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Complementarianism for Dummies

The leadership of CRC is "Complementarian," and we try to live and teach and counsel and preach accordingly. What does is it mean to be "complementarian" anyway? 

Mary Kassian is one of the people responsible for coining the term. She wrote a helpful primer article on the idea: Complementarianism for Dummies. Read the entire article here. Read some excerpts below: 

Complementarians believe that God created male and female as complementary expressions of the image of God—male and female are counterparts in reflecting His glory. Having two sexes expands the view. Though both sexes bear God’s image fully on their own, each does so in a unique and distinct way. Male and female in relationship reflect truths about Jesus that are not reflected by male alone or female alone.

Complementarians believe that the Bible’s principles supersede tradition. They can be applied in every time and culture... What complementarity looks like now is different than what it looked like sixty or seventy years ago. So throw out the cookie-cutter stereotype. It does not apply.

Men are not superior to women–women are not the “second sex.” Though men have a responsibility to exercise headship in their homes, and in the church family, Christ revolutionized the definition of what that means. Authority is not the right to rule—it’s the responsibility to serve.

Complementarians stand against the oppression of women. We want to see women flourish, and we believe they do so when men and women live according to God’s Word.

Essentially, a complementarian is a person who believes that God created male and female to reflect complementary truths about Jesus.

Complementarians believe that males were designed to shine the spotlight on Christ’s relationship to the church (and the LORD God’s relationship to Christ) in a way that females cannot, and that females were designed to shine the spotlight on the Church’s relationship to Christ (and Christ’s relationship to the LORD God) in a way that males cannot. Who we are as male and female is ultimately not about us. It’s about testifying to the story of Jesus. We do not get to dictate what manhood and womanhood are all about. Our Creator does. That’s the basis of complementarianism.