The Husband Leader

the husband leader | the wife follower

There was a time early in my marriage when my husband wanted to go into partnership with someone to buy a karate school. We’d just returned from Eastern Europe, where he’d taught martial arts, and we weren’t settled into jobs yet. It was a dream come true for him. We didn’t need money to invest, just our time and name. It provided financially, and would keep us in the small community where our family lived.

My husband was excitedly telling a man from our church about the opportunity. He glanced over at me. Then said kindly, “What does your bride have to say?” I didn’t want to be yoked to a non-believer. I think he could tell by my face—so he wanted my husband to say it. My husband mumbled something to the effect of “She’s not on board.”

Our friend kept his smile, but something hardened. The gist of his reply was, “God gave you this woman for her insight. Why wouldn’t you listen to her?” And then he explained how every time he hadn’t listened to his wife—things went awry in his life and career.

It was a big deal for my young husband to relinquish that dream. He’d already given up teaching in Europe because I was pregnant. But I don’t think it was more than a year before the one who purchased the karate school without us cheated on his wife with a student.

The husband is the head of his wife

Scholars spend years on the word and only fully settle the meaning for themselves and the ones who have predetermined to agree to the interpretation. I could look up a lexicon and memorize a Greek word—but I can’t read, much less study and translate Greek, so I won’t touch it.

The verse example of unequally yoked oxen describes the struggle of a believer and a nonbeliever tied together, but it’s also a good image of marriage. A team pulling a load needs to work in unison.

I often hear the military illustration that there needs to be a clear leader in the home. “We need to know who is the head or it will be chaos on the battlefield.” Hopefully, your sanctuary doesn’t mimic war, but, when there’s conflict, I agree the wife can show trust in God by submitting her will to her husband. It can be beautiful for all parties involved—provided there is no abuse. In destructive relationships, all guidelines need caveats, clarification, and exceptions. Enabling someone to sin is to be a contributor to their sin. Even if the sin is against you, it is the work of the enemy to keep someone trapped in sin.

(ESV) Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Eph 5:22-24

Let’s first acknowledge that the church submits to Christ with free will, and when it is from Christ, it is supposed to be an easy yoke. If she is really struggling to lay down her will, it might not be her fault.

When I see Traditional American church culture built around this verse of women submitting, it makes me think of when Vashti didn’t obey the king of Persia in the book of Ester. All the officials were worried their wives might not submit either, so they encouraged the king to get a new wife and sweetened the deal with a beauty contest that stole all the available girls and castrated all the available boys. Humans always try to teach culture as biblical. Then, when it comes to choosing to obey God, we often prefer to adhere to current cultural traditions, including church-culture.

So what does the submitting look like? I’ll tell you what it doesn’t look like.

Selfish husbands would rather spend for their own pleasure than buy diapers. Being the “head” isn’t making decisions alone, controlling the money, telling her to be quiet, or suppressing her opinions and desires while he exalts his own. Letting him do these things is not godly submission.

Neither does it mean he initiates all things. What one man can excel in every area? Some men are good at bringing play and fun into the house, some are good at providing, some are good at studying scripture, some initiate exercise. This is one of my irritations of romance novels. Women fantasize about a god-like man who replaces God as her husband, and does all things perfectly. He is handsome, rich, and surprisingly, still interested in her hot mess.

Should a husband lead in an area he is not qualified? Why did God say it is not good for men to be alone? A marriage should counterbalance strengths and weaknesses. Geese fly in a V formation, taking turns facing the brunt of the wind.

I’ve been told in church to submit first, and then he will lead. I’ve also been told that when he doesn’t lead well, let him fail and keep practicing… and tell him he’s doing a good job. (I think that’s only come from pastors who later cheated on their wives. Which is an interesting correlation.) You cannot make someone else follow God. Your submission (especially to his rebellion to God) won’t make him a better leader.

It isn’t godly submission to stand by while he runs your very joint life off a cliff, destroying you along with him. “Keep trying honey, we’ll both be out of jail soon.”

(ESV) In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. Eph 5:28-30

So—women, don’t exalt your will in this joint endeavor of marriage, but I would say if a husband doesn’t relinquish his will to her in equal measure, then he isn’t loving her as Christ loved the church and gave his life for her.

And when we come to that impasse, who should give up first? Probably the more godly one. Although, maybe it should be the husband if he doesn’t want his prayer life hindered. Hey, giving up his will first is almost like an example of leading.

Verses (like that) can be destructive weapons out of the whole-Bible context. When you see something confusing, look for the over-correction/clarification, which typically follows a few paragraphs down. And if you’re going to talk about authority in a marriage, include 1 Corinthians 7:14, which says that husbands and wives both have authority over each other.

There’s a difference between submitting your will for peace and stumbling after a blind leader when you have access to a true shepherd.

There were several reasons I didn’t finish and don’t recommend the book, A Woman After God’s Heart, but there’s one example in it I want to highlight. She gets a call from her husband who says he wants to take a job in another country, so he’s uprooting their life. Her immediate reply is “I’ll start packing.” She applauded herself for submitting so quickly and trusting her husband so implicitly. Anyone who loves the idea of change and adventure would probably do the same.

The problem I have with the example is that withholding her opinion and counsel from her husband puts an inordinate amount of responsibility on his shoulders. Remember, it isn’t good for man to be alone. When God is gracious enough to give a man a wife, why wouldn’t that man utilize her wisdom, sensitivity, insight, and counsel? Why would a woman withhold all that from a man she cares about? Because he’s the head? Does that mean he should lead without resources? What about a calculator? Can he have access to that? Or is he just so very in charge?

It makes me think of a loveless marriage in a Regency novel where the woman complains if she wants a new wardrobe or to throw a party, but does not know about the finances. It just becomes a battle of wills for each spouse to get what they want. Don’t call him the leader just so you can blame stuff on him. No one-flesh union. No partnership in financial, logistical, and spiritual burdens.

And here comes the crux of my ire. A spiritual leader? Does that mean he is part of your relationship with God? Are you allowed to have a relationship with God without a husband’s permission? Is he alone responsible for telling the family what God is saying? Should a woman read the Bible without his lead?

Or does this only apply to women with husbands who profess faith? I wonder if our concept of spiritual leadership is just a tradition from when women couldn’t study theology, or couldn’t read at all, and they needed someone literate to help them?

I would say seeking a guide is a problem in the modern church. When people do not search scripture on their own and look to a pastor, or anyone else, to teach them spiritual truth. The hierarchy of the church is for structure and organization. It’s logistical—not your access to God. Throw those tables over. Learn how to feed yourself. Each one of us should seek to grow and bring that growth back to the community.

Unless he is using verses as weapons against her or the kids—every believing woman wants her husband to know scripture and to speak it over their life. So yes, let him wash and nourish away. But she needs to be searching on her own to hear God’s voice. She needs to bring scripture to the family table as much as him. It isn’t unfathomable that the reason men were told to “wash their wives in the word” is because they were the ones who needed to be told, and women often naturally seek spiritual things.

Adam was told not to eat of the Tree of Knowledge, and even though we don’t see in scripture God directly telling Eve, I like to think maybe God reiterated trusting him when he walked with them in the cool of the evening, and it just isn’t recorded. Eve’s deception was when she trusted the crafty twisting of God’s words. I think men of the church are conditioned and trained to not trust Eve’s daughters, because “Eve was deceived,” but also, because as part of the curse, she probably wants his job and he needs to protect it.

I don’t interpret Genesis 3:16 that women want a Manchild to be responsible for, or to boss around, as a result of the curse. I think “her desire for her husband” is more than interplay and who’s in charge. Eve could have walked with God in the garden, but now she will always have unfulfilled relational longing that she’ll try to satisfy in a husband. So much, that it could be used against her to keep her in a dysfunctional relationship. I see “He will rule over you” as a prophecy from God (this is what men will do), not a command. Life is going to get harder: there will be pain in childbirth, men will dominate, and weeds will grow in the ground. This isn’t the way it was supposed to be.

It’s true that Adam was made before Eve. But Adam is the one who brought sin into the world. Relying on Adam for leadership when it involves disobeying God… still gets you kicked out of the garden.

When Moses was not following God’s instructions, his wife rose up and did his job. Who knows why Moses was ignoring the Lord? Maybe it was apathy, revulsion, laziness or disobedience. But it says the Lord sought to kill Moses because of it. Zipporah circumcised her son. She saved Moses’ life. If a woman knows God’s will differs from her husband’s, she should not submit to the mortal.

I appreciate when churches are careful to emphasize that the husband is a servant-leader because Christ demonstrated servant leadership in the structure of the church. As I said in Uncovered, Christ showed kingdom leadership to the point of Peter’s embarrassment. Christian leadership should not look like the rest of the world, defined by the leader being in charge and everyone politely or fearfully deferring to him.

I know sometimes it’s just semantics to want one word over another. Head, leadership, submission. But for marriage: an equally yoked, one-flesh union of mutual submission, why even use the word “leader” if the husband should be (embarrassingly) serving according to the New Testament disruptions of cultural norms? Why would we try to bring back the Greek and Jewish culture of Jesus’ day when Paul took care to upset it and say there is no more male or female, slave or free in the kingdom?

I know too many women without a believing man in her home. Is she out of luck? What about when he is in sin? And then, if suddenly her man comes to church, does he regain control of telling her what church to go to, and when to go? I know mature Christians in decades of marriage where his spirituality leads beautifully. I know people in decades of marriage where this same thinking is detrimental to her and the kids’ relationship with God.

We don’t see this in any other place of structural organization in the church. You don’t allow elders and deacons to rise in the church unless they are mature in their faith. You give an appropriate amount of headship to someone who is tested. You have boundaries until people have stacked opportunity with trust and responsibility. And the more that you can trust them, the more privilege you give them. Don’t lay hands on them too quickly. A new convert shouldn’t be in charge of anything. And some failings and weaknesses should preclude authority in those areas. Why should that look different in the home?

Romans 12:6-8 talks about spiritual gifts. Leadership is one of those gifts, and those who lead are to do it diligently. Your gender does not prevent or mandate your gifting. Christian men are not leaders just because they are men.

The other day, I asked my husband what he thought leadership looked like in a marriage. He said, to him, it meant “he leads himself.” That is something I would follow. That is tested leadership. Following someone who seeks to follow God. There is a reason I’ve been married to him for three decades. If I was going to let anyone be my spiritual leader, it would be him.

But gosh, the veil has been torn. I have direct access to God.

Now I can sit back and wait for comments asking if my husband read this, and gave me permission to post it.