Follow Your Head: A Theology of Woman from the New Testament (Part 2 of 2)

For the first part of this two-part series, click here. 

The Role of Women: Submission 

We can think of the role of women in submission in terms of the home and the church.

Submission in the Home 

“Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands” (Ephesians 5:22-24 ESV).

As the Church is commanded to submit to Christ, its Head, so also is the wife to submit to the husband, her head. The word submit means “to place or rank under, to subject.”¹ Wives are to submit to their husbands in everything.² A woman can beautifully picture the relationship of the Church to Christ through her own submissive attitude towards her husband.

Interestingly, in the Greek, verse 22 does not have the word submit. The word has been added to aid understanding, but the idea flows from verse 21: “Submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Thus, verse 22 continues with the idea of submission: “Wives. . . [submitting to your] own husbands.”

Some claim that verse 21 refers to a mutual submission in which husbands and wives submit to each other in the same way. Thus, the wife is not required to submit to her husband specifically as one who has authority over her. This false idea of submission is an attempt to negate the biblical command for wives to submit to their husbands.

Rather, Paul begins his series of commands to husbands and wives with a command in verse 21 to “be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.” This subjection to one another is evidence that one is filled with the Spirit (Ephesians 5:18). Paul goes on to apply this principle of subjection to one another to child/father relationships, as well as  slave/master relationships (Eph 6:1-9).

One author explains,

Believers should not insist on getting their own way, so there is a general sense in which husbands are to have a submissive attitude to wives, putting their wives’ interests before their own, and similarly parents to children and masters to slaves. But this does not eliminate the more specific roles in which wives are to submit to husbands, children to parents, and slaves to masters (emphasis added).³

Submission in the Church 

A woman’s demeanor                                               

Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head, but every wife who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head, since it is the same as if her head were shaven. For if a wife will not cover her head, then she should cut her hair short. But since it is disgraceful for a wife to cut off her hair or shave her head, let her cover her head (1 Corinthians 11:4-6 ESV).

During the time of the early church, women were allowed to pray and prophesy publicly in church. The gift of prophecy was unique to the early church and is not applicable today for men or women.

In the Corinthian culture of the day, women wore head coverings to show both their femininity (i.e., their distinction from men) and submissive attitude.

Paul’s point was that women were allowed to minister in the church, but they were to do so in a feminine way that did not usurp male headship.

A woman’s silence 

Two passages explain how a woman shows submission through “silence” in the church.

• In 1 Corinthians 14:34, Paul says that “the women should keep silent in the churches.”

The problem Paul was addressing was the inclusion of women as prophets in the judgment of male prophecy (cf. 1 Corinthians 14:34-35). A woman’s publicly judging a man’s prophecy in church contradicted Paul’s previous teaching in 1 Corinthians 11 that women were to submit to the male leadership.

• In 1 Timothy 2:11, Paul says, “Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness.”

Paul here commands women not to teach or exercise authority over men, because teaching evidences one’s authority (1 Timothy 2:12). Women are not to have authority over men in the church. 

A woman’s service

Submission to men does not negate a woman’s ministry in the church; it simply guides  it:

Women participated in ministry in the Scriptures, but their ministry was a complementary and supportive ministry, a ministry that fostered and preserved male leadership in the church. Thus the ministry of women in the church was notable and significant, but it never supplanted male leadership; instead, it functioned as a support to male leadership. This view does not rule out all ministry for women. Instead, it sees the ministry of women as complementary and supportive (emphasis added).⁴

Several examples in the New Testament show how women served in the church under the leadership of men:

• In Acts 18:24-26, Aquila and his wife Priscilla explained Scripture more accurately to Apollos. Priscilla’s involvement in the private explanation was under the leadership of and alongside her husband.

• In Titus 2:3-5, Paul instructs Titus to make sure the older women were teaching the younger women. Women can have a teaching ministry to other women in the church.

• Paul also commends various women for their labor with him, for him, and for the sake of the Gospel (Romans 16:1-4, 6; Philippians 4:2-3).

Man is the head of the woman. In the home, this should be evidenced by a wife’s submitting to her husband in all things. In the church, this should be evidenced by a woman’s submitting to her husband’s leadership (if married) as well as to the male leadership in the church. Women should still take advantage of the many opportunities to minister within the church.

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Holly Huffstutler serves with her husband David, the pastor of First Baptist Church in Rockford, IL. She blogs with him here where this post first appeared. Holly is a homemaker, raising and schooling her four children.

Image by Rosy / Bad Homburg / Germany from Pixabay

1. Robert L. Thomas, in New American Standard Hebrew-Aramaic and Greek Dictionaries:Updated Edition (Anaheim: Foundation Publications, 1998). [↩]
2. This never means that a woman must accept abuse from her husband. Any woman suffering from any form of abuse should seek help from her pastor and any necessary law enforcement. [↩]
3. Andrew T. Lincoln, Ephesians, vol. 42 of Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, 1990), 366. [↩]
4. Thomas R. Schreiner, “The Valuable Ministries of Women in the Context of Male Leadership: A Survey of Old and New Testament Examples and Teaching.” Online: https://bible.org/seriespage/valuable-ministries-women-context-male-leadership. [↩]