Submission in Marriage- Eph 5 – Part 1

Posted on June 24, 2020 by dkoop

A woman was talking to her friend and said, “In our marriage I make all the minor decisions an my husband makes all the major ones.”  The friend asked, “what decisions do you make?”  “I decide how we spend our money, when we get a new car or furniture, where we shop, where we eat, where the kids go to school…”  Well, said the friend, “What kind of decisions does your husband make?”  “Real important ones like, who should be the next president or who should win the Super Bowl or the World Series.”

Most of the problems in marriage can be traced to one thing: control.  The majority of arguments between husbands and wives have to do with disagreements over who will get their way.

Today we will look at solution to the problems that come with control issues in marriage it is Ephesians 5.   We are given God’s original blueprint—which contains a way for husbands and wives to move beyond power struggles by embracing a proper understanding of Biblical Submission.

This particular text can be very difficult to understand. In fact, these verses in Ephesians 5 have caused so much disagreement that many people ignore them all together. That little six-letter word—submit—is one of the most disliked, and divisive words in the Bible.

I believe we have to come to a proper understanding of this troublesome word if our marriages are to bring us the joy God intends. We simply must understand this word if we are to understand His blueprint!

Submission, what is it?  Here’s the definition: “A Greek military term meaning “to arrange [troop divisions] in a military fashion under the command of a leader”. In non-military use, it was “a voluntary attitude of giving in, cooperating, assuming responsibility, and carrying a burden”.” So the word, in its original context, means voluntarily giving in, and cooperating.
So Paul’s instruction, then, is that husbands and wives should voluntarily give in and cooperate with each other.

Notice what Paul doesn’t say: he doesn’t use the word “obey,” which he does use for children and slaves in the next chapter. That word is stronger; there isn’t the same idea of it being voluntary. Though it may be a small point, I believe it is significant and demonstrates that Paul recognizes that the marriage relationship is one of equality.

  1. Submission Is For Both Husband And Wife

Many times we fail to understand this text and apply it to our marriages because we begin at verse 22 instead of verse 21 where Paul plainly says to BOTH husband and wife,

Ephesians 5:21  “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.”  (NIV)

Ephesians 5:21  “Out of respect for Christ, be courteously reverent to one another.”  (Msg)

It’s up to BOTH partners in marriage to give & sacrifice!

The attitude is that of Christ who gave His all for us!

One young man saw an elderly couple sitting down to lunch at McDonald’s. He noted that they had ordered one meal, & an extra cup. He watched, the older man carefully divide the hamburger in half, then counted out the fries, one for him, one for her, until each had half of them. Then the old man poured half of the soft drink into the cup & set that in front of his wife. The man then began to eat, & his wife sat, watching, with her hands folded in her lap. The young man decided to ask if they would allow him to purchase another meal for them so that they didn’t have to split theirs. The old guy said, “Oh, no. We’ve been married 50 years, & everything has always been & will always be shared.” The young man then asked the wife if she was going to eat, & she replied, “Not yet. It’s his turn with the teeth.”

We are to both share in submitting.  It should be a give and take.  Not give and give by one partner and take and take by the other.

In our house, everything is not my way and everything is not Niki’s way.  If it was my way, we would vacuum once a year instead of once a week.  If it was my way we wouldn’t buy new furniture, we’d keep what we have.  When we got married I had an orange velvet paisley couch.  I thought we should keep it for our new home.  Niki said, I love you but no!  I found out with new furniture, “Hey this isn’t so bad, when I sit down my knees no longer touch my chin” or “wow, this new recliner is nice”  If things were Niki’s way we would have the minimal yard and landscaping and it would probably be dead.  She has found out that, “yeah, the yard is where we spend a lot of time, it does draw people outside when it’s nicely done, it does raise the value of our home.”  Our last home sold quickly and the reason given was because they liked the yard.  So we both learn to cooperate with one another and neither one of us controls every aspect of our family and we both benefit.

  1. Submission Is A Choice We Personally Make

 It doesn’t say, “Husbands, tell your wives to submit” — or, “Wives, tell your husband to love you like Christ.”   If you use this verse like a club it will be used against you.  In fact verse 22 is none of your business husbands, it is directed to the wife.  You will have enough to worry about by focusing on verses 25-33!

Here what the wives are to do…

 Wives are to relate to their husbands in light of their relationship to Jesus.

Ephesians 5:22  “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.”  (NIV)

Ephesians 5:22  “Wives, understand and support your husbands in ways that show your support for Christ.”   (Msg)

Wives are to treat their husbands as Jesus would want them to treat them. I mean, a godly wife should constantly be asking herself, “What would Jesus do?”

Here’s a rough—but I think accurate—paraphrase of what Paul is saying “As the church is constantly asking ‘what would Jesus want us to do’ in everything, wives should also be constantly asking, ‘what would Jesus have me do’ when it comes to relating to my husband.”

A question that might be on your mind,  “do I cooperate with my husband if he is doing something immoral or sinful?  Do I submit and go along?”  No, nowhere in the bible are we told to cooperate with sin or go along with wrongdoing.  We are also told to cooperate or “submit to governing authorities”  (Romans 13) however we see that when the government tells us to do something that is contrary to scripture, God does not want us to disobey him to follow the government.  For example:  Shad-rack, Me-shack, and Abednego, in the book of Daniel where aids to the king of Babylon, the king made a golden statue and said to everyone to bow down and worship it.  They said, no and the king said, then I’ll throw you into a fiery furnace, they said, fine.  The king did and God protected them.  The same thing happened to Daniel, a law was passed, “no one is to pray”   This didn’t stop Daniel, he prayed and because he broke the law was thrown into a Lion’s den, again God protected him.  We see this in the New Testament in Acts 6, the disciples are taken before the Sanhedrin who tell them, “do not teach about Christ”  They replied it is better to obey God than you.

So in a marriage, submission is not going along with something that is wrong, it is not enduring abuse.   This is not submission.  Submission is choosing to meet the needs of your spouse, to show love to be Christ like, to be supportive.  This is submission.

To husbands, now, wives, if you are uncomfortable with Paul’s instructions to you, relax: what he calls husbands to is worse.  We will look at that in the next post.

Darrell

www.Upwards.Church

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Defusing Anger- Eph. 4 – Part 2

Posted on June 20, 2020 by dkoop

In the last post we covered “acknowledging our anger” and “dealing with our anger”, now the third way to defuse anger:

  1. Control My Anger

Look at verse 29 where it says, “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs.”Verse 32 adds to this, saying, “Be kind and compassionate to one another. ”

  • Try Kindness:

U.S. News And World Report cites a 20-year study of 2,000 married couples, in which researchers have uncovered another predictive factor in determining which couples will stay married for the long haul. The study showed that if you want to have a marathon marriage, then you need to work at maintaining a 5-to-1 ratio of positive to negative comments. Kind, positive interactions like complimenting, smiling, and touching must outnumber negative comments like sarcasm or put-downs by a ration of 5-to-1. So for every negative, hurtful, discouraging thing you say to your spouse, you should say five loving, helpful, encouraging things. You must be kind far more than you are unkind.

Now, let me break this down for us and give us a few examples of what I mean by “be kind”.

  • First, don’t yell. Remember, the louder your words are, the less your mate will hear.
  • Second, don’t say mean things. The uglier our words, the less we will communicate. Unfair criticism chips away at our spouse’s dignity-especially us husbands. It leaves us with less strength to love our spouses. It makes us defensive.

An elderly man lay in a hospital with his wife of 55 years sitting at his bedside. “Is that you, Ethel, at my side again?” he whispered. “Yes, dear,” she answered. He softly said to her, “Remember years ago when I was in the Veteran’s Hospital? You were with me then. You were with me when we lost everything in the fire. And Ethel, when we were poor-you stuck with me then too.” The man sighed and said, “I tell you Ethel, you are bad luck!”

  • Third, do little things to express your love. Now, we men love to do big grandiose things-but what most wives love best is consistent little things, being nice in little ways day after day.
  • Fourth, don’t use words like “always” and “never.” “You never take out the garbage.” “You always forget to pick up the kids.”

I say this because statements like this are always false, never true. Generalizing like this encourages the conflict to continue and even fan it up to the next level. Plus these words are anything but kind.

  • Fifth, express hurt, not hostility.

And the best way to do this is to use “I messages” instead of “you messages.” When you say, “I feel, such and such a way,”  we are being less inflammatory. We’re not judging or accusing.  We’re owning your own feelings. Plus we are opening the door for further discussion and practical problem solving. For example, “I feel overwhelmed by household responsibilities,” is much better than saying “You never help me around the house.” So, express hurt not blame.

  • Sixth, keep your disputes to yourselves. Verse 31 says, “Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away, “

In other words, don’t fight in front of other people. Think of it like this. You don’t bring your dirty laundry to church to wash it out do you? You don’t bring it to social gatherings do you? No, of course not. You put your dirty laundry where it belongs. You deal with it in your laundry room. Well, the same principle applies to marital conflict. Keep it to yourself! I don’t want to sound too much like a parent but the fact is, it’s rude to fight in public! Plus with this kind of childish behavior you humiliate each other-a very unkind thing to do-and you make reconciliation next to impossible. And if that weren’t enough, you divide the church as people who witness your disputes take sides. So don’t fight in public! Unless it is a case of abuse, keep your disagreements to yourselves.

All these tips sum up to a very important skill for dealing with conflict-be kind-because, as the anonymous poet put it:

“A careless word may kindle strife; A cruel word may wreck a life;

A bitter word may hate instill; A brutal word may smite and kill;

A gracious word may smooth the way; A joyous word may light the day;

A timely word may lessen stress; A loving word may heal and bless.”

Remember, we transform our spouses by simply loving them enough to treat them with respect and courtesy.

  • Try Forgiveness:

As Paul says in verse 32, “forgive each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.”

When spouses find themselves embroiled in a fight they must both remember that the goal is not to see who wins-but to be reconciled. We’re not trying to win arguments; we’re trying to win hearts! So spouses must be committed to resolving the issue and restoring harmony.  We say “I’m sorry” over and over and over again. We say, “I forgive you.” over and over and over again.

Forgiveness is not a feeling. It is an act of the will. It’s saying, “I love you-and I value our marriage. Our relationship is important to me. I draw strength from it so I want it to be healthy. I want it to glorify God, so I choose to forgive you!” Forgiveness is not easy. It goes against our sinful nature. Love is a lot of work!

We must learn to do the hard work of forgiving and forgetting.

An elephant and a crocodile were swimming in the Amazon, when the elephant spotted a turtle sunning himself on a rock. The elephant went over to the turtle, picked him up in his trunk and hurled the turtle far into the jungle. The crocodile turned to the elephant and said, “What did you do that for?” The elephant answered, “That turtle bit me 50 years ago.” The crocodile could hardly believe it and said, “And you remembered him after all these years? Boy you sure have a good memory.” “Yep,” said the elephant. “Turtle recall.”

Too many of us as spouses have memories that are too good! We say we forgive-but what we really do is remember our spouse’s shortcomings and bring them up again when we want to. We won’t succeed in marriage with that kind of memory. No. To have the kind of relationship that God intends, both spouses must develop the ability to forgive, and let go with Jesus help.

Darrell

www.Upwards.Church

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Defusing Anger- Eph 4 – Part 1

Posted on June 20, 2020 by dkoop

Have you been angry lately?  There’s a lot of anger in our world right now.

Typically there are three reactions to anger — being aggressive, passive, passive-aggressive or dismissive.  Many know that I love reptiles.  In most families there is an alligator, turtle, a viper and a lizard. You always know when the alligator is angry — they growl and show their teeth.  When the turtle is angry, they withdraw into a shell.  Or the viper, pushes down their anger, it turns to venom and they bite when you least expect it. The lizard just runs away.   Which are you?

Anger is a legitimate emotion.  But how we express it is what matters.

How to Defuse Anger:

  1. Acknowledge My Anger

25  Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully…
26  “In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, Ephesians 4:25-26 (NIV)

Anger is a God-given emotion.  If you never get upset over anything you’re not in touch with reality.  Anger just means you care deeply about some things.  Sometimes the most appropriate emotion is anger.  Even God gets angry — 375 times in the Old Testament it says God got angry.  We know Jesus got angry when he drove out the money changers at the temple who were ripping people off.   The number one cause of depression is anger that is pushed down.  When I swallow my anger, my stomach keeps score.  Many say, “I’m so depressed!”  Have you ever thought that maybe you may be angry and you just don’t want to admit it?  We don’t like to admit it when we’re angry.

If we’re going to resolve our anger we first have to admit our anger.  Don’t lie.  Don’t pretend it’s not there.   Once we admit it then we can resolve it.

The more I understand my anger, the more patient I’m going to be.  We need to ask ourselves, “Why am I angry?  Why am I ticked off?  What is upsetting me so much?”  Anger is a warning light that I’m dealing with a different issue than what is on the surface.  We get irritated by surface issues but we get angry by life issues.  Have you noticed that most arguments don’t start with the real problem?  They start with a surface irritation. You only get to the real problem if you hang in there, keep talking until you both get in touch with why you are angry, why you feel the way you do.

A few root causes of anger:

  • When I feel unaccepted.  When you reject what or who I am, when you compare me to other people, when you nag me, when you make fun of me I get angry.
  •        When I feel unappreciated.  When you take me for granted, don’t value my work, don’t value my effort at home or at work, when everything else in the whole world seems more important than me I get angry.  Husbands, that’s one of the main reasons your wife gets upset.  She feels that everything else is more important than her.
  •        When I feel unsupported.  When you work against me instead of with me, when you don’t share the load, when you’re not feeling responsible, when I feel unprotected I get angry.
  •        When I feel uncertain.  When I don’t know I can trust you. When you don’t tell me the truth.  When I’m not certain what you’re saying is right I get angry.

The key to dealing with your anger is to understand it.  The bottom line in 90% of all anger — the root issues — is the either hurt or fear.  When we say, “I’m angry!”, what we really ought to be saying is “I’m hurt!  I’m disappointed!  I’m afraid” When we begin to focus on hurt and fear we’re going to get to the real issue instead of dealing with the anger.

When we say to our mate, “I’m so mad at you!  You make me angry!” that’s a “you” statement and all it does is make people defensive.  But when you say, “I’m hurt!” or “I’m afraid!” they are much more willing to listen.   Stay at the table until you get to the real issue.  What are you feeling?  And then deal with that.  The sooner we learn to say, “I was hurt by that.  I felt unloved (or unappreciated or unaccepted)” the sooner we can say this, the quicker we can get to resolution.  Now we’re dealing with the real issue.

  1. Deal With My Anger

26  “In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, Ephesians 4:26 (NIV)

This passage teaches that when we get angry we should deal with it in a 24 hour period.  This is a great literal rule you can to apply in your marriage.

Any doctor or psychologist can tell you that anger is energy. It’s got to be expressed.  When I swallow my anger, my stomach keeps score.  If I don’t talk it out, I’m going to take it out on myself.  Why?  Anger produces biochemical changes in your body.  That’s a well-known fact.  People get flushed, their neck gets tight, their muscles get tensed.  Your adrenals go into overdrive.  Have you ever heard anybody say, “That just burns me up!”  They’re right.  “He’s a pain in the  …  back.”  Maybe that’s our back problem — unresolved anger.

The issue is deal with it.  There is only one letter difference between danger and anger.  And anger is a very dangerous emotion if not handled properly.  It’s like nitroglycerin.  It’s dangerous to you physically, emotionally, relationally; it’s dangerous to you spiritually.  You’ve got to deal with it in a timely manner so it doesn’t build up and hurt you.  If you hold on to hurt it just becomes resentment.  And that’s the problem.

Unresolved conflict just keeps growing.  Push it under the table under the carpet and you may think it’s dead but it will rise again.  And like some of those horror movies when the monster comes back to life, it’s more powerful than before.  They’ve got twice as much atomic energy.  It’s going to come back to haunt us.  Deal with it now.  The best time to deal with it is as quickly as possible.  Unexpressed anger becomes bitterness and that is always wrong.  Anger is not always wrong, but resentment and bitterness are always wrong.  That’s why the scripture says, “If you are angry, don’t sin…” [That means there’s a way to be angry and sin and a way to be angry and not sin.] ” If we hold onto it, it becomes resentment.

In the next post we will examine the last way to Defuse Anger.

Darrell

 www.Upwards.Church

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Tearing Down the Walls of Division – Eph. 2

Posted on June 20, 2020 by dkoop

14 For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, Ephesians 2:14 (NIV)

Archeologists working in Jerusalem have found two of these inscriptions in the ruins of Herod’s temple. This is a picture of one of them. It says, “No foreigner may enter within the barricade which surrounds the sanctuary and enclosure. Anyone who is caught doing so will have himself to blame for his ensuing death.” Not exactly a warm welcome was it!?

There was a lot of racially, fueled hostility, enmity, between Jews and Gentiles, and unfortunately that particular variety of wall, building of enmity has not died out.

Right now we are very familiar with this kind of barrier, because we still can’t seem to get along. We “wall” ourselves off from one another over everything from differences in political party affiliation to worship style preference, to race. Don’t get me wrong, most people want to get along, they want the walls to come down. Every once in a while we forget our differences long enough to rally around songs like, “We are the World” and the like, but the walls remain. On our own it’s next to impossible to bring the walls down, and when we do, someone just puts them back up again.

Bishop John Reed tells about a time he was driving a school bus in Australia, a bus that carried both white students and aborigine students. He grew tired of all the squabbling between the two groups as he drove them to and from school, and one day an argument broke out that was the last straw…so he pulled over to the side of the road and told the boys this kind of nonsense had to stop. He said that kind of behavior was a sin and would not be tolerated on his bus. Then he turned to the white boys and said, “What color are you?” They said, “We are white.” Reed said, “No…from now on you are green. Anyone who rides my bus is green. No what color are you?” The white boys replied, “green” Then he went to the Aborigines and said, “What color are you?” They said, “We are black.” He said, “No…from now on you are green. Anyone who rides my bus is green.” “Now what color are you?” And the Aborigines students said, “We are green.” The situation seemed to be resolved until several miles down the road, he heard a boy in the back of the bus announce, “Alright, light green is on this side, dark green is on that side!”

Bishop Reed had the right idea. What was needed was the unity of a new race…like his “green race.” But he couldn’t pull it off, because no human can. To bring down the barriers, the walls, that separate humanity, to accomplish this kind of demolition requires the power of God, because the real problem is never a wall between men, between races, between political parties or whatever, the real problem behind all these walls is the wall that existed between the fallen human race and our Holy God. This “wall” is why people can’t get along.

Our lack of peace between each other for whatever reason can always be traced to our sin, sin that “walls” us off from God. Racism is not really a SKIN problem but rather a SIN problem.

The reason there is enmity between man and man, is that there is enmity between man and God. The fact that we are born sinful, fallen beings, this is what fuels selfish, prideful hatred like the Jews felt toward the Gentiles. And sin continues to fuel hate and hate prompts us to build walls between each other today.  A few verses later Paul explains, 16 and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. Ephesians 2:16 (NIV)

Paul is saying that it’s natural for man to have hostility and hate, to hate God and hate other people.   Christ came to earth to do some needed demolition.

He came to tear down this wall of enmity that exists between us and God. He came to make it possible for our sins to be washed away so we could be forgiven…and come near to God. As Paul puts it in verse 2:18, “Through Jesus we have access to the Father by one Spirit.” In that relationship, when we come to God by grace through faith in Jesus…we can then be empowered to love all people as He loves all people.

This is something the church must get right. To be effective we can’t have any walls, especially racial ones.  I can understand why non-believers build these kinds of walls, but Christians don’t have any excuse. We have experienced God’s grace, we know by first, hand experience that He loves all people equally, so when we don’t get this right we are being outright disobedient against God. God’s people should always work to end racial discrimination, be it individual or systemic.

Jesus brought the wall down. And in so doing, He created peace. He created one man from the two. In essence He made a new race, not the “Greens” but the “forgiven(s).” Paul’s point here is that we need to be made right with God before we can have the power to be right with each other. Only as we experience the forgiveness of Jesus can the walls come down.

Warren Wiersbe tells of the time a man came into his office and said that his marriage needed help. He told Wiersbe , “My wife and I need a re-cancellation.” Of course he meant, “reconciliation” but in a sense “re-cancellation” was the right word. After all, these two spouses had sinned against each other and the Lord and there could be no harmony, the wall that separated them could not come down, until they repented and asked Jesus to forgive their sins, to cancel them out. That was our problem before Christ came.  Our problem was sin, so God sent His Son to be the sacrifice for our sins, thereby revealing His love and meeting the demands of His righteousness. It was truly a “re-cancellation.”

When people are saved by the blood of Jesus Christ, there is no longer Jew nor Gentile. As His blood washes away our sins, it reveals that we are the same in God’s eyes. Walls come down and we become truly one in this new “structure” God built called the church.

Think about that for a minute. God took two groups as diametrically opposed to each other as Jews and Gentiles. He took them, and when He saved them, He unified them, unified them to the point where the two became one race. God the builder broke down the barriers that separated them. He abolished the hatred and enmity between them. He destroyed the divisions, brought down the barriers and He brought them peace.

Because Jesus is my peace, I choose to live in peace.  Will you join me?

Darrell

www.Upwards.Church

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