Since it’s Sunday, and as far as I can tell the churches in general still can’t get it right, I thought I would comment a little bit about that favorite passage in the bible: Ephesians Chapter 5. The old “Wives respect your husbands and husbands love your wives.” bit that gets focused on every now and then in church.
Usually its said how much men need respect and how much women need love and generally men don’t give love and women, well they “give love” but not respect is usually how it is characterized, you know the morally superior sex gender that the church caters to generally gets a more favored treatment.
But the sermons miss the point.
I have heard men spouting how their wives “must give them respect” (Which by the way is an admission that their wives in fact don’t respect them, otherwise they would be spouting off how their wives do respect them and what fine christian women they are.)
Women love complaining that their husbands are incapable of love, and will complain about it endlessly. (Which in of itself is a sign of lacking respect for their husbands).
That all being said, I am going to point out that the message is the reverse of what it should be and any preacher worth his salt should know this, or know the implied message and yet, like poor marksmen they keep missing the target.
The real message in Ephesians is this: Husbands should be men that their wives (want to) respect and wives should be women that their husbands (want to) love.
Instead both sides think the other should just “give them” what they want instead of earning it.
Entitlement thinking.
I am not talking about respectability, I am talking respect. Being a man with game, social dominance, a leader. Acting as the head of the household, not just assuming it. A person does not respect a follower, they respect a leader. So must a man be.
Game.
The men that demand respect are the ones that won’t get respect. You can’t make someone respect you (fear you yes, obey you maybe, but not respect you) unless you act in a way that earns respect. As soon as your are demanding the respect “your position deserves” the respect ends with the position, it is not yours it belongs to the role you play. (This is often the problem people in positions of authority have. They have the respect of their position, but not the respect of the person. People must accept their judgments, but if they were truly wise, people would honor their judgment instead of resenting it. The respect would extend to all aspects of their lives.)
This is not about shaming men into socially acceptable behavior (which the churches do regularly). That behavior has to do with respectability and not being a man worthy of respect. They are very distinct from each other. Man that worries about being respectable in that sense is very often not a man worthy of respect (ironically). A woman is not going to respect a man that can be shamed into behaving, such a man is not a leader. By shaming men, the church undermines men and undermines marriage.
So too with women, if you wish to be loved, you must be lovable. So many women believe that simply by being a woman they deserve love. Not so. Love too must be earned, just as respect is. Otherwise it is hollow objectification. Loving a woman, simply because she is a woman, is not loving the person.
Being a bitch does not make you lovable (the man may love you but he will have you too, it will poison your relationship over time). So often now being a bitch is mistaken for being strong, when being a bitch is really a sign of weakness, brittleness, and inability to cope with life’s difficulties.
If a woman is not loving, she will never feel loved by her man.
Why this is so hard for the churches to convey, is beyond me, yet it is.
