Building up believers and the New Testament church

They Two Shall Be One

God's Order - Given to Lift Us Up

The Scripture tells us that woman is the glory of the man even as man is the glory of God. What causes the woman to be the glory of the man? Is it not the ministry of the man bringing her up into oneness by love as she submits and adorns herself with a quiet and meek spirit?

Christ so loved the world that He came down to us, that through the power of an endless life we might be brought up to where He becomes all in all. He came not to be ministered to, but to minister. The husband's function, likewise, is not to be ministered unto, but to minister, imparting the ability to the weaker vessel to function in her place of ministry. All expressions of love and ministry must be out of true relationship with Christ, as unto the Lord and for His glory. Ministering to each other cannot be done in the life of God unless there is first a ministering to the Lord.

We must begin to know what a love relationship is. First, we must recognize the authority of Christ as it is working in individuals, not of our choosing, but as it has pleased God. It was God who created man, it was God who took part of man and made woman, and it was God who made man the head of woman. Woman was made for man, not man for the woman. God knows the part of the body that lacks, and has given it more abundant honor (1 Corinthians 12:24). God's oneness can only be brought about as each member fulfills his or her ministry in God's order. The woman cannot lift herself up, but by submitting to man, in God's order, she is lifted up to that place where she is one with her husband. God designed the man to rule and the woman to answer to him. From man, God made woman to be a helpmeet.

We cannot think for one moment that the woman has the hard place in submitting to her husband. We would not say the church has the hard place in submitting to Christ. It is just as difficult for the husband to take his place as head as it is for the woman to submit to her husband as her head. This is all God's working, and requires that God reveal it to each one. Neither can find fulfillment in God's will unless he or she is moving in God's order.

God's design for the husband-wife relationship is to bring both in His order to His highest expression, which is "Christ in you," Christ filling all in all. Each must want to do God's will because of the life that is flowing in him, or her. It takes grace to do God's will, wherever you have been made to fit into God's working.