The Home as God Intended
Part 7 – Wives: Submit unto your Husbands
First Baptist Church of Tawas City Michigan
Rev. Bruce A. Shields
www.TawasBaptist.org
Welcome
Ephesians 5:22-24
“22 Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. 24Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.”
Prayer
Now I can’t find this in the Bible, but perhaps you’ve heard the story that before Eve was created, God was talking with Adam. He said, “You really need a helper, don’t you?” And Adam answered, “Yeah, I really do.”
So God said, “What if I make a woman? She’ll be perfect for you. She’ll be beautiful. She’ll rub your back at night, & your feet in the morning. She’ll plop grapes into your mouth. She’ll prepare all your favorite meals without fail. She’ll clean up the kitchen & take care of the kids. You’ll never have to do a thing, just sit around & be the king of your household.”
Adam said, “Boy, that sounds great, but how much is this going to cost?” God said, “Well, it’s pretty expensive. It will cost you an arm & a leg.” Adam thought for a moment & then asked, “How much can I get for a rib?”
We’ve talked over the past few weeks about the house and the way God intends it to be, focusing on the men’s responsibilities and the importance of their spiritual leadership in the home.
We need to keep in mind today that we do not want to take the scripture we just read out of context.
We need to remember that it is our responsibility to ensure that we are living up to God’s expectations of us, not our spouses.
The scripture we just read is for women. Not for men to pull out of their pocket like ammunition when needed.
Men, if you feel your wives are not living up to your expectations, first realize they only have to live up to God’s expectations, second, read;
Ephesians 5:25-33 this is for the men.
If each of us build our relationship with Christ and examine ourselves to ensure that we are living up to God’s expectations, then our spouses will always be satisfied.
Most problems in relationships are REACTIONS to improper actions.
But if men do what God calls them to do, and women do what God calls them to do, they will both be satisfied with the other.
God gave Adam a partner, not a slave.
Not a servant, but someone who would share the responsibility.
Had Adam been meant to rule over his wife from creation then it would not have been necessary to have stated in Eve’s punishment in Genesis 3 “and he will rule over you.”
It was from this punishment that the original Hebrew family structure took their order.
1) husband
2) wife
3) male child
4) female child
5) slave
Although this was the structure, male and female were considered equal by Jewish law.
In Exodus 21 the law was set down concerning personal injury and death. If a person was injured or killed the punishment was the same regardless if they were male or female.
If a slave was injured or killed the death penalty was not required, instead there was a financial punishment.
So slaves were regarded less than everyone else.
But within the context of the law women and men were equal.
In many cultures of the day though, women were no better than slaves.
Demosthenes (384 BC – 322 BC) is generally considered the greatest of all Ancient Greek orators. His writings provide an insight into the life and culture of Athens at this period of time.
He stated “We have courtseans for the sake of pleasure, we have concubines for the sake of daily cohabitation and we have wives for the purpose of having children legitimately.”
We need to eradicate this way of thinking if we are to live godly lives.
In the Greek culture there was no place for a wife.
Xenophon (In Greek Îåíïöῶí, c. 427-355 BCE) was a soldier, mercenary and Athenian student of Socrates and is known for his writings on the history of his own times, the sayings of Socrates, and the life of Greece.
Xenophon wrote about women, “Let her live that she might see as little as possible, hear as little as possible and ask as little as possible.”
Within Greek thinking of the day, the wife’s role was to run the home and care for legitimate children, but the husbands pleasure and companionship were found elsewhere.
They were treated as slaves in their own homes.
Are we allowing this thinking in our church today?
The Roman view of wives was just as enlightening.
Senneca the Roman historian wrote, “Women are married to be divorced.”
Under Roman law a wife had no legal rights and no legal resource.
Everything she was depended on her husband.
How many in our society today enslave their wives in this same manner?
We need to change this ungodly behavior.
This ungodly way of thinking.
The Hebrew culture had its problems as well. By the time Christ arrived on the scene, divorce was rampant.
Mostly because of interpretation of scripture.
Deuteronomy 24:1 pretty much made divorce as easy as writing a dear John letter.
Deuteronomy 24:1
“If a man marries a woman who becomes displeasing to him because he finds something indecent about her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, gives it to her and sends her from his house,”
Conservative Rabbi’s at the time interpreted “something indecent” to mean adultery.
But the more liberal teachers said it could be anything from walking about with their heads uncovered to serving their husbands a spoiled dinner.
If you read in the King James it says “When a man taken a wife and married her, and it comes to pass that she finds no favor in his eyes…”
I’m sure there has been many a man who twists that to mean that if you find someone more attractive.
So, Hebrew men could pretty much divorce their wives for just about any reason.
Of course when Jesus came on the scene he straightened a lot of these things out.
We know it was not God’s intension for us to run around marrying and divorcing each other.
It’s God’s intension that marriage be a reflection of Christ’s relationship with the church.
Does Christ leave us? Of course not.
We are to be a living testament of Christ’s love for the church.
When Jesus came, His treatment of women was radical, especially for the time.
He had female followers!
He had female sponsors, women of wealth who supported his ministry.
He spoke to the women at the well.
He had supper at Mary and Martha’s.
And let’s not forget the acceptance of Mary Magdalene.
Notice what Paul doesn’t say here in Ephesians: he doesn’t use the word “obey,” which he does use for children and slaves.
That word is stronger, there isn’t the same idea of it being voluntary. Though it may be a small point, I believe it is significant and demonstrates that Paul recognizes that the marriage relationship is one of equality.
The last verse repeats the same point, but adds the words “in everything.”
This doesn’t mean in every little detail or every situation – obviously the wife is not to submit to sinful demands.
It does mean in every area of life – it is the idea that we don’t live separate lives as married people. We are to be one, as we see in verse 31, and that means being united in all areas.
So we see how many cultures and societies have taken advantage of women, treated them like slaves, and just been quite ungodly towards them.
Even Christ professing husbands have misused the scriptures for their own personal gain.
Is it any wonder women have a hard time submitting to their husbands?
Lets say you were on a plane with a dozen people, and the pilot fell ill or was incapacitated and there was no one flying the plane.
You know that if no one fly’s this plane you are all going to crash.
You only have so many options.
A) Pray that God restore the pilot to be the pilot you first got on the plane with.
B) Fly the plane yourself although you are not equipped to do so and just hope for the best.
C) Curse the unconscious pilot and pick another from the passengers.
This is how we treat our marriages.
When things get rough, and aren’t going good, and the pilots of our homes, the men, fail to fulfill their roles, we see women making these choices.
Some choose A) and pray for God to restore their husbands to be the men they started their journey with.
Some choose B) and take the leadership role of the house themselves, trying to fill the responsibilities that God has placed on the man, thinking “someone has to do it!”
Some choose C) cursing their husbands, divorcing them and trying again.
Sometimes they find themselves in the same predicament all over again because they were so focused on what their husbands were doing wrong, they never searched the scriptures to ensure that they were living up to God’s expectations of them.
This is why we cannot use the scriptures for ammunition attacking our mates.
These instructions are for guiding us, not pointing out what the other isn’t doing right.
So what is the problem?
There are two major problems we face trying to interpret this passage. First is history – this passage has been used by men to abuse women. It has been misinterpreted and misapplied to subjugate women and in an inappropriate exercise of power that has been in the best interests of the man instead of the woman – put simply, men have selfishly and greedily demanded submission based on this passage without regard for the woman, and completely ignoring the commands addressed at them.
Men are to love their wives as Christ loves the church. That means to have their best interest in mind, not your own.
The second problem is that we equate “headship” with inequality.
We interpret the phrase “the husband is head of the wife…” to somehow mean that the husband is more important, more special, and somehow more valuable because he is “the head.”
This is the problem we have with the hierarchical terminology.
But there is no notion of inequality here. In fact, Paul addressing women directly as free moral beings demonstrates this and was radically countercultural for his day – his culture would have expected him to only address the men and tell them how to demand submission from their wives, which Paul never does.
Let me extend the analogy a bit and say that if the husband is the “head,” I think the wife is the “heart”: and you can be brain-dead and still technically alive… The point is that both are essential.
And remember that the word “submit” means to do so voluntarily, to choose.
Expectations are laid out for both partners. The key verse reminds us that “the two become one.” So regardless of how we interpret the rest, let’s be clear that we are not talking about inequality.
If you still are not convinced that the original Greek word we have translated as “submit” does not mean unequal, consider this: the same word is used of Jesus’ relationship to his parents in Luke 2:51, where it is translated “was obedient to them.” Does this mean Jesus was inferior to His parents?
It is again in 1 Cor. 15:28 where it says Jesus will “be made subject to” (same word) the Father – does this mean Jesus is inferior or not equal to God the Father?
Of course not. And neither does it mean that in Ephesians, despite what we think of when we hear the word “submit.”
But for me, the things that are most convincing are vs. 25 and verse 31. I understand “the two shall become one” as the most important factor and command, and so in my marriage this means that we must be united on the decisions we make – and if either one of us is uncomfortable with it we talk about it more.
Sometimes it means we come to a different decision, other times it means one of us voluntarily gives in – or “submits” – to the desire of the other.
But the point for me is that we must be one.
The second key factor for me is vs. 25, the command to love my wife as much as Christ loved the church, even giving self up for her.
If I am serious about living this, then I don’t find myself in a situation of “demanding submission” to my will.
My goal instead is to love my wife so much that she is free to make choices and to feel supported and accepted and understood. Now of course I don’t always succeed, but that is my goal. Does this mean I am not “the head?” No. The Bible says I am, so I must be.
What it means is that as the head I have decided that my wife will be an equal partner and that we will jointly decide things together.
In that way, I believe we come to a point of submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
We know that men do not always say what they mean.
When a man says ’’IT WOULD TAKE TOO LONG TO EXPLAIN"
He means: "I have no idea how it works"
When a man says "TAKE A BREAK HONEY. YOU ARE WORKING TOO HARD’’
He means: "I can’t hear the game over the vacuum cleaner"
When a man says ’OH, DON’T FUSS, I JUST CUT MYSELF. IT’S NO BIG DEAL"
He means: "I have actually severed a limb, but I will bleed to death before I admit I’m hurt"
When a man says "I’M NOT LOST. I KNOW EXACTLY WHERE WE ARE.’’
He means: "No one will ever see us alive again."
Great Reasons to be a Guy
• Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat.
• You can kill your own food.
• Three pairs of shoes are way more than enough.
• You can quietly watch a game with your buddy for hours without ever thinking, "He must be mad at me."
• Wedding dress: $2,000. Tuxedo rental: $75.
• If another guy shows up at the party in the same outfit, you just might become life-long friends.
• The same hairstyle lasts for years, maybe decades.
• One wallet, one pair of shoes, one color, all seasons.
So let’s ask ourselves a couple of questions.
First a question of logic: if husbands were loving wives like Christ loved the church, would submission by wives be an issue?
Second a more pointed question to wives: do you “voluntarily give in and cooperate” with your husbands?
Finally a pointed question to husbands: do you love your wife like Christ, to the point of complete sacrifice of self – and perhaps more importantly, does your wife feel and know that you love her that much?
CLOSING
