Memory text: “Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.” Ephesians 5:22-24.
“Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” Eph. 5:1-2.
Incense was burned every day as part of the morning and evening sacrifices. (Ex. 30:7-8) Incense was also brought into the Most Holy Place during the Day of Atonement. (Lev. 16:12-13). Blood does not smell good, and there was a lot of blood connected with the sanctuary services. But the incense covered that unpleasant smell in both apartments of the sanctuary, and even overflowed the environs of the sanctuary and spread through the camp of Israel.
The incense represented Christ’s work of mediation on our behalf. What saves us is His blood, but the incense represents the sweetness of his mediation on our behalf, how pleasing His sacrifice is to God the Father, who accepts it joyfully and thereby accepts us. This is what allows us to “go boldly before the throne of grace.” (Heb. 4:16; Eph. 3:16)
“But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people. Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving. For of this you can be sure: No immoral, impure or greedy person—such a person is an idolater—has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of such things God’s wrath comes on those who are disobedient. Therefore do not be partners with them.” Eph. 5:3-7
Many make an idol of money, or sex, or power. Idolatry does not mean that the thing we have put in the place of God is necessarily a bad thing; it is often a good thing. We can make idols of our honor, our reputation, our esteem in the community, our skill in our trade, our spouse’s love for us, our love for our children, our wide circle of friends. The problem is not the thing itself, but only that we have put it before God, and God says, “Thou shalt have no other Gods before me.” (Ex. 20:3)
For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. It is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes visible—and everything that is illuminated becomes a light. This is why it is said:
“Wake up, sleeper,
rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.” Eph. 5:8-14.
Is Paul calling for us to be muckrakers and gossips when he says, “expose the fruitless deeds of darkness”? Does he intend for us to be investigative reporters or private detectives, snooping out evil and publicizing it? No, that is not how it works. Rather, the exposing of the darkness is accomplished by the shining of the light. It is the contrast between the way we live and the way they live; if we live as children of light, the light that shines from us exposes the deeds of darkness. So we do not focus on fruitless deeds of darkness, we focus on the light; we focus on living as children of light.
What are we to make of the last three lines? They were likely an early hymn or poem known to both Paul and the Ephesian believers. The Greek words translated "sleeping” or “drowsing" (katheudon) and "dead" (nekron) share an “own” sound on their endings, so they rhyme.
“Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Eph. 5:15-21.
Music is important. Praising God in song is central to worship. For many Adventists, church music is an afterthought, but that is not biblical. Musicians were part of Hebrew worship. The Levites, who were paid from the tithe, provided choral and orchestral music for the sanctuary services; some 4,000 Levites were set apart for this purpose. (1 Chron. 15:16-16:42; 23:2 - 26:32) Did you know that David himself selected 288 full-time skilled musicians to serve at the temple? 1 Chron. 6:31-48; 25.
Excellent music transports us to a higher realm; try the middle movement of Mozart’s concerto for Flute and Harp, K. 299, and see if you do not relate to Salieri’s comment about miraculous music and “such unfulfillable longing.”
“Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.” Eph. 5:22-24.
Here is a passage the Adventist Church has long been trying to write out of the Bible, but that takes some doing, because it isn’t alone. It is not a one-off. “Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.” Col. 3:18. “But I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God.” 1 Cor. 11:3.
“Wives, in the same way submit yourselves to your own husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes. Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight. For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to adorn themselves. They submitted themselves to their own husbands, like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her lord. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear.” 1 Peter 3:1-6
There is no such thing as feministic Christianity. Feminism is of the other persuasion, the spiritual Egypt and Sodom persuasion. Just as many pagan religions had priestesses, almost every modern leftist revolution, including the one currently in progress in the United States, has prominently featured feminism, defenestration of traditional sex roles, and outright gender-bending. What makes Adventists think we can incorporate this blatantly anti-Christian phenomenon into our culture, worship, and doctrine? What makes us think we can claim Scripture as the rule of our faith and practice when we ignore the Bible’s clear teaching of patriarchy?
I do not exaggerate. I am an Adventist from birth, starting in the mother’s room, then cradle roll, then primary, etc. I was raised on the Sabbath School quarterly and Adventist Review. But it was not until I was in my twenties, and for the first time read through the Bible cover to cover, that I discovered passages like these, passages my church had carefully hidden from me:
“Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says.” 1 Cor. 14:34.
“A woman must learn in quietness and full submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, and then Eve. And it was not Adam who was deceived, but the woman who was deceived and fell into transgression.” 1 Tim. 2:12-14.
How can anyone remain in doubt about the biblical model of male spiritual headship—that men should be in the leadership offices of the church—after reading this? And yet probably 85% of Adventist clergy are committed to ordaining women to gospel ministry, and having them serve as conference, union and GC presidents. This is profoundly discrediting to our church. We purport to be a people of the book, but that vain boast is belied by our embrace of feminism and female spiritual headship.
The SDA Church has a dilemma in which the clergy have embraced an unbiblical practice that many among the laity will never accept. The tactic of the last several GC presidents has been to hope that Jesus will return before we must confront this problem. But hope is not a tactic, and maybe it should occur to us that Jesus will not return until we start obeying the Bible with regard to something other than the right day of worship and the state of the dead. Just a suggestion.
“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church—for we are members of his body. ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.’ This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.” Eph. 5:25-33.
A woman’s most deep-seated need is to be loved. Her second most deep-seated need is for security, first, security in her relationship with her husband and the father of her children, second, physical security and, third, economic security. A woman who is loved by her husband as Christ loved the church, with selfless, self-sacrificing love, is a blessed woman indeed. A man who loves his wife that way will be rewarded with her respect and submission, and he will be a blessed man. Those who will not follow Paul’s counsel here are throwing away happiness with both hands.
Why do you think Ellen White was so strong against alcohol? It was not because alcohol harms the liver. It was because a drunk husband and father cannot be the man Paul speaks about in this passage. He cannot be the lover, protector, and provider that God has designed him to be, and his wife will not give him the respect and submission God designed him to have. With an incapacitated and possibly violent husband, the wife will be saddled, as the only responsible adult, with the burden of being the head of household, a role that is stressful to her, and which she does not really want.
The model of patriarchy Paul spells out here is a model that, if followed, will be a tremendous blessing to both wife and husband. God specifies the rule of husbands and fathers not because He hates women, but because He loves men and women both, and wants us all to be happy. He has designed us as sexual beings to be joined together in marriage, a union that, when both husband and wife follow the Ephesians 5 model, will be “a little bit of heaven to go to heaven in.”
It is time for Adventists to stop kicking against the pricks and embrace God’s loving plan for men and women.