However, with this soft documents, you could delight in reading in the leisure even in the voids of your works in workplace. Again, reviewing habit will consistently provide beneficial perks for you. It will aid you to boost the top quality of your life. It is accurate and informative. It will help destroy some of the myths surrounding the gift of prophecy and will bring you closer to God's desire. Being Reformed CRC , I have had many questions about the gift of prophecy gathered over many years and many book.
Almost all of them have been answered here. Packer wrote, this book is "Careful, thorough, wise, and to my mind, convincing. You will find scripturally-based answers to what the gift is, who can have it, how it is used, and how it can benefit the Church. This book is much newer, but covers much of the same ground. Read it and pray for God's illumination on the matter. An Excellent Resource By TJ A fantastic tool for those interested in a balanced, scriptural approach to the New Testament gift of prophecy and its place in the church today.
Tons of biblical references are cited, giving this very readable work a scholarly quality. A must read for those serious on the subject.
Vasicek Wayne Grudem is a scholar, and his approach to the New Testament gift of prophecy is refreshing in that he appeals to the thinking Christian. Loved each and every part of this book. I will definitely recommend this book to religion, theology lovers. Your Rating:. Your Comment:. Grudem Submitted by: Jane Kivik. He received his doctorate in theology from the University of Munich and taught biblical studies for six years at Bethel College, St. Paul, before becoming a pastor.
Ware Ph. Previously Dr. Bruce is married to Jodi, his wife of twenty-three years, and they have two daughters, Bethany and Rachel. PREFACE R Since the publication of Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood edited by John Piper and Wayne Grudem; Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, , the ongoing debate over the biblical understanding of men and women has brought new challenges to the perspective we presented there, as well as new insights from ongoing scholarly inves- tigation of Scripture and of trends in the culture.
Several speakers at a conference in Dallas, Texas, held March 22, , addressed those new challenges and new insights as they related to manhood and womanhood in marriage. The conference was designed to inform and challenge pastors and other Christian leaders regarding recent developments in the manhood-womanhood controversy, and we are grateful to Crossway Books for publishing four volumes with the contents of the messages delivered by speakers at that conference.
Finally, he applies these insights to singleness as it finds expression in the fellowship of the church. In Chapter 3 John Piper shows how marriage is not an end in itself but must always be lived for the glory of God. He argues that God expects us to love Him more than our marriage partners, and that this does not diminish but enriches our marriages.
He challenges us by say- ing that if we want strong marriages in our churches, we need to preach less about marriage and more about the greatness of God. Glare, the editor of the Liddell-Scott Greek- English Lexicon: Supplement and probably the preeminent living lexicographer of ancient Greek.
But what has been the historic position of the church on the roles of men and women in marriage? In Chapter 9 Peter Jones helps us under- stand why sexual perversion is so common in modern culture.
Jones argues that this is the inevitable result of a society turning away from Christian convictions about the nature of God and the nature of real- ity. Jones sees deep spiritual opposition at work in our culture to destroy biblical teachings on manhood and womanhood. Lest we think this is an academic fad, Heimbach warns that it is infecting modern culture, and he sees ominous parallels in the thinking of evangelical feminists.
The focus of our Dallas conference, and therefore of the four vol- umes in this series, was manhood and womanhood in the family. Though some chapters occasionally touch on related areas such as the church or society, those areas are not treated extensively in these volumes. I am grateful to Susanne Henry and Sharon Sullivan for excellent secretarial help in producing this book, to Travis Buchanan for careful work in compiling the indexes, to several generous donors who will here remain unnamed for providing financial support for the Dallas conference that gave birth to this book, to Kevin Hartman for competently and graciously overseeing the details of that Dallas conference, and to my wife, Margaret, for her unfading support, encouragement, counsel, and patience in my writing and editing which always seem to take longer than either of us expects.
Finally, I have dedicated this book to Dennis Rainey, the wise, godly, and amazingly energetic director of FamilyLife. Thanks be to God for the excellence of His wonderful creation! It means to be like God and to represent God. It is a privilege given only to us as men and women. Every time we look at each other or talk to each other as men and women, we should remember that the person we are talking to is a creature of God who is more like God than anything else in the universe, and men and women share that status equally.
Therefore we should treat men and women with equal dignity, and we should think of men and women as having equal value. We are both in the image of God, and we have been so since the very first day that God created us. The Bible thus almost immediately corrects the errors of male dominance and male superiority that have come as the result of sin and that have been seen in nearly all cultures in the history of the world.
Wherever men are thought to be better than women, wherever hus- bands act as selfish dictators, wherever wives are forbidden to have their own jobs outside the home or to vote or to own property or to be educated, wherever women are treated as inferior, wherever there is abuse or violence against women or rape or female infanticide or polygamy or harems, the biblical truth of equality in the image of God is being denied.
All of these aspects are distorted by sin and manifest themselves in ways that are unlike God and are displeasing to Him, but all of these areas of our lives are also being progressively restored to greater Godlikeness through the salvation that is ours in Christ, and they will be completely restored in us when Christ returns.
Nor does he say that woman is the image of man. Rather, Paul is simply saying that in the relationship between man and woman, man in particular reflects something of the excellence of the God who created him, and woman in that relationship reflects something of the excellence of the man from whom she was created.
Yet Paul goes on almost immediately to say that men and women are interdependent see vv. He does not say in this passage that man is more in the image of God than woman is, nor should we derive any such idea from this passage. If men and women are equally in the image of God, then we are equally important to God and equally valu- able to Him. We have equal worth before Him for all eternity, for this is how we were created. In contrast to many non-Christian cultures and religions, no one should feel proud or superior because he is a man, and no one should feel disappointed or inferior because she is a woman.
Further evidence of our equality in the image of God is seen in the New Testament church, where the Holy Spirit is given in new fullness to both men and women Acts , where both men and women are baptized into membership in the body of Christ Acts 5, and where both men and women receive spiritual gifts for use in the life of the church 1 Cor. The apostle Paul reminds us that we are not to be divided into factions that think of themselves as superior and inferior such as Jew and Greek, or slave and free, or male Dr.
Nor is the practice of sex selection limited to abortion. This is a tragedy of unspeakable proportions. In addition to the harm of these lost lives, we must think of the destructive consequences in the lives of those women who survive. The first chapter of the Bible corrects this practice and corrects any lurking sense in our own hearts that boys are more valuable than girls, when it says we are both created in the image of God.
Circumcision by its nature was only administered to men. By contrast, both men and women are baptized in the New Testament church. In this way, every baptism should remind us of our equality in the image of God. Speaking personally, I do not think I listened very well to my wife Margaret early in our marriage.
I did not value her different gifts and preferences as much as my own, or her wisdom that was arrived at or expressed differently. Later we made much progress in this area, but looking back, Margaret told me that early in our marriage she felt as though her voice was taken away, and as though my ears were closed. I am not advocating that mistake either, and in what follows I will argue for the necessity of a male leadership role in decision-making within marriage. James Dobson Sept.
Not because we differ with egalitarians8 on this question, but because we differ at this point with sinful tendencies in our own hearts. And we differ at this point with the oppressive male chauvin- ism and male dominance that has marred most cultures throughout most of history. Why do I list this as a key issue? Because anyone preaching on manhood and womanhood has to start here—where the Bible starts— not with our differences, but with our equality in the image of God. There is yet one more reason why I think this is a key issue, one that speaks especially to men.
I personally think that one reason God has allowed this whole controversy on manhood and womanhood to come into the church at this time is so that we could correct some mis- takes, change some wrongful traditions, and become more faithful to Scripture in treating our wives and all women with dignity and respect.
The first step in correcting these mistakes is to be fully convinced in our hearts that women share equally with us men in the value and dig- nity that belongs to being made in the image of God. In particular, egalitarians deny that there is any unique male leadership role in marriage or in the church.
Sometimes I use the phrase evangelical feminists to mean the same thing as egalitarians. Distinctions in masculine and feminine roles are ordained by God as part of the created order, and should find an echo in every human heart. The marriage relationship models the way God relates to his people.
A husband is to love his wife as Christ loved the church. He has the God-given responsibility to provide for, to protect, and to lead his family. A wife is to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband even as the church willingly submits to the headship of Christ.
She being in the image of God as is her husband and thus equal to him, has the God-given responsibility to respect her husband and serve as his helper in managing the household and nurturing the next generation.
The Bible teaches that the rulership of Adam over Eve resulted from the Fall and was, therefore, not a part of the original cre- ated order. The Bible defines the function of leadership as the empow- erment of others for service rather than as the exercise of power over them Matt.
See Appendix 1 for the full text of this statement. The Bible teaches that husbands and wives are heirs together of the grace of life and that they are bound together in a relationship of mutual submission and responsibility 1 Cor. Does the Bible really teach that men and women had different roles from the beginning of creation?
When we look carefully at Scripture, I think we can see at least ten reasons indicating that God gave men and women distinct roles before the Fall, and particularly that there was male headship in marriage before the Fall. The order: Adam was created first, then Eve note the sequence in Gen. We may not think of this as very impor- tant today, but it was important to the biblical readers, and the apostle Paul sees it as important: He bases his argument for different roles in the assembled New Testament church on the fact that Adam was cre- ated prior to Eve.
According to Scripture itself, then, the fact that Adam was created first and then Eve has implications not just for Adam and Eve themselves, but for the relationships between men and women gener- ally throughout time, including the church age. The representation: Adam, not Eve, had a special role in repre- senting the human race.
Looking at the Genesis narrative, we find that Eve sinned first, and then Adam sinned Gen. See his discussion elsewhere in this volume, Chapter 2. Although I have not listed it separately here, this could be counted as an eleventh reason along with the ten I list.
But this is not the case. In fact, it is just the opposite. The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven. Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven. Nor was it true that Adam and Eve together represented the human race. It was Adam alone who represented the human race, because he had a particular leadership role that God had given him, a role that Eve did not share.
And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. Just as God demonstrated His sovereignty over day and night, heavens, earth, and seas by assigning them names, so Adam demonstrated his authority over the animal kingdom by assigning them names. Thus parents give names to their children see Gen. And God is able to change the names of people when He wishes to indicate a change in their character or role see Gen.
This is because in the creation story in Genesis 2 Adam is giving a broad cat- egory name to his wife, indicating the name that would be given to womanhood generally, and he is not giving specific personal names designating the character of the individual person.
In addition to the eight examples men- tioned above, it was used a further five times as a proper name for Adam in distinction from Eve Gen. The male con- notations of the word could not have been missed by the original readers. God gave the human race a name that, like the English word man, can either mean a male human being or can refer to the human race in general.
Does this make any difference? It does give a hint of male leader- ship, which God suggested in choosing this name.
But it is precisely the hint of male leadership in the word that has led some people to object to this use of the word man and to attempt to substi- tute other terms instead. The primary accountability: God spoke to Adam first after the Fall. Ortlund, Jr. Even though Eve had sinned first, God first summoned Adam to give account for what had happened.
This suggests that Adam was the one primarily accountable for what had happened in his family. An analogy to this is seen in the life of a human family. In a similar way, when God summoned Adam to give an account, it indicated a primary responsibility for Adam in the conduct of his family. This is similar to the situation in Genesis , where God had given commands to Adam alone before the Fall, indicating there also a primary responsibility that belonged to Adam. By contrast, the serpent spoke to Eve first Gen.
The purpose: Eve was created as a helper for Adam, not Adam as a helper for Eve. See Ps. The nature of the activity of helping is so broad that it can be done by someone who has greater authority, someone who has equal author- ity, or someone who has lesser authority than the person being helped.
For example, I can help my son do his homework. Or my son can help me clean the garage. Yet the fact remains that in the situation under consideration, the person doing 18I am taking this analogy from Raymond C.
Thus, even if I help my son with his homework, the primary responsibility for the homework remains his and not mine. I am the helper.
And even when God helps us, with respect to the specific task at hand He still holds us primarily responsible for the activity, and He holds us accountable for what we do. She was cre- ated as one who differed from him, but who differed from him in ways that would exactly complement who Adam was. The conflict: The curse brought a distortion of previous roles, not the introduction of new roles.
Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you. What is the meaning of this word? In this context and in this construction, it probably implies an aggressive desire, perhaps a desire to conquer or rule 19This is the definition given in Frances Brown, S. Driver, and Charles A. That occurrence of the word is in the very next chapter of Genesis, in Here the sense is very clear. In the Hebrew text, six words are the same and are found in the same order in both verses.
It is almost as if this other usage is put here by the author so that we would know how to under- stand the meaning of the term in Genesis And that sense fits very well in Genesis also.
The difference in meaning may also be signaled by a different construction. The Genesis and Song of Solomon examples are not exactly parallel linguistically, because a different prepo- sition follows the verb in Song of Solomon, and therefore the sense may be somewhat differ- ent. It is much more appro- priate to the context of a curse to understand this as an aggressive desire against her husband, one that would bring her into conflict with him. This term is common in the Old Testament, and it regularly, if not always, refers to ruling by greater power or force or strength.
It is used of human military or political rulers, such as Joseph ruling over the land of Egypt Gen. It is also used to speak of God ruling over the sea Ps. Sometimes it refers to oppressive rulers who cause the people under them to suffer Neh.
In any case, the word does not sig- nify one who leads among equals, but rather one who rules by virtue of power and strength, and sometimes even rules harshly and selfishly. Once we understand these two terms, we can see much more clearly what was involved in the curse that God brought to Adam and Eve as punishment for their sins. In any case, while the sense in Song 11 is different, both the context and the con- struction are different, and this example is removed in time and authorship from Genesis and must be given lower importance in understanding the meaning of the word in Genesis.
Prior to their sin, they had lived in the Garden of Eden in perfect harmony, yet with a leadership role belonging to Adam as the head of his family. It is crucial at this point for us to realize that we ourselves are never to try to increase or perpetuate the results of the curse. We should never try to pro- mote or advocate Genesis as something good! Eventually God will bring in new heavens and a new earth, in which crops will come forth abundantly from the ground Isa.
So we ourselves should never try to perpetuate the elements of the curse! We should not plant thorns and weeds in our garden but rather overcome them. We should do everything we can to alleviate the pain of childbirth for women.
And we should do everything we can to undo the conflict that comes about through women desiring to oppose or even control their husbands and their husbands ruling harshly over them. Therefore Genesis should never be used as a direct argument for male headship in marriage. But it does show us that the Fall brought about a distortion of previous roles, not the introduction of new roles. It was first suggested by Susan T. The restoration: When we come to the New Testament, salvation in Christ reaffirms the creation order.
If the previous understanding of Genesis is correct, as we believe it is, then what we would expect to find in the New Testament is a reversal of this curse. In fact, that is exactly what we find. What God does in the New Testament is reestablish the beauty of the relationship between Adam and Eve that existed from the moment they were created.
Eve was subject to Adam as the head of the family. Adam loved his wife and was not harsh with her in his leadership. That is the pattern that Paul commands husbands and wives to follow. The mystery: Marriage from the beginning of creation was a pic- ture of the relationship between Christ and the church. When the apostle Paul discusses marriage and wishes to speak of the relationship between husband and wife, he does not look back to any sections of the Old Testament telling about the situation after sin came into the world.
Here Paul makes clear the meaning of the 23There was a foreshadowing of these New Testament commands in the godly marriages found in the Old Testament and the honor given to women in passages such as those in Ruth, Esther, and Proverbs They were created to represent that relationship, and that is what all mar- riages are supposed to do.
Now the relationship between Christ and the church is not cul- turally variable. It is the same for all generations. And it is not reversible. There is a leadership or headship role that belongs to Christ that the church does not have. Similarly, in marriage as God created it to be, there is a leadership role for the husband that the wife does not have.
And for our purposes it is important to notice that this relation- ship was there from the beginning of creation, in the beautiful marriage between Adam and Eve in the Garden. The parallel with the Trinity: The equality, differences, and unity between men and women reflect the equality, differences, and unity in the Trinity. Conclusion: Here then are at least ten reasons showing differences in the roles of men and women before the Fall.
Some reasons are not as forceful as others, though all have some force. Some of them whis- per male headship, and some shout it clearly. Perhaps I could say something at this point about how male-female equal- ity together with male headship work out in actual practice.
The situation I know best is my own marriage, so I will speak about that briefly. In our marriage, Margaret and I talk frequently and at length about many decisions. Sometimes these are large decisions such as buying a house or a car , and sometimes they are small decisions such as where we should go for a walk together. Usually we reach agreement on the decision. Very seldom will I do something that she does not think to be wise.
But in every decision, whether large or small, and whether we have reached agreement or not, the responsibility to make the decision still rests with me. I think that male headship makes a differ- ence in every decision that the couple makes every day of their married life. If there is genuine male headship, there is a quiet, subtle acknowl- edgment that the focus of the decision-making process is the husband, not the wife.
And even though there will often be much discussion, and though there should be much mutual respect and consideration of each other, yet ultimately the responsibility to make the decision rests with the husband. And so in our marriage, the responsibility to make the decision rests with me. This is not because I am wiser or a more gifted leader. It is because I am the husband, and God has given me that responsibility. In the face of cultural pressures to the contrary, I will not forsake this male head- ship, I will not deny this male headship, I will not be embarrassed by it.
This is something that is God-given. It is very good. It brings peace and joy to our marriage, and both Margaret and I are thankful for it. Yet there are dangers of distortion in one direction or another. Putting this biblical pattern into practice in our daily lives is a challenge, because we can err in one direction or the other. There are errors of passivity, and there are errors of aggressiveness.
On the right side of the chart, the errors of aggressiveness are those that had their beginning, as we saw, in Genesis The husband can become selfish, harsh, and domineering and act like a tyrant.
This is not biblical headship but a tragic distortion of it. She can become a usurper, something that is a tragic distortion of the biblical pattern of equality in the image of God.
On the other hand, on the left side of the chart, are the opposite errors, the errors of passivity. A husband can abdicate his leadership and neglect his responsibilities. He does not discipline his children, and he sits and watches TV and drinks his beer and does nothing.
The family is not going to church regularly, and he is passive and does nothing. The family keeps going further into debt, and he closes his eyes to it and does nothing. Some relative or friend is verbally harassing his wife, and he does nothing.
This also is a tragic distortion of the biblical pat- tern. He has become a wimp. A wife also can commit errors of passivity. Or her husband becomes verbally or physically abusive, and she never objects to him and never seeks church discipline or civil governmental intervention to bring about an end to the abuse. But this also is a tragic distortion of biblical patterns.
She has become a doormat. Now, we all have different backgrounds, personalities, and tem- peraments. We also have different areas of life in which sanctification is less complete. We can even fall into errors of aggressiveness in our own homes and errors of passivity when we visit our in-laws! Or it can be the other way around. A corresponding responsibility on the part of the wife is to have primary responsibility to care for home and children. Each can help the other, but there remains a primary responsibility that is not shared equally.
I will not discuss these in detail at this point but simply note that these additional aspects of differing roles are estab- lished in Scripture. Biblical support for the husband having the pri- mary responsibility to provide for his family and the wife having primary responsibility to care for the household and children is found in Genesis with ; Eve is assumed to have the pri- mary responsibility for childbearing, but Adam for tilling the ground to raise food, and pain is introduced into both of their areas of respon- sibility ; Proverbs , especially vv.
In addition, there is the complete absence of evidence from the other side. Nowhere can we find Scripture encouraging women to be the primary means of support while their husbands care for the house and children.
Nowhere can we find Scripture encouraging women to be the primary protectors of their husbands. Certainly women can help in these roles as time and circumstances allow see Gen. I want to be the one responsible to provide for the family, the one my wife looks to and depends on for support.
I recognize that in many families there is a temporary reversal of roles due to involuntary unem- ployment or while the husband is getting further education for his career, and in those circumstances these are entirely appropriate arrangements; yet the longer they go on, the more strain they put on a marriage.
I also recognize that permanent disability on the part of the husband, or the absence of a husband in the home, can create a neces- sity for the wife to be the primary provider; but every family in which that happens will testify to the unusual stress it brings and to the fact that they wish it did not have to be so.
It feels right to me to look to him and depend on him for that responsibility. At this point I will mention three of the most common objections: 1. Galatians abolishes role distinctions in marriage. Mutual submission in Ephesians nullifies male author- ity in marriage. They are all parts of one body in Christ, and all share in equal value and dignity as members of one body in Christ. Rather, it says things that are dif- ferent, things that are diverse, share some kind of unity.
So in Romans we read: For as in one body we have many members, and the members do not all have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. And so Galatians simply says that we have a special kind of unity in the body of Christ.
Surely this verse cannot abolish all differences between men and women, not only because Paul himself elsewhere commands husbands and wives to act differently according to their different roles, but also because marriage in Scripture from beginning to end is intended by God to be only between one man and one woman, not between one man and another man or one woman and another woman.
But homosexual conduct is surely forbidden by Scripture see Rom. And our egalitarian friends within the evangelical world agree that homosexual conduct is prohibited by Scripture. Therefore Galatians does not abolish differences in roles between men and women. The egalitarian objection from Galatians , therefore, is not per- suasive. Egalitarians are simply trying to make the verse say something it does not say and never has said and never will say.
Galatians tells us that we are united in Christ and that we should never be boastful or arrogant against others and should never feel inferior or without value in the body of Christ. But the verse does not say that men and women are the same or that they have to act the same.
And this means there is no unique kind of submission that a wife owes to her husband, and no unique kind of authority that a husband has over his wife. And a hus- band should also be subject to his wife. There is no unique leadership role, no unique authority, for the husband. However, egalitarians mean something so different by this phrase, and they have used this phrase so often to nullify male authority within marriage, that I think the expression mutual submission only leads to con- fusion if we go on using it.
They took it to mean that those in authority should govern wisely and with sacri- ficial concern for those under their authority. The motion was defeated, and appropriately so. These events were reported to me by friends who were present when the statement was being debated on the floor of the Southern Baptist Convention in the summer of In the sense that egalitarians understand the phrase mutual submission, the idea is found nowhere in Scripture, and it actually nullifies the teaching of significant passages of Scripture.
How then should we respond when people say they favor mutual submission? We need to find out what they mean by it, and if they do not wish to advocate an egalitarian view, we need to see if we can sug- gest alternative wording that would speak to their concerns more pre- cisely. Some people who hold a fully complementarian view of marriage do use the phrase mutual submission and intend it in a way that does not nullify male leadership in marriage.
I have found that some people who want to use this language may simply have genuine con- cerns that men should not act like dictators or tyrants in their mar- riages.
NIV And in Ephesians Paul makes this statement: For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior.
It is important to realize the decisive significance of these verses, and particularly of Ephesians , for the current controversy. The problem of this interpretation is that it does not fit the evidence. I have given more detail on those studies in another chapter in this volume. So the egalitarian objection also fails to be convincing, and we are right to conclude that the Bible gives husbands the responsibility of a unique leadership role, a unique authority, in the marriage.
Much more is at stake even than how we live in our marriages. Here we are talking about the nature of God Himself. This is an impor- tant parallel because it shows that there can be equality and differences between persons at the same time.
Just as God the Son is eternally subject to the authority of God the Father, so God has planned that wives would be subject to the authority of their own husbands. Never does Scripture say that the Son sends the Father into the world, or that the Holy Spirit sends the Father or the Son into the world, or that the Father obeys the commands of the Son or the Holy Spirit. Never does Scripture say that the Son predestined us to be conformed to the image of the Father.
The role of planning, directing, sending, and commanding the Son belongs to the Father only. The Father did not give someone who was just another divine person in the Trinity; He gave the one who was His only Son, the one who eternally had been His Son.
It was also this way in the creation of the world, where the Father initiated and commanded and created through the Son. We see from these passages then that the idea of headship and submis- sion within a personal relationship did not begin with the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood in Nor did it begin with some writings of the apostle Paul in the first century.
Nor did it begin with a few patriarchal men in a patriarchal society in the Old Testament. No, the idea of headship and submission existed before creation. It began in the relationship between the Father and Son in the Trinity. The Father has eternally had a leadership role, an authority to initiate and direct, that the Son does not have. Similarly, the Holy Spirit is sub- ject to both the Father and Son and plays yet a different role in creation and in the work of salvation.
When did the idea of headship and submission begin then? The idea of headship and submission never began!
It has always existed in the eternal nature of God Himself. And in this most basic of all authority rela- tionships, authority is not based on gifts or ability for the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are equal in attributes and perfections. It is just there. Authority belongs to the Father not because he is wiser or because He is a more skillful leader, but just because he is the Father.
Authority and submission between the Father and the Son, and between both Father and Son and the Holy Spirit, is the fundamental difference between the persons of the Trinity. And that relation- ship is one of leadership and authority on the one hand and voluntary, willing, joyful submission to that authority on the other hand.
We can learn from this relationship among the members of the Trinity that submission to a rightful authority is a noble virtue. It is a privilege. It is something good and desirable. It is the virtue that has been demonstrated by the eternal Son of God forever.
It is His glory, the glory of the Son as He relates to His father. Submission to a rightful authority is a good and noble and wonderful thing, because it reflects the interpersonal relationships within God Himself.
We can say then that a relationship of authority and submission between equals, with mutual giving of honor, is the most fundamen- tal and most glorious interpersonal relationship in the universe.
We are beginning to dislike God Himself. Now this truth about the Trinity creates a problem for egalitarians within the church. They try to force people to choose between equal- ity and authority. And our response is that you can have both—just look at the Trinity. Within the being of God, you have both equality and authority. In God you can have equality and differences at the same time.
They say that the Father also submits to the Son. But so deep is their com- mitment to an egalitarian view of men and women within marriage that they will modify the doctrine of the Trinity and remake the Trinity in the image of egalitarian marriage if it seems necessary to maintain their position.
A survey of historical evidence showing affirmation of the eternal subordination of the Son to the authority of the Father is found in Stephen D.
Kovach and Peter R. Schemm, Jr. The Key Issues in the Manhood-Womanhood Controversy, and the Way Forward 53 we fear that someone will take offense if we talk clearly about God-given differences between men and women. And if it is very good, then we can make some other observations about the created order.
This created order is fair. Absolutely not! The order of relationships within the Trinity is fair. And the order of relationships established by God for marriage is fair.
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