Col 3:18 “Wives, submit~~ to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.”

Just as the commands for the husband to be mutually submissive (Eph 5:21) and sacrificially love his wife (5:25) are contrary to his selfish dominant nature, so the command for the wife to be submissive is contrary to her controlling nature.

All women were changed because of the fall in the Garden (Gen. 3:16).

God gives a command to a wife that is contrary to her old nature: “be continually submitting,” which is the translation of a word meaning “to place under in an orderly fashion.” The verb form means to “acknowledge someone’s authority over you.”

The word is also used to describe Jesus’s submission to His parents (Luke 2:51), demons’ submission to the disciples (10:17, 20), the spiritual mind’s willing submission to God’s commands (Rom 8:7), and man’s submission to governing authorities (13:1).

Often inconvenient passages such as this one are ignored or outright denied any authority in a woman’s life. These passages are mistakenly relegated to a first–century culture and declared to be inapplicable to our own.

However, failure to apply this principle to marriage has devastating results. A wife who willingly submits to a servant husband who is committed to her benefit will discover the joy of marriage.

Titus 2:5 instructs women to be “workers at home, . . . being subject to their own husbands, that the Word of God may not be dishonored.” A lot is at stake.

Several misconceptions need to be clarified: First, nowhere is there any insinuation that submission implies inferiority.

Second, obedience is conspicuously absent from the instruction to wives, but it is included for children and servants. Submission focuses on meeting the husbands’ needs.

Third, husbands are prohibited from abusing their authority. Jesus said, “You know that the rulers in this world lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader [or husband] among you must be your servant” (Mark 10:42–-43^NLT).

A servant leader is first modeled at home. Nothing compares to the joy of marriage done God’s way. Do you trust His way?

“Lord, submission is seldom easy, especially in marriage, where we tend to think our rights and needs are more important than a rule. May what is ‘fitting in the Lord’ become fitting in our eyes as well.”

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