Mark,

What I have been asking from you is to show us how submission works under your understanding. Please give examples of how a wife is to submit that is something that a man cannot do for her. Are you able to answer this?

Mark,
Read through my comment #2 to see that the Greek term for “submit” in its original sense did not have to relate to authority when it was used in non-military use. Thus submission becomes voluntary and is given freely instead of by constraint. To say that submission always implies an authority goes against the non-military use of the Greek term.

So Christian submission is not something under compulsion to an authority that can make us submit. Rather it is to those who either have a need and we are submitting to supply their need rather than our own or they have something to give us that cannot be given without our willing submission to receive. This is a beautiful thing and as Christians practice submitting to those who have no power or authority over them, it shows the beauty of the Lord who lives within us.

More to come…

Mark,

I resent the personal comments to you regarding our private debate. Let me know if they didn’t come through.

Mark,
Since I assume that you are still reading here, even though the hard questions that we have been asking haven’t been answered, I recommend that you try. It will be a good exercise for you and helpful for the dialog.

Also I sent you a couple of emails regarding the private conversation you wanted to have with me. If you haven’t looked at them, you may want to check them out for I think you will find my reasoning quite interesting.

Cheerio.

100 gengwall,

So Mark, NN, since Christ can physically discipline those He “loves”, and the husband/wife relationship is identical in every way to the Christ/Church relationship in your view, is it ok for husbands to spank and otherwise physically discipline thier wives if, in the husband’s (Christ perfected) view, she is being sinful?

That is quite a thought! It is completely against the idea of sacrificial love, yet when one usurps God’s authority and claims it for their own “right”, then who could stop such a one from physical or emotional abuse when they are the highest authority in their home? And in many lands pagan husbands have already claimed this right and been responsible for the death of their wives. They don’t see anything wrong with having full authority of life or death for another mature human being.

It is sad, isn’t it that these comps could care less about their egal brothers and sisters in Christ? It is a sign of a spiritual problem, since we are to be known for our love of the brethren. Very sad.

Now the interesting thing is that it is only married women who need an authority over them to lead them and make their decisions and pull out the male trump card. Apparently single women are capable of operating in faith quite well, serving the Lord with all their hearts and making wise decisions. I wonder why that is?

Excellent question SM. I hope that Mark and NN will enlighten us to the necessity of an authority over the woman especially seeing that the Scripture encourages us all to grow up in order to make wise and mature decisions. I will be eagerly waiting for the answer too.

There is no doubt that setting oneself under a person is only to be there to lift up or to receive. It has nothing to do with an involuntary action that would be demanded by one in authority.

Thanks TL. I do have Liddell and Scott’s lexicon. I didn’t copy the whole list of lexicons that I have.

Here is a screen print of the Enhanced Strong’s on the term submit:

Here is the information on Liddell and Scott’s work:

And lastly here is the screen print from the entry on submit from Liddell and Scott:

Well, I am going to add my thoughts into the mix, but since I am the blog owner, I did a new post on my view. http://strivetoenter.com/wim/2010/06/02/submission-and-origin-of-authority/

In the new post I challenge Mark and other complementarians to give us examples of how their authority is lived out over their wives in a one-way authority/submission relationship.

Hi Liz, welcome to my blog!

The difficult verses are dealt with in several areas on my blog. A shortened version is here http://strivetoenter.com/wim/2006/12/02/what-does-1-timothy-211-15-mean/ and a longer more indepth version here http://strivetoenter.com/wim/2007/09/30/the-rest-of-the-story-1-timothy-211-15-and-matt-slick/

It looks like the last post crashed with too many comments. I should have started a new post a lot sooner. I am going to see if I can remove a few comments if that will help and post them here.

Here is Susanna’s last comment:

Hay Mara, since you enjoy early church stuff, here’s some more:

“On the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood’s Web site, Grudem challenges egalitarians to provide an example in which hypotasso is being applied “to relationships between persons and where it does not carry the sense of being subject to an authority.” We have already found this to be true in Ephesians 5:21-33, James 4:4-10, and 1 Pet 3:1-6, and we find additional examples from the writings of the Apostolic Fathers. Clement of Rome, who is believed by many to be the Clement mentioned by Paul in Philippians 4:3, is an early witness to the mutual subjection of all believers.

Let us take our body for an example. The head is nothing without the feet, and the feet are nothing without the head; yea, the very smallest members of our body are necessary and useful to the whole body. But all work (lit. all breathe together) harmoniously together, and are under one common rule (lit. use one subjection) for the preservation of the whole body. Let our whole body, then, be preserved in, Christ Jesus; and let every one be subject to his neighbour, according to the special gift (lit. according as he has been placed in his charism) bestowed upon him.

Polycarp was the disciple of John the Apostle, and in his letter love, humility and good works are all part of mutual subjection.

Stand fast, therefore, in these things, and follow the example of the Lord, being firm and unchangeable in the faith, loving the brotherhood, and being attached to one another, joined together in the truth, exhibiting the meekness of the Lord in your intercourse with one another, and despising no one. When you can do good, defer it not, because “alms delivers from death.” Be all of you subject one to another having your conduct blameless among the Gentiles,” that ye may both receive praise for your good works, and the Lord may not be blasphemed through you. But woe to him by whom the name of the Lord is blasphemed! Teach, therefore, sobriety to all, and manifest it also in your own conduct.

The disciple of Polycarp, Irenaues, wrote in his only surviving work, Against Heresies, “Submission to God is eternal rest, so that they who shun the light have a place worthy of their flight; and those who fly from eternal rest, have a habitation in accordance with their fleeing. Also Origen connected submission with salvation in the beginning of the third century.

What, then, is this “putting under” by which all things must be made subject to Christ? I am of opinion that it is this very subjection by which we also wish to be subject to Him, by which the apostles also were subject, and all the saints who have been followers of Christ. For the name “subjection,” by which we are subject to Christ, indicates that the salvation which proceeds from Him belongs to His subjects, agreeably to the declaration of David, “Shall not my soul be subject unto God? From Him cometh my salvation.”

Tiffany,
You asked:

Cheryl you have mentioned before that complementarians have never answered questions you have for them about various texts. I suspect what you mean is that they have never answered to your satisfaction, they have never proven their position to you.

So when is it proven?

Thanks for re-asking your question. I missed that one.

No, I don’t mean that my questions are not answered to my satisfaction. What I mean is that my questions are not answered according to God’s standards. For someone to be charged with a crime there needs to be two or three witnesses. Both Jesus and Paul also used the two or three witnesses as a standard for a testimony of truth and for bringing truth to the church in a “safe” way. So I look for evidence that would be applicable to a solid witness that is confirmed in the Scripture. Two witnesses is okay with me.

In the area of authority, a Biblical witness is mandatory. It is such an important area because we must never assume an authority that God has not given us. That would be usurping His authority and it is a very inadvisable thing to do.

So I look for evidence that would stand up in court. What is a good witness? I would accept evidence from God, Adam or Eve that in the original good creation God had given the husband authority over his wife. Unfortunately we all know that there is no such evidence in Genesis.

So I look for evidence in the NT that the woman is told to submit to the husband’s authority over her. There is nothing like that either. I would also accept any apostle who would tell the husbands that they are to take authority over their wives as God has given them this authority. No such evidence of this either. So how are we to accept an authority that has no witness? It is very problematic.

For the vast majority of the thread the sides haven’t even been able to agree on basic common ground. (the definition of authority, that for whatever reason it is there that the instructions are different to husbands and wives, and others).

It doesn’t help when one redefines a word like authority. How can there be common ground when the definition of a word is outside of the definition of our common English words? God gave us language so that we can use it to understand each other. If every took common words and made them mean something different for each person, then we would not have a hope of communicating. We need to be consistent. It was Dave’s idea that if one wanted to change the meaning of a word that all one would have to do is to create a new word that had that meaning. That is the legitimate way of having a word with a new meaning. Just make up a word and tell us what it means to you and we can dialog around that word. But it is not helpful to take authority and recreate a meaning.

Does this make sense?

Which really is fine. Arminians and Calvinists disagree on many many (very big) things. They are both however Christians and a part of the body, The aren’t both 100% right, but they are both still Christians.

I agree that we are all a part of the body of Christ. However even with that issue there are ways to help with our understanding of each other’s viewpoint by defining our words and working hard to understand the other person’s point of view.

This isn’t an issue of not being a Christian and so we can agree to disagree.

Tiffany #566,
You said:

re 550

First of all, I don’t think that it is clear that you don’t believe husbands have 100% authority over wives.

It should be. Not only have I stated it numerous times, but I gave the very specific explanation of the nature of universal truth which comes from God and the implications for that in the marriage relationship.

You are speaking about universal truth and we are speaking about authority. This doesn’t help to make this clear but to cause confusion. But I will try to decipher what I think you are saying. I believe you are saying that in the areas of God’s domain, God has authority. One of the areas that God has all the authority is in the area of truth. No man can take authority over his wife and make her believe something that is not true as universal truth is not something that he can change and enforce upon her. Universal truth is God’s authority over her.

But in the area of all other things outside of God’s direct authority you believe that the husband has 100% authority to set the direction of the home and the marriage. The woman will be in complete submission to his authority by setting her mind to learn and accept his desires so that she is in complete agreement with him and his authority to lead the home and the marriage.

Does this come close to how you believe the husband to be the authority of the home and marriage?

Tiffany, does this somewhat accurately convey what you are saying?

Somewhat. The problem with the example, while I think it accurately portrays in one aspect what I have been wanting to get across, it gives the impression the the unique things that make the wife *her* disappear. Which isn’t accurate. The wife as she submits to her husband isn’t going to disapeer. I suspect you would like to go further in this particular part of the discussion, but this really must be my last comment and I need to be coming to a close.

So you believe that if a wife sets aside her desires for the home and the marriage and she lifts up her husband’s desires so that they are the things that she strives for instead of her own desires, that she will not disappear and no longer be a person of her own? Then can you tell me what circumstances would happen that would make her disappear?

I am going to make one last statement re:authority. going back and reading some of my explanations I can understand your confussion. My intent was never to discuss authority to begin with, but only submission and I should have stuck to that. In saying a little rather than none or a lot, it has made things less clear rather than more.

After working through your statements, I think that I am understanding where you are coming from. There seems to be a unique definition given for authority that no one else uses but you have been convinced that your understanding of authority is the Biblical one. You also seem to have a very unique definition of submission which involves becoming so involved with your husband’s desires that you now become the same way. Yet you say that this doesn’t make you disappear. Yet the fact that you brought up a disappearing makes me believe that you do understand the trap that this kind of thinking can lead to. I know of no one else that has ever expressed to me that submission was a wife absorbing or taking on the desires of her husband. While I don’t doubt that there are women who are very much like their husbands in a lot of areas so that there have common desires, the meaning of submission does not mean to take on another person’s desires. God didn’t make a mistake when he made you the way he did with unique desires and likes and dislikes. God doesn’t expect us to become a mini version of our husband’s and their desires. We are serve our husbands and allow them to serve us without becoming just like them.

Self-sacrificing, nourishing, cherishing – these are the characteristics of Christ’s application of authority. Just as with any other natural gift of God it can be abused

Self-sacrificing, nourishing and cherishing are not connected to authority. In fact a question I asked you before which you didn’t answer shows the problem of claiming that these things are an application of authority, for how would one now claim that a wife does not have authority when she applies these very same characteristics? You can’t have it both ways. If these are signs of authority, then they have to be signs of authority in all who have these signs. Or they aren’t the signs of authority. Which is it?

Either way authority exists – the question in our lives is how it is used.

It hasn’t been proven that a husband has authority over his wife. One cannot just claim that this authority exists without showing where God gave such an authority.

Let’s stick with that as what my working understand of authority is.

That would be problematic because you would then have to show how these characteristics are a sign of authority for men but not authority for women who have the same characteristics.

However I still maintain that in a marriage where both are seeking Christ it is basically a non issue.

I understand that you are meaning that the woman seeking Christ will submit to her husband’s leading in every area and since she submits herself to take on his desires, they are no longer in a place of ever having a disagreement on an area that he has full authority over.

It has been maintained on here that authority is much more keeping in line with the likes of Hitler, stalin,etc and that it has no place with fellowship of believers or even of Christ over His people.

No, I don’t think anyone has said such a thing. What has been said is that God’s authority is a good thing. Therefore if God Himself gives an authority to the man and the woman (like he gave us the rule over the earth) this authority is also a good thing. But to assume that God gave an authority to the man over his joint-heir wife when God did not say a word about giving such an authority to him, then this kind of assumed authority is wrong and it can cause a great deal of trouble in the hands of sinners.

I will continue on the next comment…

Jane,
Thanks for praying about your comments and coming across very respectfully. I would like to comment on your typing because I think you are hitting the “hard return” or “enter” at the end of the lines you are typing because it is causing the words to appear like they are a new paragraph which can give a whole different view to what you are writing. When you comment, try to just keep typing and not hit the return until you are wanting to start a new paragraph and I think that will solve the problems in reading and understanding what you have written.

Jane, we have found what we are looking for. That one is Jesus and we are able to see Him in our brothers and sisters in Christ. If you turn away from the church, you are turning away from the the manifestation of the Lord Jesus who lives in each of us. While we may disagree with part of the church that sees a special privilege for men, they are still our brothers in Christ. We don’t have an option of discarding them and staying away from the gifts that they have been given for our benefit. If we let these things separate us, we will be isolated and alone and bitter. That is not the way that Jesus meant it to be.

I am sure that there are a lot of others here who have some words of wisdom for you. But my word to you is not to discard the body of the Lord Jesus if you say you love Him.

Marg,
Welcome to my blog! I hope you feel welcome in my blog living room! (Thanks to TL for that coming up with that great name)

Tiffany,
I won’t be able to get back to you until later tonight. Seems like the days are so full that late evenings is the only time I have free to sit down to answer.

TL,
Good work on the Greek, we can work out the consequences of the grammar a little bit later.

Lydia,
Thanks for the sleuth work! Glad to have you on board for this one.

SM,
What can I say? You have been an invaluable help in gently working through some very important issues so that we can come to an understanding of the other side. Much obliged!

Charis,
Glad you agree on all of pinklight’s questions that they are “no”. Also regarding your question. No, I haven’t read from Carolyn Custis James. I don’t go to too many complementarian sites these days. Just too busy.

Susanna aka Susannah 😉
Good work as always. You are way smarter than I am! Glad that you also are back and following the blog.

Back later today…

Dave,

if authority has to have its meaning changed to fit in with what Jesus meant, then we need to find a new word, not re-define the old word.

BINGO! (That means you win the prize in Canadian slang)

I just watched two short youtube clips that give a wonderful testimony to our responsibility to not being silent.

Adam was silent and his silence was counted against him as sin. It is how a perfect man failed his wife and the repercussion of that silence and then the act of cowardly joining in the eating with full knowledge of the consequences, that has affected us all.

Hi Ingrid,
Glad for your questions.
You said:

Why did Adam fail to protect his wife (Gen 3:6), and allowed Eve to be deceived while in his sinless state? He knew very well that the serpent was lying to Eve because he was right there, yet he did nothing. Not exactly the behavior of a perfect, sinless person.

This is the $64,000 question that the Bible does not give to us directly. We do have some facts that can help us. We do know that Adam’s actions were considered treachery by God (Hosea 6:7) How do we get treachery out of his actions and why he did this can be explored.

We can liken what Adam responsibility to use his knowledge to one who is a watchman on the wall. The one who has been assigned his turn to be on the wall to watch for any sign of the enemy will have knowledge that the people inside the city do not have. He will be the first to see the enemy. His responsibility will then be to warn the city of the impending attack. It would then be the responsibility of the city to heed the warning of the watchman in order to prepare for the attack and defend themselves. The watchman is not responsible for what the citizens do with the warning, but he is responsible for giving the warning.

God has said that the watchman who fails to give the warning is guilty of treason. So we can understand why Adam was guilty of treachery and God considered him to have acted in a treacherous way. But why did he act this way?

We know that God created both the man and the woman to be rulers over the earth and that entailed being rulers over the animals and rulers over the earth itself. Because of this we can understand that Adam would have known that Eve was also ruler of the serpent who was talking with her. Was Adam going to step into the conversation and be bold enough to contradict the serpent in front of his wife thus making it look like his wife didn’t have full authority over the serpent? Perhaps. Whatever his reason, we know that he kept silent when he should have spoken out. Silence was the easy way out of what he may have seen was a dilemma. Silence enabled him to not contradict his wife’s rule. But it was the coward’s way out no matter what his reasons were for keeping silence. Perhaps he thought that she would come to her senses on her own so he waited and kept silent. He lost his opportunity to act as a faithful watchman when his wife took the fruit and ate. Now it was too late. Now what to do? His silence was a failure. She ate and she would die. He knew that. And so he chose to carry on the unfaithful direction and he ate the fruit by taking it from the hand of his deceived wife.

What I think happened was the first sin of omission. I think that it was akin to Cain who claimed innocence when he told God that he wasn’t his brother’s keeper. I think that Adam felt that he didn’t need to be his wife’s keeper because it was more comfortable to be silent and hope for the best than to be confrontational and be a “helper” to his wife. I think that a perfect man can sin through omission but by failing to protect his wife from death, this failure of Adam’s was an act of treason in God’s eyes.

I do expect that when we get to Heaven that God will tell us the “rest of the story” and why Adam did what he did. But I do think that Adam’s silence as a sin of omission was the start of the full fall. It really is sad and if Adam had given up of himself for his wife, I believe that the fall would never have happened. I think that is also why men are instructed to give up of themselves for their wives and only in Christ are they able to fulfill their godly duty to their wives. The failure of the first man is not the example of a godly husband and Christian husbands can receive God’s wisdom and power to be to their wives what Adam should have been to Eve – one who places her first and sacrifices themselves on her behalf.

Does this help a little?

Tiffany #457
You said to TL:

I think it is clear I don’t believe husbands have 100% authority over wives. But rather 100% within a certain sphere

I am going to try to tackle this one and figure out what you mean. First of all, I don’t think that it is clear that you don’t believe husbands have 100% authority over wives. When you say that marriage is 100/0 for the husband, you create all kinds of interpretations in people’s minds what that 100 entails. Nothing has been clearly defined and then when you do define things (or was it NN who defined authority?) it is confusing since the actions that belong to your definition of authority do not fit with what the word means in our English language. And what is also confusing is that you don’t give any indication why you hold men to have “authority” when they love and cherish, but women have no “authority” when they love and cherish.

If I may be bold here while holding to my respect for you as a sister in Christ, it seems to me that you have created a special world where words take on their own meaning and this meaning is consistent between you and NN but it also keeps other people outside your world, because we can’t understand the different use of words. We are used to defining words the way our English language has defined them. I mean no offense at all, because it is what it is, but it is the reason, I believe, why we seem to remain confused by your posts.

So I am going to try to take a stab at defining what you may be saying when you use words differently than the definition of those words allows for. Before I do that, I would like to comment on the Biblical reinterpretation of “authority”. When Jesus said that worldly rulers lord it over others, but that this was not to be among His disciples, and He lists servanthood as the focus of their greatness, I believe that Jesus did not reinterpret “authority” but He reinterpreted “greatness”. “Greatness” in the world is authority and power and wealth and might, etc, but “greatness” in the church rates outstanding, important, first-rate and chief with humility, a servant heart and a love for all.

I believe that your view of “authority” and “submission” is in allowing the husband full right to have his desires made forefront by the wife. Therefore whatever his desire is should be pursued by the wife. If his desire is that the whole house should be decorated in black and white, then she should joyfully set aside her desires and make his desires her own. She should work to like black and white and shop for black and white and make black and white her own love. Therefore I understand you as saying that if a woman seeks to please her husband and will choose to make his desires as her own, then his authority in the marriage that would have resulted in being the one who makes the ultimate decisions when his wife’s desires are different than hers, is really a moot point since she has trained herself to accept, love and revel in his desires. She is now a black and white person because she has submitted to become involved in his desires. His desires are to be her desires so that there really is no need for a “taking authority” over her but “expressing authority” in his “areas” of responsibility which are cherishing, sacrificing and nourishing.

Tiffany, does this somewhat accurately convey what you are saying? If so, then I have some additional things to say, but I don’t want to put them up just yet until I know if I understand the concept of what you are trying to convey. If this isn’t what you mean, then I need you to explicitly correct me and define what you mean. I need you to use the English words in a way that we all commonly use them and leave aside using words in a way that would express your understanding but would not communicate to those outside of your marriage. Fair enough?

TL, comment #456,
You said:

Christ is God and knows all things, but does not make our decisions for us at all. He gives us wisdom and understanding as we ask and as we can handle. But God has given us the ability to choose many things. That is how we are able to sin. It’s a bad choice.

I would like to key in on this very wise statement of yours. Some people think that the authority God has over us means that He makes all of our decisions. This isn’t true. He hasn’t promised to tell us what to do in every circumstance, but He has promised that if we ask for wisdom, he will give it to us freely.

What we are then to do as maturing Christians is to take the wisdom that God gives us and to apply it. The application is ours while the wisdom is God’s. Paul speaks about this in 1 Cor. 6

1 Corinthians 6:5 (NASB)
5 I say this to your shame. Is it so, that there is not among you one wise man who will be able to decide between his brethren,

If we are promised that God will give us wisdom if we but ask for it, the implication is that mature Christians will use this wisdom to “decide” a matter. This means to pay close attention and to evaluate and separate the issues so as to make a judgment. We are all called upon to be mature, ask for wisdom, and then use the wisdom that we have been given to make our own godly decisions.

When I was a young girl a lady in our congregation wrote a book where she detailed all the “decisions” that God made for her each day. She asked him every day what hat he wanted her to wear and what pair of gloves, what dress, what shoes, etc, etc. She honestly believed that God wanted to dictate His will to us so that we merely received direction instead of becoming wise in making our own decisions through His principles. However when people think that God wants us to be passive in receiving direction for every single decision that we are to make instead of working hard to find out God’s principles, seeking God’s wisdom and then making our own wise decisions that bring glory to God by the expression of our mature faith, we are distilled down to remaining as children who are unable to make their own mature decisions.

Charis #434,
You said:

eg. nn’s post about “perfecting” his wife. Based on her personal testimony of a clear “before and after” I though Cheryl might be able to grasp how a husband through choosing to follow the unilateral instructions to husbands to “nourish and cherish” to understand and to live with and value as a co-heir has a part in bringing his wife to perfection.

I do not believe that Scripture has a “role” for a husband to “perfect” his wife. I believe that this “role” belongs to the Holy Spirit.

However I do believe that a husband is able to empower his wife to use her gifts and to give her room and opportunity to grow to be the best that she can be in Christ. The husband has no part in her being a joint-heir but I do believe that he can respect her place of equality as an heir and treat her in a way worthy of a sister in Christ while loving her in a special way as his own body.

Tiffany comment #429,
You said:

As for how you are treated on other blogs, not really the issue.

Actually it wasn’t me that was treated that way, it was another egalitarian. However it is important to me regarding this blog. After all if we are to practice what Christ requires of us with loving our brothers and sisters in Christ, we can practice it here in a respectful way. While it is rare that complementarians on their forums will hold back inappropriate comments against egalitarians, I want to have a respectful attitude towards complementarians who comment on my blog. In that way I want to be different and set an example for others. I try very hard to keep this blog respectful and it feels good if once in a while a complementarian would have enough love for me to affirm me in what I am doing.

Also we need to separate comments about abusive systems from the people themselves. It is okay to express concern and passion about systems that harm people. I just ask people to try hard to say things so that it is clear that we are not attacking our brothers and sisters in Christ. And I ask our complementarian brothers and sisters to work hard not to be so easily offended by our opinions. If we strive for love and acceptance of our brothers and sisters in Christ even with differences on these secondary matters we will fulfill the law of Christ.

1 Corinthians 13:4–5 (NASB)
4 Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant,
5 does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,

To all:

While none of us is perfect, I can pick out those who are practicing this rule of love. Should I mention who they are? Perhaps I will bring out their names, but something tells me that the spirit with which they write is coming across to more than just me. For all those who are trying hard to show respect, I give you my kudos and wish I could give you a hug in the Lord. You folks inspire me and make me see Jesus in your passionate writing that is respectful, honest and kind. Way to go!

Okay, I am back and I think I have been able to read the majority of the comments.

Tiffany,
You asked on #412:

I am not getting in the eros/hierarchy/etc discussion but I would like to jump into this idea of word/definitions in the Bible you have put forth. It is your contention that we can use the word Trinity to describe the Godhead because we see it clearly defined in scripture even though the word itself is never used. I would agree with you. You then seem to be saying that eros can not be used because no definition of it exists.

No, I am not saying that. What I am saying is that to interpret Ephesians 5 to include eros would need a solid argument from the text. And to say that eros is a picture of hierarchy would also need to have a solid argument from the text. What I am saying is that the solid argument is missing. I do not ask of complementarians anything different than what I ask of egalitarians. Most know that I have not agreed with some views of egalitarians here and others have not agreed with me. When there are disagreements the requirement to be persuasive is to show the view from the passage, the particular text and the grammar to explain how our understanding is the natural meaning of the author in their writing.

If you want to say that there is not hierarchy in marriage even though eros is there then that is perfectly fine and the discussion can proceed from there.

That is what I have done. There is no hierarchy in eros nor have the Scriptures included a hierarchy in eros, but for the matter at hand, there is nothing in Ephesians 5:21-22 to suggest that Paul is point to eros or to hierarchy.

To suggest a definition of eros used is “a cult like tactic” and “an invalid argument” when the exact same principles were applied to the word Eros as you do to Trinity does not work.

You misread me. I was referring to the tactic of using an invalid argument to disprove a valid point. It is the argument that pretty much all cults use. As I pointed out the very definition of the Trinity that I gave is found throughout the Scripture yet we cannot take the Trinity as a meaning anytime that Jesus is spoken of even though as the Word He is God. In the same way we cannot take a definition of eros where the thought is in a sexual passage and import it into other passages. Just as incorrect importation forbids the Trinity from being brought into all passages about Jesus, so it can be an incorrect importation to bring eros into a passage about husbands and wives.

Does this make sense?

Sue,
Thanks for expressing your views in a very respectful way! As far as anger, I believe that the Bible says that we are allowed to be angry, since it says be angry, but the next part is hard for us as it adds “but sin not”. Uncontrolled anger that is not resolved with God’s help can easily become bitterness. And bitterness contaminates both ourselves and others.

I think the next post will bring very enlightening comments and discussion as we talk further about authority and submission.

Pastor Dave, you are a gem of the gems. I wish that you would create a seminar teaching men how to love and sacrifice for their wives by putting them first. If you could teach these godly men how God really wants them to see their wives as Christ sees the church, I don’t think there would ever be a problem in our marriages as we submit to receiving all that our husbands have to gift us with!

Anger against men is easily turned against women too when some people think that the women haven’t done enough to help women be free from dominance.

My blog isn’t about charging individuals with not fixing the world of all dominance. To the one who continues to post their anger I ask you to read my “disclaimer” tab at the top of my page. This gives the rules for posting on this blog. If you abide by the rules you may post.

This is what came in that is a small sample of what I am blocking:

Cheryl, is KILLING women and girls around the entire world. The mentality IS connected and as long as that very real TRUTH is shelved because hey we don’t want to call a spade a spade, we get NO where, except yes, circle jerking back and forth around a few scriptures,

So my work in helping women is not good enough? And now I am killing women and girls around the world? Sorry, this kind of anger is not going to get onto my blog.

Enough said.

I have more to say but didn’t get finished. I will try to answer the rest of your questions tomorrow. Sorry for the delay.

Jane,
You said that you are not angry. And then you said that you are angry. I did not originally put you on moderation but only held back one post. I think that anyone reading your comment that did come through after the one I held back, can easily see that you are angry. But the things that you are angry about are not what this blog is about or what this post is about. If my saying that I held back an angry post demonized you, then you are very easily offended.

This blog is not about getting back at men for their offenses. The men who come here are not rapists or murderers. They are almost always godly men who may or may not agree with the issue of women in ministry. Just because men don’t agree with us doesn’t mean that they are evil misogysts. You may not like submission but it is something that Christians are all to do for each other and so we do not demonize submission just because it has been abused. And the cross is very precious to us.

I ask you please to withhold your anger. If you can communicate without using inappropriate speech, then you are welcome to be heard. But if you are only wanting to vent anger, I won’t allow it through and I will put you on moderation. The purpose of this blog is to discuss issues with gentleness and respect so that we have an opportunity to bring about change. If we can help you make a change in your own situation, that would be great. But please be respectful and not post your anger here.

Thanks!

Tiffany,
I appreciate your patience. I have left a lot of what you asked me until I had time and I am so behind in almost everything right now in ministry as well as this blog, that likely I will miss some of what you have asked and for that I apologize. Perhaps if there are still questions that you have in your heart, you will re-ask them so that I don’t have to try to re-read all of the comments to find what I missed.

You said:

I am going to perhaps confuse things here and say that the husbands authority isn’t a trump card.

This is indeed confusing because you never define what a husband’s authority is. You speak a lot about submission and then skip over authority as if it doesn’t really exist if you are fully submitted. The problem for egalitarians who really want to be Biblical, is that we do not believe that a husband has been given a place of authority concerning his wife and so when we meet a complementarian who believes in the husband authority we want to get answers from them that we don’t see in the Scriptures. When you don’t define the authority or the extend of the authority that God has given the man, it just doesn’t help us understand your position.

You are right that we are not under Christ’s authority as conquered subjects, but rather as joyful worshippers. And this is a oneness. But it is still oneness on Christ’s terms. He is still Lord.

I believe that Scripture does not make us guess what Christ terms are. Our oneness with Christ has some very real application in the next life. We are joint heirs with Christ and we will rule and reign with Him. That means that we take what He has given us and we use it for ruling and reigning and judging. These are descriptions of a powerful ruler beside Him.

You said;

It isn’t a 50/50 split oneness, or even a 51/49 split oneness, but a 100/0 split oneness. It is a good and joyful not forced freely given 100/0 split onesness.

We do not appear to be thinking the same thing when you talk about numbers and “splits”. I will leave my own opinion aside for now and if you want to know why I answered the way I did with 100/100 I will let you ask for an explanation.

As far as your 100/0, correct me if I am wrong, but it now appears to me that you are talking about a 100% will of one along with a 0% will which is seen as complete submission. Is this along the line of what you meant by percentages?

Much has been made of the idea that the mirror of the marriage of Christ and the church is about representing onessness.

I think you perhaps meant “mystery” of Christ and the church.

Ephesians 5:32 (NASB)
32 This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church.

The “reference to” in Greek means an extension involving a goal. Therefore the marriage of one man and one woman is the original thing but from this original is an extension towards a goal of mankind united with Christ.

After speaking about us as the body of Christ, Paul makes application back to the original by saying:

Ephesians 5:31 (NASB)
31 FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND SHALL BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH.

It is absolutely amazing that God has created a counter-cultural mandate for marriage. Instead of the woman submitting to her husband’s will, he gives up his own home and his own father and mother to come to her. It is the husband’s initiating of sacrificial deference that brings him to her place.

This is not what the world sees For the world see the husband’s power and authority and the man set up as the master never acquiesces . It is a complete mystery to them but to us, it is God’s revelation of what has been hidden from ages past. It is a symbol with metaphorical significance. He initiates. He sacrifices. He leaves all and comes to her.

I am with you all on this, but I am putting forth that it is this sort of onessness and that is what the marriage relationship should reflect.

Ephesians 5:31 is set up as the oneness that the marriage relationship should reflect. The initiating is never required at her feet. Submitting means receiving what he brings. Submitting means receiving.

More to come…