Wives and Submission (1 Peter 3:1)

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No purchase necessary. Void word prohibited by law. 18 -plus terms and conditions apply. See website for details. This week on The Wrap Report, we're going to go to one of our midweek

Bible studies at Grace & Truth Bible Church on 1 Peter 3, verse 1.

Yeah, we didn't get very far. Plan was to get through the first six verses. Didn't happen. But I think that this will be very helpful for many people to look at the subject of wives and submission.

There's much confusion there. There's many views that people have when it comes to this. Lots of discussion on the issue of submission.

And yet, when we look at the context, we're going to find many may not have it as they think.

So check it out now on The Wrap Report. This is your host, Andrew Rapoport. One, two, three!

Welcome to The Wrap Report with your host, Andrew Rapoport, where we provide biblical interpretation and application.

This is a ministry of Striving for Eternity and the Christian Podcast Community. For more content or to request a speaker for your church, go to strivingforeternity .org.

All right. Why don't we turn to 1 Peter 3.

We're going to look at 1 Peter 3, the first six verses.

We'll read the first nine. See what we'll look at next week as well.

It'll help with some of the context for this week. 1 Peter 3, verses 1 -9.

In the same way, you wives, be submissive to your own husbands, so that even if any of them are disobedient to the word, they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives.

As they observe your chaste and respectful behavior, your adornment must not be merely external, braiding the hair and wearing gold jewelry or putting on dresses, but let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God.

For in the way, in former times, the holy women also, who hoped in God, used to adorn themselves being submissive to their own husbands.

Just as Sarah obeyed her husband, obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord, and you have become her children if you do what is right, without being frightened by any fear.

Your husbands, in the same way, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with someone weaker, since she is a woman, and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered.

To sum up, all of you be harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kind -hearted, and humble in spirit, not returning evil for evil or insult for insult, but giving blessing instead.

For you were called for the very purpose that you might inherit a blessing.

So we'll look at the first six verses, and actually I think, just as we looked at a couple weeks ago, it's going to take us a little bit of time probably to get here, because I'm going to start actually in Ephesians.

All right, so let's take a look. What I want to do is, because when we look at this, and we had got into some discussion after class one week, so when it comes to the whole issue of submission and wives submitting to husbands,

I'm going to start in Ephesians, and then we'll come to 1 Peter. These are the two passages that people look at where it talks about wives submitting to their own husbands.

There are a lot of different ways that people define this submission, some that are biblical and some that are not.

So let me deal with up front what this is not saying. What clearly it's not saying is that the wife is a second -class citizen who has no rights but to do whatever her husband commands.

That's more Islam. The reason that many people try and make an argument like that is the word submit is a military term.

It's a word that we end up seeing used in military. It does mean to be subordinate, to attach, to be subject.

Those are some of the ways it is used, but it also has a meaning that could be to place or to arrange under or to assign.

So the idea that the word can be used in a military term as far as an obedience thing, that there's a subordinate who doesn't have the authority to make commands on someone that's overranking them, does not mean that's the way it's used in the context.

So the word can mean that, but it also can mean that it just means to assign someone, to a position, to place someone in a position.

So the context helps us to understand which meaning it's going to be. So as we look at Ephesians, I want to start in Ephesians, and what we have in Ephesians in verse 21.

Now in 22 we see, if you look in your translations in Ephesians 5, 22, you see it says,

And one of the things we had talked about a couple weeks ago, is that if you look in, depending on your translation, if you have a more literal translation, you're going to see that the word subject is in italics.

Now this is something just to know, when if you have a more literal translation, King James, New King James, ESV, New American Standard, something that is where they're translating word for word, you're going to get a little indication sometimes, when you see something like this that's in italics.

What that means is the word wasn't there in the Greek. They added it in, so it flows better in the

English. So what they're trying to do in a word for word translation, is take each Hebrew or Greek word, or Aramaic words, translate word for word, then sometimes what they have to do is move words around for the new language, and then what they'll do is if they don't move it around sometimes, they have to add words.

And so here, the literal translation would be, Wives, be to your own husbands. So where do we get the word subject, or submit?

Well that comes from verse 21. And so as you look in verse 21, this becomes really the launching point for the rest of this chapter into chapter 6.

So what you see is it says, Be subject to one another in the fear of Christ. So what we're having is that verse 21 says that, each one of us are to submit or be subject to one another.

And then what we have here is a group of categories. Wives, unto their own husbands.

Husbands, loving their wives as Christ loves the church. Children, in obedience to father and mother.

Fathers, not frustrating their children. Slaves, obeying their masters.

So what you end up seeing is a series of categories that he gives in what it looks like to be submissive to one another.

So what you end up seeing is that, I've had a gentleman who came to me once, and he wanted me to help counsel his wife because she wasn't submitting to him.

And what he meant by that is she was to obey everything he said. He didn't like that much of my counsel to him was, no, beating your wife is not biblical, because that was part of the problem that she originally came to me with.

And his argument was that she's to obey him. And I said, what verse tells you that she should obey you?

And he said, Ephesians 5 22. And I said, OK, so she's to obey you according to that verse.

Yes. I said, well, then in verse 21, you're to obey her. Be subject to one another. In fact, you're supposed to submit to me in the same way.

So I can beat you then. Right. He didn't think that was appropriate. OK, so you can see how people can abuse this.

So the word submission or subjection to subject is not there in verse 21.

What you have is this overarching thing of be subject to one another. And then categories, wives are to be subject to their own husbands.

OK, as of Lord. Now, there is an issue of headship that we have. OK, so we do know that God has ordained, not whether we like it or not, that the men would have a different role in the church and within the family.

And they're accountable for that. But that doesn't mean the woman is less of a person. It doesn't mean there's there's it's this submission is still a mutual submission.

So how do the wives submit? They submit to their own husbands. How do the husbands submit? They do so by loving their wives as Christ loved the church.

Now, ask which one's the easier one to do. The wives, because it's impossible for us husbands to love our wives like Christ loves the church.

But let me just give a little detail. If you look down in verse 33, and I like to point this out to guys who who tell me as this gentleman that I used earlier in the example, when when people will say, well, my wife is not submissive,

I usually will ask, and whose fault is that? You see, if you look at verse 33, it says in the New American Standard, nevertheless, each each individual among you is to love his own wife as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband.

Now, the interesting thing here in the Greek is this could be read that husbands love their wives, even as yourself, so that the wife may see that she respects him.

So with that clause, it almost seems as if if the wife is not respecting the husband, could be the husband's fault.

He's not loving her enough. Right. I remember we had there was a lady's Bible study going on in our house, and Yim was there.

And some of the women were discussing this whole thing of submission and you know that it's it's hard. It really is kind of interesting.

At least then it was a Chinese church. Whenever in the American churches, everyone seems to tell my bride that, well, the reason that she's so submissive is because it's natural to her culture.

She'll be like, no, no, it's not. You know, but it was interesting because one of the things that happens, the ladies got into a discussion about submission and Yim brought up, if your husband is loving you and putting you first and foremost in everything, why don't you want to submit to him?

And that's a fair question to ask. And so the question to the men who expect their wives to submit, are you loving them enough that they want to?

Right. Or are you thinking of yourself first all the time so that they're not they look at this and go, you're not really thinking of me all the time.

You're not putting me first. You're putting yourself first. So when you make a decision, I don't know if it's for your best interest or my best interest.

But if the husband's always loving like Christ loves the church, do we ever question what

Christ is doing to feel like it's not what's best for us? No, we know that what Christ does, anything that he is going to choose is what's best for us, even if we may not like it, but we know it's what's best.

Well, that's how men are supposed to be. They're supposed to be so loving to their church or sorry, to their wives that the wife would know that, well, he's always got my best interest in mind.

So clearly the men have the more difficult task. OK. And so as we look at that, you know, again, this passage in Ephesians five is not giving a blueprint of just submission of wives to husbands, but it's a blueprint of how we all submit to one another, wives to their own husbands, husbands loving their wife.

So how does the husband submit to the wife? By loving her like Christ loved the church. How do children submit to their parents?

By obeying what they say. How do fathers submit to their children? By not frustrating them.

How do slaves obey or submit to their masters? By obedience. You see, each one of those is categorizing how we are submissive to one another.

Does that make sense so far? OK. Because I know this is not the way most people end up teaching this, but hopefully you're seeing it's within the context here.

I think the reason some people have a problem with it is because, well, we have chapter breaks and verse breaks that were never there.

Right. In Paul's day, no one read verse 22 or 22 to 24 by itself.

Actually, not just 22. This was never read outside of reading verse 21. It would be read in context.

You know, that same context is here in Peter. You know, as we go back to Peter, we were looking at Peter and we had been looking at the idea of submission.

Now, if you remember back at starting at chapter 2, verse 11, what did he talk about? In chapter 2, verse 11, he built up to this idea of, which we see in verse 13, submit yourselves for the

Lord's sake to every human institution, whether to a king as authority or to governors, as they are sent by him to punish for the punishment of evildoers and the praise of those who do good.

So here was the first element that we start seeing about submission. Right. What was it? To submit to a human institution.

Well, if you're not submitting to a human institution, what's the only other institution you could submit to? A divine one. Right. He's saying to submit even to a human institution there.

We talked about that. But then if you drop down to verse 18, we saw another way that he talks about submission.

In 1 Peter 2, 18, slaves, be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only to those who do good and gentle, not only to those who are good and gentle, but to those who are unreasonable.

So now the second level of submission he brings up, you submit to government. Now he talks about submitting slaves to masters, but to unreasonable masters, to people who are abusive in their control.

Right. And he says to that, you be submissive. So again, we end up seeing that there was the submission to government, the submission to slaves to masters.

And then as we get into chapter 3, it talks about submission of wives. Now look what it says in chapter 3, verse 1.

In the same way, well, in what same way? In the same way of what he was talking about in chapter 2.

Right. When he got done talking about slaves submitting to their masters, he ends up using Christ as an example for us and then gets back to that.

So what you have is he's talking submission to government, submissions to masters, gets into this, here's an example of Christ being a slave of being submissive.

And then let's get back to the idea of submission in the same way, wives be submissive to your own husbands.

Now, as Kevin brought out, when we looked at this some weeks ago, though the word submit doesn't appear in Ephesians 5 .22,

it does appear here in the Greek. So the word is here to submit. And as we see it here, though,

I want you to notice the trend. Submitting to a human institution, submitting to an unreasonable master.

And then this is now submitting to an unsaved husband. Look at what it says. In the same way, you wives be submissive to your own husbands, so that even if any of them are disobedient to the word, they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives.

So what is he talking about? The idea is not saying you submit in the obedience thing.

It's the idea that this submission is in the extreme in all three of these cases. So you have the categories here again.

But what do you see in this? Different than Ephesians 5. Ephesians 5 is giving different areas of life where we submit. Here he's giving the extreme cases.

Here he's saying, okay, you submit even to a human institution. You submit even to an unreasonable master.

You submit even to an unsaved husband. And what's the goal in each of those that you end up seeing?

In each of those, you end up seeing that his focus with the slave is your testimony, right?

The issue that we saw with the government is what? Your testimony. What is the incident here?

This is an easy question. It's your, I'm actually expecting an answer, testimony. See, it wasn't very hard, right?

So you see the pattern here in each three of these. Your submission to a human institution, we do that.

And the goal, the thinking is our testimony. What does our testimony look like? As a slave submitting to our master, what is our focus?

What is our testimony going to look like? A wife submitting to her unsaved husband, her concern is what's her testimony look like?

A testimony so strong that she could win over her husband, an unbelieving husband, not just unbelieving, but the way it's explained here, a disobedient to the word.

He's not just not believing. He refuses to believe.

It's even stronger. It's that he's fighting it, okay? So you have someone like that.

What do you do to win them over, right? Now, let me say this. That's not just wives.

I remember when I was up and doing some evangelism in Toronto. One of the guys that was evangelizing with us, he got saved and his wife did not.

In fact, when he got saved, she became a hardened atheist. And he didn't know what to do. He was very frustrated. He was looking at the fact that they were probably going to have to separate because of the fact that they were just going so totally different ways.

And every time he'd go to church, it irked her so much she'd purposely do things, you know, just to drive him nuts.

And he didn't know what to do. And I went to this passage. And he said, well, wait, this is wives to husbands. The reality is it works both ways.

As a husband to an unsaved wife, you should win her over with love, which he ended up doing.

And I ended up running into him some years later, and he told me that she became a believer. Well, why?

Because he stopped fighting her all the time over it and just wanted to have a strong testimony to her.

Why? Because her salvation became more important than winning an argument. And in the case here of an unsaved wife, that her husband's salvation might be more important than winning an argument.

You see, now, let's take the step back and look at the broader context of 1 Peter. What have we been saying through each of these lessons?

What's the focus of 1 Peter? Yeah, persecution, right? Suffering. That's what you're starting to say, right?

It's the idea of how do we deal with persecution? When we're suffering, how do we deal with these things?

So let's look in that context and say, well, how would this work then in that context? Well, you're being persecuted.

At a time when you're being persecuted, might that be a time that you might want to fight against government when they're persecuting you?

If you're a slave and your master is being unreasonable, might that be a time you want to refuse to obey and fight against it?

If you have an unsaved spouse, might that be a time you want to fight that?

You see, in each one of these, the focus that we have to have is that we have to have the bigger view of saying, what's our testimony before the world, the government, or our master, or an unsaved husband?

You see how that fits in? So I don't think this is the way that many end up seeing this. And actually, as I was preparing for this,

I talked to a number of people, the advantage of being at a big conference with lots of people, then followed up by a pastor's conference with lots of pastors.

It's a good place to just bounce ideas off people. And one of the things as I was talking with folks, they end up saying, you know what?

I never really thought of it this way, but it fits within the context. Because we end up hearing this preach, is we'll hear just the

Ephesians 5, 22 for the wives, and then the rest of that's for the husbands. We'll read these six verses to the wives, and then we'll read seven to the husbands, as if it's not in any broader context.

But I think when we look at the broader context, it's clear that you and I are to submit to one another. Now, is there going to be a difference within our families?

Well, yes. I'm going to put my bride in, I'm going to have more focus on her than anyone else, right?

Because I have a responsibility to her, right? So I'm going to submit to her in a greater way than I might

Chris. No offense, Chris. It had nothing to do with spilling the coffee, which you didn't do this week.

But no, right? We do have within our families, there's a greater responsibility.

And so there's going to be, that submission may be different, right? The children's submission to the parent is different than the parent's submission to the children.

They're within the same family. The wife's submission to the husband is different than the husband to the wife, even though they're in the same family. But yet, we submit to one another, you see?

And that's, I think, the real missing piece when people teach this is the mutual submission that we have to one another.

These things describe how we submit. But the thing is that we all are to be submissive to one another.

Does that make sense? Okay. Let me stop there and see if there's any questions. I'll look at you. You don't have any questions?

Are you in agreement? I was going to let you go. I was going to let you come up and teach it because you've been studying.

He's been preparing for it for a couple of weeks. Oh, okay. I always study. So there you go. Well, that is true.

I just have a question. I had someone bring up the submit to one another. They said adapt to one another, not like submit, but adapt to one another.

Could it mean adapt? Because we're all so different. Well, it has the idea of more of a term.

The term is actually more of like if you enter into the Army, you're assigned, you're placed as a private.

And so it's more of the word is not that one person is better than the other because what can happen?

That private could be reporting to a colonel or to a sergeant, but then he might become a higher rank.

It's possible, right? And so the idea there, it's the place that you're in. So when you end up looking at it, when

I look at this, what do I see? The place you're in. Husbands, wives, children, fathers, slaves, masters.

In the other passage we looked at, human institutions, unreasonable masters, unsaved husbands, right?

So you end up seeing the place that you're in. Husband. This is going to be a dumb thing.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, you see what it is, though, is that if we think about it, look at each of those categories.

And what we end up seeing is what we're to do is to realize God placed us here. Right. We had a for those who are there for the when we're looking at going through the

Constitution, we're talking about marriage and divorce and remarriage. Right. Going through different issues.

And one of the things that I was saying is, look, we don't get to choose how our life is going to turn out. We'd like to think that.

But I'm sure all of us had different plans for our lives at different points than the way they actually turned out.

Right. And so as you as you look at that, we have to accept the place that God's put us. So you have someone who's married to an unsaved person.

Is that difficult? Yeah. I've counseled many women that have been married and both sides.

But it seems like it's more women that are married to unsaved men. And I've counseled women that they marry the person when they were a believer and the other was a nonbeliever.

And they're struggling with the fact that they made that choice. OK. That's where you're placed.

Right. That's the submission. You're in that place. So you're assigned if you want to use that. But it's it's that's where you're put under to.

This is your kind of station in life. Now, God is in control. Guess what? He knew that this is what was best.

We may not know that. Right. But sometimes that works on our sanctification. I mean, where do we grow the most? Do we do we grow more like Christ in times of comfort or times of trial?

Trial. Right. And yet we want to avoid the trials, don't we? When we avoid the trials, we're actually avoiding the thing that's going to help us grow.

Right. So. So, you know, the idea, I think the overarching idea that we have in First Peter is not to avoid the trials, not to avoid where you are in life, because that's where you're going to grow the most.

Right. That makes sense. As far as submission,

I think it's as if your enemy is hungry, feed him if he is thirsty, give him a drink. Instead of doing, you will keep coals of fire on his head.

It's in a way it's a type of submission. You're submitting yourself to the

Lord and instead of doing, you're feeding your enemy and you're giving him a drink.

That's what Romans what? Well, 1220. But because of that submission, it's a powerful thing.

Yeah. And it has the effect of bringing like the judgment that calls a fire on somebody's head when you're submitting as to the

Lord. Yeah. Very powerful thing that people feel the conviction of, even though there's nothing like in the first Peter text, there's nothing really being said.

Yeah. But it's still a very convicting thing when you're submitting, say in that case, first Peter to your husband.

Yeah. The husband feels under judgment. Correct. Yeah. And that's the whole thing of it. And that's why

I think he's trying to, Peter's bringing it out here as well, is the idea that how do you win him over without a word?

It's when you love someone who is not treating you well, right? You show love.

They feel guilty. How many here saw the movie Fireproof? Okay. So you guys will get this. The rest of you, go watch it.

It's probably my favorite movie. But what do you have? Okay.

Now, for those that didn't watch it, I'm going to spill the beans. Oh, well. But you have a husband and wife who are fighting.

Husband gets saved, and he's got to deal with the fact that he's going to try to win over his wife, right? So he creates this whole thing of a love dare.

He sets up a thing that every day he's going to do something to prove that he loves her no matter how much she tries to fight it.

And that's the idea here is what happens with that? Well, you accept this is life for me, right?

And we've been going through this. We've been going through this a number of times, right? As we were talking about submission to government, right?

The whole idea of guess what? The government may make laws that we don't like.

We submit, right? Now, we talked about the fact that in this country, the law is the constitution.

It's not the president. And that's really the issue. I think for many of us

Christians, we're saying we are obeying Romans 13 by obeying the law, which gives us freedoms that they're trying to force things on us that are illegal.

They don't have the right to do that, right? So that becomes the issue. But in a place where if the law of the land was that we didn't have a constitution that gave us these freedoms, as a

Christian, we would have to submit to that. Would that be hard? Sure, it would be. But in each of these cases, what we end up seeing is these are case after case of difficult situations that we submit to.

And in that submission, the focus is that our testimony would be different, that people would see the testimony.

And I'll show this just before we get to Kenny. But I mentioned before the case of the guard in North Korea, where a guy had gotten saved.

He fled North Korea, became a Christian. As a Christian, he felt he had to go back to North Korea because they didn't have a gospel presence there.

Went back into North Korea, was arrested for his faith, was being tortured by a guard, all the guards.

And what this guy would do is pray for them. And when the guy was eventually killed, one of the guards got saved.

Because the guilt he had over beating someone and that one showing love.

That's why you read Voice of the Martyrs. That's why they said that the blood of the martyrs were the seed of the church.

The way they handled their martyrdom, their death, had such a testimony that people were getting converted.

Because this is not the way you behave, right? It's unnatural to be treated unreasonably and return that with love.

And so what should be the case of a wife who has an unsaved husband? Her concern for his soul should be so great that she doesn't try to badger him with the gospel.

She doesn't try to refuse things in his leadership of the home.

But to submit in such a way that even without words, he's going to feel the guilt because he feels the love.

Now, Kenny, you had a question. Well, I mean, you know, in the context of the whole letter, my problem is that unsaved husband.

But, I mean, as I thought through it more as you were talking, in the context of the whole letter,

I mean, the same principle could apply to... Well, the same principle could apply to a saved husband.

But I think what you have, just like with the servant, the slave and the master being an unreasonable master, because look at what it says in 1

Peter 2, 13, right? Slaves be submissive to your own masters with all respect.

So he gives the characterization, right? Not those who are good and gentle, not those. That's easy. He's focused on those that are unreasonable.

Okay, the reason I would say this example is wives to an unsaved husband is, one, they're described as being disobedient to the word, refusing the word.

They'd have to be an unbeliever to be refusing the word. But the second is, the whole thing is that they're won over by the behavior.

So if they're won over, what are they won over to? From disobedience to the word to won over to the word.

So it would have to be an unbeliever. But does that mean that women that are married to saved people, saved men, don't have to be submissive?

No. Just like the slaves have to be submissive to the master who's good and gentle. But Peter is trying to use the extreme.

And so the extreme for the slave is an unreasonable master. The extreme for the wife is an unsaved husband.

And keep in mind, why would he use this example? Well, I think part of it, and unlike Paul, where Paul focuses one verse on the men and several verses, sorry, one verse on a woman and several verses on the men,

Peter does the reverse. He gives one verse to the men and several verses to the women.

But why might he do this? Why would he focus on this? Because he's focusing on the extremes of the situations of suffering.

Does that make sense? And so that's why I think he puts this in here. It was just a thought. Yeah. Go ahead, Gina. So I'm glad you put it like this because I've heard very many.

Okay. Are you saying you don't have a problem with this anymore? No, it's getting better. It's getting better.

1 Timothy 2 where it says, Mm -hmm. 1

Timothy 2 .12. Well, actually 11. And so I met some people that will hook that up with verse 12 as well and then hook that up with.

With this here. Yeah. Correct. And make the women just be like under their thumb. Yeah. You know what

I mean? Yes. And I'm actually working with a couple right now where they're in a church that that's what they're doing.

They take the 1 Peter 2, 11 to 14. They put it with Ephesians 5, 22.

They put it here with 1 Peter 3, 1 to 6. They put these together, okay, and say, well, see, this is the way a wife is supposed to be.

What do they do in that? And what that is, when you see people do that, that is called proof texting.

Okay. Now, proof texting isn't always bad, but it's often bad. Okay. What proof texting is, is where you take a passage from here, a passage from here, a passage from here, slam them together, and you say, this is what the

Bible teaches. Now, that's fine to do if each of those passages are in context.

So we looked at the context of Ephesians. We looked at the context of 1 Peter. Let's look at the context of 1

Timothy 2. First off, what is 1 Timothy? And we didn't teach on this, but some of you may know.

What's the purpose of 1 Timothy? Timothy 2, to what?

Okay. And all of that, but all of that was under, as Gina said, the church, instructions for the church, right?

It's like the blueprints of church, how church should function. So these are instructions for church.

Now, let's see if this fits the way some people use it. This means women are supposed to be silent.

And with this one case I'm dealing with, you end up having someone who's being told that a woman is not allowed to teach other women, not even allowed to teach children other than their own children, and only at home.

So a woman can't do a Sunday school. Now, let's take a look at 1 Timothy 2 and do some looking at this.

First thing we know about it is the context is instructions for church. Okay. So it says that a woman must quietly receive instruction.

Okay. So what you end up having here is that it's dealing with the learning.

Now, what was going on in that day? How would men and women have learned in a synagogue?

Well, they wouldn't have been together. They would have separate sections. And I've been into some synagogues where if you go to an

Orthodox synagogue, like on a High Holy Day, they may have the men and women together. But the men are on one side, the women are on another, and there's a dividing wall.

Old men and I would like that too. Yeah. Okay. And so you'd have that separation.

In the synagogues, they would have a separate area of training off. And so what happens now when men and women get together?

Well, some will argue that women might have been too chatty. I mean, that never happens. I understand. Men can be chatty too, though.

But the issue that I end up seeing with it as you look at this is it's about the receiving of instruction.

Okay. So this doesn't have to do with them talking. It's that they're to receive quietly the instruction.

Right. And then it's going to say, talk about teaching right after that. But I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority.

Now, here's the interesting thing with this. Does this apply outside of the church? That's the question. Right. Now, the argument for why a woman cannot teach or have a teacher have exercise authority over a man, as we see in verse 13 and 14.

The first reason is the creation order. Adam was created first and then Eve. So because of that headship, that's the reason for this instruction.

The second was the sin order. Eve was deceived first. And therefore, because she was deceived, that is why this instruction is here.

So for whatever we want to say about it, God is putting this back to creation.

Okay. Now, does this mean that a woman can't ever give instruction to a man? Well, most people tend to focus on this.

They'll talk about preaching, authoritative preaching, and they focus on the exercise authority.

Now, the exercise authority in 1 Timothy 2 is the idea of a forceful authority.

You have some force. You have some leverage or threat that you have over somebody. The word for teach is just a general instruction.

Now, let's give an example. Some guys work in corporations where they work for a woman.

Is that biblical? Does she have forceful authority over a man? Yeah. She can fire him.

Right. She has forceful authority. So the question, though, is can a woman give general instruction to a man?

So here's the example. You've got a contractor coming in your house. The husband's not home. Can the wife tell the contractor what to do?

It's a general instruction, right? Now, those who want to take this and say it applies everywhere in life because it's based on a creation order, here's the dilemma.

Do we have an example where a woman is giving a man instruction, general instruction, or having forceful authority outside of the church, and it's commended or we know it's not a sin?

Well, there is an example. Jesus Christ, who cannot sin, instructed women to go instruct the disciples.

They gave a general instruction to men, and they were told to do so by Christ, who cannot sin.

So if Christ can't sin and he tells them to do this, it must not be a sin for them to do this.

Therefore, women can give a general instruction to men. You have a contractor come in the home.

She can do that because a woman can give general instruction to the disciples. So when we look at that and look at this now,

I'm saying now, how do I apply this? This is then applied only to the church, which fits with the context of the whole book.

Even though within the church the purpose for it is rooted in creation, this doesn't apply outside of church then.

Do you follow the reasoning there? Okay, so what am I doing now? I'm taking the Ephesians 5, we looked at context.

I'm taking the 1 Peter 3, look at the context. I'm taking 1 Timothy 2 and looking at context. Now I look at this and say, well, 1

Timothy 2, a woman must, you know, some will say a woman must be silent. And I know, you know,

Yim and I went to a home church many years ago. And as they were going through 1

Timothy, they came to the conclusion women had to be absolutely silent in church. They ended up having it where women can't even sing.

You know, they were to be silent in church. And, you know, the guy who is leading this home group,

I'm like, his wife was like very chatty. She loved to talk. And I'm just like, yeah, we'll see how long that lasts.

But, you know, I don't think it applies the way many people are, you know, the way that's applying is a receiving of instruction.

So I definitely don't think that it deals with singing, you know, or being able to pray.

But, you know, one of the things is that we have to keep in mind that the way we typically teach is not the way in the first century in the pagan culture that instruction would be done.

See, instruction then is there be people that would be shouting out during the instruction. OK, asking questions or giving correction or saying that could be common.

OK, when you go across the world, there's differences in the way that you have. I always think about MacArthur.

He was he said when he first went to when the wall came down and he went over to Russia to preach.

And he said the first time preaching a Russian in Russia. And what were they? He said he says they were just shouting out.

They were either things like, you know, an agreement or disagreement. He said the other thing they would do is he goes, he's looking up and he just sees paper always falling down.

What they would do is they their style was at the end of someone gives an instruction at the end.

It's expected that you're going to have questions. And so what they do is they're they're writing questions and throwing it over the balcony and it's just fluttering down.

Then they pass it up. So at the end, these are all the questions that he had to answer. He also mentioned that they also go for like six hours.

You know, he's like, you know, he thought after an hour of teaching, you'd be done. And they were like, where's the rest of it?

You see things, you know, we have to think of the culture that it was in as well. So there could be an issue where you have if you have where this if the instruction is that women are to not be teaching or having authority in church.

And people are shouting out things that are correction or agreements or other illustrations during a teaching time.

Could you see how a woman could be teaching while receiving instruction? Right. Same way how people can can gossip during prayer meetings.

Right. They take the gossip and put it you clothe it in a prayer. You know, you know, go pray for so -and -so.

He was drunk at the bar last night. You know, when you just saw his car, you know, nearby or something.

Right. It's like people do that. And so I think the reason for the woman quietly receiving instruction is that in that cultural situation, she shouldn't be shouting out like the men would do, because that could be a form of teaching.

Does that help? OK. Also, I heard that since the women inside, they were yelling questions. What do they mean,

Harry, or something? Well, but yeah, so yeah, I think I have heard before that.

But the thing is that people say, well, because the men and women were separate, the wives are shouting out. Here's the problem. This was not where Timothy is.

This isn't a Jewish culture. So I don't I think the whole thing is they weren't separate. And that's so so I have read that in a commentary before.

I just don't think it fits with the context because the Cretans wouldn't have been using a Jewish model.

And so I don't think they I think they would have been together. And then, you know, for Timothy, it would have been very strange. So Timothy would be the one having the problem with it.

OK. Any other questions? Did you have your hand up or. OK. I don't know if you were just leaning it on the chair or if it was a question.

Well, you're just you looked at your watch and are laughing. So you look and I'm saying

I'm over time or are you. Yeah, we had six hours left.

Well, you can verify that I could probably talk for six hours. They said usually preach, brother, preach.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that's the funny thing is I can I've preached in New York City for three and a half hours straight.

No one asked me to stop. And everyone stuck around. Do that in a church on Sunday. And, you know, it's like, hey, it's noon.

Yeah. So and I don't think we're going to get much further than the word submissive.

I actually didn't think we were going to get through all verse six. Look, I knew that I wasn't getting the six verses in, but.

But we'll get back to submissiveness in verse five. I mean, I'm really looking forward to, you know, verse six.

That's, you know, I'm hoping that by the end of my next lesson, you know, I'm going to be calling me

Lord. Right. No, that's not happening.

But we'll get to that context. Mr. Mr. Mr. Lord. But, you know, this is this is one of the things

I thought that it comes up. And I wanted to take the time to take a step back and look at this, put it in its context so that it's clear.

Because unfortunately, this is one of many passages that a lot of people misinterpret. And they do so because, well, for many reasons.

For one, there are people that like to be dominant, both men and women. Right. I mean, that is if you go back to Genesis chapter three, that's exactly what the curse is, that the wife would want the position of the husband.

So the whole, you know, what they used to say in the 70s, the gender wars, it's that started in Genesis chapter three.

You know, that was that creation where the husband is going to he's going to want to dominate and the wife is going to want to be the head.

Right. So the husband doesn't want to lovingly lead. That would have been the original model.

And the wife, instead of just saying, well, I'm going to follow your lead, is going to go, no, I'm going to fight it. I want to be the one making the decisions.

And the guy's response is going to be, no, I'm going to force you to obey me. And so you end up seeing that a lot. You end up seeing in a husband wife relationship.

There's typically one who is more dominant in a lot of unsafe households. It's it's the wife.

I had heard that from Paul. We know every man, every woman has that and we just met that true.

No. Yes. Yeah. I mean, I don't think. Yeah, it's part of the curse, but I don't think that it means that every man is going to want to be abusive to his wife and every wife is going to want to dominate the husband.

I guess more like, but it is a general domineering. Yeah. You know, every woman has that trait also to want to lead.

But because we're Christians that. Well, but see, there's there's unbelievers who understand these principles, too. Right.

So it is it is a general principle. It is it's part of the curse. The reason you have this dominance issue within a family structure is because of the curse.

It doesn't mean that every single relationship has that, but it is it is generally true. Yeah. No other questions.

Are you waiting till after that? No, no. He's been he's been like waiting for this, this verse.

I don't want to die. I just have to be able to keep somebody else.

Yeah. So I understand both sides. Yeah, it's a good thing. I actually had a woman say to me once, if we were married,

I could make you do it. Yeah. You know, something says that that may not be the case, that, yeah, marriage doesn't change that.

Actually, one of the one of the problems is, you know, and when I counsel people in marriage,

I often talk about a book because I, I know the author and I know that the book probably isn't valuable.

But the title of the book actually defines what much, much of my marriage counseling seems to be.

I know I'm perfect. I just want my spouse to be also. Right. That's the big problem

I have mostly with marriage counseling is like both parties think they're the perfect one. It's the other one that has to change and they never look at themselves.

It's why if you ever do any marriage counseling with me, you'll you'll find what I do is when I talk to a husband, I talk about what the husband has to work on.

When I talk to the wife, I talk what the wife has to work on. And when they're together, I talk about what they both have to work.

Right. As a general principle, I don't talk to the wife about all the things the husband's doing wrong or with the husband about all the things the wife is doing wrong.

Right. Focus on them. And because it's fitting with what we're learning here.

Right. They have to accept their position in life. Whatever the spouse is doing, they have to submit.

Right. Regardless. And just unto the Lord. That's I think the key. If there's not a love and intimacy with Christ, if you're not submitting to that, you're going to have a very tough time.

Correct. Because if your intimacy level with Christ is not strong, then they become kind of black and white regulations that don't seem to hit home with you because you're struggling with something, almost trying to take a hold of it legally, as opposed to you submitting yourself to Christ.

That he's, you know, servant is not above his master. My master went through all this. He was judged unrighteously, he says, and he bore it.

He submitted himself to it. He says, so I follow after him. That's lacking. He says, how are you going to submit?

And we're growing in that. Exactly. And that's why in each one of these passages, what do we see in Christ, in Christ, in Christ?

You know, that's the thing. This is this is not it. We're doing this for our spouse, but we're really doing it to the

Lord. Right. And and the whole thing and the whole thing of first Peter, right. The mindset, if we're doing this unto the

Lord, that's what changes our perspective. And so that's the whole thing here. It's unto the

Lord. How can we deal with the suffering? We know Christ suffered far more than us and he was righteous.

Right. That's the example that Peter gives. How much more can we suffer for a little while? Our suffering is for just a little while, but then eternity we have.

I mean, and that's the perspective he keeps wanting us to have. And now what he's doing is giving all these different scenarios where we have this scenario and that scenario.

In this scenario, we were seeing what how this plays out. How does this are keeping our testimony?

How is it? What is it like to have this perspective in these different circumstances? So so the focus of first Peter three is not so much on the the the wife's submission.

And that's what the whole thing is. What I find most people focus on in this passage is the wife's mission.

And that's actually not I don't think the main issue. I think the main issue is our love for Christ and love and our wanting to have a good testimony.

And I think this fits with the context that started back at chapter two, verse 11. As you recall, because grace also suffered for us, leaving us an example.

Yes. You should follow his steps. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's that. So he just got done is saying to the master in chapter two or to a slave, you you submit to the unruly master.

Christ is the example. Right. For for showing one is for you, for this reason, this is the purpose clause.

So, yeah. Higher law. And that see, that changes everything. You know, what I see is right now in America, we have so many people wanting to fight the government.

And I'll admit I'm one of them. OK. And I do go back and forth on this issue because I'm going, we fight the government.

But then there's this higher law. And OK, so the government is is overstretching and over doing things.

It doesn't have the authority to do and do it. OK. But at the same time, I struggle with my testimony has to be that even these unsaved people would want to come to Christ over.

Right. It's a struggle. But that's the same struggle as in this verse that an unsaved woman is going to have or sorry, a saved woman is going to have with an unsaved husband.

Right. OK. Any any last questions before we close out? All right. Then let's let's close in prayer.

And then next week, just a reminder, next week, we do not have study. I'll be up in Boston.

So we won't have study next week. But the week after, maybe we'll get through these first six verses.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we are so grateful for the many blessings that you give to us. Lord, so much of this book, as we've seen, is to get our perspective right, to get our mindset right, that we would be focused upon you, focused on eternity.

Help us, Lord, to be keeping that mindset so we'd have an eternal perspective that we'd be striving for eternity every day.

That we wanting to to put in the perspective of everything that we have in life in saying, what do you desire first?

Thinking of the higher law of what you have, that we could deal with any circumstance then, Lord. We could be slaves to unruly masters.

We could be wives married to unsaved men. We could deal with those things if we have our minds fixated upon you.

So we thank you for this, Lord, and ask that you would just be glorified and honored in what we do.

We thank you for it in Christ's name. Amen. Are you tired of pillows that go flat or every couple of years they smell bad and what are you going to do with them?

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