For some of you, this
past week has been pretty stressful. For some of you, this past lifetime has
been pretty stressful so I have some characteristics to see if you and your
family are stressed, just so you will know. That way you can be working on it.
- Bizarre and Recurring Dreams
- Jaw and Tooth Pain
- Hair Loss and Changes
- Stomachaches and Intestinal Problems
- Twitching
- Acne
- Regular Illness
- Irregular Periods and Severe Cramps
- Itchy Skin and Rashes
- Abdominal Fat
If that is the way it is at your house, you may have stress in
your life. Everybody with a job that requires you to work with people probably
makes the joke that this job would be great if it weren’t for all these people.
People cause stress. It is universal and for all times. Everybody is busy and
everybody gets their nerves in a knot every now and then.
There are libraries full of books and tapes on how to de-stress
and how to make the most of your time and how not to let people bother you.
These people have some good ideas like get enough sleep, de-clutter your space,
set boundaries, be positive, and take time for yourself. Those aren’t bad ideas
to try but why is it that even after you do all of those things, somebody can
walk up and with one sentence, send your blood pressure through the roof?
I know that we have so many things going right now these days
and everything seems to be happening at once and everybody wants your full
attention for everything they are doing that you sometimes don’t feel
like being Christ-like. Your spouse is getting on your nerves, your boss, your
employees, your kids are all acting crazy. Why don’t they listen to you? You
know you have the right answer. It’s obvious and yet everybody wants to do
something else. Crazy people!
Does that sound like your house, your job, your family…your
church? Well, the Bible has some wise
words for all of us. Imagine that. Our passage this evening is in Ephesians 5, verse 21. “21 Submit to one another out of
reverence for Christ.” Now, good luck finding that in any of those self-help
books but if we can get that right then it will manifest itself in all of our
relationships. If we submit to one another out of reverence for Christ then our
relationship with our spouse will honor the Lord. If we can submit to each
other out of reverence for Christ then our relationships at home will honor
Christ and also for our relationships at work. If we submit to one another out
of reverence for Christ then our whole lives will honor Christ.
There is, of course, one
small problem. When I say the word “submit”
what is your natural reaction? I can almost guarantee you that your first
natural reaction was not. “Oh, ok. No
problem. That’s easy.” Right? It’s the same problem we had over in chapter 4, verse 2 where it says to be
completely humble and gentle, with patience and love. Oh, sure. Want me to give
a million dollars away too?
There are at least 3 questions that come up when one
considers the prospect of submitting to another person. They are good and
natural questions and need to be answered.
1) If I submit to my husband, parents or boss, does that mean that
I am inferior to them?
2) If I don’t look out for myself, then who will?
3) What if the person to whom I submit abuses their role?
To answer all 3 of those
questions it is helpful to know exactly what that word “submit” actually means.
It was originally a Greek military term meaning to arrange in military fashion
under the control of a leader. It shows order and purpose. In non-military use
it was a voluntary attitude of giving in, cooperating, assuming responsibility
and carrying a burden. It quite literally means “to put under”. (Strong’s Concordance)
Now, does putting
yourself under someone else mean that you are inferior to that person as in
question 1? Martin Luther wrote that “we
are to sharply distinguish between these two, the office and the person.”
As a person, we are all created equally. Since this is a military term, let’s
think about how the military operates. Everyone in the military has a rank.
Without it, there would be chaos. Nothing would get done.
My Uncle Bill is quite a character and
evidently always has been. When he joined the army they, of course, sent him to
boot camp. He said he was there for only a couple of weeks and they sent
another group of young men to the camp to start their basic training. Uncle
Bill thought it would be funny to wake the brand new recruits up in the middle
of the night and claim he was a sergeant. He made them get dressed and do
pushups and even got them out in the yard to do some marching. He screamed at
them and told them they were worthless and all the stuff the real sergeant had
been screaming at him. He thought that
was real funny until the next day when they figured out what happened and made
him stand in front of everybody in camp and salute himself in front of a mirror
and order himself to do pushups. True story. See, without order, the military would collapse and so would the church and
so would our lives and our relationships. But at the same time, if the lowliest
private is trapped behind enemy lines, the military will still do everything
possible to get him back because they recognize the value of the man as a
person.
John 3:16 says that “God so loved the world…” He died
for everybody, not just the famous people or the rich or the ones who make
laws. What you have to realize is that part of the definition that says to
submit is a voluntary act of putting yourself under another. And what happens
when you put yourself under someone? You lift them up. It’s not about being
inferior. It is about voluntarily lifting others up out of reverence for
Christ.
The second question that
might be asked is, “If I don’t look out
for myself, then who will?” And it is a shame that this question has to be
asked but it’s a natural. If I lift other people up; if I submit myself to
others out of reverence for Jesus, then who is going to lift me up and meet my
needs?
My first response to that
question is that we are not guaranteed to have anybody in our life to meet our
needs as we see them. I’m sorry to be blunt but it is just a fact. Ask Paul who
is writing this. He spent his whole life lifting others up and lifting Jesus up
and there were times in his life when I think we can all agree that his needs
as we would define them were not met. You know the passage in II Corinthians 11 where Paul describes
his hardships; beaten, shipwrecked, stoned, hungry, thirsty, etc.
But there is something
else I want us to see about this verse and that is that it is a command. Paul
is not asking. He is not saying, “Hey, it
would be nice if you could…” This is a command to submit to each other. And
what happens when we are obedient to a command? BOOCOD? There are blessings of obedience and consequences of disobedience.
What happened when
Abraham was obedient and left his comfortable home? Blessings. What happened
when David was obedient and killed Goliath? Blessings. What happened when Peter
was obedient and got out of the boat? Blessings. What happens when Unchained
Biker Church is obedient and preaches the Gospel in prisons? BLESSINGS! When we
are obedient to what God tells us to do, God takes care of His children. It may
not be how we think it should be done. But He always takes care of us.
Lastly, when you are
submissive to others in a church, do you know what happens? What have I said
about our attitudes? They are contagious. If you walk into a church where
everybody has to have their way, how are you going to act? But when we as a
church submit ourselves to each other in reverence for Christ, it starts to
catch on. It is not the default attitude for people and so sometimes it may
take a while but God sees it and blesses it and pretty soon we are known as a
church that doesn’t have stress or division or members talking behind each
other’s backs. We are known as a church that has a passion for people and a
passion for Jesus which is just how we want to be known.
The last question I want
to address today is if I submit to someone, what if they abuse that submission?
What if they take advantage of me? This could happen in any one of these roles;
as a wife to a husband, a child to a parent or a slave to a master or even
right here in the church.
To answer that, we must
first see where this authority comes from. It comes from God. God is a God of
order and has established certain authority or leadership roles. He tells
wives, children and workers to be submissive but the husband, parents and
bosses must discern the Lord Himself has given them that authority and it is
not to be abused. It is the same with all Christians. We must submit out of
reverence for Christ who not only wields the authority but also humbled himself
as a servant.
So that submission that
we are commanded to give is not unconditional. That authority is not unlimited.
The submission required is to God’s authority delegated to human beings. If,
therefore, they misuse their God-given authority by commanding what God forbids
or forbidding what God commands then our duty to submit no longer holds and to
do so would disobey and dishonor God.
So, we see that
submission does not make you inferior to the other person. We will be taken
care of by God and be blessed when we submit to others and we see that
authority is not unconditional. So it should be real easy now that we
understand, right? No problem?
I hear you. I do. “Todd, I just can’t do it. I know I should
but I just can’t. I’ve been burned before and I just can’t do it.” As I have told you several times before…you
are exactly right. You can’t do it. No matter how hard you try you will not be
able to submit, at least not for long. But when you come to that realization,
you are right where you are supposed to be.
You see, the answer is
back in verse 18. Let’s go back and
read that. Not the part about not getting drunk although those are wise words
but the latter part. “Be filled with the Spirit.” Everything past verse
18 supposes that you are filled with the Spirit. You can’t speak to one another
with spiritual songs unless you are filled with the Spirit. You can’t submit to
your husband for any length of time without being filled with the Spirit and so
on for children, workers and members of this church.
Everything Paul talks
about here in Ephesians hinges on being in Christ; you do it through Christ;
you do it out of reverence for Christ. You remember what Paul said earlier
about Christ being the cornerstone of the church? You can’t do any of this
without Christ being foremost, filling and working through you. It’s not about
you. Because when you make it about you there will be stress in your home.
There will be stress in your job. There will be stress, disunity and division
in this church.
But with Christ and
through Christ we can be who we are supposed to be and this church will do what
it is supposed to do.
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