Transcription
God made uh Adam a suitable helpmate, and he made that helpmate not because she's weaker, but because God has given men a capacity and a responsibility that women do not have. And we have to be honest about it. We can say, "He's not a man; he doesn't know how to lead; he doesn't..." whatever. There's still a capacity inside of him that God did not give us as women.
One of the biggest examples that I can give of that: imagine it's raining, and you're in New York City. If you've ever been to New York City or in France and it starts raining, and people start selling umbrellas on the street—those $5, $10 umbrellas—they're not worth much, but they get the job done until you get home. Imagine you have that man, you have the man that gets the job done. Isn't anything special, but he gets the job done. That man, no matter how little you view him, is made to handle the rain. You were not made to handle the rain, but you were made to hold up that which can handle the rain. If you didn't have that umbrella, you would come back home smelling like what you were poured on—what poured on you. When a man comes back in as that umbrella, he gets dried quickly; water repellent, it falls off of him. And no matter how equipped you thought he was, he still was built for the rain.
The difference: also, some of you want that Neiman Marcus umbrella; some of you want the wood handle. Those things are heavy. And if God gave you a man like that, then you have to be the woman that can hold up that man. Because an umbrella that is not used—it can be for the rain, for the sun; it shields, it provides shade; it allows what's under it not to be touched. We are the vessel—not weaker; we are the vessel that was meant to let the one that God gave us be held up and used for what he was made.
So now, as a wife, I want to say, "I don't want to get wet; I don't want a sunburn; my skin's not built for that." So instead, I'm going to let the man be who he was meant to be. And if God gave me—which he did—my man's about as heavy as this table, that means God made me capable of holding him up. If my man is not doing what he was made to do, it's because I, as his wife, am not holding him up. One thing I will credit myself to is that that man can come and do what God has him to do, because on the back end he is being held up and held down.
Not about me, but to say this about submission: if you think submission misses because the man is doing what you believe is right for a man to do, then you've missed your assignment before God. God will bless your obedience as being a wife; the Bible's full of it—Ephesians and Corinthians, in the Old Testament—just start looking for them. And I please read, love, and respect; it will change your life. Submission does not make you a weaker vessel; it just makes you the part of the of the of the machine that is needed to function, but entrusting somebody else's responsibility—that that's what they were made for—to do what God has made them to do. So I value submission. "Submit one to another" is not in the same way; he is not going to submit to me the way I'm going to submit to him; that's not even biblical. As he submits to Christ, so I submit to him who has submitted to Christ.
If God has made the man the head of the house, to love his wife as he is to love the church, God is going to hold him to a standard. God is also going to hold you to a standard, and it's not going to be dependent on, "Did you value him?" or "Did you do right by him because he did right by you?" or "You did right by him because you did right by what God commanded you to do." You will see a dynamic transformation inside of your home when you begin to obey His word. Submission is our safety as wives; submission is your safety as a wife. Whether you have—because I want to believe if you married him, he has good intentions—if even if he doesn't have, or if you're with him, or if you love him, it's because you believe that's a good person, even if they don't have it together yet. Keep trusting God, but allow your heart to not be tainted. If he's doing right by you, God will make him do right by you. God knows how to reach the man that he gave you, so that you don't suffer and cry, so your child doesn't suffer and cry, and so you don't live in a house that is just like what you've always seen. You will be the chain breaker of marriages and relationships and love in this life if you just do it God's way. Amen. Amen. Wow.