JDL - Direction Eight - Roles

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. ((Eph. 5:22, 25 (ESV))

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. It is essential to recognize, acknowledge, believe, (whatever verb you might want to us here) that this is what happened. God created, because if we start anyplace except that God created, then the rest will not make sense. When we begin with God creating, then everything else falls into place (more on this later).

In the beginning God created, and as God created all things out of nothing from His perfect wisdom, He gave everything a perfect design and order. Out of the darkness of chaos we are told that God created and gave order. God is a God of love, and so what He has given He has given out of love. The good order that He gave us is an order out of love.

The reasons we have problems in our world today is because God’s good order has been confused. Sin entered the world, and with sin came confusion. With sin came the battle of the sexes. With sin came the questioning of the good order, as well as the questioning of absolutes and of God’s authority. And so we have the world we have today.

In the beginning God created. God created all things out of nothing. God created the first human, the man, Adam out of the dust of the ground. God Himself formed the man, not calling him out of nothing as He did with all other creation, but fashioning him out of the ground. And then God created the help meet or suitable companion for the man, the woman. Again, God did not create the woman out of nothing, but He created her from the man, from one of his ribs. And so we see that there is an order to this creation, and there is a connection between these two special creatures of God.

Unfortunately, what God created as good soon became sin. In His creation of the man and the woman, God gave them free will. Certainly they only knew good and perhaps that is why the devil was able to tempt them so easily, because they only knew good and did not know the evil of which the devil was about. Eve and Adam sinned. They questioned God’s Word, they disobeyed God, and they ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evi,l and then they not only knew good, but also evil. And this disobedience, this sin brought sin into the whole world.

It was Eve who was first to sin and then Adam; yet when God came calling, He came calling Adam. He came calling Adam, because Adam was the first created, and He was the one God had put in charge. Adam was the one accountable for the two who had become one flesh. It is this order of creation which is still at work in our world today. Every family must have one person who is the one ultimately accountable for the family, and God has given that accountability to the husband.

How does this accountability work? Just as there are no companies with two presidents because a company cannot have two heads, so there is no family with two heads. Because God is a God of love, He has given us families, and He has given good order in our families. To not have good order in the family would mean to have chaos (just look at the chaos of broken families). Without good order, there is no peace and harmony, but with good order, there can be, at least, an attempt at peace. Yet, sin remains, and as long as sin remains, there is the temptation to competition and the disruption of the good order.

God gives good order and the good order He gives is different roles for husbands and wives. The role of both the husband and the wife is that they are to put each other first in their relationship with each other. Literally they are to put themselves in order under the other. And here we would say, first after their individual relationship with the Lord. The role of the wife, then, is that she is to put her husband first and is to help him in his position as the head of the family. This she is to do in like manner as she puts Christ first in her life. Thus, the negative would be that she would not do this in the same way that she does not put Christ first in her life. The wife also has other roles that the husband does not have, and one such role is that she is able to bear the image of God in that she can create life. She can give birth to children. However, she cannot do this apart from her husband (not counting the marvels of modern science which are not a part of God’s created order and plan). It is only in the bounds of a loving relationship and marriage, in the giving and receiving of love in marriage, that the wife is able to procreate.

The role of the husband is that he is to love his wife as Christ loved the church. Christ loved the church so much that He gave His life for the church. Thus, husbands are to love their wives to the point of giving their lives for their wife. The negative of this would be that if the husband would not give his life for his wife, this says that he does not so love Christ. So, we see that the husband is the one who is and will be held accountable before God concerning his managing of his family. There is an ultimate absolute authority, and that is God. There is an accountability, and that is to God.

This is given to husbands and wives for the sake of love and for the sake of good order. Without love, God would let us do as we wish (and we never want that because our sinful nature always wishes sinful things). Without love, God would not give us boundaries and safety; thus, He would not give us good order and peace. But we do have a God who is a God of love, and because of His love, He gives us boundaries, He gives us roles, He gives us good order for the sake of peace and harmony, for the sake of His love for us. Thus, He gives us purpose.

Think About
In your life, in your relationships, do you put others first or yourself? Is there order and peace in your life in connection to the ordering of yourself in your relationships? Maybe you need to change the order, so you will have peace.

Prayer
Gracious Lord, Creator and Giver of all, thank You for the gift of boundaries, the gift of roles, and the gift of order so that we can have peace. Forgive me when I fail to let Your order reign especially when my desire is to have my own way even to the detriment of others and my relationships. Restore unto me the good order You have given to me. For Jesus’ sake. Amen.