I want to take a brief moment before we begin and define two terms that I will use repeatedly in these messages on marriage. The two terms are Complementarianism and Egalitarianism. What do they mean?

What both Sides Share in Common

(1) Both Complementarians and Egalitarians agree that men and women are equally created in the image of God, and that neither is more or less the image of God than the other.

(2) Both Complementarians and Egalitarians agree that men and women are equal in personal dignity, that neither is more or less worthy or of more or less value as human beings.

(3) Both Complementarians and Egalitarians agree that men and women should treat each other with kindness and compassion and love, and that any and all forms of abuse or disrespect or dishonor must be denounced as sin and resisted.

(4) Both Complementarians and Egalitarians believe that women should be actively involved in ministry. Complementarians agree with Egalitarians and celebrate the fact that women, for example, served as “co-workers” with Paul and held the office of deacon.

(5) Where Complementarians and Egalitarians disagree is whether women can serve as the Senior Pastor or as a Ruling Elder in the local church, what I call senior governmental authority. Egalitarians believe the Bible permits women to hold such positions of leadership, while Complementarians do not.

I am extremely reluctant to place restrictions on anyone of either gender or any age in the absence of explicit biblical instruction to that effect. In other words, if I am going to err, it is on the side of freedom. In my opinion, the only restrictions placed on women concern what I call senior governmental authority in the local church. I have in mind, as noted above, (1) the primary authority to expound the Scriptures and enforce their doctrinal and ethical truths on the conscience of all God’s people, and (2) the authority to exercise final governmental oversight of the body of Christ.

Therefore, unlike a number of other Complementarians, as long as the principle of male headship is honored in the above two respects, I believe women can lead worship, can lead small groups, can assist in the celebration of both baptism and the Lord’s Supper, can serve as deacons (or deaconesses), can chair church committees, can lead in evangelistic and church planting outreach, can (and should) be consulted by the local church Eldership when decisions are being made, and can provide leadership in virtually every other capacity of local church life. Women should be encouraged to pray and prophesy in corporate church meetings (1 Cor. 11) and should be given every opportunity to develop and exercise their spiritual gifts.

What do Complementarians believe?

Complementarianism asserts that God has created both men and women (1) in his image, of equal value and dignity as human persons, but (2) with a distinction in the roles and responsibilities each is to fulfill in both church and home.

Complementarianism asserts that (1) and (2) above are perfectly and practically compatible with each other. Complementarianism asserts that functional differences between men and women in church and home, as expressed in the biblical terms “headship” and “submission”, do not diminish or jeopardize their ontological equality.

Complementarianism believes that submission to rightful authority, whether wives to husbands or children to parents or Christians to elders in the church or all citizens to the state is a noble and virtuous thing, that it is a privilege, a joy, something good and desirable and consistent with true freedom, and above all honoring and glorifying to God.

Are there Complementarians whose primary motivation is self-serving, who insist upon male headship in church and home as a way of compensating for their own insecurity and holding on to the power and resources of the church? Yes. Tragically. Are there Egalitarians whose commitment is driven by a radical feminist political agenda and who bristle with resentment at the mere thought that men and women, by God’s design, may be different? Yes. Tragically.

I’m not so naïve as to think that none of us is tainted by unbiblical and self-serving motives. I’m simply calling for mutual generosity and patience as we together explore God’s best for those created in his image.

You also need to understand that there is a sense in which I address this issue of both headship and submission with a measure of reluctance and hesitation. It isn’t because I’m in doubt about what Scripture says on the subject or because I’m uncertain about my own beliefs. It has to do with the widespread misunderstandings and caricatures about headship and submission.

Many think that headship and submission mean that a wife must sit passively and endure the sin or the abuse of the husband, as if submission means she has no right to stand up for what is true and good or to resist her husband’s evil ways. Perhaps some of you come from families in which the husband was an insensitive bully and where it was assumed that it was the wife’s “duty” to tolerate this silently. God’s word does not call upon a wife to acquiesce to brutality or thievery or abuse.

Some of you may think that a husband can get away with whatever he wants in the name of headship, as if that word or concept endorses and encourages his sinful behavior, such that the wife has no recourse but to “submit” to his dictatorial and destructive ways. I utterly reject and grieve over such a terrible distortion and misapplication of the Scriptures on this point.

I know that there are both men and women who look at someone like me or other complementarians and say to themselves, or perhaps even say to others, “My dad is a mean and abusive bully who belittles my mom and ignores her needs and those complementarians hold to a view that says that’s ok or at that there’s nothing she can do but quietly ‘submit’ and put up with it; after all, he’s the head of the house.”

It’s hard not to be offended by such a horrible distortion of the truth. I assure you of this one thing: that is not biblical headship; that is not biblical submission.

On more than one occasion I’ve had women tell me horrible stories of neglect, tyranny, abuse, abandonment, and even adultery on the part of the man, the husband, and then say: “How could you possibly embrace complementarianism, a view that permits and perhaps even encourages such sinful behavior.” Let it be said once and for all: I don’t! Can complementarianism and the notion of male headship be perverted and distorted by selfishness and sinful oppression? Yes. Even as egalitarianism and the denial of male headship can be perverted and distorted into a rejection of any differences between male and female.

I realize that was a long and controversial preparation for our short series on marriage, but it needed to be said.

Subsequent to my having given up golf as a serious pursuit, there aren’t many things that cause me to lose my temper. In case you didn’t understand that statement, let me put it bluntly: there are scattered throughout the state of Oklahoma several golf courses in which there are ponds or lakes, at the bottom of which no doubt still lie golf clubs that used to be mine. What you need to understand is that each of those clubs deserves to be there, having failed me at various crucial times during tournaments in which I participated. But, enough of that. As I said, there aren’t many things that cause me to lose my temper.

One thing, however, is guaranteed to set me off. There is one thing for which I have very little tolerance and for which I have reserved the harshest language that God allows me to use.

I’m talking about Christian men who either ignore or abuse their calling as the head of their homes. I’m talking about those men who, for lack of a better way of describing them, are either patsies or bullies. They are both cowards, but in different ways.

Patsies are cowards because they are terrified of stepping up to the plate and assuming the responsibilities that God has given to the husband. They are afraid of being exposed as inadequate to lead their wives and families into Christian maturity. So they hide behind a passive personality and bury their faces either in a newspaper or a television show or their jobs or a hobby or whatever excuse they can find to avoid facing the demands of being the sort of husband who leads and loves his family the way Christ does his church. In any case, they are cowards, and I don’t apologize for calling them that.

Bullies are also cowards, although they act in such a way to deliberately cover it up. They are just as scared as the patsy, but they hide their fear by intimidating their wife and children and controlling them and ruling them with a rod of iron. You’ll never see the feelings of insecurity or the incompetence of a bully because you can never get close enough. They keep you at arm’s length through their anger and domination, but they are just as frightened as the patsy and just as much a coward and just as much a failure in their responsibility to lead and love as Christ does.

In the case of both these kinds of men, they have no idea what the New Testament means when it uses the word “headship” to describe the husband’s responsibility in a marriage. In fact, that pretty much goes for most Christians today, and virtually all of the non-Christian world.

So where do we begin?

What is Marriage?

A good place to begin is with the meaning of marriage (Gen. 2:24; Mt. 19:5; Mark 10:7-8; Eph. 5:31). I would define marriage as the enjoyment of spiritual and physical unity based on a life-long, covenant commitment.

Marriage is a unity of both flesh and spirit. It is a mutual commitment in which husband and wife share their bodies, their spirits, their possessions, their problems, their insights and ideas, their goals and gripes, their sadness and happiness. Ideally, nothing should stand in the way of this mutual experience. As Wayne Mack explains:

"The wife promises that she will be faithful even if the husband is afflicted with bulges, baldness, bunions, and bifocals; even if he loses his health, his wealth, his job, his charm; even if someone more exciting comes along. The husband promises to be faithful even if the wife loses her beauty and appeal; even if she is not as neat and tidy or as submissive as he would like her to be; even if she does not satisfy his sexual desires completely; even if she spends money foolishly or is a terrible cook. Marriage means that a husband and wife enter into a relationship for which they accept full responsibility and in which they commit themselves to each other regardless of what problems arise" (3).

In his recent book, This Momentary Marriage, John Piper makes a profoundly important statement that is consistent with the words of Wayne Mack. “Staying married,” writes Piper, “is not mainly about staying in love. It is about keeping covenant” (25). Piper isn’t saying that being “in love” isn’t important. Of course it is. But when love wanes, when affections fluctuate, when hard times make it even harder to honor and respect one another, what keeps a husband and wife together is their mutual commitment to “keep covenant.”

In order for true, biblical unity to occur, both husband and wife must understand what the Bible means by headship and submission. The failure to appreciate these truths has contributed immeasurably to disunity and eventual dissolution of countless marriages.

Misconceptions about the Nature of Headship

1. Husbands are never commanded to rule their wives, but to love them. The Bible never says, “Husbands, take steps to insure that your wives submit to you.” Nor does it say, “Husbands, exercise headship and authority over your wives.” Rather, the principle of male headship is either asserted or assumed and men are commanded to love their wives as Christ loves the church.

2. Headship is never portrayed in Scripture as a means for self-satisfaction or self-exaltation. Headship is always other-oriented. I can’t think of a more horrendous sin than exploiting the God-given responsibility to lovingly lead by perverting it into justification for using one’s wife and family to satisfy one’s lusts and thirst for power.

3. Headship is not the power of a superior over an inferior. Human nature is sinfully inclined to distort the submission of the wife into the superiority of the husband. That some, in the name of male headship, have done precisely this cannot be denied, but it must certainly be denounced. We must also remember that the abuse of headship is not sufficient justification for abandoning it. Rather, we must strive, in God’s grace, to redeem it and purify it in a way that honors both Christ and one’s spouse.

4. Headship is never to be identified with the issuing of commands.

5. Headship does not mean that the husband must make every decision in the home. Unfortunately, some men have mistakenly assumed that it undermines their authority for their wives to take the initiative in certain domestic matters. They are threatened if their wives express their opinion or disagree with a decision the husband is prepared to make. This is more an expression of masculine insecurity and fear than it is godly leadership.

Identifying the Essence of Headship

Definition: Headship is the divine calling upon a man to take primary responsibility to lead his wife and family into fullness of Christian maturity and to love them like Christ loves the Church.

1. Headship is more a responsibility than a right. A “right” is something we tend to demand or insist upon as something we are owed. This can all too often make for an authoritarian and self-serving atmosphere in the home. When headship is viewed as a sacred trust in which the husband is “called” by God to lead and honor and sacrifice for his wife, the tone and mood of the home is radically improved.

2. Headship is the authority to serve. John Stott explains:

"If headship means 'power' in any sense, then it is power to care, not to crush; power to serve, not to dominate; power to facilitate self-fulfillment, not to frustrate or destroy it. And in all this the standard of the husband's love is to be the cross of Christ, on which he surrendered himself even to death in his selfless love for his bride" (232).

Cf. Jesus in John 13. Was he any less in authority over his disciples when he was on his knees washing their feet? No.

3. Headship is the opportunity to lead. If Jesus is our example of biblical leadership, it will help to take note of how he led his disciples.

a. Jesus led by teaching his disciples (cf. 1 Cor. 14:35) – Men, are you equipped to teach and instruct your family? Do you study? Or do you squander your time with the brain-numbing effects of TV?

b. Jesus led by setting an example for his disciples (John 13:15) – What about your speech? The way you dress? The way you use your money and spend your leisure time? What example you set for your children by the way you talk to your wife in front of them? By what you watch and listen to?

c. Jesus led by spending time with his disciples (Acts 4:13) – Most men spend on average less than 10 minutes a day in face-to-face interaction with their kids. Do you devote time daily and weekly to sitting with your wife and listening to her and speaking encouragement into her life?

d. Jesus led by delegating authority to his disciples (Luke 10:1-20)

4. Headship is Scripturally limited. Husbands have never been given the authority to lead their families in ways that are contrary to the Bible. On a related note, if a wife is ever asked or told by her husband to do something that violates Scripture, she is not only free to disobey him, she is obligated to do so. I knew a couple several years ago in which the husband pressured his wife to watch pornography with him. She must say No!

5. Headship does entail the responsibility to make a final decision when agreement cannot be reached. This final decision, however, may on occasion be to let his wife decide. No. contrary to what you may think, this latter option does not undermine the husband’s authority.

6. Headship entails gentleness and sensitivity. See Col. 3:18-19 where Paul exhorts husbands not to be "embittered" against their wives. The idea is that of "friction caused by impatience and thoughtless nagging" (Moule).

7. Headship does not give men the right to be wrong. Simply because God has invested in the husband the authority to lead does not give him the freedom to lead in ways that are contrary to God’s Word.

8. Headship means honoring one's wife. See 1 Peter 3:7.

9. Headship means loving and caring for one's wife as much as we love and care for ourselves. See Eph. 5:28-29. Consider the time you devote to your own physical health and mental enjoyment: hobbies, activities, golf, TV, etc. Do you pray for your wives, both with them and apart from them?

10. Headship means loving and caring for one's wife as much as Christ loves and cares for us. See Eph. 5:25-27. Christ's love for us has several characteristics:

• It is unconditional (Rom. 5:8)
• It is eternal (Rom. 8:39)
• It is unselfish (Phil. 2:6-7)
• It is purposeful (Eph. 5:26-27)

"Christ 'loved' the church and 'gave himself' for her, in order to 'cleanse' her, 'sanctify' her, and ultimately 'present' her to himself in full splendour and without any defect. In other words, his love and self-sacrifice were not an idle display, but purposive. And his purpose was not to impose an alien identity upon the church, but to free her from the spots and wrinkles which mar her beauty and to display her in her true glory. The Christian husband is to have a similar concern. His headship will never be used to suppress his wife. He longs to see her liberated from everything which spoils her true feminine identity and growing towards that 'glory', that perfection of fulfilled personhood which will be the final destiny of all those whom Christ redeems. To this end Christ gave himself. To this end too the husband gives himself in love" (John Stott).

• It is sacrificial (Eph. 5:25)
• It is demonstrative (Rom. 5:6-8)

Dorothy Sayers:

"They [women] had never known a man like this Man – there never has been such another. A prophet and teacher who never nagged at them, never flattered or coaxed or patronized; who never made jokes about them, never treated them either as 'The women, God help us!' or 'The ladies, God bless them!'; who rebuked without querulousness and praised without condescension; who took their questions and arguments seriously; who never mapped out their sphere for them, never urged them to be feminine or jeered at them for being female; who had no axe to grind and no uneasy male dignity to defend; who took them as he found them and was completely unself-conscious. There is no act, no sermon, no parable in the whole Gospel that borrows its pungency from female perversity; nobody could possibly guess from the words and deeds of Jesus that there was anything 'funny' about women's nature.”

Clearly, then, there is no place here for either patsies or bullies. There is no place here for cowards. There is only place here for courageous but humble men who are quick to acknowledge their shortcomings and just as quick to take whatever steps are necessary to learn and grow and become equipped to do what is essential to lead and love as Christ does.