About the “Cut to the Chase” series: short, bullet point discernment pieces warning about various teachers. In the Cut to the Chase I include links at the end if you care to go to the longer essays.
Aimee Byrd was a member of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC). She burst onto the scene in 2013 with her book The Housewife Theologian. She was selected to be co-host at the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals along with intellect Carl Trueman and theologian Todd Pruitt, where she settled for a few years. She wrote more books and was a published essayist and became a sought-after speaker.
But slowly as Aimee began to espouse and proclaim her more feminist stances, alarm was raised about her from various camps in the faith. By 2020 Aimee was ‘gone’. Gone from the complementarian stance she’d once espoused, and openly rejecting biblical gender roles. Let’s cut to the chase-
Dr. Jonathan Master, seminary president and theAlliance Of Confessing Evangelicals’ editorial director publicly asked Aimee some questions about her then-new stance, which were posted after she had refused to answer them privately: Questions for Aimee
Aimee’s public response to Dr. Master: “Peeling Yellow Wallpaper” simply demonstrated her further entrenchment into feminism, a rebellious spirit, and a hardening to correction.
The Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood reviewed Aimee’s polemical and startling book containing her newly revealed feminist stance, here. They disliked it strongly.
Women are not to preach. To do so despite clear instructions in the Bible shows a blatant disregard for the Jesus they profess to love. “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments” Jesus said in John 14:15. And as Justin Peters said,
3. Aimee is divisive and hardened to correction. This violates Proverbs 15:32, “One who neglects discipline rejects himself, But one who listens to a rebuke acquires understanding.”
In fact, Aimee knew she would be publicly excoriated for her preaching, saying at the opening of her sermon at Covenant Church,
I had to do some, you know, real soul work and prayer work to accept that invitation, not only for my own views on that issue, but just knowing ‘Hey, this is going to be on the internet’ and there’s going to be a public smearing of me after this…
And rightly so. But those with a seared conscience believe they are unjustly being smeared rather than being rightly rebuked.
Also Proverbs 1:7 “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.”
Aimee left her denomination rather than submit to its teaching.
4. Aimee ordained herself so that she can officiate weddings.
In an essay on her blog titled “By the Power Vested in Me” Aimee declared her joy in being able to officiate her brother’s wedding after completing a quick course and obtaining a certificate of ordination. She obtained this certificate from American Marriage Ministries, which believes that “All people, regardless of race, gender, or sexual orientation, have the right to marry.”
AMA’s requirements to become an ordained minister are to fill out this form. That’s it.
But, Aimee says, “I have a high regard for the pastorate.” Obviously she does not. She said in her essay that when her brother asked her to officiate his wedding, she wanted to make sure “if I say no, I want it to be for good reason.” So she consulted culture and history. The Bible is not a good enough reason?
All Cut to the Chase essays here. Discernment on Joyce Meyer, Priscilla Shirer, Beth Moore, David Platt, Jackie Hill Perry, Lori Alexander (The Transformed Wife), Jen Wilkin
I’ve recently written about the clique of folks who claim in public that the church ‘hurt them’, and I went into a discussion of the difference between emotions and emotionalism. That essay is here.
Many women who teach the Bible on the speaking circuit are false. Not all, of course, but many. Since they are false they have to manufacture a work-around for their lack of illumination of the scriptures. They don’t exegete well (exegete meaning draw the Author’s intended meaning out of the Bible). They either twist the word (2 Peter 3:16), or they eisegete (meaning they put their own ideas into the Bible rather than unearth the one meaning the Author intended). Perhaps they use a cover for their obvious lack of theology. One of these covers frequently used is emotionalism.
One danger is emotionalism, in which we allow our feelings to interpret our circumstances and form our thoughts about God. This is putting feelings before faith. The other danger is a kind of stoicism, where faith is rooted in theology but void of affection. This tendency removes feelings from faith altogether. While it is true that our emotions should not lead our theology, it is vital to our faith that theology lead to a deep experience of our triune God.
[Confession: I am certainly not perfect. I myself need to work against Stoicism.]
WHEN we commune with God, WHEN we are in prayer with the Spirit, WHEN we are at Jesus throne of grace, THEN our emotions develop into great affection for the Triune God. We do feel emotions such as relief, joy, humility, amazement, awe, proper fear; all the emotions that our study of His attributes will cultivate. But it’s theology first, and then the outflow of that growing knowledge of God is subsequently a growing feeling of affection for who He is. Put succinctly, the more we study Him the more we love Him.
Jonah knew full well who God is, but he was led by his emotions. Anger, resentment, bitterness, xenophobia…when you feel temptation to be led by your emotions at the expense of submission to God’s authority, remember Jonah.
When these false teachers lead by emotion, it creates a dependency on emotions. But emotions are fleeting. Hence the surfing analogy. We want to feel that high again that we felt at the Study/simulcast/event/conference etc. False teacher Rick Warren unwittingly explained the high of emotional learning back in a Baptist Press interview in 1998.
We’re just a church that tries to look for waves, and we ride them. And then we try to do it with balance. Catching the wave means first determining what God is doing… ~Rick Warren.
His quote typifies the flitting of encounter to encounter, a surfing the waves of an adrenaline approach to Christian life rather than persevering obediently, sacrificially, and steadily. Remember, we first discover who God is by reading His word. The article is (tellingly) titled, “Rick Warren: Surfing skills critical to ‘catching waves’ of God’s activity“
A church should look at Jesus. Not flit from high wave to high wave, and not surfing up and down based on a humanly interpreted vision of what God is doing.
Emotions give us that adrenaline and then suddenly you’re surfing, trying to catch that high you felt but every time you catch it, it needs to be a little higher than the last time. Why? The Law of Diminishing Returns-
The law of diminishing returns is a principle that states that after a certain point, each additional unit of input results in a smaller increase in output. In other words, you get less and less bang for your buck the more you do something. This can be applied to many areas of life, including business and investing. (Source).
Emotionalism will give you diminishing returns. In God’s economy, you only ever receive more. His is an economy of eternal increase. A false teacher’s economy is only ever one of decrease.
Let’s look at some examples of how false teachers use emotional language to deceive you into that false high.
Aimee Byrd’s Twitter & Threads profile pic
Aimee Byrd wrote recently about her decision to become ordained. She filled out a form, and voila! now she can legally marry people in her home state. Here is her gushing, over-the-top-emotional description about how performing the ceremony for her brother made her feel:
Last weekend I got to experience something that resonated so deeply with my soul. It felt like I got to meet a part of who I am. And in this, I wasn’t only seeing beauty, but participating in the beautiful. … ~Aimee Byrd
I’m hesitant to write about this, because it is so deeply meaningful to me. … ~Aimee Byrd
When I started this Substack, I wanted to write about what is real: what is the lump in my throat right now? ~Aimee Byrd
Aimee is a good writer, if a little fluffy for my taste. I’m not saying we should not write about what we are feeling when we commune with God. I am saying that some female teachers and false preacher women depend on flowery writing based on emotion rather than biblical facts.
In Aimee’s case, she wrote “It felt like…” She said that she mulled this over deeply and concluded, “But this is my brother asking me, and if I say no, I want it to be for good reason.” But her reasoning was based on a deep dive into history and culture, not the Bible. She decided to ordain herself because of how she felt about it [and because, she wrote, ‘the church hurt me’.].
All that combined, she wrote, “The state of Maryland doesn’t qualify what makes one ordained, or what kind of person is ordained, but recognizes ordination in the ministry as a status for the task of legally officiating a wedding. … I was comfortable to be appointed for this specific and beautiful ministry.” But God decides, and God trumps Maryland.
‘I was comfortable.’ Women are not to aspire to the ordained office in order to perform functions before the throne of God. But Aimee was ‘comfortable.’ Her soul resonated. There was a lump in her throat. It’s deeply meaningful. Sure, so that means her rebellion is OK?
Beth Moore has always written emotionally. She is emotionalism personified. She over-states things emotionally, constantly (that’s the key, emotional language is constant) using words like “with all my heart” and “deeply desire”, “in my bones”. Her teachings are saturated with overblown hyperbole and hyper adjectives such as vital, crucial etc. Even her first published study was filled with adjectives that work to evoke emotions and fervency rather than draw out from the Bible the attributes of God. She uses words like “vital” and “crucial” repeatedly. If everything is vital and crucial, then nothing is.
Beth Moore performing her Bible Study, with emotion
The basic test to determine if you’re being taught to be led by your emotions is, a few days after a study, think about what is at the top of your mind most. Did you learn more about God? Or more about the teacher? Do you remember the teacher’s anecdotes and how they made you feel, for about God and how seeing Him through scripture made you feel? Your thoughts and feelings about God stay. The thoughts and feelings about the teacher about the study about how you felt at the time, flee. See what remains. It should be a clearer picture of God.
[Many] falsely suppose that the feelings, which God has implanted in us as natural, proceed only from a defect. Accordingly the perfecting of believers does not depend on their casting off all feelings, but on their yielding to them and controlling them, only for proper reason. John Calvin, Commentary on Acts 20:37.
I sometimes highlight examples of women in the Bible who were a positive influence in the faith. I mention a few of them below. Alternately, I highlight less than positive examples of some women either in the Bible or walking around today, as an example of what not to do or to be like.
There are some “Bible teachers” and female “leaders” in today’s times who I am of the opinion are actually harming the faith and throwing mud on the name of Jesus. I scan their output in every once in a while and read some stuff they’ve put out there lately, albeit hands over my eyes peeking through horror movie fashion.
I did that yesterday morning with Aimee Byrd. Formerly co-host along with Todd Pruitt and Carl Trueman of the Mortification of Spin podcast, author, blogger, sometimes Sunday guest preacher, Aimee has had a long public history in the faith. To the negative.
A couple of years ago, Aimee loudly left her long-term denomination, Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC). Aimee is actually an ex-OPC mirror to ex-Southern Baptist Beth Moore, who also left her denomination loudly and badly. Both ladies left for what I personally see as the same reasons: refusal to submit to biblical gender roles.
Yesterday I read Aimee’s new essay “Messages of Shame”, where she publicly whined about decades-old comments she’d received, which she “put in the tomb with Jesus.” Her essay really only displayed the accuracy of those comments, some of which included her failure to listen, her pushiness, her unapproachability, and her resistance to correction.
I’m not great at accepting criticism or rebukes myself, so I understand the temptation to hold on to anger. But for her to be public with long-held resentment against people whose comments were probably off-hand or artless, failing to give grace or think the best of folks, shows an un-loving stance. It’s even worse when someone is looked upon as a leader or an influencer.
“Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.” (Matthew 5:11)
Hatred stirs up strife, But love covers all transgressions. (Proverbs 10:12)
Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins. (1 Peter 4:8).
And this too:
For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment. (James 2:13).
Writing 20 years later of men who caused her “wounds” or whose comments were “violent” (allegedly, as she interprets it) for example, writing of a man who giggled at her, is as petty as Beth Moore complaining that no one acknowledged her in an elevator.
Believing women who actually possess the Holy Spirit in us, are strong. Look at Abigail in a brutal marriage. Jesus’ mother Mary seeing her Son die so excruciatingly. Esther. These are the women to model one’s self after. Not these paper kittens like Moore and Byrd.
In her essay, Byrd ‘threw’ these “messages of shame” into the tomb of Jesus. Using the tomb of Jesus as her personal trash can to throw what she interpreted as “sins” of others against her, not even her own sins, (20 year old comments, giggles, compliments) is log-in-eye arrogant.
Unfounded attacks are hard to take. So are gossip, slander, and insults. Well-founded rebukes are even harder, because they would our pride even more if they are true.
By God’s providence my devotional this morning touched on this very subject. Favell Lee Mortimer said in his Devotional Commentary on the Gospels:
“It is in this spirit that irreligious people judge those whom they call “evangelicals and saints.” They accuse them of hypocrisy, and of pride; they watch their conduct with an eagle’s eye, and triumph over their infirmities with a demon’s joy. Such people have a beam in their own eye. This beam prevents them from seeing their own sins. We may be assured, that if we do not see ourselves to be very great and miserable sinners, there is a beam of unbelief in our eyes which prevents our seeing it. While we cannot see our own sins, we cannot see the sins of others aright. What we call sins in them, perhaps are not sins.We do not know how to reprove until we have discovered what sinners we ourselves are. But when God, by his converting grace, takes the beam out of our eyes, then we may help our brother to overcome his sins. Then we shall warn him in a spirit of humility and love, feeling our own unworthiness, and anxious for his good.”
Ladies, don’t be easily offended. Don’t nurse victimhood. Forgive and move on. We are called to do that. I know that some comments hurt. I know that criticism or rebukes are hard to take. But the primary reason we do, and with grace, is because Jesus took them ALL. No one in history was more reviled, insulted, rebuked, spat upon, ‘wounded’ with REAL violence than the sinless, perfect, beautiful, truthful Jesus. You need to remember that, I need to remember that. When we receive remarks we interpret as disdainful or insulting, our flesh might want to allow to build resentment around.
Yet love takes many forms:
Better is open rebuke Than love that is concealed.
Faithful are the wounds of a friend, But deceitful are the kisses of an enemy. Proverbs 27:5-6
We need godly examples of women who are strong in godly ways. These women who are strong in the right ways aren’t seen by many. This is either because the culture tries to hide them from us, or because they are truly godly, and thus are doing their work in humble, background ways and don’t seek promotion or limelight.
There are many weak women in Christianity too, and many of these ARE seen.
Weakness: A lack of strength, whether physical or spiritual. Scripture attributes weakness to human sin and foolishness and urges believers to find their true strength in God alone. ~Dictionary of Bible Themes
The weak women I am referring to we see raised up on influential platforms are paper tigers, these are not the actual strong women of God. They are in fact weak women. They use their influence to publicly nurse wounds and have navel-gazing psychology sessions they call Bible lessons. They have confounded the sisterhood with an errant notion of what “strong” means.
But how to tell the difference? Let’s have some biblical clarity on what these terms mean in God’s economy.
These are not strong Christian women. These women are what the world says is a strong woman.
“But I do want to say that I have always been strong-willed.” Beth Moore
Weak women give in to what they want, whether God wants it for them or not. Weak women give in to sin. In many of the cases, these weak women want to preach- which is sin.
The Bible declares one type of weak woman:
For among them are those who slip into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, (2 Timothy 3:6).
The context here is that Paul is writing to Timothy that in the last days difficult times will come. Then Paul lists an astonishing array of sins which will come to characterize the era, including false teachers who insinuate themselves into the church and capture weak women. The false teachers do this because it is a help to satan to have weak women doing his evil bidding. These women are easy to capture.
Different translations of the verse verse also use the words gullible, vulnerable, idle, or silly. What makes these women weak, idle, silly, vulnerable or gullible? SIN.
Silly women led away in their sin.
Titus 1:11 says the same, these false teachers aim directly for these women. In the Titus verse, they do so successfully and “disrupt whole households”.
Warning for Christian women: Sin makes us silly, weak, and vulnerable to false teaching. Repent often!
Barnes’ Notes explains about these weak women who are ‘laden with sins’ – “With so many sins that they seem to be “burdened” with them. The idea is, that they are under the influence of sinful desires and propensities, and hence, are better adapted to the purposes of deceivers“. … Led away with diverse lusts – “With various kinds of passions or desires – epithumias – such as pride, vanity, the love of novelty, or a susceptibility to flattery, so as to make them an easy prey to deceivers.”
Their sin has made their mind weak and their morals corrupt. These weak women have given in to pride, ambition, flattery. I liked Barnes’ note that these weak women are also ensnared by “novelty“. How many religious trends do we see women jumping onto? Blue bracelets, Prayer rugs, Contemplative prayer, Promise Keepers, Purpose Driven, Daniel fasting, Lectio Divina, direct revelation … anything new comes along and these weak women leap onto it as if it’s the Second Coming.
Before I move on to describing a Godly strong woman, I would like to mention that the weak women, especially those in the preaching pack, do two things that are offensive. The first is that rather than ensure their behavior or their worldview is not borne out of sin, these women co-opt God Himself into their sin and assign Him as the cause of it. I am highly offended by this.
Here is one example: Beth Moore said of the early days of her preaching to men, back when she had two young children at home by the way, “I didn’t have some big plan,” Moore said. “I just knew God was calling me to take one step of obedience, and that’s all I’ve been doing ever since.”
Weak women put the onus for their sin onto God. They are so weak they can’t or won’t take responsibility for their choices. They deflect, saying, “oh lil me was content stayin’ at home but God called me into this, who am I to disobey?’ I have seen this excuse from Jennie Allen, Beth Moore, Christine Caine (‘it’s a calling‘), and lots of other women in the pack. They don’t say what’s really going on: “I wanted to preach, so I did.” Weak women give in to their sinful desires. (Genesis 2:18; Genesis 3:16b). Weak women blame and deflect. (Genesis 3:13).
The second offensive thing to me that weak women do is harp on **”abuse”. Abuse would be anything to these weak women, from truly awful sexual abuse, domestic violence, to being ignored in a car (a complaint Beth Moore actually wrote about). Or of not being thanked for wearing flats so the men around her would feel taller. (Another one from Moore).
The **abuse focus is truly a grief to me. It’s awful how these weak women have twisted abuse to their own corrupt ends.
For example, have you noticed a lot of these women claiming to be ‘strong’ are in what’s known as the “Survivor Camp”? They constantly refer to men as abusers or oppressors, and constantly bring up their own abuse or others’. These women who preach & teach sinfully, insinuate that every man sitting in a pew is an abuser just waiting for his moment to become a violent oppressor against innocent women who unhappily meander into his proximity. Sometimes they accuse whole denominations! Beth Moore did.
And Aimee Byrd-
“She admits over and over in writing and interview that her impetus for writing has often been situations in which she feels offended as a woman, slighted, or personally neglected”… her teaching is ungodly: it does not arise from unreserved faith in God’s Word, but from dissatisfaction with her experiences.” By Shane D. Anderson
Rachel Green Miller worries about women who are “belittled…” Oy.
I hope and pray that if any of these Survivor type preaching platformed weak women reading this who are supposedly advocating for the “abused,” that tomorrow when I post what a TRULY strong Christian woman is, they would be embarrassed for their ridiculous and petty complaints.
They are weak females whose basis for ministry rests on a wounded dove cooing weakly in the dirt, or is saturated with nursing old wounds they love to pick over. These women do not base their ministry on the foundation of the transcendent Rock who endured all the abuse, pain, loneliness, neglect, rejection, hatred and reviling there ever was or will be.
These weak women laden with sins are just snowflakes, ready to melt at the tiniest offense
No one knows more than Jesus how it feels to experience all those things. Yet packs of women trade on their feelings as wounded snowflakes and exploit their hurts, for what? Attention, fame, power, and/or money.
Weak women are “led away”. It’s easy to give in to sin. It’s hard to subdue one’s sin, mortify it. It’s difficult to keep in the prescribed roles and bounds Jesus has for us. It takes a strong women to resist sin. A weak woman succumbs to them.
Tomorrow: What is a strong woman according to the Bible?
**RE ‘abuse’: I am aware that true abuse exists. I am quite familiar myself with various kinds of abuse. Quite. I am sensitive to the hurts that various kinds of abuse cause. I know the impacts of true abuse are wide-ranging and long-lasting. I am not dismissing true abuse. I am offended by the USE of abuse as a cover for sin, as an excuse for behavior, or as a merchandising of a ministry.
The reason I don’t speak of the various kinds of abuse I personally have endured, is because it DOESN’T MATTER. It is of no consequence. It doesn’t figure in.
Why? First of all, Jesus took the wrath for anyone who abuses but later comes to faith. Abusers are usually not saved people, who can’t help their lusts. If they are saved people, we need to forgive, and remember that Jesus took ALL the abuse on the cross, including separation from the Father who turned His face away. How does my experience of abuse compare to that?
Secondly, these snowflake ladies turn any little bump in the road into abuse. They have abused the word abuse so that anything that offends them, they claim is abuse. It’s not.
Thirdly, others have suffered much more than me, and not because of another’s sin, which is to be expected in the world, but for the Name. Paul, for example, experienced abuse; physical and spiritual. Stephen was martyred. Silas went to jail with Paul. Mary mother of Jesus endured it. And many others in history. You will see some of them in tomorrow’s post.
So, ladies, let it go. Yes, you were hurt, so are MOST PEOPLE. You’re not special with your pet abuse you carry around. Lay it down at the cross. As Jimmy Buffett said, ‘Breathe in, breathe out, move on’.
I wrote 2 weeks ago that @aimeebyrdPYW seems to be apostatizing. You can read it here: We say Goodbye to Aimee Byrd
More bad news confirming Aimee’s drift has emerged. In her newest essay published October 10, Aimee lauds Catholic mystic Teresa of Avila. According to the Roman Catholic Church, Teresa was a bridal mystic; this is a woman who so intensely desires God she has bodily ecstatic experiences she later writes about, using language of erotic passion.
THE ECSTASY OF SAINT TERESA. RENAISSANCE: ITALY, this is a description of a sculpture from the artist Giovanni Lorenzo Bernini done in 1645-1652 AD. “Saint Teresa’s love of God and her desire for spiritual union with him found expression in a vision in which an angel pierced her heart with a golden spear and sent her into a trance. The erotic intensity of her vision is vividly suggested in this image by Teresa’s swooning expression and languid pose, and by the deep folds of drapery, which convey her agitation.”
If that kind of language makes you uncomfortable, as it should, then by all means refrain from reading any of Teresa of Avila’s actual writing because the descriptions of her mystical and ecstatic unions with her Groom get more obvious.
Teresa was a female ascetic, and a female version of a monk, and a mystic bride. This means not only does she swoon with erotic passion for her god, but also has constant visions and visitations from ‘him’.
That Aimee Byrd is reading one of Teresa of Avila’s books and is entranced with the notion of this heretic’s outlook on religion is more proof that this once solid Bible teacher is apostatizing.
In her essay, Aimee promotes Teresa of Avila, says she is enjoying reading Teresa’s book, then Aimee talks of our ‘souls’ deepest longing’. No. Avoid Aimee!
Tim Challies wrote a series on the False Teachers, and included Teresa of Avila as one of the more famous false teachers of history. You can read his essay here. And let us not believe that the influence of these female mystics has waned. Challies noted, “We can also spot her direct or indirect influence in the works of bestselling authors like Sarah Young (Jesus Calling) and Ann Voskamp (One Thousand Gifts).”
As for Aimee, I read in her writings a longing, one that she herself claims to possess. That she longs for the One True God is obvious, and also obvious is that she does not have Him. If you feel led, please pray for Aimee, that her soul’s deepest longing will be satisfied by having been given the gift of repentance, that her soul will be saved, and that Jesus would get the glory.
This is an essay that chronicles the rise and fall of an influential person who was formerly in the faith. Among other topics, I use this blog platform to chronicle modern-day discernment issues and compare to the Bible. I did with Beth Moore. I followed up with: Beth Moore’s Spiritual Biography. I did also with Francis Chan. And Ravi Zacharias.
Now we see a departure from the faith with Aimee Byrd. This essay, like those others, is meant to illustrate how false teachers happen, or how it is that a once seemingly solid Bible teacher goes astray.
I finish with a warning from the Bible.
Apostasy in the Bible
We all know the story about Demas.
for Demas, having loved this present age, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica; Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia. (2 Timothy 4:9-10).
Apostasy in 3 verses. In Philemon 1:24 Demas was a ‘fellow worker’ with Paul. In Colossians 4:14 Luke sent warm greetings to Demas. In 2 Timothy Demas fled to the world because he decided he loved it so much.
Philemon was written in about 57-62. Colossians was written in about 60-62. 2 Timothy was written in about 64-65.
If we take the earliest writings to the latest writings as time brackets, the falling away of Demas played out in about 7 years.
Judas departed from the faith. His story played out in about 3 1/2 years.
Other people in our current times may take a short while to apostatize, or longer. We understand and accept apostasy stories like Demas and Judas because they are in God’s holy word. Seeing apostasy happening in today’s time is often harder. We have a difficult time believing or accepting that a famous person who seems so solid is a false convert.
But it’s the same. Some people are self-deceived that they are in the faith. (Matthew 7:21-23). They never were. Their veneer of belief erodes and reveals the unsaved person that they are. This leads us to the sad story of Aimee Byrd. Joining Demas, Judas, Chan, and so many others, Aimee Byrd is a gone girl.
Apostasy’s Progression
In 2013, Presbyterian Aimee Byrd published her first book. It was titled “Housewife Theologian: How the Gospel Interrupts the Ordinary” and the blurb says, “This book is for women—for all women who want to explore beneath the superficial and get to know God, and themselves, better.”
She had been writing a blog for a while and used the blog as the platform to get her material out there. She wasn’t an academic or a church staff person at the time, just a wife who wanted to write. She became known as The Housewife Theologian.
Wow! Great!
The book’s contents got the attention of Carl Trueman and Todd Pruitt. She was interviewed on their podcast, Mortification of Spin. It went well. She was asked to join the 2 guys on the podcast as a co-host. She began blogging for Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, too. (ACE).
The Alliance is a broad coalition of evangelical pastors, scholars, and churchmen from various denominations, including Baptist, Congregational (Independent), Anglican (Episcopal), Presbyterian, Reformed, and Lutheran who hold the historic creeds and confessions of the Reformed faith and who proclaim biblical doctrine in order to foster a Reformed awakening in today’s Church. (Source)
Her first book was followed up by a second, Theological Fitness: Why We Need a Fighting Faith. Then two years after that, a third, No Little Women: Equipping All Women in the Household of God. So far so good.
Then in 2018 she published Why Can’t We Be Friends? : Avoidance Is Not Purity about male-female friendships among believers and how we should not avoid them just because sometimes ‘the sex part gets in the way’. Hmmm. Gender stuff. Hmmm. The brilliant and astute Carl Trueman was still providing recommendation blurbs for her books, and Aimee was still co-hosting the podcast. Yet Trueman called Why Can’t We Be Friends “provocative.” The Gospel Coalition issued a mild warning in their review of the book, which was generally positive:
Byrd is eager to destigmatize male-female friendship in the church, particularly friendships that involve time spent one-on-one. But she so frequently references sharing car rides and meals that it feels like she goes beyond defending those activities to almost implying people who don’t engage in them aren’t experiencing true friendship. (Source).
Byrd had become an important and influential voice in evangelicalism. A female voice, podcasting with the big boys (and Pruitt and Trueman are renowned minds in the faith). In 2020 when Byrd published “Recovering from Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: How the Church Needs to Rediscover Her Purpose” it hit like a bomb. Here is the blurb:
This book dismantles every mistruth that you’ve heard about the role of women in the Bible, her place in the church, and the patriarchal lie of so-called “biblical manhood and womanhood.” In its place, Aimee Byrd details a truly biblical vision of women as equal partners in Christ’s church and kingdom.
What was noted to be “conspicuously absent from Recovering from Biblical Manhood and Womanhood” is any mention of 1 Timothy 2:12. A women may not teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet. This was a stance Byrd had formerly proclaimed, one she said believed in and lived by. But apparently no more.
We see the tip-off word in that blurb – patriarchy. Another signal word, equality. Byrd was then asked to step away from the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, (ACE), the Mortification of Spin podcast, and her blogs were removed from the blog section (which has a rotating panoply of writers, not just Byrd).
The ACE was not outright opposed to the theological ideas contained in Byrd’s new work, they said they understood the book to be polemical. They said they knew their Alliance contained a variety of flavors of theologies (within certain limits). But they did ask her Nine Questions about her new stance. Byrd answered, but in the ACE view, it was an ungracious and unsatisfactory defense. I’d suggest reading the above links in their entirety to get the flavor of the ACE’s dismissal of Byrd from their platforms.
Her denomination was in an uproar for a year. Divided and upset.
History Lesson: –metaphorical Jezebel of Rev 2 split her church. Charge: False prophesying, misleading the church. –Puritan Anne Hutchinson split the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Caused massive uproar. Charge: Teaching men, and claiming direct revelation. –Beth Moore caused massive uproar in the SBC denomination. Charge: False prophesying, claiming direct revelation, & teaching men. –Aimee Byrd, Denomination elders said her new stances caused a disruption of the peace of the church, rejecting biblical gender roles.
Yes, women are strong. But when strength is used in the wrong way, when we do not submit and remain in our roles, our strong will causes disruption to the peace of the church.
Byrd began writing about being a “survivor”. Of being “reviled”. Of not “being valued.” Of “abuse in the church.”
Discerning people began issuing warnings.
Like this prediction from Denny Burk in 2020- Denny Burk said of Byrd, “I predict arguments like Byrd’s will prove over time to be a briefly held way-station on the movement from narrow complementarianism to egalitarianism. Readers who do not wish to take that journey should be cautious about Byrd’s book.”
Like this one from Mike Myers in 2021, “My concern is that the writings of Mrs. Byrd have gradually drifted from helpful, orthodox, and godly, to harmful, heterodox, and worldly.” (Source)
Like this one from CBMW in 2022- “But as some reviewers argued at the time, the position offered by Byrd’s book is a kind of way-station to egalitarianism. Even still, many dismissed these warnings as defensive or overblown” stated the Council of Biblical Manhood & Womanhood in noting Byrd’s reversal of positions.
Side Note: When your mature theologians or credible discernment people issue warnings like those, please consider them seriously. We see the trends. We know the trigger words. We have the Holy Spirit’s wisdom in this particular gift to discern the crack in the foundation. You don’t have to wait till the house crumbles to begin testing a person’s theology and comparing it to the Bible.
Now cut loose from the ACE, Byrd formed “a new nest” (blogging platform). Soon after, she preached her first sermon. Once a hard and fast complementarian, a ‘housewife theologian’, in 2022 Byrd stood behind a pulpit on a Sunday morning to exposit the word to a congregation.
Aimee preaching at Covenant Baptist Church in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, a SBC church btw.
This is in direct violation of the 1 Timothy verse and her own previously stated beliefs:
Aimee in 2013: “There are many roles for women in the church, but Scripture makes it clear that the office of elder and pastor is not one of them (1 Tim. 2:12). Not only that, most men are never called to this position (1 Tim. 3:1-7). I believe God has ordained this for our good.“
Ten years after the lauded and doctrinally solid Housewife Theologian was published, Byrd has in 2023 become an abomination to God. Strong words? In 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 we read,
The women are to keep silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak, but are to subject themselves, just as the Law also says. But if they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home, for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in church.
The word disgraceful means base, sordid, shameful, dishonorable.
I again show you Aimee Byrd preaching, and therefore disgraced, shamed, and sordid in the eyes of God:
But that is not where it ends. There’s more, and it’s worse. Worse than being sordid and polluting God’s pulpit? Yes.
Applauding other women who preach in God’s pulpit. (Romans 1:32).
Byrd wrote this week (September 2023) an essay she titled, “What a Woman Pastor Showed Me.” As with so many egalitarian heathens, like Beth Moore, they drop out of their denomination and seek places where their ears and heart can be tickled with sin. Byrd left the Presbyterian denomination of which she had long been a member, but could not find a church home for an extended period of time, despite visiting around “desperately”.
On the advice of a friend, Byrd recently checked out the Methodist church near her town. Byrd wrote that she never had thought she’d attend a Methodist church, saying of herself she’d been a “Reformed elitist”.
Rebuttal: dismissing churches which teach false doctrine isn’t elitist, it’s mature discernment and proper separation from theological pollution.
Byrd went on, noting that the congregation was small, older, and all-white. Byrd wrote, “But the all-white part is disappointing.”
Rebuttal: The Spirit sends whom He will send if it’s a real church. If He sends all white folks then so be it. They’re family. Period. If the church isn’t a true church, the people will congregate where they want due to their ears desire tickling.
Side note: I viewed or scanned through 35 of the services in the church that Aimee is gushing over. Aimee had noted the church’s demographics: small in number, mature, all-white, only a few families. One thing she didn’t mention that I noticed in these videos: the congregation seems to be composed mostly of women.
Byrd wrote: “The liturgy was refreshing. Christ was there. The whole service was saturated in the gospel. The pastor is a woman.”
“Reverend” Katie O’Hern Hamilton preaching with her son on her hip
Rebuttal: the place Byrd was in was not a church and they know not any Gospel. Christ was definitely not there. Christ does not affirm what He abominates and calls by His Spirit “sordid.”
Byrd wrote: She then dismisses the little ones who want to go to the children’s time outside of the sanctuary and transitions behind the pulpit with baby Wilbur still on her chest. I watched a woman deliver a wonderful sermon with a baby attached to her.
Rebuttal: I mourn the example Katie O’Hern Hamilton is giving her children, I mourn the congregation’s inability to see that this is disgraceful, I mourn the lost time her children are divided from attention from their mother, I mourn them when they grow up thinking this is OK. I am actually aghast and offended with this.
I mourn the loss of Aimee Byrd from the faith.
Above, this speaker whom Aimee Byrd believes is actually a pastor qualified to give sermons, her child is trying to get her mom’s attention during the service while this woman who thinks she’s a pastor is trying to give directions to the undiscerning congregation. Another child, perhaps Kate’s other boy, is playing the keyboard while the lady next to him tries to stop him. This is during the service.
1 Timothy 3:4 says in the qualifications for pastor, “He must be one who manages his own household well, [notice the he] keeping his children under control with all dignity (but if a man does not know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of the church of God?),” emphasis mine.
Obviously, the dignity of the service is out the window with the “pastor’s” kids interrupting service, crawling all over, and distracting the congregation. Aimee revealed that the older child “likes to distract, be heard” and said, “Howard, the outspoken toddler, bypassed daddy and ran straight to pastor-mom as she raised her arms, yelling, “No, mommy; no, mommy; no mommy!” over and over through the entire benediction. How hilarious!”
Jesus does not think it’s hilarious. Not at all. “But I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first. But if not, I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place, unless you repent.” (Revelation 2:4-5).
Fallen!
Aimee Byrd went from professing Christ and all His word true, including his ban on women preaching, to disillusionment with the church, and finally to identifying with the “marginalized, oppressed, and disillusioned“, rejecting churches with “patriarchal hierarchy,” landing in a church that is not a church, led abominably by a woman, and exulting in finding where her itching ears can be tickled.
The Danger of Apostasy
Do you know how many, MANY verses in the Bible warn of apostasy? Many. I would repeat them all but there are so many and this essay is already long. See here. Believers are repeatedly warned to check one’s self to make sure we are in the faith.
But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons... (1 Timothy 4:1)
1 Timothy 4:16 says “Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; persevere in these things, for as you do this you will save both yourself and those who hear you.”
Do you think it doesn’t happen in these days? Think again! Do you think it cannot happen to you? Think again. Sin is crouching at the door waiting to have you!
Hebrews 6:4-6, For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God and put Him to open shame.
How many who did not pay close attention to their life or doctrine (1 Timothy 4:16) will try and appeal to Jesus on the Day by shouting about their works? (Matthew 7:21-23)
Do not be fooled. Apostasy exists and it hides WELL.
Apostasy, er, Angle Shades moth camouflage
In fact, Philip the Evangelist, who presumably had experience detecting a true and sincere testimony, traveled with Simon the Sorcerer after Simon’s baptism, only for Simon to unmask himself before Peter when Simon asked to buy the Holy Spirit. (Acts 20).
The Disciples were told at the Last Supper that there was one would betray the Son of Man, and the men were so sure of Judas that they questioned themselves before asking if it was Judas.
Byrd is egalitarian now. Sin doesn’t end there. Amy Spreeman said of these sad, well-trod paths away from Christ, “Egalitarianism appears to be the gateway drug for total [homosexual] affirmation”. That’s what’s next. It always happens. In fact, Aimee’s new church which is led by a woman is having a class of a “detailed study of the Bible passages most commonly cited in the church’s disagreement about same-sex marriage and LGBT+ inclusion.”
It is not clear which side this particular UMC will fall on…but with a Princeton Seminary graduate as a female pastor teaching this class, I am not hopeful that it will be biblically correct.
Sin leads down, to the abyss. Repentance leads up, to Christ. Ladies, watch your life and doctrine closely.
AIMEE BYRD is a woman that has been in spiritual decline for a few years. At least, public evidence of a decline has been observed for a few years, the inward decline was probably a lot longer. Her 2020 book, Recovering from Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: How the Church Needs to Rediscover Her Purpose was a huge red flag.
‘There are significant problems with Byrd’s interpretation of the important passages about biblical manhood and womanhood, passages she does not even address in the book. Worse, the entire thrust of Byrd’s book is in the direction of feminism”, as this reviewer (and many others!) noted.
A month after her book was published, her long-time broadcast/podcast partner, Reformation 21, announced they had dropped her from the podcast.
I was saved in around January 2004. For 18 months I followed Joel Osteen, until I got a Bible that is. In mid-2006 I moved to Georgia and began attending church, and was baptized.
Since then, the acceleration of false teachers populating the faith and their numerous public implosions, seem to be accelerating. Even previously solid-seeming platformed teachers and theologians are falling like dominoes.
Byrd’s Author pic at Amazon
I used to listen to Reformation 21’s Mortification of Spin Podcast with Carl Trueman, Todd Pruitt, and Aimee Byrd. I’m not a huge fan of listening to women, I prefer men, but I was pleased that the so-named “Housewife Theologian” was able to speak on theological issues in a roundtable with men. ‘Good for her’ I’d thought. ‘If she has time away from family to do that.’
Aimee wrote as to why she wrote her book Housewife Theologian: How the Gospel Interrupts the Ordinary and joined the podcast in 2013, “Much of my blogging speaks to why it matters to know the true God and what hinders our growth in this in our own church culture.”
Initial reviews of her first book were good:
Jodi Ware at TGC wrote, She evidences how thinking rightly about God and his revelation strengthens and directs women in their particular roles of wife, mother, and homemaker; though, gratefully, much of what she writes also applies to women in other circumstances and in different stages of life. ~Housewife Theologian: How the Gospel Interrupts the Ordinary, 2013.
Downgrades have always happened, they’re cyclical. “Church history is a series of cycles. You can see what’s going to happen by knowing what happened before.” ~Phil Johnson.
But does it seem to you like it does to me that the downgrades, controversies, falling pastors, teachers exposed as false, whole ministries disqualifying themselves, is happening at an ever increasing rate? It seems to me it’s speeding up.
So in 2013 Aimee Byrd appeared suddenly when her blog got noticed, was put on a podcast, wrote a book, seemingly solid in 2013, but by May 2020 she was gone. Seven years for her arc to appear, crest, and crash. What happened?
Recovering from Biblical Manhood and Womanhood is what happened, Byrd’s 2020 published book where she rejected complementary roles for women, confused the lines between biblical masculinity and biblical femininity, insinuated patriarchal abuse, and more. The book was an outward evidence of her inward drift.
Her drift and new feminist-ish stances upset many. Her book sparked many questions, some of them put onto a lengthy list by Greenville Seminary President Dr. Jonathan Master, published at Reformation 21 titled “Questions for Aimee“.
Byrd replied to Dr. Master at Reformation 21 somewhat wide-eyed innocently that she was ‘a bit perplexed’ by Master’s questions, saying “I wrote a book highlighting how a contemporary movement has damaged the way that we disciple men and women in the church, focusing on the way we read scripture, the way we view discipleship, and our responsibilities to one another.“
No. No, it wasn’t. Most people could see that.
Either Byrd didn’t see it, failing to pay close enough attention to her own drift (Hebrews 2:1), she was cunningly masking it (2 Corinthians 11:15), or she knew exactly what she was doing (Galatians 2:4).
The Council for Manhood & Womanhood was not perplexed with Byrd, but a bit perturbed. The Council knew, as Andy Naselli wrote, that “For the past several years on her podcast and blog, Byrd has been criticizing the version of complementarianism that leaders such as John Piper teach.” They weren’t blindsided at Byrd’s drift, but perhaps they were surprised at the now public level of her rejection of male-female roles. Andy Naselli wrote at the Council that the premise of Byrd’s book was that “Byrd argues that “biblical manhood and womanhood” is not all biblical. A lot of it is unbiblical. A lot of it is based on cultural stereotypes that wrongly restrict women and thus prevent them from flourishing.“
In June of 2020, a month after her book hit the shelves like a bombshell, Aimee Byrd still maintained at Reformation 21 that she was writing about ‘just discipling’, “There are some fundamental differences in the lens CBMW writers and I use in understanding men and women. Also, “I take a look at some of these to see how the female voice functions in Scripture, often telling the story behind the story, making visible the invisible.“
If a person is telling a story not in the Bible, then it’s made-up and based on man’s – er – woman’s biases/philosophies/ideas… Right? Right.
Do you see feminism on the horizon? Or even closer? Many did. Shortly after her book’s publication and the public back-and-forth on blogs etc, The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, which sponsored the Reformation 21 podcast, released Byrd from their cadre of contributors. They wrote:
This post is motivated by the recent action of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals Board of Directors to part ways with our long time contributor, Aimee Byrd. Those asked to leave have one thing in common; they have caused our audience to respond in a largely negative way. They have caused other contributors to either speak up, to sit out, or to leave altogether. And these situations often and recently have kept other contributors from joining us. Yet it must be a conversation, a two-way dialogue, and done so graciously. When that is not possible, when contributors will not or cannot define or defend what they believe, continuing together is no longer viable.
The firestorm heated up, naturally, with more militant feminists insisting that Byrd’s release was either due to cyberbullying (Julie Roys’ contention), or that Byrd’s dismissal was due to the fact that the patriarchy is threatened by strong women. (Rachel Green Miller’s contention). Byrd herself countered that she was targeted, underwent spiritual abuse, and was subjected to ‘misogyny’. She insisted she was complementarian, perfectly satisfied with the distinction between male and female roles.
But… if a person is a complementarian inside a complementarian camp, they are not a “threat”, are they? If a person is complementarian, why would they need rebukes? If their biblical orientation of male and female roles was orthodox, why dismiss her from a podcast hosted by two other men who are also orthodox in their biblical views of male and female roles?
It’s a case of speaking out of two sides of the mouth. On the one side, words come out that are supposed to quell the waves of concern, and on the other, words that stir up the waves in the first place. Most people only listen to one side of the mouth of the double speakers. But if you’re ‘inside the camp’, you don’t part ways with same-believing folks.
“I predict arguments like Byrd’s will prove over time to be a briefly held way-station on the movement from narrow complementarianism to egalitarianism. Readers who do not wish to take that journey should be cautious about Byrd’s book.” ~Denny Burk.
Well he nailed it. People with discernment see the markers of the slide much earlier than others, and alert the church to them. This month, we see that Aimee Byrd is preaching. Byrd has gone from way-station to terminus.
I changed the word “speak” to “preach” because such minimizing language fools no one. Byrd is preaching in church services. Period.
Colin Smothers at the council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood wrote this month of Byrd’s slide downward,
From the article above: The reason Byrd’s article from 2013 is suddenly relevant today is because this week, in an apparent reversal from the position she once articulated, Aimee Byrd preached her first Sunday morning sermon…
But what is new is Aimee Byrd’s position on preaching, which was on display this past Sunday. How she squares her new position with 1 Timothy 2:12 is yet to be seen. As Andy Naselli pointed out in his excellent review of her 2020 book, 1 Timothy 2:12 is conspicuously absent from Recovering from Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, which she wrote as a trenchant critique of CBMW’s ministry. CBMW was formed in 1987 to help the church faithfully live out verses such as 1 Timothy 2:12, and to not ignore them.
It is of course sad that people drift from the Rock, and if unchecked, drift into deep waters of sin. But the Hebrews verse is pointed, and applicable to each and every person, you and me included.
For this reason we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away from it. For if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every violation and act of disobedience received a just punishment, how will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? (Hebrews 2:1-3).
What happens when we do not pay attention? Aimee Byrd is what happens. A very public, and very sad, implosion. But make no mistake! This could happen to any one of us, me included! Drift is an ever-present warning. Our flesh is so strong. We underestimate how strong. Add to that, God put the usurping curse on us (Genesis 3:16). So while it is sad that Aimee Byrd is now usurping the pulpit, hers is an object lesson for all of us. Do not neglect so great a salvation. We will want to, we will sometimes, but pray to the Spirit of God to draw us back. And if we still neglect it, and still drift happily away from the object of our love and devotion, and cease reading His word as our anchor, pray the Spirit will yank us back. Yes, it’s unpleasant when He does that, but it is for the glory of God above all, and our good. Where Byrd landed is the rocks of usurpation and the reefs of feminism. We need to remain under the wings of love.
For You have been my help, And in the shadow of Your wings I sing for joy. Psalm 63:7.
the-end-time.org 