Page 56 - Sarah's Children

to her husband or father. The following scriptures depict what the manner of the
godly woman should be.

I Peter 3:1-6
In the same way, you wives, be submissive to your own husbands...
Your adornment must not be merely external... but let it be the hidden
person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet
spirit, which is precious in the sight of God. For in this way in former
times the holy women also, who hoped in God, used to adorn
themselves, being submissive to their own husbands; just as Sarah
obeyed Abraham, calling him lord, and you have become her children
if you do what is right without being frightened by any fear.

Titus 2:3-5
Older women likewise are to be reverent in their behavior... so that they
may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their
children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to
their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored.

Ephesians 5:22
Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord.

In the society we live in such instructions seem preposterous. In a society that
lampoons its presidents and government officials, in a society that places buffoonish
caricatures of government leaders on the editorial pages of its newspapers, in a
society where the patriarchal family is viewed as antiquated and backward, these
instructions to the women of the Christian church are largely viewed with scorn and
rejection. Yet there are godly women who desire to be all that the Creator made them
to be. They desire to find in their own being a conformity to the revealed word of
God.

How very much is revealed in this one command, “Wives, be subject to your own
husbands as to the Lord.” How are the saints to be subject to the Lord? They are to
obey without complaining. They are to show reverence and godly fear. They are to
lay down their own lives that they might fulfill the desire of the Lord. They are to
always honor Him with the words of their mouth.

We have looked at one circumstance in which wives are not to obey, and that is when
they are commanded to sin. In every other instance they are to follow the principle
of, “Wives, be subject to your own husbands as to the Lord.” This is the revealed will
of Yahweh, for man is the head of woman even as Christ is the head of man.

Can you imagine how households would be transformed as women began to practice