Commentary on First Peter (101)
For many Christians, their favorite portion of any discussion on submission to authority is the one that defines the exceptions. In other words, whenever the Bible commands obedience, they wish to know, "But when may we disobey?"
The correct answer, of course, is that a wife may disobey her husband whenever he commands something that is sinful. For example, if the husband commands the wife to commit adultery, or to worship a false god, then the wife will have no choice but to disobey. This sounds straightforward, but additional comments are needed to prevent abuse. This is because wives often take it upon themselves to call something sinful when it is only contrary to their personal preference or standard.
Once a farming couple was taking a truckload of newly harvested wheat to the market for sale. The details of this story are hazy to me, but it seems that there are government regulations limiting the moisture on each unit of crops. The reason for the law is that water adds to the weight of the product, and the wetter something is, the less of the product the buyers are getting for the price. So the purpose of the law is to prevent fraud.
In this instance, the wife thought that the wheat was too wet, and she urged her husband not to sell it in such a condition. The husband, however, informed her that the amount of moisture on the wheat was well within the limits specified by the government, and therefore he sold the wheat against his wife's protest. Now the wife felt that her husband had committed fraud, and she could not help feeling that she had participated in a dishonest transaction herself. She complained to her pastor, who was wise enough to inquire about the details of the case without assuming the worst of the husband right away. He then informed the woman that she was in fact the one at fault.
The husband had done nothing that was against either divine law or human law, and yet the wife felt that what he did was immoral, and worse, he made her a part of it. The truth is that she had no respect for either the Lord or her husband, but she was evaluating the husband's action by her private standard and subjective judgment. In effect, she had made herself the head over her husband, and even defied the Lord in the process. She was not more honest than her husband – she was just more self-righteous.
Therefore, when we acknowledge that there are exceptions to obeying the husband, we are probably not saying enough. Are the wives able to distinguish actual immorality from personal distaste? Or are they going to regard as an exception anything that they do not like, anything that runs contrary to their own hang-ups?
Business decisions cover one area in which wives may disagree when in fact they just want to take control of the situation. Another area is sexual inhibitions. Here many wives have frustrated their husbands for no good reason, labeling certain activities as perverse and immoral when they can offer no biblical reason for their opposition. Their aversion probably comes from their personal hang-ups, perhaps inherited from their family and church traditions. Unbelieving husbands then blame the Christian faith for draining the joy and excitement out of their marriage, when the real culprit is their wives' scriptural ignorance and self-righteous attitude.
These are just examples – wives illegitimately defy their husbands in every area of life. The church should affirm the place for exceptions, but also help the women define them, so that preference does not become law, and personal inhibitions do not become divine prohibitions. In any case, it is time that Christians respond to God's command with a "Yes, Lord" rather than the tiresome "Yes, but" that has become the spiritual reflex of many believers.
August 10 2006 | Expositions