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Date:         Mon, 27 Jul 1992 12:30:07 EDT
From:         Leo W <Leo_W@QM.CIRCA.UFL.EDU>
Subject:      Home & Business #2
X-To:         Christia <christia@asuvm.inre.asu.edu>

This series is reproduced with permission from a booklet, "Christ and the
Church in Home and Business (Eph. 5:22 - 6:9)," by Charles H. Welch circa 1964.
 Quoting from the forward on page one, "This booklet is sent forth in the hope
that it may help wives and husbands, children and parents, and servants and
masters, to see their proper relationship to each other, and thus to "walk
worthy of the vocation" wherewith they are called."

------------------------------------

Ephesians 5:21 reads: "Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of
God".

The opening words of the section before us are:

"Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord".

We are evidently embarking upon an application of the teaching of verse 21, and
therefore must remember that while the wives are here told specifically to
submit to their own husbands, it is only a working out of that spirit that
reverences Christ, and submits to whatever He shall lay upon us.  Further, the
submission of the wife to the husband is "as unto the Lord", and this spirit
runs throughout the sixfold command.  Before tracing this through the section
before us, let us seek an understanding of the word "submit", for unless we
understand a command, our obedience will not be of a very high order.

THE MEANING OF SUBMISSION

The word "submit" is translated in Ephesians as follows:

"And hath put all things under His feet" (1:22).
"Submitting yourselves one to another" (5:21).
"Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands" (5:22) .
"As the church is subject unto Christ" (5:24).

The word means properly, "to arrange under", "to set in order under".  In 5:24
the church "is subject unto Christ", and yet what a high place that church
holds in the purpose of God.  There is no grovelling submission here.

It will be seen that the idea of "submission" in Ephesians five is not one of a
humiliating or servile description, but of recognizing the Lordship of Christ,
and so to be willing for the lowest or the highest place, as He shall will.  It
will be seen that the husband who acts in his position as "head of the wife",
is as submissive to the will of the Lord, as is the wife, who sets forth the
relative position of the church.  Both attitudes are honourable and necessary.

When we remember that the first occurrence of the word is Luke 2:51, which
refers to the Lord in His childhood "and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto
them (His parents)", surely the last shred of rebellion must vanish as we
realize what that submission involved.

THE SIXFOLD COMMAND - SUBMISSION "AS UNTO THE LORD".

Eph. 5:22-24  Wives SUBMIT, as the church to Christ.
   Eph. 5:25-33  Husbands LOVE, as Christ the church.
Eph. 6:1-3  Children OBEY in the Lord.
   Eph. 6:4 Father TRAIN in nurture of the Lord.
Eph. 6:5-8  Slaves OBEY, as unto Christ.
   Eph. 6:9 Masters DO THE SAME, for you have a Master in heaven.

A great deal of harmful discussion has revolved around the question, "should
the bride say obey at the marriage service?"  Paul does not say "wives obey"
when he treats of the social fabric and its interrelation, he reserves the word
"obey" for children and slaves, with their correlatives "bring up" and "forbear
threatening", using the higher word "submit" of the wife.  This word "submit"
is wrongly translated "obedient to their own husbands", in Titus 2:5.  The only
passage where wives are said to obey is 1 Peter 3:5,6 which grows out of the
submission of verses 1-5.  A wife who has submitted to the divine arrangement
will of necessity "obey" when obedience is demanded, but it is the result of a
willing compliance with the Lord's will, a grateful seizing of the opportunity
to typify the church's relation to the Lord, a very different thing from that
obedience of the child, which is "right", and according to commandment.

THE RELATION OF WIVES AND HUSBANDS

"Wives submit ......     .....  as the church unto Christ".
"Husbands love .....     .....  as Christ the church".

It will be seen that we are upon higher ground than that of 1 Corinthians
eleven and fourteen and 1 Timothy two.  There the Apostle goes back to:

NATURE AND CREATION.

"For the man is not of the woman; but the woman of the man.  Neither was the
man created for the woman; but the woman for the man ... Doth not even nature
itself teach you ..." (1 Cor. 11:8-14).

LAW

"Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them
to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law"
(1 Cor. 14:34).

CREATION AND SIN

"For Adam was first formed, then Eve.  And Adam was not deceived, but the woman
being deceived was in the transgression" (1 Tim. 2:13,14).

The Apostle had all these courses open before him to enforce his point, but he
passes them all by for the greater and higher motive used in Ephesians five.
To the wife Paul says, "The husband is the head of the wife", but to the
husband he says, "Love your wife".  He feels under no necessity to say,
"Husbands rule your wives".  To each is the word given tempered with much
graciousness.  Because the husband is head that does not mean ruthless rule and
rough-shod methods.  The husband in Christ is "submitted" to an obligation that
cannot be computed.  He is to love his wife, "even as Christ also loved the
church, and GAVE HIMSELF for it".

Perhaps when wives are loved with that kind of love, all argument as to
submission and obedience will become unnecessary.  The love of the husband
moreover is to be all in the direction of blessing, not for selfish ends:

"That He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word,
That He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot, or
wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish"
(Eph. 5:26,27).

Take one item, perhaps the lowliest, "not having wrinkle".  The word "wrinkle"
in the original, means exactly the same as the English word, viz., "a
corrugation of the skin".  Care and anxiety, worry of any description are the
chief causes of wrinkles; how this reveals the character of the husband's love,
that shields the wife from as many anxieties as possible.

(TO BE CONTINUED)
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