Back in 2010 an unnamed pastor* at the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (CBMW) explained how the complementarian model for marriage works in: Breaking the Marital Impasse: How Authority and Submission Work When Spouses Disagree
Breaking the impasse is critical to the complementarian model because having a “tiebreaker” is, along with the husband having sole responsibility for all failures of the marriage and most of the responsibility for failures by the wife, what distinguishes complementarian marriage from egalitarian marriage. Often times complementarians will present the husband as the tie breaker, but this can’t really be. In the complementarian model the husband’s responsibility is total, but should his wife feel on any issue that he isn’t “listening” to her, she has not only the right but the obligation to throw a godly tantrum. Since the godly tantrum trumps the tiebreaking role, obviously someone else needs to be the tiebreaker.
Enter the CBMW, which explains that the tiebreaker in all decisions within the marriage is neither the husband nor the wife but the third person in the complementarian threesome, the couple’s pastor. To illustrate how the complementarian model of marriage works, the CBMW pastor offers the example of a couple which has been discussing an issue for several weeks before the husband finally decides that the time for further discussion has passed and makes a decision:
…the problem concerned Elizabeth’s leadership of our church’s preschool ministry. Elizabeth loved the work, but life in their home was crazy. Ted was forced to work longer hours at work, their family was growing, and another ministry they shared in the church was quickly multiplying. Ted did not believe it was wise for Elizabeth to continue to supervise the preschoolers. They had been discussing this issue for weeks, but could not agree on a course of action. Finally, Ted “put his foot down” and made the final decision. Elizabeth would have to resign from the ministry.
Since the couple was at an impasse Elizabeth invoked the complementarian model of decision making, appealing to the couple’s pastor for a ruling:
Elizabeth was stunned, angry, and hurt. In her anger she told him she would never quit. After 24 hours of conflict, Elizabeth called me for help.
The CBMW pastor explains that this model is required not just for cases where a husband is sinning, but where a wife feels uncomfortable about her husband’s decision (emphasis mine).
What would wise, biblical counsel sound like in real-life situations where conservative Christian spouses disagree about the nature of submission and the parameters of marital authority? What is a wife to do when she feels uncomfortable submitting to her husband in an area, but cannot quote “chapter and verse” that it is a sin.
The pastor explains that Elizabeth was right to come to him, because even though her husband discussed the issue with her for weeks before making a final decision, she felt like her husband was committing the sin of not listening to her (emphasis mine):
…Elizabeth began to sense that Ted was not really listening to her. She was aware that he had made up his mind before they talked. She discussed this issue with him, but he never really engaged the matter before making the decision that she must quit. Ted and Elizabeth thus made a fleeting and failed attempt at guidelines #2 and #3.
That is when guideline #4 kicked in and Elizabeth sought help from her pastor. She was right to do this because as a believer she is under pastoral authority as well as husbandly authority. She also had grounds because she believed she needed help in engaging a sin issue with her husband.
Therefore the CBMW pastor agreed to preside over the case of Elizabeth’s role in the children’s ministry. After deliberating over the case, the pastor issued a split verdict. Ted had the right to make the decision that he did, but although he discussed the issue with his wife for weeks, he was sinning because she didn’t feel like he was listening to her. Ted also sinned by making the decision since making a decision his wife disagreed with was unloving and constituted demanding his own way. Elizabeth on the other hand was right to refuse to do as Ted said and appeal to the third person in the marriage (because Ted was in sin), but she was wrong to not submit to her husband and appeal to the pastor (because this is rebellion). In the end, two thirds of the marriage were found by the CBMW pastor to be in sin (everyone but the pastor himself), and the pastor ruled that Elizabeth was to quit her work in the children’s ministry (emphasis mine):
As I spoke with Ted and Elizabeth it became clear that they were both right, and they were both wrong. Ted was correct that he had authority to make a decision regarding Elizabeth’s ministry commitments that were doing damage to her and her family and needed to be streamlined. He was incorrect in the way he executed his leadership. In fact, Ted had not listened to his wife. He did not shepherd her well. Repentance for Ted meant confessing that he had been quick to speak and slow to listen, and that he had been unloving in demanding his own way, thus violating the law of love.
on the other hand, Elizabeth was correct that her husband had treated her in an unloving way, but was wrong in that she used his sin as a legal loophole to squirm out of submission. She approached the decision about her ministry as an exercise in personal autonomy, rather than glad-hearted submission to authority.
In Summary:
Ted:
- Was right to make the decision.
- Sinned by making the decision.
- Listened to his wife for weeks before making the decision.
- Sinned by not listening to his wife before making the decision.
Elizabeth:
- Was right to not submit to her husband and instead appeal to the pastor to overrule her husband.
- Sinned by not submitting to her husband and instead appealing to the pastor to overrule her husband.
The pastor:
- Has final authority in all decisions in the marriage.
- Has no responsibility for the outcomes of the marriage, as assuming this responsibility would be usurping the role of the husband.
Hopefully this clears up any confusion as to how complementarian marriage works. For those interested in practicing this alternative lifestyle, I would suggest buying a bigger bed, as things are about to get awfully crowded.
*Update: Commenter David J pointed out that the name of the author/pastor is Heath Lambert, based on footnote #4 in the article.
Let’s make this easy, the wife flips a coin, heads she wins, tails he loses.
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Hi Dalrock,
I’ve read and enjoyed many of your posts.
I am chiming in here because I want to emphasize that not validating the concerns and feelings is incompetent leadership. This is true whether one is discussing a business leader or, in the case of Christian marriage, a husband’s leadership.
An effective leader inspires people to follow, and this is typically accomplished by demonstrating that the leader truly understands the follower’s point of view and experience.
So what happens when a husband isn’t doing this and hell breaks loose? I don’t know. I don’t have an answer to that. I know you’re being sarcastic above, but if a couple reaches an impasse in which neither party feels heard and understood by the other, it’s a really crappy place to be.
The following is a gender neutral comment: I have found in my own marriage that when I “gridlocked” like this with my husband that empathizing with and listening to his concerns is the thing that breaks the gridlock. Then he listens to my concerns, I feel better, and we move forward with what is typically his original plan, sometimes with some small modifications.
The only real difference between before and after the impasse is both parties feeling heard and validated in terms of their experience (that is NOT the same thing as being agreed with).
I really can’t fathom how anyone can disagree with that.
~Katharine
Dear Fellas:
Sadly, this lack of boundaries is evident even here on Dalrock blog, with men frequently acting like women, gossiping about people’s marriages, speculating on infidelity without a shred of evidence, etc.. See Pastor Saeed and his wife Naghmeh for recent example.
It’s amazing to me that rather than welcome their brother home, the comments include all manner of lurid shit about his wife, any one of which would get the speaker’s ass kicked if he were to say it to the husband directly (whether it may be true or not).
When I read the New Testament, it seems to hold the family unit as sacrosanct. In fact, several selections overtly mandate that other men don’t need to be talking to or about any married woman. Ephesians 5 covers the fact that a woman’s husband is responsible for her, and it follows that he will handle her misbehavior and he should be approached about it. It doesn’t mention any exceptions nor outside authorities.
It’s not reasonable to tell men they should be married, and then to expect them to be cucks in the house that they pay for. Meddling preachers can fuck off, and should be told this explicitly. It’s a husband’s job to correct his wife, and not some faggot priest’s or anonymous internet kooks.
Boxer
@Katharine
This is a brilliant trick, because it places your feelings as the arbitrator of the rightness of all decisions your husband makes. If you are upset, he must be sinning.
Indeed. This is the problem.
The day your wife runs to the preacher over something like her “feelings”……that’s the day you need to start planning your escape. You no longer have a marriage.
@ Katherine
Says who? I sure can’t find that in Scripture. So what authority do you cite for this proposition? From my brief review of Scripture, it seems to me that a fair number of leaders, including husbands, don’t even bother concerning themselves with the “feelings” of those who are under their authority.
Take Joseph, the foster-father of Jesus, for example. He packed up and moved to Egypt, and there is nothing in Scripture to indicate he even asked Mary’s opinion, much less “validated her opinion” on the matter.
Once again, who is your authority for this?
I suppose it is too much to hope for, but stop and think about. You are claiming all of these things, and none of them have any basis in anything Divine. That means they come from the World. And what does Scripture tell us about worldly things again?
Does anyone read the Bible for the answers anymore? I mean really? This reads like there is also data missing. Elizabeth also immediately betrayed Ted’s leadership and trust by seeking outside council to trump Ted’s leadership. Even when “Hell breaks Loose” in spite of the Husband’s potential to not make perfect decisions at all times, the wife is to submit to the husband.
Ephesians 5:22-33New International Version (NIV)
22 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. 23 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. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing[a] her by the washing with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church— 30 for we are members of his body. 31 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”[b] 32 This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
Katherine-
Since women are able to justify anything by feelings, then their lack of logic and reason makes them the eternal veto.
As long as wifey is unhappy, her feelings are supposedly some spiritual law.
Exactly. It places a woman’s feelings, which are affected by her post-Fall Appetite, in the position of determining what is right, and what is wrong.
I have a post which is relevant to this subject matter:
https://donalgraeme.wordpress.com/2015/11/24/the-mammon-trap-replacing-the-holy-spirit/
And any man with any sense will avoid marrying a woman who shows this kind of belligerent, rebellious nature.
“For those interested in practicing this alternative lifestyle, I would suggest buying a bigger bed, as things are about to get awfully crowded.”
Obviously said in jest, but really things have been crowded in the bed for a long time, except instead of the pastor it’s been the state. Modern Marriage is a menage a trois and will quickly become a whole party.
This post concerned how a pastor handled this situation, but what makes this so terrifying to a bachelor considering marriage is that this is what the the typical church gal thinks is normal to do in a marriage. How many men go into marriage naive about this, only to find out when it’s too late to change, because she has no incentive to change?
I’ve heard horror stories of what wives will do when they don’t get their way and this tale is mild in comparison.
So how does ‘Kathy’ [not Katherine] mentioned in this story, fit into this threesome? See below:
BTW – If Toad is reading this you’re not allowed to answer the question.
The moral of the story is: Don’t let a beta male pastor get into your personal business. Be a man.
@Don Quixote
Great catch. I’m not sure how that happened. Perhaps I was thinking of Kathy Keller and her godly tantrum? Either way, thanks for the correction. I’ve fixed the post.
@Katherine
I guess that is why Moses had to deal with rebellion in the desert, because he was an incompetent leader (according to you Katherine).
@Katherine, I understand what you’re saying, because as women our feelings and emotions are SO MUCH of our reality and experience of life that to feel they are being ignored is actually really to feel that the earth is crumbling beneath our feet.
It is completely devastating to me to feel like my husband isn’t acknowledging my feelings. This isn’t to say that my feelings are right or that he should have find a way to agreeing with them. Just that there is such an awful temptation to self assertion when it feels like they are being callously ignored.
I’m embarrassed to admit this but somewhat I got into a conflict with a family member because I FELT that they were being mean to me and I walked out. My husband called me and ordered me to come back to the house. Honestly it felt almost impossible to obey him because at first he wasn’t allowing me to tell him about my feelings about how this family member treated me and that felt SO SO AWFUL. It really felt like my heart might die.
Eventually he calmed down and did let me share my feelings, and just simply acknowledged them without validating them — he explained to me why he didn’t see this family member’s behavior as being mean in the same way I did, and he again ordered me to get my butt back to the house, but this time it was a MILLION times easier to obey just because I felt so much less pent up and tortured and controlled by my feelings from having been allowed to talk about them.
There is no doubt that I was sinning quite seriously here. I don’t want to justify my behavior because I’m ashamed and somewhat confused by it, and am still in the process of confessing it and working on it. I guess I just want to explain what it feels like.. and maybe telling what it feels like to you all just won’t mean anything because feelz don’t matter to you as men. Ack.
I just so appreciate when my husband helps me obey instead of having to fight myself on my own.
All this to say… my heart hurt for Elizabeth reading this, but I see your point.
Boxer said it concisely: “Meddling preachers can fuck off, and should be told this explicitly.”
Ah yes, when a church does not value headship, they will do what they can to pacify the situation by trying to explain that, “You are both wrong and you are both right.”
I wish I could think of a circumstance where this wouldn’t happen, but even in adultery, the pastor would gently solve it by telling Jill not to let other men put their penis in her anymore and telling Jack to love her more so she doesn’t want other men’s penises in her.
LeeLee & Katherine,
This is not about feelings. This is about decisions. This is about authority in who gets to make all the decisions.When you got married and said your vows, did you vow to OBEY your husband? Only you (never the husband, just you) are supposed to vow this. Did you take that vow? And if not, why not? And if you did, what do your feelings have to do with him making the decisions? You are supposed to obey. If you don’t obey, you are in sin.I council young single men in a church group. These men are very successful singles and they are going to remain that way, single because they have one thing going for them in their bachelorhood, one thing a marriage (to either of you) they would have to give up: full authority over all decisions in their lives. They don’t have to defer to anyone on anything. They are in control. They take whatever jobs they want. They work as much or as little as they want. They live where they want. They live as they want. They vacation where they want. They worship in whatever church they want. They choose, they defer to no one. They are not the least bit interested in how that makes others “feel” about them. Why would they ever want to give that up?Sure feelings are important. You need to feel loved by your husband. He shows you he loves you by having s-x with you. That validates his feelings towards you. But the decisions in his life on how to run the family, just defer to him. Submit. If you are worried about how that makes you feel, as Dalrock said, THAT is the problem, and it is YOUR problem, not your husband’s.
If anything, posts like this can help a man see how subtle the rebellion is.
“If I don’t FEEL that you’re listening to me, then you are in sin because you’re supposed to LOVE me like Christ loved the Church and give yourself up for me!”
According to folks like Katherine above, and the CBMW, a man is not leading properly if he is not “validating” and “listening to” the concerns of the wife. (Of course, “validate” and “listen to” means “do what I want, or I’m gonna get really mad and I won’t have sex with you and I won’t cook your dinner or clean your house and I’ll tell the pastor on you.”
This idea that a pastor is an appellate court to where a wife can take her grievances, and that a pastor has a “right of review” over a husband’s decisions, is destructive to a marriage. This idea that a pastor is the arbiter of what is “good” and “right” in a marriage cannot stand. A pastor’s authority over husband and wife cannot extend into the marital home.
Here’s the bottom line, LeeLee and Katherine: This is about the difficulty women have in submitting to and trusting their husbands. Women don’t want to submit, don’t think they should have to submit, and don’t really trust the men in their lives. And they don’t really trust God to protect them and provide for them even if the husband makes an occasional poor decision.
And if he makes lots of poor decisions, well, that’s on you too, because you picked him. You should have chosen a man who could make more sound decisions. You failed to do that. You must now live with the consequences of your choices.
Meddling preachers can fuck off, and should be told this explicitly. It’s a husband’s job to correct his wife, and not some faggot priest’s or anonymous internet kooks.
Indeed. I am by no means a violent man by inclination, but if I were to get a call from or be paid a visit by my pastor in which he were to inform me that he had overruled my decision as a husband on something that impacted my household and had told my wife to disobey my decision, that pastor would very quickly be a bloody mess of contusions and broken bones and I would very quickly ensure that we were no longer attending his church.
Further to my last, imagine that this pastor was not a middle-aged husband and father of years of experience in being both of these, but some pimply-faced kid two years out of seminary who should be punching a clock in a 9-to-5 and getting some time in real life before presuming to play leader of a flock, dispensing advice on things of which he hasn’t the vaguest clue.
feeriker, Really all this is, is churchianity trying to reconcile feminism with Christianity. That is all this is. That is the only reason why pastors are even having these discussions. They hold the church of feminism equally to Christ. So the only way to reconcile one with the other is allowing the pastor to have full veto power.
Deti…..there’s no way a feminist will take responsibility. These women commenting aren’t Christian. They may be churchian, but I digress. Rebellious women aren’t Christian. Doesn’t matter how you dress it, it’s still a pig. Pay attention to what’s said…..these women are a product of a feminised culture……and as such, it’s a serious, life changing mistake to marry one.
Godly women are noted in the Bible for a very important quality……they have their say in their heart, and then wait on the Lord. Inserting a feminist preacher in the middle of your marriage is simply stupid. There’s no good that can come from it. But that’s the trend, nowadays, isn’t it?
Yes, a man can make bad decisions…..no doubt about it. Perhaps his first serious mistake was his choice in a rebellious wife. All of this happens in the eyes of others. Young marriagable men take note of a woman’s disposition. And, yeah, if she’s rebellious, her sisters were raised the same way. Actually, if the problem is bad enough, it could affect her father’s standing in the church as well.
Feminists aren’t Christian. They’re the real life daughters of Eve. Literally. And they are going b to reap the same consequences. If a man has married one, that’s a serious life changing mistake. Let the young men learn from the tragedies of the older men. Wisdom is the application of the knowledge that you obtain.
Oh… they can buzz off with such meandering bullcrap masquerading as Godly leadership.
That was a massive betrayal by the wife and should have been loudly condemned as she was made to go and apologise to her husband and make amends by doing what she was told by her husband. She went behind his back and tried to usurp his authority. Way out of line.
Something about the influence of Jezebel….
And then LeeLee and Katharine wrote:
“…because he’s my husband and I will trust and submit to him because he’s got this!”
Wait…wrong thread. Wrong Blog. Wrong Internet. Wrong century. Wrong planet. Wrong galaxy. Wrong dimension. Wrong….wrong….wrong…
And the pastor gets the added benefit of feeling like King Solomon “splitting the baby” by finding a third way the couples failed to see!
And so the peace that passeth all understanding came to rule in their home once again!
After reading this, I began humming Rupert Holmes “Escape (The Pina Colada Song)”.
This is hilarious!!!
My wife and I were discussing leaving a church we were attending. I didn’t want to go there anyway and she manipulated me with the Holy Spirit is leading me crap. The pastor allowed her to pressure me into going to her church.
She got tired of his church, so we were discussing leaving. She wanted me to handle telling him.
YOU GOTTA CATCH THIS!
So I email him that she and I are having heated discussion over something and she is not submitting. (at this point I was committed to his church and wanted to stay there). I didn’t tell him the issue we were having, just that she wouldn’t submit to my leadership. After going through the regular “if you lead in the right way she will submit” crap, he pointed out that I should ‘live with her with understanding’. When I told him I had listened to her enough and that I was the authority he got a little heated and suggested I wasn’t loving her etc. I asked him what to do then. He point blank said that I should sacrifice my preference for hers.
Fine pastor. We were discussing leaving your church. I wanted to stay, but since she wants to leave I’ll defer to her preference. Have a good one.
Few months later he wanted to counsel us, and although he told her to be submissive he couldn’t bring himself to explain I am the head and have authority. You can listen to him daily. He is very well known “biblical” expositor.
This is why you never go to couple’s counseling period, especially with a pastor who wants to be Mr. alpha. These men are backstabbers and cannot be trusted. I can see the future where these pastors get first dibs at a kiss during the wedding ceremony similar to what happened in braveheart.
I am chiming in here because I want to emphasize that not validating the concerns and feelings is incompetent leadership.:
If you’re referring to the example Dalrock quoted in the original article, try a reading comprehension check, toots:
…because even though her husband discussed the issue with her FOR WEEKS before making a final decision…
I think it’s more than safe to say that if they had discussed the issue “for weeks” that it would be something pretty short of miraculous if he didn’t understand (or “validate,” if you prefer) her concern. I’m sure he understood it perfectly.
As for validating her feeeeeeeeeeelings ….
Would “validating” here by a synonym for “caving in and letting her have her way, no matter how catastrophic the long-term results were to the household, the marriage, and even the church ministry in question?”
Apparently “Ted,” being a logical long-term thinker (we men tend to be like that), wasn’t about to let “Elizabeth” self-destruct by letting her have her way, which not only would have potentially had catastrophic results for her, him, their family, and their church ministry, but would also have inevitably result in her blaming him for her inevitable and perfectly predictable failure.
So, no, darlin’, “Ted” not only was far from incompetent in leading his wife, but did exactly what scripture commanded of him: exercised headship and kept his weaker vessel from breaking.
For those interested in practicing this alternative lifestyle, I would suggest buying a bigger bed, as things are about to get awfully crowded.
Not bad. I grew up evangelical, and I remember that pastors used to chide single young men to “Leave room for the Holy Spirit!” and refrain from kissing, touching or being in any close proximity to their girlfriends. Now they can tell the husband “Move over and make some space for the authority of God almighty!” before stepping in to service their wives.
“Deti…..there’s no way a woman will take responsibility.”
FIFY. The inability to accept blame for mistakes or wrongdoing or to accept responsibility for the consequences of one’s behavior is something that NO woman is programmed to do, whether she calls herself a feminist or not.
That was a massive betrayal by the wife and should have been loudly condemned as she was made to go and apologise to her husband and make amends by doing what she was told by her husband. She went behind his back and tried to usurp his authority. Way out of line.
I would argue that the pastor was even farther out of line by enabling the rebellious wife’s usurpation of her husband’s biblically-mandated authority as head of the marriage. I’ll even go far as to say that this should be grounds for defrocking.
IBB said on January 18, 2016 at 4:08 pm:
Exactly. As I said, any pastor who insinuates himself into a marriage between husband and wife in the way this mangina knucklehead did deserves to have the full wrath of both man and God come down upon him (and then have himself defrocked).
So the pastor has to have authority, but no responsibility.
Don’t cuckservatives whine about how important it is to match authority with responsibility? Oh, but when groveling to a woman is possible, any and all values go out the window.
This is why I am delighted to see cuckservatives being ridiculed and marginalized from both sides.
I would flat out tell the pastor that the spirit would move me to tithe substantially less than I currently do because it would be clear the church had too much money if it felt it was a prudent use of God’s resources to manage my family’s calendar. Utterly ridiculous.
I will say every time I read a story like this, or see something similar in my daily life it makes me more appreciative of my wife.
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Feelings. The shifting sands of a woman’s feelings and on those shifting sands, we are to make concrete decisions. For an assist, there is a pastor, catering to the woman’s feeeeeelings, counseling the men to make decisions based on shifting sands the men must then be responsible for. The wives and their feelings and the pastor’s opinion get a free pass and the men, bound by the responsibilities assumed by catering to the shifting sands of a woman’s feelings are “sinning” by calling bullshit to all this? What kind of “man” submits to all THAT? What is the point? All you’re doing is validating via pastor, a woman’s standard-issue dopey feelings and notions her dopey thoughts aren’t being listened to, as they should not. When are men going to take up spanking disobedient wives again? And these pastors? They need a trip to the playground for messing in men’s business and families. Anything less than full support of the husband is unacceptable. Otherwise, why would a man bother with a church?
he was sinning because she didn’t feel like he was listening to her.
But if even if he was sinning she is commanded in the in 1 Peter 3:1 … that even if some Husbands) do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives.
Nowhere is a husband commanded to “listen” to his wife but Adam was cursed for it. (Genesis 3:17 ) “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; He is also to rule her. 1 tim 5:17 Peter instructs husbands to live with their wives with knowledge. This is not knowledge of her opinion but of the Word of God and her prevailing sins.
Where the husband is not commanded to listen to his wife the wife is commanded to obey and submit to him. Eph 5:22, Col 3:18, Heb 13:17. The bible also give the husband to veto any vows made by the wife (Numbers 30).
Putting it together :
1) If there is disagreement the husband is not required to listen to his wife.
2) The wife is commanded to obey her husband.
3) If she objects she is to do so without acting on her objection or voicing it.
4) If an argument ensues the wife is in sin.
5) A wife’s feelings often lead men to sin and men should do what is right according to the Word and rule over his wife without giving in to her emotions.
The “women complain – men comply” model is doubly sinful. Husbands should be taught to disciple their wives to stop complaining and to stop complying, instead ruling with knowledge of the Word.
This is not the first example of this we’ve seen highlighted just by Dalrock. Mark Driscoll said the same in his sermons on marriage. Jason Meyer (John Piper’s successor at Bethlehem Baptist) said basically the same thing in his sermon on “abuse”.
All these folks want to set up the pastoral team as a court of appeals for the wife to go to if she doesn’t get her way.
It sounds like a paradox that you could be both right and also sinning at the same time. However it makes sense if you think about it. If doing what the pastor says to do (doing the “right thing”) is more important than what Scripture says to do (not sinning) then he’s not really contradicting himself.
Any man who submits his relationship with his wife to some third party for arbitration… ugh, he is screwed, and he deserves to be screwed. Any man who tries to intervene in my relationship with my wife is going to get his ass kicked, period.
Heh, I see that others feel the same way…
Late to the party. The husband is lost if he allows some pastor to call the shots .especially after the wife runs to get him. If he doesn’t have kids he should get rid of her for trying that.
Well Dalrock another post for MGTOW. next thing you know you’ll have a post on a guy that used a surrogate and nanny and spared himself this madness.
I like your style and attitude Tarl
Tarl happens to be correct, Ghost. But then, if this is the state of Christianity, why bother with the institution?
Imagine a priest messing with the wife of Gotti. Giving her notions that her feeeeelings matter? Calling Gotti in to tell Gotti how it’s going to be for him and Gotti’s wife. Imagine that, Gents.
And then, be Gotti. The better option is to project frame that the pastor wouldn’t dare risk violating or trifling with if you must bother with a Church to begin with. Check Mate! Remarks to that?
Ted…Ted….Ted…Ted…Ted. It’s always Ted’s fault. As it is every husband’s in marriage to the modern woman, be it egalitarian or complementarian. There really is no difference. This is a really open-and-shut case, with Scripture saying “Wives. obey your husbands in all things…”. How much clearer can the Bible be?
It’s been said that Christianity has collapsed in the Western world. Is it any surprise, with pastors meddling like this? Worse, with offertories, YOU ARE PAYING TO HAVE YOUR AUTHORITY UNDERMINED! It is absurd.
Always, the church comes out with wishy-washy compromises that are embarrassing. Is there a war in the Middle East? The Archbishop will come out and say “There are just as many for the war as there are against it. So everyone should be at peace with their own consciences …blah blah blah…”. It’s contemptible.
The cycle in the past has been boom, recession, depression and war, then boom again. It seems that we are due for some horrible cataclysm since that is the only way civilization can be rest after the feminization of the western world.
@innocentbystanderboston & thedeti — I understand. I know that I would have to obey my husband even if he were an evil green monster, which he isn’t, he’s kind and wise and patient. I hate the fact that I defied him – that’s not who I want to be.
It’s just really, unbelievably hard sometimes when it feels like I’m strapped into an emotional roller coaster that I couldn’t get off even if I desperately wanted to. It’s hard to make that *rational* choice just to submit. Hard, but worth it and worth it to train to be able to.
I just don’t feel that anyone could feel differently.
All the talk of defy vs not defy…..that’s good. There needs to be an acknowledgement that husband has been right more often than not, despite her feelings, and that needs to be repeated like a mantra.
Sometimes food is not eaten with flavor having primacy. Sometimes it is fuel,and simple nourishment. This dilemma manifests oddly parallel to that of feelings as primacy….even though one is far more important to put down than the other.
LeeLee it is always hard. remember God commands men to love their wives. Kepp doing it right and when you are not the young pretty hot thing you will have the respected wife thing. Women that respect there husbands and families with deeds and words have an endearing quality that is loved by all that can see and appreciate those qualities in women. It is especially true today.
Never stop being a good wife
Basically the pastor here is cuckolding the husband emotionally. By providing the validation of her feelings (emotional gratification) while at the same time placing himself above the husband in the marital relationship, he has made the husband an emotional cuckold. I can’t imagine that the sex life for the couple in the OP thrived after this emo-cucking.
I attend church but no longer have any illusions of how Godly they are. I do it out of obedience to the desire of God. This is the typical stuff that happens. Pastors think of themselves as the best and most knowledgeable Christian in the church when in reality that is far from the truth. But they have to believe in this to justify all the years in seminary and training. Christians that read the Bible and learn as they go and learn through experience and trials and tribulations have as much or more knowledge of the Bible as anyone else. This is the beauty of our Faith! We don’t need someone between us and God to show us how it is done. We have the Holy Spirit and have Christ as our intermediary.
Of course, evangelical churches are now offereing a buffet of ideology and doctrine and one (as well as they) get to choose what they believe. THe one constant is tithing. They don’t toss that aside.
Im amazed Ted delayed this decision for weeks. Nothing there that couldnt have been decided in a couple of days.
Methinks Elizabeth has a great deal of practice in emotionally cuckolding her husband. Perhaps someone should count the china in their house….
On the original post, a few passages.
Matthew 6:24 (ESV): “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money (Mammon).”
Acts 4:19-20 (ESV): “But Peter and John answered them, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.”
Galatians 1:10 (ESV): “For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.”
Matthew 7:24-27 (ESV): “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”
Many “pastors” will learn these things to the undoing of their Souls.
@Katharine_Di_Cerbo:
While everyone is, rightly, piling on with the utter error in your comment, let me take a different direction.
Luke 6:45 (ESV): “The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.”
Your comment shows that, in your Heart, your feelings are above God. You may be a nice Woman, but niceness isn’t going to save your Soul. You need to go to God and repent, fall before Him for is Grace is sufficient. Then stand up, accept your responsibility, learn to control your emotions while submitting to God and your Husband. Hard? Yes. Worth it? Beyond all of the riches of the World.
So here we have the rub.
The Oscars are to be boycotted by certain people due to lack of diversity.
The authority of the Bible is to be boycotted now by women, due to lack of diversity.
You see lads, if the Bible had had a few women on the panel, when the decisions were made as to what to put into the Book, there wouldn’t be any of this “husbandly authority”.
If you guys would only open your eyes, you would see that clear as day.
Christians that read the Bible and learn as they go and learn through experience and trials and tribulations have as much or more knowledge of the Bible as anyone else.
Spot on.
Let me say it again, as it bears endless repeating, even thought it’s painfully obvious to anyone who spends any amount of time in an American church:
As long as what churches today call “Bible Study” consists not of reading the Bible, but of group readings of the latest Churchian Oprah Book of the Month Club best-seller that might in passing mention some portion of the Scripture, but that mostly consists of feelings and feel-good anecdotes, then of course ignorance of the Bible will remain widespread and all-pervasive. Studying the Bible takes mental and spiritual effort, accompanied by focused and fervent prayer, two things that the average churchian cannot be bothered with, to say nothing of the fact that the Bible contains many messages that serve as a strong rebuke to the typical modern churchian’s lifestyle and behavior.
Pastors, for their part, encourage and enable this spiritual sloth largely because 1) they themselves were inadequately schooled in the Scriptures and are nearly as benighted as their congregants and 2) a biblically literate congregation is a direct threat to (and will ultimately expose) their ignorance and heresy, leading to the compromise of their authority.
LOLzzzzz on all the hard core guys ready to kick this beta-Preacher’s ass.
The issue concerned the woman’s ministry in the church. This is a clear exception to the general rule that the church has little (if any) authority between a husband and his wife but most people don’t get those distinctions so it will be generalized to eventually set up an appellate court the wife can run to if she doesn’t get her way. The pastor who wrote this is a clever devil. No doubt he is crafty and sly, but are his rulings Godly?
On the contrary, this type of clever, slick, slippery behavior reminds me of a snake- revealing the inspiration for all of this.
We fight not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
empath
I just don’t feel that anyone could feel differently.
I feel that you must be right. Then again, my feelings about this could change.
Dear Katherine-
Sometimes God does not listen to me in the way I want him to. I don’t feel like God is paying attention to my feelings. I guess God needs counseling.
See, I used your trick. I now have a perpetual reason to rebel against God.
@LeeLee and @katherine:
Yes, take her in your arms and hold her and listen while you nod your head patiently and tenderly. WE..FUCKING..GET..IT. Now kindly piss off We are not talking about having a long, heartfelt conversation as the salve for your hurt fee fees. We are talking about WEEKS AND MONTHS OF BITCHING, MOANING, COMPLAINING, ARGUING, NAGGING, PICKING, POKING, HOT/COLD/HOTCOLD/HOT/COLD, WHINING, SEXUAL DENIALS AND BITCHBITCHBITCHBITCHBITCH. You women know exactly what I am talking about and you KNOW that is what happens.
He listened to her. He didn’t agree with her. That doesn’t mean he is not loving her like Christ. After all THAT patience and forbearance the answer is if he would just listen nicely and with Christly love. This angers me as I write this because it is a verbal trap that so many men are unable to answer. Guess what ladies. I can answer it.
Christly love doesn’t mean “wife always fEEEELLSLLLLS like he is loving her like Christ.” Christly love is stern. Christ demanded a rich man sell all he owned before he could follow him. He told people to forsake their fathers and mothers and family to follow him. He didn’t ask if it was CONVENIENT or if it made them FEEEEEEEEELELLLLLLL good. He said take up your cross and follow me.
You see girls, it works both ways. If you want us to love you like Christ then we can demand obedience and devotion just as Christ demanded obedience and devotion. The rallying cry of the modern Christian woman in rebellion is:
“I don’t have to submit if you don’t love me like Christ loved the church.”
So perhaps we should consider precisely the nature of that love.
In the New Testament, the “Bride of Christ” is the Christian Church which is the heir of the original “Bride” wooed by God- the nation of Israel. Do you have any idea how many examples there are in the Bible explaining in exquisite detail how God deals with his “Bride” when she is rebellious? How about the entire book Judges, Lamentations, most of Isaiah, Jeremiah and several others.
If you haven’t read these books I hate to spoil the plot but let me give you a hint: When the people of Israel turn against God, He does not remain their Best BFF. God does not play the part of the weak Beta man who is all forgiving, ever merciful and kind while she walks all over Him, mocks Him, and abandons Him. The Lord will not be mocked, and neither should you be mocked as a husband. Read it and know this is God Almighty Himself speaking as recorded by the prophet Jerimiah, Chapter 12, specifically about how He deals with His rebellious wife
I will forsake my house,
abandon my inheritance;
I will give the one I love
into the hands of her enemies.
8 My inheritance has become to me
like a lion in the forest.
She roars at me;
therefore I hate her.
9 Has not my inheritance become to me
like a speckled bird of prey
that other birds of prey surround and attack?
Go and gather all the wild beasts;
bring them to devour.
10 Many shepherds will ruin my vineyard
and trample down my field;
they will turn my pleasant field
into a desolate wasteland.
Over and over and over again in the Old Testament God’s “Bride” turns away from him, often to “seek other Gods.” Over and over again the Lord then turns his face away from His people and lets His Bride be raped, and tortured, and abused, and humiliated. He turns His face away from them and lets enemies seize the lands and starve, enslave, and butcher the people.
The Lord ONLY returns His favor on the people of Israel, His bride, when they cry to Him and beg his forgiveness. Of course this is the unique nature of our God, to forgive when forgiveness is sought. No matter how rebellious or how awful your wife behaves, if you are going to love her like Christ loved the church, you must forgive her when she seeks genuine forgiveness and repentance. However, if she will not seek that, then all I am suggesting is that if she turns her face away from you, then you follow the perfect example of the Lord and turn your face away from her.
A wife is commanded to submit, even if the husband is not following the word. What the ever living hellfire and damnation is unclear?
Oh and on the argument that a wife will follow good husbandly leadership like Christ: Sure! Nobody would ever desert the perfect love of Christ in his hour of need. Oh, right, all 12 disciples deserted Him and over 8% of them outright betrayed him. Evem Jesus perfect love could not command perfect obedience while God almighty Himself could not keep a woman from disobeying him despite giving her, literally, paradise. What can a man be expected to do with his Christly love?
BPP – WOW!
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The Scriptures were never intended to be a complete how-to manual for Christian life. Jesus left authority with His Apostles (Luke 10:16) and that authority has been passed down to those who are in apostolic succession to those Apostles. We know that because Jesus told his disciples to “tell it to the church” (Matthew 18:15-17) if their brother offends and the matter cannot be settled privately.
Through sacred tradition we learn that Mary had complete faith (trust and confidence) in her husband Joseph and that he never failed her trust in him.
If a man chooses not to respect the authority Jesus left to His Apostles and their successors, can that man be surprised if his own household does not respect his authority?
>not validating the concerns and feelings is incompetent leadership
In a kissy-feely type of environment, this might be a person’s expectation. I am unaware of Christ leading in this way. I am reminded of Christ’s words hurting Peter’s feelings, as Christ asked Peter for the third time if Peter loved Christ. Or Christ rebuking the church, and threatening to send punishment in Rev 1-3.
>An effective leader inspires people to follow
Partly true, but this suggests no obedience is necessary. Obedience is done when I do not WANT to do as directed, but do so anyway.
A wife who is not obedient is worse than useless. She is also sinful. I was about to quote the 4 passages on this, but I suspect you not would be affected by God’s Word. Let me know if my assumption is incorrect.
>The only real difference between before and after the impasse is both parties feeling heard and validated in terms of their experience
I agree with seeking to normally understanding the other’s needs (not their view), but the problem is that, in the example from the original post, the husband had been listening… for WEEKS. And the wife still claimed he had not really listened. Women are not suitable for family leadership; this needs to be firmly understood. Just as strongly, as the fact he is to rule her while loving her as the weaker partner. Again, if you are willing to accept Scripture, let me know. Otherwise, dogs, pigs and pearls.
LeeLee
>because feelz don’t matter to you as men. Ack.
Men do have feelings and passions. Most men, and also some women, have the wisdom to put facts as the authority / decision maker, rather than feelings however, so it may appear the feelings are ignored or absent.
>I just so appreciate when my husband helps me obey instead of having to fight myself on my own.
Very valid point. It does not eliminate the need to obey, but focuses on how to help his wife obey God’s commands. Doing so may not always be possible, but it seems wise for a leader to enable his people to be great at their various God-gives roles and duties.
It’s great that you make the struggle to be a better in your God-given role of wife. May God guide your obedience to God’s commands.
@Boxer
>Boxer said it concisely: “Meddling preachers can fuck off, and should be told this explicitly.”
I’ll add my +1 to SJB.
@Jonadab-the-Rechabite
>Putting it together :
>1) If there is disagreement the husband is not required to listen to his wife.
>2) The wife is commanded to obey her husband.
>3) If she objects she is to do so without acting on her objection or voicing it.
>4) If an argument ensues the wife is in sin.
>5) A wife’s feelings often lead men to sin and men should do what is right according to the Word and rule over his wife without giving in to her emotions.
a) Great summation.
b) Where am I supposed to find this unicorn? Damn what a tall order. I know… umm…. Maybe 2 wives that might act this out. Maybe a third. Out of maybe a thousand couples I have met (IRL) over my lifetime.
@Looking Glass
>Your comment shows that, in your Heart, your feelings are above God. You […] need to repent
This is the best advice, and also very perceptive. As some others have indicated in the same thread, a rebellious wife is very likely not a Christian. A repentant, obedient servant of God does as God commands. Matt 21:28-32, Luke 14:33, Luke 17:10 and John 14:21-24 speak to this.
@Micha Elyi
> Jesus left authority with His Apostles (Luke 10:16)
That’s both disappointing and funny. If you had read the passage you quoted from, you would know that Luke 10 is not talking about the apostles. It is talking about 72 people, not “the 12”.
>and that authority has been passed down to those who are in apostolic succession to those Apostles.
Gee, where is this in the Bible again? Even if you had not used the Luke 10 passage and applied it to the wrong people, that passage says nothing about the humans deciding that they could pass any “special” authority to anyone whatever men they subsequently chose.
Titus does discuss appointing elders, but if you read Titus 1:5-9, you will see that such elders were to “hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught” — that means, they were to hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught. They were not to add anything new. Name me one (false) religion with the power / authority structures you endorse, where the leaders all refuse to add anything new, no new “moral” rules; instead they “hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught”.
>If a man chooses not to respect the authority Jesus left to His Apostles and their successors, can that man be surprised if his own household does not respect his authority?
Hmmm… I see
a) a shaming attempt
b) Acting as if something unproven is proven (the successors bit)
c) an attempt to conflate rejecting false religious professionals with a failed marriage
It is wonderful to have God’s word available to me. Otherwise I might be deceived by religious people, and even by those who are genuinely confused or lacking themselves in knowledge of the truth.
@Dale:
It’s worse than just some Women who claim to be Christians have no salvation. There’s little in the way around the reality that most Women in Churches have no place in Heaven by their choices.
This is a little bit of an aside, but it does intersect with this topic. Part of the way the Blue Pill causes so much trouble comes from this passage. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” Galatians 5:22-24 (ESV).
Most Christian Men would be pleased if their wives consistently showed any of these traits to them. In fact, most Christian Men wouldn’t find this part of the Internet if most of their wives even made a vague attempt at godliness. Just a little bit of action of actually *acting* Christian will do wonders for most relationships. But they can’t be bothered; the leadership can’t be bothered to say anything; the husbands don’t know what to do. And a chunk of Men will see Heaven and see almost no one they went to Church with them in Paradise. That’s the cold, sad reality that the “Church” ignores.
@bluepillprofessor:
That’s a money post, man. Great job.
If a man chooses not to respect the authority Jesus left to His Apostles and their successors, can that man be surprised if his own household does not respect his authority?
Yeah because everyone knows that Catholic women respect their husband’s authority. /sarc
@Dale: “It is wonderful to have God’s word available to me.”
Since we have God’s word, it is useful to ask “What did God actually say?” Several claims have been made up-thread that could benefit from comparing them to what God actually says in his word. Due to limits on space and reader’s attention spans, I need to be brief here to the point that I might be misunderstood. But hopefully the comments will trigger some useful thoughts in the minds of the readers.
1. Eve decided that there were benefits to be had from disobeying God ** before ** she bit into the forbidden fruit. Eve’s behavior before eating the forbidden fruit demonstrates what her nature actually was before the fall. Her rebellious nature is what caused the fall. She did not acquire a rebellious nature because of the fall. Somewhere on YouTube you should be able to find an old copy of Eve’s first big hit – “Born This Way”.
2. Nowhere in the Bible does God say that he cursed Adam or Eve. God doesn’t even say that he cursed the ground. Rather, he states that the ground is cursed because of Adam’s disobedience.
3. God expects women to love their husbands as much as he expects husbands to love their wives. Elsewise, why would he have told the Titus 2 women to teach the young wives to love their husbands. The meme “husbands love your wives; wives respect your husbands” may have a solid foundation in psychology. But it does not fully reflect what God actually said.
4. God said of Adam, it is not good for man to be alone; therefore, I will make a proper and fitting help for him. It is pretty obvious that God’s purpose for the woman was to help the man. So she has an obligation to aquire the knowledge, skills, and abilities to be able to do that. What may not be so obvious, and something I don’t ever see emphasized, is this: by creating a help for the man, God created an expectation that the man would actually make use of the help. This expectation creates a further expectation that the man will actually listen to the woman in order to make best use of what she has to offer (talk is necessary; neither spouse can read the other’s mind). This point needs to be developed further. But, In order to keep this short – simply consider the man who never acts on any help the woman offers him, or who never tries to find out by talking with her what help she might be able to provide. We could rightly conclude that such a man is thumbing his nose at God – for God is the one who created the help for the man, and created the expectation that the man would use the help. God did not create the woman to be a help for the man just so that the man could turn around and ignore her. That truth places some obligations on the man that don’t usually get fully vetted around here.
5. Nowhere in the Creation story did God tell the woman that she must submit to the man. Rather, he created her to be a help. Consider that one can submit without ever being a help. One cannot be a help without submitting to the guidance given by the helped. But God’s stated reason for creating the woman was so that she could be a help (which implies being allowed to participate in the man’s life), not so that she would simply submit.
6. The New Testament reveals a procedure for how disputes among members of the church should be handled. Nowhere does the New Testament say that this procedure for handling disputes was available only to the men and was denied to the women. Given this, the wife in the story above was not wrong in taking her concerns about her husband to the church. But she should have taken her concerns to the Titus 2 women in the church, not to the pastor. Older men tutor younger men in the things of God. Older women tutor younger women in the things of God. Problems crop up when one gender ministers to the other gender. Wise churches enforce the men minister to men and women minister to women approach. Doing this helps avoid the appearance of the valid problems discussed up-thread about the pastor coming between a husband and wife.
———-
The New Testament says “wife, submit to your husband”. And lots of posters up-thread have verbalized exactly what they think that process should look like. But, long before the New Testament was written, God actually said “wife, help your husband”, and – by implication – “husband, make use of the proper and fitting help I’ve given you”. Pretty much crickets on anybody verbalizing exactly what that dynamic should look like. But I dare say it looks a lot different than what has been put forward up-thread.
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2016/01/18/christian-mothers-wives-take-up-fight-against-isis-whose-women-serve-as-suicide-bombers-and-slaves.html?intcmp=hplnws
even traditional christians think running the home and looking after kidsetc is a lesser job
those men should be embarrassed that they send their wives to die at war…
christians believing the ideas on this blog are going to be the minority…
5. Nowhere in the Creation story did God tell the woman that she must submit to the man. …
… The New Testament says “wife, submit to your husband”. And lots of posters up-thread have verbalized exactly what they think that process should look like. But, long before the New Testament was written, God actually said “wife, help your husband”, and – by implication – “husband, make use of the proper and fitting help I’ve given you”.
And so you verbalize what YOU THINK that process should look like.
Pretty much crickets on anybody verbalizing exactly what that dynamic should look like.
Not really. Paul pretty much gave us what we need to know when he wrote:
“Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.”
And if that wasn’t clear enough, Peter wrote:
“Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives, 2 when they see your respectful and pure conduct. 3 Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear— 4 but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious. 5 For this is how the holy women who hoped in God used to adorn themselves, by submitting to their own husbands, 6 as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. And you are her children, if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening.”
That doesn’t sound like crickets to me.
christians believing the ideas on this blog are going to be the minority…
We’ve been in the minority for a long time.
2. Nowhere in the Bible does God say that he cursed Adam or Eve. God doesn’t even say that he cursed the ground. Rather, he states that the ground is cursed because of Adam’s disobedience.
Actually, the text says God cursed the ground….here:
And he called his name Noah, saying, This same shall comfort us concerning our work and toil of our hands, because of the ground which the LORD hath cursed. Genesis 5:29
Does the story look any different if he is Edward and she Liz? – and – Is there any appeal procedure from the decision of a CBMW Pastor?
I would also like to add that in a recent survey it was found that 42% of Britons do not believe in God but these surveys are always flawed and not least because most people would be as embarrassed to admit to a belief in any deity as they would to reading The Daily Mail. Everyone – even the Agnostics and most Atheists and that includes Dawkins (who has retrenched from Atheism to Agnosticism) believe in Jesus and every woman wants to marry, in White, in a Norman Church on The South Downs (see a recent previous thread). How can that not be Christian?
I think involving the pastor is weird. It puts the pastor in a dumb position because really they can only offer a split decision. However, beyond that I think alot of the posts here are way too strident in their commitment to a single leadership strategy.
If we love our wives like Christ loved the church we will do what we can righteously do to make our decisions palatable and our leadership easy to bear. Even if that includes the apparently dreaded “validation and listening” so many find abhorrent. Seriously, this is a big deal? Katherine defines a modern leadership style – its more feminine and team building in its approach than traditional authoritarian ones, but it may be a more effective method in LEADING women than declaring my way or the high way and being disappointed when she FEELS upset. I don’t live in a war zone or the Zombie apocalypse so most our decisions are deliberated on and made together over days to weeks. Leadership is assembling information and getting the information from all available sources – even feelings – before decision making.
Good leadership is like good missionary work is like good parenting. You work to find the way to lead the person you want to lead, you do not demand they adapt to your style. Thats not leadership or headship. Christ had different responses to different people depending on what they needed. Some of my children need one thing and some another. Some wives need one thing and some another. Some times one wife needs one thing and other times different things.
Finally, I would not be so dismissive of the feelings God gave women. They cannot be the basis for decision making, but those powerful feelings bring so many blessings into a home and marriage that despite the frustrations they cause me and the occasional whackadoodle world view that flows from them they should be considered a gift. God made men and women different with different strengths and weaknesses. Feelings can be a beautiful strength in women.
He did all of that and it wasn’t enough. Modern leadership style as you call it is grinding the family into dust. It doesn’t work. Decisions need to be made, sometimes quickly. A woman’s feelings are hers to sort out as she must submit to her husband’s leadership.
This woman didn’t submit, she listened to her feelings and overruled her husband by going to their pastor to complain. She violated her marriage vows and destroyed any trust the husband might have had in her. Feelings should not enter into proper decision making. Feelings are often only of the moment and based on emotion and not reason. Bad decisions will come from that.
You mean ‘servant leader’. Yeah, you can bugger off with that. Your wife chose to adapt her lifestyle and choices to yours when you got married. The husband is the head, he’s not pushing from behind and leading where she wants to go.
Yes, we’ve heard, women’s feelings come from God and are holy whilst men’s are bad and evil. Screw you! Everyone has feelings as everyone has arseholes, that doesn’t make them a strength. Screw your blue pill mangina bullcrap!
@Don Quixote
Answer your question? I’ll kindly refrain,
And of wisdom I do have some pearls,
Though the problem is something quite plain:
A threesome consists of one guy and two girls,
But two guys with one girl is a train…
Great post, Dalrock. It’s interesting that this topic of leadership (men failing to lead, women desiring to lead & refusing to submit) seems to be accelerating towards crisis.
Pastor, husband and wife. “Complementarian Threesome”
And you guys claim *my* reading of the Bible is strange…
And Christians ridicule Muslims? Christianity is dying int he west and one of the reasons are these weak Christians that have helped destroy the traditional family. Why should any man attend these churches and be subjected to this anti male bias.
It is too late to change America and the decline of morality and ethics in the short term. As a Muslim, I enjoy reading this site to help me identify people who will are espousing ideas to tear down our traditional family structure and ensure they are resisted at all times.
The moral of the story is: Don’t let a beta male pastor get into your personal business. Be a man.
QFT. This has been going on for many years, with many devout young men being influenced greatly. Very common theme in Christian books, radio, movies, etc.
Now when I see it in churches I get disgusted, and my sons often hear my contempt for pudgy falsetto worship leaders who tell me I need to go to their retreat to learn what it means to be a man.
I’m curious to know if a woman’s chaffing under submitting to her husband’s authority is more about him not being the Alpha she wants to submit to.
For as long as I’ve participated in the christo-manosphere the one repeating theme in churchianity is always women’s belief that they should redefine submission (going so far as to become charismatic speakers) to their husbands. They will rewrite it, reinterpret it, and re-source the Holy Spirit to fit the ends of their imperative, but underneath that they are still their own solipsistic mental point of origin and all pretense of religious conviction be damned in favor of it.
For the more Alpha Christian husbands I know (which is a precious few) this isn’t even a topic discussed with their wives – it’s just a given that he’ll make the major decisions for her and the family. My guess is the more Beta, the more lack of trust in his capacity to make good decisions, and thus the less security she feels in his authority. So to compensate she must assume the role of authority and headship, but she can’t biblically do that without the reinterpreting and the social affirmation from other women (and even pastors) to reinforce this so she can feel secure.
The feminist undercurrent is rife in contemporary churchianity, but you have to understand the mechanics of why feminism found the church to be such fertile grounds in which to sow itself.
Rollo,
Understood, but as you know, women flake on alphas, too.
It’s the nature of mankind to rebel against God because of our sinful nature. As you’ve also no doubt heard/read, wives are especially inclined to rebel against a husband’s headship. We’ve discussed the particular passages often on this site.
Behavior can only mitigate/manage the rebellion. It won’t end it.
Regarding the pastor inclusion in marriage issues, I am reminded of Tom Landry’s “two QB” experiment. When you have “two starting QBs,” you have none. He tried it decades ago and no one has been able to make it work since.
“since” should really be “either.”
@Rollo
You’re certainly on to it. With the insidious growth of feminism in the church, it’s now to the point that young women have not had the right examples, or teachings, about true headship and submission. I believe there are many women who operate in that spirit of rebellion completely unknowingly, and it’s exasperated by men who then do not know how to lead, or deal with a wife who often resists or challenges him. As you said, for real Alphas, it’s not an issue; he handles things how he wants and she follows.
I hesitate to lay blame, but now I see a great opportunity for men to turn the tide in the church and in their marriage, by embracing what it really means to be a man, a leader, the head of the family. It certainly would help if the guys I knew would step it up.
Friend who was a complete Churchian beta is in trouble. I thought he had found a unicorn, that maybe some women are Godly enough not to require game. She left her job to “be a better wife” and cook him dinner, and would also talk her husband up on social media.
I was early Red Pill when they got engaged and tried to increase his vetting. She seemed like she would pass, she even answered “would you leave me if I became abusive”, with “no, my duty is to win you back without a word”.
But now they are separated because of his ‘porn addiction’. Don’t know if they can reconcile but she wants him to leave the house for a time and it looks like it will just setup the standard Churchian emasculating dynamic. He says it effected his job but I don’t know the extent, or how deprived of affection he was (but that side will not get any play). They probably also won’t hear that porn is not adultery and is not biblical grounds for separation.
More likely is that she became increasingly unhappy and frustrated (hypergamy fail) and couldn’t verbalize it (he should just get it). Now he is going the standard, “I have a broken and contrite heart, and just need more accountability”, I don’t think he can hear any Red Pill advice.
As former roommates with a room now open, I think he is planning to move back in for a time. I might just be able to push barbell training and maybe Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu to get him outside of his head and feel more dominate, but even the intense pain he is going through is probably not enough to make him reconsider gender dynamics.
AnonS,
What’s her relationship like with her dad?
I hesitate to lay blame, but now I see a great opportunity for men to turn the tide in the church and in their marriage, by embracing what it really means to be a man, a leader, the head of the family. It certainly would help if the guys I knew would step it up.
What would that “stepping up” look like in a church?
Rollo/Anchorman… If we really love God then we’ll want to follow Him, and we’ll desire to please Him and obey Him. It may still be a struggle, but the desire and love is there. Jesus says that those who love Him, obey His word. So… if we love our husbands, then no, it’s not hard to submit and obey them. That may be part of why mature women are supposed to instruct younger wives to love their husbands, like what RichardP brought up (amazing comment!).
With my own husband, I love and adore him so much, and it just grows with every year, it’s so amazing… so submitting to him and obeying him is easy for me – its dealing with other people that gets me tripped up lol. But we’ve had a very uncommon marriage from the start… and it’s a testament that a beautiful, fulfilling, godly marriage really can be achieved.
Feelings.
Nothing more than feelings.
Trying to forget my…feelings…of…
Wait. I was taught that Christ came to care for the brokenhearted? But does having to follow and submit break the ladies heart?
Am I a heartbreakeeeeerrrr
Dream makeeer
Love takeeeerrrr
Don’tcha mess around wit meeeeeee…
Wait. I was also taught that God doesn’t care about my “feelings”. He cares about me being CONFORMED into the IMAGE of His Son, and having His MIND. He said that such will bring perfect peace into my mind if it stays on Him and that as I reckon (or how I think), that’s really what I’m about.
So…does my leadership not bring the ladies peace in their mind?
Are there any good guys?
Are there any bad guys?
Is it just you and me and we just disagree?
Woo woo wooo
Ohhh ooh.
Whoa oh ooooohhhhhh
And lastly.
What does Marcellus Wallace LOOK like?
Seems to me that Ted tried.
Ted was
up
down
tryin’ to get the feelin’ again
all around
trying to get the feelin again
The one that
made HER shiver
made HER knees
start to quiver
Every time Ted walked in…
Us guys, we got no heart, huh? They are rocks cast into the sea..
Dalrock: The name of the author of the CBMW article is Heath Lambert (per footnote 4 of the article).
Lambert is right to allow a place for church discipline even in exceptional marital matters, per Matthew 18:15-20. The problem is that he’s made the exception way bigger than the Bible makes it. The husband is an authority over the wife just as the state is an authority over any individual Christian. And the Bible authorizes individual Christians to disobey the state ONLY when the state forbids something God commands or commands something God forbids. So: the apostles disobeyed the Jewish leaders’ command that they cease to preach in Jesus’ name; Daniel’s compatriots refused to worship Nebuchadnezzar’s statue; etc. Outside this narrowly delineated category, however, we do not have God’s permission to depart from the general command to obey state authorities, which He has placed over us. Of course, this leaves the government free to trample all over our “gray areas.” The government doesn’t have to validate our feelings, it doesn’t have to be nice, it doesn’t even have to follow its own rules (in the U.S., our Constitution); once we’ve exhausted the appeal avenues the government itself provides, we’re required to submit to the government’s ultimate conclusion, even if it’s a clear abuse of the Constitution and/or takes our property or otherwise invades our right, unless we can point to a clear prohibition/command in the Bible that we would be violating if we obeyed the state.
The parallel to the husband/wife relationship is clear. There’s only one exception to the submission command, only one trump card, and that is God Himself. But if He hasn’t explicitly required the opposite of what the husband has decided, submission is what He requires. Hurt feelings, stupidity, selfishness, or whatever — even the pastor’s belief that the husband’s course is unwise, unloving, etc. — none of that excuses disobedience. Lest this sound much stronger than what the Bible actually requires, check the context of the I Peter 3:1 submission command that has been referenced several times above: “Wives, in the same way submit yourselves to your own husbands.” “In the same way” as what? In the same way as whatever Peter said just before 3:1. And what he said just before 3:1 is in 2:11-25 — (1) For everyone: “Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake to every human authority” (hence the parallel I elaborated above); (2) Slaves: “Slaves, in reverent fear of God submit yourselves to your masters, not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are harsh.” Note, again, that the niceness, gentleness, or lovingness of the master doesn’t matter. (3) Christ: “To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. . . . When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly.” Our protection from stupid or mean authorities isn’t disobedience of those authorities — it’s God, who ultimately judges justly and to whom we are to entrust ourselves. And THEN, (4) Wives: “Wives, IN THE SAME WAY SUBMIT yourselves to your own husbands.” Peter even draws the same parallel to unbelieving or stupid husbands as he did to mean slave masters and those who physically abused and then killed Christ: “[S]o that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, when they see the purity and reverence of your lives . . . [and] the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight. For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to adorn themselves. They submitted themselves to their own husbands, like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham [who, to protect himself, made her falsely claim to be his sister rather than his wife, not once but twice, among many other bad calls] and called him her lord. You are her daughters if you DO WHAT IS RIGHT AND DO NOT GIVE WAY TO FEAR.” That last phrase diagnoses the root of every wife’s failure/refusal to submit — she fears that God won’t take care of her when (she thinks) her husband is wrong, so she has to take care of herself by not submitting to him and instead doing what she thinks should be done.
Lambert didn’t consider any of this, with the emasculating results many others have highlighted above.
RichardP @ 4:04 am:
“by creating a help for the man, God created an expectation that the man would actually make use of the help.”
This is THE most frustrating bit of the modern perception of marriage, the idea that a man takes on endless, unspecified obligations to his wife and society when getting hitched. Isn’t it enough that he loves her as much as himself? Must he have every neighbor constantly checking to make sure he’s sufficiently buried in duties and expectations that his life is a guaranteed misery? Can God not be trusted to hold him accountable?
Society has set the price of sex at either lifetime slavery or Godless fornication. The stupidity of this policy cannot be over-emphasized. If a man is crazy enough to make a marriage commitment today then the least we Christians can do is not add to his burden!
The Modern Evangelical Pastor opened his sermon:
“Following up on our sermon last week, which covered the Old Testament Book of Cady-Stanton, today we will turn to the New Testament. Beginning with the Letter of St. Friedan to the Church in New York…
And so you see men, Christ commands you to obey your wife’s feeeelings in all things.
Next Week we will cover St. Oprah’s Sermon to the Chicagoans. Gird you loins ladies.
Now turning to Church Business, the Men’s Auxiliary of the Women’s Leadership Council is selling thigh high red boots and whips. Gentleman, they make an excellent Christmas gift for your Christian Femdom Wife, and will help ensure you comply with her headship. The proceeds will go to the project to emasculate your sons in accordance with scripture.
Let’s all give thanks that we attend a Bible Believing Church. Amen”
Applying my comment above, Lambert’s response as pastor when Ted’s wife came to him should have been to read her both 1 Peter 2 and 3 and then to tell her: “Ted isn’t commanding you to break God’s law or prohibiting you from keeping God’s law. Your responsibility is to submit AND to do so with purity, reverence, gentleness, and a quiet spirit, while acknowledging him as your (human) lord. If you do that, don’t be surprised if (a) it turns out later that you see in retrospect that his decision was right and (b) your genuine submission in this matter (and any others) results in the ‘listening to me’ that you think was absent this time. But if you don’t do what I’m telling you, YOU will be the one in line for church discipline.”
@ Rollo Tomassi
“For the more Alpha Christian husbands I know (which is a precious few) this isn’t even a topic discussed with their wives – it’s just a given that he’ll make the major decisions for her and the family.”
This is gold. I know a married Christian Alpha and it is the same with his wife.
@Rollo
This isn’t right, and it is the same error Katharine and Kevin make above. By this argument, if the husband is doing his part submission will be easy. This is a lie*. There are hopefully things a husband can do to make it easier, but the temptation to rebel is very strong. As LeeLee writes upthread, submitting to a husband can feel terribly wrong. It goes against not only everything society is telling her (including Christians), but it is something the Bible tells us she will struggle with anyway. Feminists tell her she has to forever be on her guard of becoming a “doormat”. The CBMW tells her the same, using the same wording even, and the CBMW is the group supposedly fighting for biblical gender roles. She wants to throw a tantrum, and the complementarians tell her this is what submission looks like, and that wives throwing tantrums instead of submitting are being godly.
It isn’t fair to take the credit away from submissive wives and give it to their husbands.
*This lie in turn is used to sell the much more pernicious lie, that husbands who don’t do X (follow Oprah if you are Kevin and Katharine, use Game for others) as a husband you are sinning. This is subtle, but there is a profound difference between saying a man is sinning if his wife doesn’t feel like he is listening, and suggesting that he listens to his wife (without abdicating headship). But either way the truth is we don’t need Oprah, nor would we need Game, if we simply quit rebelling against biblical roles in marriage.
“AnonS,
What’s her relationship like with her dad?”
It seemed fine from the outside, but now that I think about it he is probably a beta (but outspoken). He is Republican commentary writer but he shared a story where his daughter had anxiety as a kid during the wedding. They had a hiking trip where the weather went bad and she got panicked and said “Daddy brought us all out here to die!”, they told it as a funny kid story.
She has bought a puppy out of the back of a pick up truck; had multiple dogs going up (they were constantly over excited when I visited years ago). They have been married ~4 years and they have a son.
She recently disabled her Facebook and didn’t give a reason, but now I know its probably this separation. I guess its better than the alternative.
@Dalrock
” But either way the truth is we don’t need Oprah, nor would we need Game, if we simply quit rebelling against biblical roles in marriage.”
And this is what I’m told is blue-pill self-defeating idealism, brother.
If you can’t stop women, EVER, from rebelling, you can either Game her, beat it out of her, or go MGTOW and call the whole damn thing off.
But to expect women to actually “woman up” and do what God says to do….??
I mean, you already know, Doc.
If we really love God then we’ll want to follow Him, and we’ll desire to please Him and obey Him. It may still be a struggle, but the desire and love is there. Jesus says that those who love Him, obey His word. So… if we love our husbands, then no, it’s not hard to submit and obey them.
The first five words of your first sentence cut to the heart of the matter. I would wager that very few people who claim to be Christian today ever honestly, humbly, and seriously contemplate the question of whether they really, truly love God and truly place their complete trust in Him and His word – or if, when the rubber hits the road, they really believe in Him at all. Recognition of our fallen, sinful nature aside, there are simply too many commandments and rules that God has set forth for us that most of us just don’t like and that we will go to outrageous lengths to ignore, rationalize as not pertinent, or pretend to obey while clearly not doing so with contrite and cheerful hearts. If we were honest with ourselves (God of course isn’t fooled for a microsecond), we would admit that we are in open rebellion, like the defiant teenager who screams at Mom and Dad “I ain’t gonna play by your damned rules anymore! I’m leaving home and am gonna live my way!” If rebellious women were truly honest, they would come right out and admit what’s how they really feel, usually some variation of 1) “those rules aren’t God’s, they’re man’s, and I’m not going to pay any attention to them!”, 2) “God is a misogynist monster and I’m done with him!” or the ultimate 3) “I don’t really believe in this ‘God’ anyway.”
That may be part of why mature women are supposed to instruct younger wives to love their husbands, like what RichardP brought up (amazing comment!).
As I never tire of pointing out, such women (“Titus 2 women”) are so rare in the western world today as to be for all practical purposes an extinct breed (a common pushback among older Christian women of the modern West in response to the instruction in Titus 2 is some variation of the ever-popular “that was the First Century, we’re living in the 21st”). If you know such a woman (or are considered one yourself), pray that God grants her a long life and a fruitful mission, for she is needed more than ever in these, the end times. Frankly, I’m not optimist that she’ll make a resurgence.
When submission is preached, the wife is told that she is not really submitting to her husband, but to Jesus Christ, so that the obligation is to Jesus (as to the Lord) and not her husband. This provides a loophole that allows her to sidestep her husband when he does not fulfill what her personal, private relationship Jesus tells her, study bible in tow, what her marriage should be.
What is missing is the concept that the husband’s authority is itself given by Jesus so that a wife rebelling against her husband is also rebelling against Jesus. Submisson to the Lord is not separate from submission to the husband.
It will continue to be a struggle for a woman who was brought up in this society to submit to a man, and for very obvious reasons.
Right from the cradle she’s been told she is smarter, better, and more desirable than boys. She is constantly given a pass for crappy behaviors and praised for every trivial achievement. She is the typical “Daddy’s princess”. The church, the media, the government and virtually every institution in existence reinforce this pathetic image of hers.
As she slowly grows into manhood she begins to realize how much power she holds over men who would do anything to win her heart. She held all the power in her romantic relationships, and virtually all the men she came across would do her bidding without so much as ask what’s in it for them.
THEN, she gets married……and she is expected to love, honor and obey the man she’s been told is inferior to her, is less desirable than her, and is not as smart as her.
Hehe, you might as well ask her to cut off her head.
@Anonymous Reader
“What would that “stepping up” look like in a church?”
The same it would look anywhere else: very simple attitude and activity changes. Resist being passive. Start being decisive. Stop being controlled by the emotions of their wives. This would be the first step for men to begin to be what God called them to be.
Dave
As she slowly grows into manhood…
Thread winner. Even if it’s accidental, a typo, Freudian slip, whatever…still thread winner.
The ultimate answer to this rebellion, I believe lies here –
http://www.feministcurrent.com/2016/01/07/its-time-to-consider-a-curfew-for-men/
@Anonymous Reader
“What would that “stepping up” look like in a church?”
The same it would look anywhere else: very simple attitude and activity changes. Resist being passive. Start being decisive. Stop being controlled by the emotions of their wives. This would be the first step for men to begin to be what God called them to be.
Please flesh that out. Use any example you want, but I’m asking you to think this through in real terms. Put some details on it.
For example, a preacher gets up on his hind legs and drones on about Christian marriage consisting of “mutual submission” to a church filled with nodding mothers and nodding-off fathers, what does your man do? How does he “step up” in this case?
Or a man and his wife are in a Bible study group where a married couple are teaching about Christian marriage, and the woman begins holding forth about “mah FEELings” like the woman at the top of the thread, with her husband nodding along. What does your man do? How does he “step up”?
Or a man’s wife is in an all-female Bible study group and she brings home a “study guide” that is one of Beth Moore’s books. What does he do? How does he step up?
I don’t know how long you’ve been reading here or in the androsphere, but this isn’t a new idea. Details matter. Because you’re asking a man to pick fight, possibly with an entire church and his wife, all at the same time. How should he go about doing that in a prudent manner?
This isn’t right, and it is the same error Katharine and Kevin make above. By this argument, if the husband is doing his part submission will be easy. This is a lie*.
Precisely, Dalrock.
It all goes back to Genesis 3 — women tend towards rebellion by nature and men, by nature, tend to give in to women’s rebellion because they love women too much, even at the expense of obeying God. That’s been going on since pre-lapsarian times, per Genesis 3, and it’s what’s going on today.
Applying my comment above, Lambert’s response as pastor when Ted’s wife came to him should have been to read her both 1 Peter 2 and 3 and then to tell her: “Ted isn’t commanding you to break God’s law or prohibiting you from keeping God’s law. Your responsibility is to submit AND to do so with purity, reverence, gentleness, and a quiet spirit, while acknowledging him as your (human) lord.
Exactly. Then he should have referred her to an older, righteous woman in the church to “listen” to her, so her feelings would be assuaged.
Rollo, which alpha are we talking about?
pua alpha?
situational alpha?
or
classic alpha?
A woman may find it easier to submit to a strong man, but the strength is not the factor that matters. It is the ACT of submission by the female that frees her and her love. Women’s energy, by and far is inward gazing. If they can look at their husband, and within their freewill, completely submit to him, they find the love of God and a Spirit that fills them with gratitude. Her submission is her strength.
A strong husband may allow his wife to submit more easily, but her submittal may not be as deep as a woman who has agreed to be the wife of a normal man. A wife of this man will have to far deeper to find her acceptance of her submittal, so more then likely that decision will be far stronger then the easy-peasy submittal of the so called alpha wife.
The poor person who gives her last penny to charity is far greater in God’s eyes then the billionaire who gives almost all of his wealth away.
The ultimate answer to this rebellion, I believe lies here –
Heh. She strikes me as a crank — most feminists would obviously not agree with her, because her branch (pretty much “sex negative”) lost that fight in the 1990s.
Thought experiment, then I have to go to a meeting.
A married man and woman are in a truck driving on a multi hour trip. The weather is poor and getting worse – snow, sleet, road starts to ice up. He pulls off the road, checks weather forecasts, road conditions, looks over the vehicle, and then decides that pressing on out from under the weather to the destination is better than stopping. They drive on.
The road gets icier. Night falls. Semi trucks throw slush up on the windshield sometimes. The striping on the road vanishes under fresh snow. He’s in control of the vehicle at all times, feeling the road and watching all around. She’s fearful of a possible accident and worried.
Question: should he focus all of his concentration on driving that truck through the bad weather, or should he instead take part of his attention and focus it on her fears and other feelings? Should she talk his ear off about her fears and feelings, or should she keep silent, allowing him to focus on driving?
Yes, it’s an analogy. Sometimes they are useful.
NS, don’t know if you read the other McCain, but he posits that one of the feminist end plays is to have all women become lesbian.
Looking how the campus rape fad is growing, and reading a lot of his links, there seems to be a strong group among these modern, young feminists who are completely brainwashed into believing this kind of tripe.
My question is, who are going to round all us men up?
Maybe eunuchs will be making a come back?
Um AR, you do realize that it will be her driving right?
C’mon man this is the 21st century!
How does submission to spiritual authorities, like Hebrews 13:17, fit in with submission in marriage? Since the wife is supposed to submit to the husband, and the husband to Christ, is that the extent that the husband needs to answer to? I am just wondering if a man is to receive teaching and correction about his marriage from those he submits to in the church. Let’s say a man is treating his wife poorly in fits of anger and rage. Do his pastor or elders have the authority to rebuke him?
Let’s say a man is treating his wife poorly in fits of anger and rage. Do his pastor or elders have the authority to rebuke him?
Sure. But this isn’t hard.
RC Sproul Jr covered this in a message, but it’s so frighteningly simple that it was almost a waste of time.
Sin= Man gets disciplined by Elders. Wife submits.
Not sin= Man does his best to obey God. Wife submits.
Dalrock, its not just that if the husband is doing his part that submission will be easy – I think Rollo may be right about the fact that the more a woman admires and respects her husband, the more she will DESIRE to submit to him by default. That doesn’t mean it’s not a struggle, but that it will be easier than a woman who’s married to a beta who defers to her wishes and what she wants to do all the time and has no game plan for their decisions. Many Christian men grow up like that, constantly deferring to their wives what to do about this or that, and saying they don’t care that they want her to decide (and they really do!). These men are self-defeating because they’ve never learned how to be truly masculine leaders in their own homes… I’ve actually seen one say that he didn’t want to be a leader – he just wanted to be a partner with his wife. That’s their mentality, so yes, it would be harder for a woman married to a man that admits he doesn’t want to lead, to follow him. There MUST be one leader in a marriage… I’m sure you can’t deny that. So if that poor man is already telling her he doesn’t want to lead, why would you think it would somehow not be harder for her to fill his God-given role and lead herself?
If a wife genuinely loves her husband and is attracted to him then yes, it is easier to want to please him and obey him – it’s almost the same as it is with being a Christian. Being a Christian is HARD, it’s a constant struggle at times to will against one’s own nature to obey and follow God. BUT if we love God and desire to please Him, then it will be easier over time to submit to His will for us and have a peace about it even when it brings suffering. Just some thoughts!! 🙂
@David J
Thank you. I had missed that entirely. I have added a note to the OP.
@Rollo:
Dalrock pointed out one observation error you made, but there’s another. The true “Christian Alpha” is just that… an Alpha Male. He got his choice of the generally the best Women available. My run of the stats suggest around 15% of American Women are actually still worth the risk of marriage and some will actually do the work. When you get to choose the “best” and that “best” is scared of losing you (because she knows she could easily & rapidly be replaced), it puts the Woman’s Heart in a different frame. Still isn’t a Godly one, but a different frame none the less.
So there’s a mutual-exclusivity issue when looking at the rare examples. Always be wary of studying Unicorns, as it’s hard to figure out where they came from.
@Dragonfly:
Being a Christian should be less of a struggle each year. That’s known as Spiritual Growth. But it requires being honest and repentant. That’s what Men and, especially, Women hate to do. It requires taking Responsibility for your actions.
@Anonymous Reader:
…”Or a man and his wife are in a Bible study group where a married couple are teaching about Christian marriage, and the woman begins holding forth about “mah FEELings” like the woman at the top of the thread, with her husband nodding along. What does your man do? How does he “step up”?”
Great question. When putting up my vague comments, I was doing so with a few of my fellow churchgoers in mind; some who bug out on our monthly men’s discussion group because their “wife wants him to stay home.” That guy is allowing the tail to wag the dog and simply beginning to take a stand and inform his wife that he’s made a commitment and that this group is important to him is just the first step in regaining headship and being less controlled by her desires. It’s just a start and maybe that does lead to a fight. But oh well…
I love your example of the couple’s study group. Again, sitting there silent while that discussion is taking place is too passive. Our man (if he’s in the know) should feel emboldened to speak out during the discussion about un-biblical concepts. I’d bet there are others just like him who are just waiting for someone to say what they’re thinking. Or he can begin his own study group, and so lead and guide the discussion in ways that are biblical, and counter to the new-age feminism. Doing is so much better than wishing things were different. If our man starts his own group, you can then have half a dozen other men (and potentially their children) with an example of someone who leads, who challenges, who encourages.
I’m not saying this solves the issue of a rebellious or headstrong wife, but men are to be leaders and many aren’t doing much to stand against the onslaught. They’re being steam-rolled and simply saying something, doing something, getting into the fight is more than they’ve ever done. But maybe those guys aren’t reading here, I don’t know…
https://warriorsandadventurers.wordpress.com/2016/01/13/leadership-an-invitation-to-inspire/
@Freekeri
“Decisions need to be made, sometimes quickly.”
As I specified, I don’t live in a war zone or the Zombie apocalypse. I has no important non-trivial decisions that need to be made “quickly”. Or they happen so rarely they are an edge case which does not require a coherent approach.
“you meant servant-leader”
I know that is a loaded term here, so I will not go into the numerous ways Christ said, and demonstrated that who is greatest among you shall be your servant. If you are secure in who you are and your role, being a servant to those you love is easy and rewarding. If you live in fear of your authority being lost, sure – don’t be a servant leader. Christ was confident He would still be the Christ if He washed some feet. I am confident I will still be the head of my home if I serve my wife.
@Dalrock
I think you are reading your own fears (or fears of trolls) into my comments. I use the word easy, but the thrust is clearly we can make it easier.
Paul gives instructions to husbands and wives. Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church. Your line of thinking would mean that the wife can do nothing to make her easier to love, because in man’s essence there is no desire to love and only to hate and be selfish. That’s silly – as silly as thinking that within women their is only rebellion. Its awfully black and white thinking. Only Christ is alone on his journey, my wife and I can both help each other to flee sin. Both husbands and wives can do things to make it easier on their spouses to follow those commandments. We are all fallen creatures open to temptation. If washing women in the word does not make it easier for them, or winning a husband over without a word does not make it easier, what is the point? I think you are reacting and our positions are much closer than appear on these posts.
This is more obvious if we point out how easy it would be to make it harder for men to love their wives or for wives to submit by the behavior of their spouse. A sexless complaining harpy is HARDER to love. A domineering shouting insensitive jerk is HARDER to obey. Of course we can influence our spouses just like we can influence our children and our neighbors. It takes nothing from them, because we are the agents of God and He has the glory.
Finally, emotions being a divine quality does not make a particular emotion in a particular situation divine or greater than the Spirit. I never said that, anymore than I would say because logic is a divine gift then every product of logic was inspired and always correct.
LookingGlass, I think that’s what I said here, “BUT if we love God and desire to please Him, then it will be easier over time to submit to His will for us and have a peace about it even when it brings suffering. ”
But as you mature in spiritual growth, I’ve also heard that it gets easier to see all our human flaws and imperfections – like Paul in Romans 7, whereas a younger Christian wouldn’t even notice half those same flaws because they often aren’t as aware (or convicted really) that they even ARE flaws. So the more godly one becomes, the more aware they are how much of a struggle it is, the more easily one becomes convicted of even the tiniest departure from what God wants from us.
As you obtain spiritual growth, you should find it easier to make spiritual choices, but also find it more glaringly obvious why you need Christ for your sins you still have.
In Koln it is only one subset of men who assault unchaperoned women. The woman (in De Nihilist’s linked article commented on by Novaseeker) thus makes a category mistake but I cannot say whether that is caused by stupidity or misandry.
I was thus, by chance, listening to a recording of an opera you have surely never seen but which I saw on its revival at Covent Garden in 1979 and composed to his own libretto by Michael Tippett. What jumped out at me listening again to The Ice Break – the scene is an airport – a group of white people welcome what are effectively refugees and set to a dreary protestant-style chorale and to the words ‘we meet with cordial greeting’ whereas in the next short scene the black part of the chorus greet each other as one might expect (but i won’t give the exact words used) and to much more aggressive music. What struck me was that nearly forty years ago Tippett who is much criticised for his naive and pretentious libretti gets absolutely spot on the scenes in Europe towards the end of last year.
Yet this woman wants to curfew all men.
No, you won’t be a leader, you will be and are a servant. That’s why it is a loaded term because it explains exactly what the modern day Church thinks is leadership and why men are running away from Church, marriage and women. Fewer men are wanting to take on your role. It’s risky and stupid.
We get it though, only men who are confident and perfect need apply, just beware that anytime you’re not perfect or Christlike, your wife will be off to the pastor, bishop or her own inner Holy Spirit to overrule you. You can continue in your servant leader role, I don’t want it.
Opus, you need to read the comments, in them she makes clear she knows that the attacks were committed by migrants but still says Western ‘rape culture’ and Western men are to blame. I think that article is trolling quite frankly. I would love to see them try though. The quicker feminists show their hands and play their stupid games, the better.
What a stroke of luck. The fact6 that she made the choice to do that means it was a stroke of luck for the guy. Being Christian doesn’t mean you are blue pill. Maybe the Christian husband will sleep on the roof while honey is getting her head chopped off after her gang man style love making session on the front.
“In fact, Ted had not listened to his wife. He did not shepherd her well.” Translation: He didn’t submit to her. And I used to think CBMW was a good pushback against feminism. What a bizarro world.
@feministhater
Attempting to deal with a woman of such dishonesty or stupidity is like playing chess with a pigeon: the pigeon knocks the pieces over, craps all over the board and then struts about as if it has won. As it happens she might get her way but as an increasing number of men are voluntarily going MgTow, which is a form of sexual apartheid, men are voluntarily curfewing themselves anyway.
It is women who want to flood Europe with military-aged men from the middle-east and it is these same women who will ultimately have to be chaperoned. Were the refugees to be peak SMV females from – say – the former Soviet Republics there would be a demand to keep the said females out followed by massive slut-walking (in an effort to raise the native-females sagging SMV).
I have already (come to think of it) had my first brush this year with an enititled feminazi and her gratuitous rudeness. I ignored her by walking away and not looking back (in anger or otherwise). Sadly, every day the newspapers are full of headline stories about the poor wimminz – today’s Times headlines that women pay more for the same item on the high street. Who can doubt it, when my haircut costs £10,00 including tip and a woman will pay five or ten times as much, and it is a woman who was responsible for yesterday’s debate to keep Mr Trump out of Great Britain, and another woman who wants to remove Cecil Rhodes statue from the Oxford College where she studies courtesy of his largesse. You can always rely on women to chew the hand held out to them or to show no future time orientation.
Reluctant Neo
The push back against feminism is not going to come from the Christian church. We need to get that out of our heads. It is sweat of the brow time now. Culture is a short cut for day to day living.
My wife is an elementary school teacher that is big on math. I used a math analogy for culture in that culture is a multiplication sign. Ex. 3+3+3+3+3+3+3=21 that is red pill conscious thought culture will short cut it as 3 x 7 =21. You don’t even have to know 3 added 7 times it just is the answer. that is blue pill and once blue pill 3 x 7 can be anything the “ism” wants. Today’s
“ism” Racism, feminism, cuckservative, socialism what ever. Truth is red pill, God is a good guide for that. Either way we’re going to have add the numbers up every time and don’t rely on some cultural institution, political bent or for a church to do it for you.
The push back is us. The manosphere and all that it encompasses. The only church that I know of trying to bring truth to reality is this one here Dalrock is running. So stay on your A-game fellas lots of men need the truth in their lives. Teach them how to add and make a culture founded on truth to give them peace and confidence to thrive. Give up the scripture hair splitting and build a working culture founded on truth. Think of all of those historical characters and authors of the past we recommend to each other. Well those men are us now.
@ Reluctant.
Yeah, I thought the same thing, too, at one point. Until I got schooled a bit here recently.
@ Dr. Torch
Now when I see it in churches I get disgusted, and my sons often hear my contempt for pudgy falsetto worship leaders who tell me I need to go to their retreat to learn what it means to be a man.
+1. After repenting to my elder about taking him to task about his thoughts on men, he mentioned that there is often a coffee and such gathering of the men at his house every so often. I wouldn’t be caught dead there.
I’ve been thinking about this whole “Porn-addiction” thing that keeps getting held over the heads of men in church. Maybe a thought of “A single man viewing porn is the sin of one. A married man viewing porn is the sin of two people: him and his wife for not taking care of his needs” might make some thoughts get spun around in a person’s head or two.
Dave says: THEN, she gets married……and she is expected to love, honor and obey the man she’s been told is inferior to her, is less desirable than her, and is not as smart as her.
I was listening to the “Gary and Shannon Show” on KFI-AM in Los Angeles. Gary’s wife phoned in. After they briefly talked, Shannon joked, “I know who wears the pants in THIS family!”
Then all three “joked” about how Gary’s wife is the boss of Gary, that she’s the smarter one.
It’s so commonplace to assert that the wife is one’s boss, that she’s smarter than the hapless hubby. If the conversation were flipped, and Gary asserted, seriously, that he was the head of the marriage, there would have been gasps. He would have been perceived as a male chauvanist tyrant, a sexist beast.
No such thing as a christian alpha, period!
Alphas are convicts, criminals, and have fathered children and possibly married once, twice or more, but divorced and alone. An alpha doesn’t give an inch, centimeter, or millimeter. He is constantly doing only as he pleases or sees fit. Most live alone in a basement apartment (just stereo typing), make enough money to get buy etc.
Betas are respectable in society, hold down jobs, respectable with neighbors, listen to men as well as are listened to by other men, attend church (or not).
I know that goes against all you “alpha” christian guys, but God is our Alpha and our Omega. Alpha boys THINK they are god.
Anyone that has to game his wife is actually doing exactly what she wants. You playing tarzan to her jane. That is not being the tough, independent alpha. It’s being submissive to her hypergamy.
@Anonymous Reader
Please flesh that out. Use any example you want, but I’m asking you to think this through in real terms. Put some details on it.
For example, a preacher gets up on his hind legs and drones on about Christian marriage consisting of “mutual submission” to a church filled with nodding mothers and nodding-off fathers, what does your man do? How does he “step up” in this case?
It looks like this sermon by my former professor.
I’ve been thinking about this whole “Porn-addiction” thing that keeps getting held over the heads of men in church.
Well, it’s done because its easy to do. Everyone agrees looking at porn is a sin, and it’s also mostly a male sin (although that’s changing very quickly among the younger set — much more than is openly discussed). The issue is that it’s being viewed as a “divorceable sin” as if the man had actually had sex with another woman physically. The “adultery of the heart” concept is being rolled out for the first time in the history of the Church as a justification for divorce — in no time in previous history was the sin of a husband looking at another woman with lust considered grounds for divorce, biblical or otherwise. It’s nonsense, just like servant leadership is nonsense. It’s twisting the entire approach to male/female relationships, and marriage in particular, to match 21st century sensibilities, which are largely feminized and lean heavily in favor of women (what Rollo calls the “Feminine Imperative” or “FI”). It’s that tendency that causes the Church to treat porn viewing as a divorceable sin, and water down the headship of husbands by turning it on its head, as if all Christ ever did was wash people’s feet. It’s simply twisting things to match the ambient mainstream perspectives as much as possible, out of fear that if they do not, they will alienate too many. It’s really that simple.
Nova,
Totally agree that it’s nonsense and it’s just another male-only shaming tactic. Most of the men installed as pastors still seem to think their daughters are the only Bride of Christ. They’ll beat men up for not being manly but their daughters are the ones wearing yoga/stretchie pants and a sweater to church on Sunday morning.
Look at Fireproof. Sure, his sin is watching porn but maybe her idolatry, adultery, usurpation and unsubmissiveness could be addressed at some point….? Maybe? Nah, who’re we kidding.
I’m really starting to get tired of this FI stuff in church.
Novaseeker: “Everyone agrees looking at porn is a sin, and it’s also mostly a male sin (although that’s changing very quickly …
No, it was never mostly a male sin. Not if one classifies romance novels as porn.
Romance novels ARE porn. I’ve never read one, but I’ve often heard about their contents. Haven’t we all? Rape fantasies, for the most part. Rape by an Alpha. Isn’t that the ubiquitous plot?
A woman pines for a Bad-Boy Alpha, who’s initially out of her reach, for whatever reason. But she knows they were meant to be. He eventually rapes her, realizes he loves only her, she is The One. Then she tames him into marriage.
The Taming of the Alpha Rapist. That’s the plot of all romance novels, no?
Incompetent leadership is wavering in a man’s resolve due to an irrational / rebellious woman
DeNihilist says:
January 19, 2016 at 2:19 pm
The ultimate answer to this rebellion, I believe lies here –
http://www.feministcurrent.com/2016/01/07/its-time-to-consider-a-curfew-for-men/
They’re delusional. They’re blaming the Muslim Rape Culture on white men. Women demanded the importation of Muslims, a woman, Merkle, ordered it as a matter of law. Now that the logical follow-on has occurred, Rape Culture, the feminist press blames the very White men who would protect women from these cretins. They blame restrictions on abortion, the porn industry, blah, blah, everything but their own desire for a multi-culti society. Now that the rape culture is upon the white feminist women via the New Year’s Eve festivities in Cologne, Paris, Berlin, London, they blame everyone except themselves and Muslims with no acknowledgment that it was Muslims.
Sorry it’s happening, but you know what? As a White man that has seen his religion denigrated by feminists, his military and police denigrated and weakened by feminists, seen his governments weakened and ruined by feminists, why the hell am I, as a Christian man, my interest ruined by feminists in my own country and society, be obligated or be inclined to protect these women? To Hell with them. They wanted rape culture, they got it. From the looks of things in Cologne on New Year’s Eve, the White men wandered off and left these women to the fate women invited onto themselves. The White-dominated police aren’t lifting a finger, either. Good. Serves them right. And if Christian women wish to go the way of feminism, to Hell with them too. I’m taking care of myself and my own. The rest of the society, especially feminist society, are on their own. I’m not lifting a finger on feminists’ behalf. Rot, be raped, whatever. Not my problem anymore.
No, it was never mostly a male sin. Not if one classifies romance novels as porn.
Sure, but I was talking about visual porn. I agree that 50SOG, or even many romance novels, are “female porn”.
They’ll beat men up for not being manly but their daughters are the ones wearing yoga/stretchie pants and a sweater to church on Sunday morning.
Exactly. The hypocrisy is never-ending, really.
http://www.feministcurrent.com/2016/01/07/its-time-to-consider-a-curfew-for-men/
Follow up on that site, Gents. Check out the sheer hatred of the only men that will protect them. And they blame US for the Dindu violence of New Year’s Eve in Cologne. A curfew for men. Great idea! Brilliant. The White men will observe it, leaving no men on the street to protect women from the Muslim-Raping Dindu on the streets that do not observe the curfew. Their self-destructive nature, their willingness to destroy themselves is breathtaking. And it was and is women inviting this upon themselves with the demand to import a real rape culture.
Women are just morons, right? Is that the jist? Have I got that right?
Their self-destructive nature, their willingness to destroy themselves is breathtaking. And it was and is women inviting this upon themselves with the demand to import a real rape culture.
Our only job is to withdraw from any involvement, and ensure that women outside of our immediately family (and even then, caveats and reciprocal standards apply) get no help from us.
Alphas are convicts, criminals, and have fathered children and possibly married once, twice or more, but divorced and alone. An alpha doesn’t give an inch, centimeter, or millimeter. He is constantly doing only as he pleases or sees fit. Most live alone in a basement apartment (just stereo typing), make enough money to get buy etc.
You have no idea what an Alpha is, or even the context of what’s being discussed. Go read some Rollo and get back to us. Or don’t.
Thank you PokeSalad
Betas are respectable in society, hold down jobs, respectable with neighbors,
Not by women. If you haven’t figured it out by now, the more useful to society and well-behaved a man is, the less women are attracted to him.
You should be embarrassed not to have figured this out by now.
Embarrassed not to have admitted it by now? Perhaps the signs haven’t shown themselves yet..
Reblogged this on MGTOW 2.0.
”If we love our wives like Christ loved the church we will do what we can righteously do to make our decisions palatable and our leadership easy to bear. ”
I am sure God does have a duty to righteously make his decisions palatable and leadership easy to bear. I wonder where in scripture there is that?
And I am sure that God is supposed to respect the feelings of his followers.
Likewise Christ is supposed to make his decisions palatable to the church right, right?
Why obey Christ when his decisions are unpalatable and disrespectful to our feelings whose leadership is hard to bear?
As a Catholic, I have to ask; is this really the way the “newer” American Protestant denominations choose to handle problems? A couple has an argument, the wife whines to the pastor, and then the pastor passes judgment on who is “sinning” and who is righteous? Who gave them the authority to make such arbitrary determinations about such every day events?
It’s just a very foreign concept to me. I know priests who will sit down and counsel atheist women through post-abortion grief without ever once bringing up the fact she committed a terrible sin (and an act that’s entirely against the Catholic philosophy on the sanctity of life) but something as mundane as job hours merits eternal punishment? At least the Catholics have a body of scholarship, on top of the Bible, to reference and priests are generally aware that their own opinion is only that. It sounds like these sorts of churches let pastors just say whatever. Why do people attend churches like that? How did a model like that get popularized?
The irony, of course, is that the woman who was convinced her husband was “in sin” because he forbade her to pursue ministry unfettered by family responsibilities and the ensuing chaos her absence was causing – this very same woman would feel entirely justified in demanding her husband cease and decist were the roles reversed. Indeed, she’d be right back in that same pastor’s office in tears or other hysterics, insisting her ministry-over-family husband was blatantly selfish and in gravest sin by “…abandoning the family [read:her] as he poured himself into (insert anything other than wife here) and thereby neglecting her feelings.” And the pastor would no doubt be in lock step with her, oblivious to the irony himself and all the while taking careful notes for his next blog post about the wonderful role of “helpmate” this woman was exemplifying.
Can anyone spell ” Cognitive Dissonance?”
@mrteebs:
“Willful Blindness” is properly the more accurate answer. You have to numb yourself to things that seem “off” in the Christian church. It’s a process and you’re always responsible for those types of actions.
It occurs to me that segregation of the sexes may indeed be the next thing – tragically the elite as much as androphobic females also seek to blame all men for the behaviour of the rapefugees. Last night I was reading (refreshing my memory really) about The Hanover Square Rooms, which was the main indeed only Concert Hall in London from the late eighteenth century. What jumped out at me – and it was said to be the best in Europe – was that there were red tickets for the men and black for the women; in other words the men sat together and likewise the women. The next time you see a Jane Austen Mini-Series and everyone is sitting together as we do now, be aware that that is historically mistaken. I also recall that the great Hector Berlioz was reprimanded when a student at the newly made Paris Conservatoire in the 1820s for entering the building by the women’s entrance – yes that’s right, the oppressed females were equally represented under their first Head of Conservatoire Cherubini some two hundred years ago. Even earlier in my life I vaguely recall in Public Houses, that the snug rooms were for females only, away form the raucous behaviour and poor language of the male dominated saloon bar.
These things go in cycles.
Observation:
A couple has an argument, the wife whines to the pastor, and then the pastor passes judgment on who is “sinning” and who is righteous?
Question:
Who gave them the authority to make such arbitrary determinations about such every day events?
Answer: The husband!
Until husbands learn to tell these misguided pastors to zip it up and keep it moving, they will continue to dabble into matters that shouldn’t ever concern them.
Looking at the number of times the word “sin” has been used in this thread and the number of men who obviously agree that certain things are sin when the Bible clearly does not identify as sin, it makes me wonder if men can even give a Biblical definition of what sin is any more.
It actually gets interesting because there’s Sin (for everyone) and sin (violations of the conscience on the individual level) and that seems to throw everybody for a loop. Romans 4:15 and 5:13 pretty much covers it in that Sin is any transgression of the Law. Romans 14:23 and James 4:17 cover the violations of conscience. However, that leaves specific prohibitions/commands that apply only to Christians, such as the prohibition in 1st Cor. 6 on joining the members of Christ to a whore. Taking it a bit further, Ephesians 5:18 is a command not to be filled with wine but rather to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
It seems to me that when it comes to the idea that the church is to exercise discipline and judge an individual, (Matthew 18:15-17) the church should notice that the passage says it only applies when the brother is in sin. That passage DOES NOT give the church the authority to step into someone’s marriage to judge the husband just because some women and a few blue-balled white knights are offended and butthurt by the husband’s behavior. In the example given in 1st Corinthians 5, the man Paul judged had committed a death-penalty offense (Leviticus 20:11, he had his father’s wife, not his mother).
Yet, today, we have crazy so-called Christian women claiming that looking at porn is lust and thus it must be adultery, citing Matthew 5:28. The huge problem with that is Christians don’t realize that adultery requires a married woman. No married woman, no adultery. The only way a man can ‘look on a woman to lust for her’ is if she is a married woman because that’s the only way adultery could be committed. That brings up the question of what lust is. I go with the definition of lust as a sexual desire for someone that cannot be legitimately satisfied because doing so would be sexual immorality, a violation of the Law.
But, men have been trained to think like women and instead of going with what the text of Scripture actually says, they go with what their feelings tell them the text is saying. You know, just like a woman. Jesus didn’t make that mistake in Matthew 19, because when asked what the grounds for divorce were He cited Genesis 2:24, which was the grant of authority given to the man to initiate marriage. He said “What therefore God has joined together let no man separate.” When the Pharisees brought up the Law of Moses, Jesus said “but from the beginning it was not this way.” In both answers, Jesus was referring to Genesis 2:24. Why did He cite that passage?
Because the grant of authority given to the man in Genesis 2:24 to initiate marriage did not contain a corresponding grant of authority to terminate the marriage. Moses stuck that in there at Deuteronomy 24:1-3 and so it became part of God’s Law, but as Jesus said, “from the beginning it was not that way.” Jesus was making a point, not about what God said, but about the importance of what God did not say.
Christians run around today with a theology concerning marriage that was put in place by the Catholic church that still works perfectly, as intended, which was to drive a wedge between husband and wife and insert the church in the middle in order to usurp the authority of the husband and empower the wife against him.
In the very same breath, modern Christians claim they are not “under the Law” and then claim they are under the Law when it comes to allowing divorce because the prohibition on divorce specifically given to married Christians in 1st Cor. 7:10-11 by Jesus doesn’t apply to Christians… you know, because Jesus interpreted the Law on divorce for the Pharisees in Matthew 19.
It’s chick logic for Christian men that results in not just an indifference to sin, but an ignorance of what sin is.
What LG describes as willful blindness is all around us in the church and it goes a lot further than just the feminism crap. It’s a willful blindness to what Scripture actually says and DOES NOT SAY about marriage, divorce and family relations that nobody wants to touch with a 10 foot pole. That’s because nobody wants to be like Jesus and when asked about marriage to go back to the beginning.
When I did it I was amazed because I realized that just about everything I’d ever been taught about marriage was wrong. If one looks at Exodus 22:16-17 and the corresponding passages, it says that taking a woman’s virginity is the act of marrying her. That means the woman who is:
Not a virgin and her father did not specifically annul the marriage,
Not a virgin because she was forced to have sex but not discovered
Not a widow with an N=1
Not a legitimately divorced woman with an N=1
Is MARRIED to the guy that got her virginity if he is still living and ANY other guy she’s having sex with is the guy she’s (currently) committing adultery with. Whoops! That makes Mark Driscoll an adulterer who “married” some other guy’s wife.
I challenge any serious student of the Bible to study (not just glance at) Exodus 22:16-17 and compare it to Deuteronomy 22:13-21 and 28-29. Then take a look at Numbers 30 and to round it all out take a look at Judges 21. Keep in mind one of the lessons Jesus was teaching in Matthew 19 (we can’t assume something that isn’t in the text) and after studying on Exodus 22:16-17 for a bit, ask yourself this question:
“Why am I trying so hard prove Toad is wrong about this? Is it because if he’s right just about every Christian man I know is guilty of committing adultery?”
Yes. The answer is if I’m right, feminism in the church isn’t the big problem, the elephant in the room is the fact that (with very few exceptions) any married couple in your church in which the wife has an N > 1 is not married to each other and that includes you. It’s called adultery. Ask yourself, did you “marry” a virgin? If not, was she actually eligible to marry? Probably not. Actually, the odds that any non-virgin of today is not married are extremely slim given the exceptions in Exodus 22:16-17 and Deuteronomy 22:28-29. Why is the woman in Deuteronomy 22:13-21 to be stoned to death if she wasn’t a virgin? What crime did she commit that has the death penalty? Adultery. She not only committed adultery, she caused her so-called husband to commit adultery. Funny how the word that’s translated as “harlot” in that passage is also defined as “adultery.”
It’s a deep hole, guys. I recommend everyone stop digging and study Ezra 9-10 and 2nd Kings 22-23 for examples of how to repent of institutionalized sin. It’s obvious the traditional approach of telling girls “premarital sex is a sin” isn’t working and maybe we ought to tell them the truth: “When you give a guy your virginity it isn’t a sin but it’s not “just” sex, it’s the consummation of your marriage to him. As far as God is concerned, you will be married to the guy you give your virginity to and if you have sex with any other guy that will be the sin of adultery. Unless, of course, your father goes ballistic when he hears about it and annuls your marriage.”
I suppose it depends on how one wants to look at it, but the 113 guys listed by name in Ezra 10 didn’t get their names there because they married foreign women in violation of God’s command not to, they got listed because they chose to honor God, confess their sin and repent of their sin by putting their foreign wives away. For at least some of them that must have really hurt.
The only question is how one repents of adultery. I suppose the first step is to recognize that one is actually committing adultery…
An alpha would not post on this or any blog. He wouldnt write blogs. He doesnt care about you or anyone else. You prove my point. You think he follows twitter or facebook? Thats laughable. If you want to talk about getting laid? Look at the high school dweeb who became a rock star or wealthy doctor. They started getting laid. That doesnt mean theyre alpha.
Yes betas are cuckholds to their hypergamous wives. In the christian setting he has abdicated is role of leader because he has been controlled by the rebellious wife who is sinning and should be called out for it. I agree.
I have read all of Rollos work. He himself will admit to being beta early in his marriage to the extent he didnt have sex as much as he wanted because of rejection. He understands rebellion and hypergamy, but the dichotomy of pure alpha/beta is irrational.
Think of the most “alpha” males in society. Who are they? I am a doctor. I have treated thousands of people. I have a few close friends who were in spec ops. Out of all of the spec ops guys only one is married to his first wife. We are talking 2 delta force guys, 2 seals, 4 ranger/g berets. All the patients i have treated who are millionaires are on multiple marriages. Ex pro sports a couple of real estate Trump type guys. Why did their wives leave them if they were alpha, and let me tell you, most of these guys are tougj as nails mentally and emotionally or they wouldnt have got to their levels.
The betas who remained married may have alpha characteristics…. True, if they tempred their hypergamous wives who are awalt (i agree with that).
The alphas i know betaed up to the bar and crashed the party. They get laid by the 10/10 and then screw it up by cheating or being too beta like. I know a few men who are dweebs and have some pretty hot wives or gf. They are very beta with no game. Are the BB? Probably, but why isnt she divorcing him? Mayb she will. Maybe he isnt getting laid? Probably.
My point is i ve looked at this as much as anyone else and the reason your marriage has lasted is because you have found a balance of characteristics.
An alpha doesnt game. He is what he is. The beta may have some natural game, and might have learned and internalized a lot of game, but he still has to game. If you have to consciously put effort or had to internalize game just to keep or have sex with your wife, you are beta. On the other hand if simply have called your wife out on her hypergamous nature and made her confront it and succeeded in showing her biblical marriage and sex, that is alpha behavior.
Calling her on her rebellion is not alpha. That is what we should be doing to anyone who we need to rebuke for sinning. I would expect my dweeb neighbor to call out my sin and as a christian i humble myself and if its true sin i ask for forgiveness. Same with your wife. The problem is they are awalt and have a very very very hard time admitting to any type of sin nature that they have, i agree.
The FI and feminism need to be put down, theres no doubt. But it will get worse. You fall into the trap of lack of introspection when you think there is a clear line of distinction between a/b. I am not a neophite trying to swade you. Just like many of you i have a line of successes behing me that i can point and say i am an alpha, but my alpha gave his life for my sins. You will not swade me from that.
I agree with 99% of dalrock and most of you. The manosphere has changed my life and i am appreciative for all of you.
God bless you and keep you
… instead of going with what the text of Scripture actually says, they go with what their feelings tell them the text is saying.
Says the guy who has openly admitted to being polygamous, and who is therefore disqualified from church leadership.
AT, you should be listening, not teaching, when it comes to Scripture interpretation.
Artisanal Toad says:
January 20, 2016 at 6:48 am
Then according to this view isn’t every man who sleeps with a prostitute also committing adultery (unless the father annulled the “marriage”)?
AT – would adultery not also apply to every one who fornicates in our current society (except those involving female 1st timers)?
Artisanal Toad keeps peddling his damnable errors and strange doctrines. He writes as if Jesus never came, as if the OT has not been done away with, as if we are still under the law, and as if he was right.
Well, Jesus has come; the OT has been done away in Christ, and we are no longer under the law.
With the coming of Christ, the OT was fulfilled and became inapplicable to us who are living under Grace. But AT would ignore that fact and pretend that the OT still applies to us today, which is false.
What does it mean to be under a Law?
1. It means we are subject to the demands of the law.
2. It means we are subject to the sanctions of the law.
All laws have sanctions (i.e. punishments that are meted out when broken). When you take away the sanctions attached to any law, you turn that law into a piece of advice, or a sort of teaching material to use in teaching others. The OT in its entirety has been turned into just that: teaching materials. The Bible clearly stated this:
For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. Romans 15:4
Jesus demonstrated this by forgiving the sanctions of the OT law against adultery (John 8:1-11). Paul did the same by prescribing excommunication rather than death to an adulterous brother (1 Corinthians 5). If we were still under the OT law this would never have happened.
The NT Christians is dead to the law. As far as the OT law is concerned, the Christian does not exist. He has been freed from the demands of the law.
Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth?…..Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. Romans 7:1-4
This false teacher, Artisanal Toad, who would pretend that we are still under the law, and still subject to its sanctions, when in fact we are not, is preaching “another gospel” (Galatians 1:6), and those who preach another gospel are exposing themselves to a curse.
But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed! (Galatians 1:8-9)
Even during the time of the Apostles, there were false teachers who were trying to subject the people of God to the OT law. Those preachers were exposed and shamed. (Galatians 2: 4-6)
People of God should completely ignore Artisanal Toad. He is a false teacher peddling strange and damnable heresies.
With all this talk of Alpha Male Christians, we’re losing sight of the real problem. Alpha FEMALE Christians.
1. If having sex with a woman equals marriage, how would you define fornication?
2. How come a man who genuinely loved a virgin woman, had sex with her, passionately wanted to marry her and was ready pay any amount as bride price, still realized that, despite the sex and his own desires, the woman was still not his wife? How come the Bible described the unmarried sex as a “defilement” of the woman? Yes, read the story of Dinah in Genesis 34, and learn the truth.
3. How come Mary was called the wife of Joseph even “before they came together”, or had sex?
Artisanal Toad, by reason of his erroneous beliefs, ought to be excluded from the fellowship of God’s people. However, because we are no longer under the Law, he may stay and learn, but he is not permitted to peddle his errors.
@Dr. Jeff
You have helped me to navigate a a bit further through a maze I’ve constructed with contradictions I’ve gleaned from some of the expositions on a/b. I’m not quite adding “hear hear” but I liked your comment better then the blunt force of the clean lines some use to separate α and β.
Also, please lets not take another stab – AT- the sexual law problem again.
Alpha female will stab you in the pack everytime
every time
I’m not agreeing or disagreeing with AT or Dave at this time, but this is a good question in light of the “virginal sex = marriage” view:
How come Mary was called the wife of Joseph even “before they came together”, or had sex?
I want to add that I am not trying to be contentious with my comments in this. The “virginal sex = marriage” discussion has come up at the church I attend more than once before and I am genuinely interested in the thoughts of other believers on this subject.
Is there really such a thing as an alpha female?
Empath,
My one good friend that i hunt and shoot and have drinks with was a seal on team one out of coronado. He is still married 27 yrs. the first time i saw him i had to ask my daughter (3rd grade at time, now junior in college) whos dad was he was. He definitely had an air of dominance from 30 feet. He looks 6′, but he is only 5’5″. I have not once heard him swear. His wife is 8/10 still. He does what he wants up to a point, but also takes orders from his wife. He was a state champion in his sport in HS and said bud/s wasnt that hard (for him). Oh, and he is in IT and is a complete computer geek.
Donald trump: 3rd marriage. Either is wife wanted the divorce or he succumbed to a dominate woman who wanted him to divorce. If he was such an alpha, wifey one would have let him filander, and so would mistress. He is just an example. Brad pitt? Why the divorces? They succumb to either wifeys rules or their adultering partners. Why would an aloha divorce is he knew he was going to lose money, his house, his kids…. Are you saying that alpha is so stupid that he thinks the courts are going to award him custody and not make him pay out? No. ALL MEN KNOW THEY WILL GET TAKEN TO THE CLEANERS WHEN WIFEY DIVORCES. Or at the least he knows he will lose more than it is worth it to divorce. Only women are that stupid to not care about what will happen to their kids and the ripple effect. Most men can see down the line to what ultimately happens to their local society when they and their male peers are frivorced.
Find out how much someone like Trump ( only use him because recent spotlight) has lost to his divorces. He is very smart. Think he just love losing millions? Think again. You are not internaly arguing other sides of the a/b coin. You are swade by the thoughts that you are some how alpha to your wife/ gf jane.
Donald
@Jeff — solid comment. Good call-out: “An alpha would not post on this or any blog.”
@Dave: How come Mary was called the wife of Joseph even “before they came together”, or had sex?
.
42. That’s how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. Paul said so.
.
How’s that fast progressing bishop?
Jeff
Urban Dictionary says “Swade” is a super cool male. Something bubbling underneath?
cynthia @ 12:50 am:
“As a Catholic, I have to ask; is this really the way the “newer” American Protestant denominations choose to handle problems?”
There is nothing Protestant about the modern Protestant church. Sola scriptura and priesthood of the believer aren’t even talking points, let alone guiding principles. Pastors have the RCC’s entrenched credentialism without the RCC’s hierarchy to hold them accountable… the worst of both worlds.
“Why do people attend churches like that?”
The men don’t. The women, apparently, are happy to have easily identifiable Alphas like Pastor My-way and Fuckbuddy Guitarist.
“How did a model like that get popularized?”
Damn good question. Protestantism was a willingly decentralized movement specifically to prevent this kind of infiltration & subversion. It’s unnatural (I would say, inhuman) for so many independent churches to go wrong in the same direction at the same time.
“A couple has an argument, the wife whines to the pastor, and then the pastor passes judgment on who is “sinning” and who is righteous? Who gave them the authority to make such arbitrary determinations about such every day events?”
That isn’t a stone a Catholic should throw.
@AT@JDG “…1st Cor. 6 on joining the members of Christ to a whore…”
Wasn’t St. Paul talking about joining a Christian to a harlot, slut, whore…just like the example of the father’s wife in the above passage? It’s not just sex with a prostitute, but actually marrying a harlot isn’t worthy of a Christian man.
Or, St. Paul was referring to the temple prostitutes of Aphrodite that were common in Corinth. This explanation would make sense in context of St. Paul then discussing what food can be eaten by Christians dedicated to other gods.
@GunnerQ
I don’t think this is coincidence. When Protestants took power away from the higher church leaders we empowered the heads of congregations instead. This solved one set of problems and created a new set of problems. This then mixed badly with feminism as well as the megachurch movement.
@ Gunner Q
Well said. I would take it further. The jesuits and catholic system are responsible for much of our problems here in America. Christians and their theology opened the door for them. Yes, the fact of the matter is most “christians” in the USA don’t know or hate the bible. They want none of its laws and have refused to continue the reformation.
The more atheist this country becomes, the more catholic it becomes. Look at leadership like the supreme court. Dominated by catholics with a token court-jew. When “conservatives” had the control during Bush’s term, why didn’t we destroy some wicked institutions like abortion as we were promised and as was campaigned? Please ask yourself that question.
Look at the executive branch. Biden is a jesuit with many catholic degrees, Obama is a unqualified, disqualified traitor etc. Knights of Malta et al. dominate the military. The one who leads prayer in congress is a jesuit priest. The fasces (fascist iconography) is in our state buildings. The gold-trimmed flags only allowed in a military court are located in every court in the nation. Freemasons and their occultist ilk are pervasive in churches, clubs, and local leadership catching up the residue. And on and on and on.
Feminism (and its daughters egalitarianism and complementarianism) is simply communism applied to the family. Communism is just the doctrine of the trinity applied to a people/state. Marx didn’t hide that he got his ideas directly from the doctrine of the Filioque and the trinity. This pushed by jesuits and catholics and their followers, unwitting or otherwise, in order to continue the damnable counter-reformation. Also see the lies of abolitionism (read philemon, bro?) and the industrial revolution.
Research the council of trent and the doctrine of temporal power. The pope thinks he has de jure rule over the governments and people of the world. The papacy never changed their thoughts on this neither have they rescinded the relevant bulls or briefs. Don’t let them fool you with their words, but watch their actions. As someone else said concerning relationships with a prospective wife, the past indicates the future. Two words: The Inquisition. This is exactly what has been going on in this country since the war of northern aggression (the civil war according to some) pursuant to the destruction of Protestants and the Bible. Just like in Braveheart, the rulers have determined “if we can’t get them out, we’ll breed them out.” Forced integration, miscegenation, etc. and Civil Rights Act and that era was just communism being applied socially. Martin Lucifer King (he never actually changed his name from Michael. He used the name Martin Luther for marketing purposes) lied and was not a Christian. Don’t believe me? Read his writings, look into his life, and his relationships. Furthermore, his mentor was trained by a jesuit priest and they were all flaming communists. Mao Tse-tung was one of his supporters.
Keep reforming or line up to the chopping block. The law of Moses is not for our righteousness, but it is still the standard of behavior and is a perfect law (Psalm 19, etc.). It isn’t abrogated in Messiah. Those that say otherwise teach the doctrine of balaam in order to use God to destroy you. Don’t succumb to the counter-reformation. Start asking the right questions and shake off the lies of generations.
No, it was never mostly a male sin. Not if one classifies romance novels as porn.
Novaseeker
Sure, but I was talking about visual porn. I agree that 50SOG, or even many romance novels, are “female porn”.
It wasn’t that long ago that textual porn such as 50 SOG was classified as “pornographic”. The term “Banned in Boston” had meaning a century or so ago. It’s a real coup on the part of the Female Imperative to essentiallly redefine the term “pornography” from “video, audio, text that is intended to cause sexual arousal” to “anything that men use for sexual arousal”. It means that women’s porn can be sold in chain bookstores while men’s porn is exiled to the Internet, because “men’s porn bad, women’s porn ‘literature'”.
It also, as Nova and others noted up the thread, creates a glaringly obvious double standard. Well, it’s glaringly obvious when considered in a slightly abstract manner. When viewed through the standard Blue Pill “Men Bad Women Good” lens, it’s not at all obvious. And that’s part of the larger problem.
I should add that the redefinition of “porn” as “only what men do” appears to be part of the larger societal pattern of criminalization of the male sex drive.
To be literary for a moment, sometimes the modern world looks a bit as if Galadriel kept the Ring for herself…
Empath,
I am usually good at catching humor…. even from a Brit (brother form across the pond). Don’t get that one, but meant persuaded.
Think of the most hypergamous woman and then flip the script for a man. He is arrogant, lacks self awareness unless it has to with his narcissistic solipsism etc.
If many of you think you are alpha, you must be narcissistic and bpd. Women suffer this naturally to some degree, however a christian woman who humbles herself (rare I know), and becomes aware of her own selfishness, lack of respect for authority, lack of submission will eventually realize she needs to temper her hypergamy. Rollo or anyone else will call this the wall. I agree, but as with men, women too can gain wisdom with age.
That true born again christian woman who still acts like a feminist bitch, but who continues to study and eventually understands her lack of wisdom and submission to God (thus her lack of submission to her husband) begins to be changed by the renewing of her mind.
I am in no way defending women. We are in this mess because of women and the FI. I am just comparing the supposed alphas out there who are truly beta, but haven’t been retrospective enough to see that they are not alphas. I certainly would not want to associate with an alpha.
@Anonymous Reader, Novaseeker
The double standards are indeed everywhere. But a new one just occurred to me now. Go back to the story Dalrock referenced in the original post, where the husband insisted his wife stop working:
Ted did not believe it was wise for Elizabeth to continue to supervise the preschoolers. They had been discussing this issue for weeks, but could not agree on a course of action. Finally, Ted “put his foot down” and made the final decision. Elizabeth would have to resign from the ministry.
Does this sound familiar? It should. We’ve already heard this story before; It’s the same one Tim and Kathy Keller shared in their book, the one that ended with her smashing their wedding china with a hammer. In that instance, you had a wife who thought her husband was working too much at the expense of their family. The husband thought differently and would not change. So the wife decided to resort to drastic means to make him cut back on his work. The church decrees that she was right to do so.
In Ted and Elizabeth’s case, you have a husband who thought his wife was working too much at the expense of their family. The wife thought differently and would not change. So the husband decided to use the authority that the church admits was his to make a final decision that she would cut back on her work. But afterwards, the wife finds herself annoyed and unhappy with that, and so the church decrees that he has now sinned by doing so.
Thus proving that the church has one true measure to determine whether an action is righteous: it pleases the wife.
“What is a wife to do when she feels uncomfortable submitting to her husband in an area”
Ha, if a woman is allowed to disobey every time she feels “uncomfortable” we’ll simply end up with what they have now: feminism. Besides, that’s what we’re forced to endure right now anyway. Everything is subject to a woman’s emotional storms these days and look at the horrid mess our families are in.
Jeff
He does what he wants up to a point, but also takes orders from his wife.
You’re confused. Maybe you’ve read all of Rollo’s archives, although I’m frankly skeptical of that, but clearly even if so you haven’t learned much beyond a few buzzwords.
“Alpha” is situational. I know a retired military officer who has led units in combat. He is a leader of men. I’ve worked with him on a few projects. I’ve also watched him interact with his wife, and is totally Betaized around her, he caters to her whims in a heartbeat. In the context of intersexual relations, he’s a Beta, no matter what ribbons he’s earned the right to wear on his chest.
Your “No True Alpha” mindset is simplistic and it is not at all new.
@ Dalrock
I’ve been thinking about your response to Rollo’s observation yesterday and it seems there are other observations to make as to what he noted about those situations. Being a bachelor, I don’t really want to comment on the implications this has for already married men, but for someone like me looking at the possibility of marriage, it speaks to the supreme importance of properly vetting a prospective wife and the consequences if you don’t.
As you’ve said before, Biblical marriage is based on headship, not game. Game improves marriage but it can’t be the foundation. This means don’t marry a woman who requires you to be “sufficiently” alpha (in her mind) to stick to her vows. Do not enter into a marriage with uncertainty about this. If her keeping her word is based on your game, at that point it doesn’t matter what verses are read to her or what he says. The entire state/culture/society/church apparatus will tell her otherwise and twist Scripture however needed to rationalize her behavior, as Rollo observed. In the past this was not the case, and many men marry thinking things haven’t changed in this regard. There is absolutely no external pressure or incentive for her listen to him based on any appeal he might make to obeying the Bible. Men in those situations aren’t sinning, but it’s a dangerous place to be if you marry the wrong woman.
With or without agreement with anything or everything Jeff said, this proclamation is demonstrative of the drive to not subscribe to things that are -not new-, or to things that are simplistic. It is the quest for being seen as knowing something that others will never totally figure out. Its one of my chief frustrations about game discussions (no desire to have one), certain political discussions, and a subset of evangelical discourse. Definitions are made fluid not because they actually change, but because they are made to change in order to elude anyone sharing fully in them.
“Look at Fireproof. Sure, his sin is watching porn but maybe her idolatry, adultery, usurpation and unsubmissiveness could be addressed at some point….? Maybe? Nah, who’re we kidding.
This is my first post. Dalrock, I can’t thank you enough for this blog. I started reading it last fall and it’s been refreshing and uplifting. Now on to the comment above.
Sean, you nailed it. I watched that movie several years ago and was married at the time. My blood was boiling by the end of the movie. I told my wife (at the time) that this piece of trash movie was nothing but a 1 and a half hour infomercial for adultery. That whore who played the wife was unrepentant at her adultery with the doctor, her lack of submission to her husband and overall demonic attitude through the entire movie. And if that’s what passes as a “Christian” movie today, I opt out. I haven’t watched any of these “faith based” films since, especially anything with those Kendrick folks.
What I want to know is when the sequel to Fireproof comes out. I think it will be called, “The Great Whore of Babylon”.
I experienced first hand a male, feminist pastor, who did everything but come out and verbally encourage my wife at the time to enjoy and revel in her adulterous behavior. Good thing I did not have my Smith and Wesson handy when I talked with him.
Question, as this thread makes clear, any man who is married or contemplating marriage also needs to vet churches as well. If there is a particular denomination that a man prefers, that narrows the options. AMOG pastors / priests are no friend of man or marriage, as the OP clearly shows.
This gets pretty sticky because thanks to the feminization of society in general and the churches in particular, it’s a difficult task. Off hand I’d take a really hard look at any church that is run by a Boomer pastor / priest, because that demographic is chock full of White Knights who are always ready to excuse any and all bad behavior by women. Either an older (70+) or younger (GenX) man would probably be preferable.
Please note I’m not making any theological statement here about which church is “right”, but merely pointing out that leadership in whatever form (hierarchy, board, pastor, whatever) will affect every social aspect of that church. A church completely run by Boomers will not be all that friendly to men, in my opinion.
I wrote to Jeff:
Your “No True Alpha” mindset is simplistic and it is not at all new.
Empath
With or without agreement with anything or everything Jeff said, this proclamation is demonstrative of the drive to not subscribe to things that are -not new-, or to things that are simplistic.
No, Empath, it isn’t. Your mindreading skills are not working too well today.
Jeff’s understanding of Alpha is simpllistic.
Jeff’s use of the “No True Scotsman” fallacy is not at all new.
I find your vaguely passive-aggressive, snarky, statement to be below your usual standards.
@ Anonymous Reader
That is also important, too.
At the end of the day, though, you can always find a new church or pastor if either of them are harming your marriage. But the “permanency” of marriage, both spiritual and due to our current martial/family laws, means that if a Christian man chooses the wrong wife he’s in a lot of danger because for him divorce isn’t really an option if she remains in a constant state of rebellion or holds the threatpoint of divorce over him herself (unless she outright betrays or cheats), and even if he is able to get out of the marriage relatively unscathed or with the backing of his church, there is always collateral damage that might have been avoided had the marriage been built on the right foundation.
@Dave
Congratulations, Dave. Asking questions is the sign of an open mind.
1. If having sex with a woman equals marriage, how would you define fornication?
First, I did not say “having sex with a woman equals marriage” but rather “having sex with a *virgin* equals marriage. The word “fornication” is an English word, almost always used when translating the Greek word “porneia” into English. It means “sexual immorality” and describes any sexual act or relationship that is a transgression of God’s Law. Fornication is a sin, and according to Romans 4:15 and 5:13, it must be a transgression of God’s Law in order to be a sin, so fornication can be literally defined by listing all the prohibited sexual practices and relationships in the Law, to include everything from incest to sodomy to bestiality to adultery and even to having sex with your wife while she is menstruating. It’s an impressive list, both in what it contains as well as what it does not contain.
2. How come a man who genuinely loved a virgin woman, had sex with her, passionately wanted to marry her and was ready pay any amount as bride price, still realized that, despite the sex and his own desires, the woman was still not his wife? How come the Bible described the unmarried sex as a “defilement” of the woman? Yes, read the story of Dinah in Genesis 34, and learn the truth.
The first clue is found in verse 2 of chapter 34. And when Shechen the son of Hamor the Hivite, the prince of the land, saw her, he took her by force.
Deuteronomy 22:28-29 provides us with instruction:
“If a man finds a a girl who is a virgin, who is not engaged, and seizes her and lies with her and they are discovered, then the man who lay with her shall give to the girls father fifty shekels of silver and she shall be his wife because he has violated her; he cannot divorce her all his days.”
You ask “How come the Bible described the unmarried sex as “defilement” of the woman?”
The simple answer is that it doesn’t. Read it for yourself, because “defilement” and “violated” only applies when the virgin is seized and forced without her permission or consent. She was “violated” when she was seized by force and that which can never be replaced (her virginity) was forcibly taken from her. It appears you are trying to use the term “defilement” as it applies to what we today would call “rape” to any “unmarried” sex with a woman, but that is NOT what Scripture says. That you ask the question in those terms means you still don’t get it. It isn’t “unmarried” sex because the consummation of a marriage is married sex.
In a backhanded way, you are attempting to take the authority to marry away from the man and give it to the church or community. It’s the idea of saying that if they didn’t get their marriage solemnized by a third party (church or state) that they aren’t married. Again, that is NOT what Scripture says.
The answer to all your questions devolves to the question of what acts constitute the initiation of marriage. To that we look to Genesis 2:24, in which the authority to initiate marriage was given to the man. Not to the state or the church or to the father of the woman, but to the man. The first point is the man must intend to marry the woman. After that comes the question of the woman’s consent. In the case of the virgin her consent is not necessary because she has no agency. Therefore, when one boils it all down, the essential acts necessary for a marriage to a virgin to exist in fact and in deed are the intent of the man and the consummation of the marriage- the act of taking her virginity.
Why was what the Sons of Jacob did treachery? Because they killed their brother-in-law and all his people. Not only that, they used the sign of God’s covenant with Abraham (circumcision) as a trick to accomplish their treachery. They knew they were not to intermarry with the foreigners (who do you suppose told Abraham to send for a bride for Isaac from among his own people?) yet they deceived Shechen and Hamor and got the men to wound themselves using the sign of God’s covenant in order that they might kill them. That’s right up there with drowning them in the baptismal pool.
I may as well add that this was certainly a case of Shechen and Dinah being discovered, because Shechen and his father Hamor were very open about what happened and wanted Dinah to be the wife of Shechen, offering to pay any amount in bride price. What they did was completely in accord with Deuteronomy 22:28-29.
To put it in modern terms, Dinah was a strong independent woman who went out from the protection of her father’s household without anyone to protect her in order to mingle with the foreign women. Alone and away from the protection of her father and brothers she was at the mercy of the foreigners who could do with her what they pleased. They did so but then they followed up on their ethical responsibilities (recognition that Dinah is Shechen’s wife and payment of the dowry to Jacob). And where was Dinah when they came in and killed all the men? With her husband.
3. How come Mary was called the wife of Joseph even “before they came together”, or had sex?
Everywhere in the Law the betrothed virgin is described as the wife of the man she is betrothed to. Married to the man she is betrothed to but the marriage is not yet consummated. This is why sex with a virgin that is betrothed is always a death penalty offense offense for the man (rape) and if they are discovered in the city (it assumed she did not cry out so it must not have been a rape) the woman as well (adultery).
The answer to your question actually supports what I am pointing to in Exodus 22:16-17, because to seduce the unbetrothed virgin and take her virginity is to completely skip the betrothal period and the approval of the father to the marriage and go straight to the consummation of the marriage between the two. They are married in fact and in deed, the only question is whether the father will annul the marriage after the fact by rescinding the agreement of the woman. The payment of the dowry is not a penalty because no matter how the marriage comes about the man has to pay the dowry.
The text of Deuteronomy 22:28-29 indicates the father does not have the authority to annul the marriage and that is consistent with Numbers 30, because his daughter was seized and forced and thus made no agreement he could annul. That is the situation (prior to the Law) that Jacob was presented with.
@ Katherine
“I am chiming in here because I want to emphasize that not validating the concerns and feelings is incompetent leadership…”
Women who struggle with following (which is the majority of women) don’t have a leg to stand on when it comes to critiquing their husband’s leadership.
“I have found in my own marriage that when I “gridlocked” like this with my husband that empathizing with and listening to his concerns is the thing that breaks the gridlock. Then he listens to my concerns, I feel better, and we move forward with what is typically his original plan, sometimes with some small modifications.”
Your assertion is based on a 3 false premises:
#1) That the example given in the article (Ted not listening to Elizabeth) can be taken at face value. In other words, if Elizabeth is saying Ted isn’t listening to her, is it actually true? Why did you assume this to be the case? Just because he didn’t make you feel like your views were taken into account, it doesn’t mean that he didn’t.
#2) Your FEEEEEEEELINGS are not the arbiter of your husband’s righteous authority over you.
#3) The “Gridlock” in your marriage isn’t an occurrence like catching a cold…
it’s 100% Y O U R F A U L T.
Shut up and obey your husband. (1Tim 2:11)
AR,
I would say you prove the simplistic AF/BB statement. I am stating he takes orders like:
Wife: can you make the smoked shoulder for our guests?
Husband: No you fucking bitch do it yourself and grab me another beer and a beer for jill here, her jumping up and down on my pecker is making her thirsty.
(this will endear your wife!)
Husband Reality: Sure, no problem, I just need to spank something first. Come over here!
(gets laid later)
It is absolutely not new, I agree.
Any betas out there that think they are alpha for slapping wifey on the ass while he walks past her in the kitchen is deluded or has some comic wit. I would think that is almost a given if you are masculine in anyway.
Show me a man who is alpha among women, and I’ll show you the same man is alpha among men. Show me a man who is a beta among women, and he is a beta. He might be the toughest, roughest beta, but he is beta. Military is an example of leading men WHO VOLUNTARILY HAVE PUT THEMSELVES UNDER YOUR AUTHORITY. That is a strawman. My example of military is that as tier 1 guys, they have proven to the nth degree in most manners to be mentally, physically, and emotionally tougher than 99.999999% of humans on the earth. Wouldn’t this qualify them to be mentally, physically, emotionally tougher than their wives? Absolutely, however they know the balance of keeping things civilized (society… local, regional, global), peaceful. They know when and how to LEAD and FOLLOW. They know how to humble themselves when most men fall prey to their own ego and pride.
Alpha doesn’t care who or how he leads and doesn’t care if anyone follows. Those that do only serve to boost his own ego at their expense.
An alpha wouldn’t humble himself to change his own kids diaper. An alpha is so narcissistic that even Rollo will say he is competitive toward his own kids, even more so his male kid/s. That sounds like kings of past who would have their own sons killed because of fear of being overthrown by their sons.
A beta will bend and move. He will change his mind from the arguments of others. It’s situational only in the mind of a beta who thinks he’s alpha.
If alpha is building a structure he takes no input from anyone and thinks it’s grand. Beta will take advice and seek wisdom, will allow criticism and correction.
You’ve simplified it, not me.
Intrasexual and situations have nothing to do with alpha, it does with beta. Alpha doesn’t care what situation he’s in. That is why they are the thugs who give hypergamous women the tingles. Beta can give tingles to some women too, that doesn’t make him alpha.
Rollo has very, very good stuff. Read his commenters. They write like SJW, hypergamous women, or alphas. Read through them, the only ones that show up as beta are the ones who ask questions (take advice for a better relationship/society… see?). The rest write as if they are alpha, only alpha wouldn’t spend the time of day to tell people he is alpha, or take selfies and put them on Facebook. He isn’t trying to show off his alpha… he just is and hypergamy will seek it out. PUA and gamers will be seen through sooner or later.
Read Vox. He admits to being a delta (which I would think is a beta). Vox talks about deltas making up society and who put forth effort to make things better for themselves, their families, and others. Alpha might do that secondarily by pure happenstance, but his aim is only self preservation and pleasure without regard to any others… a sociopath.
It’s not situational.
AR, Nothing passive aggressive about it. I could not care less whether he has alpha defined well or not or what the modifier (situational?) should be. It is tedious chasing things that cannot be caught….by us unenlightened. I don’t really have any standards when it comes to the esoteric.
I love the No True Scotsman fallacy. There ought to be a new named rule that says if X occurs long enough then the NTS fallacy will be asserted. Its a beaut.
I will drop the passive-aggressive-voice pedantry, even if it is less wordy than that about virginal sex being marriage and such.
I think if Game were the salvation of men, more attention would be paid to it in the Bible, huh?
A man has entitlement to a wife. A man so weak that he won’t pursue this is to be criticized. Nothing wrong there.
However, being strong and virtuous does not guarantee much if any tingle producing. God dishes out talents, and being attractive to women is partially a God given talent. Men can work to be more attractive, but nothing in the Bible tells me that just because I want a particular talent, I’ll have it. Many other men may be more attractive to women than me. That is no fault of mine.
WOMEN HAVE AGENCY.
THEY CLAIM TO NOT HAVE AGENCY.
THEY ARE LYING ABOUT THIS.
Men are weak when they listen to women’s claims about not being responsible. But the weakness is listening to the women. Men are not responsible for women’s sins. Ever. Men can talk to them as they do any sinner, try to get them to repent, but they are not responsible for the sins of even a wife, ever. Even if they choose an evil wife, her sins are her own. Always.
Remember that women will constantly deny this, attempt to shift blame to the husband for not being alpha enough, shift blame to God, whatever it takes. Men may listen to these words, but God never does.
Please point me to a story in the Bible where a woman’s individual sin was ever excused. They were always taken into account. Lot’s wife looked back and turned into a pillar of salt. Lot did not and was spared, and wasn’t blamed for what his wife did.
WOMEN HAVE AGENCY.
AT,
I noticed that you conveniently stuck to the OT. Are there any NT examples you could point to? Any Apostolic statements that support the irrelevant passages that you quoted?
If you so believe in the OT law that much, when will you start applying the sanctions of the law to those who violate the law? And how about you observing the feasts, and sacrificing the animals and such? Oops! I forgot, there is no more Levitical priesthood; no one to wear the ephod, you see. You are really out of luck.
Or you simply pick and choose which parts of the law you’d like to have–like you’re having a buffet or something?
“Yep, that bit about polygamy, I’ll have some of that”.
“Sure that other one about having unmarried sex, that sounds good too”.
“But the bit about stoning folks, I’ll have to pass”.
“And the animal sacrifices? Not so much”
You have nothing to teach me, Artisanal Toad. You are in serious error and are taken over by seducing spirits and doctrines of demons–the doctrines that Jesus referred to as the “doctrines of the Nicolaitans” which He hates.
Nicolas also started well (see Acts 6:5) before he received “new revelation” and began to teach the people of God to engage in polygamy, and like Jezebel, to commit fornication.
One of the things this thread does is illustrate that to one extent or another, everyone wants to have authority over someone else. It devolves to the idea that others should believe and act as we do and if they don’t, something should be done about that.
@Robin Munn
Nice. Avoid the message by shooting the messenger. I think we can discuss the erroneous prohibition on elders being limited to one wife at the same time we discuss whether men living in open adultery can be elders. After all, nowhere is polygyny described as a sin yet adultery is a death-penalty offense, the same as murder and sodomy.
Or, maybe that’s your way of avoiding having to study Scripture. I get that a lot. Picking up the Bible and studying it is a whole lot harder than picking up rocks and throwing them.
@JDG
As I tried to explain to Dave, only the virgin lacks agency to consent or not consent to marriage. The widow, the divorced woman and even the prostitute have agency and are thus free to consent or not to consent to marriage. As such, having sex with a prostitute does not initiate marriage unless the man and woman are in agreement to marry.
@Empath
Avoiding the question of what Scripture actually says when it comes to sexual morality only causes injury to the body of believers. It’s all the more important when the traditions and teachings of the church (be it the RCC or the protestant flavors) clearly do not comport with what Scripture actually says.
As it stands, my understanding of what Scripture says means I’m an adulterer and if my wife hadn’t “divorced” me I’d still be living in a state of adultery to this day. Not the most comfortable of positions to find one’s self. The fact that I did not know what Scripture says about marriage and the fact that I have never been in a church that taught such things or even heard of such a church does not absolve me of my sin in that matter or of my need to repent.
And what does it say when I come along and point out some major problems with current practice in the church that doesn’t comport with Scripture? Oh, sorry, wrong subject. I was supposed to get with the script and throw rocks at feminist women? There are those here who screech and shriek like women that I’m a “false teacher” and a heretic. They are long on accusations and non-existent on Scriptural argument. When they do try to argue from the Bible their efforts are laughable. My favorite is still the claim that Matthew 19;4-5 says polygyny is forbidden, a claim that if true would eviscerate Christianity completely. Why? Because if that’s what Jesus meant to say, He violated Deut. 4:2 by adding to the Law and thereby sinned. Follow the dots, because if Jesus sinned then He wasn’t the Messiah.
Your response points to the fact that men and women in the church would rather avoid such discussions and thus avoid the need to teach what Scripture actually says, which injures those in the church who do not know what they should know and thus make decisions in ignorance of God’s Word. I’ll stand by what I said earlier:
It’s obvious the traditional approach of telling girls “premarital sex is a sin” isn’t working and maybe we ought to tell them the truth: “When you give a guy your virginity it isn’t a sin but it’s not “just” sex, it’s the consummation of your marriage to him. As far as God is concerned, you will be married to the guy you give your virginity to and if you have sex with any other guy that will be the sin of adultery. Unless, of course, your father goes ballistic when he hears about it and annuls your marriage.”
To claim that I’m wrong in that statement is to examine the question of when a person is actually married and by what act. There is NOTHING in the Bible that *requires* a wedding ceremony or a license or even the permission of the father for a man and a woman to be married. Yes, looking at it from a Scriptural point of view turns a lot of Christian tradition on its head, but if you look at where that tradition came from it leads you straight to the Catholic church and their intentional effort to usurp the authority of the man to initiate marriage and their intentional efforts to usurp the authority of husbands within marriage.
Many modern church traditions are nothing more than fruit of the poison tree from which feminists derive their power. Stop striking at the branch and start striking at the root of the problem.
@jeff:
Alpha doesn’t care who or how he leads and doesn’t care if anyone follows. Those that do only serve to boost his own ego at their expense.
Care to give specific examples of a few well known alphas and betas in society or scripture?
As you are going, even God Himself, the Ultimate Alpha, will not qualify as an Alpha for you.
There is NOTHING in the Bible that *requires* a wedding ceremony or a license or even the permission of the father for a man and a woman to be married.
You’re right. But I hold that you do have a driver’s license, and maybe a professional license as well. Pray, tell us, which Bible passage says you must have those? (Hint: there is none).
Why did you decide to have those, again?
@Dave
AT,
I noticed that you conveniently stuck to the OT. Are there any NT examples you could point to? Any Apostolic statements that support the irrelevant passages that you quoted?
Yes, Dave, thank you for asking. The Apostolic statement you are looking for is 2nd Timothy 3:16-17:
All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.
That statement of doctrine makes your description of Old Testament passages being “irrelevant” an erroneous and incorrect opinion, inasmuch as the Old Testament is “inspired by God” and is “useful for correction” of your equally erroneous conviction that only the New Testament counts.
So, am I a false teacher for quoting the Apostle Paul, or is the Apostle Paul the false teacher for writing that with his Apostolic authority? In accordance with 1st John 1:9 I’ve confessed my sin, Dave. How about you? Are you an adulterer too?
Striver,
I agree.
However, and this is to your credit, bloggers and posters will tell you that alpha can get and keep the women. Alphas don’t care. If posters and bloggers were alpha, their women would always tingle and never frivorce. Even the better beta that was frivorced and has become RP aware is still beta no matter what he does moving forward (looks/acts alpha)…. he’s a divorced man (beta). Even if he goes clinically insane and kills the ex, his kids, and some shoppers, he is still beta and even less so. He is gamma.
If AWALT (which I agree with) is true, any woman in paticular will rebel and shit test. She will also look for other alphas or better betas no matter what an alpha or beta does, she is a horrible human, just like the alpha. Anyone not seeing the true nature of an alpha is perplexing to me. They seem to see the horrible hypegamous woman who goes through men and ruins lives, but not the alpha man who does the same.
I think AR and others are good decent men, not alphas.
Traditions are not always a bad thing. The Apostles commanded the early Christians to defend the traditions and to reject those who would not follow them:
Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle. 2 Thessalonians 2:15 (KJV)
Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which he received of us. 2 Thessalonians 3:6 (KJV)
AT does not realize that by asking Christians to deviate from established Christian practices, he is trying to establish his own traditions.
@Dave
You’re right. But I hold that you do have a driver’s license, and maybe a professional license as well. Pray, tell us, which Bible passage says you must have those? (Hint: there is none).
Why did you decide to have those, again?
Dave, the answer to your question and the Bible passage you claim doesn’t exist is found in Romans 13:1-2a (and LOOK Dave, it’s IN THE NEW TESTAMENT!!!)
Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God. Therefore whoever resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God
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AT,
I find your claims on sex/marriage to at least encourage productive study of the bible. However, I am curious how you believe a woman would become a prostitute. If she gets married upon loss of virginity, how can she be an acceptable prostitute under the law? Would she not be committing adultery with every client? Only widows and father-annulled women?
Dave,
First off. I agree God is the Alpha. Do you see men single handily setting up kings and deposing them? Job comes close to alpha. Solomon himself was the wisest man to live and yet was persuaded to worship an idol/s, was he alpha? Certainly listened to women. Sampson was tricked by a woman. Alpha?
Alphas? Charles Manson and the like and look where he and his like are… Ted Bundy is a great example. Look at the pictures of the young women of that time. Very pretty. He blames porn (a beta characteristic by Rollo’s definition).
Beta? David. Flawed man who continually came back to God in humility and repentance. Alpha characters, but humbled himself. Peter. Confronted the Lord not to wash feet, lied bold face to Him. Denied, willing to fight to the death with those coming to capture Jesus. Humbled himself to Him, he took rebuking.
Nice. Avoid the message by shooting the messenger. I think we can discuss the erroneous prohibition on elders being limited to one wife at the same time we discuss whether men living in open adultery can be elders. After all, nowhere is polygyny described as a sin yet adultery is a death-penalty offense, the same as murder and sodomy.
Or, maybe that’s your way of avoiding having to study Scripture. I get that a lot. Picking up the Bible and studying it is a whole lot harder than picking up rocks and throwing them.
I’m quoting your reply in its entirety because it speaks volumes about your attitude, none of them good. The Scripture is entirely clear that elders are to be “the husband of one wife” (Titus 1:6, 1 Timothy 3:2). And those men in this discussion who are qualified to be such have told you repeatedly that you are in severe error concerning the Scriptures, but you refuse to listen and instead call this clear Scriptural prohibition “erroneous”.
You are misreading the Scriptures, and yet you lecture everyone who tells you so that they are not studying the Scriptures “correctly”. Your utterly bizarre definition of adultery and marriage is self-evidently false and needs no refutation, yet you continue to behave as though you were the only one to get it right and the rest of Christendom was wrong. Did it never cross your mind that if all the traffic on the road appears to be going the wrong way, it might be you who is facing in the wrong direction?
I doubt that this comment is going to persuade you that you’re heading in the wrong direction, any more than any of the other comments. But please, stop and look at your attitude, and repent of your pride before it consumes you. Because you’re heading in a VERY bad direction, and will do no good for the Kingdom this way.
@AT:
Dave, the answer to your question and the Bible passage you claim doesn’t exist is found in Romans 13:1-2a (and LOOK Dave, it’s IN THE NEW TESTAMENT!!!)
Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God. Therefore whoever resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God
Precisely. If the law of the land said to observe a ceremony and obtain the father’s consent prior to your marriage being recognized, should you or shouldn’t you obey? Do you still need to appeal to “No verse of the Bible said to observe a marriage ceremony!”?
Thus, you have contradicted yourself.
Dalrock @ 10:43 am:
“I don’t think this is coincidence. When Protestants took power away from the higher church leaders we empowered the heads of congregations instead.”
That doesn’t explain the remarkable synchronization we’ve seen across continents and decades. I have a working theory, not quite polished, that modern telecommunications are responsible for the collapse of Protestantism because they eliminated political and cultural isolation. To draw a geographic analogy, compare China to Europe. China has very few geographic barriers with the result it was easily ruled by a central authority for the length of recorded history. By contrast, Europe has so many barriers that a man could radically change his government by hiking over a couple mountains. The result was a great deal of experimentation, competition and progress.
Protestantism was Europe-like, each denomination and church existing independently with the Bible as our unifying bedrock. When the information age came along, our bedrock shifted from our Bible to our neighbors… a China-like centralization.
Morally speaking, centralization is suicide. It’s obviously unsafe to keep lots of power and lots of ignorance in the same room. The more power the guys in that room have, the less likely they’ll be held accountable or consider those they have power over to be their peers. Which opens the door to all kinds of feel-good heresy.
The theory is obviously still rough. Also, telecommunications has served the benefit of completing the Great Commission mandate of preaching the Gospel throughout the world. And of course, here we are blogging on the Net.
Jeff
You are everything wrong with Christian men today. That statement is the statement of a cuckservative. On the surface it looks strong and biblical and masculine. In reality it is just some fool mouthing off something that was true in another cultural world. That world where that statement would be valid no longer exist and hasn’t for a long time. This blog came about because of the lost culture that invalidates your statement.
Well since you have decided to get involved we have two choices change the culture or develop ways to survive and thrive in the one we have. Both paths require knowledge of the current reality.
A good start is right here https://heartiste.wordpress.com/. You must learn “Game” and the nature of females. Understand the liberal mindset and the concept of the cuckservative. What you will find is the learned PUA types are just as in tune and in many cases more so than any Christian man here on the realities of life.
Christian betas didn’t abdicate shit it was taken from them at gun point and the current church and Christian righteous types seems ok with it living in this delusion of faithful righteousness. I guess the lesser men bound for hell will be the ones to fix things so you won’t get your soul dirty.
Question, I completely agree with vetting a potential wife as top priorlty, changing churches is much easier as you point out than “changing wives” (No, A Toad, just don’t). Dalrock’s postings on interviewing a potential wife are very good places to start.
Even stable, worthwhile women are still women, and thus they are affected by other women they associate with. So a married man needs to pay attention to his wife’s social circle, and that specifically includes the women of any church they go to. The women of churches tend to follow whatever the culture of that church is, and the leadership therefore matters.
I’ll go out a bit on a limb here and state that men should avoid, walk away from, boycott those churches that allow women to preach. I leave to others the task of defending that position from the Bible, but merely observe that women in leadership in a church is a recipe for feminization. And we have more than enough of that to go around already.
Jeff
Read Vox. He admits to being a delta (which I would think is a beta)
If you mean Vox Day, rather than the Vox site, if memory serves he considers himself a Sigma, which is not at all the same thing as a Delta. Perhaps this is one part of your confusion.
@Dave
In your efforts to put words in my mouth that I didn’t say, you overlook one critical point about tradition that Jesus said: “In vain do they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the traditions of men.”
Traditions are great as long as they reinforce what Scripture actually says. The problem comes when they contradict Scripture (such as your tradition that only the New Testament counts) and prevent people from discussing what Scripture actually says or living their lives in accordance with Scripture.
Dave, I may be sarcastic with you on occasion, but please don’t think I’m giving you a hard time because you are actually doing your job as a Christian man and opposing something you believe to be wrong as best way you can. In truth, your efforts heap shame upon the others who are better able to take up the exegetical burden of examining what I’ve said, but can’t be bothered to do anything other than toss around their opinions. In fact, if you had a few classes in hermeneutics and learned a bit about the history of the church you’d put them to shame with not just your efforts, but the results of your efforts.
The reason why things are so screwed up in the church is because the men who claim to be men of God don’t want God’s Word to be the hill they take their final stand on. Hand them a Bible and ask the question: “Is this the hill you’re prepared to die on?” The real answer is that they’re only willing to die on that hill if the cause is a popular one.
@jsr
I am curious how you believe a woman would become a prostitute. If she gets married upon loss of virginity, how can she be an acceptable prostitute under the law? Would she not be committing adultery with every client? Only widows and father-annulled women?
Women sell their bodies, as a rule, only when they have nothing else to sell (need) or when they realize the price they can receive is higher than they can get from working with their clothes on (greed). So, it boils down to need or greed and God chose not to criminalize the “profession” and thereby condemn such women in need to a “moral” death of starvation.
There is another class of women I did not mention for reasons that should be obvious: slaves or former slaves. I suspect that in those days there were plenty of widows and divorced women, as well as run-away slave women, many of which didn’t have any way to earn a living other than on their backs. Did you know that Deuteronomy 23:15-16 says a runaway slave is not to be returned to their master?
“You shall not hand over to his master a slave who has escaped from his master to you. He shall live with you in your midst, in the place which he shall choose in one of your towns where it pleases him; you shall not mistreat him”
If a married woman is taken as a slave, is she still married, or has her new master taken the place of her husband? If she becomes free after being a slave, is it similar to being divorced, in that she cannot go back to her husband? Scripture provides us with no answers to these questions. All I have is opinions.
There is nothing to stop a widow or a divorced woman or even a woman raped and not discovered or seduced whose father annulled the marriage from becoming a prostitute. However, we should assume that if the woman has a living husband she has someone who should be supporting her. There is also an obligation on his family in that matter, and the dishonor of her being reduced to the point of prostituting herself would be their dishonor as well. Why does the church have a roster of widows to support? Because family takes care of its own.
@Robin Munn
Perhaps it escaped your notice that you are appealing to authority and making no attempt to actually refute what I said. However, having appealed to authority of anonymous elders who are refuting me with their opinions (as are you), I direct you to an eminent authority, the Bible translator Spiros Zodhiates. What follows are his marginal notes on the passage in question from the Zodhiates study Bible:
“The husband of one wife” does not mean that he, the bishop or the deacon, was never married before. Nor does it mean that in order to be a bishop or a deacon, one must be married. Paul was certainly considered both a bishop and a deacon, and he was never married. If this meant that a bishop or a deacon was never to have been married before then it would excluded a remarried widower. But the Apostle Paul in Romans 7:1-3 places no restriction upon a widower to remarry. In the case of divorce, neither the Lord Jesus nor the Apostle Paul places such a restriction on a divorced person who was the innocent party in the unfortunate and God-hated divorce process which is the result of a man’s sinfulness.
One of the meanings of this expression, but not the principle one, is that the bishop or deacon should not be married to more than one woman simultaneously. The expression mias gunaikos is known in Greek grammar as an attributive genitive, which is equivalent to an adjective, and would have been better translated as “a one-woman’s husband.” Not a ladies’ man, in other words. The total context speaks of the moral conduct of the bishop and the deacon. He should be one totally dedicated to his wife and not be flirtatious. Paul brings out the same thought in the similar passage in Titus 1:6 where the expression is exactly the same, except as pertaining to a woman that she should be one man’s woman, not flirting with other men.”
I will also note the logical argument that polygyny is an act which God regulated (many passages in the Law), condoned (2nd Samuel 12:8), commanded (Deuteronomy 25:5-10) and participated in (Jeremiah 31:31-32). The entire list of qualifications for Elders and Deacons are aspects of character, except for your reading of the “husband of one wife” which is a marital status rather than a character aspect of the individual. Robin Munn, your interpretation of this passage is to claim that having more than one wife simultaneously is an indication of bad character and thus you are likewise making the claim that God’s character is somehow impugned by His actions in regulating, condoning, commanding and participating in polygyny.
For these reasons I prefer the analysis of Spiros Zodhiates, that what “husband of one wife” really means is “not a ladies’ man” which places it exactly in line with all the other aspects of good character that are described as requirements of an Elder or Deacon.
How about you, Robin Munn? Does Spiros Zodhiates have it wrong too?
Did it never cross your mind that if all the traffic on the road appears to be going the wrong way, it might be you who is facing in the wrong direction?
When the traffic is coming out of the Vatican, yes, I assume it’s going the wrong way and I have yet to be proven completely wrong. Sometimes they get it right, but even a broken clock is right twice a day. As for my take on divorce and adultery, which you arrogantly don’t even bother to refute, claiming that it’s “self-evidently false and needs no refutation,” your opinion is still just that. An opinion completely based on tradition and devoid of any support from Scripture.
It’s not that I’ve got it right and all of Christendom has it wrong, it’s that on the issues I’ve chosen to discuss I can point to where Christendom got it wrong and why, and it goes straight to the decisions of the early church to try to increase their power by taking over the institution of marriage. In doing so they violated God’s Law (added to the Law and subtracted from it, violations of Deut. 4:2 and 12:32), usurped the authority of husbands and even regulated the marital bed. The church literally created feminism and even Dave gets it right when he says it’s because this stuff is happening because the husbands permit it. They permit it because of people like you and Dave learned to attack people who don’t agree with him from people like you, using your example of stating an opinion as fact with no Scriptural support.
But, since you claim you have it right because it’s the tradition of Christendom and I’m the one that’s wrong, then teacher, show me where I got it wrong. From Scripture, not from your (Catholic) teachings and traditions.
@Dave
Precisely. If the law of the land said to observe a ceremony and obtain the father’s consent prior to your marriage being recognized, should you or shouldn’t you obey? Do you still need to appeal to “No verse of the Bible said to observe a marriage ceremony!”?
Please point to the law, statute or ordinance that requires a ceremony and/or the fathers consent prior to a marriage being recognized. If and when you do, I will point to the current binding ruling of the Supreme Court, the law of the land since 1878, from the case of Meister v Moore, in which the court ruled that marriage is a fundamental right and laws requiring things like marriage licenses are “merely directory.” The term “merely directory” means such laws are nothing more than polite suggestions. In fact, the recent Cody v Brown case ruled that unlicensed polygyny cannot be criminalized and threw out a portion of the Utah bigamy statute as unconstitutional.
To make a long story short, Dave, the law of the land in the United States is that any State law requiring licenses, third party solemnization or ceremonies for marriage is nothing more than a polite suggestion and anyone is free to disregard such laws without any possibility of penalty. So, the answer is no, I don’t have to obey such laws because the Supreme Court told me it wasn’t necessary.
AR,
Alpha Game Plan is the site I mean. He has on several occasions said something to the term of being at a social gathering with other delta men, so I assumed he considered himself a delta.
That is beside the point. If you consider yourself an alpha, I assume you have been in many bar room brawls over some chick because you 1) you don’t care about the other guy and 2) just want the girl (not showing your tough, you know you are.
If you are alpha, when was the last time you cheated on your SO when you picked up that 10/10, took her back to your place or hers? What? You know better than to cheat on your SO? But she’s a 10/10 and your a guy (assume, and horny no doubt). She’s with a guy? So what, your an alpha. You take what you want. No? Then you have made a decision that benefits others, not just your narcissism. When you have relegated human behavior down to the level of animals, it lacks continuity if you are going to raise that same behavior back up to human standards. As christians we follow a biblical standard. We follow God’s commands irregardless of our emotions, our pride and lusts. You and others want to separate God from the equation. Rollo takes a line of sociology, psychology, and anthropology. These separate God from conversation, thinking, emoting. I do not think that is a good thing for a christian to do. God should permeate every aspect of our lives. Is He Alpha? Did He come in the flesh? Did He take on human form as a man? Do you follow Him?
If the answer is yes and we expect women to follow His Word and consider Him in everything, then we are all betas, some tougher physically, mentally and emotionally, but still beta. On which level anyone is at is beside the point.
GG,
I 100% agree. As someone who is a very poor communicator of thoughts, I agree. It has been taken by gun point. Using abdicating was wrong on my part. I should have used taken by the reality of losing money and kids etc. I think I am agreeing with you on all your points. But PUA are/were beta, or they wouldn’t have to learn anything.
Jeff
Alpha Game Plan is the site I mean. He has on several occasions said something to the term of being at a social gathering with other delta men, so I assumed he considered himself a delta.
There are currently two different men posting articles at Alpha Game Plan. One of them is Vox Day, and one of them is not. I suggest you should read more carefully.
Jeff
If you consider yourself an alpha, I assume you have been in many bar room brawls over some chick because you 1) you don’t care about the other guy and 2) just want the girl (not showing your tough, you know you are.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man
Nailed it.
You are dead on right. And beta males are the most productive men we have. What makes the PUA special is that they learned it. Naturals are just assholes of no value to society Chateau Heartiste says so himself. Imagine a red pill Christian man with game. Wise as a snake humble as a dove, I may have got that wrong. Man should never cherish innocence not these days.
Toad, I know of a father who has annulled 213 marriages for one daughter!
🙂
greyghost –
What is a Red Pill Christian man with game going to do? Game only works for ONS or “plates.” I am assuming Red Pill Christian man is going to want to get married at some point, where is he going to find a wife? If 80% of the potential wives are carousel riders or baby mamas, these women are inappropriate wives. I don’t believe in trying to Marriage Game unmarriageable women, and those women are all unmarriageable. It’s supply and demand. Even a virgin or low mileage chick is going to know she’s special and jack up her price.
Women are not stupid. If Game is such a cure-all, why is it not in the Bible? There are women all over the Bible, various bad ones, and some better or good but flawed ones as well. Men can learn a lot about women by studying the Bible. Loose, promiscuous women are just bad, bad, news for a society, and that’s what the Bible has to say about them. You can either pray for their salvation, ask them to repent, or hope for better times. I don’t see our times being any different than those times in that regard.
@Red Pill Latecomer, Novaseeker, Anonymous Reader, et. al.:
I never knew a single woman in my age cohort who showed any interest in any type of pornographic images, although I don’t doubt that there were some. Apparently, things are different among the younger generation of women. In any case, the supply of romance novels and romantic comedies and dramas is endless, and most women of all ages seem to enjoy these. To what extent does a steady diet of these films lead women to feel that they have married beneath themselves?
Furthermore, women spend endless hours looking at HGTV (“Home & Garden”), and subscribe to all sorts of magazines focusing on home improvement, entertaining and fashion. All of these magazines tend to make women less satisfied with what they have in real life, which seems very similar to the problem men have with porn. There are also plenty of websites for decorating, fashion, remodeling, etc.
If a woman told me that she was thinking of leaving her husband because of his porn use, I would ask her whether she ends up coveting the husbands, houses, kitchens, gardens, clothing, etc., that she looks at in magazines and on the internet and television. Most Christian men seem to be willing to admit that they should avoid porn. I’ve never seen any article or heard any sermon suggesting that women ought to try to leave THEIR fantasy world. Pastors may occasionally preach against the poor moral values displayed in TV dramas, or they may talk about the waste of time that television represents, but nary a word about the greed and envy that television unleashes.
FULL DISCLOSURE: I still watch TV, and I always read Southern Living cover to cover.
Striver… you ask what is a Christian “red pill” man to do?
http://girlwithadragonflytattoo.com/2015/07/05/the-nice-guy-wants-to-be-your-partner-not-a-leader/
Gg,
Exactly. The new post by mr. d is perfect.
The pua is going to hell unless he finds Christ.
God should permeate every aspect of our thinking and feeling and action. Like you said alphas are dreggs of society. Beta is a civilization builder.
If hypergamy id Godly, then by all means christian men need to learn game. If it is ungodly, we need to learn the bible and put the rebellion down, that has nothing to do with game and everything to do with His commands of obedience.
If game is Godly than yes we need to learn it. If not we need to hopd women and churchians respnsible for this mess, as you said; they took it by gun point.
AR. I will contend that even the dreggs of society the “alpha” is a beta. He is just a useless beta. Anyone that is under authority is a beta.
Try this, its not a strawman. Its doable. Dont pay your taxes. Many “tough, i am right christians” have tried it. Jail, thus under authority. I cannot fathom how that can be a strawman. If i can come up with real scenarios all day long, they are not strawman. If you are submissive to anyone…. You are beta.
@Original Laura
There is another even more pernicious form of porn that women in our culture consume shamelessly, and this is divorce porn. Sometimes this is thinly veiled like in Danielle Steel novels, where the fantasy is a woman becoming a widow and then finding a new man. But very often all pretense is dropped and women outright feast on fantasies of divorce leading to an exciting new love (EPL, Fireproof, Single in the Suburbs, Stella, etc.). There is no counterpart for men in this genre.
AR,
Read proverbs 31:3, then go back to proverbs 30, read the whole thing and pay close attention to the beginning and end of 30.
Proverbs 31:3 should clearly tell you not to waste your energy with or for women.
If the answer is yes and we expect women to follow His Word and consider Him in everything, then we are all betas, some tougher physically, mentally and emotionally, but still beta.
Often referred to as a “Greater Beta.” If you were at all familiar with the literature, you would know this.
It’s quite tedious when, amidst a discussion of, say, plate tectonics, geological phenomena and so on, a boor crashes in to breathlessly inform the gathering that the world ain’t flat. Do tell.
Dalrock, I wonder though, how many women aren’t seeing through this “divorce porn” blogs and writings and movies and such? It’s very obvious that these divorced women are not happy in the longrun – unless you’re purely just talking about fictional movies and books where they makeup a fantasy of it.
The real life ones, like Laura Lifshitz, are easy to see that their life now is MUCH much worse off than when they were with their husband who just had normal human flaws. I’ve stopped reading her, because even the titles of her posts make me sick. It’s so obvious how horrible her life has turned out since divorcing, even though she ALWAYS tries to spin it the other way at the end of her articles. She may make money off of blogging about that, but she certainly isn’t happy… and I it goes with the statistics I think I’ve seen that most women regret divorcing their husbands just a few years later. Whereas her husband has happily moved on, dating and finding someone YOUNGER than Laura, and sweeter. This will be the “other woman” her daughter will get to watch as a second mother. And Laura hates it, but she did it to herself.
This goes back to definitions. Your definition of “alpha” and “beta” aren’t consistent with Alpha Game Plan’s definition (Vox identifies as a sigma, BTW), Rollo’s, Rossi’s, etc.
Your definition is more in line with what folks would consider an “alpha” from Hollywood or pop literature.
The RP definition is less focused on raw power and more on socio-sexual ranking. The RP alpha, for example, isn’t likely to fight a guy to get a woman.
Anchorman,
Alpha wouldnt fight over a woman, but by god he would post selfies on fakebook and read blogs about his own characteristics and give feedback on how alpha he is. Thats logical. I guess i am an alpha then. Nice. I can get on rollos blog and brag.
If thats the case… Alpha dont care about marriage, so why would he marry? Ah, he got tricked. The continuity of your discussion is telling.
Rollos blog and dalrocks changed my perspective on most everything. But arent you/ rp bloggers changing the definition of alpha beta?
Poke. Thanks yea the “better beta”. The soft pudgey man is less than beta. I find the wanta be alphas funny. I went through the stages of rp awarwness. Most are stuck in over self zealousness of I AM ALPHA, beating their chest.
Did you unplug?
Then you were not alpha.
You are rp now and unplugged does not make you alpha, it makes you a better beta.
You were already unplugged. Good for you. You are ahead of the rest of us.
Jeff,
I’m not changing any definitions. I understand various definitions enough to spot when two people are using different terms. Even though I understand the various definitions, I don’t subscribe to them, because I think it leads discussions in the wrong direction.
You can continue to dismiss their definition(s), but you’ll run into the same problem until you understand their perspective. Commenters in the RP world will say you don’t know what you’re talking about. It won’t end until you either educate yourself on the definition(s) or drop the topic. I’m just telling you how it will go.
As far as whether they changed the definition, I don’t think they did. Rather, they realized the Hollywood/pop literature caricature of alpha no longer fits in a world that disrespects men. Decades ago, a man was respected if he was a father, husband, bread-winner. Now, he’s mocked. Women won’t the man who has social status or can engage her on a primal level. Average, frustrated chumps (AFCs) are neither. Married, suburban dads are neither.
The RP community recognized this and called an end to the programming. The exposed the Narrative (women love nice guys, really!) for what it was – a system to maximize Feminine Imperative. More precisely, what the Narrative became since the mainstreaming of Feminism.
Women won’t the man who has social status or can engage her on a primal level.
Should be “want.”
Your definition is more in line with what folks would consider an “alpha” from Hollywood or pop literature.
“He” knows almost nothing about the topic..simply a bull-defecating-in-the-china-shop attempt to distract and annoy. No more time should be wasted on “him.”
By the way, “Jeff,” I’ve never seen a “doctor” that had poorer spelling or syntax in their posts/language. Just sayin’.
Robin Munn says: “You are misreading the Scriptures, and yet you lecture everyone who tells you so that they are not studying the Scriptures “correctly”. …you continue to behave as though you were the only one to get it right and the rest of Christendom was wrong. Did it never cross your mind that if all the traffic on the road appears to be going the wrong way, it might be you who is facing in the wrong direction?”
It’s a slow pitch right across home plate, but no, not going to go there. None so blind as those who will not see.
I spoke about this article with a co-worker of mine who is a good Christian and has been for many years. His response was to quote Luke 12:13-15 and state that this pastor should have told this couple the same thing: “Who made me a judge or an arbitrator over you?”. Along with this he said that the pastor should have told them “submit to one another in love and learn to live peaceably with one another.”. At face value this would sound great to other Christians, but when I presented to him the fact that the Word sets an authority structure over marriages, and that this pastor should have told the wife “submit to your husband”, as the Bible says, this co-worker told me that I was being legalistic! This is part of the problem with this whole situation! Even older Christians, from whom younger Christians are supposed to learn from, don’t fully understand or accept scripture for what it is, it has to be contorted and manipulated to make us all feel safe with it! This is the same ‘interpretation’ of scripture that is being preached throughout churches in the United States and Europe. If we cannot read scripture at face value without being called ‘legalistic’ (scripture which is obviously not poetic in nature) then what hope does the church have, if even the most direct scripture (“You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.”) suddenly becomes legalism when administered, the church will fail, having no direction and no power.
Poke,
Sorry about the spelling syntax. I am usually on my iphone and exercising when I read and/or respond.
http://biblicalgenderroles.com/2015/10/22/reverencing-ravishing-and-rollo/comment-page-1/#comments
I’ll stop arguing as I do respect you and others. My frustration with the dichotomy is the pretense that if you know game, your wife will submit and respect you. As GG has stated the FI rebellion has taken all that is masculine by gunpoint and to say that being a certain “way”, they (rebellious women) will not only hand us back that which is rightly ours, but will do so enthusiastically is ridiculous. Irregardless of any behaviors you have naturally or have acquired, most women will ended up rebelling against you and God.
@Dragonfly & Dalrock:
You actually need to abstract a bit on the topic to truly see it. It’s vicarious Emotional Experience. Remember, Women really hate taking risks, so it makes sense that, while they crave the emotional rollercoasters, they will generally avoid the actual actions. Until they’ve incorporated all of it into their worldview and then will act on it.
We see the process in action via Media manipulation & stories, but the mechanics don’t make the most amount of sense until you experience it. I’ve gone through a fairly severe period of physical infirmity, so I’ve gotten a good lesson in the way Women will try to use you as an emotional elicitation tool. I, as a result, tend to be fairly cagey (or very dry) about the details in real life. In many ways, it’s just a form of Lift Chasing, but it’s both pernicious and dehumanizing. And it’s the functional basis of every “sob story” you’ve ever seen in the Media. That’s the point of them.
Jeff, “My frustration with the dichotomy is the pretense that if you know game, your wife will submit and respect you.”
^I believe that some women need to be gamed harder than others. Part of the demise of PUAs is when they find a “good girl” who is very resistant to game because she’s taught to avoid “those guys.” It’s like crack to them because she’s such a challenge.
But then I’ve also heard that having to constantly game a woman in a longterm relationship is a very bad sign – that she’s a “low quality” woman and is too high maintenance. I don’t think I completely understand it though.
But basically, a husband that naturally “gets it” is pretty intoxicating and easy to submit to overall. Of course there are tendencies in a long term relationship for a wife to rebel, but if she’s extremely attracted to her husband (and let’s be honest, a large part of that is derived from how he acts), then yes, she WILL be afraid of losing him to some degree, and have enough respect for him to KNOW that he could walk away from their marriage if she treats him like crap or doesn’t meet his needs.
The bottom line for all to know. (jeff looks like he is stumbling into it) By law with real guns and bullets there is no headship by any man. The church knows it and would rather its men remain ignorant of it. BTW fellas women know this too.
By law there is no Christian wife keeping men ignorant and sighting scripture to show faithfulness and righteousness will not and does not change anything.
Dragonfly
Your comment is about the best it gets. Children complicates things if the man loves them. When women sense the man needs her she instinctively loses all respect for him. Civilized society before mother child custody, the vote, and all laws of misandry in general made it easy and obvious for her to see the benefits of her husband and that played directly into the basic nature of women. (that is civilization 101)
Jeff
Take a look at this article right here https://heartiste.wordpress.com/2016/01/20/charles-darwins-pros-and-cons-of-marriage/
Dragonfly:
That link you posted; you just don’t get it, do you?
Of course, how could you. You’re just another solipistic women, whose only thought is how she deserves to be treated, how the world should revolve around her.
You have linked that story before. How can you not see that the five time mother is just absolute garbage. She’s a five time mother, where are the father(s)? Don’t you think it’s highly likely she has already picked such low quality men that they didn’t bother to stick around, or she’s kicked multiple men out of her children’s lives already? So she finds a partner that’s willing to help, and of course she is unappreciative. A good heads up for me, I suppose. I mean, I’m divorced and have three kids of my own, I’ve 50, perhaps I meet a woman in her 40s with her own kids, perhaps we can both help each other? Nope. She will likely be resentful and unappreciative of anything I do to help. Won’t waste my time, thanks for illustrating how awful women are.
The guy in the story is a simp, but his conduct is a mote to the woman’s beam.
You are sinning every time you ask men to be more alpha. You are to submit to your husband. End of argument. Doesn’t matter how alpha he is acting, you are to submit. Your going on about alpha behavior is sinful and disrespectful to your husband and all other men here.
@Looking Glass
>And a chunk of Men will see Heaven and see almost no one they went to Church with them in Paradise.
Churches have more women attenders than men. But, further to your comments, it is my strong suspicion that higher numbers of the men will be in heaven than the women. But, the Lord knows the heart, not me. (1 Sam 16:7)
@RichardP
>What may not be so obvious, and something I don’t ever see emphasized, is this: by creating a help for the man, God created an expectation that the man would actually make use of the help.
…
>consider the man who never acts on any help the woman offers him, or who never tries to find out by talking with her what help she might be able to provide. We could rightly conclude that such a man is thumbing his nose at God
Your thoughts in this area are interesting, but definitely reading between the lines of what is written, so we should not firmly base any theology on this. But still, it could be valid to suggest that God expects us to make use of what he provides. 1 Cor 7:1-9 gives an example that some “Christians” would find offensive.
Humanly, I might partly agree somewhat with the second part quoted above (thumbing his nose at God), if not taken too far. E.g. if a man has a good woman available to him, who is willing to be taking as his wife, and to whom he finds appealing (ministry/help abilities, beauty, etc.), then it seems strange to refuse the help. However, 1 Cor 7 addresses this situation. And the Bible says:
36 If anyone is worried that he might not be acting honorably toward the virgin he is engaged to, and if his passions are too strong[b] and he feels he ought to marry, he should do as he wants. He is not sinning. They should get married. 37 But the man who has settled the matter in his own mind, who is under no compulsion but has control over his own will, and who has made up his mind not to marry the virgin—this man also does the right thing. 38 So then, he who marries the virgin does right, but he who does not marry her does better.
Therefore, it is in no way sinful to refuse to marry a good woman. In fact, it is better not to do so.
But the above is not even the situation we have. The vast majority of women are decidedly NOT good women. Perhaps if our leaders focused for awhile on teaching women how to behave and think, things would improve.
>procedure for handling disputes was available only to the men and was denied to the women. Given this, the wife in the story above was not wrong in taking her concerns about her husband to the church.
The passage in Matt 18 is about sin. And a man exercising his authority, seeking to bring the best result for his family, is not sinning.
Even if the foolish woman thought he sinned by making a decision she disagreed with, a wise pastor would have corrected her on that and stopped. The only sin I detect was her rebellion. And possibly the husband’s choice to refrain from rebuking her and disciplining her for her disobedience.
I see David J gave a great comment already at 12:05 pm.
>But, long before the New Testament was written, God actually said “wife, help your husband”, and – by implication – “husband, make use of the proper and fitting help I’ve given you”. Pretty much crickets on anybody verbalizing exactly what that dynamic should look like.
It seems you are trying to separate a wife’s help from her requirement to obey, so that you can ignore the second to talk only about the first. Without obedience, she is of no help at all. Same as us with God. I cannot help Jesus without obedience. I encourage you to read John 14:21-24, and see if it is unloving for us to obey Christ, or for him to expect it.
As for the crickets, I myself commented above: “it seems wise for a leader to enable his people to be great at their various God-gives roles and duties”.
So your crickets comment is invalid.
@Feeriker
>rules that God has set forth for us that most of us just don’t like and that we will go to outrageous lengths to ignore
Great comment. This is a good way to summarize my impression of those who feel they can ignore anything God said in the OT and in the gospels, simply because those were said before the sacrifice of Christ was given.
@cynthia
> It sounds like these sorts of churches let pastors just say whatever.
Unfortunately, you are, in some cases, correct. In one example, I tried to give a dissenting opinion to a pastor. After listening for less than 10 seconds, he firmly interrupted me and blabbed on for a couple minutes. I should have told him to be silent first and speak afterward — James 1:19-21. But if being arrogant allows him to “win the argument”, he is motivated to repeat the behaviour.
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@Dale:”The vast majority of women are decidedly NOT good women. Perhaps if our leaders focused for awhile on teaching women how to behave and think, things would improve.”
We, as a society, send over 80% of all young women off to secular, anti-Christian, feminist University for four years of solid programming in the Liberal Arts again, feminist-style. After that, what leaders are to “teach women how to behave and think”? They’re programmed but good. And any notion of submission to anything is a micro-aggression worthy of therapy. Your premise is good, but you’ll find no women in the venue of re-education. Pile in the corruption of women within the Church and I find things to be derned disappointing and depressing for a young man in the United States wanting to settle in and have any semblance of a husband-led family for himself. At what point do you tell men to find Christian women overseas, to abandon the American, feminist dating market? There must be some point. Even “Christian” women are the same feminist, solipsistic, selfish brand, albeit with a slightly different wrapper, ball-busters constantly angling for advantage, financial and otherwise.
We sit and attempt to navigate all this, but mostly, we’re navigating polluted waters and these waters are never going to be cleaned up because the pollution is in the souls and hearts of the women we have to work with. Doesn’t it make sense to abandon ship and through missions or other Christian pursuits overseas, perhaps find better women outside the United States, untouched by the poison of feminism?
Easy for me to say, I’m nearly sixty and possessed of a wonderful Brazilian woman 10 years my junior, but looking back, if I had to do it again (and women have gotten MUCH worse in 30 years), I’d have to seriously consider jumping ship. As a widespread practice, that would shake ’em up, but not in a way to change their miserable, hateful, feminist behavior, but merely to heap scorn on sensible men finding a sweet and submissive wife overseas. Just doing Devil’s Advocate, pardon the choice of words.
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A pastor with any of leadership ability would have told the wife that her husband made a Godly, well-thought out decision, and it was her duty to follow it. He would have added that she needed to stop coming to him like a spoiled brat who didn’t get her way.
Attention pastors: belittle and humiliate men to fuel your prideful egos at your peril. We men vote with our feet because we don’t believe in drama. We men are not like the harpies that you side with for dubious reasons.
We men are enjoying the collapse while your baby boomer donors die off. The men truly seeking God will have the last laugh.
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