Series:  Marvelous Marriage, #2

February 11, 2007

WHO’S ON FIRST?

Ephesians 5:21-33

Chris P and Rob K: do part of Abbot and Costello’s comedy routine, “Who’s on First”

When we think about the roles of husbands and wives today, many couples feel like they are caught in the middle of this comedy routine. It’s so confusing.  In the Fifties, things were much clearer.  Most people felt like the tv show had it, “Father Knows Best”.  Who’s on first? Father was, of course.  Mother’s on second, and the kids are on third base. Everybody knew their role.  But since then, the sexual revolution and women’s liberation have come in full force, and now many husbands and wives are very confused as to what their role in the marriage is supposed to be.  This confusion has only been increased for Christians by many misguided sermons on the subject.  The culture is telling women they need to stand up for themselves, be independent, don’t let their husbands tell them what to do; while at the same time, the church is often telling women that they are to be submissive to their husbands and do whatever the husbands tell them.   What are husbands and wives to believe?  What are the biblical roles for each of them?  That’s what I’d like to explore with you a bit this morning. 

          The classic passage on roles in marriage is Ephesians 5, a section of Scripture that has often been mashed into the shape that the preacher wants it to be.  Let’s walk through this, and see if we can find out the mind of Christ on this important subject.  It will help you to have your Bible open as I go through this.

I.        Mutual Submission    Eph 5:21; 6:1-9

          Ephesians 5 begins in the middle of a section that started in 4:1, where Paul is urging his readers to live lives worthy of their calling as God’s people.  In 5:21, he begins a new sub-section under this same general heading.  The new section is on household relationships, and the thesis statement is, Ephes. 5:21, “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.”   That’s the general heading for everything that follows all the way through 6:9.  In this section, Paul deals with three different relationships that were commonly found in households in his day:  husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and slaves.  In each case, the guiding principle is what he said in 5:21—submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. 

          Let’s look at the second and third of these relational pairs first, and then we’ll come back to husbands and wives.

          Ephes. 6:1-4

    “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. [2] ‘Honor your father and mother’--which is the first commandment with a promise-- [3] ‘that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.’

    [4] Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.”

          OK, the principle is, submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.  What does that mean for children?  They are to honor and obey their parents.  But what does it mean for parents, specifically fathers, to submit to their children?  It means to treat them with gentleness, being careful not to exasperate them with unduly strict or unreasonable standards, to help them become godly young men and women by training them in the things of God. 

          The next relationship is slaves and masters, Ephes. 6:5-9

    “Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ. …

    [9] And masters, treat your slaves in the same way. Do not threaten them, since you know that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him.”

          It’s easy to see what it means for slaves to “submit…out of reverence for Christ”—they were to obey their masters, with sincerity of heart.  But notice that masters are commanded to treat their slaves “in the same way” – i.e., to submit to them out of reverence for Christ.  In this case, it means to treat them with fairness, and respect, not threatening them (so not beating them, either).  In Colossians Paul elaborates on this point to say that masters are to provide their slaves with what is fair and right (things like decent living conditions, adequate food, medical care, etc.) because the masters are to recognize that they have a master, too, the Lord Jesus.  So the general idea here is that masters (and we might transpose this into our current equivalent—employers) are to submit themselves to their employees in the sense of looking out for their welfare, coming under them to support them in their jobs.

          In both of these relationships, mutual submission seems to mean that each side is looking out for the best interests of the other.  It’s an attitude that says, “I submit myself to your good, your welfare.” 

          So now in that context, let’s go back and see what Paul has to say about the relationship between husbands and wives. 

II.       Wives   Eph 5:22-24, 33

          Ephes. 5:22-24, “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. [23] 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. [24] Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.” 

          Following the understanding of what it means to submit in the other two relationships we looked at, we can say that this means that a wife is supposed to submit herself to her husband’s good.  She is supposed to be looking out for his interests and welfare, not just her own.  Self-centeredness is an equal opportunity sin: women and men are equally guilty of it.  It takes different shapes, but we are all constantly tempted to see ourselves as the center of the universe.  The women’s magazines, and advertising targeted to women, are especially powerful forces that try to convince women to put themselves first.  God’s plan is exactly the opposite of that – life is not about you.  It is looking out for the other person, putting your husband first.

          What does that look like?  It might mean you will forego that fancy dress or the day at the spa in order to get him something you know he wants.  Maybe you’ll rearrange your schedule so as to fix him his favorite meal sometime.  Even though you’d love it if he would take the initiative to plan a date, you will submit your desires and make the plans yourself.  It will look different for every couple, but the point is to put him first in your life, to come under him and support him and serve him in every way you can think of.  At the end of this paragraph, in v. 33, Paul summarizes it by saying that the wife is supposed to respect her husband. 

          But, some will insist, doesn’t it say that the wife is supposed to submit to her husband in the same way that the Church submits to Christ?  And doesn’t that imply some kind of authority and submission to that authority?  Yes, I think it does.  And here’s how I think it should look.  First, note that later in this passage, Paul reminds us that in marriage, the two become one flesh.  So there is a unity here that underlies however we interpret this.   And the controlling principle of this passage is v.21, submit to one another.

           In light of all that, my interpretation of what it means that the husband is head of the wife is that Paul is saying a two-headed monster is a monster.  Every organization needs one person who is ultimately responsible for the direction and conduct of that organization—someone we call the head.  The husband is to set the tone and direction of the family. So when it comes time to make a decision, a wife is responsible to make sure her husband knows everything she thinks about it, and how she feels about it; and the husband is responsible to make sure he asks about these things, as well as tell her his thoughts and feelings.  Then you work for a win-win, a decision that both can feel good about. 

          What if you can’t come to that?  Then ask whether you really have to make that decision now or not.  Can it be put off to a later time, and maybe by then one or both of you will change your perspective.  But if you have to make a decision, and you can’t agree, and you both fully understand the other’s position, then I think the husband should make the decision.  That’s what it means to be the head.  And the wife should go along with it cheerfully.  I think that in a healthy marriage, these situations are rare; usually, you can work toward a decision that you can both feel good about.  If the husband makes what turns out to be a bad decision, wives, you can’t gloat, “I told you so!”

          Now let’s look at what Paul has to say to the husbands.

III.          Husbands    

          It is significant that the instructions addressed to the husbands are three times longer than those addressed to the wives.  I wonder why that is, men?  Paul makes two main points.

          A.          Love your wife as Christ loved the church   Eph 5:25-27

                    In case we don’t remember what that looked like, he makes it very explicit:  “and gave Himself up for her.”  Christ’s love for the church was a submission of His rights, His desires, His wants and needs, even His life, for the benefit of the Church.  There is no question that Jesus Christ is Lord of the Church; He is the Head, the one with authority.  And yet, He sacrificed Himself for us.  That is the model for us husbands.  We are called to give up our wants and needs and desires and preferences, and even our rights, for the sake of our wives—to do whatever would be for their benefit. 

          Paul goes on to describe some more dimensions of Christ’s service for the Church, as models for us husbands:  Ephes. 5:25-27, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her [26] to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, [27] and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.” Christ’s goal was to make the Church beautiful, holy and blameless, so that we wouldn’t have any moral stains, or wrinkles, or blemishes.  He was looking out for our good, and what would be best for us, regardless of what it cost Him. 

          That’s the way we are to love our wives.  So, what’s best for your wife?  How can you make her more beautiful inside?  How can you nurture and bless her personality, and her character? How can you strengthen and support her spiritual growth so that she becomes the woman God intended for her to be? How can you foster her natural talents and interests? Notice, this is not by being critical and negative—it’s by sacrificing yourself for her, going out of your way for her, serving her, helping her, encouraging her, regardless of the cost to yourself. 

          The second analogy Paul gives us husbands is to love our wives the way we do our own bodies. 

          B.          Love your wife as you do your own body    Ephes. 5:28-31

                    Ephes. 5:28-31, “In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. [29] After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church-- [30] for we are members of his body. [31] ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.’”  Here’s a pretty obvious observation:  no one ever hated his own body.  We men may not fuss and preen over our bodies the way we think the women do sometimes, but we do what we think we need to to stay healthy and safe and strong.  We feed and care for our bodies—sometimes we feed them too much!  But very few mentally healthy men have ever starved themselves, or carelessly abused their bodies. 

          Well, Paul says, that’s the way Christ cares for and feeds the Church, which is His Body; and that’s the way we are supposed to care for our wives.  Because in God’s sight, we are one flesh with our wives. They are part of us.  When we care for them, we are caring for ourselves.  It is unbelievably short sighted for a man to squelch, dominate, abuse, denigrate, ignore or otherwise fail to nurture his wife, because if she is not all she is supposed to be, that inevitably pulls the husband down.  You can’t be everything you are supposed to be without a vibrant, healthy, spiritually strong woman at your side.  So do yourself a favor and feed and care for your wife, just as diligently as you do your own body. 

          One other way that men tend to come up short of this biblical directive is the opposite of the domineering, controlling male: it’s the passive, totally uninvolved husband.  This man may be so engrossed in his work that he just can’t seem to connect with his wife; or he may be a very passive personality, just letting life happen to him, rather than taking his God-ordained role as initiator. 

          Both of the analogies in this passage show that this kind of passivity is not what God wants from us men.  Christ certainly took the initiative to love the church.  He could have stayed in glory, where things were much better than they were here on earth.  But He got up off His heavenly couch, put down the remote, and went into a world of sinners who beat Him up and killed him, just so He could do what we needed and could not do for ourselves.

          The other analogy fits, too:  We may be somewhat passive about life in general, but we do tend to take the initiative to do whatever we have to for our own bodies: we wash; we dress; we take steps to nourish our bodies;  when we are hurt, we get medical care.  We don’t wait for somebody else to do these things for us, we take the initiative to care for our own bodies.  In just that way, we are to be sensitive to the needs of our wives, and take the initiative to meet those needs. 

          Men, here’s a challenging little exercise:  try to write down a half dozen needs that your wife has.  Where are her hurts?  Where are the things she is struggling with?  What are the concerns in her mind and heart?  What do you think she would say are her prayer requests?  Many men can’t come up with six needs their wives have.  If you can get to 10, you are a winner.  But then ask God to show you how you can be involved in meeting those needs.  If you got up off your duff, and took the initiative to meet some of your wife’s needs, without her ever telling you about them, that would be huge! 

          Now I want to address some of the ways Ephesians 5 has been misused in the church.

IV.          Misuse of Ephesians 5

          All too often, men have concluded that women, and especially their wives, are theirs to control or treat however they want.  These verses have been used like a club to keep women in a subjugated role.  Men, including some pastors, have claimed that this passage means the husband makes all the decisions.  You will sometimes hear teaching about the umbrella of authority, which is sometimes linked with protection.  But in practice, that may still mean that the husband can do whatever he wants, and the wife just has to take it.  In the worst cases, this has been used to justify abuse, which is so contrary to the spirit of the passage one wonders if they ever read it.  How can a husband justify abusing his wife when he is clearly commanded to love her as Christ loved the church and sacrificed Himself for her?  And he is commanded to nurture and provide for his wife as he would his own body!

          Wives are not doormats to be selfishly dominated by husbands.  What husband would want to treat his own body with that kind of disrespect?  Christ certainly doesn’t treat the Church that way. 

          Regardless of what a husband wants or demands, a Christian wife can’t give in to doctrinal error, or submit to a request to do something that is contrary to God’s will (Acts 5:29, “We must obey God rather than men!”) 

          Mutual submission calls us both to stop insisting on our rights, and to serve and support each other.   Husbands are to promote the well-being of their wives.  How can I help you succeed?  How can I help you become all you want to be?  And wives are to be asking the same question of their husbands.  

          So now we think we have a good handle on what the passage means and doesn’t mean.  How does that work out in practice?  Well, one of the big mistakes people make is to read the other person’s lines.  My advice to husbands and wives is:

V.      Read Your Own Lines

          Don’t be reading your partner’s lines, and then try to prompt them from the sidelines.  Wives, don’t tell your husband that his job is to lay his life down for you.  Husbands, don’t tell your wife that her job is to submit to you no matter what you say.   God has designed this relationship so that when we each play our own part, it works beautifully, but if we try to force our partner to play their part, it doesn’t work at all.

          If the wife is constantly bucking her husband’s authority, if she is constantly questioning his motives and his judgment, if she obviously does not respect him, then it makes it very hard for him to sacrifice himself for her.  If she demands that he lay down his life for her, it’s very hard to do.

          And if the husband is constantly putting his wife down, and telling her she needs to submit, and ordering her around, and trying to control her, that makes it almost impossible for her to willingly and cheerfully submit to his leadership or respect him. 

          But if we read our own lines, look how good it can be: Wives, if you knew that every fiber of your husband’s being was directed toward your welfare, to bless you, to help you become all you could be, to make you successful in life, wouldn’t that make it easy to follow his leadership? What woman would not want to follow the leadership of a man whose every decision was for her benefit? 

          And what man wouldn’t want to lay down his life for a woman who obviously was determined to do him good all her days, who willingly and cheerfully followed his lead, praised his decisions, and gave him respect in public and private? 

          So read your own lines.  Play your own part, and keep your nose out of your partner’s script. 

          Here’s a story I got from a friend that illustrates what it means to “submit to one another”. 

          Come with me to a third grade classroom..... There is a nine-year-old kid sitting at his desk and all of a  sudden, there is a puddle between his feet and the front of his pants are wet. He thinks his heart is going to stop because he cannot possibly imagine how this has happened. It's never happened before, and he knows that when the boys find out he will never hear the end of it. When the girls find out, they'll never speak to him again as long as he lives.  

          The boy believes his heart is going to stop; he puts his head down and prays this prayer, "Dear God, this  is an emergency! I need help now! Five minutes from now I'm dead meat."

          He looks up from his prayer and here comes the teacher with a look in her eyes that says he has been discovered.  As the teacher is walking toward him, a classmate named Susie is carrying a goldfish bowl that is filled with water. Susie trips in front of the teacher and inexplicably dumps the bowl of water in the boy's lap. The boy pretends to be angry, but all the while is saying to himself, "Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!"

          Now all of a sudden, instead of being the object of ridicule, the boy is the object of sympathy. The teacher rushes him downstairs and gives him gym shorts to put on while his pants dry out. All the other children are on their hands and knees cleaning up around his desk. The sympathy is wonderful. But as life would have it, the ridicule that should have been his has been transferred to someone else - Susie. She tries to help, but they tell her to get out. "You've done enough, you klutz!"

          Finally, at the end of the day, as they are waiting for the bus, the boy walks over to Susie and whispers,  "You did that on purpose, didn't you?" Susie whispers back, "I wet my pants once too. "