Editor’s Note: This is Part I of the series, “Priscilla and the Explosion of Women Church Planters Today,” based on Terran Williams’s keynote address at CBE’s 2024 Tell Her Story conference. You can listen to the address in full here.
Does the Spirit of God regard gender when he chooses people to plant, care for, and lead churches? Something we see repeatedly is that the people with power get to write history. Since churches mostly have been led by men, it’s remarkable how many stories of women who play significant leadership roles have been erased from history—but thankfully, not from the Scriptures. In this series, I want to share with you some stories of modern female church planters in the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia, and Africa. Without their work, the fulfillment of the Great Commission would be significantly undermined. In Part II, I will discuss the evidence that Priscilla of the New Testament provides biblical precedent for female church planters and leaders. Finally, in Part III, I will share the stories of two women from Cape Town, where I live, whose leadership was used by God significantly yet have been all but forgotten to local history. I will also recommend that it should be the Great Commission of Matthew 28,1 not a misinterpretation of 1 Timothy 2:12, that is the hermeneutical key in answering the main question: Does the Spirit of God use both men and women to lead, to plant, and to teach churches today?
The Middle East
While the religious context of the Middle East is primarily Muslim, you might have heard about the Iranian revival that has seen over a hundred thousand people converting to Jesus in the past few decades. Iranians are being evangelized, discipled, and brought into these vibrant underground churches, which are reminiscent of the first century of churches. These also tended to be small, met in homes, and relied heavily on anointed individuals to do the work. The grandparents of my friend and church planter Dr. Katia Adams have been at the forefront of this Iranian revival, so I asked her to make an inquiry: How many of these underground churches have women in significant roles?
It turns out that 50 percent of all of these underground churches—which are evangelizing, discipling, and bringing into community both men and women—are led by women. It teaches me a lesson, to be honest. When I first wrote my book, How God Sees Women, I wrote that in stridently patriarchal cultures, like Muslim ones, it would be better to only release men into leadership. I went beyond my level of knowledge with that statement; I hadn’t done the research. In reality, regardless of a patriarchal context, an underground church that relies heavily on anointed workers can thrive in the work of evangelizing both men and women and discipling them in community.
Asia
Dr. Leslie Segraves, another friend and co-author of mine, is a mission leader of the Serving Shoulder to Shoulder Ministry in South Asia. She shared that in South Asia, a movement of about 4,000 women were equipped as disciple makers, and they’ve planted churches in no fewer than 20,000 villages. These women carry a strong emphasis on multiplication, so many of the house churches they’ve planted have multiplied and reached up to the twelfth generation of church plants. Then, looking to Southeast Asia, a body of 2,000 or more women were equipped as leaders in the disciple-making movement and have led thousands to Christ. There was indeed impact, despite their work beginning during COVID lockdowns!
Leslie also told me about the tens of millions in China who were reached for Christ in the last half century, which is something we rejoice in as the global church. The story is fairly well known—men and women have been propelled by the Spirit to oversee house churches that consist of their converts. Like the churches borne of the Iranian revival, more than half of these house churches have also been led by women. Leslie’s face turned sad as she explained that some of China’s church growth has begun to slow down. A chief reason, she explained, is that outsiders have entered in and brought increased church policy, which has restricted women from joining their brothers in leadership.
Leslie shared with me that some leading Chinese women have lamented to her. They have said, “We’ve given our blood for Christ in our nation, but now foreign books and outside theology have entered in and taught women that they should not lead. We want to obey Christ—we want to make an impact—but now we no longer know who we are.”
Africa
We would be remiss to leave out Africa. Headlines about religion may be focused on the words and actions of Western male leaders, but the reality of the worldwide church is quite different. One missiologist says that more and more Christians live outside Europe and North America, especially in Africa. I’ve heard somebody say that in 2050, if there’s one human face that will be chosen to represent the Christian majority, it will be a young African woman. Yet statistics actually show that statement to be inaccurate, because the fastest-growing section of the church is already in sub-Saharan Africa, where women are thriving. So, the face that best represents Christianity in the world right now is a young African woman.2 I can tell you, as somebody living in Africa, the Spirit of God is upon both men and women. For example, my longtime friend Paul Van Coller planted Hope Church in Mongu, Zambia. This church has grown to be the largest in the region, and God gave this church a vision to plant churches all over Zambia.
We’re talking about hundreds upon hundreds of churches being planted! When Paul and his leadership team prayed for workers for the harvest field, they did not expect the Lord of the harvest to send not only men, but also many women. It’s like the story in Acts 16:6–10, where Paul has a vision, and he’s called to Macedonia by the man of Macedonia. But Paul discovers that it is a woman—Lydia—who would open the door for the church movement into Europe (Acts 16:14–15).
Paul Van Coller had the same experience. Many women began to arrive at this church in Mongu, knowing the Spirit of God had called them. Many of them would walk for days and had literally limped all the way there across crocodile-infested rivers, because their bodies were broken, to receive the gospel and to receive training before going back to their villages to plant churches.
When the women returned to their villages, there was some resistance, because they’re women. In animistic African cultures, women are not just inferior to men—they are property of men. But as these women persevered, the men noticed the Spirit of God empowering these women, especially as the women brought men onto their leadership teams. It’s amazing how men took to these churches, and these women have done remarkably. Paul told me the story of Musa in the Kicheche church. She was trained in the gospel, and she has planted four generations of churches. Musa not only leads one church but has twenty churches under her leadership.
I asked Paul to take a photo for me when he went on a field trip to these churches, and he sent back a beautiful picture of Monica, Charity, and Febby from the Metete area in western Zambia. This is a place where men are terrified of witchcraft and alcoholism is rife, but these three women defied those terrors, faced crocodile-infested rivers, and planted the first church in the area. Amazingly, they have planted church after church, and something like forty churches are now under their leadership. If you look at Paul, Barnabas, and Timothy in the book of Acts and wonder what they might look like in the twenty-first century, I propose these three women are your answer. The predominant move of God in the world, missionally speaking, is Africa, where an estimated quarter of the 10 billion people on planet Earth will be by the year 2050.
Priscilla’s Precedent
We should not only tell the encouraging stories of these brave, church-planting women; we should pray for them. Pushback against women church planters and leaders still exists, as illustrated in their stories. Detractors say, “These stories are interesting, but practice should not drive our theology. Our theology should drive our practice.”
“Besides,” they go on, “there is no biblical precedent for women church planters who gathered their converts, cared for them as pastors, and taught apostolic doctrine.” But my response is: yes, there was—Priscilla in the New Testament. Although the references to Priscilla are scattered across the book of Acts and the writings and letters of Paul, when you piece all of that together, we actually know quite a lot about Priscilla. I call her the “pastor-teacher,” and she is the subject of Part II of this series.
[1] Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped him, but they doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” Matthew 28:16–20, NRSVUE.
[2] See The Face of Christianity? It’s an African Woman! for further discussion of this topic.
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash.
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