Jesus Changed Everything for Women

This post is based on a recent sermon: “Isn’t Christianity bad for women?”

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“Christianity is oppressive to women.”

I’m sure you’ve heard that before. It’s not a new accusation. It’s been around for a long time.

But Christians are used to being mocked in this regard. In fact, it used to come from the opposite direction.

One of Christianity’s fiercest early critics, a Greek philosopher named Celsus, mocked believers by saying they could only convince “slaves, women, and little children.”

He wasn’t completely wrong. From the very beginning, Christianity was known for welcoming and honoring women. And according to sociologist Rodney Stark, by the second century as much as 2/3 of the Christian community was made up of women.

But that should make us pause.

When you look carefully at the ancient world into which Jesus was born, you quickly discover that it was not kind to women. Women were legally subordinate to male guardians. Marital fidelity was enforced unequally. Infant exposure—especially of baby girls—was common. Assault against a woman was often treated as a property crime against her father or husband, rather than a fundamental violation of her personhood.

That’s the world Jesus stepped into.

He welcomed women. He spoke to them publicly. He received support from them. He allowed them to sit at His feet as disciples. He entrusted them with the first announcement of the resurrection.

That was not normal. That was REVOLUTIONARY.

But here’s what’s even more important: Jesus didn’t invent a new view of women. He just applied the teaching of the very first pages of Scripture.

Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created man in his own image… male and female he created them.”

Both men and women fully bear the image of God.

That means dignity does not come from status. It does not come from strength. It does not come from cultural power. Dignity comes from being made by God and for God.

This is why Christianity insists that women are not property. Not disposable. Not secondary. Not spiritually inferior.

The Apostle Paul puts it this way in Galatians 3:28: “… there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

In Christ, men and women share the same salvation. The same Spirit. The same inheritance. The same access to God. In other words, there is no VIP section at the foot of the cross.

That idea was radical in the first century.

It still is.

But Christianity doesn’t stop at equality. It also affirms distinction.

Our culture says men and women can’t be equal unless they’re interchangeable. The Bible says different.

From the beginning, God designed men and women with equal dignity and distinct callings. Equal image-bearers. Distinct roles. Equal worth. Complementary strengths.

Equality does not erase difference. And difference does not diminish value.

The gospel envisions radical equality and enduring distinctions.

That’s why husbands are commanded to love their wives as Christ loved the church—sacrificially, selflessly, and with tender strength. That’s why the New Testament is filled with women hosting churches, funding ministry, discipling believers, proclaiming truth, and advancing the kingdom.

Christianity did not sideline women. It elevated them.

Even today, many of the strongest advocates against the trafficking, exploitation, and abuse of women around the world are Christians motivated by the conviction that every woman bears the image of God.

So when someone asks, “Isn’t Christianity bad for women?” we should gently respond:

Compared to what?

Pound for pound, Christianity has done more than any other belief system in history to elevate the dignity of women—because Christianity begins with a God who made women in His image and a Savior who died to redeem them.

Jesus changed everything for women.

And He still does.