Colossians is such a powerful letter filled with so many rich truths that we would do well to let sink deeply into our hearts.
One theme that is easily found in this letter is the believers’ new identity in Christ and how that has transformed them from their worldly/fleshly lives into new creation and life in Spirit. The 3rd chapter opens with a powerful statement: “If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.” (Col 3:1) That’s right now–if Jesus is your Lord, you are raised with him RIGHT NOW. If you’re rooted in Christ, you are alive in Him and no longer alive to your former self. Paul is helping the church in Colossae see that truth so they quit grasping at things of the world.
Then comes the oft-quoted verse about husbands and wives, continuing with other instructions based on relationships (children, parents, bondservants, and masters). (Col 3:18-4:1) Is Paul just shifting gears to discuss what a “Christian household” should look like? That’s what the headings in many of our Bible translations lead us to believe…
This new life isn’t something we turn on and off based on where we are or who we’re around. It must be lived out all the time in every situation. 24/7, 365. That must include the way we treat our spouses and our children, and anyone else in our lives.
“Submit” language has caused much angst when interpreting this verse. Commonly, interpretations go awry when context is not fully considered.
Back to the Garden of Eden: Adam and Eve began in perfect harmony–with both God and each other. Adam even says of Eve in Gen 2:23 – “[She is] bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.” This perfect unity is stated very plainly in the following verse (Gen 2:24): “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” Doesn’t get much more unified than that.
But then sin entered the world. And because of that, consequences were enacted that disrupted that perfect harmony. The woman’s consequences are made plain in Gen 3:16: “To the woman he said, ‘I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you.’” The NLT version puts it like this: “And you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you.’”
In the fallen world, there will be a natural power struggle. The harmony and unity is gone, and the focus is on who gets to control the other.
Paul is not saying that in a Christ-centered home, the husband rules the wife. Rather, he’s arguing against the fallen world order because we are no longer under that curse if we are in Christ. He’s pleading for the wife to quit acting like Eve and “desiring to control” her husband. But he’s just as much pleading for the husband to not play his part in that curse and “rule over” (ie, domineer) his wife. He’s pleading for a return to the perfect unity of “one flesh.” That unity is also displayed in how we make up the body of Christ (“Is Christ divided?” 1 Cor 1:13).
Let us been knit together in love, bound in perfect harmony, in both our marriages and our spiritual family (Col 3:14).