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Submit To One Another
Ephesians 5:21-6:9
! Introduction
- Do the “radioactive” game.
- Ask, “what would happen if people tried to power their way through on their own?” “What makes it possible to be successful in this game?”
Do you know that this is how God wants us to live our lives as Christians?
Listen to what the Bible says in Ephesians 5:21, "Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ."
Read it together, put it on an overhead.
!
I. Submission Commanded
In many life situations, we try to use power to gain an advantage for ourselves.
We are naturally selfish and we try to get ahead by selfish actions.
Everyone has power and everyone abuses it.
Husbands have physical power over their wives and some abuse that power through beatings.
But wives also have a certain power.
I have observed wives who through nagging and manipulation drive their husbands crazy.
Parents have power over their children and some use that power wrongly through physical and even sexual abuse.
But children also have a certain power over their parents.
We can probably think of children who through tantrums and misbehaviour drive their parents to despair.
Employers have power over their employees and sometimes abuse that power by underpaying or demanding more than is reasonable.
But employees also have a certain power over their employers and sometimes use that power by stealing from them or not giving them a full days work.
We abuse power with each other even as friends.
We might use the power of talking to get our way.
We might use the power of silence to shame people into doing what we want.
In Christ, there is a new way and that is the way of power yielding instead of power taking.
As part of our new life in Christ, we are commanded in the Bible to submit to one another.
!
II.
Why Submit?
How many of you like this idea and want to do it?
Submission does not come naturally.
In fact, it is probably one of the most difficult things for any of us to do.
When your parents ask you to go and mow the lawn when your favorite show is on, is it something you do gladly?
When your teachers assign homework, do you do everything they say all the time?
If your brother is sitting in your favorite chair, do you let him sit there every time?
When the government says, “wear a seat belt or put on a motorcycle helmet” do you like doing it?
We hate submission.
So, it is important that we listen carefully to why God wants us to submit.
The reason given in the verse is, “out of reverence for Christ.”
What does that mean?
When Jesus was tempted in the wilderness, the devil came to him with three temptations.
Each temptation was a temptation to use power and not to submit to God.
The first temptation was a temptation to supply his own needs by the use of the power he had to make stones into bread.
He did not submit to Satan, but did submit to God when he said, “man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”
The second temptation was to get people to follow him by demonstrating power.
He was tempted by Satan to fall from the temple and show everyone that he could do that without hurting himself.
They would be impressed and follow him.
Once again, Jesus did not submit to Satan, but submitted to the Word of God, by not testing God.
The third temptation was to avoid the hard way of the cross in order to win back the world and do it by bowing down to Satan.
It would have been much easier to do that, but he did not submit to Satan, rather he submitted to God.
As a result, he ended up submitting his body to the Jewish leaders and the Roman soldiers and dying on the cross.
Jesus submitted by giving himself for us.
We read in Ephesians 5:25,26, “…Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word.”
The reason we are to submit is because this is what Jesus did.
Like Jesus, we are not to submit to Satan or sin, but we are to submit to the will of God and to one another as we follow the example of Jesus.
Now the thing we need to take note of is that Jesus did this not because he was weak and couldn’t stand up for himself rather, it was his strategy for winning.
It was a deliberately chosen way of winning because it is more effective.
Jesus won victory over sin by submitting to death.
It was his plan, his way of doing a better thing than using power.
Submission is not an acquiescence, but a strategy.
We do it because according to Jesus example it is a much better strategy.
One time, I watched an interview on TV.
The four people who were talking together were all trying to talk at once.
It was annoying to listen to that conversation and so I turned it off.
Submission is letting someone else speak.
It is deferring to the other so that order and peace can reign.
The basis of submission is selflessness.
Jesus did not die so that he would be happy.
He died so that we would have life.
Submission requires that we try to live in such a way that others benefit.
So submission is a way of being selfless and obeying the command of Jesus to “Do unto others as we would have them do unto us.”
The biggest problem with submission is that we are afraid that it will cost us too much.
There is a word for this attitude and that is lack of faith.
When we submit, we do so because we believe that God, who is just and holy and loving, is in charge.
Thus, when we submit, we do it as an act of trust in God.
!
III.
Practical Submission
We know that naturally we like to use power.
In Christ, we are invited to choose a new way of acting.
What does submission mean in the most significant relationships we have in life?
!! A. Among God’s People
The context of the verse is one about the church and that says that we ought to submit to one another in church and among our Christian friends.
Can you imagine what kind of a world it would be if instead of God’s people all insisting on their own way, we learned to submit to one another?
What would it do in your circle of friends if you were less demanding and more submitting with one another?
!! B. In Marriage 5:22-33
Someday, you will get married.
Submission is important in your relationship as husband and wife.
Wives give up their power in the marriage by voluntary submission to their husbands.
It does not say women in general are to submit to men in general, but rather that Christian wives are to chose to lay down power and submit to their own husbands.
Such submission does not in any way suggest that the husband is better than her.
Rather, it is a voluntary decision to submit.
When we look at it that way, then submission is not servility to an autocrat, but rather it ought to be voluntary, wholehearted, sincere and enthusiastic.
The "wife fulfills her duty by properly submitting to her husband, not by compelling him to love her."
The husband also lays down his use of power in the relationship and defers, or submits to his wife by loving her.
This was written in the context of Paul's day.
Marriages in that day were in trouble in every culture.
Among the Jews, men could divorce their wives fairly easily.
If their wife did not please them, they could get a divorce.
Among the Greeks there was a lack of companionship in marriage and sexual pleasure was often sought outside of marriage.
Many Romans practiced what was no less than serial polygamy in which wives were little more than disposable property.
In such a context, the call for a husband to love his wife was a radical call.
It was and is a different way of living than many in the world.
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