Being a Wife God’s Way (Part 1 of 2)

The Bible assures us that husbands and wives are spiritual equals, equal and value and worth and dignity. So if we're equal before God, why does he command wives to submit to their husband's leadership?

Alistair Begg answers that question today on Truth for Life. He's teaching a message titled, Being a Wife, God's Way. And our focus this morning is on the first six verses, which I'd like to read in your hearing. 1 Peter 3 verse 1, Wives in the same way be submissive to your husbands, so that if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without talk by the behavior of their wives when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight. For this is the way the holy women of the past, who put their hope in God, used to make themselves beautiful. They were submissive to their own husbands, like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her master.

You are her daughters, if you do what is right and do not give way to fear. Father, I pray that as we turn our hearts to these verses of Scripture, that the Holy Spirit might be our teacher, that you will give to us alert minds, the ability to think clearly, the willingness to submit openly to exactly what your Word may teach. And to this we give ourselves now, seeking your grace. In Jesus' name.

Amen. As we come to the first verse of chapter 3, we're at the midpoint of a section on submission which arguably continues until the twelfth verse of the third chapter. And having established the necessity of submission in relation to civil government, and then in the realm of everyday employment, and having provided the foundational basis for all of this in the example of the Lord Jesus Christ—and he did that in verses 21 and following to the end of chapter 2—Peter now turns to the family unit and says, If the family unit is to work in the way that God intended, then this same principle and pattern of submission needs to be operative. And he begins by addressing it in the whole area of the privileges and responsibilities of being a wife. And that's why we've entitled our study this morning Being a Wife God's Way. Being a Wife God's Way. Does God have a particular way for a wife to be? The answer which Scripture gives is unreservedly yes. Well, then, do I want to be that kind of wife? And do I want to lead my family in such a way as to make it possible as a husband for my wife to become all that God intends for her to be?

These are the areas that we now find ourselves addressing. Any lingering doubts regarding the fitting description of those who are in Christ as being aliens and strangers in the world, which you will remember we picked up in the eleventh verse of chapter 2, may be dispelled by considering the radical and revolutionary impact of what Peter is saying here. If you don't think that you are an alien or a stranger, or if you find yourself completely absorbed by the culture—if I do also—if we're tempted to believe that alien and stranger is some kind of anachronistic phrase, then that will be gone once and for all for the individual, for the wife especially, who is prepared to believe and to behave in light of the first six verses of 1 Peter chapter 3. The wife who lives this out, who seeks to do so, will be confronted by the unfavorable reaction of her peers—peers who regard themselves as incredibly enlightened, tremendously progressive, very twenty-first century ladies—and the challenge is on a lady who would be prepared to bow beneath the instruction of this word. Frankly, she would cause less fuss by dressing up as a Viking and going grocery shopping than the fuss that she will cause by bearing testimony to this principle at a neighborhood gathering of women. I put it to you ladies, try the test. You're invited for coffee, and you're going to the grocery store.

Dress up as in the most bizarre clothes you can find and go to the grocery store. Then go to the Bible study or to the meeting and suggest that you are committed to being submissive to your husband. And then assess which got the greatest reaction. And I want to put it to you that the odd Viking in the grocery store is as nothing compared to the impact of a wife who apparently has taken leave of her senses, is paying attention to an ancient book, to words written by a Galilean fisherman that seemingly are locked in history past. Now, if that doesn't set this up in about as dynamic a way in terms of the impact of these verses as it can, then I can't do any further. Verse 1 of chapter 3 is linked to the preceding teaching on submission. How do we know that?

Because Peter employs the phrase, in the same way. Wives in the same way. In the same way as what?

In the same way as all that has gone before. In the same way as Christ has displayed a submissive spirit. In the same way as we, in relationship to civil government, are responsible to bowing beneath this truth.

In the same way, wives within the home are to display this submissive spirit. Now, when you come to something like this and you're reading through the Bible, perhaps you're not reading elsewhere, perhaps you've come as a visitor this morning, and here we are at this, and you're saying, well, isn't this perhaps just one word in the midst of the Bible? Is this in accord with what the rest of Scripture teaches?

And the answer is yes. And it is in accord with what we find throughout the rest of Scripture. For example, in Ephesians 5, in oft-quoted verses from the wedding ceremony, in Ephesians 5 and 22, Paul has said, Wives, submit to your husbands as to the LORD. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, which it must do to be all that Christ intends for it to be, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything in order that they might be all that God intends for them as wives to be. Now, if the Scriptures are so clear concerning this, why is it that there exists such uncertainty in the minds of men and women in the church, irrespective of the society surrounding the church?

I want to suggest that it is on account of two things. The reason that we have difficulty in declaring and in displaying this principle of submission is, first of all, because of the conviction which marks the pagan perspective. Now, some people might not like the use of the word pagan. I'm sorry, but I chose it guardedly and guidedly. The world outside of the Christian church is pagan in its perspective.

That's what the Bible says. And yet it remains very, very clear concerning its agenda. Let me give to you just one quote, of which there could be many. This is from a lady called Felice Schwartz, the president of Catalyst, writing in Working Women's magazine. Quote, When the children of today's generation of career women are themselves emerging from their teens, the polarization of sexes that put women in the home at the nurturing end of the spectrum, and men in the office at the work end of the spectrum, will have disappeared.

And with it, the stereotypes of supportive women and aggressive men. And what we must say in response to that is, she seems to be absolutely correct. But to the church, which is resident and alien in society, is given another agenda altogether. And yet, such uncertainty, promoted by the conviction of a society around us and by the confusion of the church in which we find ourselves. This is seen by the amount of articles which are presently being written which attempt to make mutual submission, and the authority of a husband, or the responsibility of submission, actually enemies to one another on the battlefield of life. And in point of fact, what the Bible says is that the mutuality which exists between a husband and wife and the inevitable responsibilities which fall to each are not in the purposes of God enemies but rather friends.

Now, we need to think carefully about this, and let me try and guide us through. Turn with me for a moment, again, to Ephesians 5, if you let go of that passage. Ephesians chapter 5, and prior to the verse which I read, which was the twenty-second verse, you'll find the twenty-first verse, which of course you would expect. And in the twenty-first verse, it says, Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. There is, says Paul, to be a mutual dimension of submission which exists in the relationships of God's people to one another, and not least of all which exists within the family unit and the relationship between a mom and a dad, between a husband and a wife. That mutuality of response is not something which is earthed simply here in Ephesians 5, but it comes out clearly in other places. And one of the most graphic expressions of this mutuality is in 1 Corinthians chapter 7, where Paul is pointing out that husbands and wives, in terms of their responsibilities to one another within the marriage bond, as it relates to the physical dimension of their expressions of love for one another, are called to mutuality.

They are called to mutually submit. Verse 3, 1 Corinthians 7, The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband. The wife's body does not belong to her alone.

Now, that's like a red rag to a bull in our present feminist culture. We can't allow ladies to walk the streets of America saying, My body belongs to me. We cannot allow statutes to be written in to our governmental laws which say that a husband has no responsibility, no control, no say in what happens to the child that a woman carries in her womb.

And why not? Because her body does not belong to her alone, but it also belongs to her husband. Tremendous, say the husbands.

Wait a minute, we're not finished. In the same way, the husband's body does not belong to him alone, but also to his wife. Therefore, says Paul, do not deprive one another of the physical relationships within marriage. Mutually submit to one another. Now, I'm gonna leave that aside now, because that takes us into a whole nother area of teaching, and we'll come to that another day. But what it's saying is this, that there is a mutuality about the relationship in the marriage bond.

And we need to understand that clearly. But that mutuality does not negate the place of submission, which is to be taken by a husband to Christ as he submits to the task of leadership, and which is to be taken by a wife to her husband as she submits to God's design for her, uniquely created with wonderful potential for good as she lives it out for God. Consider Galatians chapter 3 in this regard.

And we will return to 1 Peter in a moment or two, but let your fingers do the walking. Galatians chapter 3 and verse 28. This is a verse which is often used to teach the exact opposite of what I'm about to teach you. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. So says somebody, because of Galatians 3.28, there is now no place for the other biblical teaching concerning the responsibilities of headship and authority and submission within the home. But what is Galatians 3.28 saying?

It's saying this. Before God, there is only oneness. A woman is not inferior to a man in terms of spiritual citizenship. A lady has direct access to God the Father through Jesus Christ, the same as does her husband.

She is uniquely involved in that relationship. However, what the verse is not teaching is that it overturns, for example, 1 Peter 3.1, and is suggesting that since we are all one in Christ Jesus, and since our maleness and our femaleness does not come into play in the spiritual realm, so some argue, the notions of gender and the notions of the polarity of the sexes is also completely obliterated. But if you think about that, that is so silly, that God went to such lengths to make man qua man and to make woman as woman, and then in the great economy of his purposes from eternity, he decided that at some midpoint he would obliterate all the distinctions of gender, etc. You see, loved ones, we need to learn to study our Bibles in such a way that we allow the Bible to say what it says. And the context here in Galatians 3 is that Paul is proclaiming our oneness in Jesus Christ. We are all sons of God through faith in Jesus Christ. Sons and daughters of God.

He uses the word sons generically, as does the rest of Scripture. And then he goes on to explain the implications of this. So, if I labored it a little, let me try and come back to what I'm endeavoring to get across. Mutuality within marriage, says the Bible, does not negate the place of submission.

Now, let me illustrate that for you in one final reference. 1 Corinthians 11.3. Now, I want you to realize, says Paul, that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God.

Now, does anything strike you about that for a moment? The last phrase, the head of Christ is God. What do we know, those of us who know our Bibles, about the Trinity? What do we know about God the Father, the Son, and the Spirit? We know that they are co-eternal and that they are co-equal.

That they are equal in power and in eternity and in every other way. There is no distinction between the members of the Trinity. So therefore, there is an all-consuming mutuality within the Trinity between the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. But, says Paul, the head of Christ is God. Jesus said, I and the Father are one. Jesus said, he who has seen me has seen the Father.

Absolute mutuality. So how could it possibly be that God is the head of Christ? The answer is, it cannot be in essence or in nature, therefore it must be in function.

In function. So therefore, Christ, who is co-equal with the Father in all respects, submits from all of eternity to do the Father's will—not because he is inferior to the Father but because it is vital and necessary for the purposes of God to be worked out from all of eternity into time that Jesus delight to do the Father's will. His mutuality is without question, and his submission to the Father is absolutely plain. Now, the point of all of that is simply this—that that is the exact picture that is the same kind of structure which is written into the fabric of marriage. The husband and wife are equal before God—now, hold on—but in order for the family to function in harmony, the woman, with no loss of dignity, takes the place of submission to the headship of her husband in the same way as Christ, with no loss of dignity, took the place of submission to the headship of his heavenly Father. Now, when we understand that, we can stop all the silly stuff. God's purpose is, God's perfect design for a family, is such that he has made it that the woman's tenderness and her gentleness are to dovetail with the husband's strength in leadership.

Now, that is another message to which we're going to come. Because what about the wimpy husband factor? What about the husbands who've never led from day one? What about the abrogation of leadership within the homes on the parts of men? What about these crazy characters who don't know whether to put brown shoes on or black shoes on and walk around with one brown and one black, if that was necessary? Useless individuals!

Useless to their children, useless to their wife's useless characters! And how does a wife, then, make sense of the first six verses of 1 Peter 3 if she happens to be living in a home with a husband who has never submitted himself to his responsibility under God in leadership? But ladies, we've got to go six verses for you and then one for the men. And that was what Peter did. I don't think we ought to read a great deal into that except what is there.

All right? I hope you heard clearly one of the things Alistair said today and that is that mutuality within marriage does not negate the place of submission. That's a challenging but clear message from Alistair Begg and you're listening to Truth for Life. Now, as you listen to Truth for Life and you benefit from learning what God's word has to say, you may not realize this but you actually have a fellow listener to thank.

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You'll find lots of useful guidance for all ages and all stages of life. Request your copy of Lasting Love when you sign up to become a Truth Partner today. You can also request the book when you make a one-time donation to Truth for Life. Visit truthforlife.org slash donate. I'm Bob Lapine. Can true beauty bloom along with wrinkles? We'll find out tomorrow as you join us for the conclusion of today's message. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.