What Is Respect? Part 2: Marriage
This is the second post in a seven-part series; see part 1 here.
Review
In my last post in this series, I claimed that much of the confusion
and angst surrounding the issue of respect is because the terms are not often
qualified and different generations have different assumptions about respect.
Here, again, are my main proposals for working through each level of the respect pyramid. I argued for the first point in my first post in this series, and the last three I am working out as we move along in the study:
- All respect is ultimately for God
- Respect has three different forms or levels
- The different levels have different theological bases
- The different levels have different requirements
This study is beefy and will take some time, so I have extended my blog series on this subject from three posts to seven, so that each sub-category of submission will receive its own post. Here is an overview of the series:
- Introduction & Courtesy
- Submission, Part 1: Marriage [this post]
- Submission, Part 2: Parenting
- Submission, Part 3: Government
- Submission, Part 4: Workplace
- Submission, Part 5: Church
- Imitation & Conclusions
This post will cover the first
sub-category of submission: marriage. But first, a word on authority.
Submission: Respect for Authority
What is respect for authority? How does it differ from
respect for another person? Is respect for authority the same as respect for
our parents? Should we respect the government the same way we do our parents?
In the church, is respect for our pastors the same as respect for our parents
or the government? Questions abound, and in my experience they are often
discouraged, either because asking questions is itself seen as rebellious or
because the authorities lack good answers to the questions, both of which only
exacerbate confusion and angst.
As a side comment, many have cited the apparent epidemic of
young people who refuse to respect authority, but is this really surprising
when they hear their parents bash authorities at home, hear their spiritual
leaders bash the government, and hear all manner of reporters and elected
officials constantly bashing the president?
So, let's talk about submission. Maybe that word is
triggering for you – to be honest, it is for me as well – but my claim is that
often we are triggered not by God’s use of the word in Scripture, but by
people’s misuse and abuse of the word instead.
God as the Source of Authority
Before I can discuss submission, however, our current cultural climate demands that I first make a case for authority in general. Various threads of modern philosophy have led to the conclusion that authority is inherently corrupt and therefore should always be opposed, and therefore the goal of humanity is to eliminate all authority in pursuit of a utopia. Let me briefly outline some points in contradistinction to those claims.
- God himself is good and just, yet also the ultimate authority (Ps. 47:2, 7-8; 96:13).
- God, who is good and just, has established at least some human authorities (Dan. 2:21; John 19:11; Rom. 13:1).
- Rejection of authority as a whole is a rejection of God’s design for the world (Rom. 13:2; Tit. 3:1; 1 Pet. 2:13-17).
- Eternity will look like perfectly following the perfect authority: Jesus Christ (Rev. 11:15).
While the Scriptures referenced above do not deal with each
specific category I will cover, they do establish a basic principle: authority,
while it can be abused, is not inherently evil but rather is part of God’s
intended design for the world. In fact, this design predates the Fall, for
God created humanity to have authority over the earth, ruling it as his
mediators (Gen. 1:26-30).
To tie this all together, then, the basis of submission is God himself. What do I mean by that?
- God created everything – This means that everything belongs to God, everything exists for God’s glory, and every person owes God full obedience (1 Ch. 29:11).
- God grants authority to his creation - This means that no human being intrinsically deserves submission. It comes from God; it's not about people's worth, it's about God commanding us to submit to that person. We must honor God's appointment (see number 2 above for Scriptures).
On that basis, let us move forward.
A Framework for the Study
As a framework for how I will work through this study, let
be briefly present four passages that provide the principles I will analyze in
each sub-category of submission.
Romans 13:1-2 – This passage tells us the broad
principle that all authority is established by God, and therefore those under
that authority must submit to it. Why? Because rejecting that God-established authority
is indirectly rejecting God’s authority. This truth is also found elsewhere in
Scripture (Dan. 2:21; John 19:11). Principle: All authority is God’s
authority.
Genesis 1:26-30 – This may seem like an odd passage
to reference with regard to authority, but bear with me. The first chapter of
the Bible explains that God created human beings in his image – the imago Dei
– for the purpose of ruling creation in his stead. As I mentioned in my last
post in this series, I frequently refer to this fact as “the forgotten doctrine,”
and here is another place it pops up in our study: since we are images of God
meant to rule in his stead, then how we use our God-given authority makes a
claim about who God is. Every time we use authority, we are saying implicitly, “This
is what God is like,” and so every human act either glorifies God by
proclaiming what is true about him or blasphemes God by proclaiming what is not
true about him. Principle: Our use of authority makes claims about God.
Matthew 20:25-28 – In this passage, Christ tells the
disciples that, although the leaders of pagan nations selfishly abuse their
authority, his followers should not act in that way. Instead, Jesus presents a
radical model of leadership: if you want to be great, then serve – that's what
Christ did. In truth, servant leadership is redundant, because Jesus clarifies
that to lead is to serve; anything else is tyrannical abuse of his power for selfish
ends instead of accomplishing God’s purposes, which is where the next passage
comes in. Principle: All leadership should be servant leadership.
1 Timothy 2:1-3 – What is the point of authority? We
will see this played out in each sub-category of submission, but this passage
presents a broad principle in the specific context of governments. Paul tells
believers to pray that the government would do its job and leave us alone so we
can follow God. The point of government: to keep people from killing and
harming each other so people can get saved and follow God without interference.
Principle: The goal of authority is to encourage godly living.
1 Peter 2:13-15 – This last passage helps us to define that trigger word: submission. This word is often misused and even handled carelessly; it is frequently either left undefined or improperly defined. In Scripture, submission is a generic term for living out your position in a God-designed hierarchy. It is not a synonym for obedience. There are some hierarchies in which submission involves obedience, but that does not translate to “submission = obedience.” It means recognize your position in the hierarchy and act accordingly. While some have taken Ephesians 5:21 to mean that all believers submit themselves to all other believers in deference, that is not the most natural reading of this verse. The Greek word for "submission" (hypotassÅ) refers to an authority structure; it is nonsensical to say that two people should each treat the other as the authority. Rather, the verse means that all in the church body who are under authority (wives, children, slaves) must submit to their God-established authorities (husbands, parents, masters) [1]. In this study, I will examine what submission means for each sub-category. Principle: Submission is living out your position before God.
There are five hierarchies that God has established: husbands and wives, parents and children, citizens and government, employers and employees, and pastors and congregants. To the first of these we now turn.
Submission Sub-Category 1: Marriage
Our use of authority makes claims about God – Ephesians
5:25 tells husbands: “love your wives as Christ loved the church.” I will speak
more on implications in the next section, but here let me stop and say
this: how a husband treats his wife is a constant declaration to her of how she
stands in God’s sight. Though she may be a believer and justified before Christ
through his blood, if a woman’s husband treats her as if she must gain his
favor through works, he will push her toward legalism; if his love for her is
fickle, he cause her to doubt the goodness and faithfulness of Christ’s love;
if he threatens to leave her, he leads her to doubt her eternal security in her
Savior; if he harms or abuses her, he makes her despair at the thought of a sovereign
Lord who would do likewise. And so he leads her to doubt, to despair, and
potentially even to blaspheme as his sinful treatment of his wife has made him
a false teacher. Husbands, your responsibility is great, for at stake is the very
glory of God! Yet this is not all that is required of us.
All leadership should be servant leadership – Again, Ephesians
5:25 sets the standard of love for husbands as the same as that of Christ for his church:
“husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for
her.” How did Christ love? He died! Let no man ever think that he can properly
lead his wife without first dying to himself. This is not something you can do
with a high view of yourself. At times we forget that marriage is not our
primary identity, and so when it comes to husbands and wives – especially if
both are believers – it is easy to forget that above and beyond these specific
stipulations for marriage, they are commanded to fulfill all the “one another”
commands given to fellow believers, not only to love, but also to serve, support, encourage, and esteem
each other as better [3]. In fact, in all hierarchies, Scripture puts the onus on the superior rank
rather than on the inferior: husbands are to “live with your wives in an
understanding way … so that your prayers may not be hindered” (1 Pet. 3:7) and “do
not be harsh with them” (Col. 3:19). Male headship should only be used for the
sake of the family's spiritual life and should be marked by service rather than
demands. For more thoughts on this, see my post Make Your
Wife Beautiful.
The goal of authority is godly living – The passage
does not stop there; the explicit purpose for which Christ died and which husbands
are commanded to imitate is: “that he might sanctify her [the church] … that
she [the church] should be holy” (Eph. 5:26-27). This is how husbands are
to love their wives: just like Christ loved the church by sacrificially dying
to make it holy, so too husbands should love their wives by sacrificially dying
to self to make their wives holy. The authority given to husbands in marriage
is the responsibility to lead their wives toward Christ, not a right for them
to flout for their own benefit. A much-overlooked aspect of the role of husbands
and fathers is that their leadership exists in part to model what godly submission
looks like as he submits to his own authorities, first to God, and then to government
and – if applicable – his employer. A sign of true biblical masculinity is submission. Conversely, a husband who revels in God’s forgiveness
when he is not willing to submit to authority, yet punishes any perceived
threats to his own leadership in the home, finds himself in the position of both
the man with the beam in his eye and the unforgiving servant (Mt. 6:3; 18:21-35); he should not expect to receive that forgiveness in which he revels. (Mt. 18:35).
Submission is living out your position before God – So, we have yet to answer the big question: what does it mean for wives to “submit to [their] husbands as unto the lord” (Eph. 5:22)? First, it is not unqualified. As with any authority, we do not follow sinful leaders into sin (Acts 5:29), which means that leadership which would harm or degrade a human being in God’s image – including the wife herself – must not be followed; to do so would be sin. Second, it does not mean obedience. You will look in vain through Scripture for a passage that commands wives to obey their husbands [4]; while the word “obey” is clearly used in Ephesians 5 for both children and servants, it is notably missing from the command to wives. They are to respect the position that God has given to their husbands and be willing to be led by them toward Christlikeness, but Scripture never says they must obey their husbands. God's expectation for marriage is that a couple will follow God together, discuss decisions together, and come to peaceful agreements together, because that's what Christians do. We don't argue to win, we don't fight dirty, and we don’t manipulate; we are kind, forgiving, willing to be defrauded, and willing to discuss and either agree or agree to disagree, yet we still get along because we are all in Christ and to do otherwise is to grieve the indwelling Holy Spirit (Mt. 5:39-42; Eph. 4:25-32; 1 Cor. 6:1-8). Nevertheless, this submission is to be “as to the Lord” (Eph. 5:22), meaning that submission to God-ordained authority is ultimately submission to God and his plan for creation.
Conclusion
This has been a plunge into the biblical teaching on submission in the realm of marriage, and yet it could be deeper still. As it stands, I had to rethink my plan to originally write three posts in this series so that I could adequately handle this first and the subsequent issues. I do not claim to be the final word or authority on these matters, but I have seen much harm done in the church through misuse of these passages relating to husbands and wives. Let us remember in our thinking about authority these five points, especially with regard to marriage:
- All authority is God’s authority
- Our use of authority makes claims about God
- All leadership should be servant leadership
- The goal of authority is godly living
- Submission is living out your position before God
I leave you, husbands, with a challenge from that famed orator of the early church, John Chrysostom, from his sermon on Ephesians 5:25-33:
“Take then thyself the same provident care for her, as Christ takes for the Church. Yea, even if it shall be needful for thee to give thy life for her, yea, and to be cut into pieces ten thousand times, yea, and to endure and undergo any suffering whatever, - refuse it not. Though thou shouldest undergo all this, yet wilt thou not, no, not even then, have done anything like Christ. For thou indeed art doing it for one to whom thou art already knit; but He for one who turned her back on Him and hated Him. In the same way then as He laid at His feet her who turned her back on Him, who hated, and spurned, and disdained Him, not by menaces, nor by violence, nor by terror, nor by anything else of the kind, but by his unwearied affection; so also do thou behave thyself toward thy wife. Yea, though thou see her looking down upon thee, and disdaining, and scorning thee, yet by thy great thoughtfulness for her, by affection, by kindness, thou wilt be able to lay her at thy feet. For there is nothing more powerful to sway than these bonds, and especially for husband and wife.”
[1] Benjamin Merkle, Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament: Ephesians, 177. In this study, I will examine what submission means for each sub-category. Principle: Submission is living out your position before God.
[2] The meaning of “source” is a rare and debated meaning for this word, mostly confined to speaking of the source of rivers. The major lexicons either do not mention it or list it only as a minor usage (see BDAG, BrillDAG, LSJ).
[3] Love (John 13:34-35; 15:12, 17; Rom. 12:10; 13:8; 1 Thess. 3:22; 4:9; 1 Pet. 1:22; 4:8; 1 John 3:11, 23; 4:7, 11, 12; 2 John 5); live in harmony (Rom. 12:16; 15:5, 7); edify, don’t sinfully judge/hinder (Rom. 14:13); greet (Rom. 16:16; 1 Cor. 16:20; 1 Pet. 4:14); care for (1 Cor. 12:25); serve (John 13:14; Gal. 5:13); bear burdens (Gal 6:1-5); bear with (Eph. 4:2; Col. 3:13); be kind (Eph. 4:32); value more than yourselves (Phil 2:3); encourage (1 Thess. 5:11); do good (1 Thess. 5:15); stir up to love and good works (Heb. 10:24); confess your sins (James 5:16); show hospitality (1 Pet. 4:9).
[4] The
closest we come is 1 Peter 3:6, which notes, “Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him
lord.” However, this is not a command but a description of specific Old
Testament events. And lest we forget, God explicitly tells Abraham to obey
Sarah in the matter of sending Ishmael away (Gen. 21:12).
All Scripture verses come from the ESV.
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