Hello All,
(Just a general disclaimer that I must insert here at the beginning. I am but a lay person, like most of you. And these weekly “thoughts” are but my own. Not the definitive word on this or any topic. Just my own conclusions derived from my own study and faith in God. The greatest hope I have for these weekly “thoughts” is to have them be a springboard for further study on your part. Not to be a weekly treatise to be blindly accepted. So, please read them with this intent, this motive in mind).
This week’s lesson from the “Adult Sabbath School Bible Study Guide”, is titled “Living wisely”. On Sunday's lesson, a good question is asked. "Paul also invites Christian wives to submit to "your own husbands as to the Lord.... does he mean a wife is to submit to her husband as though he were Christ..."? An excellent question, indeed. As the quarterly goes on to state in Sunday's lesson, "This verse should not be interpreted to allow any form of domestic abuse". True. So, what does it mean?
The Phillips translation of this can help us. "You wives must learn to adapt yourselves to your husbands, as you submit yourselves to the Lord, for the husband is the “head” of the wife in the same way that Christ is head of the Church and Savior of the body. The willing subjection of the Church to Christ should be reproduced in the submission of wives to their husbands. You wives must learn to adapt yourselves to your husbands, as you submit yourselves to the Lord, for the husband is the “head” of the wife in the same way that Christ is head of the Church and Savior of the body. The willing subjection of the Church to Christ should be reproduced in the submission of wives to their husbands".
How is the church in subjection to Christ? Forced (choose Christ or you will burn in the fires of hell)? Coerced (choose Christ or He will kill you)? Or voluntarily because you are so wonderfully loved? Christ wants no compelled relationship. He only wants love, freely and willingly offered. And this is a clue. The submissive love Paul is talking about is never to be a burden or an obligation (horrors!!). It is a wonderful and deliberate choice, because it is desired. It is wanted. And so, with wives and husbands.
We worship God and submit to Him because He is worthy of such worship and submission. And so, with wives and husbands, too. Wives are to submit because in the husband is found a love for them like Christ's love. Therefore, Paul's council to husbands is for each to love as Christ loves. A wonderful love-arrangement, straight from our loving God.
We all know that love is.... surrender. The surrender of your heart to the sovereignty of love. Paul would not have women submit to husbands, merely because He tells them to submit. He would not have husbands love their wives, merely because He tells them to submit. Surrender is volitional. It is not a sullen acquiescence to a hostile take-over.
In the Genesis account pre-fall, the holy pair were “one” (Genesis 2:24). There was no talk about submission. This talk came about after the fall. Remember, that all God put in-place after the fall is “for your sake” (Genesis 3:17). For their good… and for our good today, too. The “school” outside of the “Garden” would prove to be a dangerous place. A place where distrust of God would yield its deadly fruit. A place necessary for the redemption of mankind, to be sure. But a dangerous place, nonetheless. Women being less strong then men… women being the bearer and protector of babies and children… women being preyed upon by unscrupulous men… women would need to be protected. Recognizing this need, God placed the woman under the protection and nurturing support from the man. And placed the responsibility for this upon the man for the sake of the woman. A mutual submission by both man and woman to God’s will in this matter. A necessary mutual obligation for the good of both. Not the ideal. That ideal was seen in the pre-fall “Garden”. Man and woman being “one”. But after the fall, rules would need to be put in-place for the protection and good of all.
Does this understanding help? Satan has been most adept at getting us to believe that God’s rules hinder our freedom… inhibit us from the “good life”. That it enables men to “lord it” over women. Satan has us seeing things backward. God’s rules in this world of sin are for our good, not our ill. And so, the counsel given in Ephesians for man and woman is for our good, too. Sinful man does not want to be responsible. They want to live for self. Sinful woman does not want to be submissive to men. They, too, want to live for self. Yet God’s rules put a hedge around us… for our good. And praise His name for it!
With brotherly love, Jim