"A Wife Like the Church" Ephesians 5:22-24 Sunday Morning Worship Service

This month's Washingtonian magazine, which I subscribe to, has a cover story called When Successful Women Divorce.

And when I got this in the mail, I read the title and uh I immediately made a joke in my own mind, which the author actually makes herself in the story, but I thought, when successful women divorce, well, they don't seem to be successful at marriage, do they?

But the author herself makes that same comment.

The story is fascinating.

It is a picture of what the author describes as something that is unique to the DC area.

It's a DC capital area phenomenon that, first of all, in the in the DMV, there are thousands, tens of thousands of more women than men, just period.

But there's a different dynamic at play in the DC area, and that is there is a huge gap between college-educated women and college-educated men.

There's a huge earning gap that those single college-educated women make a lot more money on average than the single college-educated men.

So there are more single-educated women in the DC area, there are more women in the DC area, there are more high-earning women in the DC area than there are men.

And this has led to this phenomenon described in the story that a lot of these successful women will marry, they will have kids, and then they will not step away from their career once they have kids.

They'll keep going.

This will often lead to divorce in the family, and there's a divorce settlement, and then the woman goes on and she remarries.

And it's the second marriage that this article is focused on.

She is often marrying someone perhaps without a college education, certainly someone who makes way less money than her, and they sort of have an agreement that her husband number two will be the stay-at-home mom, so to speak.

That's the language the story uses.

What could go wrong?

The story answers that question by saying that the system doesn't work.

First of all, the author points out that many husbands don't like, and this is the phrase the article uses, quote, doing mommy stuff.

And by mommy stuff, they mean running the kids to and fro, emptying the dishwasher is an example that the story uses of mommy stuff.

I don't know about you, but husbands, when I empty the dishwasher, I make sure I do it when my wife is passing by so that I get full credit.

Anyway, these marriages aren't working.

One woman in the story says it this way quote, I'm gonna read from the story.

It was a weekend.

I'm shaving my legs, and I realized, wow, I'm making more money now, and I'm still the wife.

I'm still doing all the stay-at-home mom stuff, and I'm breaking my neck to get to the grocery store before the nanny has to leave to catch her bus, so I don't have to do errands on the weekends.

I'm a strong person, and I have no idea how this has happened to me.

And this woman's story is not unique, but has played itself out in countless other couples' lives, where the woman realizes she's significantly out-earning her husband, and yet he is not doing the mommy stuff.

One woman describes marrying someone who wasn't college educated and he's supposed to be doing the mommy stuff, and he's not, and so he goes to community college and she starts, uh she's paying for him to go to community college out of town, and she's spending a lot of money on him, and then he comes back in town to look for a job, and she catches him, not job hunting, but binge watching Hallmark holiday movies.

And at that moment, she says that it is all it is all over at that moment.

She realizes it's all over.

Uh, if you're gonna be binge watching Hallmark Holiday movies on my dime, then husband number two is out the door.

Now that's all introduction to the main point of the story.

The main point of the story is that there's a DC phenomena where these women are now paying massive amounts of alimony to their husbands.

Now, alimony through all of human history has been something that men pay to women because the idea is that women are somewhat dependent upon men for their uh uh provision in life, for their protection, for their um taking taking care of them when they grow grow old.

And uh in the American world, women have often made sacrifices where they have uh put their husbands through college, and then he goes and gets a high-paying job and he bounces on her, and so alimony is the way to take care of that.

It's most laws even forbid women from having to pay alimony to men.

That was until 1979.

In 1979, there was a series of lawsuits filed by uh the ACLU against all kinds of laws in our country that made distinctions based upon gender.

And one of the lawsuits was about alimony being only having to be paid for by men.

The lead attorney for the case was Ruth Vader-Ginsburg, and she won.

And so courts now allow women to pay alimony.

Uh, the story quips that it's so common in the DC area, it is called gallimony.

Can you imagine the woman's frustration?

She's significantly out-earning, her slacker lose her husband, who's brought almost nothing to the table, lasts a few years in the marriage, playing video games and watching Hallmark specials, she divorces him, and now she has to fund his lifestyle.

That is a victory for gender equity right there.

This article, by the way, is not coming from a biblical worldview.

It is very much kind of second-wave feminism, it is very much uh rejecting the biblical worldview, and yet the author kind of stumbles upon a fascinating reality.

She stumbled upon the fact that when you deviate from the Bible's plan for marriage, things go poorly.

Things go poorly.

Obviously, the authors say this is not right, and yet they can't quite figure out why it's not right.

They note that it's ironic that Ruth Bader-Ginsburg led the charge on this, and uh there's a whole slew of books and articles, journal articles being written right now by what's called second-wave feminists that are pointing out this irony that Christians understand, but that a lot of the feminist movement from the 70s and the 80s and even the early 90s has ended up hurting women.

This is no exception to that.

Well, the Bible's view of marriage stands in stark contrast to our culture or our society's view of marriage.

You see this in Ephesians 5, verses 22 through 24.

Ephesians 5:22–24

I'm going to read it.

If I were to read this and you wouldn't know us from the Bible, you may even be offended by it.

But this is the Bible's description of marriage in such contrast with our world.

Verse 22 wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord.

For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its savior.

Now, as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

What's in this short little description here is that God has designed marriage with a structure to it.

God has designed marriage with an order in it.

The most common word in an English translation here is submit.

It's in verse 22.

Wives submit to your husband.

Verse 24, as the church submits to Christ, again in verse 24, wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

The word submit here is a critical word to understand.

Let me define it for you.

It's a, of course, a biblical word.

It's not an English word, it's a Greek word, and the Greek word has this definition: the recognition of and compliance with an ordered structure.

That's what the Bible means when it speaks of submission.

That you see a structure, you recognize your parts in that structure, and you place yourself underneath that structure.

That's submission.

It is a word used all over the New Testament.

For example, Luke 2, verse 51 says Jesus was submissive to his parents when he was a child.

Luke 2:51

He understood there was an authority structure of parents over children.

Romans 13 says citizens are supposed to submit to the government.

You recognize there is an authority structure, you place yourself under that authority structure, you submit to the government.

The demons in Luke's gospel are supposed to submit to the Lord.

In fact, they will in the end times.

Angels are subject to Christ in 1 Peter 3.

Angels are subject to God, the Father, in 1 Corinthians 15.

In fact, in Luke, by the way, the demons were going to be subject or submissive to the apostles in their preaching.

The apostles had authority over the demons.

This is the same word that's used in marriage here, that there should be an authority in marriage, that the husbands are designed to lead their families.

Wives are designed to complement their husbands with a particular focus on raising children.

That is the design of marriage, that is the structure of marriage, that husbands lead the family, provide for the family, that wives complement their husbands with a particular focus on raising children.

That's the biblical model.

Now that is not our culture's model, of course.

Our culture models egalitarianism, our culture models the erasure of any differences between husbands and wives.

Our culture says, you know, you're called in life to live to be the best you can be, the most you can be, and that's seen in the arena of your own personal ambition and personal success.

Very different than how the Bible describes marriage, of two people that are giving their lives for each other.

So there's no denying that what Paul describes here in Ephesians 5 is not what our world teaches about marriage.

The Christian way of viewing marriage is generally viewed by the vast majority of our culture as backwards and stone age and you know misogynistic and 10,000 other things.

But the truth is that everything done in the church is different than everything done in the world.

All kinds of parenting is different in the church than parenting in the world.

You work with different motivations, even if you're a we have a secular job, if you're a Christian, you approach your work differently than people in the world approach theirs.

We just live fundamentally different lives than the world.

And that same would be true in marriage, of course.

Marriage is the most intimate uh human relationship.

It is the bedrock, new families are the bedrock of society.

So it would make sense that the distinction between the way Christians lead their lives and the way people in the world lead their lives would be exponentially magnified in marriage.

As I mentioned, the command is for husbands to be the head of the family, the head of the wife is the language Paul uses even here.

Now, submission, I started with the definition of it because submission doesn't mean self-erasure.

Submission doesn't mean that you do everything your husband tells you to do.

Of course not.

That's not submission.

Submission, as I mentioned in the Bible, is a recognition of a structure and then this placing yourself under that structure.

The Bible does not say the wife is inferior to the husband, but the Bible does say the wife is different than the husband.

An army would be chaotic if everybody got to take turns being general for the day.

You're marching out to battle, and the private says, Hey, how come that guy gets to be in charge?

I feel like that is limiting my potential for self-fulfillment and growth.

No, there's structure.

And we understand it in the military, you submit yourself to it.

We understand it as a nation, you submit yourself to it.

And that structure is, of course, more magnified even in marriage.

So, what does it mean that the wife is to be the helper to her husband, as described in Genesis 2 that we looked at a few weeks ago?

I see two components to that.

There's nothing scientific about these two components.

Just when I break down what I think the Bible is describing, I come up with two different words.

There's relationally and occupationally.

Relationally, a wife is supposed to be a compliment to her husband.

Even wrapped up in the word of compliment or help meet is this idea of submission, isn't it?

I mean, when you see that the wife is created to compliment her husband, it's not like the yin-yang.

It's not two equal forces that are just different and there's give and take.

It's one of submission.

Adam was made first, then Eve.

And if you remember that kind of language, it was that Adam was inadequate.

It was not good for man to be alone.

He needed help.

People have a uh husbands have uh a deficiency, and the wife was created to help those deficiencies.

And so the main function of why the wife was created was to make up the deficiency in the man.

Of course, you can make all kinds of jokes about things that men don't understand and how their wives help them, and those jokes are funny because for the most part they are true.

The men are less observant than women, and you can think of 10,000 different uh examples of how this is seen in life.

And um, the most basic way is that uh God created Adam and told him to subdue the earth and to multiply and be fruitful on it.

He's not able to do that.

All the animals come in front of him, he's not able to do this, it's not good for him to be alone.

And so God made Eve out of Adam.

Adam was made out of dirt, Eve was made out of Adam to help make up the deficiency in the man.

This plays out in our life where uh the wife should be the one the husband goes to for comfort, the one he can speak to, the one to whom he goes for encouragement.

They relationally, the wife, should make up what is lacking in her husband.

And the second word I use was occupationally.

The wife is described in the scripture as the homemaker, the mother of the children.

And this is where her primary sphere of influence will be.

I'll pick up more on that later this morning.

But for now, let me just say that's what I mean by occupationally.

Relationally, the wife is submissive to her husband and how she completes him and helps him.

Occupationally, she is submissive to her husband and how she sees her role in the home.

And some of you may think this sounds like the Victorian era.

Is Pastor Jesse longing for the days where women were to be seen and not heard?

Uh no, I hope not.

The Victorian era has its own errors, just like the American era has.

And I condemn the errors of the Victorian era as much as I do our own American era.

The Bible doesn't call you to be like the Victorians in England, nor the feminists in America, but the Bible calls you to conform your marriage to the pattern of Scripture.

So, what is that pattern?

I want to give you a little outline as we go through this passage.

Two sources or patterns.

I couldn't decide which word I liked better, so you get both of them.

Two sources are patterns for submission and marriage.

What I mean by sources, submission and marriage comes from a head.

It comes from a source.

Like a river has its source, submission and marriage has its source, two of them, in fact.

And also it has its pattern.

Submission and marriage is not ex nihilo, it's uh it's actually after a pattern.

There's examples for us of what this submission should look like.

Before I look at those two examples, let me just say something that I do hope is obvious.

The primary application of this passage is going to be in the context of marriage.

As I look around this worship center right now, I see some people who are widows and widowers.

I see some people who are single and want to be married.

I see a lot of young people.

So, how does this apply to them?

Well, last Sunday I preached a whole sermon on singleness, so I'm not going to re-preach that whole sermon.

I hope married people listen to that sermon on marriage so that you understand how to better relate and encourage single people in the church.

Just like I hope single people listen to this sermon on marriage so you understand better God's design for what the reality is most of our congregation is experiencing.

If you are not married and you want to be married, I hope that you look at what the Bible teaches about submission and marriage and you commit to not marrying if you don't want to follow this pattern.

In other words, you look at what the Bible says about submission and marriage and you say, Yes, I want to follow that in my life, so now I want to get married, or you say, I do not want to follow that in my life, and so you stay single then.

Listen, marriage is a common grace.

Non-Christians can get married, some of them can have good marriages, even, but the Bible is the user manual.

When you get married, if you're not going to follow the user manual, it voids the warranty.

You're going to break the product when it comes with an instruction guide.

And so the context, the application, the overflow, the manifestation of Ephesians 5, 22 through 24 is going to be in the context of marriage.

So first.

First, the source or pattern for submission in marriage is its connection to marriage's design.

Its connection to marriage's design.

Verse 23, the husband is the head of the wife.

Husband is the head of the wife.

This is a phrase that Paul uses elsewhere in 1 Corinthians, for example, there he describes the husband as the head of the wife because Adam was made first, not Eve.

This is why I started this series in Genesis chapter 2, because you go back there and you understand that marriage was designed because it was not good for men to be alone.

Genesis 2 · chapter mention

Men do have inadequacies, as I mentioned earlier.

They often be less relationally aware, less observant, less aware of different personal dynamics, and just at a very practical level.

And their wives can help them, they help them see things that they wouldn't see themselves.

You know, you are the worst person for making decisions about your own life.

Do you know that?

You don't see yourself accurately, you don't see yourself rightly, you're not aware of what your strengths and weaknesses are.

You need somebody else to do that for you.

And marriage provides a wife to help her husband see his inadequacies, avoid errors, avoid mistakes, and really lead a more fulfilled life.

In God's design, even before the entrance of sin in the world, husbands were supposed to be the leader of the family.

This is why Moses says in Genesis 2 that husbands will be the initiator in marriage.

For this reason, a man will leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife.

The leadership in that scenario is on the man.

The man initiates this new family.

When he leaves his old family, they become joined together.

They make a new family.

By the way, in the Roman world, the Romans taught that a wife should still be submissive to her parents, even in marriage.

That was a typical Roman view.

And so when Americans read, Ephesians 5.22, wives submit to your own husbands as to the Lord, we get bugged by the word submission, don't we?

We're like, what do you mean, wives be submissive?

Rar.

You know, the Romans would read this and be, what do you mean, wives be submissive to their husbands?

So this is a countercultural verse.

Whether you're Roman or an American, this is rubbing the cat the wrong way here.

The Romans wanted wives to be submissive to their parents.

But Paul upends that whole structure saying that wives are to be submissive to their husbands because go back to why God made marriage.

The husband will be the initiator in leaving his family, joining himself with a wife.

They will have a new family holding fast to one another.

God designed families this way to be a blessing and a particular blessing to children.

This is reiterated in Genesis 3.

After the fall, the wife will have the unique capacity to bring children into the world.

Now, to the world, children are viewed as obstacles to success, obstacles to your happiness, a hindrance to what you really want to be in life.

But God designed children to be a blessing to the family and specifically to mothers.

Psalm 37, verse 26 describes children as a blessing from the Lord.

Psalms 37:26

Psalm 127, verse 3 says there are arrows in the quiver.

Psalms 127:3

They're weapons for you to go to war against the world.

They're a blessing for you to have.

And you think, how are arrows a blessing?

Well, because if you if you need to defend yourself, if you need to hunt, you want more arrows, not less arrows.

They're good for you to have, they're a blessing for you.

Children are the most vulnerable in society, the most needy in society, the most in need of protection in society.

They can't make it on their own.

And so God designed the family for the place where they would be nurtured and cared for predominantly by the mother.

That's God's design for marriage, as described in Genesis 2 before the fall, reiterated.

In Genesis 3, after the fall, and played out through the rest of Scripture.

The Bible does not say that wives are inferior to the husbands, just different.

And that difference is seen in their predominant sphere of influence.

Now, as I mentioned, our society says a woman's predominant source of success is in her career, in her maximizing the income for her family by maximizing her opportunity to demonstrate her skills and proficiencies, of which I'm sure she has many.

But that is where success is seen according to our standards of our world.

And that is very contrary to what the Bible describes as a successful family.

The Bible describes the successful family as one where the husband is providing for the family, and the wife has a predominant focus on the home and the raising of children.

It's not just Genesis 2 and Ephesians 5, it's Proverbs 14, verse 1.

Proverbs 14:1

The wisest of the women builds her house.

Proverbs 31, verse 27, which we'll look at tonight.

Proverbs 31:27

She looks well to the ways of her household.

1 Timothy 2, verse 15.

1 Timothy 2:15

There's several passages that describe that.

So when I say the submission in Ephesians 5 is the pattern of God's design for marriage, that is based on all of those verses, but especially Genesis 2.

Now, if Paul's going to say, I want the younger women to marry and have children and manage their own households, they're going to need to be taught how to do that.

And probably the most critical verse for that is Titus chapter 2, verses 3 through 5.

Titus 2:3–5

I've got on the screen so you see it for yourself.

Paul says, Older women, so this is women whose children have grown up, they are gone.

What should older women do now that their children are gone?

What should they spend their time doing?

Well, they should be reverent.

They shouldn't spend their time slandering one another or their children.

They shouldn't be slaves to much wine.

Do you see these unique temptations for older women?

The kids are gone and they have a disposition towards gossip and they have a disposition towards alcohol because they're filling their time now.

And to train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, submissive to their own husbands.

That's not a list of different things.

That's a list of one thing.

That's a list of one attitude.

Goodness in the home.

The goodness in the home is seen in self-control.

It's seen in moral purity.

It's seen in being kind and submissive to their own husbands.

That word submissive, the same word in Ephesians 5.

So when Paul says in Ephesians 5 that wives are supposed to be submissive to their husbands, this is what he's talking about.

It's this pattern of marriage.

So it's less about do whatever your husband tells you.

It's more about recognize that the husband is the leader of the home, and the wife should have her predominant sphere of influence inside of the home.

That's Paul's notion of submission in Titus 2.

And of course, it's this notion of submission back in Genesis chapter 5.

Genesis 5 · chapter mention

Now there are a million practical questions that jump into our minds right away.

Because that's how we are.

This is the way we normally approach commands in the Bible, not just about marriage, but about anything.

We normally approach commands in the Bible with like, that's what the Bible says.

This is what I want to do.

Do they fit?

No, not quite.

How hard do I need to push to get them to fit?

Because you don't understand.

I really want to do my thing.

And the Bible's over here, shoulder.

Let me lean into it and I can get it to fit.

I mean, that's how sin entered the world, isn't it?

This is what God said, but this is what I want.

Do they fit?

No, let me do my thing anyway.

This is the normal pattern of sin in the world.

Nevertheless, because I know that I will get a hundred emails this week, let me answer a few of them right now.

Does the Bible say that women cannot have jobs outside the home?

No.

Nor did I say that.

I did not.

I chose my words very carefully.

Does the Bible say that a woman's primary responsibility is in the home?

Yes.

And that the husband's primary responsibility is to provide for the home.

Also, yes.

This is hard in every culture.

It's hard in every culture in the world, but especially in a capitalistic society, because our society associates success with cash, with lifestyle.

You're a more successful parent if you can provide a bigger house for your kids.

And so we fall for the culture's lie that you are a good parent if you can provide X, Y, and Z, things which require in Northern Virginia, the DC area, a two-income family.

And so when you believe that lie, you start to frame your family differently than the Bible's model.

You think, oh, the my wife needs to work in order to provide for a family.

After all, we need a house with a yard so we can have a dog.

I'm being serious.

This is what I hear this from people.

My wife has to work because that's the only way we can afford the house.

Why do you need a house?

Because it's got a yard.

Because what was wrong with the apartment you were living in?

It doesn't have a yard.

Why do you need a yard?

Because we want to get a dog for the kids.

Tease that out a little bit.

The trade-off you're making is you're saying it's better for my kids to have a dog with a yard than a mom at home.

I mean, that's not a palatable trade-off when you phrase it like that.

So you, of course, would never phrase it like that.

You would say we need a yard for a dog, and each kid needs their own bedroom.

Because you can't, I mean, how barbaric would it be to raise a kid sharing a bedroom?

Could you imagine?

There's no way a good parent would let their kids do that.

And they have to be on the right travel soccer.

You know what travel soccer teams cost and lacrosse teams and hockey teams?

My goodness.

I saw a little kid go into a hockey practice yesterday.

The bag was bigger than like six of him.

It's a lot of money for that.

A lot of money.

So of course, the mom has to work so that we can have that kind of lifestyle.

I'm telling you, that's the lie of the world.

That is the lie of the world.

It's not, I mean, it's not the Bible's pattern for marriage to prioritize those things over having the mom in home with the kids.

So I would urge young moms to think critically about your desires in life.

And I know sometimes the pressure for this, by the way, isn't even coming from the husband who wants the house and the dog and the hockey team.

Sometimes this pressure is coming from the grandparents, the kids' grandparents.

You know, I've I've heard, I've talked to young couples, and they have the wife's parents saying, We did not make all those sacrifices for you to go to that Christian school, if you go to that college that cost, you know, 50 grand a year, if you go to Virginia Tech and graduate so that you could go be a stay-at-home mom.

Are you kidding me?

And so people they caved that.

They caved to that.

And so I just want to appeal to young moms.

You have little kids at home for such a short period of time.

It's so short.

It's so short.

And it goes by.

My kids right now are 13 and 8.

That's the window.

I cannot believe that.

It was like yesterday they didn't exist.

And now there's a teenager around.

Wow.

It's so quick it goes by.

It's so quick.

We don't trade that.

Don't trade that time.

Don't trade it for a different approach to marriage.

You know, as I mentioned, we get wrapped up in the practical immediately.

We immediately think of a thousand questions and a thousand examples because this is real life stuff.

And every family is different, every person is different.

You know, a question like, okay, so I'm I have young kids at home, but I'm an ER nurse.

I work one night a week as an ER nurse.

My husband's home with the kids.

I work the night shift and he stays home the next morning, and that gives us better health insurance, and the income helps us send them to Christian school or whatever the story is.

And, you know, are you saying that's wrong?

And no, I'm not saying that's wrong.

I never said that was wrong.

In fact, that seems like a very neat opportunity.

If that's if that's you and your life, that seems like a great way to provide better health insurance for your family and to make extra money while still prioritizing the kids at the home, doesn't it?

At least it does to me.

Or are you saying moms, you know, can't have what about piano lessons at home?

Like other kids are coming to my house and doing piano lessons.

Is that okay?

It's in the home.

Well, again, think think this through.

Again, that's a that's great.

If you have the ability to bring in income that way by doing piano lessons at home for other kids or reading, tutoring for other kids in your home, great.

That's such a blessing.

I would make sure that you're not doing it in a way that sacrifices your time with your own kids, the parenting, you know, don't put your kids in front of a you know video games all day so you can raise other people's kids, would be the point.

But if you have your priorities right and you've balanced it right in your own parenting, that again seems like a great, a great privilege, a great approach.

You know, what about grandparents?

Can I keep working?

Because the grandparents are local, they can come raise the kids Monday through Friday.

That way I can keep working.

And you know, grandparents are a blessing.

I get that, and God providentially gives us blessing with family and life to help with our kids, and the grandparents want that, right?

Like, go back to work, I want the kids.

But just think about what you're giving up.

I've seen the joy that comes from living in a small home with the mom home with the kids while they're young, and it is an incredible joy if your attitude and your heart is right.

I would just encourage you not to trade that too easily.

You know, the this pattern of marriage is gonna look different family to family.

These are principles, they're not laws.

You know, I don't want to get sucked in all the uh teacher and I talked about different practical situations and what I should say, and should I go down this road or that road with practical applications?

And you know, honestly, she said, do less practical stuff today, because every family is different.

You know, the the practical applications of this are gonna be played out with the person discipling you in the ABFs, with with counselors or with just older, godlier people that know you better, know these principles better than you.

That's where the practical applications are gonna come into play, more than you know, me answering like half-day kindergarten, okay, but full day, totally bad.

You know.

So I'm not saying those things.

I didn't say that.

I didn't say it's sinful for a mom to work outside the home.

I didn't say all families should look the same.

I didn't say a mom's only value is in the home.

Again, it is the pattern of the Bible that moms should have their priority as work at home, and they should guard as any temptation that causes them to shift their focus or their sense of calling away from that priority.

That's what I'm trying to say.

Wisdom principles acquire a wisdom to apply, and that requires wiser people than you to help you navigate those kind of choices.

Proverbs 31 is a great example of this.

We will look at that tonight.

What about a mom who works from home while her kids are in bed?

Or, you know, again, 10,000 applications.

I can think of some godly women at home.

I mean, it's some godly women at Emmanuel.

I I know a woman at Emmanuel who is uh an attorney and she had children, and so now she carves out two hours, uh, three or four nights a week after the kids are in bed, and she does consultation for uh some of her clients in that in that window, and it's a great way for her to maintain her practice and her to bring in income in a way that doesn't sacrifice her kids.

And I'm not saying that's the only way to do it.

That's one example that comes to mind, or a doctor who like looks at ultrasounds on her phone that is sent from you know some of some of her patients, and she can assess those kind of things from home.

It's not distracting to the family, she's keeping her practice up.

I mean, there's 10,000 different people with 10,000 different applications of this all over the map.

The point is there's the principle of what the wife's primary occupation should be as she's raising the children in the home.

Don't sacrifice that principle.

We live in a fallen world where other things try to take that principle from us.

Imagine a husband who is, you know, disabled and can't work, or a husband who leads his family and the wife has to provide for the children because he's gone.

Imagine a world with slavery or apartheid.

Imagine telling a, you know, 18th century Virginia slave that the godly picture of a mother is a stay-at-home mom and what she's supposed to do, or 20th century apartheid South African woman.

You know, the godly picture is you being at home, a stay-at-home mom.

Of course not.

We live in a fallen world where sometimes the biblical pattern cannot be followed.

But that doesn't disparage the biblical pattern.

So the pattern is rooted in Genesis 2.

The difference between men and women, husbands and wives, should be reflected in marriage where the husband is the leader of the family.

We'll talk more about that next week.

The wife, when it says submit to your husbands, what I was trying to convey is it doesn't, it's less about do whatever he says.

It's more about recognizing the structure of marriage where the husband is the leader of the family, ultimately responsible for it, and willingly placing yourself into that relationship.

Secondly, the second source or pattern for submission is the connection to marriage's savior.

First was the connection to marriage's design, the second, the connection to marriage's savior.

This is a theological argument here.

The husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church.

Or in verse 22, wives submit to your husbands as to the Lord.

Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its savior.

Here, Paul is using language from Ephesians 1.

He charted his course for marriage, knowing what he was going to write about in Ephesians 5.

He starts on this in Ephesians 1.

He lays out the basics of the gospel.

In eternity past, God the Father chose whom he was going to save.

Then he sends the Son to be the redeemer.

He gives his life for his church.

He lays his life down, bears their sin in his body.

Your sin was given to him.

He dies on the cross bearing your sin, resurrected a new life.

Jesus redeemed you, is the language of Ephesians 1.

He buys you, you are his.

That's the language from the slave market, if you remember Ephesians 1.

That Jesus bought you out and you now belong to him.

You are his.

You are his to have and to hold.

To borrow a line from our wedding vows, you belong to him.

That's Ephesians 1.

Paul is now drawing on that language in Ephesians 5 as the source of this kind of submission in marriage.

It's super interesting to me that he's using that analogy when he's talking to wives.

It would make sense that he would use it when he's talking to husbands, which we'll look at next week.

Husbands need to love their wives as Christ loved the church, the sacrificial element of that, that's next week.

But he starts that illustration, that metaphor, that source language, that pattern here, with wives.

He starts by saying, consider Jesus.

Consider your relationship to him.

Now, first something it doesn't mean, verse 22, wives submitting your husband's as to the Lord, that doesn't mean you submit to your own husband in the same way, like in totality, like you submit to the Lord.

You know, whatever the Lord says, you do.

Don't question the Lord.

That's not the way you submit to your husbands.

Rather, submitting your husband's ass to the Lord, I think, is in reference to the Lord.

In other words, as a Christian, you recognize your marriage is going to look different than the marriages in the world.

Because you submit all things in your life to the Lord, marriage is one of those things you submit to the Lord.

I think that's what he's going for.

So not the totality of everything you've submitted to your husband, but the totality of everything you've submitted to Christ.

He has ultimate allegiance.

And now you are submitting this particular element of your life, marriage, to your husband.

So it's general, particular.

Generally, Christians are submissive to everybody.

Generally speaking, you prefer each other over yourself, generally.

Generally speaking, you prefer the needs of your wife over yourself, or the needs of your kid over yourself, or the needs of your husband over yourself.

Generally speaking, you prefer the needs of those around you, your brothers and sisters in the Lord, over yourself.

Generally speaking, you prefer one another over yourself.

There's a million exceptions to that, but generally speaking, that's the Christian life.

More particular.

Wives, you're preferring your husband's needs over yourself.

Next week will be husbands, now they prefer their wives, but for now, wives, you prefer your husband's needs over yourself.

To the extent that it is submission.

You're submitting your life to the biblical paradigm of marriage because this is what Jesus acts like to the church.

He lays his life down for the church like a husband will lay his life down for his wife.

The church then follows Jesus because he saved us.

So, wives, you're gonna follow your husbands because you're following Jesus.

So, how do you follow Jesus?

Do you follow Jesus reluctantly?

I hope not.

I hope not.

And we know what reluctant obedience is like, right?

You know, Christmas morning rolls around and your six-year-old opens socks.

Socks.

And grandma gave him socks, grandma's sitting right there.

You tell six-year-old, say thank you to grandma for the socks.

And the six-year-old says, thanks.

Christmas spirit everywhere.

Did the child obey?

Yes.

That's not how you follow Jesus.

Jesus doesn't tell you to do something, you're like, okay.

That shouldn't be how you follow your husbands.

You follow your husbands with joy, with an eagerness, with a happy heart, with an attitude that creates a happy home.

That's how you submit to your husband.

With a joy and a delight in you, because that's how you submit to Christ.

This is of no benefit to Jesus or your husband for you to be reluctantly submissive.

So the argument is theological.

As the church submits itself to Christ, which is joy and eagerness, in that manner you're supposed to submit yourself to the husband.

It's more about the attitude of the wife than it is about the totality of, you know, following commands.

I don't think that's what the word submit has exactly in mind.

One more illustration about that.

When he talks to parents and children, he says, children obey your parents.

That's not the word he uses here.

When he talks to slaves, he says, slaves serve your master, not the word he uses here.

He uses different words when he's talking to slaves and parents than he does when he is talking to husbands and wives.

There he uses the word submit.

I think it really is about the structure.

So the joy you have in submitting to the structure of the church under Christ is the joy you have in submitting to your husband to your husband, the wives should have.

That's the design.

And you do this and you recognize Jesus owns me, my husband in that sense owns me.

We are one flesh.

It even has wormed its way into the wedding vows.

I mentioned this earlier.

You set your wedding vows to have and to hold.

What does that mean?

To have?

I vow that my husband has me.

It's possessive language.

This is what Ephesians 5 is talking about here.

You submit yourself to your husband to protect you, guide you, shield you, preserve you, and guard you.

People get offended by saying as he is himself, is its savior.

So how is the husband the savior of the wife?

That's the analogy.

Is Jesus is the savior of the church?

You submit to your husband.

The implication is he's the savior and of the wife.

How is the husband the savior of the wife?

Well, warning.

This will be the politically incorrect part of what I'm going to say.

The rest of the stuff, that was easy.

What does it mean the husband is the savior of the wife?

That's the implication.

And again, it's not popular to say today, but the husband in this sense saves his wife from being alone in the world, from being dependent upon other people, from the dangers in the world that are unique and specific to women, from a woman who wants children, wants that companionship, wants that kind of life.

A husband is saving the woman from the life absent that and bringing her in to a family and to a marriage where she'll be loved and cared for and be able to fulfill her desire to raise children, which was described in Genesis 3.

That's how the husband's not the savior of the wife, like the husband has his the wife's sins and died on the cross and resurrected from the grave on the third day on behalf of his wife.

No, not that way.

But in the way of he lays his life down to minister to her needs.

As Jesus did for the church.

He doesn't literally die, although I suppose he could.

But the typical marriage, the husband isn't called to literally die for his wife, but to surrender himself willingly for her needs.

So the church responds to Jesus doing that for us by submitting to Christ.

The wife responds to the husband doing that for her by submitting to the husband.

It's the same way.

Look at verse 24 in the same way.

So why?

Should submit in everything to their husbands.

The husband is a savior with a small s, Jesus is a savior with the big S.

Jesus has authority over all of our lives.

Absolute obedience to Him.

You do not owe absolute obedience to any human being at all.

Absolute obedience is only owed to Jesus Christ.

But under the authority of Jesus Christ, wives are to submit to their husbands because they're the leader of the home.

Does that mean wives can never disagree with their husbands?

Of course not.

Wives could never contradict their husbands.

Of course not.

You know, but if you also know there's a submissive way to say, can we talk about that decision more?

I'd like to revisit that decision.

Maybe tonight, nine o'clock.

Can we talk about that decision more?

I know you're free.

There's a submissive way.

Like I don't have a piece with that decision.

We need to talk about this.

There's a submissive way to do that.

Verse, who died and gave you the pants of the family?

You know?

There's a submissive way to lead a Christian marriage.

And that's what's described in the Bible.

It's about your attitude of joy, it's about your sphere of influence, working at home, it's about your attitude towards your husband, where you view yourself as complimenting him, encouraging him, filling up what is lacking in him, so that your family can be a bastion of peace from the world and a bastion of joy and safety for the children, regardless of how small their rooms are.

As I mentioned though earlier, marriage is a common grace given by God to the church.

Even non-believers can enjoy it, though.

The whole world can participate in marriage, but you cannot fully understand what it is unless you submit your life to the one who designed it.

The kind of submission that's ascribed for wives in marriage?

It's insane.

The leadership that's ascribed for husbands in marriage is insane.

It's crazy.

How could a non-Christian love his wife like Christ loved the church?

How could somebody who doesn't believe that Jesus died on the cross submit his life to the will of his, to the needs of his wife?

Or how could a woman who doesn't believe that Jesus died on the cross to win his church submit her life to her husband?

So people say the divorce rate in our world is 50%.

That's crazy.

I'm like, I can't believe it's not higher.

How can non-Christians do this?

But how could Christians not do this?

And I'm telling you, you have a choice.

You have a choice.

As a Christian, you submit your life to the pattern of marriage.

If you step outside God's pattern for marriage, what is the alternative?

You know, when you go down this road, what is the alternative?

What does that look like?

It does not look like a peaceful and happy home.

The closing line of that article, by the way, fascinating.

On the third marriages, everybody gets prenups.

That's the choice.

Team chaos over there, where there is no structure.

You say I reject structure because I'm going to live for myself, that's team chaos.

Or team order.

I recognize that God made the family with order, and I joyfully and willingly submit myself to that.

I would no longer assert my own rights, but I surrender my rights for the service of the family.

Lord, we know this is a supernatural work in our hearts as all surrender is.

So we surrender to you.

We die to ourself.

And we lift you up.

I pray for those in difficult marriages.

I pray for husbands that refuse to love their wives.

I pray for wives that refuse to submit to their husbands.

Pray their hearts would be convicted by their own sin.

And they would see the pattern you designed for marriage, and that they would both gladfully submit themselves to it.

This is so different than what the world teaches.

We know that.

But you have not called us to be like the world.

You've called us to imitate your son.

So, Lord, help us do that.

Help us be more like Jesus Christ.

We ask this in his name.

Amen.

And now for a parting word from Pastor Jesse Johnson.

Thank you for joining us today.

If you're in the Washington, D.C.

area, I would love to see you at Emmanuel Bible Church.

Our service times and church information are on our website at ibc.church.

For more information about the Master Seminary and their Washington, D.C.

location, go to tms.edu.

I hope this resource has been a blessing to you and it helps you seek the Lord daily, serve others around you, and share the gospel of Jesus Christ with boldness.

May the Lord bless you.