I want to say one more thing about the Biblical ideal for womanhood. You are to be known for your growing desire to submit to and for others. I know that sounds crazy. Who would want to submit to others?
Answer? God.
The LORD is exalted over all the nations, his glory above the heavens.
Who is like the LORD our God, the One who sits enthroned on high,
who stoops down to look on the heavens and the earth?
He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap;
he seats them with princes, with the princes of their people.
He settles the barren woman in her home as a happy mother of children.
Praise the LORD. (Psalm 113:4-9)
We candy-coat this in the English. Though God rightly is on the throne of all of the heavens, he shapels himself, literally humiliates himself not for his own sake, but to glorify the poor and needy. This is his DNA, the DNA of Jesus and the Holy Spirit in our inner-being (Eph 3).
When Paul says that we are to submit to one another, he is just saying that we are to be more and more motivated and empowered to act like God.
Wives, you are invited to be filled with the DNA of God and go and act accordingly. It is a high honor to submit in order to raise others up.
Men as well. I get it that this is not how the world works. I get it that Jesus was killed doing that very same thing. But it was in his nature.
Woman, it is in the very core of the nature of the Holy Spirit in your inner being as well.
For men, the primary gospel is that they can through the power of the Holy Spirit overcome neglect and indifference and the aloneness that comes from that. Women, you can in the Spirit alone overcome the need to control your life and the related issues of fears, anxieties, worries that stem from it. And vice versa.
Eve should have thrown herself upon God. She failed. Mary totally threw herself upon God and His plan without questions.
Jezebel, the wicked Queen of the pagans, spent her life gathering power and control—selfish and narcissistic. The daughters of Lot did not trust that God would provide husbands for them and conspired to deceive their father Lot into incest.
On the other hand, perhaps the pinnacle of ideal women in the Bible, Ruth gave her life totally over to God.
This will be a hard thing for all of us to swallow. This will be particularly hard for American women to hear and to embrace. Women, the good news is that God knows your deepest longings and hopes far more than you do and has a marvelous plan for you.
He has divined a path for you that will invest in you the identity, glory, identity, the sense of being loved and honored more than you ever dreamed was possible. This is what you most deeply desire, isn’t it? This is what you have been longing for in your careers and relationships—but honestly never really found. Am I right?
The bad news is that the first step will be a war against your flesh. No judgment. It is what it is. Yet, hear this. When the Spirit rips through you, you will begin to desire to give illusions of control to God. He can give you that kind of superhuman faith. Ask. Remember, if you just try harder to submit, hupetasso, you will fail and will likely do damage to your own self-worth.
On the other hand, if you access the power of God through his spirit in your inner being and begin to have your cups filled with the vastness of Christ love for you (Eph 3:14-21), you will begin to want to hupetasso with His hupetasso. A very different glorious thing.
Keep saying the Simple Uncluttered Gospel aloud, 3-5 times a day. You will begin to notice a difference. You can get the Simple Uncluttered Gospel in a bookmark from from my website, https://gospel-app.com/product/simple-uncluttered-gospel-bookmarks-2/. If you really want to be jazzed, check out my first book on the Song of Songs, The Kiss of God: Rediscovering the Song of Songs. Get it either on paperback or Kindle at Amazon.
You may start to dance again. Take heart child of God.
