Does the Bible Say a Husband Must Also Submit to His Wife?

Ephesians 5 and the Meaning of Mutual Submission

Ephesians 5 22 says wives submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. Whoa timeout. The egalitarian interrupts the verse right before it says submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. And verse 25 says husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church.

So a husband must submit to. Well the fact is that's correct. Wait. Really yes really. A wife must submit to her husband and a husband must also submit but not to his wife. The instruction submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ is followed by three contexts of submission.

Wives to husbands children to parents and slaves to masters. But the text reminds husbands fathers and masters all of whom are men by the way that they have a master they must submit to and he is the Lord Christ.

Headship, Authority, and Christlike Love in Marriage

A wife submitting to her husband is to be a picture of the way the whole church submits to Christ. To submit is to yield to authority. Does Christ submit to the authority of the church. Of course not so.

A husband does not yield to the authority of his wife since God has given headship to the husband as Christ has headship over the church. But as an imitator of Jesus the husband must love his wife as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.

Colossians 3 and Galatians 1 on Christian Conduct

Colossians 3 18 and 19 says wives submit to your husbands as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands love your wives and do not be harsh with them. Countercultural you betcha. But as Galatians 1 10 says if we were trying to please men or women we would not be servants of Christ.

When we understand the text.