How To Respect Your Husband (2)

Would you please locate in your Bible once again Ephesians chapter 5? I'm sure your Bible just opens up to that passage readily anymore. You're getting used to hearing Ephesians 5 and that's great because it is such a foundational passage of Scripture on what we're preaching on on Sunday mornings on marriage. The story is told of a woman who had very little respect for her husband. She would put him down constantly. She would make light of his work. She would make fun of his ideas and his opinions. One day while she was shopping she decided that she would try to just drop in and his work place, his office building and just see what in the world he did anyway while he was there all day if if anything. And so she called him on herself only said it's kind of a busy day but sure yeah come on up we'll we'll chat for a few minutes and when she got there he was indeed busy so she had to wait a few minutes before she could really get into seam and from her chair just outside his office she could not help but see and hear a number of people that came to his desk. She recognized that her husband's co-workers had a lot of respect for him. She also recognized that his boss who walked into the room at one point and the way he talked to her husband he obviously had a lot of respect for her husband as well. Then she noticed his attractive young secretary who obviously had admiration and respect for him as well. Then she watched as an older employee in the company one who had been there much longer obviously than her husband but who worked under him came and talked with him and she couldn't help but cringe a little bit when she heard this older gentleman say yes sir to her husband. Finally she had a chance to get in to talk with him and she quickly said a few things and excused herself and said I'll see you this evening at home she made it to the car before she burst into tears and it suddenly hit her that there were two things about her husband that she had completely missed. One was that he had a lot of leadership ability and a lot of insight that she didn't recognize and wasn't giving him credit for and the second thing that really hit her was that she he deserved as much respect at home as he did in his workplace and wondered why she had missed that for so long. In Ephesians chapter 5 Paul is dealing with the relationship between husbands and wives and as we have seen he summarizes the duties of each in the marriage with one key concept. He says a lot about both but then he summarizes it in verse 33 with this one key concept look at it again however each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself and the wife must respect her husband. So husbands we are to love our wives as ourselves or in the greater context of the passage as Christ loved the church and wives are to respect their husbands we've talked to the husbands a good bit about their responsibility last week we started in on the responsibility of the wives and following the lead of Emerson Egrich's in his great book Love and Respect. I'm using his acronym these are not original with me the acronym of chairs although it was pointed out to me after last week service that you could just as easily rearrange these letters and it could read his car. Kind of like that but it would it would change the way we're presenting them so we'll stick with this one for now we've already looked at at the sea to respect your husband in the area of conquest and conquest does not mean to conquer you as his wife but we saw that it meant his God given desire to work and achieve in the workplace. Secondly wives need to respect their husbands in the area of hierarchy hierarchy means an leadership structure and the idea that God has given your husband a desire to protect and provide for you these are inborn desires that God has given your husband it's part of the way he expresses the image of God that God has created him with and we saw that from scripture last week today we're going to look at the A and the I A standing for authority and I standing for insight and in a couple of weeks we'll look at the last two responsibility and sexuality but today we're going to look at authority and insight now I hope this is working out as well for you guys as it did for me this week when I went home from church last Sunday and I walked in the back door and into our kitchen jeannie was on her knees with her hands on the floor saying welcome home Lord John I just about joined her in the floor rolling in laughter it was so funny and although we had a great laugh about that I will say that my wife is a great model of the very things that I'm preaching about and I so thank God for her and her spirit but I also know that someone came up to me after the service last week so I think for some of you guys it may not be working out so well someone came up and I will say this was ingest but came up to me and said I want you to know I took very very extensive notes this morning and she showed me her her sermon outline and in every blanket had the word blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah so we'll see how it works out we're trying to get today and see how it goes okay respect and authority I think it's important that we gain a biblical perspective here I touched on this last week it overlaps a little bit with one of the principles we talked about last week but this week we need to make clear the biblical concept of authority in leadership structure in the home and it's so important that we understand this because our culture is so against this today and teaches something diametrically opposite so let's begin with what authority means what are we talking about here well basically we're talking about the God-given desire to lead and serve the God-given desire to lead and serve and I want to couple those things together because they are coupled together in scripture and we're going to see that God has given a clear leadership structure in the home but that leadership is to be carried out within the context of servanthood you have your Bible open to Ephesians 5 let's look at what Paul says in verse 22 wives submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord and we've already seen before that that word submit was a military term in the first century that Paul used which literally means to place in rank under or to to take a place under someone to take a place of submission to someone and here's the reason why in verse 23 for the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church his body of which he is the savior now as the church submits to Christ so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything it is quite clear from these three verses that number one the husband is the head of the home and the leader in the marriage relationship that is clear from what he says in verse 23 it is also clear from verses 22 and 24 that it is the wife's responsibility to defer to his leadership to place herself under his leadership now we touched on this a little bit last week the leadership is not a domineering put you in your place kind of a abusive leadership that's not at all in fact the leadership that a husband is to express is to be done in the context of servanthood Jesus is an example of that notice how he goes on to say Paul does in verse 25 this is the way that husbands are to provide this kind of leadership husbands love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her and as we've seen before he goes on to express how that took place and how Christ continues to work with his church until we get to heaven but he came and died for us he came to serve us Jesus is the perfect example of the kind of leadership that Paul's talking about so Paul does not say okay now that we've got this leadership structure settled in the home husband is the head of the home the wife is placed up under the religion he doesn't address the husband say okay now husband's lead be be tough really he says no husband's love love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her that's the context of the leadership that a husband is to provide and Jesus himself modeled that kind of leadership you remember the story in Matthew chapter 20 we won't take the time to turn there but let me just recount it for you Matthew chapter 20 toward the end of Christ's ministry two of his disciples actually their mother comes on their behalf but they're right behind her it's clear from the text their mother comes James and John and says I have a request of you Lord she says I want my two sons to be on the right and on the left in your kingdom in other words the two most prominent places in your kingdom I won't reserve for my sons today we would say the two highest cabinet positions secretary of state secretary of defense I want those two positions for my sons and James and John were no doubt standing back there saying yeah yeah that's what we want to and so Jesus says okay it's time for a leadership lesson first of all he said are you able to drink the cup that I'm gonna drink are you able to be baptized with the baptism I'm gonna be baptized with and he was talking about his suffering are you willing to go with me to suffering because the way to leadership is through suffering and they don't completely catch what he's saying they say oh yeah yeah we are we're on board we're good with that that's not quite the way they said it is the King John version but anyway that's kind of the way it sounded Jesus said okay I want to teach you something about leadership the kind of leadership you're talking about as a kind of Gentiles do they Lord it over people they flex their muscles they they let people know who's in charge and they are authoritarian from the top down but he said it shall not be so among you but let let him that will lead be your minister or your servant and let the one who wants to be first be last and then Jesus closes out that lesson in verse 28 of Matthew 20 by saying I'm the example he says even as the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many same thing Paul talks about here how does a husband lead his family lead his wife it is to be done from a servant hood perspective that's what authority means so I want to make sure you understand when I talk about a husband has a built-in desire for authority that is not any biblical reason for an abusive domineering kind of put you in your place authority yes there is a leadership structure in the home it's clear the husband is the head of the home the head of the wife and the wife is to place herself under his leadership but that leadership that authority is to be exercised in a spirit of love and as a servant to our wives even dying for them if necessary like Jesus did his bride the church but I do not have to tell you although I'm going to spend a little time doing it I don't have to tell you that that is not well received in our culture today that whole concept of authority and a higher-archic time kind of structure and one person's in leadership the others to place herself under that's that doesn't go over well in our culture today in fact there are a lot of objections to headship and submission today so I want to talk about a few of those some of them you hear in the secular world some of them you hear in the Christian world one of the objections to headship and submission is this that idea is not even needed or desirable that went out with the 19th century come on John don't you know where we are we're in 21st century modern America that idea is an idea out of an ancient culture out of a backward culture where women were downtrodden and men were the dominant people in society so John we don't live in that kind of culture anymore we've come a long way baby you are really up there now we live in 21st century America and that's what we hear so often from our culture second thing that we often hear from the culture is this Paul well Paul was a bachelor anyway hated women you know what do you expect out of a guy like that third thing I often hear and this comes out of the Christian community so called Christian feminists teach this that Galatians 328 says there is no more hierarchy leadership submission structure since the cross and here's how they teach it look at Galatians chapter 3 verse 28 there is neither June or Gentile neither slave nor free nor is there male and female for you are all one in Christ Jesus and there are certain teachers who say see the Bible says there is no more gender distinction in Christ if you're saved under the cross there is no gender distinction and I wait a second that strikes me as kind of strange didn't Paul right Galatians yeah didn't Paul right Ephesians yeah hmm was Paul just having a bad day when he wrote the Ephesians I don't think so remember this is God's word if you study those two letters closely you'll understand that in Galatians 3 Paul's talking about something entirely different he's talking about our position in Christ even says at the end of verse we are all one in Christ Jesus so as far as our position in Christ our justification our salvation our standing before God there is no distinction we are equal in our position in Christ that's why it says there is no no racial distinction in Christ Georgia in tile there's no social ladder you know social cast kind of distinction slave or free and there's no gender distinction in Christ man or woman male or female but he's talking about our position in Christ I'm no more saved than my wife is I do not have a higher standing before God in my justification than Jeanne does we are on equal footing at the cross and in the in the body of Christ as far as being in the family of God that's what Paul's talking about in Galatians 3 he's not talking about leadership structures in the home or in the church and to use this verse to deny what he teaches clearly in other places is a terrible misuse of Scripture here's the fourth thing I often hear about way of an objection and it's this you know John the Bible teaches mutual submission husbands and wives are to be mutually submissive to each other so that the wife really does not owe any unique submission in any way to her husband because the Bible teaches where to be mutually submissive to each other and you know where that comes from don't you right here in Ephesians 5 verse 21 look at verse 21 it says submit to one another out of reverence for Christ oh so we are to be mutually submissive to one another and then he goes on to talk about wives and husbands right okay we're gonna do a little bit of Bible study right now okay on a Sunday morning do a little bit of Bible study the word submit is not the main verb in a whole line of verbs to get the main verb that controls this whole passage you got to go back to verse 18 verse 18 is the main verb do not get drunk on wine which leads to the botry now here it is instead be filled with the spirit in the original language Paul wrote in that's an imperative that means that's a command that is the leading verb the command that he's given the next four verbs are all participles in the in the language Paul wrote in it's clear and what that means is something like this if I were to say to you the little girl played in the park running jumping and skipping you would understand clearly that the main verb the main thing I'm getting across is that she played how did she play running jumping and skipping okay the the next four verbs after the verb be filled with the spirit are participles in some translations they all end in I and G that's the most appropriate way to translate them notice what Paul says be filled with the spirit what does that look like well it will result in four things speaking to one another with Psalms hymns and songs from the spirit in other words our relationship with each other will be biblical will be speaking to one another in biblical terms secondly we'll be singing and making music from your heart to the Lord to other participles that go together joyfulness in other words and then the third one is always verse 20 always giving thanks to God the Father for everything so there'll be a thankful spirit if you're filled with the spirit and then the fourth one which is also in the same same flow of thought as the other three is verse 21 it should be really rendered submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God or in the reverence for God that's the way the King James translates it and that's the most appropriate way to translate it it is another participle supporting the main verb which is to be filled with the spirit how are we filled with the spirit by these four ways that's what that looks like and then Paul says you want to know what the filling of the spirit looks like in the home still under the category of the main verb he's talking about what the filling of the spirit looks like in home if your home is spirit controlled it will look this way wives submit yourselves to your own husbands husband love your wives just as Christ loved the church the main verb that controls this passage and it is quite clear in the original language is be filled with the spirit here's what it looks like in your personal life now here's what it looks like in the home a spirit filled home is one that does follow God's leadership and authority structure ladies if you are influenced by the culture today and the feminist teaching of the day I want to remind you especially in response to those first two arguments that I gave you against headship and submission I want to remind you this is not some culturally tainted coming out of a backward culture that Paul's talking about this is God's word this is God's word we're dealing with Paul was not influenced by his culture if you believe that you don't believe in the inspiration of scripture that's pretty serious this is God's word this is God's truth and this Paul base is teaching here on some backward culture and he's just influenced by the male dominated culture of his day no he quite clearly tells us what he bases is teaching on and it's two things the order of creation and the events of the fall look at these verses on the screen for screen in chapter 11 verse three but I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ and the head of the woman is man and the head of Christ is God we saw that last week just you know giving that structure even in the Trinity there is leadership and submission structure and so it's also there in the home but here's the reason for that you skip down the verses eight nine here's the reason why four or because man did not come from woman but woman from man neither was man created for woman but woman for man Paul bases his arguments squarely on Old Testament teaching not on his culture he doesn't say well this is what I heard in Corinth this is what I got out of Rome no this is what I got out of Genesis he says this is based on Old Testament teaching that's where he finds his basis for this leadership structure in the home it's in the order and purpose of creation now look at this passage in 1 Timothy chapter 2 verses 11 to 13 a woman a woman should learn in quietness and full submission I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man now that passage has caused no small difficulty in the church and it's another example where people say well Paul just speaking out of his backward culture influenced by the male dominated society of his day and so that's kind of drivel I've read over and over again from Christian teachers that is not at all what Paul's doing Paul is is basically saying it's not it's not their woman can't teach I think this passage is saying basically in the context of what he's telling Timothy to do with the church as a whole and how to operate the church that a woman is not to be in the pastor teacher position in a church the official teaching voice to the church as a whole do women have teaching roles in the church of course yes there are women who are better teachers than I am or ever hoped to be but the official position of pastor teacher in the church the official teacher of the church is reserved for a man I didn't say that Paul said that God the Holy Spirit said that through Paul so that's what he's talking about or assuming authority being in a leadership position it's why we don't have women deacons now that's an issue with some as well but we do that because of what God said not what I say or anybody else now notice why he gives this why he says this for Adam was formed first then he remember the order of creation of 1 Corinthians 11 he uses the same argument here does Paul base his teaching on the backward culture of his day the male dominated society of his day no he tells us very plainly I'm basing what I'm teaching clearly in Old Testament scripture here's the reason why God says this is to be the way it is now it will come to a verse a little bit later in 1 Timothy 2 that goes even a little further than that gives another another reason but I think those objections to headship and submission need to be recognized for what they are they are attempts to cave into the cultural ideas of today rather than stay true to the word of God the Bible is very clear about this men and ladies but please remember please remember the kind of leadership a husband is to provide makes it a joyful experience for his wife to place herself under loving sacrificial leadership this is not of I'm gonna be in charge and you're gonna do what I say it's not that at all not that at all that's an abuse of leadership so the scriptures are pretty clear so given those objections from scripture and how weak they are what is the meaning of submission ladies how do you show respect to your husbands basically submission means this and we'll be very careful how I say this it is a willing humble yielding to the leadership of your husband to use Paul's word submission to place yourself under the leadership of your husband as the Christ as the church does to Christ remember again it was a military term in the day denoting a certain position or rank that there was a leadership structure so you recognize his God-given position as a leader now I know some of the objections to that as well some say I will not do that unless he deserves it do you find that anywhere in the scripture now I understand that there are some men whose character does not deserve respect some women too but we're talking about that structure there are some men whose character does not deserve respect the position God has given your husband deserves respect and you certainly should address him about any abuse of that leadership but in a respectful fashion some say well I'm only supposed to be in submission of my husband if he's saved right doesn't it say submit yourself to your own husbands as you do to the Lord so doesn't that mean only if he's saved no we'll come to this in a later message in first Peter 3 Peter specifically addresses the case where a wife has an unsaved husband and he commands the same thing that Paul does when he says you should submit to your husband as to Christ he's saying basically you do this as an act of submission to the Lord it is a part of living out the Lordship of Christ in your life to place yourself under the leadership of your husband now there are I believe a couple exceptions to this if there is abuse in the relationship I would never counsel a woman to stay under abuse and just tolerate it and not say anything that neat that darkness that sin needs to be brought out into the light and dealt with secondly if a husband expects you to do something or commands you to do something directly contrary to the word of God then God is your higher authority and you must obey God now you can do that in a gentle and meek spirit that's what Peter is going to talk about we'll see that later but the scriptures quite clear exceptions given yes but the scriptures quite clear all else being equal there's a leadership structure in the home and submission means that you place yourself under the leadership of your husband it does not mean slavery it does not mean silence it doesn't mean that you can't ever say anything yes certainly if your husband is way off based disagree with him just disagree agreeably do it in a respectful fashion do you challenge him say you don't know what you're talking about crazy man no do it in a respectful way as under his leadership but recognizing he may be saying the wrong thing or leading the wrong way submission does not mean inferiority does not mean you're inferior to him in any way it is simply a recognition of the God-given structure of how the home ought to operate and a willing placing yourself under his leadership and husbands don't ever forget that does not give you a right to lead in the wrong spirit remember your leadership my leadership is always to be as Christ love the church and sacrificial gave himself up for her let me give you some practical ways to do this ladies some practical ways to respect his authority tell him that you're thankful for his strength and enjoy being able to lean on him at times tell him that don't ever say to him you're responsible but we are equals so don't make a decision I don't agree with don't say that to him praise his good decisions be firm but gracious about his bad decisions if you disagree with him please do that in private not in front of the friends not in front of the children show respect for his position disagree with him in private if you disagree with him that gives you the opportunity to have a voice and a wife should clearly have a voice in the direction of the home there's so much I could say here first Timothy three talks about qualifications for a pastor talks about a pastor being able to manage his home great word a manager doesn't do everything make every decision and talk down to people a wise manager includes people in the decision making process so a husband ought to include his wife you have a voice you should be able to disagree but do it in a respectful way which means you don't undermine his authority and his leadership in the home in front of others or in front of the children another way you do this ladies or can do this is give your reasons for disagreeing quietly and reasonably but do not attack his right to lead you will be undermining your home if you do that practical ways you know ladies you may need to ask yourself some questions like has he tried to exercise leadership and I've shot him down every time he tries disagreeing with him that's crazy you think you are anyway have you shot him down taken the feed out from under his leadership ask yourself some questions respect and authority well I don't see any to me just flying this way yet so that's good let's move on respect and insight the Bible also talks about God creating your man with a particular reflection of God's image that can be described as insight and part of respecting your husband is to respect his insight now in order to clarify what I'm talking about here it probably would be good to make first of all a careful definition of what I'm talking about and then a distinction between two things let me say first of all what I mean by insight it is the God given desire to analyze and counsel now there are obviously some exceptions and men do this to varying degrees we're not all clicky cutter in the same mold but God has made men with an ability to have the kind of insight that analyzes things and begins to kind of sort through them and prioritize them and suggest the best solution that's the way he's made us to think now there is a difference between a woman's intuition and a man's insight let's talk a little bit about your intuition and his insight now woman's intuition is often talked about and rightly so rightly recognized women do have a natural discernment about things that's intuition we might even use the word hunch you have a hunch about or a good feel for a situation so women have that kind of intuition that men may miss quite often men typically think more in terms of insight and by that again I mean the ability to analyze the situation see its many facets and come to a solution a conclusion that's the way men process things women tend to process things more through intuition and by the way both are needed my whole point here is that men you need to listen to your woman's intuition your wife's one wife I didn't say that right you need to we're not I'm not gonna say that either you need to listen to your wife singular her intuition but wives you also need to listen to your husband's insight both are needed but I want to really focus for a moment on the need to listen to your husbands insight and here's the reason why our culture today all you got to do is watch sitcoms on television I'm thankful that I don't but I've seen enough commercials to know what they portray they portray men generally as inept dumb opinionated one sided it's the women or in most cases the children who are the clear thinkers and really see through the issues and correct their parents or correct their husbands these dumb idiots of men now if you've bought into that ladies it will lead you to an arrogance and a self-righteousness and a prideful spirit that will cause disrespect for your husband if you've bought into that cultural mindset God has built your husband to have some insight that you need you need his insight for a biblical example of that I'm gonna take you all the way back to the Garden of Eden you knew it was coming didn't you Garden of Eden Genesis chapter two Genesis chapter two let's look at it Genesis chapter two just for a few moments in Genesis two when God created Adam he gave him some commands last week we saw that he gave him the command to keep the Garden to dress to till the cultivate the Garden that was before sin that was before any thorns weeds whatever he still had a job and we saw that that's part of the way God built into a man was to work and achieve in his workplace but God gave him another command as well in verse 17 and that command is this but you must not eat it verse 16 he said you're free to eat me tree in the Garden but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil for when you eat from it you will certainly die God gave that command to Adam Eve has not even been created yet that doesn't happen till verse 18 and following so God gave this command to Adam he was responsible to lead his home in carrying out the commands of God now the Bible does not tell whether or not God repeated these same commands to Eve after she was created I'm sure that's a possibility it's just not stated in in the passage more likely he expected Adam to communicate to Eve what God had communicated to him and so that probably is what happened although I can't say that with certainty regardless both of them by the time you get to chapter three know what is right and what would potentially be wrong notice what happens in chapter three now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made he said to the woman did God really say you must not eat from any tree in the Garden now Satan uses a literal serpent to communicate to Eve and he begins by casting just just planting a little seed of doubt in her mind did God really say this and it's enough to get her thinking well what did God really say did he really say we shouldn't eat so she responds to him this way verse two the woman said to the serpent we may eat fruit from the trees in the Garden but God did say you must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the Garden and you must not touch it or you will die now is there anywhere in God's command where he said you shall not touch it no that's not what he commanded Adam now know what some of you are thinking oh Adam messed it up he communicated the wrong thing to Eve right maybe but I think at this point she has enough doubt in her mind placed there by Satan that she's beginning to question God's goodness and so she reads more into God's command than was there you know God did say we shouldn't eat we're not even supposed to touch that tree oh really well Satan moves in for the kill now verse four you will not certainly die the serpent said to the woman for God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God knowing good and evil now here's here's the core of his argument God's really trying to hide something from you there's something that he doesn't want you to know or experience you think God's good knowing better than you do he's trying to hide something from you this tree of the knowledge of good and evil you think he's trying to hide some knowledge from you well by this time she is she's done verse six when the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye and also desirable for gaining wisdom she took some and ate it she also gave some to her husband who was with her and he ate it now I don't know exactly what all this looked like I don't know if Adam was with her when the serpent was there or he joins her later when she eats it we don't know how much time expired that that's difficult to say from this text all we know is that Paul gives us a divine commentary on this text in a couple of places in the New Testament and Paul's commentary leads us to these two conclusions Eve was deceived by the serpent Adam deliberately and willfully sinned Eve was deceived Adam went into it with his eyes wide open in fact God will say to him later when he's cursing the ground in verse 17 because you listen to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you and then he goes on to give the curse on the ground what was Adam's problem he did not exercise the leadership position God had given him in the home instead he listened to he placed himself under her leadership and she had been deceived by the serpent and what was Adam's reasoning that was he thinking you know Eve has committed a terrible terrible act and she's going to be excluded from the garden and she's a sinner now I don't want her to be alone I want to go with her maybe maybe that was it all we know is that Adam deliberately willfully sinned now here's the way Paul treats that in the New Testament look at these three passages very quickly on the screen first Timothy 2.14 and Adam was not the one deceived it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner and then a couple that was 2 Corinthians 113 where Paul says but I'm afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent's cunning you talking to the Corinthian church your minds may somehow be let astray from your sincere impure devotion to Christ okay so quite clearly Eve was deceived by the serpent she knew better but her intuition did not hold up for her in this case Adam had insight clearly word from God directly as to what he was to do and he directly clearly violated that and so Paul says this about him in Romans chapter 5 therefore just as sin entered the world through one man not through one woman through one man and death through sin and in this way death came to all people because all sin and he summarizes it in verse 19 by saying this for just as through the disobedience of the one man and it's clear in the passage you're talking about Adam he's contrasting Adam and Christ just as through the disobedience of one man the many were made sinners so also through the obedience of the one man speaking of Christ the many will be made righteous so the New Testament clearly paints this picture Eve was deceived by the serpent Adam knew exactly what he should and should not do and he violated it willfully and so he is the one that drags the human race into sin now ladies please don't misunderstand what I'm saying I am not saying that all women are gullible I am not saying that women can't think through situations not saying that I am not saying that women don't have insight not saying that I'm not saying that women are the reason for the mess that we're in well maybe that one but no no no I'm not saying that either what I am saying is this while men need to pay attention to their wives intuition women you need to listen to your husband's insight evidently Adam told Eve what she was not supposed to eat of and she did not listen she did not listen to his insight from God and so you need to listen to your husband's insight he will see some things that you don't see because God's given him the kind of response to things that that has a tendency to analyze see different sides of things some it all up and come to a conclusion and that's why he wants to fix you just the way he thinks so some practical ways to respect his insight and counsel tell him up front if you just want him to listen if you just start explaining a problem to him don't complain if he tries to fix you that's how God's built him to operate he is an analyzer and figures things out he will do everything possible to pull that nail out of your forehead okay but if all you want is a shoulder to cry on or someone to empathize with you let him know up front let him know up front so that he can be prepared to restrain his fix it mentality okay here's another way you can show respect for his insight and counsel thanking for his advice without acting insulted or like he doesn't care about your feelings he does care about your feelings ladies please understand when we try to suggest a solution it's because we do love you and we want things to be better for you and that's the way we're geared to think through that you can show respect for your husband's insight when you recognize his problem solving approach is his male brand of empathy it is the way he does empathize with you please ladies counsel him respectfully when you differ with his ideas you can be right about the issue and wrong at the top of your voice wrong in the way you approach it approach it with respect and then please sometimes allow him to fix it and thank him for doing it sometimes let him go ahead and pull the nail out of the forehead and thank him for doing it there is a tendency especially because of the way our culture treats men there is a tendency for women today to think that their husbands are always wrong there are these dumb buffoon idiots you know there is a tendency to think that story is told of Hans and his wife Gretel and Gretel says in exasperation to her husband Hans you know you're fighting and bickering too much Hans and I've been thinking I think we need to pray the dear Lord to take one of us to heaven the one causing the problem I will pray he takes one of us to heaven you pray he takes one of us to heaven and then I can go live with my sister is that the way you're treating your husband I hope not ladies God will bless you and give you true freedom in the context of how he's made you in your husband if you will respect him respect him respect him for his authority respect him for his insight let's pray Father thank you for your word which is clear Lord help us to listen to you rather than the confusing voices of our culture today and how men and women are presented especially in the context of marriage in the home I pray that we would return to the clear perspectives of your word and not allow our minds to be shaped by what we hear on television or here at work or here across the neighborhood fence may we maintain biblical principles in our homes that will really free us to have the kind of relationships that you intend us to have joyful loving serving one another Father I pray for husbands and wives here today I pray that you would help us all to be submissive to your authority first and foremost and then I pray that wives will respect their husband's leadership and authority and their insight and communicate that effectively in Jesus name we pray amen