Journal: Priscilla Papers
Volume: PP 39:2 (Spring 2025)
Article: The Extraordinary History Of The Extraordinary Call
Author: Joan Brown

PP 39:2 (Spring 2025) p. 6

The Extraordinary History Of The Extraordinary Call

Joan Brown

Joan Brown’s journey with biblical equality began when she helped found the Albany, New York, chapter of the Evangelical Women’s Caucus and then later followed Catherine Kroeger into Christians for Biblical Equality. Joan taught high school and college level history, and now teaches English to international refugees in St. Louis, Missouri.

In June of 1771, John Wesley commissioned Sarah Crosby (1729–1804) as the first female lay preacher in the Methodist connection. He recognized something in Crosby that he identified as “an extraordinary call.” (Before his death in 1791, Wesley recognized forty-one such women.) Prior to Crosby’s appointment as a lay preacher, Wesley had received a letter from one of her ministry partners, Mary Bosanquet. Mary Bosanquet (1739–1815), Sarah Crosby, and Sarah Ryan (1724–1768) had been leading small group gatherings for spiritual growth called “class meetings” and, as women, had received some criticism for it.1

In her letter to Wesley, Bosanquet says her critics often referred to Paul’s words in 1 Timothy 2:12: “A woman ought not to teach or take authority over a man.” She agrees that a woman ought not to take authority over her husband. But Scripture does not teach that “she shall not entreat sinners to come to Jesus, nor say, come and I will show you what God has done for my soul.” She goes on to say that not every woman—or man—was called to preach, but “some have an extraordinary call to it, and woe to them if they do not obey.”2

In the article just cited, it is implied that Mary Bosanquet introduced John Wesley to the idea of the extraordinary call. However, in his Explanatory Notes on 1 Timothy 2:12–14, first published in 1755, Wesley writes: “Let your women be silent in the churches—Unless they are under extraordinary impulse [italics added] of the Spirit. For in other cases, it is not permitted for them to speak—by way of teaching in public assemblies.”3 For this reason, some have suggested that it was Wesley himself who created this terminology in order to “interpret and adapt” Paul’s restrictions on female leadership to his particular needs.4 In reality, neither Bosanquet nor Wesley invented the extraordinary call. It has a much older lineage.

History Of The Term

Its Protestant usage dates back to John Calvin in the sixteenth century. (In his...