Is the Husband Still The Head of the Home?

In this episode, Pastor Jeff and Dave discuss whether the husband is still considered the head of the home. They acknowledge that some biblical passages have been misinterpreted and misapplied, leading to confusion around roles in the home. They also discuss the cultural pushback against the establishment of the patriarchy, and whether the Bible reinforces patriarchy or not.

LinkTree:
https://linktr.ee/AllisonParkLeadershipNetwork
Email:
Jeffl@allisonparkchurch.com
Davel@allisonparkchurch.com
Instagram:
@Jeffleake11
@Dave.Leake

Transcript

Dave Leake: 0:03

Hey, welcome to the Allison Park leadership podcast where we discuss the principles behind the plans. I'm Dave, one of your hosts. And this is

Jeff Leake: 0:10

my name is Jeff. And we're glad you joined us. I'm a lead pastor Allison Park church and David's my son and also campus pastor at the north side,

Dave Leake: 0:17

you probably already know that. And we're glad you're joining us. I appreciate that every time we say that every time. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And we're excited to be having a new editor joining our team, new Podcast Producer, Matt Smith will be will be joining us. So welcome, Matt to the team. Thank you. He's gonna Yeah, he's we're excited to add him. And, you know, hey, we just want to give a big thank you to those who have been listening for a while. Thank you for joining us in our now fourth year of the podcast. There, you know, tons and tons of episodes that you go back and listen to, but we're glad that you're here for this one. And as we always say, you know, it would just mean a lot if you would consider giving us a five star review on Apple podcasts helps spread the word nobody wants to review today. But yeah, excited to be jumping into that brand new conversation.

Jeff Leake: 1:02

So this should be a hot topic conversation right here.

Dave Leake: 1:05

It will I'll let you want to do you want to touch it since

Jeff Leake: 1:08

So we decided to title this, "Is the husband still the head of the home?" Just because we knew that would be a good trigger title. Yeah. And it also leads us into some biblical passages that we want to talk about. And we recognize that some of the biblical passages where you find this language, the husband is the head, have been misinterpreted and misapplied in a very toxic way at times. And then there has been such a cultural pushback to some of those passages, that I think there's a lot of confusion now around roles. So roles in the home, biblical, traditional. Anything goes where are we in the, in the journey and for a follower of Christ who looks at the scriptures as their guide? What should our attitudes be? Right?

Dave Leake: 1:58

I think there's also been you referenced the cultural pushback, but there is a cultural pushback against the establishment of the patriarchy. Right? Or the the leaders, you know, the leaders of society who have been with the most power being men, starting in the home, up through government and business. And so the,

Jeff Leake: 2:20

I think part of the pushback is that as the Bible reinforces patriarchy,

Dave Leake: 2:24

right, does it reinforce patriarchy? Or is the Bible you know, sort of saying,

Jeff Leake: 2:29

it's actually been the title when it comes to the Bible? And patriarchy?

Dave Leake: 2:33

Yeah, maybe we'll see.

Jeff Leake: 2:36

You know, I, it's funny, I lived so much of my life, and never really thought about the word patriarchy until probably the last three or four years. And now it has become one of the buzzwords in our culture. So I think it's good to address it. Yes. Good. Good questions.

Dave Leake: 2:55

So where do we want to start with this topic?

Jeff Leake: 3:00

We really need to hear a female voice, don't we? Wouldn't it be good if they could start us out? Because here we are two men talking about patriarchy, and husbands and heads? I think we maybe we should put some disclaimers in here. We actually did think about adding a female voice for this episode. And when I said that you your answer was?

Dave Leake: 3:19

Well, you know, I think what we're trying to do in this episode is probably more examined the biblical roots of anything, or what we're talking about more than we are trying to just have hot takes or our opinions. I don't think the goal of this episode is to, you know, put men in their place or put women in their place or reestablish a power structure, I think what we're trying to do is just examine, what does the Bible have to say about this topic? What are the implications of that? And so because of that, I realized that some people will be a little sensitive to the fact of who we are as people. But I think we are going to do our very best to be faithful to just reading the Bible and trying to understand what the biblical authors are saying, and not state our own opinions.

Jeff Leake: 4:04

And we will, well, we're not females we are, this is the podcast, that's a typical podcast for us where it's just the two of us talking. So that's our pattern at this point. But we're both married. And I think both of us understand some of the things that have been communicated to us. From our wives. We're both pastors. And so from a pastoral point of view, we also are very deeply concerned about the women in in leadership, absolutely. The women who are in our congregations, the women are in our culture, that your concerns are treated with the proper dignity and respect and sensitivity. So we're we will not get it perfect. We are not in any way perfect because there's no way for us to fully understand what it is to feel the feelings that women may feel We are going to do our best to lean into that and not ignore that in our, we're not just gonna go we're gonna go right into the objective text and we're going to give you the objective meaning, and we don't care what you feel. That is not the way that we'll approach this.

Dave Leake: 5:14

I also think it's important to say that we are sort of unashamedly pro women at Allison Park church. True. We, you know, that we're currently is competition may get here we can talk about a rationale for why but we are big fans of women in leadership yet why

Jeff Leake: 5:27

women pastors, women, communicators, women, worship leaders, women, church planters, women, lead pastors, women, children's pastors, you name the position, we're Pro. Absolutely, we Yeah, yeah, so So having stated all that,

Dave Leake: 5:42

having said all that, we're gonna get into a hot button topic. But here's what I do want to say, it is crucial for us to talk about this. Because God's plan for the church starts in the family, God's plan for fixing the world starts in the family,

Jeff Leake: 5:56

that's a good thing. Actually, the first institution God creates his family it is it's not the church, it's not business. It's not a government, you actually starts the world with husband and wife. And based upon their covenant relationship with each other, built, the world, children were born family unit was established. God's favorite descriptive word for His church, His people which belonged to him is church family. He calls his family what God has been longing for. And the reason why He created us in the first place is that he wanted to have a family. So this is a very, very important value to God, it has to be very important to us to.

Dave Leake: 6:37

Absolutely. So we are going to be jumping in to how God structured the family, how does family work? And ultimately, I think we want to talk about how husbands and wives interact with one another and what sort of gun roles are less what the roles are? So I'll say I we are we will, we will just be assuming we're coming from a biblical Christianity sexuality perspective as biological male and female marriage is what we're talking about for a nuclear family unit. And we are probably going to start with examining Ephesians. Right? Is that where you want to? Yeah, so

Jeff Leake: 7:12

this is where I think some of the misunderstanding comes from. It's rooted in this particular passage. Feagins chapter five, verses 21. Through, we'll go through the end of the chapter, but really through verse 25. Okay. So verse 22, is the trigger verse for most people. Wives, submit to your husbands. Okay, that's the phrase. And where this has been misapplied? Is that idea because it then says, you have the verses in front of you go and read a day read 22 and end through to 25? Should I start at 21? or No? No, well, let's, let's wait for the big reveal. Okay. All right. Okay.

Dave Leake: 7:55

You don't know where this is going. Wives submit to your own husbands as you as you do to the Lord. By the way, this is the NIV for the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body of which he is the savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands and everything, Husbands love your wives, just as Christ loved the church gave us gave himself up for her to make her holy cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, actually.

Jeff Leake: 8:23

Yeah, you don't have to go through the rest of it. Okay, great. Okay, so this is where we get the title, husbands are the head of their wives, okay. And then Wives submit to your husbands. Both of those things, if you take them out of the context of what we just described about patriarchy, and power structures, and how women have been pinned into certain roles and eliminated from certain opportunities and how husbands at times have been cruel and harsh and demanding and insensitive in their leadership. The idea of women should submit wives should submit, we should say, is a hard pill to swallow. Right? Because it feels like dominance. Is that my saying that?

Dave Leake: 9:12

Yeah, I think if I was gonna say it, I would, I would say, I think I think a lot of women feel that in the past generations, women had been repressed and kept, I don't know in the I'm gonna phrase it throw away but they've been kept out of experiencing the life they could have had just to be the support to the man where everything is circling around him and the wife is only like a little sidekick. And so I think that there's been a resistance to the barefoot and pregnant relegation. Yeah, relegation of them too.

Jeff Leake: 9:44

Okay, so this is this is this is really interesting, because one of the problems that we have in our in our in our culture right now is the recognition that there are certain practices that have happened in society that some people have traced back to their interpretation of school. I'm sure and women's role traditionally in the society in the home. Some people would say that's because of the way that Paul writes here in Ephesians chapter five. What's really critical though, is I think Brad said this in the the episode that we had a couple of weeks ago on the Jesus skeptic book, and we asked the question is Christianity good, Brad said, where Christianity has gone off, and it's sort of left the path of what Jesus intended for us to be, rather than throwing out Christianity altogether and saying, we're no longer going to even use the Bible, because some people have misused it, and created something that has been harmful and toxic. But Brad said, we need to actually go back to the Bible and get it correct. Because what's actually said in Ephesians, chapter five is truly life giving for both husbands and wives and children. And what the problem has been is that it has been misinterpreted and misapplied over the years, and we don't actually have not lived into what what Paul was teaching here, about Christ and the church, and how husbands and wives are supposed to respond to each other. So rather than us just exiting out this part of the Bible and say, this makes me uncomfortable. And it's been used by people that have taken this out of context and used it to limit women, I think we need to say, what does what does it actually say here? Sure. And I think the big problem with vision Chapter Five is that we always start reading in verse 22, Wives submit to your husbands. The missing part of this particular teaching is verse 21, which says, Submit to one another, out of reverence for Christ. So where are we? I think this is unfortunate, sometimes the their, their headings in certain sections in your Bible, that separate one from another, and it's almost like this is the beginning of a new chapter. And most Bibles put a new heading about, let's say, something like rules for husbands and wives.

Dave Leake: 12:02

So the the ESV on verse 22, says, wives and husbands, for example,

Jeff Leake: 12:08

and really, wives and husbands should start verse 21.

Dave Leake: 12:11

Yeah, the NIV has it right before verse 21. Yeah, says instructions for Christian households. Yeah.

Jeff Leake: 12:17

So that's an important distinction. If it starts with first 22, it seems to start by saying, wives know your place. If it starts with verse 21, it says submission is mutual husbands, submit to your wives, Wives, submit to your husbands. This is a mutual thing. Now that we've established that, let me say specifically to the wife, submit to your husband, because there's a specific role your husband has in your life that you need to honor and you need to value. And then it goes on to say Husbands love your wives by giving yourself for your wife, like Christ gave His life for the church. That doesn't mean that wives aren't supposed to love their husbands in the same way. Both of these actions love and submission are mutual. They are not just Wives submit two husbands, their husbands and wives submitting to each other and loving each other with 100% abandoned self sacrificial love. And in that environment, you have a healthy relationship. So talk talk

Dave Leake: 13:12

about like about, like, I know people that were at our marriage conference recently heard about this, but talk about the role of the husband and yeah,

Jeff Leake: 13:19

okay, so now we have the so the husband gets a name head. The wife is not named here, but actually think there are two two examples. The I think that the husband is the head of the home and the wife is the heart of the home. Both think, okay, some things you think with your head some things you think with your heart. It's not that one is has no ideas and just has to listen to the other. But I think there's a role a headship role for husbands that so what what we read into that is inequality then, okay, so we hear husband is the head of the home, we say, okay, so what you're saying is the husband is greater than the wife. And there is an inequality from the very beginning between husband and wife. But this has nothing to do with equality or power. It doesn't have anything to do with power. It just has to do with order. Okay, so get connect, connect. Yes.

Dave Leake: 14:13

What I was thinking specifically as you were talking about the husband be coming from the gardening term, and can you go into some of that? Okay, so

Jeff Leake: 14:21

let's let's start though by saying that the the imitation of so what God gives us when he gives us marriage, the the two will become one flesh, okay? There is a covenant relationship that's formed between husband and wife, where they become one, this same kind of a dynamic we see in the way that we get the description of God being Trinity, that the Lord our God is one that says they Deuteronomy, chapter six, verse four, primary cry of the Jewish people, and it defines who God is. He's three, but he's one. And you have order in the Trinity. Father, Son, Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit points people to the Sun and the Sun serves for the glory of the Father. There is an order father, first son, second, Holy Spirit. Third, but they are Trinity. They're in Unity together, they are equal to each other one is not better than the other one is not above the other, there's just an order to things. Same thing is true with husband or wife equal, they are equal. I don't know how to shout this any louder. They're equal, they are equal, they are equal. One is not more important than the other. But there is an order. The husband is designed to be the initiator, like, like as the head, it's not that he owns everything, and he decides everything. It's just that he's supposed to take the lead, there's a certain level of leadership and protective pneus. And so he's supposed to lead the way in serving and in protecting and caring. And you brought the term up husbanding, which is a word that we use for the tender of a vine. And the job of a husband is to make sure that the vine flourishes. So the husband is to take the lead and sacrificing himself in serving, so that his wife, his vine, can flourish and blossom and become everything that God wants her to be. That that role of him taking a protective leadership role that cultivates the family does not diminish the role of the wife, which I believe is the heart of the home, the wife often sets the atmosphere of the home, there is a certain sensitivity that God gives to wives uniquely, as women that men don't have, there's insight that God gives to women that often husbands don't have, and has head and heart, actually, your when we make decisions, our head and heart work together, because we have a thought. And we also sent something in our spirit. And both are working together in concert to lead us in a good direction. And so husband and wife work together in making decisions and leading their home and cultivating their children and encouraging each other and helping one another to flourish. None of that is exclusive to each other. It's just that there is an order that God creates in the home. That doesn't make wives invalid. Just because the husband has a role doesn't make the role of the wife. Just a homemaker

Dave Leake: 17:21

who can I can ask you some questions. Yes, I want to I want to elaborate and dig into this. Let me ask you some questions. Yes. So let's talk about like when you're talking about both roles, and both the role of a husband and the role of a wife, our roles of honor, that deserve honor, because of the fact that they are a wife or the wife or their husband? So can you talk about how sort of both sides should be honoring each other? Because I think I want to flesh that out a little bit more. Yeah. So

Jeff Leake: 17:47

okay, so we think husband and role and we think he cuts the grass, he takes out the trash, the traditional roles that we think the Bible doesn't say anything about that stuff, the wife will cook the meals and do the dishes and raise the kids. The Bible doesn't say anything. Like this is what we get from our traditional views of the world. And maybe because where we came from, there was the need to go out and kill your food. And so the often the men did that, and the wife was the one that prepared it like, Okay, so there's traditional practices, but none of that's biblical. The only thing it says about a husband is that you're supposed to sacrifice yourself, for your wife and lead your household. That's it. And the only thing the Bible really says about wives is that you're supposed to honor your husband, and submit to Him and support humans and encourage him. So it is really interesting to me that the thing that God commands the husband to do is the thing that most women need the most love your wife, most women have this core need to be cherished, listened to, and understood and God says, husband's, your wives need to be loved. cherish them, value them be sensitive to them. And most men have this core need to feel competent. And so the wife is challenged, honor, submit to encourage, basically, lift up your husband, so that you meet each other's needs. And together as a unit as one you because you are now not separate from each other. You're one flesh, you begin to function as a team, head and heart to build a healthy home and to live your lives so that you can flourish. And those don't have anything to do with the typical traditional roles that we sort of slap on husbands and wives to fulfill. I don't know if that answered your question. But yeah,

Dave Leake: 19:36

I think I think so. Well, I a lot of this reminds me of that book, Love and respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs. Yeah. And what I liked about that book, and what's helped me is that he describes this biblical role of husband and wife that are roles of honor that deserve what they're owed, not because of the person performance Just because of who they are, yeah, so a wife who may not be living her best, or, you know, maybe deserve to be loved deserves to be given all the love, even if she even if she doesn't perform up to husband's expectations. And on the vice versa side, husband deserves and is owed respect and honor, not because he is somebody that's doing and performing a role to somebody who expectations but just because their husband and

Jeff Leake: 20:30

you see this in other things, we honor our parents for their position, not their performance. That doesn't mean that everything that they've done to us we have to accept, we may be, we may need to forgive some things, we may have to create some boundaries about some things, but we honor them because they're our parents or in Romans 13. It says, Honor the king. Right? So whoever the leaders are, even if we disagree with their policies, Christians are to be people of honor. And and and so yeah, love and honor, are choices that have to be made simply because the people in our lives hold these roles and positions. I think that's right.

Dave Leake: 21:08

Yeah. So here's, here's how we typically teach through this. And let me let me just try to pull things out. Okay. We typically we do it the way or when I say we, I really mean you

Jeff Leake: 21:18

because you teach to them I teach.

Dave Leake: 21:20

But I don't know if I've taught this yet. Fun sometime. But it's it typically is, you know, hey, we missed the whole point of the passage, which is verse 21. So mutual submission, and I agree, I think when we use a big word X eg but when we try to pull out the meaning of that Ephesians verse where Paul's writing to this church, I do think he's talking about honoring and loving each other mutually. He's not just talking about a power struggle and saying, and when I'm a man, I want men to win. So here we go. God said,

Jeff Leake: 21:52

Can you have a power struggle with yourself? Because you're one? Yeah. Right. So technically, you're one flesh, you are joined to each other. If one is winning, and the other is losing, that's bad for the for the marriage. Right. So you both have to win. Yeah, go ahead. Okay.

Dave Leake: 22:09

So typically, we do that we go, Yeah, but there's mutual submission. And so, you know, here's, here's how this works. I think. So let me this is a raw conversation, right? Let me try to tease some things out that I think caused me confusion or others contagious. And so we talked about this, and then it ends up in this place. Sometimes when we think about mutual submission, it almost muddies the whole thing. Okay. So we have two partners, we have two parts of a whole we have, we have one thing where it's mutual submission. And then it's almost like sometimes I think there's a temptation to ignore the actual stuff you were just expanding on a minute ago, but we tend to want to Okay, so the rest of it, whereas so I did

Jeff Leake: 22:51

a teaching on this one. I think I know where you're going. So when? When does the husband's headship come into play? And

Dave Leake: 23:00

when does the wife's submission? Because it goes on to say, Wives submit to your to your husband, and it says, Husbands love your wives. There's mutual submission.

Jeff Leake: 23:08

So here's, here's what I have taught in the past. Okay, when push comes to shove, and there is something that has to be decided the wife should prefer her husband's decisions above herself. I know, I know, did you hear that? It's intense. Okay, when push comes to shove, and there's a decision that has to be made, if you're not in 100%, unity, which most of the time you will be, you're going to let your husband lead. Okay. The other thing when push comes to shove, and a decision has to be made a husband? Should what put her wife's his wife's preferences ahead

Dave Leake: 23:49

of himself. And I think that's a great,

Jeff Leake: 23:53

because if you're going to love your wife, yeah, like you love your own body that goes on to say, and who doesn't care for his own body? Yeah, you're going to listen to what your body is saying and prefer your body. Okay? So you're going to prefer your wife. So if the husband is putting his wife's preferences ahead of himself, and the wife is putting her husband's decisions above him herself, then basically you have mutual submission. But when you are so if you're the husband, and you're trying to make a decision, you're your primary concern should be what does my wife need right now? What does my wife want right now? What would be the thing that would be the best for our relationship right now? Yeah. And if the wife is having that isn't so what what, what does my husband think right now? What is he going to do? How can I get behind him? How can it give him confidence in making this decision? Yeah. And that is, again, both come with cost. Yeah. So so maybe you say as a woman, you're like putting my husband's decisions. Let him lead. I don't know if I like that. Because I put my wife's preferences. I mean, what about me? What When will I get well, I want yeah, that's what marriage is. It's the Death of yourself so you can live in love like Jesus. Yeah. And in that process, the real goal of God is to not just make your marriage great, but to make you more like Christ. Yeah. Okay. So that is the hard truths, what I just described as the hard truth. But

Dave Leake: 25:15

I think there's so much in there that I feel like, okay, so if a husband is laying his life down for his wife the way that Christ did for the church, then if it's ever a question of want, I want this, she wants that. I want to compromise. It's like, well,

Jeff Leake: 25:31

then you yield, you really should be deciding, Hey, honey, we're

Dave Leake: 25:35

gonna do what you want. Yeah. Because Because I'm the husband that I'm preferring you, because this is my choice. And,

Jeff Leake: 25:41

and if I'm the leader, I should be the leader in Christ's likeness, which means I should be the first to die to myself. And then I think I think any wife that's being led by a husband who lead like that, seriously, it has no problem saying, okay, I can see that because

Dave Leake: 25:56

because then you know that there's the best interest for me and my family. And I think the flip side, if a guy is only feeling like I have to make a hard decision, when it feels like a moral choice, or a life one where here's what I think God is asking of us or for us,

Jeff Leake: 26:14

and that's when you want your wife to say, I got your back, babe, go for it. Yeah, let's do this together. Yeah, the problem comes in Dave, when one of the two isn't acting like Jesus.

Dave Leake: 26:27

Yeah. Or when both are or when both are. Right. So if

Jeff Leake: 26:31

you're like, here, I am the husband with a wife who's not honoring me, or here I am with a husband, and my wife who's not husband, he's not loving me. And now I have to do my part of the equation. God's making me be the one to sacrifice. And the answer is, yeah, because you're really not doing it unto your husband or your wife. You're really doing an unto Christ. Because that's what it says submit to one another out of reverence for Christ, you're actually doing it to honor Jesus. Not just to honor your husband or your wife. Yes.

Dave Leake: 27:03

And here's, here's where I think we really get into the now I know, this is now becoming, I guess, it's always been a marriage episode. So sure, I was gonna ask what kind of really marriage advice but I heard somebody else say this, and I thought this was so good and so annoying. I think it might have been Levi and Jenny Lesko. And they were saying it but it might not have been so if I'm stealing somebody else's material. I apologize for the misquoting but they said the more mature one in your relationship needs to competent overcompensate for the one who maybe is sometimes lagging behind. So I think oftentimes we feel like, well, like if they wouldn't finally just

Jeff Leake: 27:40

do their part, the more mature ones, you get rewarded. Yes. Yeah. Right. And you do you get rewarded from God. That's the thing. You have to that's where it requires faith. You're like, because I have sacrifice God, you must see this. And eventually you're going to have my back and he will. He will. And but it won't come right away and won't come like you think it'll happen? It will happen. But honestly, if it doesn't, and you end up giving your life for your spouse.

Dave Leake: 28:08

What kind of a better reflection of Jesus can you have? Isn't that what

Jeff Leake: 28:11

we signed up for? Isn't that when we say, to love and to cherish until death to for better, for worse for richer for a second? Like, we're not serious about this when we got married? Like, yeah, that's what marriage is. I mean, let's just face it. Marriage is not real convenient at times. And it isn't easy. And these being in a oneness or covenant relationship with somebody is brutally difficult. Yeah. It requires for you to take second place a lot. Yeah. And if only the wife takes second place, and then the husband never does well, that's that's patriarchy. That's, that's wrong. But Jesus isn't teaching that neither is Paul. We're being taught that husbands should be the leader in sacrificing himself. Not Not that he should be the leader in getting his own way. That's how it's been taken. Husband is that home? Woman You gotta listen to me. We pound our chest. No, no, no, I lead the way in following Jesus which means I die first. Yeah. Right. So so if we take it as I have all the authority, I get to tell you what to do. That is a total misinterpretation of everything Paul taught in Ephesians chapter five, and everything Jesus modeled for us, we get the lead, get the lead role and following Jesus, we get to die first. So that so that our wives who are like our vine can blossom and grow and, and, and wives get the privilege to honor first Yeah, their gut response is to say, I'm behind you. I'm with you. I believe in you. You can do this. Like I want you to succeed. i And honestly, here's the deal. Husbands find much more value and satisfaction in their marriage, when they spend a lot of time cherishing their wife. Yeah. Because what you appreciate appreciates and so if you're cool constantly looking at your wife, and valuing who she is, and cherishing how she looks and how she responds, and the little great things about her and you're savoring her responses and her smile in her demeanor, you will find such satisfaction in her. And actually, wives are more satisfied in their marriage relationship, when they admire and respect the man they're married to. And they give honor even he does. And they like, Look at this guy that I could be with. He is such a stud. He is so competent. I mean, wow. I mean, he's such, and so you say, but But what if they're not like that? Well, they, you see, here's the thing, you have to selectively value the things that are good. And you've got to overlook the things that are still in process. And if you do that, you'll actually be more satisfied in life. There was a study done, I preached this a long time ago, that actually bore the truth that people who look at their spouses with rose colored glasses, and exaggerate their positives and, and diminish their weaknesses actually have a much higher marital satisfaction. So the idea that love is blind is actually a fact. Yeah, you have to sort of be willfully blind about certain things, and focus on others, to be able to see the value in the person you married. And that's not easy. I mean, none of this stuff is this is like, all of this Jesus way of living in a marriage is all about death, and, and resurrection. Yeah, it's the Christian marriage is the hardest, and most satisfying, it's the most challenging, and healthiest way to live. And so you know, this whole challenge in our culture around Christian marriage, there's more challenges to Christian marriage, than just the issue of sexuality. It really has to do with the mentality that goes into living and loving like Jesus.

Dave Leake: 31:57

And I do think that there's something powerful about us aligning ourselves in our, in our marriage, like, whatever, whether you're a husband or a wife, and aligning ourselves with what the Word of God says,

Jeff Leake: 32:08

well, what's the alternative?

Dave Leake: 32:10

The alternative is you fight for yourself, and you hope that they respect, okay, I think a lot of people think of marriage as sort of like a contract, like, you know, I'll do my part if you do my part. And if you're not doing your part, then I don't have to put my full self into it. Because like, I'm not getting what I was hoping to get out of this. I'm not getting the happiness out of this relationship, because you're not putting enough into it, or you're not taking care of yourself, or you're not. So we're two individuals

Jeff Leake: 32:33

that happen to be together, hoping to benefit one another. Yeah, it's like a contract until it doesn't benefit me a business. It's a very lonely thing. But I do

Dave Leake: 32:42

think when we see in the, in the Bible, how it's it's a covenant that was established by God, that two people make under God, like, Sam, we're making this to you at a covenant promise, that means forever, we will be together in this relationship where we cherish each other, even if that person sucks sometimes, yeah, yeah. Even if they're hard to be with. And you know, I have to love them. If I don't like them. You know what I'm saying? Yes, I think, Oh, I think one of the things about marriage is just like, okay, my wife is incredible. And I am so thankful. But I think before I got married, and I know you talked about this as well, as well recently. But I think like, you have this idea of like you're going to marry, you're going to marry someone and then life is going to be perfect, because you're going to marry a perfect person. Yeah. And I knew intellectually, that's not true. Nobody's perfect. But then it's like, when you're in a marriage, it's just like, Oh, I'm like living with somebody who I'm married to, but it's like a roommate and a friend. And sometimes they do annoying thing. Like, they're great. But like, there are certain things that this

Jeff Leake: 33:48

was the older I get, the more I look at my wife and I think, I can't believe you have to live with me. Right, right. And, and so and she's like, What do you mean, I love you? And I'm like, Yeah, I know. But sometimes I look at myself, and I think woof, I must be hard to take. So yeah, that is that is true. But I do think that you marry. So melody is she's got strengths and weaknesses. And I've been married to her for almost 36 years. And I recognize that God brought us together. Yeah. And early in my life, I would have thought God brought us together because she's the perfect person. She's everything I need. She's what I've been looking for him to attracted to her physically. I like her personality. I'm gonna now be completely fulfilled in my life. And that was true. But then there was the other side of it that I didn't recognize, which is that she's also the perfect person for me to grow. Yeah, right. Because her weaknesses actually provoke me in the very areas where I need to grow as a person. Yeah. And so in my learning how to love her. I've had to confront my own selfishness, and my own my own flesh leanness, and my own anger and my own I own short tempered nests or jealousies. And actually, me learning to love her in her areas of weakness have actually made me a better person. Yeah. So and I think she would say the same thing for me is that there's a ton of weaknesses I brought into this marriage, which were the perfect ones for her. And so we can look at their the perfect person, their Mr. or Ms. Right? Yeah. But that doesn't mean that you're like two puzzle pieces that would just fit together, fulfill one another's dreams

Dave Leake: 35:31

for the field loving,

Jeff Leake: 35:32

and that's your romantic myth of the Hollywood portrayal. Right. And that is just not life. And, and if you go into marriage, expecting that, and then you get the weaknesses, and the and the frustrations. And you bail, because they didn't fulfill you, and you get into a second marriage. And you you're gonna hit the same thing over and over. Like, there is no time when you're not going to be married to a human.

Dave Leake: 36:00

Yeah. So.

Jeff Leake: 36:03

So a lot of people just bailing on marriage altogether. And all they're doing is hooking up. Yeah. So the hookup culture is now replaced marriage, which is got to be the loneliest thing. So like, you have these short, brief burst of superficial relationships with some good times. But whenever it gets hard, where you become unlovely, there isn't anyone in your life to say, I know you're going through a down season, I'm with you anyway. But people bail on each other like, Okay, you just lost your job. You're just going through hard times, I think I'm out of this relationship. Now I'm gonna move on to someone else who's more convenient for me. That is so lonely. I am so thankful have someone who now that I'm almost 59 Still looks at me and says, You look so good. And then I fit in and I look in the mirror. And I'm thinking I look so old right now. You just told me I look good. Wow, thank you for that. Like, I, I wouldn't have that. If I had just done hookup culture. Now I've had this I've had to had to suffer through some things, and melody has have to suffer more. But the suffering has brought me an intimacy with someone that I would never have had, if I just bounced around from sexual relationship to sexual relationship. It's just, it's just a test. And this is why people are depressed, and they're anxious. And mental health crisis not that's not the only reason because some people are in marriages, and you put it all in, and you've been living like Jesus and the person you got, who was weak, they also betrayed you and stuck a knife in your back, so to speak, and cheated on you and hurt you. And you were left broken and bleeding. And you were like I tried the Christian marriage thing. But it takes two to tango. And it does. And now you're in another relationship with another human. And they're not perfect, too. I'm not saying that everybody who gets married gets a situation where their partner actually plays the game. Like sometimes they don't. And that's another reason why the family is so broken. But if you are fortunate enough enough to get into a marriage with someone who's tolerable. And you can love your way through the hard times and stay with each other. And there's nothing that's so traumatic that that is marriage ending. And you figure out how to work it out and become like Christ in the process. I think that's what, that's the vision that Christian marriage provides for us.

Dave Leake: 38:19

And I think that, that nothing, almost nothing should be so dramatic that it is marriage ending. There are some things there are Oh, yeah, I think that we like when we talk about it being a, a covenant, eternal promise. It's something that yeah, should not be shattered. Now there

Jeff Leake: 38:35

are three, there are three things adultery, an ongoing practice of betraying the marriage vows, where someone's committing adultery on you, a person who's just abandon you, and left you and said, I don't want to be with you anymore. The Bible says you're not forced to make them stay. And then the third is abuse. I think that if there's where it's a danger to stay together, where you've been put in a position where you've been abused, and it's just unhealthy for you and the family you're raising, those are three times I think we can look and say, clearly there that should that should end. Sometimes however, none of those things have happened and your marriage is just in a bad space. And all the teaching in the world out of Ephesians Chapter Five is not going to get it done right now. Sometimes couples need to get a mediator and maybe even separate for a season, to catch their breath. Not to end the relationship, but to figure out how to rebuild it, where you're back in the same house in the same space. The goal is never to immediately divorce, but it's to try to figure out how do we make this work?

Dave Leake: 39:42

Yeah, that's a serious thing. Very serious. Yeah. But the I think the the end point of all of this, is that it's something established by God that whenever we give it the proper honor and priority and we put in the effort, even if the other person maybe doesn't feel like they're doing it as much, which by the way, I just want to say for the record, not referencing my wife, my wife is amazing. All kinds of ever to work. And I don't want somebody to think as I'm talking about. But I think if we, if we do this the correct way, and especially with mutual submission, and living in the role that God's given to us, I think it I think we're gonna see the problems in our world begin to be solved radically. Because I think we, what we when we look at all these different issues, you know, fatherlessness, or broken homes, or all these other things, women, single men that, you know, their man abandons them and isn't paying child support and all this other stuff that happens, like, so much of our world is healed when marriages are healed.

Jeff Leake: 40:44

Well, Christian marriage, I think what we would come back to it to summarize is this. I don't believe Christian marriage practice biblically, is the problem with society. I think it's the solution. Okay. Maybe it hasn't been practiced biblically. In the past, maybe there have been people who have misinterpreted and misapplied the passages we'd studied today. But I don't think that Christian marriage is the problem in the world that's created, patriarchy and all these other things that have been problematic. I think Christian marriage is actually the solution. When practice properly, it's not just the solution for the power dynamic issues in the world. But it's also the solution like you're saying, for loneliness for fatherlessness for, you know, all of the things that people are walking through relationship, it's actually a solution for sexual fulfillment properly, and for sexual identity to be practiced properly. So it's, it's so much what is broken in our world, Christian marriage is actually a solution for all that.

Dave Leake: 41:44

That's so good. Any closing thoughts?

Jeff Leake: 41:47

I think that those were mice, that's good. Yeah, that's good. I would maybe we just say, you know, if you're in a situation, and you still feel like, I don't know what to do with where we are, please talk to somebody like we have many different resources available at Allison Park church for couples that are going through it and want to talk through some things. And so mediation and counseling, and mentoring is really important for any couple to be able to reach their best.

Dave Leake: 42:15

Yeah. And I would just say, I think as we're closing, I believe that God wants for you to have the best marriage possible. Yes. And that sometimes, some people want might not be in an emergency situation in their marriage, where it's just about to end. But things have been a little rocky, and you're hearing this and it's under your skin. You're like, Oh, you gotta be kidding me. Yeah. But I think that that's often what the Holy Spirit sounds like. Yes. It's like, it's like, Hey, I know, it feels like it's 90% of them. But it's only going to change by you dying to yourself. And so maybe somebody listen to this, I want to say I believe there's a breakthrough that God has for you. But it often starts by use of the need to Christ before they do. And then through that there's a healing process that comes I think that's a huge help. So I would, I would definitely recommend reading love and respect by Emerson agric. His book has got a lot in there, it's got a lot of advice in there for If your marriage is a little bit difficult, here's what you can do. Or if you want to if you have a great marriage, but you want the best possible marriage, here's how to understand your spouse better and how to be more like Jesus. And I read that book probably three or four times. So yeah, oh, yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

Jeff Leake: 43:25

It's not a perfect book. It's come under some criticism in some spaces. But I do think that most of it is really, really just the principles

Dave Leake: 43:32

are great. Yeah, not not gonna stand behind everything. But But I think for me, personally, it's helped me be a better husband. I'd be less selfish and, you know, some of the things that I would struggle

Jeff Leake: 43:44

with, so Sarah's thankful for that. Yeah.

Dave Leake: 43:49

You know, but hey, well, we just want to say thank you for joining us in this conversation as always, and you know, we hope you've enjoyed this, we would love it if you would consider sharing this or recommended the resource. One way you can do that is by leaving us a five star review on Apple podcasts or on Spotify helps us rise to the charts so people can find this little bit more easily. So we yeah, we appreciate your stand with us for such a long time and we hope you enjoyed today. See you guys next episode.