The Glory of Godly Womanhood

Providence Baptist Church

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Amen. You encourage me, but you're singing. It's great to be in the house of the

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Lord together and sing praises to our great and glorious God. One day you'll learn, the louder you sing, the more it encourages me.

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It seemed like the longer I preach, right? So, no, you're a blessing. Just over a year ago, in March of 2022,

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Senator Marsha Blackburn from Tennessee was questioning Supreme Court, then

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Supreme Court nominee, Judge Katonji Brown -Jackson. And she asked her this question.

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Judge Jackson, can you provide a definition for the word woman?

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Judge Jackson's response was, I can't. Blackburn says, you can't.

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Judge Jackson gives her famous line. Not in this context, I'm not a biologist.

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Now, 40 years ago, you would have thought that you were watching maybe an episode of Twilight Zone.

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20 years ago, maybe you would have thought you were watching some sort of weird skit from Saturday Night Live.

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And 10 years ago, maybe you would have thought you were watching an interview from a reporter and maybe between a reporter and a high school sophomore.

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But this is the world that we live in. A Supreme Court justice seated on the highest court in the land, one of the most prominent positions in the

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United States of America, cannot give a definition for the word woman.

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Let me turn in your Bibles, please, to Ephesians 5. An interesting passage we come to today on this

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Mother's Day as we preach through verse by verse through books of the Bible, and specifically in the last little while,

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Ephesians. Today we come to a very easy text,

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I believe, to understand, but one that grates against our present culture.

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You need to pay attention. What has happened in the last 80 years in our country is that the sexual revolution, feminism, wokeness, and LGBTQ ideologies, all these things they've combined with evangelical cowardice and compromise, and they have coalesced into one mighty firestorm seeking to burn away the very foundation of a civil society.

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All of these movements, now think about it for just a moment, all of these movements that once promised to liberate women and exalt women and empower women, they have created a world where the definition of the word woman, a meaningful definition of the word woman, cannot even exist.

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Our culture is erasing womanhood, but here we come today to the

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Bible, the place where women are actually valued and cherished and honored, but this is the very place that our culture refuses to go, hates to go, because to submit ourselves to the

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Scriptures is to acknowledge that a good and holy and sovereign

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God has rightful rule over us. This great and glorious God has set the table as it were and invited sinners to come and dine, and yet rebels in their cold and hard hearts rather star.

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But friends, this is not the condition of the believer. Our heart is transformed by grace, and we desire then to listen to what

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God says to us in his Bible, and so today we take up this passage with this overarching thought in our minds, in the words of William Perkins, the only rule for ordering the family is the written word of God.

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Today then we pick up Ephesians 5, 22, and we discuss the role of a wife in a home, and to broaden some of the application here,

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I've entitled this message, The Glory of Godly Womanhood, The Glory of Godly Womanhood.

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I'm inviting you today, church and guests, will you push back with me against the fire that is raging in opposition to the home and church today.

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I'm inviting you to be a radical with me together against this cultural onslaught.

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Let us be so bold today as to actually believe what the Bible says, and let us trust that the

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God of the universe is not only after his own glory, but our good as well.

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Ephesians chapter five, you've found it by now, I'm sure. Would you stand and let's read verses 22 through 24.

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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.

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His body and is himself its savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

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Father, we thank you for this day, we thank you for this text. Lord, though the world may rage against such a text, we pray that we in the church would embrace it and see how it exalts godly womanhood and teaches us the way that is best for our homes, for our churches, for our society.

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We pray today that we would exalt Christ above all, we would see him alone as our only suitable and all sufficient savior.

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That the spirit would break our hearts, that we would have after this day more gentle husbands and godly husbands, more gentle wives and respectful wives, that we would see the home as what you have called it to be.

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Bless our church for seeking to walk in this way. Bless the efforts that we give, knowing that the only way we can give such efforts is through your sovereign grace.

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We pray for it today, for the glory of Christ. We pray it in Jesus' name, amen.

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You may be seated. I am well aware, okay, I am well aware that if anybody remembers my name after I'm dead in God, I'm well aware that no church growth book is ever gonna be published that says what

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Alan Nelson did on Mother's Day in 2023 is just a phenomenal way to grow your church, right?

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You wanna encourage mothers on Mother's Day, you need to preach about wives submitting to their husbands, right?

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Of course, they're not gonna write that, but they have a different view of the Bible than I do, and I believe that the scriptures are sufficient, and I believe that they're very good for us to teach us the way that God would have for us to flourish in our homes and in society, and so we take this text and we submit to it reverently and humbly on this

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Mother's Day, and also encourage wives as well, and husbands, that if you're here today, you have to guarantee that you come back next week, right?

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Because we're not gonna skip over the husbands next week, we're just dealing with the wives first in order of the text, and then next week we approach the duties of husbands.

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Imagine if you could a world without mothers, well, of course, you can't do that, because without mothers, we would have no children, you wouldn't be able to imagine any such world, but imagine a world without biblical mothers, and without godly womanhood, well, in some ways, we're seeing such a travesty play out before us today.

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Godly mothers, sadly, tend to be fewer over the decades, it ought to be why we cherish and encourage the godly mothers among us.

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One reason that godly mothers are fewer throughout the decades is because we really haven't valued women in our society, and the church.

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For example, we have said that it's valuing to women to let them be on the front lines of our military.

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That is, we value women when we let them fight our battles on the front lines, but that's not valuing, that's devaluing women, it's throwing them aside as expendable.

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We've allowed men in our society, we've allowed men in our society to identify as women.

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We've allowed men to take on the roles of women in athletics, and now to win all the trophies and all the records that women used to have, now they're going to men, and the women of the year in certain secular magazines are now actually men.

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We've created a society, I'm saying, that has made women expendable. So too in the church.

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We devalue women by withholding the gospel from them, and I'm gonna get to that later.

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And also by saying we devalue women by saying that their value is really only in, say, if they can have the role of a man, if they can have the role of a preacher or an elder, or sort of upfront public ministry that the

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Bible reserves only for qualified men. We are saying, in essence, through these things, that women are expendable.

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And all of this we have intentionally or not relegated the glorious role of godly motherhood and family life and caring for the home.

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We have relegated that, we have pushed that down the list as though it is a degrading circumstance.

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Beloved, let me be frank with us this morning, and you know I can preach this way to you because you know of my love for you.

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This is shameful, and we must not be part of that. This is degrading to women, and this is dishonoring to God.

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The calling of a Christian wife and mother is a beautiful and high and holy and glorious calling, and it is one that the

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Bible takes very seriously. So what we're gonna do this morning from our text, we'll walk through five points in an effort to help godly womanhood reclaim the throne, as it were.

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That our daughters would see the biblical model as the way forward. That our young men would seek after godly women and marry them and love them and protect them and provide for them and cherish them and honor them.

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So a few words this morning to break down the text. Number one, I want you to think about the word autonomy.

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Number one, autonomy. Look at verse 22. Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the

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Lord. Now often I use the word autonomy in negative connotation, but right now

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I'm using it as a positive. Ladies, women in the

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Bible are autonomous beings. Now what do I mean by that? This is important.

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I mean that you should consider how Paul structures this command in verse 22.

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He doesn't tell your, he doesn't assume that you don't know anything, you don't have a place at the table, as it were, that you know what, your man, your husband needs to tell you this.

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No, he doesn't do this. What does he do in the text? Look at verse 22. He addresses you, doesn't he?

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He doesn't say to your husband, tell your wife this. No, no, he addresses you as an autonomous individual, as it were.

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Wives, he's talking to you here in the text. So women are not someone's property.

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They are not to be under the tyrannical rule of anyone. They are addressed here personally and individually by the apostle.

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There is a glad expectation of personal holiness placed upon Christian women.

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How much different would the text be if it said husbands, force your wives to submit?

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I think that's what some husbands think that it says. It doesn't say that. It gives the command to the women distinct from the men.

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So I want to just point out here that a woman has a sense of autonomy, meaning not that she is free from the

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Lord or the commands that he places upon her, but that her call to obedience here in the text is to be one that stems from her choice, her choice of love for her savior and her family.

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Ladies, you in essence have a choice before you today from the text, whereby

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Paul calls you to respond in faith. Second word, authority.

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Autonomy, second word, authority. Now, I'm not going to go where you think I'm going to go right now. I'll get to that in a minute.

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But first, look at verse 22. Wives submit to your own husbands as to the

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Lord. Now, if you have maybe a legacy standard Bible or maybe a new American standard Bible, or maybe even a

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King James, certain Bibles are going to put the word submit there in italics, okay? Where it says, wives submit to your own husbands as to the

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Lord. The reason they'll have the word submit in italics is because that word is not in the text.

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Like what? What? We've been lied to. No, no, no. It's being supplied there because the verb comes from verse 21.

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So listen carefully to verse 21. When it says submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ, let me try to kind of read it how it would play out in the

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Greek. Submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ, wives to your own husbands as to the

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Lord. So the verb is still there, you understand, but it's being supplied there in the

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English translation sort of makes sense. But here's the reason that it's like that in my opinion.

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There is a focus here by Paul on the phrase at the end of verse 22. Now look in your

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Bible. What is the phrase that is the purpose here? Wives submit to your own husbands as to the

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Lord. The Lord, right? Who's he talking about? Christ.

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What does this emphasis do for us then? It reminds us that a woman's ultimate authority, a wife's ultimate authority is not her husband, is not her boss, is not her children, is not her culture around her.

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Listen very carefully. A wife's ultimate authority is who? Her Lord Jesus.

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That is for a godly wife to obey this text is for her to do so out of a motivation first, not for her husband, but for who?

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For Christ, for her King, who is the resurrected and exalted

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Lord Jesus. R .C. Sproul notes, if a woman is contentious and refuses to follow the leadership of her husband, she's in rebellion, not simply against him, but also against Christ.

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Third point, autonomy, authority. Oh, these are gonna slow down a little bit. Okay, but we got through the first pretty quickly.

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Thirdly, atonement, autonomy, authority. Third word to consider from our text, atonement.

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Now, verse 23 says, now you need to understand something about language.

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Verse 22 is part of a command, right? Verse 23 is not a command.

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We move from this implied imperative in verse 22 to an indicative. Verse 23, in other words, is not a command.

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It's just a statement of fact. So let's read it. 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.

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Verse 23 is not telling us to do anything. It's just stating a matter of fact, and in so doing, it gives us a simile here, right?

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The husband is the head of the wife, simile, comparison that uses like or as, as Christ is the head of the church.

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By the way, that is true in every marriage. So you stay here today, surely no one here would say this today, but you say here today, you're a husband today, and you say,

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I'm not the head of my wife, or a wife says, you know, I'm not the head of my wife. We're way more progressive than that.

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Or a wife says, he's not my head. Okay, that's like someone standing up here today and saying, well, guess what?

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In my world, two plus two is seven. It doesn't really matter what you think two plus two is in your world.

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Two plus two is four. So too in every marriage, the husband is the head of the wife, right?

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In every marriage, the husband is the head, but the problem is too often, he represents a poor or ungodly head.

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But every marriage you need to understand, Christian marriage or not, pictures Christ and the church.

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So this is why, sadly, so many give a bad picture, but this is why that we need to fiercely protect the definition and meaning of marriage in our day.

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Now, this idea of headship, for the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, this idea of headship, there must be a parallel.

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If there's not a parallel, the comparison doesn't make sense. So what does it mean that a husband is the head of the wife?

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I think it implies these things. Order, leadership, authority, protection, provision.

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You see the parallel? Like that is all true of Christ and the church. You bring that across order, leadership, authority, protection, provision.

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You see that connected between the husband and between the role of Christ. A man wasn't created for woman, but woman for man.

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And the first man, Adam, was entrusted with authority over his wife, but an authority that came with responsibility, with protecting her and leading her and providing for her, all in the truth of God.

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This is the type of relationship that Christ is restoring in homes today. Now, we've gone away from our point here.

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The point here is what? What was the third A letter? Atonement. The atonement that a godly woman needs is not provided for by her husband.

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The atonement that any woman needs is the atoning work of Christ. Look at verse 23.

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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.

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So listen, Christ is the savior of the church. He is the only savior of the church.

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Earlier, I'd said this in this message that we have failed in too many churches today because we have withheld the gospel from women.

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Now, that's a bold statement, I know, but I believe very passionately that it's true. And so please prepare your hearts now.

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Put on the seatbelt, as it were. Prepare your minds for what I'm about to say. It's truly radical.

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It's quite the bombshell for people in our day. You're braced, you're ready. I see it.

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You're ready. Here's what you need to hear. Women are sinners.

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You okay? We're good? It's true. Now, you can go to a woman's conference today and you can hear about how beautiful you are, and you can hear about how

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God loves you and all the great things that you can do, but none of those things are the gospel.

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You can hear our society today talk about women as though they are only victims of sin, right?

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No doubt. Women, just like many women and many men, do suffer as victims of sinful actions, and I'm not denying that.

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But this comes across in an unbiblical way at times in things like, for example, where you have people arguing that women are actually the victims of abortion, right?

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Instead of perpetrators. And we have a whole catalog of excuses for a woman's sin.

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Listen, we have created an evangelical culture where women don't sin, right?

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The men are the lazy good, I mean, this comes from the culture, right? Watch a movie.

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Who's the hero of the movie? It's the wife, right? Who's the loser of the movie?

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It's the husband. And if he would just follow his wife's leadership, everything would be better. That's coming through on sitcoms.

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It's coming through on movies. Like, this is what our culture's feeding us. And so evangelicalism today sees this same reality.

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Women, I mean, obviously, we're not so silly as to say women don't sin. I mean, we say, oh, all sin, we all sin.

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But we're afraid to acknowledge the deep level sin that women deal with.

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We're afraid to address a woman's complaining. We're afraid to address a woman's anxiety.

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Friends, we have created anxiety, and this is not popular. We have created anxiety today as a medical condition.

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Research it. We're afraid to address a woman's contentiousness or jealousy or idolatry.

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And so we say, oh, dear sister, what you need is medicine. What you need is just some mommy wine time.

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What you need is therapy. It's your husband's fault. It's your kid's fault. It's your parents' fault.

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Someone hurt you in the past. It's their fault. It's society's fault. It's Hollywood's fault.

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It's evangelicalism's fault. And so we dance around the issue because we don't want to be seen as mean or insensitive by telling women that they sin.

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They really and seriously and truly sin. But listen, church, here's the point I'm making. If we look at women as something other than sinners, we rob them of the gospel because the gospel is only for sinners.

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It is only for the vile and depraved and broken, moms and wives and sisters and aunts and grandmothers.

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You need the gospel desperately. And if we withhold the truth of a woman's sin, then we withhold the hope of the gospel because the gospel comes in and says this, you're wretched and undone.

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Inherently, that is deep down inside is not something beautiful, but something wicked and rebellious.

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This is what the gospel comes in and says. And so if you say to one, no, no, no, no, you're not wretched.

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You're not undone. You're deep down. You're beautiful. And we just need to shine your face and then

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I don't let that beauty come out. Then you withhold the gospel. The gospel's not for beautiful people.

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The gospel's for ugly people and sinners. And God has made a way for these ugly, sinful people to be made new.

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Your value then, listen, ladies, your value is not ultimately in your woman or in your children or in a career or in your relationship to your husband.

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Your ultimate identity as a Christian woman is wrapped up in Christ.

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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.

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Christ is your savior. Christ is the savior of the church, which includes men and women.

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When women sin, sometimes marital problems are the fault of the man, no doubt. Sometimes they're the fault of the woman more.

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I mean, it's always both fault, but sometimes it's more the man. Sometimes it's more the woman.

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Women sin sexually. Women sin in gossip or contentiousness or pride or envy or lying.

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I could go for a thousand sins here. But my point here is this. You ladies, just like a man, need the gospel.

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The gospel is not men are dumb, your husbands are dumb, and if they just valued you more, you would flourish.

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That's not the gospel. The gospel is not girl, wash your face or mommy, you rock.

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The gospel is you are a sinner in need of a savior. Christ alone is that savior.

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Christ bled for your sins, bearing the wrath of God, do you? These sins I've mentioned and more are deserving of God's judgment and hell and the lake of fire.

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And yet on the cross, Christ was treated as you, like a sinful woman and a sinful man as he perfectly represented his people on Calvary before God.

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And then he rose again from the grave and is ruling and reigning now so that all those who repent of their sins and believe the gospel will be saved.

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Wives, sisters, ladies, you need atonement for your sins. And that atonement is only found in the finished work of Christ.

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It's not in your motherhood or even your womanhood. Go to Christ, repent of sin, repent of any unbiblical views of womanhood this morning.

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Exactly what every woman needs. This is the beauty. Christ is the savior of the church.

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Exactly what every woman needs has been sufficiently provided for in the atoning sacrifice and resurrection of our

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Lord. And who you need to behold is not yourself, but Christ.

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He is the savior of the church. Are you resting in him today? Step out of the mommy wars, turn away from the vain comparisons, quit trying

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Facebook hacks for self -esteem. Look to our King.

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Now find your salvation in the finished work of our Savior. This brings us to our fourth point.

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Autonomy, authority, atonement, another word to consider here, acknowledgement. Now we come to verse 24.

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And it says, now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

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There are several things that a woman who is a wife, particularly that has taken her sins to Christ now acknowledges.

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And as we've already said, she acknowledges her ultimate authority is not her husband. Her ultimate authority is

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Christ. He is her King. No one else, not even her husband, is equal, above or equal to Christ in her life.

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But another thing she acknowledges is her role in the marriage. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

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Now most sermons, I cannot imagine, I cannot, most sermons don't even just stop on, because you understand that it's too difficult.

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And I'm not, it's not wrong to preach this whole section together, that's fine. But many sermons don't stop just 22, 23, 24.

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It's very difficult in today's culture to have this kind of conversation. And most sermons

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I've heard on this, they seem to qualify submission into oblivion. They mean to say, well, it doesn't mean this, doesn't mean this, doesn't mean this, doesn't mean this, doesn't mean this.

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And then you never get to what it means. But if I may, I'll just say this. I don't think that verse 24 is complicated, and I don't think it's difficult to comprehend.

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It doesn't take a seminarian or a well -educated person to understand Paul's point. He's very plain here.

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Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

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The issue is not that it's hard to understand, but it's just difficult for our culture to embrace.

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The godly wife is called to submit to her husband. By the way, verse 22 is important. Wives submit to who?

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Your own husbands, right? That's an important point. It's not women in general have to submit to all the husbands of the world.

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You're called to submit to your own husband. Submission in our world today is distorted because we think about a man that is domineering or tyrannical or harsh with his wife, or you have a man who is passive and he's actually domineered.

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The southern phraseology is henpecked, right, by his wife. But neither of these scenarios are biblical submission.

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So what a godly woman acknowledges here is God's good design. That verse 24 is

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God's good design. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

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This is God's good design. Now obviously, let me make this point, obviously this everything does not mean that you submit when your husband leads you to sin, okay?

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Ask Sapphira about that one. Acts 5, 8, 9, Peter addresses

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Sapphira. And Peter said to her, "'Tell me whether you sold the land for so much?' And she said, "'Yes, for so much.'

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But Peter said to her, "'Oh,' he didn't say, "'Oh, but it's okay, "'you were just submitting to your husband. "'No, no.' Peter said to her, "'How is it that you have agreed together "'to test the

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Spirit of the Lord? "'Behold, the feet of those "'who have buried your husband are at the door, "'and they will carry you out.'"

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Sapphira died because she chose to submit to the sin of her husband.

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So Paul does not mean that women are to submit to their husbands when their husbands tell them to sin.

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Wolfgang Musculus, he died, that's a great name, he died in Gunnar and Liz, if you're looking for a child named

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Wolfgang Musculus, I'll tell you how to spell that later. He died at 1563, but he said this, "'No woman is expected to obey a man "'who orders her to do things "'that are ungodly, harmful, and unjust, "'because that sort of obedience is not of God, "'but more like obedience to the will of Satan.

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"'When it happens that the will of the man "'falls away from the will of God, "'then he ought to accept the will of his wife "'and it becomes better for the man to listen to her "'and do what she wants than for her to listen to him.'"

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So the point here is it's not that a wife is called to submit when her husband says we should commit fraud together, we should commit a murder together, we should harm our children together, we should do this sinful act together.

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A wife is not called to submit in that way. But let me push back on this.

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A wife, so be careful with this, a wife's disagreement does not automatically make the husband's will ungodly, right?

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So sometimes a man must set a direction, it's objectionable to the wife, but it's not sinful and it's not unjust.

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Now if it's sinful or unjust or unreasonable, we should talk about those things. But supposing there's, you could choose one of these directions, the husband says

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I think this is the direction we need to go, it's not sinful, it's not unjust, there's just disagreement over the course of action or immediate decision.

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In those cases, a wife ought to listen to her husband and follow his lead. Listen, it is his responsibility before God to lead in the way that he sees fit best under the

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Lordship of Christ. And this is the freeing thing, ladies. Your husband will give an account of his leadership.

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So think about this, ladies. Don't put this weight on yourself that God has not called you to put on yourself.

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But you're free. Like you don't have to put that weight on yourself to be the leader and head of your family.

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God hasn't put that weight upon you. He's put it upon your husband. Puritan William Gouge notes this requires four virtues from wives.

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Humility, cheerfulness, sincerity, and perseverance. Humility, cheerfulness, sincerity, and perseverance.

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A wife is to follow her husband's direction or the home in this way.

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Humility, cheerfulness, sincerity, perseverance. Let me tell you something, ladies and husbands. This is not about who's smarter or who's more educated.

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You run into sometimes women are more educated than men or smarter than men, it happens. It's not about who's stronger.

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Most of the time, men are physically stronger than women. There's a difference, though.

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This is not about who has a higher social status or whatever.

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This is not about the value of men and women. This is simply about are we going to trust

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God's created order and good design for marriages and family? Or are we gonna let the culture corrupt us in that?

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Are we gonna believe what the Bible says about this? Or are we going to go our own way?

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Okay, so we also readily acknowledge this, ladies and husbands, you need to hear. Paul's not saying to the wives that their submission is only required when their husbands are perfect, right?

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Because that would be nothing. That would be meaningless. Rather, John Gill puts it this way.

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This subjection lies in honor and reverence. They should think well of their husbands, speak becomingly to them and respectfully of them.

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The wife should take care of the family and family affairs. According to the husband's will, should imitate him in what is good and bear with that which is not so agreeable.

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She should help and assist in caring and providing for the family and should abide with him in prosperity and adversity.

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It's difficult. It can be difficult, especially because, I was gonna say this for next week, but I'll go ahead and say it this week.

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Husbands are sinners too, right? And that's why it makes your job, your calling as wives so difficult because your husbands aren't

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Christ. They're not. They need Christ too. But you're called in this way despite your husband's imperfections.

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And even this, ladies, even if your husband is an unbeliever, it's still true.

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That's Paul, go to 1 Peter 3 for this. I mean, not right now, but later. That's Peter's argument in 1

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Peter 3, that your submission to your husband, it actually may win him over to the faith.

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And so if it's true with unbelievers, then ladies, how much more ought it to be true of a

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Christian husband, right? So the Bible has laid out here for us who is responsible to lead in love and who is responsible to follow in respect.

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That's the summation in verse 33. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

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So God has created men and women, husbands and wives, as equals before him. And he has called men and women to himself as co -heirs of eternal life.

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Yet functionally, we cannot deny there is hierarchy in the roles of men and women.

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Husbands are called to lead. Wives are called to follow. But if we will believe the

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Bible here, listen to me, so important. This exalts the status of women.

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Ladies, you have a God -glorifying purpose. You have a

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God -glorifying role. You have a distinct and indispensable part to play in the advancement of the kingdom of Christ.

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Quit listening to the culture that says you're only valuable if you can do the things a man can do.

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That's not true. There are things that you cannot do that men can do.

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And there are things that men cannot do that you can do. And this is part of God's beautiful role of men and women in society and in the church.

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Don't listen to the junk that's coming out of the White House that says things like this.

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Anything a man can do, a woman can do, as equal or better. That's a lie.

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And the reverse is a lie. Anything a woman can do, a man can do, as equal or better.

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Obviously, one thing that comes to mind is when we think about pregnancy, right?

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Good night. It's just foolish and convoluted talk.

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It's not true. Ladies, your worth and value are not wrapped up in you needing to take on the role of a man.

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You are free and called by God to take on the inestimable value of the role of a woman.

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This frees you from needing to manipulate your husband or to try to control your home by emotional tyranny.

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Is everything okay? I'm fine. You're free to not to have to live that.

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First Peter, for example, three, four says, let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious, a gentle and quiet spirit.

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This is lost on evangelicalism today. In no way does this mean, did you hear

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Proverbs, by the way, that the lady is a teacher and it has wisdom in Proverbs 31?

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So in no way does this mean a home or a church does not need to listen to godly women.

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Husbands, if you're not listening to your wife, you're foolish and you're in sin. We are foolish in our homes and we're foolish in our churches if we do not glean the wisdom and insight of godly women.

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But you can spot the difference. You can spot the difference from a woman of humility and gentleness and sincerity with a gentle and quiet spirit who is seeking to give godly counsel.

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You can see the difference between that and a woman who is just always wanting to make sure that everyone hears her voice and that she gets her opinions through.

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God has called wives to this beautiful and glorious role of godly womanhood.

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And so many marriages struggle and Christians struggle and churches struggle because they think that they know better.

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They think they have something better for women than what the Bible has. And they don't understand that the grace and the gift that our sovereign

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God has bestowed upon us and godly husbands and godly wives. But if we'll acknowledge

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God as our good and gracious king, we will see these roles as his beautiful gift to families and moms and dads and even for the betterment of the family and society.

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Last point, autonomy, authority, atonement, acknowledgement, and finally, ability. Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the

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Lord. The husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its savior.

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Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. The comment

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I wanna make here is just following the last point. But let me start with a different angle.

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We may reject the idea of submission and authority. We hate that word in today's society, right?

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We hate the word subjection. We hate the word submission. But let me come at it from a different angle.

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So let me address it this way to the ladies. You are always subjecting yourself to something.

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You're a social being. In other words, you can either, you have a choice today.

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You can either subject yourself to cultural ideas of womanhood and value and these things, or you can subject yourself to the biblical idea here.

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And my point here is in subjecting yourself to the biblical role, submitting yourself to your own husband, choosing to obey the scriptures, by the way, a comment.

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This is a very important comment, maybe for conversations today or this week. Paul addresses husbands and wives on their own here.

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You understand? Like, here's my counsel to husbands today. My counsel to you husbands today is to not go home and say, felt like you really needed it.

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Not a good husband if you do that, okay? Don't do that. Why don't you let the scriptures and the spirit of God address your wife?

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Because that's the point here. Do you want me to tell you, I'll be transparent here. Do you want me to tell you in my own marriage, what struggles, and I'd say this because it's struggles in every marriage.

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The struggles in my marriage happen when either I say, you know what

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Stephanie needs to do? Stephanie needs to submit. Or when Stephanie says, you know what

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Quatro needs to do? He needs to love me as Christ loved the church better. But that's not the way the scriptures come in and address, is it?

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Who do they address? They address the husbands as husbands and they address the wives as wives.

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So the point here is don't miss that. Instead of thinking, what does my wife need to do better?

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Or wives, instead of thinking, what does my husband need to do better? Start right here where the Bible starts and think about where do

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I need to repent? Where do I need to grow in grace? Now, back to the point.

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Wives, as you submit to your husband, this brings a great measurement of ability and freedom to your life.

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Remember what was read earlier, we won't read it again, it's such a long passage, but remember Proverbs 31. Is there a lady in here, or when you hear

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Proverbs 31, that you do not long to see that kind of order in your home?

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I know you desire that. You want to see that kind of provision for your family.

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You wanna see your children taken care of. You understand that you fail, but you have an advocate with the

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Father Jesus Christ, the righteous. By grace, Proverbs 31 is not just an ideal, it's possible.

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And so what I'm saying is the wife is not sitting around in passivity all day and just asking her husband, can

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I do this? Can I turn on the light switch? Can I grab a book? Can I do this, can I do this, can I do this? No, she's an active woman, and faithful woman full of ability for her marriage and her household.

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So as she submits herself to the leadership and oversight and protection and provision and plan of her husband for the family, she is actively fulfilling her role in contributing to the home in such a way that without her, the home, it isn't even a home.

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It's just a wooden box with lumber and boards and paint, whatever else you use to build a home.

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That's all it is. But the wife makes it a home.

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So there's a biblical expectation of women working to help meet the needs of the household.

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You see the woman in Proverbs 31, sowing and buying land and selling merchandise and gardening.

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So let me address it this way. You need to understand the cultural differences.

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That would all have been done in the context of the home. But I wanna be careful here.

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There's not flat biblical prohibitions to a woman working outside the home.

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Like if there was a verse that said, no woman should work outside the home ever, then we would have to take that and we'd have to say, we have to apply it.

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So there's not a flat biblical prohibition like that. But we do need to acknowledge a couple of things.

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One thing to acknowledge is this. The normal in the 21st century is more of the exception in church history, right?

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That is a woman leaving her children and home and going outside the home all day. That is more of a phenomenon of the industrial revolution and particularly in the 21st century, maybe the last hundred years or so, okay?

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Secondly, we need to understand that whatever a family season or situation or circumstance, right?

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Ladies, I know you. Some of you are working, okay, outside the home, okay.

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But what you need to understand is whatever pursuit there may be in that regard, and I think we're all in agreement on this.

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You have to hear me very clearly. The Bible gives an undeniably high calling in the priority of the home, right?

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Above all outside career, extra earned income, volunteer, practice time, whatever it is, the home is the priority.

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So God's design for a godly wife and mother means that no matter what area outside the home, she may be working outside the home.

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She may be volunteering outside the home. She may be even doing ministry outside the home.

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But whatever she is doing outside the home, it is undeniable that these things must never become a priority over the home.

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Not just intellectual priority. I mean, because nobody in here is gonna intellectually say that.

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Like every godly woman acknowledges intellectually that the home is to be a priority. But I'm talking about a practical priority.

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So let me say it this way. Though there's no prohibition that flatly denies a woman the ability to ever work outside the home, if there does become a conflict, right?

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If there happens to be a conflict between a woman's priorities outside the home and the home, which comes first?

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Ladies, I encourage you, it's easy to see, right? We understand what comes first is the home.

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Let me say it this way. Our culture today acts as though your home being a priority is a prison.

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Our culture acts as though your home is putting chains upon you as a woman and keeping you as a woman from reaching your full potential.

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By the way, what is your full potential? Remember, don't forget, what's your full potential as a woman? To live in a world where there's no women.

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That's what you wanna buy into, right? We look down upon women in our society who choose to stay home or work part -time or see the home as a priority or give up a career so that they can wipe snotty noses and change dirty diapers.

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We think how foolish, how degrading, how low, how antiquated, how barbaric, how backwoods.

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But the Bible gives us a picture of godly women as queens, daughters of the

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Most High God. No matter, listen ladies, no matter your family situation, never let society tell you that you making your home a priority in your life is degrading.

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Meaning sometimes you're having to work or situation or whatever, you have to call in sometimes, you have to tell your boss, look,

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I gotta take care of my children today. And your boss gives you a hard time. Don't let him give you a hard time.

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I mean, you could submit to him, you can have a gentle and quiet spirit, but don't degrade yourself because it's a glorious thing that you take care of these precious little children who are not merely our future, but they are our now.

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Raising children up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord is a great task for parents.

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How could our society be so twisted as to downplay the beautiful and glorious role that every mother is called to fulfill in the life of her marriage and her family and her children?

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How could we do that? Now I'll make one more comment about this and then land the plane.

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Okay. Sometimes women work outside the home, there is a necessity in this.

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There's a situation and there's things that have to be done and I understand that. Sometimes though, it's because we wanna have four cars, three boats, a vacation home.

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I know of ladies who work and it's like, I don't even understand, they're just working to pay childcare.

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They bring home $25 a week because all the rest of the money has gone to pay childcare.

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I'm not talking about women in this congregation, I'm just talking about over the years. I've known situations like that.

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I don't think it's becoming of every Christian couple to take these things before the Lord and to think through them and to study the scriptures, to think through them together.

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Which all of that brings us back to Judge Jackson. Can you define the word woman?

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Wouldn't that be something, right? I give her a hard time for not defining the word woman and then I don't define it.

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So I'll give it a shot. Biologically, by the way, I'm not a biologist. Biologically, a woman is a human being consisting of XX chromosomes.

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She is made in the image of God. She is, the Bible says the weaker vessel, but the point there is that she was made to be provided for and protected so that she could flourish in her

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God called role. A woman redeemed in Christ is fiercely compassionate and relentlessly loyal.

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She's hospitable. A man can take a bundle of sticks and turn it into a house, but a woman takes that same bundle and turns it into a home.

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A Christian mother is one born again by God's grace and trusting Christ for the forgiveness of her sins.

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She is full of love for her Savior, her husband, her children, and her church.

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She is persistent over the souls of her children, the sanctification of her husband and the glory of Christ.

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She loves the Bible as her daily bread. She prays to God for all these things and more.

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And all of that barely scratches the surface of the inestimable value of womanhood and the need today for godly women in our homes and churches.

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And I know today that there is not a regenerate woman in this room whose heart does not burn within her and say, yes, yes, this is what

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I desire for my life, my marriage, my home. Husbands, what are we doing if we do not thank our wonderful God for his gracious gift of our wives and mothers?

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Church, how can we not intentionally and ferociously push back against the godless narrative of our age about the role of women?

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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.

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His body and is himself its Savior. Now as a church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands as we see the encroachment of Babylon upon the very gates of Jerusalem, standing outside our churches and even infiltrating our churches.

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How can we not stand in the gap, men? How can we not stand before our wives and before our families and say, no more, this is enough.

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We will not have the culture, say this kind of thing about my wife. We will not have the culture to grade our daughters and our sisters and our mothers.

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This is what a woman is. She is valuable. She is glorious. And this is her wonderful role given to us by our great and holy

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God. We have to push back. This is a high calling lady.

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Ladies, it's a hard calling because your husbands are sinners too, but God gives more grace.

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So ladies, wives, are you pressing into that grace today or are you resting in yourself?

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Are you resting in your husband? No, no, rest in the grace of God. Have you allowed culture to define your value or are you searching the scriptures?

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Are you repenting, wives and ladies and women, of areas you need to improve in as a woman, as a wife, as a mother, entrusting the atoning work of the

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Lord Jesus by faith? How might this passage of scripture better equip you to be the woman that God has called you to be for his glory?

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He hasn't called you to be a husband, a woman and a wife. Church, may we press back against the lies of our culture and all of us, all of us, all of us, all of us, we must look away from ourselves to Christ.

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He is King. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your text today.

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We pray that it would rest upon us and find a humble heart in all of us that we would respond to every message preached in faith.

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We would trust what your word has to say and we would live accordingly to its truths.

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Today, there may be husbands in this room that need to repent. I pray that you would bring that grace in their life.

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There may be wives in this room that need to repent. I pray you would bring that grace in their life.

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There may be children or unbelievers in this room that need to repent and come to Christ who have trusted in themselves or culture or whatever it may be, but they've not surrendered to Christ.

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I pray you would give that grace even today and bring them to Christ as their only suitable and all sufficient savior.