Well, I learned something yesterday. If you want traffic, be controversial. Yesterday was important, because today we move to one of those passages of scripture that are pretty well guaranteed to annoy anybody who follows the spirit of the age. .There is a tendency top take v 21 “Be subject to one another out of reverence” and use that to remove the demands to submit. Instead of seeing the passage as a set of principles and applications (which is very much the way Paul taught) to take the principle and deny the application as something that applied in the Roman Empire but does not now.

Which is nonsense. People have not changed. The pressure to use marriages as a form of political and economic checkers, marrying and divorcing as the alliance between families shifted, was part of pagan culture. Being married for life — which is what Jesus said the law implied — put a stop to this practice, and the heartache it caused. But to today’s text.

Ephesians 5:15-33

¹⁵Be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise, ¹⁶making the most of the time, because the days are evil. ¹⁷So do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. ¹⁸Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery; but be filled with the Spirit, ¹⁹as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, singing and making melody to the Lord in your hearts, ²⁰giving thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

²¹Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ.

²²Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord. ²³For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head of the church, the body of which he is the Savior. ²⁴Just as the church is subject to Christ, so also wives ought to be, in everything, to their husbands.

²⁵Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, ²⁶in order to make her holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word, ²⁷so as to present the church to himself in splendor, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind — yes, so that she may be holy and without blemish. ²⁸In the same way, husbands should love their wives as they do their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. ²⁹For no one ever hates his own body, but he nourishes and tenderly cares for it, just as Christ does for the church, ³⁰because we are members of his body. ³¹“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” ³²This is a great mystery, and I am applying it to Christ and the church. ³³Each of you, however, should love his wife as himself, and a wife should respect her husband.

OK: let’s look at this.

• Be careful how you live.  Live wisely. Be aware of the forces within the greater society that impact on you and your family, and consider how you are going to deal with them.  Alcest has some very pertinent points about all this… including acknowledging the cost of being a leader on the family, or of being in a power couple
  

  Wasn’t that the societal model beforehand? Wasn’t the home given great importance? It wasn’t called the head of the household for nothing folks. The man was in the house too. Both men and women were part of the home. And part of communities. And part of a society. Work and family meshed together. Sometimes foreigners came in. Now it’s all strangers or just your hermit family. There are many women and their male counterparts (of whatever SES, background, culture, religion) who are stuck in the professional career couples (“power couples”) vs. SAHM model (with liberal egalitarian behavior thrown in where the man just has to do the dishes so the wife doesn’t feel oppressed).But once again this assumes that most are part of the top 5%, top 1% or even the 0.01%. And don’t even get me started on playing career women (feminist merit badge anyone?). Please remember though, that these people are not insignificant. They are an essential part of society as well. They are leaders. Don’t think of eradicating them. We can’t all be followers or leaders or whichever. It’s just the lack of realism. The rest of society should just wise up and stop playing these useless games. Trade-offs exist and are the cause for much of the “wage gap” myth. Just accept reality.Don’t be cynical or an idealist. Be in-between. Be realistic. If you enroll at a profession where people demand to work full-time to earn promotions or bonuses, then do it. Don’t create lawsuits and discrimination policies to distort the natural results of one’s market. A couple of people will be rich, some will be middle-class and others will be poor. Why not accept the hierarchy as a whole? Why not accept inequality? Why not see authority as inevitable?

  We need to think very carefully about how we live, and what we should teach as the way most should live. This needs not to be pitched at those who are at the top of corporations or governments, but those who are working in ordinary jobs, raising families: the ordinary and everyday Christian. For most of us do not lead, and most of us need to balance our lives so we can be around the home more. I’d add that professional people need to do this as well: take that rural job and the cut of pay so you can be a parent and have a live (I have, and I highly recommend it)

• Wives, submit… Now, this sticks on the craw. Most women act as in Genesis — their desire is for their husband  — but they also want to rule. Well, that’s difficult. One of the points of sorrow for most women is that this does not happen. (And if they take their husband’s man card away, and he is no longer leading, he is no longer attractive).   The implication is that you are under authority, as a soldier or employee is under authority. You have some authority of your own, but you are not the final arbiter. Women are told, moreover, to submit as to Christ. So, Ladies, it is not your husbands worthiness that matters. It is Christ’s.   And the hierarchy matters. I’ve worked for many years in multidisciplinary teams. But when things get tough — the senior medical person is seen as the person who makes the policies and is responsible for the performance of the whole team. If you want to lead, you have to accept the accountability, Which is why the commands to husbands are more difficult.
• Husbands, love your wives. Now, again, this ts to be as Christ si to the church — and not around her flaws, for we are all fallen. But the idea is that you lay yourself down tor her. At work. In defense of home and hearth, With understanding and tenderness.  In submission to Christ.

And with wisdom. The current worldly idea that any person can implode the family by mentioning either the A or V word (Abuse or Violence) has to be challenged within the church. Not because abuse is right. It is not. Nor because violence is acceptable. It is not. But because it means that there is no security, and no authority to act  — for husbands, for mothers, and for fathers. A foolish spouse can destroy his or her marriage and children in our society and will in fact be shunned if they try  to rescue a fragile situation.  Because our society rewards foolishness, the structure — the functional roles — of men and women is thus politically incorrect and must be shut down.

In the church, we should not be so. We should be loving, yes… but wise. For wisdom will stop us enabling the foolish choices we so fervently rationalize.