Biblical Submission - Uso Pa Ba Iyon?! (Does It Still Apply Now?!)

April 17, 2004

Biblical Submission. Pagpapasakop.

Just the words themselves can make any modern woman squirm or raise eyebrows.

"What? Submission? Are we in the ancient times, when cavemen hit their wives with clubs and that was considered okay?"

"What do you mean submit? Hello, wala nang martir ngayon 'no. Sa Rizal Park na lang. Pwera na lang kung gusto mo patayuan ka ng monumento!" (Hello! There are no martyrs in this day and age already. Only at Rizal Park (where the statue of the Filipino hero Jose Rizal stands). Unless you want to build your own monument!"

"Di na uso yan ngayon. 50-50 dapat ang kasal. Dapat nga mas mahal ng lalaki ang babae." (That is not in vogue anymore. It should be 50-50. Actually, come to think of it, the men must love the women more.)

These are only some comments one might hear when a Christian woman talks about Biblical submission. I talk about Biblical submission and not just submission because that word has been hijacked by the enemy.

Case in point is the extremely popular "erotica literature", 'Fifty Shades of Grey' where Christian Grey is the Dominant and Anastasia Steele is the Submissive. The name Christian and the word submissive have been twisted to gross proportions that one might think being 'Christian' and being 'submissive' are what God means these words to be. Nothing is farther from the truth! Christian Grey is very un-Christian in his thoughts, demeanor and words and being submissive is not about being dominated in the bedroom. I only had to browse through the book and not read its full content to know that this could be used by the enemy and is being used by the enemy to malign God's Great Design for marriage and to distort the beautiful concept of Biblical submission. Women, be wary!

Christ submitted Himself totally to the Father.

Jesus Christ is the creator, not a creature and will always be equal to the Father in this sense. John 1:1 says, "and the word was [uncreated] God". However, sometime around the incarnation, Jesus made a choice to submit to the Father as His head. We call this choice, the subordination (or down-ranking) of Christ to the Father. Jesus did not give up being God, He merely began to obey the Father as though He were a creature. This is called "Biblical subordination".  (For a more thorough explanation of the Trinity, click on this link http://www.bible.ca/trinity/trinity-subordination-christ.htm )

So, God the Son, submitted Himself to God the Father, although He Himself was God. Wow. Amazing.

In the same way, we wives are called to submit to our husbands.

I copy-pasted some wonderful points from http://www.reason4living.com/articles/totw0041.htm regarding submission. It says that:

There are a lot of misconceptions about submission and submissive people.  Before we can intelligently consider what the Bible has to say on the subject of submissive wives we need to clear these misconceptions out of our way.  Let me begin with a few simple statements about the nature of submission:

• Only a strong person can be submissive.
• Submissiveness is not timidity, it is not servility, it is not subservience, it is not docility, it is not degrading, it is not a sign of weakness.
• Submission is a sign of strength, not of weakness and a greater degree of submission requires a greater degree of strength of personal character.

Submission is an act of the will — it is the result of a choice, a decision.  The act of submission can only come from a choice that a person makes.  Submission cannot be enforced upon a person.  Either a person submits of their own free will or they do not submit at all.  Submission is a gift that one person chooses to give to another person.  By contrast oppression is the act of extracting something from a person against their will.  Submission and oppression are, therefore, opposite qualities of a relationship and not even remotely similar.

The submission of a good wife is a glorious thing that is intended to help her and her husband to have a contented life together.  Problems in life and in marriage are more or less inevitable but when a woman is submissive to her man it is much more likely that those problems can be resolved harmoniously, without unpleasant quarrelling and without bitterness and resentment.  Those people who look down on submission as if it were something demeaning, degrading or humiliating are merely showing that they have no understanding of what submission is and that they are quite ignorant of its power.

A submissive wife is one whose heart is inclined towards satisfying her husband and who has made a choice to be led by her husband, to accept his authority and to be his helper in the broad biblical sense of that word.  She does not seek to please her husband because she is afraid of his rebuke or rejection or punishment, but because she delights to please him and finds satisfaction in doing so.

For a man, a submissive wife is a pleasure to be around because she helps him to feel peaceful and contented, she is a reliable helper who can be depended upon.  He can trust her with his deepest desires and fears because he is not afraid of her scorn or her rejection or her anger.  He can relax with her because he knows that even when he makes mistakes, she will be working with him to put them right and minimize the consequences rather than using them to prove a point or as an excuse for rejecting him in some way.  A man who has a submissive wife acquires a greater sense of self respect because he knows that she respects his authority in her life and she is not in any way trying to belittle him.

A submissive wife is one who makes a choice not to resist her husband's will.  That is not to say that she cannot disagree with him or that she cannot express an opinion.  Indeed the submissive wife is, by definition, a strong woman and will usually therefore have her own opinions and these may often be different to the opinions of her husband.  Can she express them?  Of course she can, and indeed it might often be wrong for her not to express them since she is, after all, supposed to be her husband's helper, not his slave or doormat.  Expressing her opinions and giving advice and suggestions will often be a valuable part of the help that she gives her husband.

* * *

So, it means that just because you are submissive, does NOT mean you are a doormat! Big relief!

I have always sort of known about those particular Bible verses of wives submitting to husbands (Ephesians 5:21-30, 1 Peter 3:5-7, Colossians 3:18-19) but well.. apparently, I didn't believe them or thought them to be applicable to ME in these MODERN times.

It was only when I read the Peacefulwife's Blog www.peacefulwife.com  that God truly opened my eyes and heart to the enormity of my pride and erroneous behavior. I really had NO IDEA that I was doing any wrong. I thought I was a very kind Christian wife! I thought I was being kind by simply not shouting at my husband or calling him names. What I didn't know was that God sees my heart and He knows of my gigantic pride and lack of faith in Him and in Dong, to direct my path. I may not have verbalized it, but in my mind I was in control, not God and not His Will but MY will should be done!

It was only when I repented and realized the gravity of my sins that healing actually took place. My spirit was filling up with peace and the worrisome thoughts and ulcer-inducing fears started dissipating. God will lead me through my husband! I just have to trust in His Great Design for Marriage. He is OMNISCIENT, OMNIPRESENT and OMNIPOTENT, I am not!

My prayer is that all wives will realize that God in 2013 is still the same God  of olden times, and what worked then will still work now. :)  He wired men and women differently. He gave us specific instructions because He knew then as He knows now that if we obey His Commandments, we will experience true peace, that the world cannot give. May we all be richly blessed! :)