My Faith Is a Hot Mess (Part 3)

We're in my faith is a hot mess, and this is part three - one more week on men and women, husbands and wives, and how the way we read Scripture shapes our relationships. You may be thinking, "Another week on this?" Well, people have been misusing Scripture to justify subjugating women for thousands of years, so a few weeks to address it doesn't seem that long by comparison.

A quick recap: there's a doctrine often called complementarianism (I've been calling it by its more accurate name, revised hierarchism). It teaches that the man is in charge of the relationship at all times, and the woman submits to his wishes unless doing so would cause her to sin - a permanent power structure with limited roles for women and unlimited roles for men, based purely on gender. It's a system you can only support by taking Scripture out of context and valuing thousand-year-old cultural customs over the well-being of real people.

This week we're looking at one of the most famous passages used to defend it:

For wives, this means submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For a husband is the head of his wife as Christ is the head of the church... As the church submits to Christ, so you wives should submit to your husbands in everything. - Ephesians 5:22-24

"It's right there in black and white," a hierarchist would say. "It even says it twice." Fair enough - but before we rubber-stamp that reading, let's do the work.

Who, who for, and why

Paul wrote Ephesians, likely from prison in Rome around A.D. 60-62 (he calls himself a prisoner several times in the letter). He wrote it to a specific church in a specific place - the church at Ephesus, a diverse community of Jews and Gentiles he knew personally from spending years there. So this isn't a context-free directive dropped from the sky; it's a letter to a particular congregation.

Now notice how verse 22 begins: "For wives, this means..." That opening clause tells us it's a continuation of the previous thought. So what comes right before it?

And further, submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. - Ephesians 5:21

Submit to one another. The submission instruction isn't just for wives. The section headings you see in your Bible - "Wives and Husbands," "Instructions for Christian Households" - were added by translators to help us group ideas; Paul didn't write headings into his letters. And here's a telling detail: some translations place that heading right over verse 22, conveniently splitting "submit to one another" away from "wives, submit to your husbands." That's a choice.

In the original Greek, verses 21 and 22 are actually part of the same sentence, and the whole block (verses 18-24) is a continuation built on the same kind of participles. English translations even add a second "submit" in verse 22 that isn't in the Greek - it's only implied. And remember: the oldest Greek manuscripts (like Papyrus 46, our earliest copy of this passage) have no punctuation at all, so translators have to decide where sentences break - which can subtly shape how we read the text. (I'm indebted to the work of Marg Mowczko for much of this breakdown.) Read fairly, "submit to one another" was meant for everyone, husbands and wives.

More instructions for husbands than wives

If you keep reading, Paul actually gives husbands more instruction than wives:

For husbands, this means love your wives, just as Christ loved the church. He gave up his life for her. - Ephesians 5:25

That word "head" in verse 23 is the Greek kephalē, which can mean a literal head, or "authority," or "source" (as in the source of life, growth, and love). Paul uses it elsewhere to mean source, and it fits here: a husband is the source for his wife as Christ is the source for the church - the source of her salvation, love, care, and sustenance. Alvera and Berkeley Mickelsen - a husband-and-wife team of authors, he a professor of Greek, Hebrew, and theology at Bethel Seminary, she a professor of journalism - studied this word closely in Christianity Today. They wrote:

In the New Testament, kephalē is better translated "source of life," "top," "crown," "exalted originator," "completer" - and not "authority over." ... In Ephesians 5:23, kephalē means the one who brings to completion, stressing on the one hand the unity of Christ and the church, husband and wife, and on the other the mutually interdependent relation between the two in each of the pairs. - Alvera and Berkeley Mickelsen

But here's the thing: even if you insist on translating kephalē as "authority," it changes nothing about how husbands are told to treat their wives - because the model is Christ, who gave up his life. Any wrestling or MMA fan knows that to "tap out" is to submit. To give up is to submit. Jesus loved his bride so much that he gave up his life for her - the ultimate act of submission. So yes, I believe Ephesians 5 teaches that wives should submit to their husbands. It also plainly teaches that husbands should submit to their wives, to the point of laying down their lives. This passage teaches mutual submission.

It's striking how some will accept the heroic-sacrifice part while refusing to give up their presumed authority - "I'd take a bullet for my wife, but she doesn't get the final say." So you'd give up your life but not an outdated system of gender hierarchy? What does that say about which one you love more? (And logically: if you did sacrifice your life, who has the final say then? Not you.)

Jesus is our model of submission

Look at what our example actually did:

Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave. - Philippians 2:6-7

And he lived it out in the smallest ways, too. On the night before his death, knowing the Father had given him authority over everything, Jesus got up, wrapped a towel around his waist, and washed his disciples' feet - a servant's job. Then he said:

Since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other's feet. I have given you an example to follow. - John 13:14-15

Even those with authority are meant to humble themselves and submit to the needs of those they love. This isn't supposed to come from obligation or duty, but from an outpouring of unconditional love modeled by Jesus.

The "tiebreaker" fallacy

Not one word of this passage is about the husband being in charge or having final say. The fallback argument goes: "Someone has to be the tiebreaker, so the husband decides." That's a false dichotomy - the assumption that the only options are "she wins" or "he wins," that someone must rule and someone must be ruled. There's a secret option C: keep talking until you reach a compromise you both can live with.

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves. - Philippians 2:3

The healthiest relationships aren't ones where someone wins; they're ones where both people put the other first. Sometimes you have to step away from the table, pray, process your emotions, and come back to work on a solution that builds unity instead of resentment. Humility is part of the secret of a healthy relationship.

Why Paul wrote it: unity

And why did Paul write this section? Unity is the central theme of his whole letter to the Ephesians - Jews and Gentiles brought together under the gospel, all parts of the same body. You can't read Ephesians 5:21-33 apart from that theme. Chapter five simply applies unity to relationships. Pull a few verses out of that context and you can make them say things Paul never meant.

What biblical womanhood actually looks like

You cannot define biblical womanhood from passages that describe people operating inside a broken system. Biblical womanhood is not a mousy, silent woman whose existence is mainly for making babies and keeping men happy. That picture isn't fair, true, christlike, or even scripturally accurate. Look at the whole story of Scripture, and you find God using women in ways that subvert the broken systems around them:

Biblical womanhood is Eve, the original ezer kenegdo - a strong rescuer and equal partner. It's Deborah, the prophetess and judge who led for decades and whose leadership men and women alike accepted. It's Esther, who risked death to save her people. It's Shiphrah and Puah, the midwives who feared God and defied Pharaoh's order to kill the Hebrew babies. It's Mary, the mother of Jesus, who found favor with God. It's the women who stayed at the cross when the disciples fled. It's Priscilla, who taught and raised up leaders alongside her husband - and is so often named first that she was likely the more prominent of the two (some scholars even suggest she may have written Hebrews). It's Lydia, a successful businesswoman who hosted and led a house church. It's Phoebe, a deacon whom Paul entrusted to carry his letter to the Romans. It's Lois and Eunice, who shaped the faith of young Timothy. And it's Junia, whom Paul calls prominent among the apostles (Romans 16:7).

Arguments about which gender is "in charge" should be non-starters, according to Paul himself:

There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. - Galatians 3:28

If Christ is the true source and authority of the church, then Christ - not our culture - ought to be the source and authority of our doctrine and the way we treat people, especially women. In a time when it was taboo even to speak to women in public, Jesus showed them compassion, listened to them, elevated them, and accepted them as equals. And let's never forget: God chose women to be the first witnesses to the resurrection - in a culture that didn't even count a woman's testimony as reliable.

The good news that redeems it all

The life-changing teaching of Jesus has the power to redeem not just our ideas about gender, but every part of our lives. All of us fall short of God's standard, and our sin separated us from a holy God - but he loved us so much that he gave his only Son, who took all our sins (past, present, and future) upon himself on the cross and paid the price for them. Three days later he defeated death by rising from the grave, and now he offers eternal life in heaven and abundant life here as we follow him.

If you've never accepted those gifts and you'd like to follow Jesus today, you can pray a prayer like this one:

Dear Lord Jesus, I know that I'm a sinner. I know I've done wrong things. Please forgive me of my sins. Right now I ask you to be the Lord of my life. Help me to turn from my sins and follow you. Thank you for dying on the cross for my sins, for rising again on the third day and taking those sins away, for saving me, and for preparing a place for me. In Jesus' name, amen.

If you prayed that prayer, it's the best decision you'll ever make, and I'd love to encourage and pray with you. Come see me after a service, or email me at josh@seacoastredondo.com.

Once a month we also celebrate communion - a time for those united in Christ to remember what Jesus did for us, just as he asked his followers to do:

This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me. - Luke 22:19

It's a time to be thankful for Christ's sacrifice, to reflect on our own lives, and to confess anything we need to bring before God. All who have put their faith in Jesus are welcome to take part.

I'll be going long for the rest of this series - I think getting it is more important than getting out ten minutes early. Until next time, may we be united by Christ in our love for one another, for God, and for all of his creation.