Submission is Not a Sign of Second Class

The fall and the curse made the home a battleground. But, Jesus Christ reverses the curse in our homes if we are willing to follow His commands. And the command to the wife was this: Ephesians 5:22, "Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord." But isn't that too much to ask? Doesn't that command to submit make her a second class citizen in her own home? Not at all. Not in God's plan. Today, we will look at the equality within creation of the man and the woman. Next time, we will look at the command to all of us to be submissive to one another, and following that, at the command to the husband to love his wife as Christ loved the church.

We have made the point before that the family was deliberately modeled after the Trinity in that there is voluntary submission between equals. 1st Corinthians 11:3 stated, "I want you to know that the head of every man is Christ, the head of woman is man, and the head of Christ is God." Because Jesus submits to the Father doesn't mean He is less in essence or worth. He is still fully God. Likewise, a wife voluntarily submitting to her husband's leadership doesn't make her in any way inferior.

Even creation itself teaches us that. If we read through the Genesis account of creation, we see that creation is progressive. Each new stage of creation is better than the one before. At first, as it says in Genesis 1:2, the world was "without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep." God started with nothing, with emptiness. Then God began to create the raw materials and began to arrange them progressively into things of beauty. Like an artist progressively adding the layers of paint to a canvas, God progressively added to his creation. Quoting John Eldridege from his book, Wild at Heart:

"Light and dark, land and sea, earth and sky. With a word, the whole floral kingdom adorns the earth. Sun, moon and stars fill the sky. Surely and certainly His work expresses greater detail and definition. Next came fish and fowl, porpoises and red tail hawks. The wild animals are next, all of those amazing creatures. A trout is a wonderful creature, but a horse is truly magnificent. Can you hear the crescendo starting to swell, like a great symphony building and surging higher and higher? Then comes Adam, the triumph of God's handiwork. It is not to any member of the animal kingdom that God says, 'You are my very image, the icon of my likeness.' And yet, there is one more finishing touch. There is Eve."

Yes, there is Eve, the pinnacle of God's creation. As one woman pointed out, "Of course, God created Adam first. Every artist makes a rough draft before starting on the masterpiece." Eve was truly God's masterpiece. Any young man courting the girl of his dreams would agree.

So yes, God created us equal. but God also created us different, with different roles and for different purposes. Therefore, we are intended to function differently within the home. In Genesis 62:11-12 it says, "One thing God has spoken, two things have I heard; that You, O God, are strong, and that You, O lord, are loving. N.I.V." God is strong and God is loving.

God has two sides to His character, two aspects. He is strong. He can create with a word. He controls the wind and the waves. God is a fierce warrior, defending and protecting Israel. This is what it says in Isaiah 63:1-4 about Christ at his Second Coming:

"Who is this who comes from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah, this one who is glorious in His apparel, traveling in the greatness of His strength? - 'I who speak in righteousness, mighty to save' - Why is your apparel red, and your garments like one who treads the wine press? - 'I have trodden the wine press alone, and from the peoples no one was with Me. For I have trodden them in my anger, and trampled them in my fury; their blood is sprinkled upon My garments, and I have stained My robes.'"

Yes, God is a mighty warrior! God is strong! And the man was created to reflect that.

But God is also loving. He is gentle and tender, like a mother hen caring for her chicks. Looking over Jerusalem, Jesus said this in Matthew 23:37, "O, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing." Yes, God is tender, loving, and merciful, as Jesus was to the Samaritan woman at the well or to the woman caught in adultery. The woman was created to reflect that tender and nurturing side of God.

To rightly show forth God's image, it takes both the man and the woman - the man to be strong and the woman to be tender. Now certainly every good man will have a tender side, and every good woman will have strength. But a man can't only be tender and be all that a man should be. Nor can a woman be only strong. These differences are built into us at creation. The husband is designed specifically by God to be strong so he can protect his family, even if it cost his life, and to work to support his family, providing food, clothes, and shelter for them. And the man is to be strong as the spiritual leader within the home. The woman was designed by God to embody the beauty, the mystery, and the tenderness of God. The woman was designed to show the nurturing side of God by bearing and suckling her babies, and to lovingly respond to her husband. And as such, she gives the man someone to protect, defend, and to lead. she becomes the one for the man to give his life in service to.

It is within this relationship that God asks the wife to submit - the two equals each fulfilling their role within the home and each serving the other.