1. Thoughts on Marriage, Church and God
I do want to be clear from the start about who I am and where I am coming from:
I am a Christian, not necessarily seen as a “good” one who follows all the rules but definitely a Christian (Who makes these rules anyway?)
I believe the bible is the inspired word of God, written down by human hand
I know that God loves me and that I am fully loved in all situations, circumstances and places
I love the church, the people who follow God to the best of their abilities
These blogs are often how I try to reconcile my belief in God’s love and my personal experiences with what I read in the bible.
I have been having a lot of thoughts about marriage, particularly how the church sees marriage, what the bible teaches on marriage and how we can reconcile these things.
There is a psychological phrase “cognitive dissonance” which I understand means: trying to believe two contradictory things at the same time leading to your head exploding.
I have found this cognitive dissonance in my life when I try to make sense of marriage in the light of church teachings. So I'm trying to make sense of my world and get some clarity here.
I have a lot to say, so I’ve divided it up into 4 parts.
(Did I ever tell you that at high school people my friends decided I could found the department of conversation because I talked so much?)
General Thoughts
Church Teachings
Bible
Reconciliation of my thoughts/beliefs, the church teachings and the bible.How do these all fit together into a workable theory or belief?
1. General Thoughts
For me personally marriage is simultaneously the most amazing, wonderful experience and the most irritating and annoying thing in the world.
I am a big fan of marriage. I adore my husband more than anyone or anything in the world. He is the best human being I have ever met and I am so blessed. But this sharing thing is hard sometimes, having to consider someone else’s feelings and opinions ALL THE TIME. Overall marriage is the best thing that has ever happened to me. If you find the right person, marry them is my advice.
But as with everything, once you start to bring God, the bible and church opinion into a marriage it is confusing. Every church I have ever been to seems to have an opinion on how marriage should work. Some churches see a very clear (sexist!) divide where the man is the “head of the house” and makes all decisions, has control over all money and the wife is to “submit” to the husband.
Churches usually teach that the man should be in charge as “head of the household”, but they emphasise that he is to love his wife “as Christ loved the church”. This means that he should be prepared to die for his wife, as Christ died for us.
I personally feel like sometimes death is the easy option (figuratively at least). It is easy for someone to think, “Oh I would die to protect my spouse”. But it is harder to live everyday thinking of the welfare of your spouse, putting their feelings ahead of your own and that to me is much more important. To sacrifice every day in tiny little ways to make them happy, for someone else’s good rather than your own, to care about their wellbeing more than (or at least as much as) your own.
It’s easy to hear the “love your wife as Christ loved the church” sermon as a theory, it’s much harder to have both parties encouraged to live daily lives of sacrifice, commitment and love. In this way I think both people would be mutually submitting their ideas, desires and wants to put the other person first, which I think may well be the real meaning of biblical submission.
I have a friend who was told off by her church because she did the budgeting and managed the finances in her family. Her husband had no interest in this; he trusted her and knew that she would make the right calls. But their church did not approve.
I personally think that in all things both members of a couple should discuss and consult, but for making decisions surely the wisest option is to let the person with the most skill and knowledge of the decision has the final say? Regardless of genitalia.
Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE churches and Christians in general but I have issues with blanket teachings like this, surely each situation is different and cannot be covered by one phrase.
Lots of churches will emphasise working in your strengths and doing what you are good at, but also say the “man is the head of the house”. It is very unclear to me how this can be reconciled. It’s almost as though the official church line is “head of the house” and also people should “work in their strengths” but no one has thought about how those two can conflict. I have no biblical reason for saying this but my gut says cognitive dissonace here.
A podcast I listened to recently (Bad Christians Podcasts) mentioned this while interviewing a very popular Christian blogger. They mentioned that the word submission is often taken to mean servitude with one person ruling or owning the other but shouldn’t.
One of the “Bad Christians” brought up the part of the bible (Ephesians chapter 5 verse 21) that talks about us “submitting to one another” which gives the impression at least that it is a mutual submission. This particular chap said that he submitted to his wife all the time as often she was better informed, more knowledgeable and was the leader in that particular area of their lives, which makes sense. But he still said that he thinks that he is the “team leader” of their family in general.
It does seem to be the standard official point of view for a church to say that the man is the head of the house/team leader. How do we feel about this?
KG
PS- Bad Christians Podcasts are fun. A group of christian guys talking about things that “good Christians” don’t talk about and being real. The podcasts are free on itunes.
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