tmeiers

Not Arbitrary or Reversible
One of the things that is crystal-clear in Ephesians 5 is that the
roles of husband and wife in marriage are not arbitrarily assigned,
and they are not reversible any more than the role of Christ and the
church are revers-ible. The roles of husband and wife are rooted in
the distinctive roles of Christ and his church. The revelation of
this mystery is the recovery of the original intention of covenant
marriage in the Garden of Eden.
You  can  see this  most  clearly  when  you  ponder  what  sin  did
to headship  and  submission and how Paul's teaching  here  in
Ephesians 5 is so perfectly suited to remedy that corruption.
When sin entered the world, it ruined the harmony of marriage
not because it brought headship and submission into existence,
but because it twisted man's humble, loving headship toward
hostile domination in some men and lazy indifference in others.
And it twisted woman's intelligent, willing, happy, creative,
articulate submission toward manipulative obsequious-ness in
some women and brazen insubordination in others. Sin didn't
create headship and submission; it ruined them and distorted
them and made them ugly and destructive.
Recovering Roles from the Ravages of Sin
Now if this is true, then the redemption we anticipate with the
coming of Christ is not the dismantling of the original, created
order of loving headship and willing submission, but a