Sisters in Christናሙና

Submission First to God

"These older women must train the younger women to love their husbands and their children, to live wisely and be pure, to work in their homes, to do good, and to be submissive to their husbands. Then they will not bring shame on the word of God". Titus 2:3-4 NLT

What does it mean to be submissive to our husbands?

Submission can get a bad reputation. And perhaps not without a warrant...considering some use their authority and dominance to be selfish and control others. As a young teenager in a very religious church, I was quick to cringe every time the words “wives submit to your husbands” came across the pulpit. But let me be very clear: God’s definition of submission has nothing to do with being someone’s door-mat or being taken advantage of—It has everything to do with the posture of our heart towards Him, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

As we learn to surrender our hearts, desires and cares to God, He does something beautiful inside us. He begins to unveil His truth, re-teaching some of the thoughts and perspectives we had all twisted up. For me, I had to unlearn my definition of submission and how that looks in marriage. For the sake of time, I will not go into detail about the biblical mandate for a husband to submit under the authority of God and to love his wife as Christ loves the Church (Ephesians 5:25). But I will focus on our roles, as wives, in submitting to our husbands.

Simply put, submission means to willingly surrender or yield. We are first and foremost daughters of the High King; therefore, we first submit to God and surrender ourselves under His Authority. But the key here is we can submit to God because we have cultured our love for Him. And we love Him because He first loved us (1 John 4:19). There is a difference between submitting without love and lovingly submitting.

Being a submissive wife is about learning to respect our husbands as God-ordained leaders in our home and how we can encourage and inspire them to fulfill that unique role in a God-honoring way.

One of the most practical ways I am learning to submit to my husband is to respect and love him as a son of the Most High God. Sometimes, I must repent and ask for the Holy Spirit’s renewed guidance. A few reflective questions that you can ask:

• Do I belittle my husband?
• Do I try to control all our decision-making because I fear he can’t or won’t?
• Am I bitter towards my husband?
• Do I say things to my friends that portray my husband as less than a precious son of God?

If our first goal is to surrender and submit to God, then the path to presenting to our husbands becomes clearer. And dear sister, if God has called us to submit to our husbands, He also enables us to live it out through the power of the Holy Spirit at work. If you are uncertain that you understand God’s definition of submission, I encourage you to ask Him. Don’t lean on your own understanding, but trust God wholeheartedly to guide you in this process (Proverbs 3:5).