Leadership & Subjection

My husband, Ricardo, has been leading a class on Wednesday morning on Marriage Enrichment.  We are watching a video of a seminar given several years ago and then discussing what was taught in the video. We’ve been married 40 years (this month), so what could this class possibly teach us?  Plenty! Married couples get into a rut, get busy with other things/people, or get lazy and our marriages suffer for it. We all need a refresher course once in a while to get us back on tract.

The 5^th chapter of Ephesian should always be front and center in any marriage:

Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord.  For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.  Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. – Eph. 5:22-24

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her…husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself…each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. – Eph. 5:25, 28b, 33

One area where we may need a refresher is in our roles of leadership and subjection. These are not easy things to discuss in this day and age where the lines have become so blurred between the two that no one truly understands the distinction between them and, how they support, balance, and protect each other.

Learning and living our roles

Godly subjection and loving leadership demand that both the husband and the wife learn what their roles are in the marriage and how they are to go about living those roles.  This takes studying God’s Word to appreciate what our roles are and aren’t. First and foremost, we need to recognize that fulfilling these roles require sacrifice on the part of both husband and wife.  Selfishness has no place in a marriage. 

The Husband Proves Himself Loving

“Husbands, love your wives, and do not be embittered against them.”  - Col. 3:9

This verse doesn’t say, “Wives, see to it that your husband loves you and aren’t embittered against you.” Instead, it says, “Husbands, love your wives.” Likewise, God directs every other verse that deals with a husband loving his wife toward the husband, not the wife. (Eph. 5:23-33). God places the responsibility for a husband loving his wife upon the husband’s shoulders. A wife cannot make her husband love her.

In loving his wife, a man acts in her best interest. He guides, guards, listens to her needs and provides for her. He does this unselfishly without thought as to what’s in it for him. Even if his wife takes him for granted, God still expects the husband to continue sacrificing himself for her and acting in her best interest.

The Wife Proves Herself Submissive

 “In the same way, you wives, be submissive to your own husbands so that even if any of them are disobedient to the word they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives, as they behold you chaste and respectful behavior”  - I Pet. 3:1- 2

Many husbands falsely assume that they are to force their wives to be submissive, Yet the verse doesn’t say “Husbands, place your wives in subjection,” but “Wives, be subject to your own husband, In all the commands concerning subjection, God tells the wife to submit herself (Eph. 5:22; Tit. 2:4-5; Col. 3:18; I Pet. 3:6; and Gen. 3:16) Subjection being a freewill act on the wife’s part is probably the most misunderstood facet of subjection.

           

God gives the command to be submissive to the wife, just as the church is submissive to Christ, and He holds her, not the man, responsible for obeying it.  God nowhere gives men the authority to force subjection upon their wives, but consistently commands women to place themselves in a sphere of obedience. A woman is to submit to her husband because she fears God, not because she fears her husband.

In properly submitting to her husband, a wife acts in his best interest. She acknowledges his leadership (I Peter 3:6), encourages him to lead and looks to him for guidance, protection and sustenance while providing for his needs.

Requires Sacrifices

The husband gives himself up just as Christ gave Himself up for the church. (Eph. 5:25). Christ gave the supreme example for a loving husband by dying for His bride (the church). In this same manner, God expects a husband to deny himself to the point of giving up his life to preserve the life of his wife.

By fully submitting to her husband as God wills (I Peter 3:1-2), a wife may have to give up a career, her “rights”, independent nature, etc. She allows her husband to fulfill his role of leadership, respects his decisions, even when she may not agree with them, and follows his lead. She doesn’t take it upon herself to do the leading, even if she thinks he’s not doing his job.

Both husband and wife must make sacrifices for the marriage to work. This is not a 50/50 deal, it’s a 100/100 deal. All your effort needs to be directed towards making the marriage work. You can’t give yourself 50% to a marriage and expect it to last. It demands a full time, “all in it for the long run” effort. When both subjection and leadership is properly practiced, personal happiness and a successful marriage result.