Feeding the Sheep - Living the New Life 12
Instructions for Christian Households
"Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting for those who belong to the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives and never treat them harshly."
-Apostle Paul, 1st century
Colossians 3:18-19
[This is the 27th message of this series]
This lesson is intended for mature believers (or adulting believers). For a more orderly study, please go through all the previous messages first, if you haven't yet.
New Nature
This is the 12th part of this series, within a series.
Households
At that time none of the believers was born into the faith, none of them grew up as Christians. They were all newbies, the first ones in their family and in their community to follow Christ.
Paul had to teach them how to be a believer, and how to act like one.
Not all couples become believers at the same time. So Paul had to address how a spouse have to behave when their spouse is not a believer. [Although this teaching also applies if both husband and wife are believers]
First he talked about the wives. Paul said that they ought to submit to their husbands. This portion of Scripture has started issues with well-meaning people. But if we take into consideration that this was more often than not, merely a wise advice particularly among households where one spouse is a believer and the other isn't, then we can understand and see the beauty in it.
God is a God of order. There is structure and hierarchy in His kingdom. In the same way there is a head of the family and that this is the husband. So although both husband and wife are equal partners, to keep order and a chain of command, the wife defers to the leadership of the husband (like rankings in the military).
And this is especially useful when the husband is not a believer, so as the wife would be able to win her husband over, not with words but by her behavior.
Now this falls into proper place when the husband follows this wise advise for him to love his wife and to be nice to her.
This is the formula for a happy partnership.
We know husbands and wives aren't perfect and they will disagree on things but when these household guidelines are set in place, there is order and harmony. And God is all about that.
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