Results 1 - 8 of 8
|
|
|||||
Results from: Answered Bible Questions, Unanswered Bible Questions Author: srchng Ordered by Date |
||||||
Results | Verse | Author | ID# | |||
1 | Submit . . . unless it hurts? | Eph 5:33 | srchng | 66451 | ||
Maybe you all can help me with this. If I remember correctly, Job "submitted" to the Lord, saying, "Though He slay me, yet will I serve Him." If he didn't say that, please correct me (or tell me who did say it.) Or, if that wasn't submission, what is submission? It seems that Jesus also gives a model for submitting even to the point of death. Isn't that what the martyrs did too? Isn't that the scriptural model of submission to God? Then there's Daniel and his buddies, perhaps with a different dynamic. If this is proper submission to the Lord, then how can wives submit to their husbands "as unto the Lord?" (Eph. 5:22) Do wives have a lesser calling to submission to the Lord than men (or husbands, specifically) so that they are called on to submit to their husbands less than these scriptural (and martyr-type) models of submission submitted to the Lord? Did God design women (wives, specifically) to be less capable of the strengths or qualities necessary for submission than Job, Jesus, and the martyrs (some of whom were women?) Submission to anyone, even God, is a tough pill for any person to swallow, due to what we refer to as "sin nature." Submission to the point of pain or injury, let alone death, is naturally untenable. Are we called to live "naturally?" Please help me see where scripture relieves a wife of the resposibility under God to submit to her husband because it pains, injures, or even kills her. Isn't a husband (or wife) to submit to the Lord that way? I'd really like to understand this. Please help if you can. Thanks, -srchng |
||||||
2 | Mutually submissive? | Eph 5:33 | srchng | 65614 | ||
Tim, I just asked God for overwhelming grace and peace to you, in the sense that it's meant scripturally, whatever that is. . . He knows. I'm glad you posted this. Would you help me see the part in Ephesians that teaches mutual submission? I've heard this referred to before, but have only found mutual submission instructed among believers in general, as contrasted with intra-marital submission. (The submit to one another stuff seemed to me to speak to entire groups - of the congregational sort.) Certainly a husband ought to submit to the godly wisdom his wife presents just as quickly as he would to that of any other believer, but I wonder if there's a difference in the kind of - or reason for - submission since neither Paul nor Peter wrote anything *specifically* to husbands and wives instructing mutual submission - as far as I know. If I've not read carefully enough, please help me see what I've missed. Also, that *helpmeet/corresponding power* bit is a gem. It's always good to get further insight as to original language and its intent. I wonder if you meant "Biblically, all our relationships should evidence a self-sacrificing love that seeks the best for others rather than ourselves" to sound like edging toward egalitarianism, or if that is your position in full. For that matter, I'm not absolutely sure precisely how egalitarianism would be defined, or how many permutations there might be ( or even whether I spelled it right.) I suppose my question on that is: Is there a God-ordained hierarchy in marriage, and if so, how is it worked out in the kind of obedience to Jesus that simply rocks the world to His glory? I'm on something of a quest for understanding of this issue which is so very important and often volatile. People have strong feelings about it, and understandably so. This issue addresses the relationship with the single most awe inspiring potential and ramifications apart from our relationship with Christ. (And perhaps even eternal potential and ramifications, in the sense of bringing children into the world in God's ordained plan - or His prescribed way of doing things, as well as other things a married coulple can cause or do in obedience to Christ.) And (in a way that looks sort of tragic/comic,) it often starts to look like a power struggle, or an attempt to interpret God's word in a way that means "I'm one-up" or "I don't have to . . " Either way, it's self-assertion rather than Christ-assertion. It looks so stupid to me when I describe it, that I feel like mocking it. But I know I'm as prone to self-assertion as anyone else. Have you ever been in an ostensibly Christian home and heard the husband scream an order at his wife to "submit" and call har a bad name? This is the kind of ridiculousness I want to learn how not only to avoid, but perhaps even help resolve. I want to understand scriptural principles and analogies that can be applied to real-life marital situations. |
||||||
3 | Either / or? | Eph 5:33 | srchng | 65504 | ||
Must it be either/or, selfish or unselfish? What if we, the redeemed, are the "joy set before Him?" Didn't He have such a relentless passion for fellowship with us that He was willing to go through all that, not to gain power or position (which were already His *good point, Robert*), but to gain US? Wasn't He so wild about us that He, from a human perspective, threw away what could have been a long, happy life - submitted to torture and death so He could have US with Him forever in unbroken fellowship? Wasn't He really being absolutely selfish and absolutely self-sacrificing at the same time, for His own pleasure AND our benefit? Isn't this really the model He gives for husbands - total self sacrifice for the sake of the joy (and even pleasure) of exceeding excellence in intimate, lasting relationship? |
||||||
4 | Greater rank, not greater person? | Eph 5:33 | srchng | 65498 | ||
Isn't it possible for someone to hold a higher rank than someone else of better character or greater maturity? It happens in the military. Can't it be that way in marriage as well? Isn't that what Eph 5:33 talks about, order or rank? It seems like the higher the rank one holds in any God-ordained system, the more one is called on to proactively pursue a lifestyle of self sacrificing love. "Whoever would be great among you must be the servant of all." Didn't Jesus say that? Anyway, it looks like in the Bible husbands are given rank in the family system and are called on to be aggressively laying down their lives, to meet needs, to follow the way of the cross, as it were. This looks like the one relationship where God grants authority first, then says, "Okay, guys, now live up to it! You wanted to be married, now learn to do marriage like Jesus does it." Isn't the whole love/submission issue of Eph. 5 and 1 Pet. 3 the kind of thing where if one spouse is looking to the other to do it right *first*, then the point is being missed? Furthermore, isn't the point of all this to have husbands and wives doing so much good to each other that God's own glory radiates through the relationship as they follow His plan for them? And don't both Paul and Peter teach us that EITHER a truly submissive, respectful wife OR a truly loving, self-sacrificing husband will have powerful influence in bringing the other into proper relationship not only in the marriage, but even to God? Am I missing something? |
||||||
5 | Thanks! One more thing. . . | Eph 5:33 | srchng | 65456 | ||
Thank you for your well consisered response. I value it highly. I will ponder your words. One thing left, though. How *he* accesses the scripural "as himself" type of love of "himself," (as it is written,)is still a question. Is it possible that he must begin with whatever sense of self preservation or self interest he has at the moment (however scant it may be) and surreder that little unworthy or un-holy looking thing to Jesus and work that very thing out in the interest of his wife, "as himself?" I'm looking for application, not just theory. How does he actually DO this, if he's low on the self respect scale, and isn't "enjoying" the love of God, even though he knows it's real? How, really, does he "walk in faith" according to this instruction? Do you think I'm close? |
||||||
6 | Is reverence feasible? Always? . . . | Eph 5:33 | srchng | 65455 | ||
I am really impressed with your answer to this question. Still, I have a point of curiosity. In reference to 1 Tim 2:12-14, mightn't this be God's order of things rather than a "flaw?" Perhaps Eve fell into sin when her husband wasn't there, because . . . well . . . he wasn't there (to protect her.) Does this make as much sense to you as it does to me in light of Scripture? Srchng |
||||||
7 | love...as himself (if no self-love?) | Eph 5:33 | srchng | 65433 | ||
If a husband has very little self-love, or even self-respect, what good is it if he loves his wife the same way? Isn't this closely related to "love your neighbor as yourself" in that self-love seems to be assumed as a given? What if self-love is lacking? How does Christianity fill in the blanks? Where is the self-love found? | ||||||
8 | Is reverence feasible? Always? | Eph 5:33 | srchng | 65430 | ||
The word "respect" or "reverence" in Greek looks a lot like phobia - fear. Is it right for a wife to see her husband as deserving of her fear? Even if the word doesn't really mean "fear" in a modern coloquial sense, is it right that she should have a sense of awe or reverence, or even attribute to him the kind of honor, power, or authority that would make awe or reverence reasonable? Does he actually hold that kind of position even if he's really bad at it? | ||||||