God's Beautiful Design for Women: Living Out Titus 2:1-5 - part 2Submitting to God

Leslie Basham: Nancy Leigh DeMoss describes submission.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss: You can’t bow your knee to your husband if you’ve not bowed your knee to God. If you’ve not bowed your knee to your husband, your knee is not bowed to God. One is the reflection of the other.

Leslie: This is Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss for Friday, November 21. Why is your relationship with your husband so important? Well, it reflects a deeper relationship between God and His people. Nancy will explain, continuing in a series called God’s Beautiful Design for Women: Living out Titus 2:1-5.

Nancy: Several years ago I was speaking at a women’s conference that was being hosted by a seminary. The conference was for women who are in women’s ministry—leadership in their local churches or they lead Bible studies. I’m not saying that’s all that was at that conference, but that’s who the conference was advertised for, which is significant when I tell you this next part.

At the end of my speaking session I was asked to do a book signing and a woman came to me in the line and she had my book, Lies Women Believe and the Truth that Sets Them Free. She held it out and said, “I hate this book!” I’m not sure if she wanted me to sign it or she wanted to throw it at me. I said, “Oh, tell me about it.”

She said, “It’s that thing about submission.” Then she said—and keep in mind this was a conference for women’s ministry leaders and Bible study teachers—until reading that book she had never even heard of the principle of wives submitting to their husbands.

I don’t know if she had walked in off the street. I thought this is really unusual to be at a seminary in this kind of setting. But what really blew my mind was several people later in the same line came another woman saying essentially the same thing. Saying, “I have never heard this principle.”

When I first started speaking to women I was 20 years old. I was doing women’s conferences and seminars. When I would teach on 1 Peter 3 or Ephesians 5, among other things, but about wives submitting to their husbands, in those days (this would be 30 years ago) the women I was speaking to were familiar with this concept. There would not have been many women in our churches who would have said I’ve never heard of this concept before. Whether they were living it or not was another thing, but at least they were familiar with it.

But I’ve come to realize that in the last generation over those 30 years this principle has not been taught. It’s a scary thing for a man today to stand up in the pulpit and teach these things. It’s not politically correct. It’s a principle that meets with enormous resistance.

So it’s entirely possible that we have many listeners—those who read my books, those who listen to Revive Our Hearts—who may say, “I have never heard of this principle before.” That’s why we’re trying to take some time to do some explanation and to give us a foundational understanding of what this thing of submission means.

We ended in the last session by saying that there is headship involved. A woman is to submit to her husband, not because he’s good looking or kind or nice or talented or spiritual or godly or any of those things necessarily, but because God has said he is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the man and God is the head of Christ. It’s his position that is what calls a woman to arrange herself under . . . Hupotasso—that’s the word for submission in the original Greek. She’s to arrange herself under his headship.

So that raises the questions, What does headship mean and what does submission mean? I want to give you a couple definitions that I have picked up from John Piper that I think are really, really good. Dr. Piper says, “Headship is the divine calling of a husband to take primary responsibility for Christ-like servant leadership, protection, and provision in the home.” That’s a man’s responsibility. He is primarily responsible in the home to lead, to protect, and to provide.

Submission is acknowledging and responding to the head. It’s the husband functioning as the leader, providing leadership protection and provision. And it’s the wife coming under that and responding to it, acknowledging it, receiving it.

So here’s the way pastor Piper explains submission. I have found this so helpful. “It is an inclination [a bent] to yield to his leadership.” He leads. She follows. Like ballroom dancing. I’ve heard so many couples talk about this now. Someone has to lead and someone has to follow. It’s an inclination to yield to his leadership and to support his initiatives. If he’s going to take initiative, somebody has to support that. It’s the disposition to follow a husband’s authority.

Then pastor Piper goes further and says, “Submission is the divine calling of a wife to honor and affirm her husband’s leadership and help carry it through according to her gifts.” It’s the divine calling of a wife to honor and to affirm her husband’s leadership and to help carry it through according to her gifts. So here you have a husband and wife working together, not against each other, but together to accomplish a common goal, not competing with each other. They’re playing on the same team.

Now we’ve been looking in Titus chapter 2, and we’re seeing that one of the things that older women are to teach younger women, are to train younger women to do is to be submissive to their own husbands, to be responsive to the leadership and initiative of their husbands so that the word of God may not be reviled.

I want us today to look at what submission does not mean. As we look at what it does not mean, we’ll see some of what it does mean. It does not mean, first of all, that you are inferior to your husband or that you are worth less than he is. According to God’s Word husband and wife are both created in the image of God and are absolutely equal before God. First Peter 3 says that you are heirs together of the grace of life.

The fact that you’re equal and both created in the image of God does not negate God-created differences and distinctions in terms of your assignment, your function. That’s where the differences are.

To be submissive does not mean forced compliance. Husbands are nowhere in the Scripture told to make their wives submit. Submission is to be a wife’s voluntary response of love and obedience to her Heavenly Father. It’s not coerced or forced compliance.

Neither is submission slavish or groveling subservience. It’s not that at all. You’re heirs together of the grace of life. You’re partners in life. What it is is loving, glad-hearted responsiveness to his leadership.

Submission is not mindless. It does not mean that you give your husband this blind, unquestioning obedience. “Yes, sir. You say, ‘jump,’ and I say, ‘how high?’” And that there is no thought, there is no response, no input. It’s just this mindless, blind, unquestioning obedience.

It doesn’t mean you don’t give input when you have it and I’m sure that you do have it on a lot of occasions. You’re made to be his helper and you don’t help him by standing by if you see he is getting ready to jump off a cliff or you see a direction he is leading the family that concerns you as you understand God’s Word and you’ve been seeking the Lord and you have concerns in your heart. If you’re his helper, you do need to give that input.

I think there are some who would think, “Well, if I’m submissive, I can’t say anything. I just shut up and do what he says.” That is not biblical submission. Biblical submission does not mean that your husband is always right. It doesn’t mean that his direction for your family is necessarily right.

In fact, submission is really not tested until you come up against something that you disagree with. If you both agree on it, then it really doesn’t require submission. You’re going along in one accord and you both see it the same way and that’s fine. The test of submission comes when he’s going one way and you see it a different way.

Submission does not mean that you give your husband absolute, unlimited obedience. It does not mean that you follow your husband into sin. If he is giving direction to you or to your family that is contrary to the Word of God . . . I’m not just talking contrary to your preference or the way you would prefer things to be, but he’s telling you do something that the Scripture forbids or he is forbidding you to do something that the Scripture commands.

Submission does not mean you run off that cliff and disobey God in order to submit to your husband. So you don’t sin in order to submit. You must obey the higher authority. But as you obey the higher authority in those rare cases where your husband’s direction is contrary to the Word of God, your response even then must be with a respectful and humble attitude.

I believe, I’m really convinced, I’ve heard a lot of women talk about a lot of submission issues over the years. I’ve counseled with a lot of women; I’ve heard a lot of stories. I am convinced that it’s unusual, very unusual that the real issue is that the husband is asking the wife to sin.

Now that does happen and even in really bad marriages most of the issues are not because he’s asking you to sin. More often it’s just that you don’t agree or you don’t think it’s best. And you may be right. But you’re not being asked to sin. But if you are asked to sin, if that is the direction given, your allegiance is to Christ and you must obey the higher authority.

Nor is submission merely complying outwardly with your husband’s direction. It’s not just outward compliance. As a wife you are called to submit to your husband in a Christ-like manner, which means not being angry or resentful or having a rebellious attitude.

God’s call here in Titus 2 to women to be submissive to their own husbands is not just to be submissive in their behavior; it’s to be submissive in their spirit. How many of you wives know the difference? You know what it is to submit in your behavior but not to have a submissive spirit. That’s the test.

Let me give you a couple of illustrations here out of some of my friends who e-mailed me about this at my request over the last couple of days.

One woman said,

Years ago my husband and I were invited to go to dinner one night and for some reason I was prompted to ask him whether I should wear a dress or pants. [She said I didn’t normally do this but that particular evening she did.] He wanted me to wear a dress but I had already decided that I wanted to wear pants. I "submitted" [and she put that in quotes] and wore a dress, but on the inside I was standing up tall wearing pants.

Through this incident God showed me that submission is more than just doing the thing asked. It is a heart issue. My heart attitude has to be one of submission or it isn’t true submission.

Here’s a similar account from another friend. She said,

I viewed submission (used to view submission) as not directly violating my husband’s instructions. If he drew a line, I would do it. I thought that was submission. My understanding of submission was focused more on outer actions than on the inner humility of a surrendered heart.

My husband’s leadership style has never been an authoritarian type. He’s a very kind and gentle leader and rarely sets his foot down on any issue. But early in our marriage if he made a decision that I didn’t want to follow, I would comply with resistance. [By the way, you can make your husband miserable by that kind of submission. He senses it.]

I was much like the toddler in the highchair that kept standing up in the chair as the mother insisted that he sit down. When he finally complied, he emphatically stated, "I may be sitting down on the outside, but I’m still standing up on the inside." That was me. I might go along with my husband’s decisions, but it was with a begrudging attitude, and I was ready to point out to him why this was not going to work if I had the opportunity.

Then here’s the fall-out of that kind of unbiblical submission, not a submissive spirit.

As a result of my strong-willed personality and my husband’s fear of confrontation, much of our marriage has suffered under the inverted dynamic of him looking to me for leadership.

When I realized how my domination had harmed him, emasculated and paralyzed him with fear, I came to him in repentance and seeking forgiveness. But it has been an arduous task of rebuilding and applying serious effort to develop new patterns of behavior and learn the attitudes of humility that are necessary in order to live out biblical submission. For him it means having the courage to lead after years of following my lead.

So you see with a lack of a submissive spirit, you can actually dig your own grave and you can build some patterns into your marriage that will be very, very hard to reverse in later years.

So submission means being responsive to your husband’s initiative, his leadership and that implies the willingness to trust God and defer to your husband because you realize that God is the One who is really in charge. God is the head. So it means surrendering the drive to be in control. It means you relinquish the reins.

Ever since Genesis chapter 3, that is really, really hard for us women to do. There’s this battle for control. I’ve asked myself, “Why is there such a struggle?” Why is submission such a struggle for us at all levels, including in the marriage context?

I think for many it is this drive for control. In Genesis chapter 3, part of the consequences of the fall on the woman was when God said to the woman, “Your desire, your drive will be to rule over the man" (see verse 16). You will be out of sync. You will not be in your created order. You will not be hupotasso—arranged under your husband. Your drive will be to run his life. So there’s this drive for control.

I think it’s hard because of fear. There’s this fear of losing control. There’s this fear of what if he makes a mistake? What if he drives our family into bankruptcy? What if he makes my life miserable? What if he makes my children’s lives miserable? Fear.

There’s the pride issue. “Every man’s way is right in his own eyes.” We think we know better. It’s amazing when you listen to couples talk about conflicts and issues in their marriage. If you hear the wife, you think, “Oh, she’s really right. He really needs to change.” Then when you hear the husband, you think, “Oh, he’s really right. She really needs to change.” They both have their heels dug in. They’re seeing it from their own perspective. That’s pride.

Then there’s just this issue that we are rebels at heart. I mean we are. We may sit in this room or in church or when we meet each other at a conference and we may look like really nice, nicely dressed and sweet-spirited people, but at heart we are rebels. We want it our way. I’ll tell you the truth. I don’t mind doing pretty much anything that I should do as long as someone else is not telling me that I have to. Can you relate? It’s a will issue. We’re rebels. So we struggle.

Now for some this struggle is in this area—and I’ve heard it from many women in different ways—my husband doesn’t lead. Or, my husband won’t lead. This is a huge frustration with many, many women today.

I had a friend tell me the other day, a woman friend, said, “My husband doesn’t like conflict and confrontation so he doesn’t tend to give direction that he doesn’t think I will want to comply with because men don’t want to run the risk of being shot down for doing what they think is right.”

I later asked that woman’s husband, in her presence, for his perspective on this subject. From a man’s perspective, “Tell me why is it harder for some men to lead their wives?” He said, “At the core, if a husband feels like his leadership is going to threaten the relationship, he will protect the relationship and not lead.” He’s going to back down because he doesn’t want the relationship to be threatened.

So you can obey outwardly but have this resistant, cold spirit, punishing your husband emotionally, being manipulative, controlling, holding him hostage. You know what’s likely to happen? He’s likely to back down. Then you say, “Why doesn’t he lead?” You may want to go back and say, “Have I made it threatening for him to lead?”

As women we can do that in very quiet ways. You may not be a screamer but your husband knows when he’s paying for having stepped out and taken leadership that you didn’t agree with.

I’ve been taking husband polls this past week, asking men about their perspective of what submission looks like and why it’s difficult in some cases for men to lead. A husband of another friend of mine said, “If everything is challenged and questioned, if it’s more difficult to lead than to do nothing, a husband may well decide to do nothing instead of risking the conflict or the failure.”

A woman wrote to me, emailed me yesterday and said, “Our marriage consists of a passive husband who is not a believer and a dominant wife [speaking of herself] who as a believer knows the command but is struggling to obey and submit to her husband. As a result, there are many times my husband will just let me make the decision to avoid conflict. It is a constant detriment to our marriage.”

The incredible model we have in Scripture for submission in action and in spirit—the greatest model—is that of the Lord Jesus Himself. The Father and the Son, absolutely equal, and yet the Son says to the Father, “I have come to do your will, O God.” In the Psalms, “I delight to do your will.” The Father’s command became the Son’s decision. Submissive to the will of the Father.

John 6:38, Jesus said, “I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of Him who sent me.” Hupotasso—arranging Himself under the headship of His heavenly Father. He took it to the ultimate degree. Philippians chapter 2, verse 8, “Being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”

You say, “What a terrible end. Look where submission will get you.” No, you’ve got to read the next verse. “Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name” (Philippians 2:9) and it goes on. You see submission is the way ultimately to be exalted by God.

You know the fundamental issue is our submission to God. If we are surrendered and submitted to Him, then coming under (hupotasso)—submitting ourselves to human authorities will not be so threatening to us.

A friend said to me last week, “I didn’t submit to or trust my husband in the early years of our marriage because I didn’t submit to or trust the Lord.” Isn’t that really what you find the issue to be?—our relationship with the Lord.

You can’t bow your knee to your husband if you’ve not bowed your knee to God. And if you’ve not bowed your knee to your husband, your knee is not bowed to God. One is the reflection of the other. Let me say that kind of submission has got to be based in trust. You say, “But my husband isn’t . . .” I didn’t say trust in your husband. Where’s the trust. It’s the trust in God.

Proverbs 21, “The King’s heart is in the Lord’s hand. As the rivers of water, he turns it wherever he will” (verse 1, paraphrased). Listen, ladies, our willingness to place ourselves under God-ordained authority is the greatest evidence of how big we believe God really is. Do you believe that God is big enough to turn your husband’s heart if that will please the Lord?

Now it may be your heart God turns. You may be thinking it’s your husband’s heart that needs to be turned, but maybe it is your husband’s heart that needs to be turned. Do you believe, do you trust that God is big enough to turn his heart if that’s what will please the Lord and that’s what’s needed?

Your husband may misstep, and he will. The best husbands, the ones you think you’d like to be married to if you had the chance to do it again, the ones you respect. You see them in the pulpit. You hear them teaching the word of God and you think, “Oh, man, his wife is really lucky.” Listen, she lives with him. You don’t. That man missteps, as your husband missteps, as every man will misstep, as you misstep.

We’re all sinners. When your husband missteps, how do you stay in a spirit of submission? You trust that God is sovereign. You trust that God’s in control and that God has not fallen asleep on the job. He’s not stepped off His throne. He is big enough and great enough to turn that man’s heart and to protect you in the process.

Leslie: Nancy Leigh DeMoss has been giving us a picture of what submission looks like when things are difficult. We don’t have time to air Nancy’s entire message today but when you order the CD series, the version you hear will be extended by a couple of minutes.

It’s part of an in-depth study of Titus 2 that every woman should hear. This series covers a woman’s relationship to God, doctrine, alcohol, other women in the church, children and husbands. You’ll get a lot out of this series. All 16 CDs worth.

We’ll send it to you when you make a donation to Revive Our Hearts of $40 or more. Just visit us online to donate. The web address is ReviveOurHeartsRadio.com, or call 1-800-569-5959.

On Monday we’ll continue to look practically at submission. What does it look like between two imperfect people? Please be back for Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss is an outreach of Life Action Ministries.

All Scripture is taken from the English Standard Version unless otherwise noted.