Healthy Families: The Wife’s Responsibility

Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.

Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.

Ephesians 5: 21-22

So here we go! This is the scripture that tends to be quoted the most in conservative Christian circles when describing the relationship that a wife needs to have to her husband in the home. When this scripture is applied, it gives the sense that the wife is to surrender all to her husband in order to be right in the home and to be right before God. However, there is a different Greek origin for that type of surrender than the one that Paul is discussing in this context.

Love First

Paul first lays out the idea that there needs to be a general submitting ourselves one to another in Ephesians 5: 21. This is the pretext to wives submitting themselves to their own husbands. Paul goes on to describe how the husband is to love his wife even as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it. The submission that is discussed in this context, therefore, has to be rooted in love. How does the world know that we are Jesus’ disciples? It is the love that we have one to another that reveals our discipleship (John 13: 35). How do we submit ourselves one to another – it is in love! Love is really the key to understand the relationships in the home. Men are to love their wives and the wife is to also love her own husband. That love is shown through this idea of submission.

So what does it mean for a wife to submit? If it isn’t full surrender than what is it? In Healthy Families: The Husbands Responsibility, we discussed the husband’s responsibility in being the head of the home as stated in Ephesians 5: 23-32. That responsibility is not based upon the husband merely being a male. It is based upon the husband seizing that God-given responsibility of being the head. That seizing was not by force or by placing the wife in a subservient position. That seizing was by love and love that is manifested to the wife in giving himself for her; in providing for her and sacrificing for her.

Wife’s Submission

If the man’s responsibility is to seize then the opposite of that is to not seize … and thus submission. This by no means places the woman in a position to be a doormat. On the contrary, Eve was created, from Adam, to be a help meet or prepared for Adam (Genesis 2: 18). Eve’s position was to be a help to Adam; to come along side of Adam and fill the void that he had in his life. However, if you follow their lives, there is the infamous lesson of Eve being beguiled by the serpent and partaking of the tree of the knowledge of good and of evil. Good gave Adam the commandment not to partake of that tree prior to Eve’s creation. It was Adam’s responsibility to see to it that neither He nor Eve partook. However, Eve, with urging from the serpent, seized that responsibility away from Adam. Instead of being submissive, she took the responsibility that was solely Adam’s. Adam, for his part, could have seized that responsibility back from Eve by following the commandment of God. But he chose to yield and thus began the fall of man.

Submission, in this vein, is not an easy task for a woman. Women have capabilities and unique responsibilities that place them in idea position in the home. Read Proverbs 31: 10-31. This passage speaks of a very industrious woman who has capabilities that excel in creating a good home. No, she is not a doormat nor is she one who shrivels under the day-to-day pressures of life. On the contrary, this woman stands tall in her abilities to not only be a help meet for her husband, but also one who takes care of her home and gains a position of honor both in and outside of the home. In fact, the husband gains honor “in the gates” because of her virtuousness (Proverbs 31: 23). However, nowhere in this passage, with her many virtues and the many attributes, does it talk about this woman seizing her husbands responsibility as the head of the home. She definitely has the capability to do so. However, she chooses not to. This defines what it means to be submissive in a biblical sense.

Love and Submission

At the very root of submission, there is love. A woman who chooses not to seize the responsibility of headship from her husband is truly showing agape love. This is a love that is sacrificial. This is a love that knows that she can take charge. However, she does not for the sake of harmony in the relationship and in the home. Husbands need to recognize this and not take advantage of this sacrificial love. Paul in Ephesians 4 starts with the thought of submission first one to another; then the wives to their own husbands. The next thought immediately goes to the husband being the head – but in love. Peter also speaks of this type of relationship in 1 Peter 3: 1-7. The woman’s subjection is not contingent upon whether her husband is a believer or not. In fact, her subjection is to be carried out regardless in order to possibly win her unsaved husband. Peter is more descriptive of the woman’s attributes and character in his passage. I do not see these attributes as weakness. I believe that he was trying to draw attention to a woman’s inner strength not her outward appearance. Peter follows-up by admonishing husbands to love and honor their wives that they may be “heirs together in the grace of life; that your prayers be not hindered.”

Our homes, in America, are in a crisis state. Part of the reason is because, as the church, we do not live out the responsibilities given to us as set forth in the scriptures. Either, this relationship is taught so one-sided that the woman does not have confidence in her rightful place in the home (i.e. doormat) or it’s not taught at all and our homes become dysfunctional; men not taking their headship in love and women taking control of that responsibility because either they want to or the man doesn’t want to. In today’s America, this role reversal contributes to the homes dysfunction and in many instances the eventual breakup of the home. The wife may call it laziness or lack of assertiveness. The husband may call it nagging. In reality, wives want a husband that takes initiative and one who does not shirk their responsibilities. Husbands want wives that will trust them, even when it doesn’t seem like they are “on the move.” In America, the problem is that this type of masculinity is called “toxic” and the wife’s assertiveness is lauding as “fierce.” God help our perspectives!

Again, at the root of all successful homes is love; agape love. Note Paul admonishes the wife to submit to her own husband. He also admonishes the husband to have a sacrificial love for his wife. When this truly takes place it does not make room for other’s to enter into the relationship. Husbands cannot continue to be momma’s boys and wife’s cannot continue to be daddy’s girls. Also the preacher or pastor does not take the place of the husband. The female co-worker does not take the place of the wife. Remember, also, that this passage is an allegory for Christ and his church. There is only one head and there is only one body. Our representation in the home is a message preached to the world.