Submission is a hard word for us to swallow. I think it is safe to say that in our society the word is full of negative connotations and immediately brings up thoughts of abuse, control, slavery and failure. In the world of Mixed Martial Arts, being submitted means you gave up. You admitted that your opponent defeated you. They were able to place you in a hold you could not escape from and had to quit, or “tap out,” to stop the pain. We see submission in our lives in the same way. It is seen as a sign of weakness, inferiority and oppression. Considering how we as a world define submission, it’s no wonder that when we speak about submitting to God we receive a massive push back. Even Christians have a hard time accepting the role of submission. We don’t want to be weak, don’t consider ourselves inferior and certainly do not want to be oppressed. But what if I told you that submission within the parameters of God’s design is actually a beautiful and glorious thing? What if I told you the fears and negative emotions you have concerning submission were completely unfounded within that design? What if I told you that submission could actually be one of the greatest gifts God has given to you? Would you believe me? Could you believe me?
Before I get started, I want to reiterate for clarities’ sake, I am not talking about submission in general; rather, I am speaking specifically on submission within God’s design. The secular world has a completely different type of submission and most certainly a lot could be said about it, and I will. However, it will be in an upcoming post. Today, I will only be looking at God’s design and what a beautiful thing submission is within it.
I think the best place to start would be to talk about what submission to God actually looks like. All too often when we hear the word submission, we think of slavery and defeat, but that isn’t true with God. God doesn’t treat us like a master would treat His slave and He certainly doesn’t treat us like a defeated enemy. Quite the opposite actually, He tells us that we are His children. We have been adopted as Children of the King, which would make our submission to God very much like a child submitting to his father. So when you see a child obeying and respecting his father, does that seem like an ugly or cruel thing? No, we recognize that a parent holds a position of authority over their children and that authority is there for the benefit and protection of the child. In fact, the only people that really seem to fight the parent’s authority are the children.
Children have a hard time seeing how their parents’ authority over them really makes their life better. They want to do what they want to do. They see the rules as a hindrance to them having a good time, instead of safeguards to protect them from hurting themselves and their future. We act the same way when it comes to accepting God’s position of authority over us. We want to do what we want to do and we have a tendency to see God as just trying to spoil our fun. He is just a controlling parent that wants to keep us from having a good time, but in reality, all he is trying to do is teach us, protect us, and lead us to greatness.
Do you remember the Disney adaptation of Pinocchio? There is a scene in the movie that does a great job of illustrating the dangers of being a child without the protection of a parent’s authority. Pinocchio is convinced to get on a boat with a bunch of other boys who go to an island where they are allowed to run amuck and do whatever they like. As a kid, when you see the island for the first time it seems like a great place to go. It is basically a huge carnival and everything is free. They can eat junk food, play games, ride carnival rides, stay up late, even drink and smoke. There are no parents there to stop them and they are left alone to their own desires, but eventually, one by one, they all start to change. Each one eventually turns into a donkey at which time they are sent off and sold as workhorses. Clearly, God won’t turn us into donkeys if we don’t obey Him (although He did once have a donkey talk to a man that wouldn’t listen) but our choices will always affect us, changing us a little bit at a time. If we spend our lives doing our own thing then we will find ourselves stuck in the circumstances we have created; instead of the circumstances God intended.
I know, in my experience, one of the hardest things for my kids to learn and understand is that the rules my wife and I set are not to make them miserable, but to help protect them. We don’t make them go to bed or eat their dinner because we are cruel dictators, but because we want them to stay healthy. We often find ourselves explaining to them that God has given us the job of caring for and protecting them and so we have to set rules and make them sleep in order to obey God. God does the same for us.
God doesn’t command us to submit so he can be a tyrannical ruler. He doesn’t want to make our lives miserable. Actually, He is trying to protect us, provide for us and bless us. He calls us to obey, because He knows disobedience will cause us to be hurt. He knows that if we are living outside of his design, it will only cause us pain in the end. God’s call for our submission actually comes from His love for us. He loves us enough to lead us through the darkness, walk with us through the dangers, and to protect us from our enemies. However, if we don’t obey and instead choose to do our own thing and place ourselves in dangerous situations, God may protect us from some of those consequences, but like any parent, He has to let us learn and so He has to let us face the punishment for our actions; like any parent, He doesn’t want to do that. He doesn’t want to see us in pain. He doesn’t want to see us in tears or trembling in fear. He is attempting to protect us and provide for us just like every good parent wishes they could do for their own kid.
I don’t want to spend a lot of time on woman submitting to their husbands. I think that a man calling for submission would come off as some sort of an agenda, which is a far cry from what I am trying to do, but just think about this. A parent could never adequately protect and provide for their child without putting some rules in place. A parent could never teach their children how to be adults or teach them about God without the kids’ respect. In fact, it would be nearly impossible for a parent to do much of anything constructive for their kids without authority and respect. Would you agree? Well the same is true for a husband that has been given the responsibility and instinct to protect and provide for his wife.
I have shown you what submission to God looks like, but how is it one of God’s greatest gifts? What makes it so beautiful? The simplest answer is that it is what we were actually designed and created for. I can’t think of anything more beautiful than for a person to actually fulfill their designed purpose. However, the truth is even beyond our purpose, submitting to God truly works in our benefit. I don’t believe dedicating your life to God means that life will be perfect, but I do believe that when we submit, we will be blessed. The blessings can come in a multitude of ways, but they will come. Submitting to God’s will brings peace and comfort even in impossible situations. He can bless your finances. He can cause you to find great joy in this life that you may have not found otherwise. He can bless your health and cause you to live a longer, healthier life. The amount of ways that God can and will bless us is infinite and impossible to list here. However, God will always bless a life that is submitted to Him. Furthermore, God will bless countless people through a person that is obedient to Him. Friends, family and strangers will all be blessed by a life that is truly submitted to God.
I would like to take a minute to show how we are still being blessed today by the submission of others. First, Moses submitting to God allowed the Jewish nation to be freed from slavery as well as gave us the first 5 books of the Bible. Noah submitted in building the ark and saved the entire human race from destruction. Paul submitted and followed Jesus which provided us with a large portion of the New Testament as well greatly expanding the Christian movement in the early years of the church. Of course, Jesus’ submitting to The Father brought us salvation. It is hard to imagine what the world would look like today if those moments hadn’t happened, but there is no doubt it would have altered history in profound ways.
I know the fear of many is that submission to God is the equivalent of slavery. I even know there are some theologians, like John MacArthur, that hold this very sentiment. However, through my study of the scripture, I have never been able to find anything that makes me think that is how God sees us today. I will talk more about this in a later post, but God tells us that He wants to set us free and break the chains. It wouldn’t make a lot of sense to do that if we are all His slaves. God gives us freewill and the ability to choose to follow Him or not, which, again, isn’t something seen in master/slave relationship. Slaves are property of the Master, but God tells us that we are His children and heirs to His kingdom, which doesn’t really sound much like being a slave. We need to stop looking at the world’s definition of submission and allowing that to scare us away from submitting to God. Submission within His design, while not easy, isn’t meant to break us, but to restore us, bless us, and bring us closer to our heavenly Father.
