I grew up in what I would characterize as a conservative
evangelical home although by no measure were/are my parents ultra
conservative. Though my parents
espoused, and still would something more akin to complementarian theology I
think they embody a relationship that looks much more egalitarian.
I hadn’t put much thought into the gender role theology my
parents provided me with until I got to Bethel where evangelical trust fund babies would sit around a circle and debate all the important questions of the
universe like “do you think women can be pastors?” Evangelicals construct theology based on one thing, the
paper pope. For most of us this
came in the form of the New International Version though some wild ones would
use the New Living Translation.
Regardless of your translation, your gender role theology came from a
few texts, chief among them—Ephesians 5.
Here the author is writing about household codes and says this:
22 Wives, be subject to your husbands as you
are to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is
the head of the church, the body of which he is the Saviour. 24Just as the
church is subject to Christ, so also wives ought to be, in everything, to their
husbands.
25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved
the church and gave himself up for her, 26in order to make her holy by
cleansing her with the washing of water by the word, 27so as to present the
church to himself in splendour, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the
kind—yes, so that she may be holy and without blemish. 28In the same way,
husbands should love their wives as they do their own bodies. He who loves his
wife loves himself.
I have a confession to make about myself. I think my strong inclination towards complementarian
theology was informed as much if not more by what I will call the meta-fairytale,
as it was scripture. The
meta-fairytale can come in all kinds of forms, but finds its chief expression in
movies like Disney’s Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and perhaps most explicitly in
Tom Cruise’s movie Legend. In all
of these meta-fairytales you have three essential elements: a damsel in
distress, an evil foe to overcome and a hero who does the rescuing. The damsel remains captive to the evil
foe who is eventually overcome by the male hero who then rescues the damsel.
The meta-fairytale should not be discounted as archaic. It’s a good story and to be sure, its
explanatory power is so pervasive that scripture utilizes it to characterize
Christ’s relationship with the church.
To boot, I like the meta-fairytale. I stand on an island in a church of mostly moderates in my
appreciation for John Eldredge.
Still, I think a problem arises when we construct a theology
of gender based on scripture without being aware of latent meta-fairytale
hermeneutic at work within us.
Here’s what I mean.
Undoubtedly Ephesians says:
“22 Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to
the Lord 23For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head
of the church, the body of which he is the Saviour. 24Just as the church is
subject to Christ, so also wives ought to be, in everything, to their husbands.”
But it also says
“25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the
church and gave himself up for her,”
I’ve grown suspicious of complementarians who are eager to
point to Ephesians 5 in support of their case. Jesus loved the church so much that He submitted to death by
Roman execution. 40 lashes on the
back, nails in the wrists and feet, beard ripped out, spear in the side
etc. You’ve seen Mel Gibson’s
Jesus slaughtered. You know the
story. It’s not that I don’t think
complementarian males would endure this for their spouses. Indeed they would. This is at the heart of the
meta-fairytale. The hero faces the
most atrocious forms of the death to rescue the damsel. But as my friend Randy once pointed out
in youth group, “people often talk about dying for Christ, but perhaps the much
more difficult thing to do is live for Christ.”
I concur. I
just got done reading some of the martyrdom accounts in Rodney Stark’s new book, and I was unnerved. But
truthfully it often feels to me like being faithful in the mundane tasks of
everyday life can take as much courage.
I’m constantly confronted by the question of death. Will I follow Jesus in the death of not
getting my way? Will I follow
Jesus in the death of putting my wife's needs before mine? Will I follow Jesus in prioritizing my
desires last in my family? Will I
follow Jesus in the death of living unselfishly with my finances and not be
corrupted by greed? Death questions confront the way we live all the time.
I’m thankful that I had the privilege of listening to Greg Boyd as my pastor in college. One
of the truths that he instilled in me is that power is
quintessentially defined by Jesus hanging on a cross. This is the way God expresses power in the world. Jesus subverts our definition of power. At the end of the day, power is not best expressed by Batman, Superman, Prince Charming or William Wallace. Power, by Biblical standards, comes
from below. Power picks up a towel
and serves. Power chooses the less
glamorous choice. Power is not so
insecure that it needs the final word.
Power does not need control.
This definition of power exposes the difference between a
Christological read of Ephesians 5 and a meta-fairytale one. In my conversation with my college
friends about gender roles it seemed that one way the truthfulness of the
complementarain marriage would express itself would be that in major decisions
where the couple disagreed the male would make the decision. I think that notion is rooted in the
meta-fairytale understanding of power and the not the Christological one.
This last year my wife and I consumed all five seasons of
NBC’s Friday Night Lights. Never
has a show so successfully depicted a realistic, healthy and dare I say
Christian marriage as FNL did with Eric and Tami Taylor. This article from Relevant gets it
exactly right when of the Taylors it says, “It’s something of a miracle that a
contemporary network television show could so vividly remind us of what is
wonderful about families who stay together, struggle together and grow
together.”
In the shows finale Eric and Tami’s marriage struggles reach
an apex when they are simultaneously offered dream jobs. Eric is offered a job as the head coach
of Dillon’s all star team and Tami a job as the director of recruitment for a
university in Philadelphia. The
impasse created by the circumstances is precisely the sort of thing that
evangelicals debate about in their marriage discussions. As is typical of a patriarchal culture
we are led to believe that the Taylor’s will order their lives around Eric’s
vocational opportunity.
Here is a short compilation revealing how that situation
resolves itself:
The most biting critique I have of complementarianism is
that it is fundamentally opposed to the notion of power that is defined by the
cross. At the juncture when
leading in the way of Jesus might be most painful, evidence that
complementariasm is subdued by the meta-fairytale emerges positing males as a
specific kind of hero.
Complementarian theology finds its limits in self-sacrificial love when
that love might entail sacrificing the traditional role that the hero gets to
play in the meta-fairytale story.
Jesus would not
just have died for his wife on a cross.
He would have died a vocational death for her as well. Jesus would have taken the sucky job so
that she could have the good one.
Jesus would use His power to lead her by elevating her to greatness at
his own expense. I wonder how many
complementarians have considered that perhaps the most self-sacrificial thing
they could do is embrace a lifetime at home with the kids so their wives could
pursue what they wanted. I wonder
how many complementarians have considered that the cost of the cross might mean
giving up vocational ambitions so their spouses could pursue theirs. I wonder how many complementarians have
considered that being the hero of their story might not mean being the hero in
the traditional meta-fairytale sense at all. Perhaps being the hero in this story means no one ever knows
your name. That being Christ means
being the spouse who gets thanked in a lifetime achievement award speech by the
other, not the one on stage accepting the award.
Husbands if you do embrace this awesome responsibility of
loving your wives do so “just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up
for her,” … I dare you.
