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How Mixed Ministry was born...

For over thirty years, I (Sue) have loved spending time with women, teaching them God’s Word, and writing for those I cannot invite out for coffee and conversation. But recently the Lord enlarged my borders to include men—lots of men, besides my husband. Hmmm, I better clarify. In 2003, I joined Dallas Theological Seminary’s full time faculty, where I teach courses like Church Ministries with Adults, Teaching Process, The Role of the Associate, Women Teaching Women, The Christian Home, Educational Process of the Church, and Developing and Leading Women’s Ministries. In many of these courses, I team up with a male colleague to teach future male ministers. I love fielding male students’ questions, encouraging their dreams, and building into their bright minds and passionate hearts.

This new gender mix exposed me to an unsettling reality—severe misconceptions abound between men and women. These misunderstandings lead to confusion, suspicion, and unwarranted fear of one another, and ultimately to a lack of biblical community in ministry. While wise men and women build thoughtful boundaries and fences to protect against indiscretions, I observe high walls. These barriers often result in marginalized women, greater sexual temptations, and lopsided churches where women, often at least sixty percent of the congregation, have little or no say. This concern led me to form team to write Mixed Ministry, Working Together as Brothers and Sisters in an Oversexed Society. Kelley Mathews, Henry Rogers, and several other writers met with me for several years to research, brainstorm, and hammer out characteristics of a biblical relationship between men and women in Christ, brothers and sisters, sacred siblings. The end product is a book that has the power to revolutionize ministries where ever Christian men and women work together.

Read it. Pass it on to your friends. Use it to train your teams or as fodder for small group discussions. (Provocative questions accompany each chapter.) Whether you oversee a church staff, work with the other gender as volunteers, or team up in the marketplace, the principles are the same. Imagine the difference if we could really work together as healthy sacred siblings, while protecting our integrity, of course.

According to all the research, the church’s influence is waning in America today. But people need Jesus. The boat is going down and we need all hands on deck, whether male or female. Bail with the book that could turn the tide—Mixed Ministry.

Are men from Mars and women from Venus?

In our first book, New Doors in Ministry to Women, we agreed with John Gray in his bestseller Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus. He argued that men and women differ in all areas of their lives. However, after researching the topic for ourselves as we worked to write Mixed Ministry, we no longer believe this broad statement is true. It sells books but is it accurate?

Yes, men and women are different, as anyone with eyes can see. New brain research proves that reality beyond speculation. But we are not from different planets. We are the same species. A more accurate statement might be, “Men are from North Carolina, Women are from South Carolina.” We have more similarities as persons than we have differences as men and women. Does this cognitive shift matter? Absolutely. If we can learn to see one another as brothers and sisters, and not as aliens, we increase the possibility of an effective, harmonious working partnership.