St. Paul's OMG Tweet/balance out of balance/defacing your Bible

Three smiles from  Scot McKnight's wonderful  "Junia is Not Alone" (see Junia's sex change:female apostles lost in translation)

First:

when Paul wrote those words about Junia the apostle in Romans 16:7, he was not snickering with a mischievous look in his eye because he had just pulled off the incredible act of calling a woman an apostle. He didn’t wonder, after he dictated those words, “OMG, what will they say about me next? That I’ll want the high priest to be a priestess? #apostlegonewild." I would suggest that he didn’t give those words about Junia a moment’s afterthought.-"Junia is Not Alone"

This:

A reader...wrote something to this effect: "Scot, thanks so much for The Jesus Creed. I’ve gained so much from it. Can I ask a question: Why are there only women’s stories in your chapter on Mary?” I asked him to call me, and as we talked, he uttered words that I need to repeat here. He asked, “We need to strive for balance in our storytelling, don’t we?” I thought (but didn’t say aloud), “Balance. The balance, my brother, is so out of balance we don’t even know what balance looks like. If we want real historical balance it would mean we would be telling nothing but women’s stories for the next two millennia.”  -"Junia is Not Alone

And I love this practical idea for pastors (.reminds me of when the Rabbiman Adam encouraged us to rip a page out of our Bibles...that page that says "New Testament," making the point that it's one narrative. I even have photo evidence of that!):

How to Help the Church Find Its Junia(s)   First, if you’re a pastor, I want you to take to the pulpit someday and get folks to open their Bibles to Romans 16:7, and I want you to ask them to do something that may make them feel sacrilegious if not abominating. I want you to ask them to strike out Junias from their Bibles. The man never existed, the name never existed, and it is an embarrassment to the church to have that name in a Bible. If you want to do this emphatically, above the place where they strike out “Junias,” have them write “Alice” or some woman who went through the struggle to gain recognition for what God had gifted her to do.  Of course, I am aware of how this may make some people feel , but with all due respect for the authority of God's Word, we need people to see that what is not original is not God's Word."Junia is Not Alone

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