Leadership in the Family
“Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is head of the church . . . Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her, to make her holy. . .” (Ephesians 5:21-23, 25).
You were wondering if I was going to get to this one, weren’t you? So let’s take this bull by the horns, shall we?
When I was just starting out in ministry (I’d taken a youth ministry position in a small church), a wise friend/mentor told me that I needed to be careful regarding leadership in the church. He told me that a body with two heads is a monster, while a body without a head is dead. So make sure I was not trying to take over but fill in a gap if it was needed.
That is still true in churches; it also applies to the family. Inevitably, in every organization, there must be one who makes the final decision. There has to be a leader. According to the Bible, the final decider in the family is to be the husband/father. It may be argued that such an idea is wrong, but one cannot objectively read the Bible without coming to the conclusion that the man is to be the leader of the household.
But that doesn’t mean that the man is the only voice that matters in the household. The popular thing is to site Ephesians 5:22-23 and conclude that the Bible wants women to meekly do whatever their husbands tell them to do. But look again at the context of Ephesians 5:21-6:4 and we see a more complete picture of the family in the Bible.
The last thing Paul writes before he addresses the family is, “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ” (Ephesians 5:21). Right off the bat, there is the expectation of mutual submission, which fits with the admonition in Philippians 2:3-4 and Jesus’ teachings on leadership and service. There is no point in trying to act in a selfish manner and claim that such an action is sanctioned by Christ. “You do not have, because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures” (James 4:2b-3) speaks to the foolishness of the self-centered life. Such is not consistent with God’s will for our lives. If it’s true in the matter of prayer, it is also true in the matter of the family.
When I was a newlywed, my wife and I had a spat. I don’t remember what it was about, I only know that she left our apartment to meet her mother for a previously planned shopping expedition. After my wife left, I prayed, “God, make my wife more submissive.” Immediately, the answer came back, “Are you loving her like Christ loves the Church?” I admitted I didn’t think I was, but I read over Ephesians 5:25-33, and asked God to make me a more loving husband, one who loved his wife as Christ loved the Church.
One of the things we tend to forget is that Paul wrote his letter to the Ephesians during the reign of the Roman Empire, and that women and children didn’t really matter in decision making. It was accepted by society that the wife was little more than the property of her husband, and children about the same. It was expected then that the wife would always submit to the husband’s will. So what Paul is writing is nothing new except in one way. No longer is the wife’s submission to be the societal norm. Instead, her submission is as to the Lord. In other words, her submission is an act of worship and commitment to Christ.
It is also significant to note that Paul wrote so much more about the changes that have to take place with the husband in light of his relationship with Christ. No more does the husband lord it over the wife as society dictated, but now he was and is expected to sacrifice for her, to place himself as her servant.
What this means is that no Christ-serving husband will make family decisions without at least having input from his wife and children. No decision will be made without considering their feelings and desires. No decision will be made without considering how it will affect the rest of the family.
I recently sensed that God was preparing me for some changes, changes that might mean things I knew my wife has strong objections about. In my prayers, I’ve been telling God that I’m open to wherever He wants to lead me, but that leading me also means leading Kim, and He was going to have to work on her, too, if this was what He wanted. Saying it another way, if God is preparing me for a change, then He must also be working in my wife’s life to prepare her for a change as well, since “’For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’” (Ephesians 5:31).
As Peter puts it, “Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers” (1 Peter 3:7). Here, think of “weaker partner” as the partner without a voting majority, but a partner nonetheless. The emphasis here is on consideration and partnership. And please notice that a husband who is inconsiderate of his wife, choosing to lord it over her, has problems with his prayer life as well. If we cannot serve those who are the “weaker partner,” how we can expect our prayers to be unhindered?
The same idea is present in the relationship between a father and his children. Again, the word to the children is do what you’ve always been doing, but now your reason is not because society demands it, but because the Lord expects it as well (cf. Ephesians 6:1-3).
To the fathers, Paul writes, “Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4). Here we are reminded that our children are to be respected and considered as people with input as well. A family that is seeking God’s leadership will be foolish not to consider the input of all the family. “Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed” (Proverbs 15:22).
God has blessed me with an intelligent and thoughtful wife, someone whose insights are worth hearing. He has also blessed me with children (now adults) who are also smart and have good advice to give, even when they were younger. Whenever we have had to make an important decision that affected the family, we talked about it as a family. Kim and I would talk with the kids and as a couple, and ultimately, we would reach a decision. The final decision was mine, but it was never made without carefully considering how it would affect each family member and how each family member felt about the matter.
A running joke in our family is I’ll see something come up about a possible job or career in El Paso, my hometown and a place I would love to return to. My wife’s response is always, “That sounds great. We’ll miss you.” I know my family likes El Paso, but there’s no love for it like I have. But I also know that if something seriously did come up that would be beneficial to the family requiring a move to El Paso, after we talked it out and it was decided that the move is what we needed to do, Kim and the kids would make the move. Maybe not the kids since Kim and I are now empty nesters, but a move to El Paso would still impact my children since it would necessitate seeing each other less often.
The point of all this is to say that it is the foolish man who would categorically insist that the Bible makes him head of the household and therefore he can rule it with an iron fist. Because the Bible also says we are to be considerate of our wives and children and that, as leaders, we are to be servants first.
Conclusion
James writes, “Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly” (James 3:1). The same is true of being a leader in Christ. The one who is called to lead is called first to serve and, through his or her service, the leadership will flow. It’s true in business, in church work and in the family. The leader must always be the servant, taking into consideration those whom we serve and lead. The Christian leader is someone who must always place others first and recognize that the role of leader is not to boss others, but to encourage others to achieve their fullest potential. The role of the leader is to be submissive before the Lord, letting Him be the model of our leadership. The Biblical leader is someone who doesn’t demand submission, but exemplifies submission in his or her own life first.
© 2018 Glynn Beaty