I remember watching an old Western where this old trapper traded a horse and ended up with a wife. And this wife did not speak English. And there's one scene in the movie where they're sitting down at a campfire, and this old trapper is trying to talk with his new wife. And he says, what is your name? Nothing. He said, what is your name? She didn't say anything. And he says, you do have a name, yes? And she said, yes. Very clearly, she did not understand yes, but she just said it because he said it. And he said, so what's your name? And she said, yes. He asked a series of questions, but he ended the questions with these two questions. He said, one, I am a great hunter. She said, yes. And he said, I am a fine figure of a man. And she said, yes. And he looked at her and said, that is all you need to know. I often look at that and think of that conversation in a marriage context. And sometimes when we are talking to our spouses, it's like we are speaking two different languages. And even when we say words that we know that we have in common, it is clear that they mean two different things by these two different people. Because why? Because marriage is tough. It's never easy. It's always difficult. In this series, we've been talking about how to have a biblical marriage. And I've said that first, we need to remember that there is a specific biblical pattern. This pattern we need to follow. It's the pattern we need to exalt. It is how God has laid out marriage. First is that God is the one who has designed marriage. He's the one who has the right to say what marriage is and what it's not, what's allowed and what's not allowed. We also said that with inside of marriage, there's this idea that we're all made in the image of God. Therefore, both men and women share the dignity and they have, relatively speaking, they're equal in personality. They're equal because they're made in the image of God. However, even though He made us equal in personality and dignity, He has created us different in function. There's a differing function that complements each other. We also said, that one of the marks of a biblical marriage is this leaving of the father and mother and the clinging to each other. So one, once they get married they form a new family unit and the parents leave the role that they had before and they now act more as a friend and a mentor than they do as a parent to a child. And the implication is that this new family unit is to have lifelong intimacy, right? The husband and wife are to share with each other and be intimate with each other in all ways. We talked about what are the problems in marriage, and it boils down to one thing, sin. If you're having problems in your marriage, it's probably because of you. And it's your sin. Therefore, the solution to sin is Jesus Christ. The solution to sin is the Scripture. The solution is walking by the Spirit. Last week we talked about the husbands and what makes a godly husband. I said that there are four things or four principles for a godly husband. One, it's that a husband has appropriate affection towards his wife. Two, that a husband sacrifices for his wife. Three, that he has a particular ministry towards his wife. And then four, he has the proper intentions for his wife. This morning, what we're gonna talk about is we're gonna talk about godly wives. What does a godly wife look like? So go with me to Ephesians chapter five. Ephesians chapter five. We're gonna be looking at verses 22 through 24. And like last week, I just wanna give you three principles I don't have a really nice outline of this text. I just want to give you three principles, because these three principles are so intertwined with each other. And as you read the text, you're going to see these principles and they're all connected. So I'm going to give you the three principles. We're going to walk through the text. We're going to point out those principles. And at the end, I'm going to remind you of these principles. The three principles for a godly wife are simply this. One, she seeks the Lord. Her first allegiance is to the Lord. Two, She's a helper. She's a helper. She's been created to be a suitable helper for her husband. And third is that she shows deference. She's humble. She yields to her husband and she does it respectfully, right? Those are the three principles that we're going to see. Number one, she seeks the Lord. That is her first and most important relationship. She helps her husband and she shows deference to her husband. So notice what he says in Ephesians 5.22. He says, Wives, be subject to your own husbands. Unfortunately, we have to talk about this because our culture has always confused things. There are some people who have looked at this text and have suggested that men wrote this simply just to keep women down because they felt that women are inferior. Or this is some sort of cultural expression. This isn't really how it's supposed to be now. This is a cultural expression. And just to answer this question, even if nobody in this room has that question, I think it's important to at least address that question. This is not a cultural expression, nor is this because we're supposed to think that women are inferior. This is designed to be this way. Wives are designed to be helpers. So keep your finger here in Ephesians, and we need to go back to Genesis. Genesis chapter two. Genesis chapter two, verse 18. It says, then the Lord God said, it is not good for man to be alone. So remember, Adam was created, he was all by himself. That's not a good thing. That's a bad thing. It's bad to be alone. If you haven't realized that from COVID, staying at home by yourself for three months, right? You realize it's bad to be alone. And Adam was all by himself. And notice what he says. He says, I will make him a helper suitable for him." Now, God himself refers of himself as a helper. This is not a derogatory term. God uses the same word of himself. The idea is someone who's a partner, someone who is coming alongside to help the man accomplish God's will. That's the idea. The man is the leader, the woman comes to help him accomplish God's will. And then notice that it's a helper suitable. The idea is that she is perfectly compatible with him. This is the perfect companion for Adam. So she was created to compliment him, to help him with his loneliness, to help him accomplish God's will. And then notice what it says, it says, out of the ground, The Lord formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called the living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all the cattle and all the birds of the sky and every beast of the field. But for Adam, there was not a suitable helper for him. Now this doesn't mean that God said, oh, Adam's lonely. So this is what I'll do. I'll send by all the animals and he'll pick out one that's the best for him to be a suitable helper. That's not what's happening here. What I think is happening is this is a lesson for Adam to show him that there is nothing compatible for him. The animal kingdom is not enough. They're not enough to fulfill his loneliness. It's to demonstrate what's gonna happen next. So notice what happens next. It says, so the Lord caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept. Then he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh at the place. And the Lord fashioned into a woman the rib which he had taken from man and brought her to the man. And the man said, this is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. So before, as all the cattle was going by, all the birds, there was nothing suitable for him. Though an animal can be a companion, it is not a suitable companion. God made a suitable companion for Adam, and that was Eve. And he says, this is bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh. She shall be called woman because she was taken out of man. Then verse 24, for this reason, because woman is taken out of man, literally bone of bone and flesh of flesh, for this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and shall be joined to his wife and they shall become one flesh. She was taken out of him. So the idea is that when a marriage comes together, the reason they can come together is because the woman is taken out of man. She was created to be a suitable helper. This is not a cultural understanding. This is designed to be this way. I would also say this in thinking about Ephesians 5 and what the Bible says about marriage. We need to stop thinking that freedom is not listening to God's Word. That's a satanic lie. Freedom is following the Scriptures. You want to be free? You want to live the fullest expression of what does it mean to be a human? It is following God's Word. Freedom is not breaking away from God's Word. Freedom is following God's Word. This is freedom. This is the best expression of human sexuality and of human relationships. Here, any other deviation by definition is now bondage. It is a lie. We need to start thinking that this is the right way of thinking about relationships. This is freedom. So back in Ephesians 5, verse 22, it says, wives be subject to your own husbands. The wife is created to be a helper. She's to help her husband accomplish God's will. And here in the English, it says, and wives need to be subject. Now, if we were reading the Greek text, the word subject in verse 22 is not there. It doesn't, it's not there. And before all of the women start clapping and saying, I don't ever have to submit to my husband again because it's not in the text, I would like to caution you for a moment. Number one, grammatically speaking, In Greek, you can write a sentence without a verb. And when you write a sentence without a verb, it borrows the verb from the previous sentence. So if you notice in verse 21, it says, for us who are being yielding to the Spirit, it says, for every single one of us, be subject to one another in the fear of Christ. meaning that the role of women being submissive to one another is not derogatory. Every believer is to be in submission to every other believer. We're supposed to yield in love towards another person, giving the other person preference, right? This isn't unique in Christianity. This is what we do. We're called to be servants. So this is where the participle comes from. This is where the verb comes from. So then in verse 22, when Paul doesn't use the word submit in verse 22, it carries over the verb so that it is then implied women are to submit. The question is, why would Paul do this? Well, one, Paul does this all the time. This is in a unique passage in Pauline writing style where the verb is assumed. He does this quite a bit. But it does offer up something quite interesting. For me, When I look at this, the grammatical force here is that women are to be subject to their husbands. It carries the same grammatical force if Paul actually wrote those words. However, rhetorically, it softens it. So think about how Paul talks to husbands in a husband's role. It was command, it was direct, right in your face. Husbands, love your wives. By Paul writing this to the wives the way he does, it's indirect. It's still expected, but it's not as harsh. It's an indirect thing. It's the idea of saying, this is what's expected of you. The husbands were commanded. which is normally how men talk to each other. Do this, do that, direct commands. Here, there's this indirect, rhetorically it's softened. It doesn't negate the fact that women are to be subject to their husbands, but rhetorically it's softened. I like that, by the way. I think that's really kind of a cool thing of how the apostle Paul wrote. But the question is, what does it mean for wives to be subject to their own husbands? I would suggest that this idea of submission, the best word is deference, not difference, not difficulty, deference. And deference, as you know, is that willingness, that yielding, that with respect. There's a sense here with submission that it's a voluntary act. that is brought about in the wife because she's yielding to the Spirit. She's walking with the Lord. And therefore, out of love, she says, I want to be a helper to my husband. I'm gonna let him take the lead, and I'm going to follow. This past week, I read an article from Elizabeth Elliott, who I really appreciate. And in this article, she described this word differently than how I thought she would have. She called this word, when she thinks of submission of the wife, she calls it a beautiful and glorious surrender. And she says, think about it, on your wedding day, ladies, what did you do? You had your father walk you down the aisle? When you said, I do, what did you do? You gave up your name. You surrendered your name. You surrendered your future. You surrendered your family. Now you're in this new family. What did you do on the wedding night? You received your husband. There's this beautiful surrender that takes place, this beautiful giving up and saying, now I'm with my husband. This is now the new family unit. And she says, this is a beautiful, beautiful surrendering. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who try to change the meaning of submit. Either one, some overbearing husbands to control their wives, which does happen, changes the definition of submission. And there are some people who try to discredit the Bible. They try to change the meaning of definition, which leaves everybody super confused. So let me say this as we're walking through what does it mean to be subject to your husband. Let me also say what this does not mean, because this is a really important thing. One, realize that this does not mean that you are inferior. Think of this, the whole church is commanded to be subject to one another. We are to yield to one another, give preference to one another. This is not a derogatory term. This is a beautiful concept within Christianity that the great, spiritual people of the church are those who serve. Also this, subjection is not equal to slavery. The submit here is not like an MMA fight where somebody puts somebody into a submission hold. where it forces you to say, okay, I'm done. This is a voluntary action from the woman who is walking with the Lord. And as she's walking with the Lord and contemplating Christ and contemplating the scriptures saying, I want to follow my husband. I want to yield to my husband. This is not slavery. This does not mean that the woman is silent and has absolutely no say whatsoever. No, rather what this means is that she is walking like the church. She is being submissive. She's willfully yielding and saying, I'm going to help my husband follow God's will. That's what I want to do. That's the heart of femininity. I'm going to help people follow God's will. I want to build up so that they can follow God's will. This is a spiritual thing. We cannot divorce it from its context in verse 21. where the command or the participle for the believer is the expectation that each of us are yielding to each other in the fear of Christ. Now, there's another phrase here in verse 22, where it says, wives be subject to your own husbands. It's kind of interesting that the apostle Paul puts in the word, your own husbands. And some people have wondered why put that in. I think it's two reasons. One, if you read verse 21, it says that we are to be subject to each other. And then it's pointing out that the wife has a special responsibility to be submissive to her husband. But we could also say a wife is not to be submissive to someone else's husband. or be submissive to another man. The idea is, is that once you enter into that relationship with your husband, you become his helper. And you're trying to accomplish God's will with him. And so he's kind of the one that sets the pace. I think of this a lot like a dance. Now I grew up Baptist and we weren't allowed to dance. And I think part of the reason was because Baptists can't dance. That's why we're not allowed to dance. But my wife watches a show where there's this ballroom competition dancing. And I'm not particularly enthralled with the show, but I have learned one thing about the show with dancing, is that normally the men, when they do their steps, they're very straight, right? They're always judged by their straightness. They have very limited steps, not the most graceful steps. but they're the ones that take the lead. And as they take the lead, the woman responds to that lead, and she responds in a way that is far more beautiful and creative than the man step. And so when I think of this idea of submission, I think of that ballroom dance. The husband's the one that makes the first step, and the wife follows that step, and it's more graceful and more beautiful in following that step. I think that's a great picture of what God has intended for a marriage. But then notice this next part of verse 22. This is an important part. As to the Lord. As believers, our first allegiance is always to the Lord. Always to the Lord Jesus Christ. We follow him no matter what. This goes for how we deal with the government, our allegiances to the Lord. And there's a similarity here to the believers as they deal with government, as believers as they deal with the church, as believers as we deal with one another. And this is the overlap, that our allegiances to the Lord. And anytime that we're asked to do something that the Lord does not want us to do, we need to maintain that allegiance with the Lord. However, that allegiance to the Lord calls us to be in submission. And so for the wife, your allegiance to the Lord calls you to be submissive to your husband. That is how you fulfill God's will in your life. That is it. You are called to be submissive. Your allegiance is still to the Lord, but that allegiance demands submission to your husband. Then Paul says in verse 23, for the husband is the head of the wife. We talked about that headship last week. We talked about the husband's loving leadership and how he's supposed to love his wife as Christ loves the church and give himself up, that it's a servant leadership, okay? And here the Apostle Paul is talking about what does it look like when a church is yielding to the Spirit? And so part of this is you have the wives being in subjection and you have the husbands lovingly leading their wives as Christ would love the church. So the husband is the head of the wife. And then he goes into this great, beautiful picture as Christ also is the head of the church. When we think of our marriages as Christians, this is not just a way for domestic bliss. This is not just a way for us to just populate the earth. For us, when we think of marriage, it has to be in the context of the gospel. We cannot think about anything apart from the context of the gospel. We're always thinking of the gospel. We are a type, we're an analogy of that beautiful and greater relationship between Christ and us. And a marriage demonstrates that. It's an illustration for us on how that relationship works. It's a profound relationship, and I'm referring to Christ and the church. That's profound. That's an incredible relationship of how Jesus Christ has saved us and is making a people zealous for good works and for his own glory. And so a husband and a wife typify that. We're an allegory of that. We picture that. And so to have a biblical marriage must mean that we have the right picture in mind, the right example in mind. And anytime that you're wondering, what does that example look like? The apostle Paul says, it's the church and the way that the church relates to Christ. And then Paul says, speaking of Christ, he himself being the savior of the body. This does not mean that the husband is the savior. And this does not mean the moment that the husband says, I do, he becomes God. As much as we would like that to happen, that does not happen. What this means is, is that I'm a picture. I'm a type. Every husband in here is a type of Christ. We're not Christ. but we resemble him in the relationship, right? And each bride typifies the church. She doesn't make up the whole church, but she typifies the church. And that union together typifies that incredible union that we have with Christ. And so every time we see each other's marriage, and every time we see a successful marriage, we're seeing a picture of how we're relating to Christ. And those feelings that we have towards each other typify the feelings that Christ has towards the church, but in a greater, in a far greater and more profound and pure way. So, Paul says in verse 24, He says, but as the church is subject to Christ, so wives ought to be subject to their husbands in everything. I think of this word everything, and the word means everything. I often wonder why Paul put everything. Because in my mind, I could think of a couple examples of where a wife should not listen to her husband, right? So I wondered, why? Why everything? And this is really what I think Paul's getting at. I don't think he means everything without question, the woman just does what the husband says, even if he asks her to sin. That doesn't make sense to the phrase, as to the Lord. Obviously, the first allegiance is the Lord. What I think this means is that the wife does not get to pick and choose where she is submissive, in what area she's submissive. She essentially says, I am the helper of my husband to accomplish God's will. I'm going to let him take the lead, and I'm going to follow that lead. I'm going to follow him no matter what step he's taking. In all matters, if he makes a step in a matter, and even if I don't agree with it, I'm going to follow. This is not that He's asking you to do sin. This is asking in really weird stuff that normally doesn't matter. If He takes the lead, the Bible would then ask you to be submissive. But I've had ladies come to me and they've asked me, well, what happens if my husband's an idiot? What do I do if he's just a bad leader? He just is constantly making bad mistakes. What do I do then? There's no contingency here. The Bible says that a wife is going to be a helper of her husband, to help him accomplish God's will. A wife expresses her godliness in her submission to her husband. Now, a wife is not silent. Wives, you can appeal to your husbands and you should. If your husband's making a mistake, you should appeal to him, but you should do it in the right way. And the one lady that asked me this question, I said something to her. I don't know if she understood it, but I'm still going to use the illustration because it's the best one in my mind. And if you don't understand it, Ask Greg for a better illustration. I don't know. I said, go to your husband when he's in the right mind, and treat your husband like a bear. I don't know if any of you have ever had to deal with bears. One thing you know about bears is you never make yourself big, and you never stand your ground with a bear, because a bear will attack. And I find that most men, whenever somebody stands up, the man's first instinct is to fight back. And if you are trying to help your husband and lead him towards the Lord and help him understand some things, standing up to him and challenging him may not be the best tactic for you to take. But I would also say this, when you talk to him, make sure that he's calm and that he's in his right mind. I would also say this, sometimes, Try not to say too much. Sometimes if you say a lot of words, the husband only hears the first two sentences. And so if you give him 14 pages, he's only going to capture the first two sentences and not understand the rest. So try to talk to him in a reasoned way and just say, here's what I was thinking, short, sweet. and then just let it go. I would also say this, too. If your husband's a bad leader, or he's not walking with the Lord, and you're trying to walk with the Lord, and here's your husband who's not walking with the Lord, my advice to you would also be, you still have to submit, but never gloat. Never point out your husband's errors to the public. Never go around to all of your friends and go, you won't believe what my husband's doing. He's so dumb. Don't do that. Don't expose your husband. Don't expose him to that ridicule. Your job is to be a helper. Your job is to be a nurturer. I would also say this, always, always encourage the good. If your husband does something right, don't make a snide comment on, well, finally, it should always be, I'm so happy that's what you did. You did a really good job. You did a good thing there. I'm so thankful for you. That type of language is better. That type of language encourages the husband to live for the Lord. I would also say this, your spirituality is the most important thing. You need to be walking with the Lord and walking by the Spirit. There's another thing that happens in the world that I want to just briefly address. is what happens if your husband is not a believer? How should a wife be submissive to her husband even if he's not a believer? I would say the same advice that I gave before, there's just a couple other things that you should be mindful of. Know that he's not a believer. Pray for him. Pray for him. Share the gospel and then live for Christ in front of him. He's gonna be watching you. Also know this, just like in the world, holy behavior always convicts on holy behavior. The husband may lash out at holy behavior. You may be called to be persecuted for your faith, even in the midst of your marriage. That does not mean that you can then negate being submissive. That means that you must still remain submissive and following the Lord. And I would say this, always, always, always, always be living for the Lord. That is the most important thing. Now, I know that there might be some other situations that may arise in marriages that will require a lot of nuance. I don't have the time. to give you all those principles. So the basic principle I wanna give, and if there's any nuanced things, we can talk about these later, is this. Wives are to be submissive. Just like the husband's love is not to be contingent on the wife's submissiveness to the husband, the wife's submissiveness is not contingent on the husband's love. God has called us to act the way that he's created us. This is not easy. It's not easy. And I feel so sorry for my wife who has to follow me because I am not the most loving man and I do not make great decisions. So, she's got to follow me in a lot of those weird decisions I make. Like, hun, I just got this brand new hobby. Let's go do all this together. She's got to be very gracious. And I'm very appreciative of her as a wife. And I'm very appreciative of all the examples that I see before me of godly wives who are submissive to their husbands and are wanting to accomplish God's will, helping their husband do that. This past week, I was, like I said, I watched or I listened to an Elizabeth Elliot article on what does it mean to be a woman. And I just was so thoroughly impressed with her. If you don't know who she is, she was married to a missionary who went down to Ecuador, who that tribe killed her husband. And she and a couple other wives of the men who were killed by that tribe ended up going back to that tribe, leading the men who killed their husbands to the Lord and lived among them and raised their children among them. Incredibly, an incredible woman. And as a young man, one of my heroes of the faith was Jim Elliot. In fact, if you look at a lot of the things I do, you can trace that back to the Jim Elliot influence. And I've often thought about Jim Elliot. He would have been a hoot to hang around with. I've often thought the only woman that could marry Jim Elliot was Elizabeth Elliot. She was the only one that could keep up with him. She was the only one that could tamper him down. I remember one story where Jim was late to Greek class, which is something I would be doing. And he sat down, and he opened up his Greek textbook, and he said to his future wife, What chapter are we in? And she looked at him and she said, well, I think you're in chapter two. The rest of us are in chapter 11. That's just kind of the relationship they had. But anyways, back to the article. She talked about how when she was working in the jungle, there was this strong, There were strong gender roles. Men knew what men were supposed to do. Women knew what women were supposed to do. They were able to communicate together. There was no competition. They worked together and complimented each other. She left that setting and came back to the United States where feminism was taking over, which was teaching women that you're not to compliment your husband, but you are to fight your husband, control your husband. She said it hurt her soul thinking about how, even within Christian colleges, feminism was on the rise, which destroyed femininity. And she ended with this, and this is how I'd like to end, this is how she ended her article. And I think this is appropriate for wives, as wives think about how they should be godly, submissive women to their husbands. She said, my plea is this, let me be a woman. holy through and through, asking nothing but what God wants to give me, receiving with both hands and with all my heart, whatever that is, that I may have the spirit that says, I am the Lord's servant. May it be to me as he has promised and as he has commanded. I think that is what a call to being a woman is. I think that's the mark of a godly wife who is one who says, I'm the Lord's servant. Whatever he has for me in my life, I'm going to serve him. I'm going to love him. And if that means that I have to submit to my husband, then I'm going to do that wholeheartedly onto the Lord as my act of worship and sacrifice to him. So let's go ahead and let's close in a word of prayer, and then we can be dismissed. Father, we thank you so much for today. We thank you for everything you've blessed us with. We are so very thankful for the godly wives that you've given us men, and for godly examples of women who were submissive to their husbands and are walking by the Spirit. We just ask that as we move forward, that we would think of what your word says about biblical marriages, and that we would pattern ourselves after the Bible, and that we would remember the things that are found here, and that we let you inform us how we are to relate to each other. We're so very thankful for the opportunity that we have to to fellowship with one another. We do pray for our two brothers who are moving on with their lives and new jobs and new schools. And so we just thank you for bringing Todd and Eric into our congregation and for fellowshipping with us for a time. We ask, Father, that we were as much of a blessing to them as they were to us. And we pray for them as they move on, that they would continue to live for You, that they would strive to be biblical, godly men who stand on Your Word and stand on Your truth, and that they point others to Your Son, Jesus Christ. We thank You for the time that we've had with them, and we look forward to what You are going to do in their lives and through their lives as we continue to be in correspondence with them. We just thank you and love you for everything you've given us. In your son's name, amen. Everyone is dismissed.