These are my thoughts on how important it is to honor, respect, and submit to the male authorities(father, brothers, boss) God has given me. I can make wonderful food, keep a clean home, and have
perfect children. But if I don’t treat my husband with respect and honor, then
all those earlier things don’t matter.
It’s like those verses in Corinthians where it says “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I
am a noisy gong or clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and
understand all mysteries, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains,
but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up
my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.” (1 Cor 13:1-3)
It is like that in marriage as well. If I speak firmly to my
children and keep them well trained, but do not respect my husband, I am like a
clanging gong in my husband’s soul. If I have the power to keep a home, and am
extremely wise, and if I have confidence in myself, so as to be able to do many
things, but do not respect my husband, I am nothing. If I give away all my
time, and deliver up my body to menial tasks, but do not respect my husband, I
gain nothing.
So I wondered how I could practice this skill, as I did not
yet have a husband. What I finally realized was that the way I treated the men
in my life then, was the same way I was going to naturally treat my husband
later. And that this was especially reflected in the way I treated my father
and brothers, as they were the men I lived with from day to day. This
realization caused a desire to honestly search and see what the Bible had to say
about the way I should treat men.
The role of a woman was given very early in the Bible. “She shall be called woman because she was
taken out of man.”(Genesis 2:23b). “Your
desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.(Genesis
3:16).
He shall rule over you. This was what God told the woman
concerning the man. After looking deeper, I found that this is not simply one
of those Old Testament commands that we are no longer held to. It is continuous
throughout the Bible, even into the New Testament. “The head of the wife is her husband.”(1 Cor 11:3b), “Neither was man created for woman, but
woman for man.”(1 Cor 11:9). “Wives,
submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the
wife even as Christ is head of the church…Now as the church submits to Christ,
so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.”(Eph
5:22-24).
As a young woman who had grown up in evangelical churches,
one of the first places I looked for the role of women was in Proverbs 31.
Though this chapter talks mostly about the more housewife type skills of women,
there are a few bits in there that talk of the role of a wife concerning her treatment
of her husband. “The heart of her husband
trusts in her, and he will have no lack of gain. She does him good, and not
harm, all the days of her life…. Her husband is known in the gates when he sits
among the elders of the land.”(Proverbs 31:11-12,23).
These verses in proverbs speak of the way a husband should
be able to trust, profit, and receive well from his wife. All of the verses I found spoke of
submitting, obeying, and respecting men. It is clear what God has called us
women to do. Our role is to respect, honor, obey, and encourage the men in our
lives. The men in our lives should be well spoken of, and people should respect
them because of what we say of them.
So I began to reflect on my life. Did I obey and submit to
my father? Did I respect my brothers? Did I encourage the men around me, or did
I tear them down with what I labeled as “teasing?” Did the people I spoke to
have respect for the men in my life because of how I spoke of them? I realized
the incredible importance of this.
I could not think that I could disrespect my father, boss
around my brothers, talk bad of my male friends, and still be able to be the
wife someday that God wanted me to be, or that my husband would need.
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