Message Four
Headship in the Family Life and Church Life

Prayer: Lord, we are so short of Your glory, so short of Your testimony. But every time we come to You we have a sense of worship. We realize that all our sins have been cleansed and all our shortcomings have been covered. Lord, You are the life-giver, and You are ready to bless us with all the heavenly blessings. Lord, we do open our spirit this morning. Lord, we do open our heart. Lord, speak to us. Appear to us. Lord, when You appeared to Abraham, he gave up everything for You. When You appeared to Jacob, he became Israel. Lord, how we want to give ourselves to You for Your appearing, for Your manifestation.

Lord, we realize no human encouragement or admonishing has any value. But Lord, give Yourself to us this morning. Lord, no matter where we are, let all our spirits be so open to hear from You, so open to touch You, so open to realize You, so open to experience You. Lord Jesus Christ, bless this gathering. Cover this small gathering with Your blood. Speak to us in a rich way so that everyone who has come here would realize some blessing, enjoy Your presence, and go on in a more healthy and proper way in the church life through this fellowship. Lord, bless us. Bless Your church. Bless all the sisters. Oh, Lord Jesus, thank You. Thank You for always blessing us.

Message: According to the Bible, God is the head of Christ, Christ is the head of man, and man is the head of woman (1 Cor. 11:3). If Christ were somehow improper to God, then God would be our head directly. But, of course, Christ has always been most proper, so therefore Christ can be our head. If a husband rejects Christ's headship, then his wife has the liberty to take Christ as her head, since her husband has rejected the headship of Christ. Rejection does not mean having a weakness. No husband is fully one with Christ yet. All husbands will have experiences of being very weak. At these times you will realize that your husband doesn't look like Christ, and he doesn't look like he can be the head. But your husband's weakness alone does not give you the freedom to reject his headship. You have such a freedom only if he himself rejects Christ's headship. The wife is here to help her husband into a proper headship.

Sometimes a husband's heart is hardened, causing him to reject the headship of Christ. He may not want to have anything to do with the Lord or with the church. Then naturally, in that condition, the sister has to learn to walk in the Lord's presence. In this way she can help her husband, because she herself takes Christ's headship. Eventually her submission to Christ will put her husband in his proper place, and then she must take her husband as her head. He should still have the headship.

If a sister does not have a husband, then the church is her husband. In a sense, the Lord is her husband, but in practicality the Lord is the church. To say, "I love the Lord," is not worth much. Only when you practically know how to love the church do you really love the Lord. Otherwise, a verbal declaration that you love the Lord could just be a kind of superstition. It may not be real. Very few people can really love the Lord without practically loving other Christians. If a sister is not married, she must realize that her real husband is the Lord, and in practicality this means that her husband is the church.

To realize the headship is a high thing. Satan became Satan because he never realized the headship. In the Bible, we see that his one mistake was his desire to be equal with God (Isa. 14:14). He did not try to kill anyone. He wasn't even a revolutionary. He just wanted a "democracy." Because of this, he became Satan. This shows us that to realize the headship is a very high matter.

Democracy is the highest form of government human beings can have. It gives all people the full right to grow, to develop, and to attain success according to their ability. The basic function of a democracy is to give everyone a chance. For example, you don't have to be from a politically powerful family to be elected to public office. Furthermore, as long as you have the ability and the desire, anyone can be a millionaire. However, the negative byproduct of democracy is that negative things are also allowed to develop. So crime and corruption also survive in this kind of society.

In a very negative sense, Satan was the founder of democracy. He was the highest of the three archangels, above Michael and Gabriel. Thus when Michael contended with him over the body of Moses, Michael did not rebuke him but said instead, "The Lord rebuke you" (Jude 9). Michael realized his position. He was not in a position to rebuke Satan, since God has created Satan to be higher than Michael. Satan was second in the universe under God. Once he wanted to be equal with God he lost the headship. If he had gotten what he desired, there would be two heads in the universe. Instead, when he lost his headship, he was cast down to the earth (Isa. 14:12-15). Then the whole universe was brought under judgment.

In the church life, we may not see the matter of headship. We must remember that the church is an organism, not an organization. It is easy for us to consider the church a democracy, but not many of us see the church as an organism. This is exactly what Satan is after. We consider that everyone is free to do what they want, and no one can tell anyone what to do. This is democracy, and this is what Satan utilizes. An organism has a natural order. This order is set up according to life, not according to arrangement. Both an organization and an organism are organized. But the organism is organized according to life, and the organization is organized according to human maneuvering. For example, my human body is an organism. My hand has always been my hand. It has no right to jump to my face and become a nose. The hand cannot say that it has been created equal with the nose. It was not created equal. The hand is simply the hand. This is not through human maneuvering, but because the body is a healthy organism.

This can be related both to the church life and the family life. In the family life, your husband is your head. Whether he is good or bad, prevailing or defeated, as long as he is under the headship of Christ, he is qualified to be your head. The wife has to learn to submit herself to her husband. If her husband's headship is poor, then it is up to the wife to perfect the headship, not to replace the headship.

For example, we could say that senators and congressmen are elected to perfect the president. The Congress is not elected to be the president. Sometimes Congress tries to be the president. Whatever bills the president proposes, Congress proposes competing bills. They compete with the president to see who has the better bills. They are acting not to perfect the president, but rather to replace the president. This creates chaos. The Congress is elected with the purpose of perfecting the president. If the president is wrong, or goes too far, the Congress guards the president and keeps him in check.

This principle also applies to the wife. Your husband may not be a good head, but as long as he does not reject Christ, you must help your husband be under the headship of Christ. You cannot replace his headship. In worldly society, when a man and woman get married, they immediately begin to struggle to see who will have control of their relationship. Most often, the wife wins and takes control of the family. She has many weapons - her tears, her anger, her threats to run home to her mother. This is not healthy. The wife shouldn't win control of the family. She should learn to perfect her husband's headship.

I believe this is not difficult for a wife to do because basically most husbands have "surrendered" already. If a husband gets angry when everything is not the way that he wants, he will be difficult to help. But most husbands are not like this. Most husbands just want a peaceful life. They are not too concerned with the details. The older a man gets, the simpler he gets. He eats whatever his wife serves without complaint, because he has learned that if he touches his wife, he is in trouble. The wife has already won. I am not saying this is good or bad, but this is the actual case with most couples. In this case, perfecting the husband is very easy. The husband cannot overcome the wife. Even Jesus cannot "overcome" the church. We are so sloppy, yet He is so patient with us. In the family life, as long as you help your husband's body, soul and spirit, as has been shared in the previous messages, perfecting your husband's headship will not be hard.

Let me use this opportunity to say a word about the headship in the church life. In the church life, all thoughts of democracy are satanic. You should not ask all the time, "Why are we doing it this way?" You should not question the elders' headship, or question that the elders are under Christ's headship. To question things in the church life is to show you don't trust that the elders are under the headship of Christ. This insults Christ's headship. It is very serious to question the elders in any way. Whether the elder is right or wrong, you shouldn't touch it. Even if the elder is wrong, it can turn out right. But if you touch it, then even if he is right, it will end up wrong. Don't make the church a place where the elders must submit to the members. Once this happens the church testimony is over. To threaten the elders and try to force them to do what you want is satanic.

In the church life we need to realize the headship. Once we realize the headship we will hate any kind of threatening. We will hate any thought of democracy in the church life. For example, it is a blessing to have someone functioning as the "brain" in the body life. That one can direct the movement for the whole body. You may consider that in an organism no one can tell you what to do. But the finger is always controlled by the hand. And the hand has no choice but to move when the arm moves. The hand cannot be responsible only to the head. If the hand wants to be responsible to the head, it must be responsible to the arm. In your body, each member's function is so much in life. It is really an organism, yet it is most organized. It is organized according to life and function, not according to maneuvering.

When the elders take a direction in the church life, and you have the thought of democracy, you may get frustrated by their decision. But if you realize how hateful democracy is to the church life and to the heading up, you will be much more restful. Very few of us really understand the heading up. Only Christ fully knows. In the process that Christ went through, His submission was so marvelous. Even before creation, He fully realized what was going to happen in God's economy. He designed the whole universe (Prov. 3:19-20). He knew what would happen to man. Adam's fall was not a surprise to Him. Christ realized that the 4000 years of human history before His incarnation were a preparation for Him to come, to suffer and to die. No one knows how much He suffered. Only in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night of His crucifixion do we get a glimpse of how difficult the path was that He took. Even though Christ had engineered the whole process and even though He knew He would be in that garden on that night, yet He still prayed to God to remove the cup if He was willing (Luke 22:41-44). He wept and prayed even to the point that His sweat was like drops of blood. Yet He still fully submitted to God's headship.

Even Christ's resurrection and ascension were under God's authority. After He resurrected He waited for God to call Him to ascend to the throne. He did not presume that because of His accomplishments He deserved to ascend, but He waited for God to call Him. Philippians 2:9 tells us that it was God who highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name. Everything is under God's headship.

In the church life, if we realize the heading up in the church, we will have a godly fear. We will be fearful that we might offend God. We who have been raised in a democratic society always like to find out "why." Jesus never asked "why." He did not need to wait for God to exalt Him after resurrection, yet He waited on God. According to our understanding, He had already accomplished everything. He had the right to ascend to the heavens, but instead He waited. We can see Christ's godliness when Mary tried to touch Him the garden. He told her, "Do not touch Me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father" (John 20:17). Apparently He was waiting for God's order to ascend.

This kind of heading up is how the church is produced, and the exercise of this heading up is how the church will be built up. This is not cheap. Just consider how Christ came down to earth. He lived as a carpenter. He died on the cross. After He resurrected, He waited for God's order to ascend. Then He was put on the throne and given the name above every name. His being headed up was not cheap. In the same way, the church is not produced in a cheap way. It requires a heading up.

If after resurrection Christ had not waited for God to call Him up, the whole process would have been over. That would have been according to Satan's principle of rebellion. Praise the Lord that this did not happen. We must realize this principle in the building up of the church. We should pay attention to the heading up in the church life. If we do this, we will be blessed. Learn in the church life not to have any voice. Whatever the church arranges, stand with it.

You must learn to trust that if you have a spirit, the elders have a spirit even more. If you say to them, "The Lord hasn't told me to do it," you are rejecting the spirit of the elders. If you think the Lord has told you something, you have to realize that the Lord speaks to the elders even more. We all must pay attention to the headship in the church life.

Question: It is easy to submit to the Lord because you know that He is right. But how do you submit to your husband when he considers himself under the Lord's headship but you know he is making a mistake?

Answer: The husband should not reject anything that is positive towards the Lord, like going to meetings, reading the Word, prayer, enjoying Christ, and so on. To reject these things, in principle, is to reject the Lord's headship. However, a sister may go too far in carrying out one of these practices, causing her husband to restrict her. We need to help our husbands take a stand for these positive practices. But in all matters not related to the divine life, we must learn to submit.

Sometimes our husband may not be prevailing. We need to perfect him and help him to be prevailing. It is not easy to help your husband be prevailing, yet submit to him at the same time. While you are perfecting your husband, you need to learn submission. Usually the wife likes to "rub it in" when she is right about something. But this ruins the headship. You may be right, but you are the helpmate. Your husband is the head. So the glory should go to him, even though the problems come to you.

This principle matches that of the headship in the church. We need to realize that no matter whether the elders are right or wrong, if we stay one with them, under the covering, we are all right. But in the family life, the wife is usually persuaded that she knows more than her husband. She may feel, "95% of the time my judgment is better than my husband's." So this is something we are always fighting against. We try to find ways to protect the family from our husband's "mistakes." We feel that if he makes a mistake the whole family will fall apart. So we try to do things ourselves. In doing this, we insult the headship. The safest way is to trust our husband, and stay under his covering. We are much safer under the covering, making a mistake, than coming out from under the covering and being "right."

Very few sisters realize how wonderful it is that they have a husband. It doesn't matter whether or not your husband is prevailing. Most sisters are bothered by their husbands. If the husband is too prevailing, they complain that he neglects the family. If he is not prevailing, they want him to be somebody glorious yet spend all his time with his wife. The wives often do not realize that the husband's existence is a great help to the wife. If they realize this, they know how to properly be under the headship.

A sister who knows how to honor her husband will know how to honor the church. But I do not believe that any sister who does not know how to honor her husband will know how to honor the church. If you know how to honor your husband you can help him have an interest in spiritual things. But if you don't honor your husband, you will not help his interest in the church to grow. If a sister is not able to stand with her husband, I don't believe she has the ability to stand with the elders. If you always find fault with your husband, you will also be able to find fault with the church because no elders are perfect. Then you will always have an opinion about how things should be done. This could cause small matters to become big issues.

If you know how to appreciate your husband, then to the degree that he is in the Lord, he will become your covering. Then it will be easy for you to learn to cooperate with the church. A sister who knows how to be under her husband's covering can be a real blessing. The real spiritual saints always know how to put themselves under a proper headship. To have a husband and to be under his headship is a blessing, not a limitation. Even if it frustrates us, it is still a blessing because it forces all the spiritual things we have to be genuine. Without "frustration" from your husband as your head, you may pick up spiritual things too easily and become obsessed with them.

An obsessed person becomes a worshipper of himself. He becomes overconfident and no longer has proper judgment. He is caught by something and is not himself anymore. It is easy for a sister to be easily upset or obsessed. A sister likes to think of herself as a good wife, a good sister, or a good mother. If you have just a little success, you are obsessed. Your husband is the best help to take you away from your obsession. You have to praise the Lord that you have a husband. Treasure your husband.

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  Copyright © 2001 T. Chu, The Church in Cleveland