Sunday, August 14, 2011

Are Respect & Submission Synonymous?

I've written on submission before, so forgive me for strolling down these paths again, but I feel compelled to address the issue once more after Michele Bauchmann's absurd remark that submission & respect are synonymous in her marriage.  Certainly, respect is a vital component of any healthy marriage, but it is not the same as submission, & we'd be fools to act as though they are.  Respect is to hold someone in esteem, while submission is to yield to another's authority.  Oftentimes, we will respect those whom we submit to, but we don't always submit to those whom we respect.  For instance, I respect my sister-in-law, but I'm not submissive towards her.  On the other hand, I both respect & submit to Michael.  He, however, while respecting me does not submit to me.  That is not his calling as my husband, while it is mine as his wife.  God has been clear in His Word:

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)

Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. (Col. 3:18)

Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the Word of God may not be reviled. (Titus 2:3-5)

We should practice both respect & submission in our marriages without confusing the two.  They are both important, but they are not interchangeable.  Let's live in the light of God's Word so that our marriages may be glorifying to God.

Soli Deo Gloria!

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