Love and Submission [Part 6]

Love and Submission...part 6

Now in that normative Christian environment some Christians decide to get married. Guess what they bring into their marriage? Christian attitudes. And what are Christian attitudes? Loving and submitting! So how does it work out in a different culture? Well, it doesn't matter what the culture is; you'll find the same things are operative there. In the fullness of the Spirit, there will be loving and submitting and sacrificial giving to each other. And the wives, particularly, focus on the submitting, as the husbands particularly focus on the loving. You see the scissors need two sides or blades. So much then for the context of Paul's teaching on marriage!

Let's look at the content of Paul's teaching on marriage. Notice again that in 5:22, "Wives, submit to your husbands," is not what it says. What it actually says is, "Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.” Now, why do I stress that? When the women who are sitting in the Church in Ephesus discover that Paul is actually addressing them, they can't believe that for a start off. "Wow! He thinks we are smart enough to understand what he's talking about." They never did that to us before! They just parked us in a corner, and we just sat and chatted. All the men did all the religious stuff, now he's actually writing to us! It's wonderful!

But you know what he just said? He said, "Wives, submit!" They said, "Nothing 'new' there! That's what we've always done, never had any options!" I mean, this guy runs our household. "Boy, if you stepped out of line, you were in big trouble!" No, big difference here! "Wives, submit!" He didn't say, "Wives, submit to your husbands. He said, "Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord." And their ears pricked up with that. He said, "Submit to your husbands as to the Lord!" Does Paul think my husband looks like the Lord? No woman has ever confused her husband and the Lord! It has never ever happened!

No, what does it mean then? What it means is this: Wives, you don't submit to your husbands ? this is to women in the Greco-Roman culture ? because he's an old tyrant and you've no option. You now submit to your husband, because by the way that you respond to your husband, you are indicating your attitude to the Lord.

How in the world can that happen? Because he is the husband, he's been given in the divine economy certain responsibilities in the marriage and the family. As he has been given these responsibilities, as you respond to him fulfilling those responsibilities, you are actually responding to the One who made him responsible. So the wife now is not simply responding to a tyrant, because she has no option; she is now responding to somebody who, in his capacity as husband, has been invested with responsibility for which he is accountable to God. "Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord." That puts a different slant on it, doesn't it?