Today on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. Jesus displayed more manhood in the manger than Adam did in the garden. In the garden, Adam looked like a man, but he acted like a boy. In the manger, Jesus looked like a boy, but he was doing the most manly thing imaginable.
He was fighting for the ones that he loved. And that means that salvation will come to the world as men begin to follow the second Adam and they become like him. Hey, welcome back for another week of solid biblical teaching here on Summit Life with Pastor JD Greer. As always, I'm your host, Molly Vitovich. I think it's safe to say that today, many people believe that the biblical view of marriage is outdated and patriarchal.
Wouldn't you agree?
Well, we'll learn today that God has a reason for the way he set things up, and it's much more than just setting a cultural norm for everyone to live by. Today, Pastor J.D. Greer is in Ephesians chapter 5, talking about what it actually means for a husband to lead, as well as clearly defining what submission does not include. An important distinction, no doubt.
So we are glad that you've joined us today.
Now, if you missed the beginning of this sermon last week, I just wanted to remind you that you can always hear previous broadcasts at our website, jdigreer.com. He titled today's message, God's Purpose and Plan for Gender.
So let's get started. Here's Pastor JD. Submission does not mean, number two, the dominance of the man, as if she existed as a serf in his house to cater to all of his whims. If I am to be the one that lays down his life for his wife, 97.4% of the disagreements in my house, I should voluntarily lose. Because headship was not given to me, so I could decide where we go out to eat, and what color the carpet should be and how we spend our days off.
Man was told to serve and submit to his wife by laying down his life for her. She was told to submit to her husband by submitting to him. Who's got the harder task? I'm going to say it's the man who's going to lay down his life because that means any power he has, he's using it to leverage for the benefit of his wife. And his leadership is characterized by that question I gave you on the second week.
How can I serve you? How can I leverage any power I have? How can I leverage it to serve you? Submission does not mean, number three, unconditional obedience by the woman. A lot of people misread Ephesians 5:22, and it says, Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.
That does not mean submit to your husband as if he were God. But it means submit to your husband as a way of serving God. And what that means is that if your husband is ever telling you something that is clearly contrary to the word of God, then you would disobey your husband and obey God. Paul tells us in Romans 13 to submit to the government, uses the same word. Right, we'll submit to the government.
You know, we submit to the government as a way of obeying God. But if the government ever tells us to do something against the will of God, then we disobey the government and obey God. Same thing is true in Ephesians 5. It does not mean, number four, independent decision-making on the part of the man. Remember that God put various attributes into each gender.
Which means that I, as a husband, am incomplete without my wife. She's got a whole different set of filters that complete mine.
Now, again, not every guy is like me, but I tend to be very emotionally detached. You know, something will happen to me. My wife will ask me, Well, how did that, how did you feel about that? I'd be like, How do I know? I haven't thought about it.
So, how could you not think about that? That's because, again, stereotype. That's because if you cut open a man's head, What you usually find in the place of his brain is a waffle with these various compartments. Because we kind of seal things off, and one thing doesn't touch the other thing. You cut open a woman's head, and what you find is not a waffle, but this big pile of spaghetti.
One thing's connected to every other thing. And so, you know, how things are working with the kids, and the husband, and the work, and my relationship with mom, and all that kind of stuff, is all interconnected. And in the last 50 years, professionalism was primarily described in masculine terms. To act professional means you're totally, you know. disconnected from everything and you're just kind of That's professionalism.
What's interesting is if you read the last 10 or so years of leadership literature, you'll notice this explosion and recovery of female values that are appearing in leadership saying these are really important. All this means is my wife's perspective is crucial. That means it is only a fool of a guy. who takes this principle and starts making decisions without the the counsel of his wife. If she tells you, don't get the second job because it's going to hurt your relationship with your kids, listen to her.
It doesn't mean number, whatever number we're on, that women should not have the highest leadership positions. in business or politics. Let me give you real quick here. Ephesians 5 and Genesis 2 are both given in the context of the home. And ideally, where both partners have the gospel as their center.
Now, Paul in some other places in the New Testament is going to apply this principle to the church. But those are the only two places where this kind of headship relationship between men and women is to be normative. When this principle of headship is enforced outside the home, Not only is it unbiblical. It's dangerous. Because all the other safeguards the Bible puts in place are removed.
Like gospel centrality, like the fullness of the Spirit, like covenant loyalty. Those are not in place. This principle in no way means. That a man should never work for a woman. Or that if you're a man, you should resent working for a woman because it's just not right.
It doesn't mean that women cannot or should not occupy the highest places of leadership in society. You ever seen one of those stunt shows where a little warning will come on the bottom and be like, you know, warning, do not try this at home? Paul would put a warning label on this passage that would say, warning, only try this at home. Because it's not something he's put out into society because all the other safeguards are not in place on it. It is not number, what, six?
Doesn't mean that the man has a power to leverage over his wife. I pointed out on the second week, but the first word is. Wives. New husbands, you get out of your wife's verse. This is not yours to apply to her and demand that she obey it.
This between her and God, D. Martin Lloyd-Jones, very conservative Bible interpreter, said after studying this passage for years, what I can tell a guy is: if your wife is not doing what she is supposed to be doing, according to this verse, All you can do is pray for her. and try to live in a way that earns the submission of your wife. You got to leave that between her and God. Those are six things that I know that submission does not mean.
Let me give you one thing I know that submission does mean. Submission does mean that the man breaks the tie in a split decision. I've got a couple of examples of this from my life, but one of the best I've ever heard, Tim Keller in his book, Meaning of Marriage, talks about the fact that back in the late 80s, he was a pastor in Hopewell, Virginia, and there was an opportunity to plant a church in Manhattan in New York City. After discussing it and praying about it with his wife, he felt like they should do it. She felt like they should not.
So they prayed about it again and they fasted about it and they spent a lot of time discussing what they should do. And at the end of that long time of fasting and praying, He felt like they should do it, and she felt like they should not.
So finally, he said, All right, fine. If you don't feel like we should go, then we won't go. And she looked back at him and said, Oh, no, you don't. You are not putting this on me. God gave you this leadership role, which means you've got to cast the deciding vote.
You vote yes, I vote no, you get to vote twice. And so, believing it was in the best interest of his family, he moved his family to New York City, and then the rest is kind of history. That's what submission actually means.
Now, I'm going to tell you the number of times that has happened in our marriage, I can count on one hand. It just means that there are times when there is a split decision and the responsibility to decide what is in the best interest of my family. God lays that upon me, He lays that upon me. And people who say, well, we'll just work it out. We'll just figure out how to come to consensus.
Yeah. But you know, in any relationship, that doesn't always work. It's like a dance. In a dance, somebody's got to lead. The lead role in the dance of marriage God gave to the man.
C.S. Lewis says that the physical dance of sex corresponds to the relational dance of marriage. In the act of sex, C.S. Lewis said, man plays the role of initiator. He moves toward the woman.
The woman plays the role of receiving the initiative of the man. We are given corresponding roles, Lewis says, in how we relate as husband and wife.
Now, these are just parts that we play. It's not some statement of superiority or inferiority. Which is why Lewis, in his inimitable way, goes on to say the crowns that men are given to wear in marriage, he said one is made of paper and the other is made of thorns. Thorns because he lays down his life for her, like Jesus did. Paper, because he's just playing a role in his marriage, not because he is superior.
Now that's about all I can tell you about what submission does and doesn't look like. You're going to need to take these principles and wrestle with them and have a long discussion and just work out what it looks like in your marriage. I want to spend the last few minutes just talking to the guys. specifically about what this means for them.
Now admittedly, in the next few minutes, I'm going to talk more to the guys than the girls. And if that bothers you that I'm going to do it that way, well, just look at Ephesians 5. You'll notice three verses for the girls and six for the boys. All right, so I'm just being biblical, guys. You were given five areas to be a leader in.
Let me talk about a couple of them. Romance. First of all, college-age single guys or young professional guys. I do not mean to get off on a soap box. Or to be too hard on you, but I've told you this before.
We have raised a generation of guys who don't really lead in anything. including this. Ain't got no courage to ask the girl out, no courage to state your intentions. You just prefer to coast along, be in what we call a friendationship, or do what I've referred to as the sneak a date. Let's just see how things work out, maybe get some sex along the way, we're friends with benefits.
That's not a man, that's a boy. A man in Genesis 2 is characterized by one who takes initiative. And girls, I'll just throw this out there. If he does not have the leadership capacity to lead and state his intentions and take the initiative in romance, I'm thinking he's probably not going to be a leader in the rest of your life. And I just don't think it's the kind of guy that you probably ought to look for.
This is Summit Life with Pastor Jiddy Greer. We'll return to our teaching in just a moment, but I wanted to remind you about our featured resource this month. Pastor JD says, if there were a Guinness Book of World Records entry for amount of times having prayed the sinner's prayer, he'd be a top contender. He struggled for many years to gain an assurance of salvation and eventually learned he was not alone. Lack of assurance is epidemic among evangelical Christians.
Maybe you've struggled with this same question for some time, and it's time for some answers. In his book titled Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart, Jiddy shows that faulty ways of presenting the gospel are a leading source of the confusion. The idea of asking Jesus into your heart or giving your life to Jesus often gives false assurance to those who are not saved and keeps those who genuinely are saved from fully embracing that reality. Don't you want to know, really know that heaven is your home someday? This book is a great first step to understanding salvation and feeling secure in God's hand.
Receive Stop Asking Jesus into your heart with your gift to the ministry right now by giving us a call at 866-335-5220 or check it out at jdgreer.com.
Now, let's get back to the conclusion of today's teaching. Once again, here's Pastor JDE. Married men. We never give up the responsibility to keep romancing our wives. I am still the leader in romance.
I have determined that I can never stop competing for the affections of my wife. I was good at it when we were engaged and were dating. I was really good at competing because I knew I had to beat out all these other losers, right? But now, after I became a husband, I started to just kind of take it for granted, just coast along.
Now, I do not think that in a thousand years my wife would ever be unfaithful to me. I'm not saying that, but I'm saying that I have to continue to compete for my wife's affections the way that I did when we were dating, because I want to make it ridiculously impossible for some guy to come along and outwoo me and how he treats her.
Well, one of my counselor friends gave me this piece of advice years ago that's really helped me. He said, You got to become a student of your wife. You've got to learn how she, what turns her on. You've got to learn how she feels love because it's not the same as how you would do it. And then he gave me this concept.
Some of you have heard this, and I don't have time to spend a long time on it, but it was the concept of the five love languages. Have you heard this? It's a really popular book. And basically, the love languages concept is that we tend to speak and receive love in a language. And it's like any other language.
The person that you're talking to has to speak the same language, or they're not going to hear what you're saying. And so, Gary Chapman, the author of this book, identifies five different love languages that people have. The first one, words of affirmation. That's where just hearing words means a lot to your spouse. To say, I love you, you're doing a great job.
Some people give and receive affection that way. A second one he identifies as acts of service. You just serve them by giving them help that they didn't ask for. A third one, gifts that are given. You just bring your wife a bouquet of flowers after work.
You buy her perfume or clothes. That's a language. Physical touch, hugs, holding hands, touches of affection. Right, up five, spending quality time. That's where just full undivided attention just speaks volumes.
Now here's the catch that most people don't get. How you speak and receive love is not always the way that your partner is going to speak and receive love. For me, when I got married, my love language is kind of two or three, I like kind of all of them, but it's words of affirmation, little gifts, and occasional acts of service. You want to make my day? You come up here, tell me I'm awesome, give me a gift card, and then I don't know, wash my car, and I'll just love you forever.
All right.
Well, so I thought, well, that's how I'll love my wife. You know, occasional gift, occasional act of service, but a lot of words. And it's just not, it wasn't communicating with her. And I had to learn that there were different ways that she would, you know, the one that is not my love language is touch. Don't come up here and touch me.
I'm not going to like it. All right.
I'm just telling you. You know, just I just fur, like, let's just all stay in our little quadrant. You know, you stay over there, I'll stay over here, and we're all going to be fine. Tell me I'm awesome from over there, okay? But hers, you know, just the occasional reaching out while we're watching TV and touching my wife, that it was in a way that was obviously not designed to move from one base to the next, but just the affectionate touch just did all kinds.
It's becoming a servant to her and learning how I can lead in romance. And guys, if you quit doing that, what happens is, I'm not excusing her having an affair. I'm just telling you, you should make it really difficult. You're responsible. To lead in romance.
Guys, this also means that you're responsible for where your relationship is. I mean, how many times do I see this in our office? Woman drag in some guy who doesn't want to be there, but their marriage is in trouble.
Now, there's a lot of things I haven't done right in my marriage, but I will tell you that when my wife and I needed help in our marriage, It was me who... Arranged the counseling. It was me who even took care of arranging some of the child care for it. Because I knew that where my relationship was was my responsibility. I'm the leader in romance, and I answer to God for it.
Let me talk for a minute about spiritual leadership. God gave you the responsibility for your family. for which he is going to hold you accountable. I would just make sure you see Ephesians 6. Then when he starts talking about the discipline of the children, he addresses fathers.
Fathers, are you leading in the discipline of your children? Or is that something you've turned over to your wife and just like, keep them off my back? That's not what I do. I make money for the family, you raise the kids. That is wrong, it is unbiblical, and it is setting up your kids for certain disaster.
I love the words of Tony Evans, who said: spiritual headship is essentially God telling the woman to duck so he could punch the man. That's what headship is if you really want to get to it. Guys, that leadership is a sacred responsibility. You are the servant leader. You were there to take initiative for the benefit of others.
Spiritual headship is not licensed to do what you want to do. It's empowerment to do what you ought to do.
Now, single guys, listen, if you become a leader in these five areas, I cannot explain to you how attractive you are going to become. Thank you. All right.
Because this is what she was created for. And it makes you in the image of Jesus, who is the most attractive person in the universe. And here's the other thing that just burns in my heart for this men. I know that as God heals the man, the healing of the family, and the healing of society. We'll just follow.
You ever look at the Genesis 3 situation, how it went down? It says, read it later. It says: here's the woman. Genesis 3 opens up with the woman having a conversation with the serpent. And it says that the man was, in Hebrew, with her.
Now, with her in Hebrew doesn't mean he was with her, like over there doing something else. With her means he was standing right there beside her. He was given the responsibility to protect her and lead her spiritually. But he knew that God had said, the day that you eat of that fruit, you will surely die. And Adam was like, I wonder if that's true.
He's offering the fruit to my wife. He's listening to this conversation. The dirt bag says. Why don't I just let her take the fruit and if she drops dead? I don't know it's not true.
So he's like, I don't know, go ahead. It's not that he did anything wrong, he just didn't do Anything. He wasn't there. It wasn't a sin of commission, it was a sin of Omission. How I know that's true.
What was the first question God asked when he came looking for the couple? Adam, where? Are you? Where are you? You could really translate that, Adam.
Where were you? Where were you when you were supposed to be leading and protecting?
Meanwhile, that conversation should have gone. Should have gone the serpent coming up to the woman, and as he's starting to get into his sales pitch, he may be like, Whoa, wait a minute, snake. What are you doing talking to my wife? No, I've done hot snakes. My wife and I were just on our way over to the tree of life where we were going to have a succulent buffet of the tree of life.
And you're here talking about this trashy tree of knowledge of good and evil. Not in a million years, snake. Go back in your hole. That's how that conversation should have gone down. The fall of mankind happened not through a sin of commission by the man, but through a sin of omission.
And it is still the question that God is asking to men: Adam, where are you? Where are you in the leading of your children? Where are you in the church? My friend John Bryson says, We got a generation of males that just never grew up to be men. who never take the role of servant leaders.
We've created a new name for this group of guys who they're not boys because they're post-pubescent. But they're not men because they're not leaders. We've got a new name for it, we call it dudes. Most guys, he says, feel like they're good husbands if they provide food and shelter for their families. That's the standard.
He said, possums provide food and shelter for their families. Is that really the standard of what we've given for what a man is? A true man is a servant leader leading spiritually, romantically, taking responsibility. Boys blame, men own. Boys take, men give.
Boys complain, men figure out. Boys pout, men endure. Boys wish, men do. Boys start, men finish. Boys stiffen their neck, men bend their knees.
The world fell into sin through a failure of a man to lead. But God saved the world by sending a new man, a second Adam, who would lead where the first Adam followed, who would serve the church where the first Adam served himself. That, of course, was Jesus. Jesus displayed more manhood in the manger than Adam did in the garden. In the garden, Adam looked like a man, but he acted like a boy.
In the manger, Jesus looked like a boy, but he was doing the most manly thing imaginable. He was fighting for the ones that he loved. And that means that salvation will come to the world as men begin to follow the second Adam and they become like him. Listen, every sociological study done points to the fact that the leadership of the father is the greatest determining factor on how the kids turn out. Tony Evans said, as goes the man, so goes the family.
As goes the family, so goes the church. As goes the church, so goes the community. As goes the community, so goes the nation.
So, you want to change the nation? You change the community. You want to change the community, change the family. You want to change the family, change the man. God, give us a generation.
Listen. Of men who will lead as servant leaders the way that God has called us to lead, because I'm telling you, when that happens, it all begins to flow.
Now you say, Well, how can you do this?
Well, again, the clue is back in verse 21. Submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. The gospel is the power for your marriage. It shows you a God who served you this way. A God who submitted and laid down his life for the church.
And as you become more aware of who this God is, it shows you what power looks like. It shows you a God who is a lover. And so you become the kind of lover that he is. After seeing what Christ did for you, you began to look at your spouse and you began to say, What can I do to serve you? Because his question was, What can I do to serve and lay down my life for you?
If you do this because of your spouse, you're going to lose motivation. That's why he says submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. When your horizontal service to your spouse has a vertical dimension of worship, then it becomes joy and you have the strength to endure. Marriage, you see, at its core, listen, is gospel reenactment. That's why, by the way, some of you resist this.
The reason you resist this, first of all, is we hate the word submission. We don't want to submit to anybody. Right? And so of course you resist this because you're a sinner. But God appointed various relationships that you would learn to submit in.
If you're single, that's why this still applies to you. Because you might not be in a marriage, but you're in a bunch of other relationships where you gotta learn to submit, where you gotta learn to serve. The point is not marriage, the point is Christ-likeness, the point is gospel reenactment. For many of you, listen, what is missing from your marriage? The reason none of this makes sense is because the gospel is missing from your marriage.
You don't know a God who is a servant, so you've turned other people into your servant. And you getting connected to Christ, you trusting in Christ as your Lord and Savior, would do more for your marriage than 10,000 sermons or seminars or books would ever do. because it would reconnect you to God and that's the decision some of you need to make. Is you need to receive Christ. You need to surrender to Him because that's why your marriage has fallen apart, or that's why your dating life doesn't work, or that's why it's all in shambles, because you're not connected to the source.
Do you know? need to reconnect with God. If so, let me encourage you to learn more about what it means to be a follower of Christ. We have lots of free resources to get you started at jegreer.com. God is our Father.
In fact, He's the ultimate Father. In the book of 1 John, He says, I write these things that you may know you have eternal life. Assurance of salvation is so important. It's understanding the relationship that you are supposed to have in relation to the Lordship of Christ and the finished work of Christ. If you'd like to go more in-depth with this question of how you can know for sure that you're saved, let me encourage you to get a copy of a book by Pastor JD called Stop Asking Jesus into Your Heart.
We'll be happy to send it to you today when you donate to support this ministry. Your gift goes a long way toward helping us bring gospel-centered Bible teaching to you right here on your station or podcast feed without cost being a barrier.
So join this mission today and give by calling 866-335-5220. That's 866-335-5220 or give online at jdgreer.com. I'm Molly Vitovich. Join us Tuesday when Pastor JD continues in Ephesians chapter 5, bringing us clarity and direction for intimacy and healthy relationships here on Summit Life with JD Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by JD Greer Ministries.
