What Phoebe’s Story Tells Us about How Paul Saw Women

Rolling the scroll back together carefully, the woman tucks it into a smooth leather satchel. She wriggles into her sandals and secures them, slips the satchel over her head onto her shoulder, and grabs her favorite traveling cloak.

As a businesswoman, this is not the first time she’s made the trip from Cenchreae to Rome, nor will it be the last.

But this trip is special.

At the door, she takes a deep breath and pauses for a moment, her hand on the satchel. A smile plays across her lips. She’s tasked with carrying her dear friend Paul’s letter to the believers who gather in Rome. Paul reviewed his words with her, making sure she grasps what he is communicating. She understands her responsibility on his behalf and to the community of believers.

Paul’s trust in her for this mission, and his commendation of her ministry means a great deal. But the biggest reason for her happiness is the term he uses to describe her. He introduces her with honor, endearment, and unquestioned inclusion.

Paul calls her “our sister.”

Wrapping up his letter to the Romans, Paul writes, “I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a deacon of the church in Cenchreae. I ask you to receive her in the Lord in a way worthy of his people and to give her any help she may need from you, for she has been the benefactor of many people, including me (Rom. 16:1-2).”

Some translations render diakonos as “deacon,” but it can be translated “servant” or “minister.”[i] While Paul offers no definition when he calls Phoebe a diakonos, he often uses it for himself as an apostle (1 Cor. 3:5) and numerous times for his co-laborers (Eph. 6:21).[ii]

The way the term normally translates in the New Testament, and the way Paul used it, means “minister.”[iii] If Romans 16:1-2 did not refer to a woman, most readers would assume Paul means minister when he uses diakonos.[iv]

(Pause for a second to let that sink in. Why do we tend to minimize the callings and responsibilities of women in the church?)

Paul saw Phoebe as a fellow minister of the gospel. She held a position of considerable prominence and authority in her congregation.[v] As Paul’s trusted courier, Phoebe would likely have read the letter to the congregation in Rome, elaborated on it, and answered questions, helping listeners understand it.[vi] Phoebe was basically the first commentator on the book of Romans.[vii]

She also served as a benefactor (prostatis) who sponsored the church and to whom Paul was indebted for financial support. Prostatis was an honorable and authoritative title in ancient times, and Phoebe probably owned (and therefore hosted) the home in which the Cenchrean church met.[viii]

Phoebe is not identified by gender role (wife, sister, daughter), but by her role and position in the church.[ix] She’s one example of many New Testament women who co-labored for the gospel alongside Paul. Ten of the 29 names mentioned in Romans 16 are women,[x] and Paul commends twice as many of the women as the men.[xi]

He clearly holds his sisters in high regard.

Furthermore, vocabulary and grammar indicate Phoebe as a deacon (or minister) of the church in Cenchrea, not just a servant from the church.[xii]  As Paul’s courier, she would have performed the letter to the Romans with tone and emphases as if Paul spoke it, shaping it by the knowledgeable way she read and then explained it to the congregation.[xiii]

Lucy Peppiatt, principal of Westminster Theological Centre, explains how Paul’s formal commendation of Phoebe offers us a picture of a “woman patron of Paul’s, a great friend and co-worker, and one who is entrusted with the safeguarding and delivering of sound teaching and doctrine to a strategic church in a key city.”[xiv]

Given Phoebe’s importance to Paul and the early church, what does her story tell you about how God sees women?

***

This post is an excerpt from my upcoming book, Prophesying Daughters: How Prophetic Ministry and Women in Leadership Strengthen the Church, releasing in March.

Photo by David Köhler on Unsplash

[i] Craig Keener, Paul, Women and Wives: Marriage and Women’s Ministry in the Letters of Paul (Peabody, MS: Hendrickson Publishers, 1992), 238.

[ii] Keener, Paul, Women and Wives, 238-239. See also 2 Cor. 3:6; 6:4; 11:23; Eph. 3:7; Col. 1:23, 25 and Col. 1:7; 4:7; 1 Thess. 3:2; 1 Tim. 4:6.

[iii] Keener, Paul, Women and Wives, 238-239.

[iv] Keener, Paul, Women and Wives, 239.

[v] Keener, Paul, Women and Wives, 239.

[vi] Terry Wilder, “Phoebe, the Letter-Carrier of Romans, and the Impact of Her Role on Biblical Theology.” Southwestern Journal of Theology 56, no. 1 (2013). https://search-ebscohostcom.ezproxy.regent.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=rfh&AN=ATLA0001991825&site=ehost-live.\

[vii] Scot McKnight, The Blue Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2016),184.

[viii] McKnight, 184.

[ix] Sarah Lancaster, Romans: A Theological Commentary on the Bible (Louisville, KY: Presbyterian Publishing Corporation, 2015).

[x] https://margmowczko.com/list-of-people-in-romans-16_1-16/

[xi] https://margmowczko.com/list-of-people-in-romans-16_1-16/, cf. Keener, Youtube video of a public lecture at Laidlaw College, New Zealand, in September 2019. 17.35-minute mark.

[xii] Lucy Peppiatt, Recovering Scripture’s Vision for Women (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2019), 124. Paul describes Phoebe as “being” (the participle ousan) of the church of Cenchrea (the genitive ecclesias), “implying a recognized position or ministry in a specific congregation.”

[xiii] Peppiatt, 125.

[xiv] Peppiatt, 126.