When Paul addresses husbands in Ephesians 5, he doesn't say what many men secretly hope he'll say.

He doesn't say, "Husbands, rule your wives." He doesn't say, "Husbands, make sure everyone knows who's in charge." He doesn't say, "Husbands, you have the final word, so use it."

He says: "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her."

The standard for a husband's love is the cross. Not cultural norms. Not what your father modeled. Not what feels natural. The cross.

And the cross doesn't look like dominance. It looks like sacrifice.

There are two errors men tend to fall into here, and they couldn't be more different from each other.

The first is tyranny — hearing the word "headship" and concluding it means you get to be the boss. You make the decisions. You have the final word. You get to be served. This is not biblical headship. It is secular power dressed up in religious language, and it makes Christ look like an oppressor.

The second is passivity — so afraid of the first error that men abdicate altogether. They don't lead, don't decide, don't take responsibility. Their wives carry the weight while they coast. This too misrepresents Christ, because Christ is not passive about His Bride.

The biblical picture is sacrificial headship — a third way that the world doesn't offer and the flesh doesn't produce naturally.

Look at how Paul defines headship in verse 23: "For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body." Christ's headship is expressed in rescue. His authority is exercised through sacrifice. He leads not by demanding service, but by rendering it. He Himself said, "The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many" (Mark 10:45).

If the Son of God came to serve, what business does any husband have demanding to be served in his own home?

Richard Baxter captured the balance precisely: "Love must not be exercised so imprudently as to destroy the exercise of authority; and authority must not be exercised over a wife so magisterially and imperiously, as to destroy the exercise of love." Love without leadership is abandonment. Leadership without love is tyranny. Christ's headship holds them together.

Notice what Paul says Christ's purpose is for the Church in verses 26–27: sanctification. He is working to present His Bride "holy and without blemish." His love is not passive or sentimental — it is purposeful. It is aimed at her holiness.

This gives husbands a diagnostic question worth sitting with: Is your wife more godly because she married you, or less?Are you leading her toward Christ? Are you nourishing her soul with the Word? Or have you been so focused on your career, your hobbies, your own spiritual consumption that her growth has been left entirely to her own effort?

Paul uses two Greek words in verses 28–29 that paint a vivid picture. The first is ektrepho — nourishes — which means to feed, to bring to maturity, to provide what is needed for growth. The second is thalpo — cherishes — which literally means to warm, to soften, to tenderly care for.

Is that how you treat your wife? Do you nourish her — invest in her flourishing, support her growth, meet her needs? Do you cherish her — treat her with warmth, tenderness, and genuine affection? Or has she become an afterthought, someone who keeps the household running while you pursue what matters to you?

Peter raises the stakes considerably in 1 Peter 3:7. He warns that if a husband dishonors his wife, his prayers will be hindered. Your relationship with God is directly connected to how you treat her.

Headship is not a privilege to exploit. It is a responsibility to bear. It means you take the weight of final accountability. It means when things go wrong, you don't look for someone to blame. It means you lead from the front, not push from behind.

And it means, above everything else, that the cross is the measure. Not your preferences. Not your mood. The cross.

Blog Post 3: The Gift They Don't Want to Give — Understanding Biblical Submission

From the sermon series "Stand Firm: Biblical Manhood" at Liberty Baptist Church

There may be no passage in the New Testament more reflexively rejected by our culture — or more frequently misused within the church — than Ephesians 5:22–24.

"Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord."

Before we can hear what Paul is actually saying, we have to clear away two errors that keep people from reading the text honestly.

The first error is to explain it away. To say Paul didn't mean what he wrote, that he was a man of his time, that we've evolved beyond this. But Paul wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. These are not his cultural preferences — they are God's revealed commands. To dismiss them is not progressive scholarship. It is a denial of Scripture's authority.

The second error is to abuse it — to use this passage as a hammer against women while ignoring the far weightier demands Scripture makes of husbands. Men who demand submission they haven't earned, who confuse "head of the home" with "exempt from accountability," who use these verses to justify harshness or control — they have not understood the text. They have weaponized it.

So what does it actually teach?

Submission is directed upward, not just inward. Notice the phrase "as to the Lord" in verse 22. The wife's submission is not ultimately rendered to her husband. It is rendered to Christ. She submits to her husband as an act of obedience to her Lord. This means — and this is critical — she is not called to follow her husband into sin. The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood states plainly that "no earthly submission — domestic, religious, or civil — ever implies a mandate to follow a human authority into sin." Her ultimate allegiance belongs to Christ, not to any man.

Submission is a gift, not an extraction. The Greek verb hupotassō appears in the middle voice here — meaning this is something the wife does, not something done to her. It describes a voluntary posture. This is not the posture of a prisoner before a warden. It is the posture of the Church before Christ — a Church that doesn't submit grudgingly or fearfully, but gladly and trustingly, because she knows He loves her.

Submission doesn't mean inferiority. The Baptist Faith and Message is clear: "The husband and wife are of equal worth before God, since both are created in God's image." Paul himself writes in Galatians 3:28 that "there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus." Equal dignity, equal standing, equal heirs of the grace of life (1 Peter 3:7).

But equality of worth does not mean sameness of role. The Son is fully equal to the Father in deity — yet He submitted to the Father's will in redemption. Equality and submission are not opposites, and confusing them doesn't lead to liberation. It leads to chaos.

Think of an orchestra. The first violinist and the conductor have equal dignity as musicians. But if the first violinist decides she doesn't need the conductor — starts playing her own tempo, following her own interpretation — the music disintegrates. The beauty emerges when each musician fulfills their distinct role within the unified whole. That's what Paul is describing. Not a hierarchy of worth, but a harmony of roles.

And consider the word used for the wife's role in Genesis 2:18: ezer — helper. Some hear "helper" and assume inferiority. But the word ezer appears sixteen times in the Old Testament, and in fifteen of those instances it refers to God Himself — the one who comes with strength to supply what is lacking. "My help comes from the LORD" (Psalm 121:2). The helper is not lesser than the helped. The woman was created because the man was genuinely incomplete without her.

Peter's portrait in 1 Peter 3 is striking: holy women who trusted in God, adorned not with outward display but with "the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God." This is not weakness. This is strength under control. This is faith expressed in trust.

And the Proverbs 31 woman is anything but passive. She speaks with wisdom. She manages the household with energy and discernment. Her husband trusts her completely. Her children call her blessed. She is a woman of active, vigorous, dignified strength — and she operates in glad partnership with her husband.

Paul's closing summary in verse 33 is illuminating: husbands are told to love; wives are told to respect. Why the distinction? Because these are the specific gifts each spouse tends to withhold. The masculine temptation is emotional distance and coldness. The feminine temptation is contempt and criticism. Both commands are difficult. Both require the Holy Spirit.

To wives: your respect for your husband is not contingent on his perfection. He will fail. He will lead poorly sometimes. You are called to respect the office God has given him — and to trust that your obedience to God's command will bear fruit even when your husband falls short.

To husbands: respect must be cultivated, not commanded. If she struggles to trust your leadership, before asking what's wrong with her, ask what kind of leader you've been.