Christian Men and Women, subject to one another

A sermon preached by Father Dwight D. Duncan, ssc, Rector, St Matthias, Dallas, Texas
24 August 2003 - The Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost (Year B, Proper 16)

Scripture: Ephesians 5:21-33


In our present cultural situation, the idea of "being subject" to someone is sure to raise hackles. Bring that idea into the arena of male/female relationships and you're in danger of violence, verbal if not physical as well!

Thus, most commentators warn preachers to stay away from the second lesson, which both the Anglican and Roman Communions require to be read this day. The odds-makers are certain that most preachers will take this advice or will spend time derisively dismissing the whole passage. BUT, since I have been in battle-mode ever since the governing majorities at General Convention set their standard on the field, I've decided to take to the field today.

It is an understatement to say that many dismiss the exhortations in Paul's letter to the Ephesians as evidence of outmoded ideas from Christianity's past which must go because, of course, "we now know better." Do we really? G. K. Chesterton, a great early 20th century lay-theologian, said something which should haunt us all: "The Church is the one thing that saves a person from the degrading servitude of being a child of his time." How so? Because the Church conveys to us through Holy Scripture and her Great Tradition the very words and thoughts of Jesus ... those words and thoughts which, conformed to by us, can make us whole ... that is, can save us.

Our father and brother Peter expressed this in today's gospel. After many of Jesus' disciples left him because of his counter-cultural statements, Jesus asked those remaining, "Do you also wish to go away?" "To whom shall we go?", Peter replied, "You have the words of eternal life."

Words of eternal life. Jesus intends his disciples, of whatever time or culture, to be that leaven which moves their time and culture toward wholeness. But we can do this only to the extent that we live by God's principles, for his words are beyond every time and culture, and therefore always fresh, contemporary, life-giving. Nothing more demeaning could be said of any Christian than that he or she was of nothing more than their particular time and culture.

In today's lesson from Ephesians, God presents us with some principles for how Christian husbands and wives are to relate to one another, and by implication how Christian men are to treat women and Christian women, men. These principles, faithfully lived, help us create healthy communities.

Notice the way the passage begins: "Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ." What does it mean here, for one Christian to subject himself to another Christian? It does not mean relinquishing one's autonomy, or self-hood, or freedom against one's will as if one had been vanquished. No, subjection means doing what those who are bound together in love want to do for one another: to give themselves completely to one another in such a way that they will be made more whole both individually and together.

And the subjection being enjoined upon Christian men and women is truly revolutionary. It is not the submission of one sex to the other, but rather a mutual submission. Both sexes are enjoined to defer to one another in a way which will help the other sex's uniqueness arise. This is to be done out of obedience to the Savior who wills to make us and our communities whole and whose principles are directed towards that end.

Wives/women are then told that they can help men become their truest and best selves by respecting them. Husbands/men are told that they can help women become their truest and best selves by loving them, cherishing them.

Might it be that this counsel is tuned both to the particular needs of each sex and also to the particular attitude each sex needs from the other? As an orthodox Christian my assumption is that this is so, for I trust that this counsel has been inspired by God our Creator, who knows what we need. Therefore, I would not be surprised to find what is in scripture expressed by secular people.

And so it was, years ago, in a program upon which I chanced. To equally diverse groups of men and women, each separated from the other, the interviewer put this question: "What do you most need from the opposite sex?" In response, each group said essentially the same thing: a need to be cared for and to feel important, worthwhile, valuable.

But then the interviewer asked each group: "What word best describes what you say you need from the opposite sex?" The men said, "respect." The women said, "to be loved, to be cherished." What would you have said? Well, when the interviewer asked the question of the men, I immediately thought, "respect." Later that evening, when I asked my wife, who had not seen the show, what she most needed, she said quickly: "to be cherished." Interesting? Well, there it is in scripture: Wives, respect your husbands. Husbands, love your wives.

Christian men are called by God to cherish women, in the same way that Christ cherishes us, his Church. What does this mean? It means that men are to put themselves aside, to take themselves out of their center, and to put their wife, women at that center with God. Men are to manifest to women their value and preciousness by treating them as Christ treats his Church. Which is how? Christ does not treat us as objects for his use but as the subjects of his care and service ... indeed, even as his equal and partner in the enterprise of saving the world for his Father.

Just so, men are to embrace women not as objects for their use, which quickly becomes some form of abuse, but rather as the subjects of their care and service, their equals and partners in the enterprise of building healthy communities. In this way men give women the secure ground they need to grow into their potential and to offer their gifts to the community.

This attitude towards women enjoined by God upon his men means that men will mortify their sinful tendency to abuse women in the age-old ways men have. Men have done this either by tyrannizing women or by being childish, which are two sides of the same coin, because both of these demand that the woman bear major responsibility for almost every detail of life. If men were to govern their relationships with women as God requires and this passage exhorts, then the whole structure of domination of women by men would be undermined.

Christian women are called by God to respect their men. We all know that respect means to show esteem and honor. How do you do that? By being servile and making things easy for someone, doing "life" for them? No, you respect someone by encouraging and expecting them to be who they are and do what they are supposed to do. According to scripture, men are ordained by God to bear ultimate responsibility for the welfare, including the spiritual welfare, of their communities. They do not bear it alone, but with women. But men's responsibility is of the Truman variety. No, not the movie; the President of the United States Truman: Harry, who had a sign before him on his desk: "the buck stops here."

By encouraging and expecting men to take responsibility for our communities and sacrificially to serve them, women provide the secure ground men need to grow into their potential and to offer their gifts to the community. And in this way, women mortify their sinful tendency to belittle men by overtaking responsibility for life's details, which has only gotten them much of the blame for problems anyway!

Twenty-nine years ago, my wife, Jean, did this for me, for us. Our first child, Jeremy, was nine-months old. I came home from a long-day in the parish to find a cocktail awaiting me, followed by a lovely meal, beautifully set out on the table, and then an invitation to retire to the living room for relaxation and some madeira for me, port for Jean. I thought I knew where this was heading!

But then: "Dwight, I need to share some thoughts with you about our life." I realized the proverbial you-know-what was about to hit the fan. But it didn't in the way that stuff often hit the fan with Jean and me, both of us very strong contenders for what we believe and think.

No, this evening, calmly and deliberately, Jean informed me that, with my zeal to be a good priest, I was putting virtually all of my focus on being that for the Church, and little on being that for our family. She said it meant that effectively she had no husband and our son no father. She hated both these facts, but she was determined for as long as she could, and she hoped it would be all her life, to be the best wife and mother she could be in this situation.

But, she said, she was a woman, not a man. So she could not be the type of head to our family it should have, nor the father to our son or any other children we might have. And she was not going to deplete herself trying to be both. If there was to be a husband and father in our family, it would be me ... or we would have none. And I would have to answer to God for that.

Since that evening, Jean and I have continued to work out what the word of God communicated to us through this passage of Ephesians means in the details of our lives. It has been challenging and exciting ... and is still a work in progress.

Let us be honest. All this is very hard to do. Given everyone's imperfections and still-sinful state, it is hard to respect a man before he proves himself worthy of it and it is hard to cherish a woman before she gives something truly to cherish. But that is why we are enjoined to do it. You see: being a responsible man is very much the result of being treated with respect and as if one were responsible. And loveliness is very much the result of being cherished and treated as if one were lovely.

This is precisely the way God is treating us and the way by which he is raising us to heaven. In baptism, God makes us citizens of his kingdom not because we are already saints but so that we can become saints and be fit for the eternal glory. So, men become manly by being treated with respect. And women become womanly by being cherished.

The question for Christian men in relationship to women, therefore, is never "Am I being respected?" or "Is she lovable?" The question for the man is "Am I loving as I ought?"

And the question for Christian women in relationship to men is never, "Am I being cherished?" or "Is he deserving of my respect?" The question for the woman is "Am I showing the respect I ought?"

And God's answer to the inevitable question, "Who starts?" is the same for both: "You do." Each of us bears the responsibility for exercising the ministry given us and doing it without waiting for the other to do theirs. In doing ours, they may be empowered to do theirs.


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