gengwall

Cheryl – I hope you will induldge us a little longer in this sidebar.

truthseeker said – “Our culture has such a strong concept of leadership attached to certain words that I suspect it might even be hard to separate ‘boss’ from ‘team captain.’ ”

I think you have hit on the major stumbling block. Remember first of all that we are dealing with English translations of Greek words. Sometimes those translations are woefully inadequate. Add to it the cultural context impacting both the original Greek meaning and the current English meaning and you have a recipe for disaster. Finally throw into the mix the tendancy to cherry pick and myopically interpret scripture and it is easy to turn “head” into “boss” and “submit” into “obey”. But a full review of Paul with the broad context of his teaching in view and his example of Christ as the focus and hopefully we can defeat those cultural influences and see the truth of God’s word. “Head” most definately does not mean “boss” and wives are never, ever, EVER told to “obey” their husbands.

truthseeker – “What I am puzzled by in the husband is head context is that whatever it is somehow is separate from what women are. Women are never referred to as head so it would seem that somehow, whatever the meaning of head is in the ‘head’ passages referring to men or husbands would have to be their exclusive domain.”

I am not so sure. Women are exclusively called “helper” (and we all know the godly nature of that term; what a high calling that is). Does that mean that men are never to be engaging in “helper” kinds of activities within the marriage? I certainly don’t think so. It also does not mean, IMO, that women are free (or restricted) from the “headship” activities of intercession, sacrifice, and service.

Also remember that Paul is trying to outline a practical model that both men and women can look to. Christ and the church is the best parallel he can draw, (there certainly was no current cultural model), but even within that, Paul admits that there are parameters to the Christ/church relationship that remain a mystery, or inapplicable. So he ends the Ephesians passage with the very practical instructions for husbands to “love” (not “be the head”) and wives to “respect” (not “submit”).

And finally, remember that headship has nothing to do with the activities of daily living within marriage. Nowhere does the bible say “the head of the house unilaterally does x”. It isn’t about decisions, tasks, or even primary roles (I know many women who are far better intercessors than their husbands, for example.) It is about responsibilities. The husband MUST interceed on behalf of the family, sacrifice for their betterment, and serve their needs. Guess what – that doesn’t feel natural to him because of his tendancy to act in the opposite manner, i.e. to “rule”. Therefore, he needs to be explicitly told that he must do these things. The wife, in reality, is just as responsible (and free) to do these things, but they are more natural for her so, in essence, at least for Paul’s purpose in fighting the corruptions of the fall, she doesn’t need to be told to do them.

The bottom line is that Christ never exercises authority over His bride. He never “rules” over her*. His only attitude and action toward her is selfless love. If that is what it means to be the “head” it is something to be embaced and celebrated, not feared.

*It should be noted that Christ does “rule”, but the social spheres in which He exercises authority and dominion are never the marital one. Whenever the church is being referenced as “bride”, Christ never “rules”. How could he! He is the second Adam. He has conquored the corrupt spousal “rule” brought on by and propogated the first Adam.