Are Women Allowed to Be Deaconesses, Ushers or Bishops in the Church?
1) Direct answer
No. Women are not to serve as bishops or deacons, and “deaconess” as an office over the church is not Scriptural. Ushers are not a Bible office, but the work of keeping order and directing the assembly belongs under the deacons’ oversight and should be handled by qualified men. Sisters may serve in helps that do not place them in authority over men.
2) Scriptural explanation
- The Bible says, “I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man; but to be in silence” (1 Timothy 2:11–12). Church offices carry authority over men; therefore they are not given to women.
- For a bishop/elder: “A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife… one that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection” (1 Timothy 3:1–5; Titus 1:5–9). That language fixes the office to a man.
- For deacons: “Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well” (1 Timothy 3:8–13). Again, male headship is required.
- The church chose “seven men of honest report” to serve the tables and keep the order of the work (Acts 6:3). That’s the pattern for deacon-type service.
- In the assembly, “Let your women keep silence in the churches” (1 Corinthians 14:34–35). That forbids public authoritative leadership over men in worship.
3) Simple clarifying logic
- Now notice: a bishop must be the husband of one wife and must rule his house. How could that be a woman? It cannot.
- A deacon must rule his house and be a husband of one wife. That sets the office to a man.
- Ushers function under the deacons to keep order and direct the congregation. Since Scripture assigns that kind of oversight to men, ushering in the sanctuary ought to be carried by men as part of that deacon-led service.
- This does not make women secondary in value, but it keeps God’s order. Sisters are called to powerful ministry in their God-given sphere: prayer, testimony, music, hospitality, visiting the sick, helping the needy, teaching children, and older women teaching younger women (Titus 2:3–5)—all without exercising authority over men.
4) Reinforcing statement
It’s not culture; it’s Bible order. One God set one pattern: male headship in church offices, with women richly active in every good work that does not place them over men.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
Contending for the Faith
56-0200 §14
I landed in Bombay, India, where I had the largest crowd of five hundred thousand people. The largest crowd I ever preached to at one time in my life was in Bombay. When I met there, here come the bishop of the Methodist church, and many of the great churches, there come the archbishop, the Hindu, Hinduist church there, and many other of the great outstanding churches. They met me out there where thousands of people come to the airport. And when they come... And they put me up to the Taj Hotel, and they met in a ro...
Hear ye Him
59-0424E §35
And this boy, when he was born, he was a son. But then, the father would go out and find the best tutor, or raiser that he could find for this child, to educate it. He wanted his son to be brought up in the very best of school that could be. And then this tutor brought the father word all the time how his son was progressing. Notice, how typical that is of God. When we were borned into the household of God, God searched the heavens to find the best teacher He could find for His church. That wasn't the bishop or an...
Church Ages, part 7: The Sardisean Church Age
60-1209 §29
...e Christian church ... they was the Christian church. They are the denominational Christian church. But the true Pentecostals was pressed out, killed, and murdered, and put to death by the popes and bishops, and so forth ---bloody as it could be. Now some day that's going to cost me my life, see, to say that. But that's one thing sure, I know which way I'm headed. Just keeps dripping with blood. But it's getting the hour now where you see, according to what's going on in the nation, that it isn't going to be long....
The Baptism of the Holy Spirit
58-0928M §75
I went to a place not long ago, to a certain man coming here writing a thesis on divine healing, and he said, "The only thing about you, Brother Branham," said, "the people hold it against you because you go to the Pentecostals." I said, "Well, I'll come to yours," I said, "if you'll support me in your city." He said, "Well," said, "I done took that up." Said, "I took it to the bishop"---of this certain church. (Methodist church, no need of pulling any punches about it.) Said, "I took it up, and they said, 'Now you...
Father, the hour has come
56-1002A §41
There, notice, but what we got off is on our theology. Oh, my. "You know, Dr. So-and-so, he's such a classic man. Oh, do you know he speaks in two or three different languages. He does all this, that, and the other. You know what? He pastored the great so-and-so church one time." Now, isn't that something. "Oh, you ought to hear how he says, 'Ah-men.' It's the most beautiful." I read a piece in the paper the other day, about that long, where it said that a certain bishop of a certain church, prayed the prettiest pr...