One of the good things I learned as an officer in the U.S. Navy was that authority and responsibility must go together in equal proportions. A person with authority but no responsibility will exercise that authority arbitrarily. He will order people around with no objective other than establishing his own power. Conversely, a person with responsibility for a task but no authority to help him accomplish it will only be frustrated. Before I apply this concept to Christian husbands, I want to discuss and hopefully dissolve a common misconception. Because the Scripture tells wives, children, and servants to obey, some Christians have inferred that it is the job of husbands, fathers, and masters to command . This is an inference only and is, therefore, invalid. The Bible contains no direct teaching nor implication that husbands, fathers, and masters are to be commanders. The Bible does not teach a chain of command. It teaches a chain of obedience and submission . The Bible teaches that s...
“ But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves , lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people” (2 Timothy 3:1-5). A young woman told me once that she loved herself and that was a good thing. She did not like it for the Bible to have it listed as a bad thing. How can we tell it is a bad thing? The other words in the list from 2 Timothy are characteristics of loving yourself. They are subsets of loving yourself. Let’s look at them. Lovers of money – loving yourself Boastful – loving yourself Proud – loving yourself Abusive – certainly not loving your neighbor as yourself Disobedient to parents – loving ...