Written by As a leader in a large children’s ministry for several years, I was privy to what was going on in the lives of many families, and my bubble was burst as well as my heart broken. There were children in my church that I found out were being sexually abused by their father. Others were being crushed by divorce as we found out that one parent had been living in adultery. I was hit with about three of these situations within a few weeks of each other, and my spirit was grieved to the point that I began repenting daily for the condition of the church. How could Christians that I said “hi” to every Sunday go home during the week and sexually abuse their children or cheat on their spouses? How could the inside of my church look just like the world outside?
One morning, as I repented and prayed, I began to ask that the Lord would make His church “holy and without blemish.” This phrase kept coming up in my prayer: “holy and without blemish.” I knew it was in the Bible, but I felt I needed to understand the context of this verse more, as if the Lord was telling me the context of this verse is important to bringing about this holiness and spotlessness in the church. I did a quick search and found the verse and those that give it context:
- Would Jesus refuse to lay down His life for the church? Yet many husbands refuse to lay down their lives for their wives.
- Would Jesus refuse to pour out His love on the church? Yet many husbands do not help their wives to feel loved and do not understand it is their duty to do so.
- Would Jesus not wash the church with His gracious words of life? Yet many husbands cannot find these words for their wives.
- Should the church ask Jesus to follow it’s leading? Of course not! Yet many Christian wives feel they should be equal with their husbands in leadership of their home.
- Should the church treat Jesus with anger or disrespect because of His decisions? Neither should a Christian wife treat her husband with anger or disrespect when she doesn’t agree with his decisions (or ever, for that matter).
- Should the church joke and laugh about Jesus or talk bad about Him behind His back? Yet many Christian wives mock their husbands behind his back to other women.
Contained in these verses is a strategy that will both reveal Christ to the earth and purify the church: the biblical roles of men and women. These roles existed from the beginning and were part of God’s original good design. These roles did not result from the fall, as we see that Adam was created first and then Eve to be his helper. Adam was charged with the sin of disobedience, not Eve, because he was the leader in their relationship. Genesis 1 clearly defines that male and female are both created in God’s image, and we understand by taking the entirety of the Word that they are co-heirs of eternal life, equal in His grace, blessing, salvation, and the ability to receive gifts of the Spirit. Genesis 1 reflects on how men and women are the same. Genesis 2 clearly reveals that there exists differences between men and women when it comes to the roles they play in relationship to each other. Reading both Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 together is necessary for a complete understanding.
The Bible tells us that there is an order, both in the church and in marriage. I took my four-year-old daughter into a public restroom that had sink with a big sign taped across that read “Out of Order.” My daughter asked what the sign said, and I told her. She then asked what “out of order” means, and I explained in words she can understand: it means the sink is broken. “Out of order” equals broken. Suddenly, I was struck with the thought: when marriages and churches get out of Biblical order, they are essentially broken. We think of broken marriages as those which are getting divorces, or where adultery is taking place, or where pornography has a hold of a spouse. But in God’s ways, a broken marriage is one where the husband and wife are not walking in the roles of Biblical order. And when the marriages of a church are out of order – broken – the church is out of order. It is powerless, outside of God’s authority because it rebels against His ways. The enemy can have his way. The world then looks at the church, and we give no answer to its problems. We have the same divorce rate the world has. The world thinks, “Why be a Christian? They look just like us. What they say is different than how they live, and Christianity isn’t working any better than what I’m doing.”
How much meekness it takes for husbands and wives to accept these Biblical roles! Meekness has been defined as an active and deliberate acceptance of undesirable circumstances. I also see it as having power or rights, but choosing not to exert power or rights for my own honor in deference to someone else’s glory, good, or will. Meekness is not weakness, it is tamed strength. Our God is meek. Look at the way Jesus chose to come into the world: his first bed was an animal’s feeding trough! He chose that birth – God arranged those circumstances. He didn’t choose Mary and Joseph because they would end up in that place at that time. He chose them and then brought them to that lowly place so that His meekness would be revealed to the earth. He asks husbands and wives to be meek and walk in Biblical roles to reveal Himself to the earth. As a husband, I tell you it can be scary to accept responsibility for my family’s physical and spiritual needs and outcomes. I don’t want to lay down my life. It would be easier to be lazy and let my wife make all the decisions for our family – she is smarter than me after all! And I imagine the fear a wife might feel at the thought of submission – what if my husband abuses this authority, or makes decisions I don’t agree with?
God is not being mean to Christian women – He only has plans for their good. There is no darkness in Him, no evil intention to suppress women. He simply created men in a certain way and women in a certain way, with a plan to bless them and reveal Himself through them to the earth. And men and women will actually find the most happiness when they stop rebelling against the way they were created and embrace it. How can the clay say to the potter, “why did you make me this way?” It’s absurd to think the clay can even have a thought, let alone understand the potter’s thoughts. The thinking that we can possibly know better than God goes all the way back to Satan’s deception in the garden, when he convinced Eve that God was withholding something good from her. It is deception. The truth of God’s love – the supreme revelation that He loves me! – will set us free to embrace these Biblical roles. When I know how much He loves me, I will be able to walk in leading my family with full confidence – knowing that He can correct my wrong decisions. When a woman knows how much God loves her, she can walk in full submission, even to an unbelieving or evil husband, knowing that God can correct her husband and turn all situations around for her good. Husbands will stand before God and answer for how they led their wives. I imagine how it can be liberating for a woman to realize that she will not be responsible for her husband’s decisions, if she submits to them.
Let us look now to some Bible verses about the roles of Christian husbands and wives. Read the Word for yourself and let it be your guide. Don’t believe what I say or anyone else says unless you can find it in the Bible. I will break up verses by husbands’ responsibilities and wives’ responsibilities.
HUSBANDS
For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; Ephesians 5:23
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, Ephesians 5:25
sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, Ephesians 5:26
So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. Ephesians 5:28
For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church. Ephesians 5:29
Nevertheless let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself, Ephesians 5:33
Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered. 1 Peter 3:7
The heart of her husband safely trusts her; Proverbs 31:11
Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her, 1 Corinthians 7:3
The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. …. Do not deprive one another except with consent for a time, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. 1 Corinthians 7:4-5
And a husband is not to divorce his wife. 1 Corinthians 7:11
If any brother has a wife who does not believe, and she is willing to live with him, let him not divorce her. 1 Corinthians 7:12
Husbands, love your wives and do not be bitter toward them. Colossians 3:19
WIVES
Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. Ephesians 5:22
Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. Ephesians 5:24
and let the wife see that she respects her husband. Ephesians 5:33
Wives, likewise, be submissive to your own husbands, that even if some do not obey the word, they, without a word, may be won by the conduct of their wives, when they observe your chaste conduct accompanied by fear. 1 Peter 3:1,2
Do not let your adornment be merely outward—arranging the hair, wearing gold, or putting on fine apparel—rather let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God. For in this manner, in former times, the holy women who trusted in God also adorned themselves, being submissive to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord, whose daughters you are if you do good and are not afraid with any terror. 1 Peter 3:3-6
and likewise also the wife [render] to her husband [the affection due him]. 1 Corinthians 7:3
the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. Do not deprive one another except with consent for a time, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. 1 Corinthians 7:4-5
A wife is not to depart from her husband. But even if she does depart, let her remain unmarried or be reconciled to her husband. 1 Corinthians 7:10,11
And a woman who has a husband who does not believe, if he is willing to live with her, let her not divorce him. 1 Corinthians 7:13
wives must be reverent, not slanderers, temperate, faithful in all things. 1 Timothy 3:11
Let your women keep silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak; but they are to be submissive, as the law also says. And if they want to learn something, let them ask their own husbands at home; for it is shameful for women to speak in church. 1 Corinthians 14:34,35 (This verse is not a general rule that women can’t speak in church. Taken in context, this verse shows there is an order that must be followed, by both men and women, when it comes to prophesying and praying in church. This verse is about order and women being under the authority of their husbands.)
Wives, submit to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Colossians 3:18
to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be blasphemed. Titus 2:4,5
And my own paraphrase of Proverbs 31:10-31: does her husband good and not evil; willingly works with her hands; brings food from afar; rises while it is yet night and provides food for her household; uses the family’s resources to increase their resources; stays up late taking care of business; gives to the poor and needy; clothes herself with strength and honor; makes money for her family however she can; speaks wisdom and kindness is on her tongue; watches over the ways of her household; is not idle; fears the LORD.
AN INVITATION
My wife and I are choosing to obey God’s Word and walk in Biblical roles of marriage unto Christ’s relationship to the church and God’s glory being revealed in the earth. We invite the church to walk in this with us.
For more on the glory of choosing submission, see SUBMISSION SETS APART THE PEOPLE OF GOD.
STAY MARRIED. 