Highlights inequity between male and female ministers

Dr Bruce Manners
Senior minister
Avondale College Seventh-day Adventist Church

Many of you will know I requested the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s North New South Wales Conference downgrade my credentials from ordained minister to commissioned minister (the credentials a woman minister holds) this past year. In simple terms, I’m troubled I have female ministerial colleagues who are not treated as my equal.

The Executive Committee forwarded my request to the church’s Australian Union Conference (AUC). A little more than a week ago, I received a letter saying my request had been denied by the conference after it received this counsel:

“It is the view of the Australian Union Conference administration that it is wrong to issue a Commissioned Minister Credential to an ordained minister, or for that matter, a Commissioned Minister Licence to a male minister upon satisfactory completion of internship. That is not the purpose of that credential and licence.

“Further, there are only two means by which an ordained minister loses his ordination: either it lapses if a minister leaves the ministry for other employment and does not intend on returning or it is annulled as a disciplinary measure.”

I’ve responded (in part): “I’m disappointed and saddened . . . but I thank [the AUC] for considering my request. Unfortunately, the response does nothing to resolve the inequity between male and female pastoral colleagues, but rather highlights it.”

Thank you to the many from my church and our campus (and others elsewhere) who supported and encouraged me when they’d learned I’d made this request. Even though I received a negative response, I don’t believe making the request was in vain because it signalled some of us—I’m not alone—see this as a problem that needs addressing.

The 400th anniversary of the world’s most used Bible

Dr Bruce Manners
Senior minister
Avondale College Seventh-day Adventist Church

This year is the 400th anniversary of the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible—and that’s something worth celebrating.

The KJV isn’t the first full English translation of the Bible—Myles Coverdale, with heavy reliance on the work of William Tyndale, created that. Called the Great Bible because of its size, the KJV would probably have become known as the King Henry Version because Henry VIII authorised it.

English Protestants who fled England and persecution under Queen Mary to settle in Geneva produced the Geneva Bible. John Bunyan used it in The Pilgrim’s Progress. The Bishops’ Bible produced by the Anglican Church, which didn’t like the Geneva Bible, proved popular. Shakespeare used it in his writings.

The KJV became the most used Bible, not because of popular demand, but through political machinations. No other translations were printed in England soon after its introduction.

The KJV has made an impact—and a huge one at that—on those in the English-speaking world. We still use expressions from it, including “apple of his eye,” “city set on a hill,” “a house divided,” “the quick and the dead” and “reap the whirlwind.” It made an impact on generations of Protestants who memorised Bible passages. For most of those 400 years, until the second half of last century, the KJV is the version these Protestants used.

What is more important, since its introduction, the KJV has been recognised by millions as God’s word to them. They treated it as “given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. . . .” (2 Timothy 3:16, KJV). It has introduced so many to Jesus. To quote the children’s song, “Jesus loves me, this I know, because the Bible tells me so.”

The KJV proved to be more than mere words on paper. It is God communicating.

God still does that, whatever translation you choose.