Submission - one way or two way street?

Submission to the husband and the wife must be voluntary and based on trust. If a woman wants to see a great example of biblical submission she need only look no further than Ester. While much has been made of her beauty, you don’t have to look very far to find Xerses falling all over himself to please and submit to Ester’s wishes. She was careful never to overstep even his most generous offer. She made sure she told the story only when it was time and then waited for a pagan king to react as the head of his household in his protection of her. That’s true submission. It’s voluntary and it’s not 50-50. it’s 100-100.

She was submitted to whatever his will was, even if it cost her life. He was submitted in love to her to give her anything she wanted up to half his kingdom. In the end he destroyed the threats against here. That’s a husband’s duty.

He knew he could trust her because she demanded nothing but his love even when she could have asked great riches. I somehow believe she knew her husband the king well enough to know he would not abandon her. He would protect her. Even if she was prepared to die at his hand she knew she could trust him. He was submitted to her will was that he knew he could trust her to do the right thing. She knew she could trust him to make the right decisions.

That’s what a marriage is all about. Knowing your marriage partner well enough to know you can trust them. You can trust them to do anything in the interest of your marriage and your family.

Married to my wife I know I can trust her to have our family’s best interest at heart and I know she can trust me to do the same. Decisions are only based on what matters most to one or the other. There is no need to discuss submission. I’m submitted to her in love, she’s submitted to me in trust. Even when hard times have come I can trust her to walk with me thru them as she can trust me to walk with her thru hers. That’s submission but it’s not equal and it’s not mutual. It differential based.

This is NOT mutual submission. Trust and love are the basis of submission. In the end that kind of submission results in good decisions. It results in a very high threshold for conflict or confrontation.

I have seen marriages where the trust factor wasn’t in place. She didn’t trust him, he didn’t trust her. So the marriage is headless and Jesus isn’t in his place in the marriage. The solution is to seek counsel from a Godly man or woman who can help sort this out. This isn’t about good or bad decisions. This is about trust, love and the Christ in the Husband. The decisions they make must be of necessity be decisions they both love. He loves it because he has heard from God, she loves it even if she doesn’t understand it because it’s in the best interest of the family for her to submit to his decision and back her husband. Hopefully he has consulted his wife for her input.

We do this all the time in government. We elect a President we respect, we believe he will do the right thing. We trust him. We hope he hears from God. We believe in him. We pray for him. When he makes a decision we don’t approve of, we live under it until the next President. It’s nearly the same in marriage but we don’t have a next husband as we do a next President.

With a President, we send our children into war, we pay our taxes, we submit even if we don’t like to.

No husband in his right mind will cram things down his wife’s throat without trying to explain himself. No wife in her right mind will scheme and manipulate to get her way. Too much of this ends up being “I win you lose”. This confrontation builds walls of resentment that take a long time to tear down.