Christ – God’s very Son – made himself lower than all of us. This putting others first is Christ likeness at its most surprising. This is submission – mutual submission.
Then, also, to get the context right, we need to know that many non-believers of the day were very suspicious of the Christians; they feared they were upsetting the social order, that all of Christ’s teaching about equality in the sight of God, and Christ’s instruction that our relationship to God must come before any other relationship, would cause slaves to rebel, and cause wives to disrespect their husbands. There was much about the social order of that day that was frankly awful, and the Gospel over time did create great tensions between how things were and how things ought to be. It was this same Paul who had written to the Galatians that, “in Christ, you are all sons of God the father… there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free, neither male nor female” i.e. none is better than the other. None higher – all are one in Christ. And of course, all mixed freely and equally in the Church.
Paul certainly had these concerns in mind, but he didn’t want anyone to think he was inciting a rebellion. This could be one reason why he re-emphasizes the word about submitting, to the wives first, in 5:23, where he says, “wives are to be submissive to their husbands in everything.”
Perhaps some of the wives in the Ephesus church were so overjoyed at their new status and elevated stature in Christ, that they needed particularly to be reminded about being submissive, but we do know the verse has been scandalously misused and abused over the years to teach that husbands are the boss, husbands are always right, and wives must be submissive to whatever their husbands want. NO, Christ is the boss, for a Christian, “husbands are often wrong,” and no wife must ever agree to do anything, however much her husband wants it, if it is not pleasing to God. Don’t misunderstand the verse – it must be seen in the greater context of mutual submission. We submit to Christ and we submit to one another.
So, we have the context; now let’s get the concept right about the marriage relationship, because the apostle gives us wonderful truth, marvelous guidance here. There is a fundamental teaching here about marriage. Whenever Jesus talked about marriage, he quoted Genesis 2:24, and here Paul quotes it also. This is marriage, he says: you leave your parents, you commit yourself to one another in the presence of God, enter into a permanent, unconditional covenant, and then you come together physically, and something new results – it’s called “one flesh.”
