So I had the joy of speaking at a marriage conference down in Texas at Yorkshire Baptist Church this past weekend. And one of the ideas developed there was the absolute incompatibility of Christian marriage and the woke nonsense. What’s more, Christian marriage is not only incompatible with the woke nonsense. Christian marriage obliterates the woke nonsense. If you want to lay siege to the Jericho of social justice, then get to work on Christian marriage. Enjoy your evening viewing of Fox News if you’d like. And when you’re done, and find yourself wondering what in the world you can do to rectify the crumbling of our civilization, then look no farther than the Christian marriage and family.
How wise is the old hymn God Give Us Christan Homes? I recall growing up singing it repeatedly in Sunday worship: “God give us Christian homes, homes where the father is true and strong, homes that are joyous with love and song . . . homes where the mother in caring quest strives to show others your way is best . . . homes where the children are led to know Christ in his beauty who loves them so.” Now it is downright patriarchal that the father is listed in the verse before the mother. How come we don’t sing of the mother in the verse before the father? Is this not another example of the misogynistic spirit from days gone by wafting its way—no I dare say snaking its slimey way into our modern expereince?
Kate Millet would say so. She is a woman who practiced homosexuality and advanced the feminist cause in the second wave of feminism. She held meetings in which the following call and response was heralded: “Why are we here today?” asked the leader. “To make revolution,” the group answered. “What kind of revolution?” “The Cultural Revolution.” “And how do we make Cultural Revolution?” “By destroying the American family!” “How do we destroy the family?” “By destroying the American Patriarch,” the group cried exuberantly. “And how do we destroy the American Patriarch?” the leader replied. “By taking away his power!” “How do we do that?” “By destroying monogamy!” they shouted. “How can we destroy monogamy?” “By promoting promiscuity, eroticism, prostitution and homosexuality!”
Now here is the interesting point. These cultural revolutionaries were not wrong in their understanding of the structure. They were wrong about wanting to blow the structure up with dynamite. In that deconstruction project, they joined with the rebellious kings and shook their fists at heaven, “Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us” (Psalm 2:3). But they were manifestly right to see that monogomay and sex according to God’s design strengthens the patriarch.
The woman who fears the LORD, a woman to be commended you will recall, enriches her husband, “The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life” (Proverbs 31:11-12). The wise father of Proverbs employs the same logic as the feminists, albeit he employs it for good and not for evil. He runs the football in the right direction. He cuts with the grain. He warns his sons that the strange woman will take away his honor and his strength, “For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb . . . but her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a twoedged sword. Her feet go down to death . . . Come not nigh the door of her house: Lest thou give thine honour to others . . . Lest strangers be filled with thy wealth” (Proverbs 5:3-5, 8-9, 10). A man’s wife, on the other hand, is his sexual wellspring that results in his strength and satisfaction, “Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well” (Proverbs 5:15).
The feminists aimed to cutoff that wellspring because they knew it strengthened the patriarch, which strengthened the family, which strengthened society. And if society remained strengthtened, then they could not advance their cultural revolution which has resulted in things like the United States considering the viability of drafting women into the military, men taking all of the gold medals in women’s track and field, and seventh grade Susan realizing that there is a bearded man in the stall next to her and the principal approves.
The Christian wife is in deep trouble with the feminists and woke crowed for she strengthens the patriarch at all times and in all places. She is, after all, wed to her husband such that the man who loves his wife actually loves himself (Ephesians 5:28). As she grows in knowledge, she becomes a better counselor to him. As she prays, he is blessed. As she grows in industry, he is enriched. Any increase she experiences becomes an increase for him. The feminists know this and despise it. The Christian woman knows it and delights in it. The Christian husband knows it and that is encouragement for Him to keep dying for her welfare (Ephesians 5:25).
It is abundantly clear that our society is reeling. We find ourselves in a battle between a Christian foundation, a Christian ethic, and a Christian culture over against a pagan foundation, a pagan ethic, and a pagan culture. And those on the side of the Philistines know how troublesome the mothers in Israel are to their cause. The spirit of our age aims to weaken, deconstruct, isolate, and starve. And these Christian women keep strengthening, building, joining, and feeding. The foolish woman is a growling tizzy, knowing nothing. She offers only stolen water and bread to her guests, and her house is a hell-hole (Proverbs 9:13-18). Many a patriarch has not known that “the dead are there” in her house (Proverbs 9:18). Lady Wisdom, on the other hand, builds her house, furnishes her table with roasted meats, mingles her wine and the patriarch is strengthened (Proverbs 9:1-6).
While the battle lines are clearly drawn, the good news is that we already know how this conflict is going to go. The battlefield itslef is laid out in the Christian fashion. The world we live in is prewired. You can’t make it egalitarian no matter how hard you try. God has designed the world in heirarchical fashion. And his design is ignored to one’s peril. The strange women, those outside of covenant with God, want to tear down the patriarchy. But they end up tearing down their whole house, and their plans fall with it. But Christian women, the greatest women in the world rejoice in God their Father. They trust and obey the Father, which inevitably results in strengthening godly patriarchy.