From: marlatt@spot.Colorado.EDU (Stuart W. Marlatt)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: MEN > WOMEN  "...because the Bible tells me so..."
Date: 3 Oct 92 06:27:46 GMT
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder

[Randall M Desmond asked how there can be equality between men and
women given that Eve was created from Adam and Paul says the husband is
head.  I responded with some comments on equality, and asked people
to consider just what headship really entailed.
--clh]

Heard some interesting teaching on this point a year or so ago. Not
so much on whether the husband is to be the head of a marriage, but on
what that means, and what models for leadership we have.

The best model for leadership is that of Christ, who led as a servant.
Thus headship translates very directly to footwasher. The final comment
above is thus generally correct - the husband leading his wife will in
lay his life down for her. Leadership is not a title to be bestowed upon
the greatest and best - rather, it is a call for sacrifice and a duty
upon those it conscripts.

I tend to think that taking up the yoke of leadership in this fashion
will tend to see willing submission (another word with lots of unhealthy
connotations; certainly _not_ implying doormat). Similarly, taking up
the mantle of leadership after the fashion of the world will generate
rebellion.

This should not be read to imply that leadership has no responsibilities
beyond making your wife feel good by continuous deferral and frequent
footwashings. I tend to think that good leadership will see such behavior
much more often than is typically the case in The Christian Home (tm).
Again, we have Christ's example - which included, along with such
apparently debasing behavior as washing feet, encouragement, teaching,
exhorting, rebuking - all founded in love, and all aspects of service.
When Christ rebuked his disciples, we may be sure that it was not because
his own desires were being thwarted, but that such actions were call for
to help his disciples become better people. (Except in as much as His
desires were aligned with this goal, and in as much as becoming
better people means becoming people who more completely glorify God.
The example stumbles in that way - but we as human, frail, and 
sinful husbands will often find our desires in conflict with those
of our God - and we have to search out the heart of God when deciding
whether the conflicting desires of our families are merely crossing
our own selfish wants, or if they are at odds with God.)


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He who was living is now dead                                             
We who were living are now dying                                          
With a little patience                                                    
  --T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land                                            
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University of Colorado:                   marlatt@spot.Colorado.edu  492-3939
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