Adam and I have been teaching a newly/nearly wed class for 4 semesters now. We love it. It's one of my favorite nights of the week. And this week we got to talk about needs, roles, and responsibilities in marriage.
It is a rough night for a lot of women. And the reason is simply because we don't like the word "submissive". That's it for a lot of us. We don't like that word. It makes the hair on the back on our neck stand up. It makes us feel weak and inferior.
But for a moment I'd like you to open your heart and mind to what I'm going to say. What if it's not the role of helper that we don't like? But instead it's our own sin. Sin that is blinding us to the beauty that is "equal yet different" roles in marriage.
Take a look at this video.
You see we (every one of us) broke marriage. It was perfect. And we broke it with sin, with pride, with our messed up hearts. And because we broke it, marriage is just that.....kind of broken. It doesn't work well. And it doesn't work well because we are broken.
And yet???!!!!
With the hope of the gospel, we can live a good, perfect marriage. With the gospel, the word "submissive" is not scary. It's beautiful. It's the same relationship Jesus had with the Father. With the gospel, being helper to our husbands is exactly where we are supposed to be. With the gospel, we can be strong, beautiful women who love and respect our husbands. With the gospel we can give our husbands a chance to lead us and enjoy it.
With the gospel, Satan does NOT destroy marriage. He tried a long time ago. And in that moment it really did look like marriage was broken. But God rescued us, He saved us, and one day Satan will lose.
Showing posts with label marriage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label marriage. Show all posts
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Saturday, December 25, 2010
It's love when.....
on your anniversary you buy each other gifts that both drive you absolutely CRAZY.
Adam does not share my love for taking a picture of EVERY thing. But for our anniversary he bought me a awesome new camera.
And I do not understand Adam's love for video games. But I bought him Rock Band so he could play "rock" with his boys. (It was a big hit!) Adam might even tear up when Connor 100% his first song, he's gotten SO close.
More importantly, you know it's love when....You sit down to a romantic dinner on your anniversary in downtown Austin and receive a phone car. You hear words like; abandoned baby, can you take him tonight, sorry we know that you are out to dinner, and please. You take one look at each other and ask for the check. I love this......man.
* they found the little boy's family the next day and although we never got any details on his case, we know that he went home to "family". It was an emotional 24 hours, but it was exactly what we were supposed to do.
Adam does not share my love for taking a picture of EVERY thing. But for our anniversary he bought me a awesome new camera.
And I do not understand Adam's love for video games. But I bought him Rock Band so he could play "rock" with his boys. (It was a big hit!) Adam might even tear up when Connor 100% his first song, he's gotten SO close.
More importantly, you know it's love when....You sit down to a romantic dinner on your anniversary in downtown Austin and receive a phone car. You hear words like; abandoned baby, can you take him tonight, sorry we know that you are out to dinner, and please. You take one look at each other and ask for the check. I love this......man.
* they found the little boy's family the next day and although we never got any details on his case, we know that he went home to "family". It was an emotional 24 hours, but it was exactly what we were supposed to do.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
A wife who submits?!? (You've got to be kidding)
So Adam and I are teaching a small group of newly weds (and one engaged couple). This is our second time doing this since we moved to Austin and WE LOVE IT. There is something so fun about talking marriage-stuff in a Godly way. This week we talked about one of the toughest subjects (I say one of the toughest cause we still have your past, finances, sex, and in-laws. Maybe I'll write about those too, whatcha think?). We talked about submission and headship.
It's a difficult subject for two reasons.
One because it's thought to be pretty old fashion and out of date. I mean come on after the women's suffrage movement and the recent equality of woman in the work place, is there room still for a submissive wife? And to be honest the woman I picture that comes to mind when I hear the word "submissive" is not the woman I want to be.
And two because deep down in every woman we REALLY don't want to be submissive. We (women) have a very deep desire to NOT be submissive (more on that later).
Let's start at the beginning. In Genesis 1:26-31 we see that God created man and woman differently but VERY equal. There was no man does this and woman do that. We were equally perfect. And then sin entered the world. We chose to live separately from God and so we had consequences to our sin.
Men had to toil and work for the first time in ETERNITY! And woman had to have painful childbirth AND (yup even I overlooked the next part). In Genesis 3:16b it says
Your desire shall be for your husband,
and he shall rule over you."
For the longest time I just saw this part of the verse and thought, yup we will desire to have a husband, makes sense to me. But if you read Genesis 4:7 ("If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.") you see that "desire" means more like wanting to control or dominate or rule over. So after the fall, woman will want to rule over, control, and dominate their husbands. INTERESTING huh??? Because of sin we will FIGHT being submissive. So it makes sense that when we (woman) read all this stuff about being the helpmeet of our husbands our first thought is: "Yeah no thanks!"
So now that we have this new knowledge hopefully the rest of this post won't be too hard to read.
Definition of Headship: The divine calling of the husband to take primary responsibility for Christ-like servant leadership, protection, and provision in the home.
Definition of Submission: The divine calling of the wife to honor and affirm her husband's leadership and help carry through according to her gifts.
So, our husbands have to stand up and be the leader of our family, but then we have this job of being honoring and affirming. NO where does it say that we roll over and listen to everything our husband says. NO where does it say that we say "Yes sir" to every command our husband gives us. NO where does it say that our husbands should ever command us to do anything that leads to sin.
I've been wrestling with what it means then to be the Biblical wife for a week now. And here is what I've come up with. Being the wife God has called me to be does not mean that I'm a weak woman. Not at all. It just simply means that I NEED TO SHUT UP sometimes. You see, I'm a natural leader and since God made me that way it is not bad. But I have to be careful that it does not crush my husband's leadership role in our family. I have to WATCH OUT and not dominate or rule over Adam. I have to stand back and LET HIM LEAD. I don't have to blindly obey him or be some weird timid little woman, not at all. That is not the woman Adam fell in love with. Nope I just need to SHUT MY FACE. It really is a lot easier that I thought.
The second thing I do is pray. I'm a helper and cheerleader and a kind of inspirational speaker for my husband. And the best way I can do that is if I am praying for him daily. I can't be the one who changes my husband's heart when it needs to be changed, it has to be the Holy Spirit. I can't nag him when I want something done, I need to speak to him about my needs and what he can do to help me, step back and SHUT UP, and then pray for my husband.
SO what do you think??? Agree? Disagree? Did I at least make you think?
It's a difficult subject for two reasons.
One because it's thought to be pretty old fashion and out of date. I mean come on after the women's suffrage movement and the recent equality of woman in the work place, is there room still for a submissive wife? And to be honest the woman I picture that comes to mind when I hear the word "submissive" is not the woman I want to be.
And two because deep down in every woman we REALLY don't want to be submissive. We (women) have a very deep desire to NOT be submissive (more on that later).
Let's start at the beginning. In Genesis 1:26-31 we see that God created man and woman differently but VERY equal. There was no man does this and woman do that. We were equally perfect. And then sin entered the world. We chose to live separately from God and so we had consequences to our sin.
Men had to toil and work for the first time in ETERNITY! And woman had to have painful childbirth AND (yup even I overlooked the next part). In Genesis 3:16b it says
Your desire shall be for your husband,
and he shall rule over you."
For the longest time I just saw this part of the verse and thought, yup we will desire to have a husband, makes sense to me. But if you read Genesis 4:7 ("If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.") you see that "desire" means more like wanting to control or dominate or rule over. So after the fall, woman will want to rule over, control, and dominate their husbands. INTERESTING huh??? Because of sin we will FIGHT being submissive. So it makes sense that when we (woman) read all this stuff about being the helpmeet of our husbands our first thought is: "Yeah no thanks!"
So now that we have this new knowledge hopefully the rest of this post won't be too hard to read.
Definition of Headship: The divine calling of the husband to take primary responsibility for Christ-like servant leadership, protection, and provision in the home.
Definition of Submission: The divine calling of the wife to honor and affirm her husband's leadership and help carry through according to her gifts.
So, our husbands have to stand up and be the leader of our family, but then we have this job of being honoring and affirming. NO where does it say that we roll over and listen to everything our husband says. NO where does it say that we say "Yes sir" to every command our husband gives us. NO where does it say that our husbands should ever command us to do anything that leads to sin.
I've been wrestling with what it means then to be the Biblical wife for a week now. And here is what I've come up with. Being the wife God has called me to be does not mean that I'm a weak woman. Not at all. It just simply means that I NEED TO SHUT UP sometimes. You see, I'm a natural leader and since God made me that way it is not bad. But I have to be careful that it does not crush my husband's leadership role in our family. I have to WATCH OUT and not dominate or rule over Adam. I have to stand back and LET HIM LEAD. I don't have to blindly obey him or be some weird timid little woman, not at all. That is not the woman Adam fell in love with. Nope I just need to SHUT MY FACE. It really is a lot easier that I thought.
The second thing I do is pray. I'm a helper and cheerleader and a kind of inspirational speaker for my husband. And the best way I can do that is if I am praying for him daily. I can't be the one who changes my husband's heart when it needs to be changed, it has to be the Holy Spirit. I can't nag him when I want something done, I need to speak to him about my needs and what he can do to help me, step back and SHUT UP, and then pray for my husband.
SO what do you think??? Agree? Disagree? Did I at least make you think?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
