The Ephesians 5 Man and The "S" Word

Special shout-outs to Quentin McCall, Rachelle Miller, Steven J. Dixon, and Michelle Hammond for the inspiration on this entry.

There is a word in the English language that is regarded with much disdain and contempt, especially in the independent culture of America. This word often leaves a nasty taste in the mouths of many. Oh, and don’t dare mention this word around any women, lest you have a death wish. If you haven’t already figured out what this word is, it is submission.

The concept of submission has always had a negative connotation to it. Most people associate it with weakness. A person who submits is often considered to not be equal to the person that is being submitted to. “Losing”, “giving up” and “surrendering” are also associated with submission. Considering all of this, you probably wouldn’t be surprised if someone scoffed at you (and that’s probably the mildest of reactions) for even suggesting submission, regardless of the reason.

I mentioned earlier that this topic is a particularly sensitive one for women. For ages, women have been fed the idea that wives should submit to their husbands. This concept originated in the Bible, in Ephesians 5:22-30. I explained in a previous blog entry that many people – both male and female, religious and non-religious – have misunderstood this passage. This misunderstanding has unfortunately led to a severe abuse of this scripture. Some take this scripture to mean that husbands are to enjoy a dictatorship position in their marriages, ruling over their wives with an iron fist, and that the wives are to become doormats, blindly obeying everything that their husbands command. Some have even misinterpreted this to mean that all women should submit to all men.

These ideas could not be any further from the truth. While they are very extreme examples of what this passage does not mean, they go to show that many people just don’t have a firm grasp on what God is trying to communicate to us there. I will refrain from going any deeper into what this passage really does mean for women, as that would be beating a horse that has long since passed away. Anything I could say on that subject can be better explained by pointing you to two very Biblical and practical articles I’ve read, "Submission 101" and "Respect".

Now that I’ve gotten that out the way, I want to focus on a portion of this scripture that I feel has been in every way neglected. The writer of Ephesians chose to address the wives first for some reason. I get the vibe that people stop reading after verse 24. Perhaps the male readers are so happy about it that they figure it couldn’t get any better, and the ladies are so appalled by those three verses that they just can’t get past them. At any rate, verses 25-30 are ignored by most. I find it ironic that there is much more time spent addressing the husband’s part in this, yet if you mentioned Ephesians 5 to anyone, the phrase “wives submit to your husbands” is the only thing closely associated.

Let’s take a few moments to break down what God is saying (yes, my conviction is that GOD is speaking through the Bible. That’s fine if you don’t agree. Maybe we’ll argue about that on another blog entry, but not this one. #SorryImNotSorry) to the husbands in verses 25-30:

²⁵ Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her ²⁶ to make her holy, cleansing^[a] her by the washing with water through the word, ²⁷ and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. ²⁸ In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. ²⁹ After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church— ³⁰ for we are members of his body.

Basically, God is calling for Husbands to love their wives in the same way that they love themselves. Whatever a Husband would do for himself, he must do for his wife, and whatever he would not do or allow to happen to himself, the same goes for his wife as well. The husband is putting his wife’s needs before his own. A husband is also required to present his wife to God as holy and blameless, without any stain, wrinkle, blemish or defect. A husband is ultimately responsible for his wife and her well-being: physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

I know I said we’d leave the wives’ role alone, but it’s important that we take a quick glance back to verses 22-24. Notice that God is speaking to the wives, telling them to submit to their husbands. God does not speak to the husbands, saying “your wives should submit to you.” If we go back to the husbands’ portion, we’ll also notice that it says nothing about husbands ruling over their wives, commanding them, or telling them what to do. God instructs the husbands only on the things listed because he knows that a woman will submit to a man if she sees that he is responsible, that she can trust him and his leadership, and that she can ultimately respect him. If a man loves his wife as himself as laid out in the scriptures, he has all of this covered. He will never have to bring up verses 22-24 to his wife. In the words of one of my favorite relationship bloggers, “If you have to tell your woman to submit to you, then you are doing something wrong.”

I can imagine that loving another human being as yourself and presenting her as stainless and blameless before God is a feat much more easily said than done, but I have a firm belief that it is possible and that it works, because I trust God and his Word. Now, I have never been married before, so take that with a handful of salt or two if you find it necessary. However, there is a particular area of my life that I feel gives me at least a small taste of what married life may be like.

If you know me at all, whether through this blog or in person, you know that I have this uncanny ability to relate just about anything to dancing. This is especially the case with relationships and, more specifically, marriage. In partner dancing, the man leads and the woman follows. Yes, the man is more or less in charge and tells the woman what to do, but it goes deeper than that. The man is in charge more so in the sense that he is responsible for two things: 1) making the lady look good and 2) protecting her.

It is often said that, in partner dancing, the man is the frame and the woman is the picture. The man should not be concerned with his own image on the dance floor, but with presenting the woman, putting her radiance and beauty on display. If there are any mistakes on the woman’s part, whether it is her technique or the inevitable accident, it is the man’s duty to cover it up and make it appear that there were no mistakes. If the woman is far less skilled than the man, he may dance slightly above her head in order to challenge her, but for the most part, he dances on her level for the purpose of making sure she is comfortable, making it appear that she knows what she’s doing, even if she really doesn’t. When a man focuses on making his partner look good, he in turn looks good himself. However, if he is only concerned about his own performance and neglects his partner, he makes them both look bad.

A lead in partner dancing is also charged with playing traffic cop. He has to make sure that he performs his moves in a way that will not put her in harms way or make her uncomfortable. He also has to watch out for others, making sure that they do not bump into him or his partner. A good lead protects his partner at all costs and makes sure that his partner does not have to worry about anything else but being one with him as he is being one with the music, and dancing to her heart's content.

While I am a firm believer that there is a such thing as a bad follower in partner dancing, a lead is better off assuming that anything that goes wrong is his fault. Even if it is a situation where a botched move really is the woman's fault, a good lead always has the mentality that "if she didn't get it, there's something I could have done better." A man should lead a move well enough that any woman who is allowing herself to be lead can follow it. If I, as a lead, have to verbally tell my partner what she was supposed to have done, then I didn't lead it correctly.

My nine years of partner dancing experience has taught me much in the area of leading, both in dancing salsa specifically and in life. The lessons I've learned there have helped me understand what God is really asking of husbands in marriages, and of me once I have found my future wife. I hope that what I've shared here has shed a bit more light on this controversial matter, and that the men reading this will join me in striving to become "Ephesians 5" men.

The "Requests" Of Your Heart

Psalm 37:4-6

4 Take delight in the LORD,

and he will give you the desires of your heart.

5 Commit your way to the LORD;

trust in him and he will do this:

6 He will make your righteous reward shine like the dawn,

your vindication like the noonday sun.

The above passage is the first passage of scripture in the Bible that I ever memorized. A trusted friend of mine shared it with me to encourage me about a particular situation in my life. That’s a long story for another blog entry, but let’s just say I’ve learned that there’s a reason why “desires of your heart” comes after “take delight in the Lord”.

One thing I love about the Bible is that, you can read a passage numerous times and still never cease to get something new out of it. It reminds me of listening to a song or watching a movie for the ‘hundred-teenth time and catching something I didn’t catch before, or making a new connection to something that I had experienced in my life since the last time. The Bible just has this strange ability to continue to be relevant as we continue to live our lives.

Earlier this year, one of the older gentlemen in my Church shared this scripture with us as he was doing the welcome one Sunday morning. The majority of us had heard or read it many times before, but he pointed out something that added a bit more depth to it for me than before. He brought our attention to the word “desires” at the end of verse 4. He explained that the original Hebrew word is “Mish’alah”. While “desire” is definitely one of the definitions of the word, it is only the third definition, coming after “request” and “petition.” When you replace “desires” in verse 4 with “requests” or “petitions”, this verse gets a little heavier. To make a request or petition involves making a desire known.

We all have desires, but our desires are not always spoken about or acted upon. Sometimes we feel like our desires are unrealistic or that we otherwise just won’t get what we ask for. Maybe we feel like the favor we’d ask for will be too much of a burden. Or maybe we don’t have faith that the person we ask can fulfill the request. For whatever reason, we don’t always speak up about what we want.

However, it is not just enough for us to have desires. Got wants us to ask for what we want. I can already hear some of you thinking, “But God is omnipotent and all-knowing. He already knows what I want. Why do I need to ask him for it?” While this may be true, that is not the point. Of course, we could obviously look to the old adage and know that “a closed mouth don’t get fed.” More importantly, God wants a genuine relationship with us. In a healthy relationship, the lines of communication are always open. Consider for a moment an Earthly relationship. The argument can be made (usually by women) that your significant other should know you so well that you don’t have to ask for what you want, but at the end of the day, assuming that your partner already knows what you want can potentially lead to confusion and hurt feelings. A failure to communicate your needs and desires to your S.O. can also come across as taking him or her for granted.

While we certainly don’t have to worry about God getting any signals crossed or incorrectly assuming our wants and needs, the point still remains that he wants to hear from us. Yes, he knows already, but he wants to hear it out of our own mouths. It is when we have personal, real dialogue with God –complete with wants, needs, desires, adorations, disappointments, even beefs with him– that we truly have a close relationship with him.

Getting back to the main point of Psalm 37:3-6, when we have delighted ourselves in him, God will grant us the requests of our hearts. He will reward us with the desires that we have laid before him with requests and petitions, not the desires that we have kept to ourselves. Learning this has made me realize that I just have not been communicating with God like I should. I thought about the parable of the persistent widow, where Jesus made the point that God brings about justice for his chosen ones when they cry out to him day and night. I also thought about several scriptures in the gospels that speak of “asking and receiving.” A common theme began to marinate in my head about consistent and persistent communication with God. I realized that maybe I haven’t been getting what I want from God because I just haven’t been talking to him and making requests of him enough. I’ve had to come to the conviction that, while I may not get everything that I want, I’d rather ask for what I want and not get it, than to not get what I want simply because I didn't ask for it. Regardless of if our prayers are selfless or selfish (he’ll guide our hearts to the right place), God wants to hear our desires, and more importantly, he just wants to hear from us!