“Who’s In Charge At Home?”  (Colossians 3:18-4:1), June 21, 2009

As long as your home is a power struggle, somebody doesn’t get it.

Insatiable cravings

Proverbs 30 records the “Sayings of Agur.”   Listen to one of them.

“The leech has two daughters.

‘Give! Give!’ they cry.

“There are three things that are never satisfied, four that never say, ‘Enough!’:

the grave, the barren womb, land, which is never satisfied with water, and fire, which never says, ‘Enough!’”

It’s a little odd to us that Agur cannot seem to make up his mind whether there are three or four “things that are never satisfied.”  Actually, that’s his way of “showing that the list, though specific, is not exhaustive.”  (Derek Kidner, Proverbs, 73).  So we can add to it.

I’ve started a list on my BlackBerry (where I can add to it anytime I think of something) of “things that are never satisfied.”  Cravings that never say, “Enough!”

One item on my list is chocolate.  Or sweets, in general.  When I was at a Sunday School party about two weeks ago at the Parkers, and decided to give myself permission to graze at the dessert table.  You would think a person who has cut back on sweets would enjoy one dessert and be happy.  Not me.  Once I gave in to my craving…well, my six, no seven, desserts speak for themselves.

On a more serious note, another insatiable craving is rights.  According to Webster, a right is “that which a person has a just claim to: power, privilege, etc. that belongs to a person by law, nature, or tradition [the right of free speech]”.  I am not saying rights are wrong, just that they are insatiable.

This is precisely what the government in Iran is facing right now.  If the people have the right to assemble and speak their minds, what’s next?  Every totalitarian nation has the same fear, and well it should.  An Islamic country, or at least the most radical of its religious leaders, fears the demand for religious rights will follow.

We have been living for more than two hundred years in a nation founded on inalienable rights – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, plus a whole bill of rights.  Don’t misunderstand me – I wouldn’t have it any other way politically. 

But rights birth greed out of a sense of entitlement.  “I’m owed this.”  Freedom is never satisfied.  It creates a craving for more.  Our way of life has brainwashed every one of us that we have a “just claim” to power, privilege, prosperity, and pleasure.  Everywhere we turn, we see the consequences of demanding one’s rights – financial meltdown, a federal deficit out of control, rampant sexual immorality, violence, and the breakdown of the family.

Turn with me to Colossians 3:18ff. where Paul will address the family.  The theme of this letter is that Christ is supreme, that he is and must be first place.  What does that look like at home?  Here’s a hint: It looks nothing like demanding your rights.

Haustafeln

If your Christian faith doesn’t transform how you relate to the people in your family, it isn’t worth a bucket of warm spit.  Those relationships are the most comprehensive, the longest-lasting, and the most private.  You relate to those people day in and day out, year after year, in a space that is, for the most part, out of ear shot of anyone else.  That’s another one of our “rights” – privacy.  Do I need to say it again?  I’m not arguing it shouldn’t be a right.  But privacy is what allows the epidemic of domestic abuse – verbal, physical, and sexual.

When you are in that place where no one can hear you and no one can see you, you expose what your Christian faith looks like.  Not at church, where your public prayers and Bible study and service can easily mask the most vile of private sins.  Not at work – well, maybe at work, which we’ll see in a moment.  Maybe not even so much when you’re all alone. 

If I want to measure the state and progress of your Christianity, I don’t want to know how you serve or what you give.  I want to know how you relate to the people who live under your roof.

Colossians 3:18-4:1 is one of several places in the New Testament where the Christian approach to family life is laid out.  The sixteenth century Protestant reformer Martin Luther called this text (and others like it) the haustafeln, or household table.

It is a collection of rules for family living.  C. S. Lewis said, “If the home is to be a means of grace it must be a place of rules…the alternative to rule is not freedom but the unconstitutional (and often unconscious) tyranny of the most selfish member” (“The Sermon and the Lunch”).  When the most selfish member demands (and is granted) his rights, grace has no room to operate in the home.

Notice Paul gives three pairs of rules – wives, husbands; children, fathers; slaves, masters.  What Paul says about family life is that from a Christian perspective, it matters who’s in charge.  But don’t jump to conclusions.  It’s probably not who you think it is.

It makes no sense to me that whoever divided the Bible into chapters and verses thought chapter 3 should end with verse 25.  4:1 is clearly the end of the paragraph, and part of the haustafeln.  And it is 4:1 that gives me the best clue to who’s in charge.

Master and Lord

To understand Paul’s haustafeln, you absolutely must eradicate your mental image of family life – a couple, with or without children, living in a private home or apartment made of wood and covered with brick or vinyl and shingles, sealed shut with doors and windows and, in more cases than not, separated from the neighbors by a yard.

The typical Greco-Roman family lived in a mud brick house with a hallway down the middle and one or two rooms on either side.  Roofs were made of branches and mud, and windows were narrow openings in the wall – not enclosed with glass.  The neighbors were only feet away.  There may also be an additional room or rooms attached to the dwelling for a widowed mother-in-law or for slaves. 

(For time’s sake, I am not going to digress into the question of whether the New Testament endorses slavery.  It does not, in my view, and in any case the system of slavery was not the same as the kidnapping and mistreatment of Africans that gave us our sad legacy of slavery, segregation, and discrimination.)

Here’s the point I want to make as I call your attention to chapter four, verse 1, where Paul addresses “masters.”  The undisputed leader of this whole clan in the Roman family system was the paterfamilias, father of the family, whose “right” was unquestioned authority – patria potestas – paternal power.  Power over his wife, over his children, and over his slaves.

So here’s what I want you to see.  When Paul addresses “husbands” in 3:19, “fathers” in 3:21, and “masters” in 4:1, he’s talking to the same person, the paterfamilias. 

This is the message: As a Roman head of the household, you have unquestioned power.  If you are a Christian paterfamilias, don’t use it.  You control the money, you make the rules, and no Roman court is going to convict you if you dominate your wife, belittle your children, or beat your slaves.  In the world’s system, you have all the rights.  If you are a Christian paterfamilias, don’t demand them.

As a Christian husband, love your wife (3:18).  Put her needs above your own.  Do not be harsh with her.  The Greek word means, “Don’t make her mad.”  Do not give her just cause to be bitter.

As a Christian father, do not embitter them (3:20).  This is a synonym of the word used for husbands, but it’s a different word.  It means to excite them, which can be positive, of course.  But it’s used here to excite them negatively – to provoke them through your ruthless treatment.  Also, he adds, do not discourage your children.  Don’t break their spirits.

And then, in 4:1, as a Christian master of your household slaves, provide them what is right and fair.  It’s not about demanding rights – it’s about being right and being impartial.

Why?  Notice how the entire haustafeln concludes.  Why should you, the paterfamilias, be so concerned about what wives and children and slaves think and feel?  “Because you know that you also have a Master in heaven.”

News flash for all of you who try to seize, exercise, or maintain power in your family: you are not in charge.  You may earn the most money, you may be physically stronger, and you may even be smarter or more educated.  But you are not in charge of your family.  You have a Master in heaven to whom you are accountable.

So use your power to love. Lead by serving.  If the feedback loop comes back to you in your own family that your wife thinks you are harsh, your children are discouraged, or your slaves think you play favorites, remember that the One who is in charge is not happy with you, and you will give account to him. 

Some husbands and fathers need to turn this Father’s Day around.  Instead of it being about honoring you, some of you need to look deep into your wife’s eyes and hold your children tight and say, “I’m sorry.  All this time I didn’t get it.  I’ve made it all about me, about having my way.  I was wrong.  Help me learn what it looks like to love like my Father in heaven loves me.”  If you’re not sure whether you have wielded power unlovingly, ask your wife and kids.

Now let me show you something else very important in this text that is too easy to miss, especially in the New International Version of the Bible.  The word translated “master” twice in 4:1 is the Greek word kyrios.  It occurs seven times in the first part of the haustafeln, 3:18-25.  But when you read the NIV, you don’t realize it’s the same word.  Let me read this to you in The Message.

Wives, understand and support your husbands by submitting to them in ways that honor the Master (18).

Children, do what your parents tell you.  This delights the Master no end (20).

Servants, do what you’re told by your earthly masters….Work from the heart for your real Master…Keep in mind always that the ultimate Master you’re serving is Christ (22-24).

Everywhere you see “Lord” in the NIV, that’s the same word as “Master.”  Nine times in these nine verses Paul uses the word, and seven times it refers to God.  So who’s in charge in the family? 

That is the message Paul wants to convey.  When family life becomes a power struggle, somebody doesn’t get it.  Maybe nobody does. 

Wives, you are your husband’s equal in Christ.  Don’t demand your rights.  Lovingly yield.  Negatively, that means you don’t nag, don’t manipulate, don’t demand.  Why?  Your husband is not in charge – but neither are you.  Ask, “What will honor the Master?”

Children, obey your parents.  Why?   It pleases the Master.

When we come to slaves, obviously most of us don’t have a direct parallel.  But the application is certainly on the job for all of us.  Works as if your Master were watching everything – not just your work, but your heart.  Do it for him, and remember that your reward is ultimately not a paycheck.  It’s his “well done.”  Whether your boss does or not, your heavenly Master plays no favorites.  At the end of the day, it’s not about demanding your rights.  The quest for rights is insatiable.

Significance and security

Well, what about that whole submission thing?  Doesn’t it still seem unfair that Paul says that to wives and not husbands?  Maybe.  It is notable that Paul tells wives to submit, not obey (as he does for children and slaves).  They’re not the same thing.  This is voluntarily giving respect and choosing so give up rights. 

Let me share with you how I address the subject of submission when it comes up in premarital counseling.

Many years ago, I read a book titled Effective Biblical Counseling, by Larry Crabb.  He said that we get our sense of personal identity from a combination of significance and security.  Significance is connected to what you do – it’s making a difference, accomplishing worthwhile goals, earning respect.  Security is more about relationships – loving and being loved.

This part is Bob Thompson, not Larry Crabb.  As I thought about significance and security, I wondered whether the need for one or the other is stronger in men or in women.  So when I talk to a couple, I ask them – quite apart from the context of Paul’s instructions about submission – “Do you think men or women have a stronger need for significance (being respected) or security (being loved)?”

With a few exceptions, overwhelmingly they agree that men have a stronger need for significance and women for security.  Whether that’s culturally conditioned or not I’m not smart enough to say.

Then I say something like this in one of my few “lectures” during premarital counseling (we’ll give the couple fictitious names – Anthony and Jessica).  “Anthony, Jessica’s number one need is security.  God made her that way.  You are the number one provider of her need to feel loved.  Never let her have to look to anyone else, especially another man, to feel unconditionally loved.  That’s your job, and it’s your most important job as a husband.”

“Jessica, Anthony’s number one need is significance.  God made him that way.  You are the number one provider of his need to feel respected.  Never let him have to look to anyone else, especially another woman, to feel that respect, to feel important.  That’s your job, and it’s your most important job as a wife.”

Family life can never be about demanding rights.  It is about meeting needs.  This pleases the One who is in charge.  Amen.