, the New Era State Convention and the Atlanta Baptist Congress of Christian Education. Earned her B.A. from the National Louis University at Evanston, IL; earned an M. Div. from the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, GA. Studied and earned certification in Risk Reduction in the State of GA. Instructs and lectures on the impact of addictive diseases and ones options after the onset. Is a skilled clinician and works quite closely with those who are developmentally impaired and disabled in at least three disciplines. Is a Partner in PolicyMaking, an organization sponsored by the Governor's Council on Developmental Disabilities in Georgia. Has preached and lectured on issues pertaining to women for the past decade throughout the United States and the World. Is married to Mr. Yerby Clinton Stevenson. Is mother to Samuel, Shinetra, and Micah. Grandmother to Anwa Haasan, Ashling, Ahja, and Micah II.