Ephesians 5:22-23, Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. Honestly, what is your visceral reaction to those two verses? In our day of gender confusion and rebellion against God-constituted authority, we can find ourselves on the defensive and feel the need to qualify and explain Paul’s words. “I know it says, wives, be subject to your own husbands… but, ahh… let me explain…”
Marital Perversions
As challenging as biblical headship and submission is, the alternatives are disastrous. The only other alternatives to the biblical order are twisted perversions, harmful counterfeits of what God has designed. On the one hand, there is “the perversion of inversion” in which the headship-submission dynamic is turned inside-out, resulting in wifely headship and husbandly submission. Here the husband abdicates his headship to his wife who then leads him as a woman is wont to do: as a mother parenting her son. The man, in effect, is married to his mother. On the other hand, there is “the perversion of extremes.” Here marriage becomes a grotesque master-slave relationship. The husband takes headship to an extreme and leads like a tyrant and the wife takes submission to an extreme, to the point of self-effaced servitude.
How can we be biblical and balanced in this fragile dynamic of headship and submission? What will give us clarity and direction as Christian husbands and wives? Answer: our discipleship to Jesus Christ. We are husbands and wives, but more foundationally, we are disciples, living under the authority of King Jesus.
Marital Discipleship
Consider 1 Corinthians 11:3. But I want you to understand that Christ is the head of every man, and the man is the head of a woman, and God is the head of Christ. We can discern a hierarchical “flow-chart” lying behind Paul’s words. We see that God is the head of Christ, and Christ is the head of every man [or husband], and that the man [husband] is the head of a woman [or wife]. We recognize a flow-chart of authority: God – Christ – Husband – Wife. But Paul does not start at the top and work his way down. Instead, he enters the flow-chart in the middle, and begins with Christ’s headship over the husband. By Paul’s approach, we learn that authority is not irrelevant, but discipleship is definitive.
Paul starts by calling the Christian husband to submit to the headship of Jesus, to be a disciple of Jesus. The husband’s authority in marriage is to be exercised in submission to the authority of Jesus. Only when the husband understands that Christ is his head, can he then consider that the man is the head of a woman. The Christian husband is given God-constituted authority, headship. But he is not authorized to do whatever he wants. He is called to do what Jesus wants, to lead his wife as he is being led by Jesus. His headship in marriage is a display of his discipleship to Jesus. Peter teaches husbands to live with your wives in an understanding way, as with someone weaker. Here Peter speaks to our marriages in light of creation and common grace. Then he speaks to our marriages in light of special grace and says, and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered [1 Peter 3:7]. Married Christians are not only spouses, they are spiritual siblings. As married believers, there is a mutual accountability to Scripture. As two disciples, both are called to bring Scripture to bear on their marriage.
What then, or rather, who then, does Paul have in mind when he writes the final phrase: and God is the head of Christ? Here Paul holds Jesus’ submission to His Father before us. In so doing, he speaks to the Christian wife to encourage her in her discipleship to Jesus. As Jesus’ headship over the church instructs the Christian husband, so too, Jesus’ submission to His Father instructs the Christian wife. As a husband learns headship from Jesus’ headship, so too, a wife learns submission from Jesus’ submission. Of course, Jesus’ submission to His Father also instructs the husband in his submission to Jesus. In marital headship and submission, both the husband and the wife are called to be submissive to Jesus.
The point is, if we would have biblically balanced marriages, we must be disciples of Jesus first and foremost. The husband is disciple of Jesus, seeking to exercise Christ-like headship in submission to Jesus’ headship. The wife is a disciple of Jesus, seeking to exercise Christ-like submission in submission to Jesus’ headship. Although we are both equally disciples of Jesus, our discipleship to Jesus is expressed differently, according to our gender and marital roles.
“Come and Die”
The call to discipleship is a call to self-denial. If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me [Luke 9:23]. Jesus summons us to “come and die” [Dietrich Bonhoeffer]. Discipleship requires us to die to self.
The Christian husband and the Christian wife are both called to self-denial. The husband must ask himself: “Can I die to self so as to give my wife Christ-like headship?” The wife must ask herself: “Can I die to self so as to give my husband Christ-like submission?” He is confronted with the prospect of having to sacrifice himself if he would give her loving leadership. She is confronted with the prospect of denying self to be submissive to a husband who is yet learning to lead, and whose leadership is to some degree, inevitably undeveloped and faulty. Both face the scary prospect of what feels like death in their respective marital discipleships. Who can teach these two disciples the self-denial requisite for them to enjoy a biblically balanced marriage? Paul answers, “Christ.”
The husband’s headship is to be analogous to Christ’s sacrificial love. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her [Ephesians 5:25]. Headship takes us to the cross. The wife’s submission is to be like Jesus’ submission to His Father when He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross [Philippians 2:8b]. Submission takes us to the cross. The cross stands at the center of a Christian marriage. Christ-like headship and Christ-like submission requires us to “come and die.” The prospect is frightening. We must overcome our fear by faith in the risen Lord.
Gospel-Love and Resurrection Power
The greatest enemy of our marriage is our sin. The only provision we have to overcome our sin is the gospel. As disciples of Jesus, we must practice the rudimentary dynamics of the gospel with each other as husbands and wives. We must exchange gospel commodities and give each other the love which Jesus has given to us in His gospel. When we sin, we must exercise faith in Christ, repent and confess our sin to Christ and to our spouse, asking for forgiveness. Then, in response, we must exercise faith in Christ, forgive and reconcile in that peace which we are given in Christ. We believingly receive and give Christ’s forgiveness to each other. We learn to love each other with Jesus’ love. As we believe and obey Christ as His disciples, the Spirit will make the gospel effective in us and transform us and our marriages.
Marriage is an institution of this present age [Luke 20:34-35]. But when two disciples are married and learn to give each other gospel-love, their marriage acquires redemptive significance and becomes a signpost, pointing to the age to come. How is that? Because the power of the gospel which is victorious over sin and transforms sinners, is the power of Jesus’ resurrection life. Two disciples, who learn to love each other in obedience to Jesus, invigorate their marriage with Jesus’ resurrection vitality and power. Their marriage points to Christ’s relationship to His church and to the resurrection and the age to come.
If we can go to our graves having loved our spouses as an expression of our discipleship to Jesus, we will have lived eternally significant lives. Although our specific marriage will not continue on in the age to come, our gospel-love will. Even the best Christian marriage is only a mere glimpse of that consummated love which we will all share in union with Jesus in resurrection glory. The best way to prepare for life in the age to come is to cultivate gospel-love in our marriages [and in our churches]. By learning to love each other in union with our risen Lord, we can begin to taste of the good things to come when we, as Christ’s resurrected Bride, will live together with Him in a glorified society of perfected love. So let’s experience the triumph of the gospel and the power of the resurrection in our marriages and, with our spouses in our embrace, yet pray, Even so, come Lord Jesus!