Kristen

Cheryl, I will try to answer your questions one at a time to clarify how I see it.

Are you also saying that the Bible could have said “The Christ became flesh and dwelt among us?”
In a way. What I’m saying is that “Christ” is a title. It means “Messiah.” But– and this is the crux of it– it is a title He took on at the creation of the world. When God made the world and its creatures, and humanity in His image, He had already decided within His triune Self that the Son would be the Christ to the world. So it does make sense to say, as Paul does in Col. 1:15-16 and 1 Cor. 8:6, that all things were made by and through the Christ. He had that title before He was incarnated, though He had to be incarnated in order to fulfill the role that the title anticipated.

the term Christ is intimately connected to His humanity in that it is not a term that can be used for the pre-incarnate Word other than in reference to the time of His incarnation, therefore to use it synonymously with “God” is incorrect.
I agree that it is not synonymous with “God.” I disagree that it cannot be used for Him pre-incarnation, because that is exactly how Paul did use it in 1 Cor. 8:6 and Col. 1:15-16.

When we say that Jesus Christ as head of the church as the husband means that the husband is like God over the wife, we distort the connection of one flesh and make it about authority and power over another. Is Jesus Christ one flesh with the Church? Is the Christ head of or head over?
I think Paul uses “head” in Eph. 5:22 in the same way he uses it in Eph. 4:15-16 — as the Source of provision and nourishment. Husbands in Paul’s day were the source of provision and nourishment for their wives. Womenhad no way of taking care of themselves or providing for themselves in that society, short of prostitution. So as the church is dependent on Christ for her nourishment and growth, so also the wife was dependent on the husband.
Jesus is not “one flesh” with the church yet. The marriage of the Lamb to the Bride has not yet occurred. When it does, when He comes back, we will “be like Him, for we will see Him as He is.” 1 John 3:2. Then we will be “one flesh.” That is the “mystery” Paul spoke of in Eph. 5:32. He will raise the Bride up, completely cleanse her of all spot or wrinkle and present her to Himself in glory. That is what husbands in Paul’s day were being asked to do for their wives– to raise them out of their lowly state of inferiority and subservience, to be glorious beside them.
Christ is “head of” the church in Eph. 4 and 5. He is “head over” all principalities and powers in Eph 1. The church is not one of the things he is “head over,” for she is beside Him in the heavenly places. In Eph 1, “head” combined with “over” instead of “of,” means “The One in the Place of Prominence” or “Preeminent One.” So applying that to Chapter 5, husbands (being in the place of prominence and preeminence in that culture) were being asked to raise their wives up to be beside them in all the things the husbands were “over.”

To be continued. . .