The Four-Legged Stool of a Godly Home - Part A

Now, what he seems to be saying is that if you have been transformed and you are in a family situation, you're not just a wife, you're a new wife. You're not just a husband, you're a new husband. You're not just a child, you're a new child.

You're not just a parent, you're a new parent. Jesus transforms our roles and attitudes within the family. And did you know we've got a special resource for you this month that'll put you on the road to Emmaus to help you relate in a fresh way to Jesus. Looking deep into the empty tomb by Skip Heitzig consists of five messages, including Rise Up, Easter's Over, Now What?, An Empty Tomb, A Full Life, Jesus Died But God, and Come Alive. For those who knew Jesus while he walked this earth, the road to discovering and believing that Jesus was resurrected started in disheartening confusion, but it ended in decisive confirmation. And we're excited to send you a special set of resurrection resources by Skip that include five of his finest Easter messages for digital download or CD and a full video titled On the Road by Skip. Behold, two of them were traveling that same day to a village called Emmaus, which was seven miles from Jerusalem. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. So it was while they conversed and reasoned that Jesus himself drew near and went with them. With your gift of support of $50 or more, we'll send you a copy of this hope-filled package of five audio messages for download or on CD and the full video On the Road as thanks for your gift to expand Connect with Skip Heitzig to reach more people in major U.S. cities. So request your resource when you give and take a walk with Christ on the road to Emmaus.

Just call 800-922-1888 or visit connectwithskip.com slash offer. Okay, let's turn to Colossians 3 as we begin today's teaching with Skip. There's a little boy. His name was Danny and Danny lived with his family in a trailer. And one of his friends came up to him one day and he said, Danny, don't you wish you had a real home?

And Danny, his response was, we do have a real home. We just don't have a house to put it in. I wonder if you have a house or you have a home.

I hope you have both. But there is a difference between having just a house and having a home. A house is a physical structure. A home is much deeper. A house can be built out of brick or stucco or wood. It can be large or small.

It can have a view or not. But a home, a home is different than a house. A home is a haven of love, acceptance, commitment, communication.

It's a place where people are nurtured in relationship. A few years ago, the President Harry Truman Museum in Independence, Missouri, discovered letters written by the former president, 33rd president. 1,300 letters were discovered. All of them were letters from President Truman to his wife, love letters. And come to find out, he made a commitment that every day that he and his wife were apart from each other, he would write her a love letter.

Now that's building a home. That's being committed to the nurture of love. Not everybody is so committed. Some people aren't those who prioritize relationships.

It's all about the material world, not about the relational involvement. So I heard about a couple who decided to fly to New York City to go to a Broadway play. And they went, saved up their money, traveled to New York. It was a packed house, couldn't find a seat in the house. But they had reserved seats in the front row. So they find their seats, they're in the front row. Every seat is taken except one, and that is the seat right next to the couple from out of town. So at intermission, the couple turned to the man who was in the seat opposite the empty seat and said, so do we know whose seat this is? It's odd that this theater, which is so packed out, couldn't get a seat, has an empty seat. And he goes, yeah, that belongs to my wife, but my wife died, so I came alone. And they said, oh, we're so sorry.

That's a tragic thing, but surely you have friends or relatives that could take the seat. And he said, oh, no, no, they're all at the funeral. So there's problems, right?

Right off the bat, you can see in that relationship, that guy's all about the house, not the home. What I want to talk to you today about is the four-legged stool of a godly home, the four-legged stool of a godly home. What I'm going to show you today is stuff you already know. This is really a review of material that we have gone over in depth in the past. We have spent hours and weeks and months on all of these various roles, and we've done so in depth.

What I'm going to do is do what Paul does, just barely Skip the surface and go into some of these basic roles. We want to look at the role of the wife, the husband, children, and parents. The four-legged stool of a godly home. Did a little research on three-legged stools versus four-legged stools. Some people prefer the three-legged type because you can set them down just about anywhere. But a four-legged stool will distribute weight more evenly, hold more weight, and tip over less easily than a three-legged stool. I think that's true in life. I think the more relationships of commitment that you have around you, the better. So we want to look at that.

Now, you can get by with a three-legged stool, but four is better. Have you noticed that our culture has redefined the home over the last, well, couple hundred years, but over the last few decades especially? Now, I remember when I was growing up, there were several TV shows on in America that sort of highlighted the nuclear family, the husband, wife, kids in tow. Now, I'm going to share some of these with you. Some of these names who are here will have no idea what they are.

Others of you will remember them well, and if you do, you're dating yourself like I am. Father Knows Best was one of them. Leave it to Beaver. The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet.

It's a funny name, really, because it really wasn't an adventurous show. But The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet. The Donna Reed Show. The Patty Duke Show. Anybody remember that?

You'll remember this one, many of you. The Brady Bunch. The Brady Bunch was kind of singular because it was a blended family, and Hollywood wanted you to know, however, though it was a blended family, it's because a widow married a widower. That, in the culture, was palatable back then.

Not much else was. But it was still really about the nuclear family. And I'm even going to throw the Adams family into the mix, because even though that's sort of an outlier, it was still about the nuclear family. And that's because in the 1960s in America, 95% of all the children born in this country were born to double-parent homes. 95%.

Today, it's about 60%. Now, I want to say you might find yourself in a three-legged situation. Not of your own desire, but you're in it. It's not a four-legged stool. It's a three-legged stool. Maybe you had somebody walk out of the marriage. Maybe you had a parent or a husband or a wife die.

Maybe there's been difficulty, and you find yourself not in a four-legged system, but a three-legged system. Two things I want to tell you. Number one, we want to help.

And I say that as the church. We want to help. We want to at least be to you the family, the surrogate spiritual family, that comes around you and helps you through that and manage that. Number two, I want to advise you to find somebody, and there are plenty around you, who are in a similar situation to you and latch onto that person.

Get encouragement and instruction from those people and give that to them. We are going to be looking at Colossians chapter 3 verses 18 through 21. It's the practical section of the book. Paul has given us the doctrinal, meaty section earlier on.

Then he turns to the practical section here. He's told us that we are new creations, new men, new women, so we should put on humility and put on forgiveness and put on love. And now what he seems to be saying is that if you have been transformed and you are in a family situation, you're not just a wife, you're a new wife. You're not just a husband, you're a new husband. You're not just a child, you're a new child.

You're not just a parent, you're a new parent. So the new man makes a new home or a new family. And those are these verses, and we're just, again, just going to barely scratch the surface. But I want to take you back to verse 17 because I believe the thought of it begins there. Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him. That follows the things that we do. Wives, submit to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be bitter toward them. Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the Lord.

Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. Now, there's not much there, right? I mean, there's just a few verses. This has got to be like the shortest marriage and family seminar in history. What Paul is doing, rather than going into depth, is simply giving the irreducible minimum. Winston Churchill said that all of the great things in life can be stated in single words. So Paul resorts to that.

These are basic directions. And you should know this as we get into it. What Paul is writing here would have been considered radical, even revolutionary.

And I'm going to explain that, at least in part. But let's begin where he begins, in verse 18, with wives. Wives, submit. Well, let me read the whole verse again. Wives, submit to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Now, I know. Them's fighting words. There are few statements that make some people more angry than the idea that a wife should submit to her husband.

I even have a cartoon at home. It shows a preacher at a pulpit, but he's behind in the cartoon. He's behind a specially built pulpit that looks sort of like a fortress that has been constructed for maximum protection. And he's peering through a little slit in the edifice, and he is saying, Today, my text is Colossians 3.18, Wives, submit to your own husbands.

But actually, actually, when Paul writes this, this statement is radically elevating and honoring, given the background of the New Testament. You go back a couple thousand years, the ancient world was pretty cruel. Back then, women were considered property of men. I mean, literally, like, a man might own camels or donkeys or fields. He owns a wife.

It's part of the chattel, part of the property he owns. In religious society, in a Jewish culture, Jewish women could not divorce a husband. Jewish men, on the other hand, could divorce their wives for practically any reason. In ancient Greek culture, respectable women lived in seclusion. They never went out alone. Certainly, they did not go out into the streets.

They were not in public alone. In fact, Socrates, the great philosopher that everybody at college thinks is so wonderful because he was so wise. Listen to Mr. Wonderful. Socrates said, Is there anyone to whom you entrust more serious matters than to your wife, and is there anyone to whom you talk less?

That's Mr. Wonderful, philosopher. He was basically saying, We all know women are inferior. So for Paul to address both husbands and wives, it was radical. He is saying, Husbands, you have a role to fulfill. You have duties to your wife, as well as your wife having duties to you.

And so thus, he is treating them as equals. Let's look at the word. Wives, here's the word, submit. Now, some husbands make this their life verse.

This verse and the one in Ephesians that is similar to it has been abused by more couch potato tyrants who have like the ethics of the Taliban, like Jabba the Hutt. Let's discover what the word means. The word submit, huppetaso is the Greek word, it literally means to arrange in rank or to get in order under voluntarily. Not by compulsion, voluntarily.

Huppetaso, arrange in rank or get in order under. The idea is to voluntarily relinquish one's rights. You might have the rights, you certainly have the rights, but to make the relationship function, you are willing to set aside or relinquish your rights to get the thing working and moving. Something else to make a note of. You'll notice that he does not use the word when he speaks to wives, obey. He uses the word submit.

It's very different than when you get to verse 20, children obey your parents in all things, or verse 22, bond servants obey in all things your masters. That's a different word. That's the word huppekul. We'll get to that, but this is huppetaso.

And huppetaso is different than obey because submission doesn't mean slavery. This is not the Marine Corps here. This is a marriage.

I want my wife to salute me when I come through the door. Good luck with that one, buddy. The idea of submission does not imply inferiority or superiority. It doesn't make anybody smarter, wiser, better, or more superior. So the idea is not superiority of the male, here's the idea, listen carefully. It's functionality of the marriage, functionality of the marriage. Let me give you an example.

I think it's the best example. In 1 Corinthians chapter 11, let me read this to you. Paul says, imitate me just as I also imitate Christ. Now I praise you, brethren, that you remember me in all things and keep the traditions just as I delivered them to you. Here's the important part. But I want you to know that the head of every man is Christ.

I think everybody would give a thumbs up for that. We all want men to be ruled by Christ. He continues, the head of woman is man.

And some of you are going, now wait a minute, I don't like that part, but keep listening. And the head of Christ is God. The head of Christ is God.

Now I have a question for you. Is Jesus Christ, or God the Son, is he inferior to God the Father? Is he inferior?

Not at all. If you say he is, you're a heretic. We believe in the triune God, Father, Son, Holy Spirit. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. The Trinity.

They are one. But we know that Jesus set his rights aside, right? That's Philippians chapter 2. Who being in very nature God did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, that is Jesus, but he made himself of no reputation.

He relinquished his rights. In the Garden of Gethsemane he said, Father, if it's possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but thy will be done. That's submission.

Not inferiority, not superiority, functionality. Submitting to the will of the Father. Now notice what it says in this verse 18. Wives, submit to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. That is, you are to submit to your husband as it is consistent with God's character, not contrary to God's character.

So, what if your husband says, Honey, I want you to submit to me. You can't go to church. Is it this way? Let's vote right now.

Do you do this or this? Yeah, I'm sorry. I'm going to church because the Bible tells me to do that. Honey, you can't read your Bible, ever. Right? Honey, go to the bar with me.

We're going to get drunk together. Yeah, see, so there are limits to this, as is fitting in the Lord. The same principle exists when it comes to government and the Christian, Acts chapter 5.

The government passed a law. You can't preach the gospel in our city. And the apostles said, yeah, not so much. We must obey God rather than men. So, God never asks a Christian wife to violate his will, his word, in the name of submission. But wives, wives, help your dude out a little bit. And what I mean by that is, you know, you want him to be a leader in the home.

Do you let him? Are you willing to give him the reins to let him lead? You know, many women I have talked to really want their husbands to be the leader. The problem is, they don't want to be the follower to that leader.

And that's going to be problematic. Remember, leadership requires somebody has to voluntarily yield. And I know some wives are going, well, if he'd only listen to me, he'd be a good leader.

You can see the problem right there. So, wives, submit to your own husbands as is fitting in the Lord. That's one leg to that stool.

Second leg, husbands love, husbands love. Verse 19, husbands, love your wives and do not be bitter toward them. I discovered something this week I had never known before this week's study of the passage. I've studied Ephesians 5, I've studied Colossians, I've taught on this stuff. But come to find out, ancient writers, ancient philosophers in that day and age would often include in their writing something similar to what we see Paul writing about here. They called them household rules, or a little household list. So, philosophers would write and say something, wives, you should do this, and servants, you should do this, and kids, you should do that, and parents, you should do that.

Just little snippets like that. So, this is not an unfamiliar pattern. However, what I discovered, according to German theologian, Eduard Losch, he said this command, this command here that Paul writes about, does not appear in any of the extra biblical household rules of the day. In other words, you'll never find an ancient writer or philosopher saying, husbands, love your wives. Which means the uniqueness of Paul saying this must have really hit the Colossians' heart.

Wow. Paul is now employing the principle of reciprocal obligation. He's saying, yes, wives have a duty in the marriage, but so do husbands.

In fact, theirs is a little bit higher and tougher. Husbands, love your wives. Love your wives. Let me make an interesting observation.

You may have not considered this before. Wives are not commanded to love their husbands. Now, I hope they do.

It works best when that happens. They really should, but it's interesting as you read this and you read Ephesians, chapter 5, there's no command for wives to love their husbands, but husbands, on the other hand, are commanded. It's in the imperative to command, are commanded to love their wives. They're not told to rule their wives or control their wives. They're not told to command their wives or subdue their wives or order their wives around like Ralph Cramden and the honeymooners, but to love their wives. So, yes, on one hand, he has the authority because wives are told to submit to their husbands, but on the other hand, according to the template, they're to have affection, authority mixed with affection, and it should be in beautiful balance, perfect balance. Authority mixed with affection.

When that happens, wives find it easy to submit. That's Skip Heitig with a message from the series Always Only Jesus. Find the full message, as well as books, booklets, and full teaching series at ConnectWithSkip.com. Now, here's Skip to share how you can keep teachings like this one today going out around the world, connecting you and others to God's Word.

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800-922-1888. Thank you for your generosity. Come back again tomorrow as Skip concludes his message with some clear instructions for children and parents. Make a connection, make a connection at the foot of the cross and cast all burdens on His Word. Make a connection, connection. Connect with Skip Hyton is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.