Sunday, February 9, 2014

David J Stewart: Preferences and Self-Seeking

It is irresistibly charming when people just say what they think instead of hiding behind eloquent words that mean nothing. On the "Christian Family Page" (presumably) David Stewart's wife writes the following:

"Wives are to submit to their husband's requests. The only exception is when a woman is told to do evil, remember Ananias and Sapphira."
( http://www.jesus-is-lord.com/family.htm)

It sounds great until you begin to think what this advice really entails. If wives should submit to their husbands' request, we are creating godly wives and ungodly husbands, for love doesn't seek its own (1  Cor 13:5), nor does love demand others follow our every preference, for love is easily entreated, and looks also to the interests of others (Phil 2:1-5).


On another page, Stewart responds to a letter sent to him:

"She argued that a wife doesn't have to obey her husband if he's wrong. In fact, she is wrong. We're talking about obedience here. Some people beat around the bush and allege that being "subject" or being "submissive" is not the same as being "obedient"; HOWEVER, the Bible eliminates all such speculation by associating a wife's obedience with that of the Church obeying Jesus Christ. It would be absurd for anyone to say that the church should be subject to Christ, and submit to Christ, but does not have to necessarily obey Christ ("http://www.jesus-is-savior.com/Evils%20in%20America/Feminism/everything.htm).

So which one is it, Mr Stewart? Do married women have to obey their husbands in EVERYTHING, even when the husband is wrong, or is there an exception, such as when a woman is told to do evil?

Jesus would never ask us to sin, but husbands do sometimes ask their wives to sin. Should married women obey God, or their husbands in such cases?

Having brought the apostles, they made them appear before the Sanhedrin to be questioned by the high priest. "We gave you strict orders not to teach in this name," he said. "Yet you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and are determined to make us guilty of this man's blood." Peter and the other apostles replied: "We must obey God rather than men!
(Acts 5:27-29, NIV).

Of course, Stewart doesn't think women should live for God, but for men, and that is where his error comes from. (See http://recoveringfrombiblical.blogspot.com/2014/02/david-j-stewart-enigma.html)

But if Christians should not sin, every Christian is responsible for her own conduct, and this requires free will. If women were created to obey their husbands, they were created without free will, and if that is the case, women aren't human. Which, of course, shouldn't surprise us for Stewart thinks feminism, this radical idea that women are human too, is evil.

2 comments:

  1. It is even worse for comps that the above states. No one is to sin and Paul says that if one cannot do something in faith, then it is sin. A wife can trump her husband's supposed "final decision" trump card if she cannot do it in faith, she is to decline according to Paul.

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  2. I agree, Don. It's as if those who believe in a hierarchy believe God will not hold the woman accountable, only the man. We know this to be a false teaching from 2 Cor 5:10: "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad." NIV

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