So often today we find that people are quick to try to redefine words in order to make them more palatable or acceptable. One of the
words is submission. In a world that is
constantly trying to encourage people to be assertive and express their point
of view and even demand their rights, submission is often overlooked as a more
appropriate option.
The Bible has a number of direct references to the word,
submit and submission. According to
Strong’s Lexicon, the original Greek word was a military term referring to the
arrangement of troops but also in a voluntary, non-military manner of yielding, providing support and cooperation.
In the world submission is thought of as a
weakness. As a result, we are encouraged
to not submit but rather to compete. We
compete for attention, for an audience and for our ideas, whether right or
wrong, to be recognized.
However practically every way, despite the culture’s instances on being assertive and the distaste for submission, we actually submit to each other everyday. At a four-way stop, you submit to the person on the right. Getting on an elevator, we submit to those getting off. When we go shopping we submit to their lines and queues, even counting the number of items we have in our baskets in order to submit to a small sign that says, “Express Check-out, 12 items or less”.
Jesus provided the best example of submission by
His submission to the plan of salvation.
Jesus was not only the incarnation of God but He was born in order to
die. He submitted to His Father in
Gethsemane when He said, “Not my will Father, but yours”. He also modeled for us the appropriate path of submission in serving his disciples in washing their feet and in His submission to Pilot and the religious authorities.
Practicing submission is actually a spiritual
discipline. When we serve each other,
we submit to each other. Wives are not
the only ones that are to submit but we are to submit to one another (Eph 5:21).
When we live in submission to God and each other, we are
practicing the principles that Jesus showed us as He loved his disciples and
showed them how to serve each other.
Biblical submission is not living according to what the world expects or
defines as ‘success’ but by the principles and calling of Jesus. As a spiritual
discipline it provides freedom, an alignment with the Gospel and true
peace. Richard Foster writes in
Celebration of Discipline that submission is “the ability to lay down the
terrible burden of always needing to get our own way".
When we understand submission as discipline we can practice the discipline by serving God, by serving each other and contributing greatly through the plan that God has established for us.
