This coming Sunday is Mother’s Day, a day when we
honor and give thanks for our mothers. All
of us, however, have been shaped by multiple women. Perhaps our mothers were the principal
caregivers when we were growing up, but many feminine hands have shaped us,
encouraged us, and corrected us. This is
a day when we can give thanks for all the faithful women who in one way or
another have “mothered us” and remember how they enriched and brighten our
days.
One of my enduring memories of my own mother comes
from a family fishing trip when I was a child.
It is 6:00 a.m. on rainy day in mid-November; we are drifting along the
shore of a Tennessee lake. My 2
brothers, my father, and I are casting minnows under the rock ledges at the
water’s edge hoping to entice a large bass to strike. My mother is sitting in the front of the boat
in a heavy coat with a plastic sheet pull over her head. She is reading a copy of “The Ladies Home
Journal,” carefully turning the pages with gloved hands. We are staying in a cabin at a fishing camp
where we cook all our own meals and must clean the place before we leave.
We made this trip twice a year. It never occurred to me that this was not my
mother’s vacation of choice. In
retrospect, I suspect it was not. In the
1980’s, she went back to work as a nurse and began to earn money. She and my
dad started going on cruises about that time.
Apparently she found her voice concerning vacations.
Women have been finding their voice in Baptist
churches for centuries. In 17th
century England, when women were allowed no leadership role in the Church of
England, Baptists were part of the nonconformist movement, which permitted
women to preach and engage in ministry. In
1846, Ruth Bixby was licensed to preach in Iowa by her Baptist church. The first extant record of a woman’s
ordination in America dates from 1869 when a Rev. A. Gerry was ordained among
northern Free Will Baptists. Rev. Susan
Elizabeth Cilley Griffin (1851-1926), of the Elmira Heights Baptist Church, NY
State, was the first woman whose ordination was nationally recognized by our
denomination (called the Northern Baptist Convention, at that time).
Rev. Edith Hill is an
excellent example of a woman finding her voice among her fellow Baptists. On Friday April 13, 1894, at 8:00 pm, the ordination
council for Miss Hill convened. The
church was full to capacity. Miss Hill recited
eighty-five scriptures affirming the place of women in the public work of the
church. The Rev. Scott preached a sermon
on Psalm 68:11 and Galatians 3:28. Then
Miss Hill was asked about her Christian experience, her call to public
ministry, her experiences in pursuing that calling, and her theology. The ordination council was quite impressed. They conferred and then recommended that the
(Eden) First Baptist Church of Pittsburg, KS, delegate her to the work of an
evangelist and, in the absence of an ordained person, that she be authorized to
administer the ordinances. Upon hearing this recommendation, Miss Hill
replied: “I hope that the church will
remember that the condition under which I [accept] the pastorate is that I
shall be regularly ordained as a minister of the Gospel.” This was said quietly and distinctly amid the
profound and sympathetic silence of the congregation. The mover of the motion explained that he had
misunderstood and withdrew his motion.
Since the crowd that day was in no mood for the compromising of what
they felt to be the leadership of the Holy Spirit, the committee conferred a
second time and recommended full ordination.
Rev. Scott offered the prayer of ordination, a Brother Martin gave the
charge to the candidate, and Rev. Hill offered the benediction. They probably ate potato salad and chicken
after that. In that crowded church, the
voice of Rev. Hill was heard. Rev. Hill
spent three years as the pastor of [Eden] First Baptist Church of Pittsburg,
where she immersed 170 men and women.
Quietly and distinctly, boldly and faithfully,
women have been speaking words of grace, challenge and healing in our lives and
our churches. As mothers, teachers, neighbors,
friends, and pastors, they have enriched our lives and our congregations by
exercising their gifts and pursuing their diverse callings under God. This is one reason why I am proud to be an
American Baptist. The full partnership
of women in our churches is not universally
affirmed, but it is characteristic of
our ABC/USA family.
This is a character trait that sets us apart from many other
Baptist groups. As we worship on this Mother’s
Day and give thanks for the women who have nurtured our spirits, we can have a
sense of pride that the voices of women have been and are being heard in our
churches. We can give thanks for
courageous women like Rev. Edith Hill who would not permit their voices to be
muted.
Blessings,
Jim Kelsey
Executive Minister
