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Pillar number two on my nine pillars of health is love for one another. There is no more important one another relationship than one we have with our spouse. However, it's my view that there are some misunderstandings floating around many Christian communities that lead to distance in marital relationships and not closeness. One of those misunderstandings is biblical submission in marriage. Biblical submission in marriage is a
controversial topic in the Christian community, but it shouldn't be. There's a lot of confusion over this issue and in large part due to weak teaching from the pulpit, many men and women are confused with their roles in marriage. Submission in marriage is not something to be feared or avoided. It's something that should be celebrated and pursued with gusto because it's part of God's natural design for relationships.
If you're woman listening to this episode, don't tune out because you think it's going to be another teaching on men ruling over women and a woman's role in marriage is to be barefoot and pregnant, doing laundry and cleaning toilets. That's the weak teaching I'm talking about. The truth in God's Word is very different and I assure you this message is an encouraging one for women. When this topic is taught from a worldly point of view,
It doesn't draw people closer to God, it pushes them away. And as a result, the abundant life that Jesus desires for us becomes more and more unreachable every day. Let's talk about it.
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Welcome to the Christian Healthy Lifestyle Podcast where I provide education on lifestyle modifications that will help you stay out of the doctor's office, age gracefully, and live a more purpose-driven life. I'm your host, David Sandstrom. God's design for marriage is that a harmonious, mutually beneficial relationship act like a nutrient to our souls. I like to call that nutrient vitamin where stands for marriage.
When our relationships are working well, it acts like a turbocharger to our vitality. And as I often say in the show, we maximize our health potential by aligning our lives more fully with God's natural design for spirit, mind, and body. A harmonious marital relationship has impact on all three parts to the human condition. When a couple is aligned spiritually, they're free to love God
and love others more effectively. When the marriage partners are aligned on a mental-emotional level, that brings peace and harmony to their mental state and they build more mental-emotional fortitude. When the marriage is working as designed by God, it has massive implications for physical vitality. By handling conflict effectively, we lower our stress levels, blood pressure drops, sleep becomes more effortless and restorative.
hormones and neurotransmitters get rebalanced and physical intimacy generally will naturally follow. That's what God has in mind when he says he wants us thoroughly equipped for every good work, 2 Timothy 3.17. My wife and I have been doing marriage ministry for over 20 years and we've seen a lot of confusion on the topic of submission in marriage. Most of the people who sign up for our marriage groups come to the first meeting with the expectation that they're going to get their spouse fixed.
That's not the biblical model. We can't make someone love us. Love cannot thrive without liberty. Focusing on trying to change our spouse is pretty much futile. We can't change people. That's God's job. That's the Holy Spirit's job. If we want a closer marital relationship, we've got to be willing to work on ourselves. Again, I'm not saying it's the wives that need to learn how to submit.
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As we're about to see, submission is for both spouses. The foundational verse for submission in marriage is found in Ephesians chapter 5. Starting in verse 22, we read this, Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. Men love to stop reading right there, but in verse 24, we see this, husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for her.
In the same chapter, a little earlier in verse 21, we read this, Submit to one another in the fear of God. So, submission is not just for the wives, husbands are called to submit as well. It's a two-way street. So, any thinking that one spouse has more of a biblical mandate to submit to the other is not in harmony with Scripture. So, can see that Ephesians 5 teaches us that mutual submission
is God's design for marriage. Now, before we unpack these verses in an understandable fashion, I'd like to talk about God's agape love. Men are commanded to love their wives as Christ loves the church. What does that mean? How does Christ love the church? He was willing to lay his life down for her. Jesus said in John 15, 13, greater love has no one than this.
that one lay down his life for his friends. Now that's a tall order. And I would suggest that the command to love our wives as Christ loved the church is far more difficult than simple submission. Now I'm going to have more to say on that in just a bit. Jesus is our example. When Jesus was about to go to the cross and he was sharing the Passover meal with the disciples in the upper room, the Bible says that he wanted to show them the full extent of his love.
and he proceeded to wash the disciples' feet. When he was done, he said, You call me teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If I, then the Lord and your teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I gave you an example that you also should do as I did to you." That's in John chapter 13 verses 13 through 17. That's agape love.
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and that's Jesus' example for all of us. Philippians chapter 2 verses 3 through 8 gives us another look and maybe even a more thorough description of agape love. Do nothing from selfish or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves. Do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus.
who although existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men, being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. So to love like Christ is to put on a stunning level of humility and
not demand respect or pull rank on others, but to elevate the needs of others above our own needs. That's servant leadership. Now that doesn't mean we're to do nothing but serve and forget about taking care of ourselves. Verse four says, do not look out merely for your own personal interests. In other words, of course we've practiced a little bit of self-love in this process, but the reason we do self-care
is to be in a better position to serve others. Remember, we can't give what we don't have. If we're completely spent by serving others and drained mentally, emotionally, and physically, we've got nothing left to give. And giving our lives away is the name of the game. So giving is the goal. Giving our lives away in service to others is Jesus' example, and that's true servant leadership.
If both spouses put on that attitude, now we're cooking with gas. Now we've got something to work with. In my book, The Christian's Guide to Listic Health, I talk about God's circuit of love. Now, I want to give credit where credit is due. I actually learned this concept from Dr. Timothy Jennings, the author of the book, The God-Shaped Brain, and the host of the podcast, Designed for More. He's an incredible Bible teacher, a medical doctor, MD, and a clinical psychiatrist.
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He's very wise, very wise guy. So love is not complete until it's given away. The reason why God declares in Genesis chapter two, verse 18, that it's not good for man to be alone is that before Eve was created, Adam had no one to give his love away to. God loves to draw our pictures for us. To help people's understanding, Jesus often used real world examples in his parables.
Many of the many of Jesus stories were centered around farming and agriculture, something that the people of his day were very familiar with. Well, I believe that God has drawn pictures for us in nature that communicates how agape love is supposed to work. Now, this is really cool. In Romans chapter one, verse 20, we see this. For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen
being understood through what has been made so that they are without excuse. So we're encouraged to look to nature to learn something about God. I believe God left us all kinds of examples in nature about true servant leadership and what sharing a God-bent love with others actually looks like. It's so ubiquitous in nature that it's almost like God is saying, I don't want you to miss this one. This is really important. When we look to nature,
we see the water cycle or the water circuit. The sun heats the surface of the water in the oceans and the water evaporates into the air. That moisture eventually collects in clouds and rains back down on the earth. The water then flows through rivers and streams and lakes and eventually makes it back to the ocean to start the cycle all over again. And what would happen if the rivers and streams stopped flowing? Stagnant water becomes deficient in oxygen and
sea creatures and vegetation would eventually die off. When rivers and streams flow and freely give their water away, it brings life. When that water stops flowing and becomes stagnant, it brings death. There's even a name for a body of water that doesn't give its water away. It's in the desert just outside of Jerusalem. It's called the Dead Sea. Or how about respiration? We breathe in air because we need oxygen.
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and we exhale carbon dioxide, and that carbon dioxide is used by the plant kingdom. Plants use our carbon dioxide and give us back oxygen. It's a beautiful, symbiotic relationship. What would happen if someone said, you know, it's my carbon dioxide, I'm not giving it away, and they put a plastic bag over their head and taped it around their neck? In a matter of minutes, death would soon follow.
Giving our carbon dioxide away brings life. You see how this works? See the illustration here? We need to give our love away in order to complete God's circuit of love. That's God's design. Now another example would be the electrical circuit. The wires in our homes receive electrical power from the power plant, but that power is useless unless the positive energy is allowed to flow towards the negative side of the circuit, which is ground.
Without a way for that electricity to be freely given away or allowed to flow through the wires, we couldn't light a light bulb or power our ovens or power any other electrical appliance in our house. That's what we do when we turn on a light switch. We close the circuit and we allow that electricity to flow through the light bulb to the ground. Without a closed circuit, the potential energy that's in the wires is useless. Everywhere we look in nature,
We see similar examples that there is an ebb and a flow to life on earth. The ocean tides come in and the tide goes out. The water is never stagnant. The sun rises, we have daylight. The sun sets and that bright daylight gives way to darkness. The seasons come and the seasons go. All of nature seems to be defaulted into one beautiful, harmonious giving away and receiving.
So God doesn't want us to miss this one. Agape love is what Jesus showed us when he walked on the earth. And he plainly says where to follow his lead. So what does all this have to do with submission in marriage? Well, pretty much everything. When we put on the kind of servant leadership that Jesus modeled, we put on a healthy dose of humility, we stopped demanding our rights, we stopped keeping score,
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and we stop demanding that our needs be met, and we focus on serving our spouse. In order for our relationships to function in harmony with God's design, we need to learn the concept of servant leadership, of putting on humility and elevating the needs of others above our own needs, and desires. If we understand this and put this kind of servant leadership into practice, we'll actually look forward to serving one another.
It'll bring us great joy to see our spouses respond and come alive when they benefit from the vitamin N we're serving up. That's God's design. And when we do, often to our own surprise, we see our needs getting met in the process. In 20 plus years of doing marriage ministry, I've never seen a spouse not respond positively to being served in a Christ-like fashion. It's just the way things work. That's the relational harmony
that God wants us to enjoy. Let me explain a little more about how this works in real life. When Eve was created, God didn't make Eve from Adam's toe so that he could walk all over her. He formed Eve from Adam's side by using his rib. Again, this is another picture for us. Men and women are co-equal in God's sight, and God's design for marriage is that each spouse is treated as having equal value.
Just because Adam was greeted first and Eve came from a part of Adam, that doesn't mean that she has any less value. 1 Corinthians 11-12 says, for as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman, but everything comes from God. So there is no superiority or inferiority. There is nothing being inferred by the fact that Adam was greeted first. We're all made from a part of our parents' bodies. We're all in the same boat.
men and women are equal in God's We have the same value, but we have different roles to fill. Now, this is where the confusion creeps in. Because most people don't understand real leadership, they get confused about the man being the spiritual leader of the home. It's God's design that the man be the spiritual leader of the home. In Joshua chapter 24 verse 15, we see Joshua acting as the spiritual leader of his household. Joshua speaking.
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But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord. Noah was the spiritual leader of his family, and Noah's obedience to God ended up saving the human race. Adam was supposed to be the spiritual leader of his family, but he failed, and we all know what happened after that. We see this in Genesis chapter 3, where Eve was the first to sin, but God held Adam responsible. Now,
someone may be disagreeing with my conclusions about equality and that person may say I'm glad you went to Genesis 3 Dave because that's where God explains that as part of Eve's punishment for her rebellion her husband will rule over her God doesn't punish us when we mess up it breaks his heart if you believe that because God is just and that in order to enforce his justice he has to punish us
I encourage you listen to episode number 199 where I talk about the wrath of God. If we were to believe that God is somehow handcuffed into punishing us when we mess up, it would force us to conclude that although it may have been God's original design that many women be co-equals in marriage, but now the human race is living under a new order. It's just part of God's nature to enforce punishment. After all, in Genesis 316, God says to Eve,
Your desire will be for your husband and he will rule over you. There you go, right there. The husband is now the boss. Hold on a minute. Let's pump the brakes a little bit. When God says to Eve, your desire will be for your husband and he will rule over you, he's not inflicting punishment. He's describing the consequences of the fall. The Bible is not being prescriptive here. It's being descriptive.
God is simply saying to Eve, because of your poor choice, the pure spirit of love and trust that I originally gave you has now been corrupted. You and all your offspring are now going to suffer from that corrupted spirit. The pure spirit of love and trust has been twisted into a spirit of fear and selfishness. The Bible says God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and love and a sound mind.
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So if we don't have a spirit of power and love and a sound mind, God didn't give us a spirit of fear. It entered the human race through our disobedience. What did Adam and Eve do once they realized they were naked and exposed? They acted in a manner that was consistent with fear and selfishness. They sought to protect themselves. They made themselves loin-carvings out of fig leaves. Now, have you ever seen a fig leaf? Ever touched one? It's like sandpaper.
It's not something I would want to wrap around my private parts for sure. Then, what did Adam say to God when God came to him after the fall? I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid myself. The pure spirit of love and trust had now been twisted and warped into a spirit of fear and selfishness. At that point, Adam and Eve were only able to pass on to their offspring what they have genetically
and spiritually. So now all humans are born with a spirit of fear and selfishness. It's what we call the sin nature. And this will lead to self-protection, self-promotion, claiming our rights, and the strong ruling over the weak. That's what God was referring to. Your desire will be for your husband and he will rule over you is just a simple statement of the state of mankind after the fall.
Because people will be motivated by fear and selfishness, the strong will naturally rule over the weak, and since men are physically stronger than women, men will tend to rule over and oppress women. It's as simple as that. God is not inflicting a punishment. He's simply explaining one of the consequences of the fall. He's describing the way things are now. Again, Genesis chapter 3 is descriptive, not prescriptive.
You see the difference? So men and women are equal, but they have different roles. Now I want to get back to submission in marriage. Now that we have a clearer picture of how husbands are called to treat their wives, let's talk a little bit more about submission. I said earlier that the foundational verse for submission in marriage is found in Ephesians 5. Wives submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. Also, 1 Corinthians 11.3,
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But I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God. Now here's an important point. A married woman is under no compulsion to submit to any action from her husband that's not Christ-like. That phrase, as to the Lord, means wives are to submit to their husbands as long as their husbands are submitting themselves to God.
If a husband is not acting in a Christ-like fashion, there is no command in Scripture that the wife has any obligation to submit to him. That changes things, doesn't it? If you're a woman, let me ask you a question. Would you be willing to submit to your husband if you were married to Jesus? I hope your answer is yes. If your answer to that question is still no, then you're
picture of the true nature and character of God needs a little tweaking. If that's the case, I suggest you go back and listen to my four-part series on spiritual health, starting in episode number 197. In that series, I dispel quite a few common myths about God that are really holding people back from surrendering to God's goodness. So anyway, it's God's design for marriage that the two spouses love one another
and respect one another, and that means putting more value on your spouse's opinions than your own. With that said, what if the couple has done everything right and they're still at an impasse? What's God's prescription for resolving the conflict? Well, it's my view that it's God's design that the man has the veto power. The man has a 51 % say in the matter. That's because living with strife
is not good and there needs to be a resolution to the conflict. And this is God's prescription for the resolution. Now, many of you know that I've been an airline pilot for the last 40 years. For more than half that time, I've been a captain. And the rest of that time, I was a first officer or when I first started out, I was a flight engineer. Over the years, airline training has come a long way when it comes to how the captain and the first officer interact with one another. It's called
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Crew Resource Management, or CRM. Now in the old days, the captain's word was law. First officers and flight engineers were not allowed to question the captain's judgment. That lack of communication was found out to be a contributing factor in many accidents. Today, the first officer is encouraged to speak up and express his or her opinions, and even in a professional manner, challenge the decisions of the captain.
Captains are trained to solicit input from the first officer and to tap into their experience and point of view. However, at the end of the day, after considering all the input from the other crew members, the captain is still the one who makes the final decisions and the captain is the one who will be held accountable for those decisions. Now I've been on both sides of this communication model and let me tell you, it's a lot easier to be a first officer. You get to express your opinions,
And then you rest on the idea that you've been listened to and heard, and you know that if things don't work out, it's the captain that'll be doing the carpet dance in front of the chief pilot a week later in the chief pilot's office and not you. As a first officer, you know that your opinion matters and you pretty much don't have to wrestle with the decision after that. You get to let it go. This, I believe, is very similar to the way it's supposed to work in marriage.
The wife's opinion is sought after and heard and even given more weight by the husband than his own. But at the end of the day, it's the husband who has the responsibility to act in a Christ-like fashion and it's the husband who will be ultimately held accountable by God for his behavior. This arrangement is a gift to women. It lightens their load, but in no way diminishes their worth or their significance to the relationship. When this is done well, it's a very beautiful thing and it brings a lot of
peace and harmony to the relationship. Well, I hope this has cleared out some of the confusion regarding the roles of husbands and wives and what biblical submission in marriage actually looks like. If you enjoyed this episode, you'll probably enjoy my book. It's called The Christian's Guide to Holistic Health. It's sold on Amazon. It's available in all formats, paperback, hardcover, Kindle, and Audible. Also, if you're finding value with this show,
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Would you help me get the word out? Would you leave me a rating and a review on Spotify or Apple podcasts? Those ratings and reviews are very helpful to people considering investing the time to listen to an episode or subscribe to the show. That's it for now. Thank you for listening. I appreciate you. Go out there and live abundantly. I'll talk with you next time. Be blessed.
