Biblical Headship

Because the husband's headship is grounded in the events of creation, we can say that his position of delegated authority is both permanent and universal, and cannot be dismissed as culturally limited. What was established at creation, no culture may destroy or alter. Also, while the practices associated with the husband's headship were ruined by the fall of Adam in garden, his authority was delegated to him before the fall. In this command for wives to be submissive to their own husbands, Paul is addressing the church – a people redeemed and returned to a pre-fall condition. While the new creation in Christ removes the cultural barriers between male and female, and frees us from the distortion associated with the practices of male headship that came as a result of the fall, it does not remove, but in fact, restores the roles of headship and submission intended by God in the original creation.

The divine intention of marriage from the beginning was for the two to become one flesh and function together – not as a ‘two-headed monster,' but under one head – and that authority is given to the husband. However, because husbands and wives are sinners, and even redeemed Christian husbands and wives are influenced by remaining sin, there is an ongoing struggle, both generally, in the flesh of all men against authority, and specifically, in the wife's tendency toward rebellion and husband's tendency for a domineering autocratic rule.