June 12, 1987, President Reagan, told a big and mighty man “tear down this wall!” That message should be told to every Christian leader, seminary professor, and pastor who teach that men are to be leaders over all women and that all women must submit to all men.
Pastors, tear down this wall!
We are divided like the former president said of Germany.
Behind me stands a wall that encircles the free sectors of this city, part of a vast system of barriers that divides the entire continent of Europe. From the Baltic, south, those barriers cut across Germany in a gash of barbed wire, concrete, dog runs, and guard towers. Farther south, there may be no visible, no obvious wall. But there remain armed guards and checkpoints all the same–still a restriction on the right to travel, still an instrument to impose upon ordinary men and women the will of a totalitarian state. Yet it is here in Berlin where the wall emerges most clearly; here, cutting across your city, where the news photo and the television screen have imprinted this brutal division of a continent upon the mind of the world. Standing before the Brandenburg Gate, every man is a German, separated from his fellow men. Every man is a Berliner, forced to look upon a scar. General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
Pastors, you want the world to hear the gospel but you encircle women and restrict women to teaching other women and children. Come here to this gate! Pastors, tear down this wall!
Pastors, you tell all males that they were born for leadership roles over their wives. Come here to this gate! Pastors, tear down this wall!
Pastors, you accept women’s service, tithes, and kids, yet you put in your by-laws that only men can be leaders. Come here to this gate! Pastors, tear down this wall!
Will you join in with your voice and demand that the mighty men of the church come to the gate and tear down the wall?
bWe Baptist Women for Equality's Blog 