Husband & Wife: Value, Authority & Roles
Husband & Wife value, authority & roles
Reflecting the equality within the Trinity, God values men and women equally, without qualification. This is clear not only from the Genesis account of God appointing both Adam and Eve as vice-regents over creation (Gen. 1:28) but is the counsel of the entire Bible as well.
Unlike the world, God isn’t a respecter of persons. He doesn’t value us according to the way the world values people. We gain or lose no value by being rich or poor, famous or unknown, comely or plain, one race or another, or male or female. Paul makes the point with Jews and Greeks (Gentiles) as the example:
There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek. For God shows no partiality. (Romans 2:9–11)
In this context doing evil and good are tightly linked with believing in Jesus. Those who reject him do evil and those who accept him do good.
Paul is saying that our destiny is determined by our relationship to God, not our nationality or any other characteristic. He doesn’t say, “I value this one more because she is a Jew,” or “I value this one more because he is a male.” Rather, all who reject Christ receive their due punishment, but the sins of all who accept Him are forgiven and they receive glory and peace.
In his letter to the Galatians Paul explicitly states that all Christians are in the same (equal) position relative to Christ:
…for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:26–28)
Again, God isn’t a respecter of persons. He doesn’t value converted Jews over converted Greeks, slaves over free men, or males over females. None of those characteristics place one in a superior position relative to their relationship to Christ–all who have come to him in faith are equally positioned. They are all sons and daughters of God, one in Christ, and part of his body, the church.
Third, God ordained a differentiation of authority and roles in marriage, a reflection of the differentiation within the Trinity. God assigned the role of authoritative and responsible leader to the husband. There are several points in Genesis that confirm this relative to Adam and Eve–Adam was created first (Gen. 2:7; 1 Tim. 2:13), Eve was fashioned from Adam’s rib (Gen. 2:22), and Adam named both the animals and Eve (Gen. 3:20).
Further, though Eve was the first to eat the forbidden fruit, God called out for Adam, not Eve, when the two were hiding because of their guilt (Gen. 3:9). God held Adam, as the first created and as titular head of the human race, primarily responsible for the sin. That’s why we read in 1 Corinthians:
For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. (1 Corinthians 15:21–22)
Spiritual death, because of the original sin in the garden, came through Adam, not Eve. Adam had failed to rightly exercise his authority over Eve and because of it both suffered–authority comes with responsibilities and there are consequences when it is neglected or abused.
The husband’s authority, as leader of the family, is one example of the division of roles between husbands and wives. We learn more about the roles God gave the first family from his pronouncement of their punishment for eating the forbidden fruit.
He told Eve she would have pain in childbirth (Gen. 3:16). Eve had the role of bearing and nurturing the children. God added that she would desire to rule over her husband but instead he would rule over her (Gen. 3:16). Unlike the happy harmony that existed up to that point, Eve would resist her husband’s authority and he would exercise that authority in a less loving, more repressive way.
Turning to Adam, God told him the ground was cursed because of his sin. Before the Fall food was plentiful and easy to come by; now life would be hard. Adam would struggle to feed himself and his family. Ground that once produced food would now produce thorns and thistles (Gen. 3:17-19). Therefore Adam had the role of providing for his family.