PRACTICING HEADSHIP =================== Samuele Bacchiocchi, Ph. D., Professor of Theology and Church History, Andrews University To appreciate more fully the validity and value of the Biblical principles of headship and submission, we shall now reflect on the practical implications and applications of such principles in marital relationships. Leadership in Love. We noticed earlier that Paul clarifies the meaning of headship by exhorting husbands not to exercise authority over their wives, but to love them "as Christ loved the church" (Eph 5:25). Putting it differently, Paul exhorts husbands to exercise not a headship of power, control, competence or domination, but a leadership of love. The model is the headship of Christ over the church manifested in His willingness to sacrifice Himself for her sanctification ("that he might sanctify her"--v.26), purification ("having cleansed her"--v.26), and glorification ("that he might present the church to himself in splendor"--v.27). This is the way I am to be the head of my wife, by loving her with the sacrificial and unconditional love of Jesus. Jesus so loved the church that He gave up everything for her- equality with God, heaven's majesty and glory, the right to an earthly family, the understanding and appreciation of his fellows, a fair trial and a humane death. This is a headship of total sacrificial and unconditional love, without rights. As a husband, am I the kind of head who is willing to give up everything for the well-being of my wife and children? Christ's love cleanses and improves the church. Through His Spirit, Christ works to "present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle" (Eph 5:27). Jesus loves to make every believer as pure and perfect as He is. "Does my love for my wife wash away her inner wounds and hurts and bring out the best in her character? Do I make it easy or difficult for Jesus to make her radiant and blameless? Jesus does not repress and inhibit my character but enables it to flower and realise its full potential. Is my wife suppressed or enriched through my relationship with her?"44 Should God ask me or you one day, "Did you love your wife unconditionally as I loved you?" What are we going to say? Shall we look for excuses, saying, "Well, Lord, you know that I loved my wife in many areas. I provided for all her material needs and I supported many of her plans and initiatives. But it was difficult to love her completely because she was not always submissive. Sometimes she insisted in doing things her own way, disregarding my feelings or instructions. And remember God, she was not always trustworthy. Sometimes she left me and the kids at home to go out to have fun. How could I love her unconditionally?" The Lord will reply, "I never asked you about your wife's weaknesses. I asked you, Did you love your wife unconditionally as I love you?" God knows our spouse's weaknesses as well as our own. Yet He calls us as husbands to exercise a headship of love by loving our wives no matter what their weaknesses might be. He calls us to exercise our headships by being first in forgiving our spouses' mistakes, first in nurturing and building our marital relationship, first in assuming responsibility for the physical, social, emotional, and spiritual needs of our wife and children. Exercising such a headship of love is not easy. In fact, it is impossible on our own. It can only be done by the enabling power of the Holy Spirit. That is why Paul introduces his discussion of the proper relationships between husband and wife, parents and children, and servants and masters by exhorting Christians to "be filled with the Spirit" (Eph 5:18). It is only by the enabling power of His Spirit that a husband can begin to love his wife as Christ loved the church and that a wife can submit herself to her husband as to the Lord. Leadership in Service. The husband-headship of sacrificial love is manifested especially through his willingness to serve his wife and children. This does not mean that he is under the authority of his family members or that he takes orders from them. Rather, it means that he serves his family by giving them a loving, intelligent and sensitive service of leadership. Headship in the Scripture presupposes a leadership of service. Christ is the head of the church because He came not to be served by the church, but to serve her (Matt 20:28). There is a radical difference between God's view and the world's view of leadership. "You know," Jesus explained, "that those who are supposed to rule over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you; but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all" (Mark 10:42-44). A husband fulfills the headship of service by leading, encouraging, protecting, providing, and caring for his wife and children. As the wife has a unique role in procreation, so the husband has a unique role in provision and protection. "The Lord," writes Ellen White, "has constituted the husband the head of his wife to be her protector; he is the house-band of the family, binding the members together, even as Christ is the head of the church and the Savior of the mystical body."45 Peter emphasizes this point, saying: "Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers" (1 Pet 3:7, NIV). The wife is "the weaker partner," not morally, spiritually or intellectually, but physically. The considerate husband will protect her from such heavy tasks as moving furniture, repairing automobiles, transplanting trees, building fences, doing masonry. Sometimes the husband must protect his wife's health by taking over some of her burdens. If the wife works outside the home or if she is not well, the considerate husband will alleviate his wife's burdens by assuming responsibility for some of them. Speaking of the husband, Ellen White writes, "If he wishes to keep her fresh and gladsome, so that she will be as sunshine in the home, let him help her bear her burdens. His kindness and loving courtesy will be to her a precious encouragement, and the happiness he imparts will bring joy and peace to his own heart."46 She continues, noting that if a mother is deprived of the care and protection of her husband, "if she is allowed to exhaust her strength through overwork or through anxiety and gloom, her children will be robbed of the vital-force and of the mental elasticity and cheerful buoyancy they should inherit."47 Leadership as Management. An important aspect of the headship of the husband is to provide a caring and competent management to the family. This involves establishing and maintaining directions, setting priorities and delegating responsibilities. In his book Christian Living in the Home , Jay Adams writes: "The husband as the head of the home is its manager. He is the head; the head does not do the work of the body. The husband is not to answer every question or think every thought for his wife- exactly not that. Rather, he is to recognize that God gave him a wife to be a helper. A good manager will look at his helper and say, 'She has certain abilities. If I am going to manage my household well, I must see that every last one of those gifts is developed and put to use as fully as possible.' He will not want to squash her personality; rather, he will seek to bring it to the fullest flower."48 In a well-ordered family a husband exercises his headship by delegating and not by abdicating responsibilities. This involves taking into consideration the ideas, the talents and convictions of his wife and children. Wives are expected to "rule their household" (1 Tim 5:14) by properly managing their homes. The wise woman of Proverbs 31 is emotionally and physically able to work creatively and sacrificially. "Part of the conflict and confusion which we see in homes today," write Larry and Nordis Christenson, "stems from a too simplistic exercise of headship. To be head of the house means more than a man occupying the captain's quarters and barking out orders. It means learning to shoulder the responsibility for giving informed and intelligent direction to the family. A husband won't have all the good ideas. His wife and children, as well as people from outside the immediate family, may have important things to say about what the family ought to be doing. It is the husband's responsibility to weigh every suggestion, determine what should be done, and see that it happens."49 The husband bears a heavy responsibility of the outcome of his decisions. If the family does not gather for worship or does not attend church, God holds the father responsible. If the children are disobedient and rebellious, the father is primarily to blame. It was Eli and not his wife, who came under God's condemnation for raising two evil sons (1 Sam 3:13). A family without the competent and dedicated leadership of a father is like a corporation without a capable president. In both instances the organization disintegrates very quickly. One of the greatest needs of America today is for husbands and fathers who provide to their families not only financial support but also moral and spiritual leadership. Leadership as Provider. An important part of the husband's leadership of service is his responsibility to provide his wife and children with food, clothing, shelter and educational opportunities. This is a sacred obligation placed upon the husband by God. "If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his own immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever" (1 Tim 5:8, NIV). Providing only a living, however, is not enough. A common misconception husbands have goes something like this: "I work hard to provide my wife and children for all their needs. What more could they ask of me?" Or, "My wife has no reasons to complain because she has much more than most women have." Providing a living for our wives and children is not a valid substitute for sharing our personal lives with them. Our wives marry us, not our paychecks. What many wives miss most is not the paycheck, but the personal attention, presence, and fellowship of their husbands. They wait to be noticed, appreciated, and given time. It is the feeling of being neglected that often will tempt a wife to look for another man willing to give her time and attention. Peter's counsel to husbands is clear: "Be considerate as you live with your wives" (1 Pet 3:7). The Greek verb translated "live" (sunoikountes), literally means "being at home with." Just "being at home with" the wife instead of going out with friends, however, is not enough. A husband may be home and yet ignore his wife by being totally absorbed in reading the newspaper or watching a game on television. As the head of his home, a husband must learn to exercise leadership in self-sharing. He must learn to set aside a block of time each day to give undivided attention to his wife and children. The benefits that will accrue from such a practice are beyond estimation. Leadership in Discipline and Instruction. As the head of the home, the husband must take responsibility for the moral and spiritual development of his family. In the Old Testament, God instructs fathers to be diligent in teaching His commandments to their children: "These words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart; and you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise" (Deut 4:7). A similar exhortation is given to fathers in the New Testament: "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord" (Eph 6:4). The two areas in which a husband must take "first responsibility" is "discipline and instruction." The enforcement of proper discipline is fundamental to the character development of a child. All too often husbands abdicate their responsibility as the moral and spiritual leaders of the home, expecting their wives to fulfill these functions. The result is that more and more wives have to serve as the moral and spiritual heads of the home. When this happens, the children suffer and the marital relationship is strained. The children suffer because they are deprived of the important role model of father as the authority figure and leader of the home. The marital relationship is strained because the wife may resent her husband's inability to function as the moral and spiritual head of the family, and the husband may react to his failure by seeking fulfillment outside the home. Despite all the anti-male-headship propaganda of the women's libbers, "it is precisely the absence of male authority." as Larry and Nordis Christianson point out, "which plagues American families."50 We are fast becoming a matriarchal society where women are primarily responsible for teaching and disciplining children, for supporting the family, for maintaining the house, for leading out in worship, and for participating in church and civic affairs. "The problem," as aptly stated by the Christiansons, "is mass abdication on the part of husbands. The need in American families today is not some kind of manufactured 'equality' between husband and wife. The equality is already there-God-given, waiting to be discovered. The need is for headship. Let men accept the responsibility of being head of the family, and wives will find under their authority a freedom, a liberation, such as no constitutional amendment could ever guarantee."51 Leadership as Lawmaker and Priest. A Christian father must not betray his sacred trust to be the lawmaker and priest of the home. Ellen White emphasizes this important function, saying: "All members of the family center in the father. He is the lawmaker, illustrating in his own manly bearing the sterner virtues: energy, integrity, honesty, patience, courage, diligence, and practical usefulness. The father is in one sense the priest of the household, laying upon the altar of God the morning and evening sacrifice. . . he is a laborer together with God, carrying out the gracious designs of God and establishing in his children upright principles, enabling them to form pure and virtuous characters, because he has preoccupied the soul with that which will enable his children to render obedience not only to their earthly parent but also to their heavenly Father."52 As husbands we are ultimately responsible for the moral and spiritual development of our families. Children naturally look to their father for moral directions. The larger size, greater strength, and deeper voice of the father bespeak to them of authority and leadership. This is why mothers need the involvement of their husbands in enforcing didcipline. Fathers serve as a basis upon which parental authority is constructed. As fathers we need to be involved in the discipline of our children, watching for power struggles between our wives and children. We must take responsibility for any of our children's behavioral problems that cause emotional stress to our wives. We must take time to communicate with our children in order to find out their moral and spiritual needs. We must serve as the priests of the home by leading the family in a daily worship experience and renewed commitment to Christ. Family worship is the symbolic center of a family's spiritual commitment. By bringing the family together for worship, the husband teaches his family members to look up to God for wisdom and strength and to make God first and supreme in their lives. Conclusion. Practicing headship, as we have seen, means not to lord over the family by barking out orders to the wife and children but rather to shoulder the responsibility of providing them with a caring and intelligent leadership. This includes a leadership in loving, shown by loving our wives with the unconditional and sacrificial love of Jesus; a leadership in service manifested in our willingness to give intelligent and sensitive service to our wives and children; a leadership in the management of the home shown by our setting priorities and delegating authority; a leadership in providing our wives and children not only with food, clothing , and shelter, but also with our personal attention, presence and fellowship; a leadership in discipline and instruction, shown by our taking first responsibility in enforcing proper discipline and in providing instruction to the children; a leadership as lawmaker and priest manifested in taking responsibility for the moral and spiritual development of our family members. In a word, practicing headship means being willing to serve our family by providing for the physical, emotional, social, intellectual and spiritual needs of our wives and children. This is the kind of headship exemplified by Christ, the model of the husband's headship. ---------------------------------- Christian regards Samuele Bacchiocchi, Ph. D., Professor of Theology and Church History Andrews University 4990 Appian Way Berrien Springs, MI 49103 samuele@andrews.edu