Several weeks ago, as I started to turn right onto the street of my church, McLean Pres., I had to suddenly hit the brakes because turning in front of me was the Secret Service in a bunch of black SUVs. The caravan turned into the MPC parking lot where the Vice President emerged from an SUV and went into church. We were all wanded and then the Secret Service stood guard at various locations during the service.
On the way home, I started wondering what it must be like to be a bodyguard, who is called to put his life between danger and the dignitary or Hollywood star he is to protect. Then it hit me. That’s what I am…because I am a husband. I am the bodyguard; my wife is the dignitary whose life must be saved. I am the protector; she is the celebrity. I take the bullet so she can continue to nurture life wherever she goes.
Don’t ever let someone tell you that the biblical view that God created male and female differently to complete each other (called complementarianism) demeans womanhood or is misogynistic. To the contrary, in sharp contrast to a culture that really was misogynistic—the ancient Roman world—Christianity began while affirming the radical idea that women are fully equal in value and dignity to men. They are, Paul wrote, full members of the Body of Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus (Gal 3:28).
The creation account had always taught that it took both Adam and Eve to fully image the nature of God. Although it is true that Scripture always refers to God with male, not female, pronouns, it is equally true that it takes womanhood to accurately picture what God is like! Adam alone cannot fully bear the image of God. Notwithstanding the fact that husbands are the head of their wives, I believe there is a strong case that the most magnificent result of God’s creative work is not the Grand Tetons, Big Sur, the Swiss Alps, or beaches of Hawaii but woman. (At least all husbands would agree most complex!)
Here is the support for this thinking: God’s creative work began with the simple “stuff” of creation and moved towards complexity, separating light from darkness, then separating the sky from the waters, and the waters from the land. His creative work continues on towards greater glory and complexity from the plants to fish then birds, then the animals, and finally to man. But the final, most glorious, most complex and magnificent creature on this list is woman. Her identity as a nurturer and life-giver is so significant, that she, unlike Adam (who is made from dirt), is made from another living being. God’s most crowning creative act, in my view, was designing woman.
Because biblical Christianity teaches wives to be submissive to their husbands and assigns leadership in the church family to men, the biblical worldview of complementarianism is increasingly being attacked as rooted in male supremacy. It is labeled “paternalistic,” which this worldview defines as, “the policy or practice on the part of people in positions of authority of restricting the freedom and responsibilities of those subordinates and in the subordinate’s best interests” (source, my Google Home Assistant).
To be sure, some men claiming to follow the Bible have used their positions and power to abuse women. Many wives, often holding a mistaken view of biblical submission, stay enslaved in codependent relationships with abusive husbands, but such treatment is the opposite of what Jesus modelled and Christianity teaches.
Sadly, the truth is that anti-complementarian forces resist far more than the abuse of women. They claim that the command to a wife to submit to her husband, is fundamentally misogynistic. A central tenant of feminism is that submission means inferiority. Submission is associated with slavery and is, by definition, demeaning. This argument is, completely, false. It is disconnected from reality; yet many in our culture are unknowingly drinking the Kool-aid.
Is it demeaning for a naval commander to salute an admiral, an employee to follow the instructions of her boss, a student to submit to the teacher’s rules, a defensive coordinator to submit to the strategy of the head coach?
Does submission actually imply inferiority of worth? Is a child less valuable than the parent he is to obey, the church member less valuable than the church elder? Is the driver pulled over by a police officer inferior in his worth to the police officer?
Human authority has never been about worth but about order. Human beings order their military, businesses, schools, sports teams, neighborhood associations, nearly every aspect of society with structures of authority and accountability. God, himself, does this ordering for Christ-followers in the home and church, while also commanding us (Romans 13:1-7) to submit to other human authority (unless commanded to do evil).
What is actually demeaning to a woman is to ignore her uniqueness, deny God’s creation design, and cause her to feel like she always has to compete with men. She is woman, intentionally created to be different from men, a glorious image of God. And no one can take that honor away from her.
True biblical teaching on gender always maintains a thoroughgoing commitment to the full worth, value, and dignity of a woman, while prescribing different gender roles at home and at church. The paradigm that informs biblical Christianity is what is called The Economic Trinity. God the Son is completely equal to God the Father in worth, dignity, and divinity (godness). But he voluntarily chooses to submit himself to The Father to accomplish the work of salvation (what the word “economic” refers to.) Upon being married, Christian wives voluntarily choose to submit to their husband’s authority as Jesus voluntarily chose to submit to the Father. Jesus, by his submission to the Father in the plan of salvation, forever refutes the idea that submission to authority means that you are inferior.
Don’t let anyone tell you that Complementarianism is some kind of outdated ideology to protect male supremacy. What it protects is true, healthy, satisfying, rewarding, glorious womanhood. May we as men be the protectors—the bodyguards of womanhood—that we are designed to be!
For further thought
1. Consider God’s design for marriage. Why would it be freeing to a wife to have every opportunity to help her husband make the best possible decision, but in the end know that God holds her husband, not her, accountable to Him for the leadership of the family?
2. Hebrews 13:17 commands church members, Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Since all believers are indwelt by the Holy Spirit and are full members of the Body of Christ, why is such authority needed?
