“22 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. ”
“What you want, baby, I got it. What you need, do you know I got it? All I’m asking is for a little respect when you get home… R-E-S-P-E-C-T, find out what it means to me.” Aretha Franklin took that all the way to the top in 1967, but she didn’t write it. Otis Redding wrote it and sang it two years earlier. His lyrics were a bit different. It wasn’t originally a woman’s words to her man. It was a man’s words to his woman.
The husband is to lay down his life for his wife. The wife is to respect her husband. That’s not to deny what Aretha was asking for. She was very right in certain parts of that song and a bit off in others. Otis was very right in certain parts of his song and off in others. For example, Paul never tells a husband to demand the respect of his wife. He urges the wife to volunteer her respect and not because of her man but because of Jesus. The wife is to respect her husband because of Jesus. That’s the claim of this sermon: the wife is to respect her husband because of Jesus.
We will study this respect in two points First: headship. Second: submission. We see headship in verse 23 and submission in verses 22 and 24.
First: headship. You live in a radically egalitarian age, which is to say that anything that smacks of authority is immediately under suspicion. The idea that the husband is the head of the wife—verse 23, “the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church”—this is almost automatically dismissed today because our culture doesn’t believe in submitting to authority.
Since the phrase, “the husband is the head of the wife,” is here in black and white in Scripture, avoiding it requires some fancy footwork from Christians trying to reconcile Scripture with this age. Here’s how it’s done. You take verse 21, “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ,” and take that to mean that the wife is to submit to the husband, but the husband is also to submit to the wife—submit to one another. This takes the offense out of the idea that the husband is the head of the wife. This takes the authority out of it. Head can no longer mean authority.
However, if you follow this line of thinking, you need to follow it into the next subsection which means that not only must children submit to their parents, but parents must also submit to their children. You can see how egalitarian our age is by the fact that parents submitting to their children is a fair description of many homes. You also need to take it into the next section which deals with the workplace.
To push this to its final conclusion, then apparently just as the church submits to Christ so Christ must also submit to the church because, after all, “the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church” and this is all about submitting to each other. The idea of reciprocal submission leads here, and this is the heart of the matter. We live in an age that is so egalitarian that it celebrates its refusal to submit even to Christ. We moderns will not even submit to God nor his plans for order on earth. We think that is below us and so, of course, the idea of a wife submitting to her husband is certainly below us, or so the logic goes.
The fact, however, is that in any human structure, there will be authority. In marriage, there is authority and submission to authority—not each partner submitting to the other. This matters because the existence of authority, and submission to it, brings order. If you are a fan of The Office you know that there can only be one head. Do you remember the episode in which Michael and Jim become co-managers? What did Oscar say facetiously about that arrangement? “Look it doesn’t take a genius to know that every organization thrives when it has two leaders. Go ahead, name a country that doesn’t have two presidents, a boat that sets sail without two captains. Where would Catholicism be, without the popes?” The joke is that there is only ne head. That’s true in marriage too.
One of the inescapable laws of leadership is that there must be an authority and God has arranged marriage in such a way that the husband is the leader; verse 23, “For the husband is the head of the wife.” Notice that the husband isn’t told to be the head of the wife. He isn’t to demand to be the head of the wife. He simply is the head of the wife.
Now the husband might shy away from his responsibilities of being the head just like a coach might shy away from the responsibilities of actually coaching, but that doesn’t change the situation. Avoiding the responsibility just makes it miserable for everyone—leader and follower. An uninvolved father is just as much the leader of his home as an involved father is the head of his home. A tyrannical father is just as much the leader of his home as a caring father is the head of his home. Each man is leading his wife and family somewhere. If you are a husband, you are leading your wife whether you want to or not and you will be held responsible by God for how you lead her. That’s part of the responsibility you picked up when you said, “I do.” Wives, if you don’t lie the fact that you aren’t the leader in the marriage, please recognize that most men don’t really want to lead in the marriage. This is grain of both of our carnal hearts.
However, this is how marriage is ordered. You can’t change it. You can’t change it any more than you can change the laws of thermodynamics. You can simply defy it and get burned, which is what is going on all around us and among us. Our growing refusal to acknowledge the structure of marriage has led to disorder. About 5% of the marriage formed in 1867 ended in divorce. By the 1980’s over 50% of marriages were ending in divorce. Now 1867 might sound like ancient history to you but how has human nature changed since then? How have men changed since then? How have women changed since then? They haven’t. The sexual revolution will tell you that men, women, and marriage has changed. It hasn’t, and you would be wise to be very suspicious of the sexual revolution based on where it has brought us.
Now not everything was perfect with marriage in 1867. Not every husband perfectly kept Paul’s words to him just like not every wife perfectly kept Paul’s words to her, but there was a widespread recognition that the husband was the leader.
Now since the husband is the leader, he would be wise to know how to lead. He is to lead his wife as Christ leads the church; verse 23, “the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church.” He loves her. He sacrifices for her to make her glorious. He cares for her as if she were him. That’s responsible leadership. If you husbands embrace that, you will see the truth of Doug Wilson’s words, “true authority flows to those who take responsibility.” If you don’t embrace that, you will see the truth of Wilson’s next sentence; “Authority runs away from those who seek to evade responsibility.” That’s true in marriage. That’s true in business. That’s true in parenting. That’s true in church.
Now this headship is about marriage not about gender. We aren’t told that a man is the head of a woman or that women are to submit themselves to men. This is not about order among the genders. This is just about order within each marriage. No woman needs to submit to a man just because he’s a man. In fact, one of the reasons a wife is under one man—her husband—is to keep her safe from the control of any other man.
The husband is the leader of his wife. Now as we’ve seen throughout this passage, all of this is grounded in Adam and Eve. Eve was created as a helper suitable for Adam. Adam was not created as a suitable helper for Eve. The husband is to lead, and the wife is to help the leader. As Wayne Mack puts it, “She knows that the team members must support the team leader, his plans and decisions, or no progress will be made, and confusion and frustration will result.” The wife must recognize that she and her husband are one and that since he is the head, she would be wise to help him be the best head he can be.
If you are a wife, you know your husband. You know where he struggles in treating you the way Christ treats the church. You know where he falls short in seeking to make you glorious. Now this is the man you’ve got. You know how you can help him, where you can’t, and how you can hit him where it hurts. The choice is yours, and the choice is Proverbs 14:1, “The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down.”
You build up your house by honoring your husband’s leadership. You have a voice in decisions. You have wisdom, but the final decision rests with your husband and is his to make. Now, husbands, you must make the final decision and you must stand by it and not blame your wife even if her input led you to make a poor decision. You made the decision. That’s part of being the leader.
The wife needs to decide how she is going to respond to her husband’s headship. She can’t change its reality and so she needs to decide how she is going to work with the situation as it is. That’s wisdom. Choose wisdom. If you choose foolishness, you might get your way on this or that issue, but there will be a cost. “Better to live on a corner of the roof than share a house with a quarrelsome wife,” is Proverbs 21:9 and 25:24’s description of one of the costs; they put that one in their twice. In modern language, “it’s better to go to your mancave than share a house with a quarrelsome wife,” or, “to just stay late at work,” or, “to go hunting and fishing yet again this week than share a house with a quarrelsome wife.” Now Proverbs isn’t excusing the husband for distancing himself. It is just describing the way marriages tend to go when a wife fights against her husband’s leadership.
The wise wife understands that the husband is the head of the home and that she can’t change that reality. She will recognize that as the God-ordained authority, her husband will stand before God for the way he leads this marriage. She will also recognize that she will stand before God for the ways in which she has built up her marriage or torn it down with her own hands.
Since her husband is to be a picture of Christ, she would be wise to consider how her husband is more like Christ because he married her. Wives, in what ways has your husband found it easier to love, to sacrifice himself, and to identify with you because of you? In other words, in what ways is he more like Jesus because he married you? That’s one of the reasons God brought you two together. You are to help your husband, but in the end it is not actually about your husband; we see that in our second point: submission.
We don’t like submitting. Calvin said that, “nothing is more irksome to the mind of man.” We Americans especially don’t like it. The American dream can be summed up as trying to get to the point at which you don’t need to submit to anyone. That’s not God’s plan for any of us. His plan is for us all to submit to Him. Husbands submit to Him by sacrificing themselves for their wives. Wives submit to Him by submitting themselves to their husbands. Parents submit to Him so by bending over backward to train their children in His ways. Children submit to Him by obeying their parents. None of this is natural. All of this is irksome to the flesh.
All of this is about God’s authority and the order that flows from it. We need to remember that this is about God. Paul reminds us of that by telling us that wives submitting themselves to their husbands is about Jesus; verse 22, “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.” Wives don’t submit themselves to their husbands because of their husbands. They submit themselves to their husbands because of Jesus. The wife doesn’t make her decision on whether or not to honor her husband based on her husband’s worthiness. She makes it based on Christ’s worthiness; “wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.”
Just as a husband is to cherish his wife as Christ cherishes the church even at her worst—remember, while we, the church, were still sinners Christ died for us—so the wife is to respect her husband for the sake of Christ even when her husband is at his worst. That doesn’t mean sin goes unconfronted. That doesn’t mean abuse is tolerated. It means that the way she treats her husband has more to do with her desire to please God than with the apparent worthiness or unworthiness of her man. It means that she is willing to treat her husband as her head not because she has put her hope in her husband, but because she has put her hope in God. That’s part of what Peter meant when he pointed back to, “the holy women of the past who put their hope in God.” This is why Calvin could say, “As Christ rules over his church for her salvation, so nothing yields more advantage or comfort to the wife than to be subject to her husband.” It’s not so much about your husband as it is about God.
This submission is comprehensive; verse 24, “as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.” If you only submit to your husband when you agree with him, you aren’t respecting him. You are just doing what you want. Submission only become apparent when you disagree with your husband in some area. You are then to show honor for your husband by respecting him and his decision.
Sadly, this is not what wives are known for. Just as husbands are not know for sacrificing themselves for their wives, so wives are not known for respecting their husbands. That’s the reason Paul needs to give these commands. Now wives are known for sacrificially loving their husbands. They are known for caring for their husbands, but by and large, they are not known for respecting their husbands. As Doug Wilson wrote, “As Christian women gather together… they frequently speak about their husbands in the most disrespectful way. They then hurry home to cook, clean, and care for his kids. Why? Because they love their husbands. It is not wrong for the wives to love their husbands, but it is wrong to substitute love for the respect God requires.”
The wife by fallen nature does not want to honor her husband. She will want to control him at times. She will want to manipulate him. She will want, at times, to be in charge. We saw that this is part of what was said to Eve after the fall into sin. What she must do, however, is to submit to him. She must seek to help her man rather than control her man. Nothing else you offer as a wife will make up for a lack in this area. If a wife is defying her husband, no amount of affection, presents, or favorite meals will mean a thin red cent to that man until she treats him as the head.
Now the wife is told to submit herself. This is a middle voice meaning that the wife must choose to do it. She has to make this choice. The husband isn’t told to make her submit. The husband certainly isn’t told to keep her submissive. That has nothing to do with this text. Singing, “R-E-S-P-E-C-T, find out what it means to me,” has absolutely nothing to do with being a godly husband.
If you want to put your wife in her place by demanding her submission, you’ve missed the point badly. If you want to put your wife in her place, here’s how you do it; “husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her [radiant].” That’s her place.
Wives, your husband’s place is with you, which is another way of saying that you two are one. If you want to honor that oneness, honor your husband as your head. Honor him that way not only because of what you find honorable in him, but because of Jesus.
None of this is really about your husband. Plenty of very godly husbands have been disrespected by a defiant wife. Plenty of godless husbands have been helped and honored by a wise wife. This is about you; this is about Christ, and that’s pretty much what all obedience and disobedience boils down to. Amen.