The S Word, by Mac Richard

Mac Richard, The S-word

It’s really funny, over the course of my ministry, how many times I have had prospective brides sit in my office with their fiancées for pre-marital counseling and say something like this:


Just to need to establish some ground rules and make sure that nowhere in the ceremony does the word submit or obey rear its ugly head, okay? Thank you. Now let’s begin.



And I understand where that comes from. I understand the pushback to the S-word. When we think the S-word, we usually think doormat, rollover, taken advantage of. But that pushback betrays a gross misunderstanding of biblical submission.


First of all, we need to understand that Biblical submission is not limited to women. It’s not. The bible does say, “Wives, submit to your husbands,” in Ephesians 5:22. But what men have eliminated for centuries is the verse that goes immediately before this. Look at what it says. In Ephesians 5:21, the first part of the verse says, “Submit to one another.”


Isn’t it funny that men who predominantly have been preachers and teachers and priests have said, “Wives submit to your husbands. This is the will of the Lord for thy life.” But many times they have omitted this part that says, “Submit to one another.”


You see, in God’s economy, relationship works because people submit to each other. No matter the relationship, whatever it may be. God says in Philippians 2, “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.” Whatever relationship you’re in, it will work better if both parties submit to each other.


Submission is the ultimate question between God and a person. See, we like to talk about grace, and forgiveness, love, and blessing. And those things are all there. But they’re only found in true submission. Male or female, husband or wife, married or single. Undecided. Submission to God. Your life submitted to Him, and in that, receiving His life submitted for you.


You see, Jesus not only calls us to this, he models this. On the night that He was betrayed, the Bible says that Jesus was praying in such anguish knowing what was to come that drops of blood formed on His forehead. Now this was before the crown of thorns was placed there. So this was how stressed and anguished He was. And he said, “God, if there’s any way for this cup to pass from me, for me to avoid the cross and the physical anguish, the spiritual death and separation from you, please I don’t want to do this. But not my will, but you will be done.”


That’s what Jesus did: submitting himself completely to and through the point of death for you and for me. Now, submission to someone who loves you that deeply, that unconditionally, that perfectly, is submitting to your own best interest. That is the miracle of unconditional love: It works because it is complete. There is no need for keeping score, for demands of more time, attention or affection. Submission works.



Posted by MacRichard on July 11, 2006 at 10:01 AM