Posted on 05/04/2006 6:01:18 PM PDT by gobucks
A married woman, who attends church faithfully, who considers herself a Christian, usually has a big problem with submission. But here, I write of a way out of this unnecessary conumdrum, for wives, and most especially their husbands. For husbands suffer from this same problem, only far worse.
Submission means ... sub ... under ... and Mission. So, if a person has accepted the submission, they are in effect accepting being within a Mission, and under the Missionary.
I might add that the Mission they are within they did NOT design - the submissioner doesn't own the mission, and doesn't have the authority regarding the mission's outcome. But the submissioner surely does have an essential role, a role that can not be done without.
Christ, in truth, must be seen as a Submissionary, not a Comissionary, regarding His acts of service to his Father. How could this not be true? He consistently would look up and credit God the Father, e.g., his remarks before getting arrested, his remarks before calling Lazurus out of the tomb. Christ never claimed to have designed that mission. On the other hand, to us, he is our Missionary, and we orient ourselves to submission with regards to Christ specifically. He is the Way.
Consequently, a wife fundamentally doesn't design the mission, and realizes this orientation in a conscious manner. A submissive wife that is ...
Now, on earth, this means that an oriented wife would understand the term fellowSHIP. Is it any wonder why so many 'partnerSHIPs' dissolve [sink]? Since when did any SHIP effectively navigate when two or more partners used consensus as the decision-making process?
Fellowship, however, is a very, very good feeling. Worldly people imitate as best as they can, and the word they use for it is 'intimacy'. Intimacy is imitation fellowship. The real thing is way better - but requires submission as a prerequisite.
So, again, a wife, fundamentally, accepts being under the mission, as designed by the Missionary. This doesn't mean I am in shackles or chains, or that I keep them ready for my wife. The orientation to who the Missionary IS, is the point.
This means that more can happen, as God intends, when I quit fighting the bit in my mouth, that Christ has offered to put there. But only as long as I become a wife first, prior to exercising the authority assocaited with Husbandry. Meek for a Clysdale means strength that can be led. Meek doesn't mean weak.
I am a man who is, yes, a wife. I have accepted, by grace, the reality that I am under the Mission, as explicitly stated by Christ - who, I am taught by the Bible, is my 'Husband'. What I did not expect was that this change of heart would lead to a wholesale change of mind, and of House government and House management.
That I would be able to husband in a manner as Christ intended. Sacrificial living ... this is not a trivial matter. But without going through the wife door first, a man finds this topic incomprehensible.
So, dare I report I Husband well? Yes. Not perfectly, but well. I don't know how any man can go about husbanding if he doesn't live out Christian wifery first.
By understanding this reality, and not rebelling against it, I can report that within my marriage, unbelievable, unreal, and yet, above all, NORMAL events have taken place. Yes, it feels simply normal. We have both wanted that for a long time. Marriage is supposed to feel this way.
Lastly, in truth, I can report that working for normal certainly never worked. Working as Comissionaries didn't work either. The path of Submissionaries is the one to take, to get out of the conumdrum.
You seem to be saying that a man has to assimilate fully to his "follower" position under the Headship of Christ, before the man can function in a Godly way as head, or leader, of his wife.
Yes?
Not only yes, but like, WAY yes. And a big howdy to you btw the way!!
TC, why is it so many things in real life are so infrequently written about? The way a boy (who is 18 or 44 years old), for example, stops feeling like a boy inside, and instead, comprehends what Manhood actually is...
For years and years this was a topic I knew existed, but rarely found anything that comes close to capturing what I was experiencing, and what I have since experienced. Wild at Heart by Eldredge comes closest to 'getting it'.
Anyway, yes. I have discovered that my transformation from boy to man required taking the wife road FIRST. This was discovered entirely by accident on my part. I didn't take this road b/c I wanted to throw off boyhood ... and in fact, I had bought the notion true manhood did not exist. All men were boys at heart, and some just acted like men better than others, or so I believed.
But then, conversion took place, which is in essence, accepting the reality of becoming a wife, and then, unexpectedly, boyhood is moved aside, and manhood arrives. What I had pursued was not something I could ever catch. It just appears ... afterwards.
Assimilate is not a word btw I would use or even follower ... a follower could imply a certain passivity. I would put it like this this: once a man fully trusts Christ, and accepts the lordship of Him, then that man understands the reality that wifery is ...
And then, and only then, via supernatural pathways that make no rational sense ... that man is awarded manhood, which enables him to be the Husband and Father God intended him to be.
A bit wordy, sorry about that.
Good for you, gobucks, for writing and posting this information. May what you have been taught and are now living out be spread far and wide and may God raise up our men! He is able. As you express in this treatment, only in bowing low can any one be raised up, or, as the Word puts it: Pride before a fall; humility before honor.
...but made himself nothing,
taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name...
Philippians 2:7-9
Many thanks...
Your way of phrasing these concepts is rather original, and certainly more evocative than my summary :-), but I don't think anything you've said should be particularly controversial, in light of the clear teaching of Scripture.
Your point about Manhood is very well taken. I think many men accept the concept of our culture, that there's no such thing as "adulthood," only larger and more expensive children. (Applies to women, as well as men - I suppose I'm an example, being a "chick" when I'm nearly 40!)
Being a man is qualitatively different from being a boy, and our churches should help make that clear.
"Being a man is qualitatively different from being a boy, and our churches should help make that clear."
Agreed. But Lord have mercy, a good many churches are the SOURCE of this problem, as opposed to being the solution.
When a church morphs from a place of conviction, into serving as a mere local community building, then the differences between the day care centers, for all ages, begin to shrink.
Thank you for the nice comments.
Very good point.
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