The Head of the Church – Ephesians 1:22-23
In Ephesians 1:22–23, Paul shows that the risen and exalted Christ is not merely Lord somewhere far away, but has been given by the Father as head over all things to the church. All things have been put under His feet, meaning that Christ truly reigns over every power, authority, enemy, and circumstance. Though we do not yet see everything visibly submitted to Him, His reign is already real, and His final victory is certain. This means the church must not live as if Jesus needs our permission before He rules. He is not elected by the church, assisted by the church, or subject to the preferences of the church. Christ alone is head of the church, and all true authority in the church must serve under His Word.
Because Christ is head, the church is His body, dependent on Him for life, direction, growth, correction, and strength. The church is not a religious service provider, a spiritual marketplace, or an organization free to reinvent itself according to preference, tradition, entertainment, or public opinion. The church belongs to Jesus Christ and must continually be reformed by His Word. He fills His church with His life, grace, Spirit, gifts, and power, giving everything necessary through the ordinary means He has commanded: preaching, prayer, baptism, the Lord’s Supper, discipline, fellowship, worship, and mutual care. This truth also shapes the home, reminding husbands and fathers that all delegated authority must be exercised under Christ, not with selfish control or passivity, but with humble, sacrificial, Word-shaped leadership. The church and every Christian must submit to Christ, trust Him, hold fast to Him, and seek ongoing repentance and renewed conformity to His Word.
FULL SERMON TEXT:
In Ephesians chapter 1, we’re going to focus our attention on verses 22 and 23. The title of today’s message is The Head of the Church.
So where we are here this morning is in the section where Paul has been praying. And in particular, in the part of the prayer where we are, he has been praying that believers would know the immeasurable greatness of God’s power towards us who believe.
And then last week, we looked at the fact that God showed that power, displayed that power most clearly and prominently when he raised Christ from the dead, seated him at his right hand, and exalted him far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named.
And now Paul continues to make that even more specific. He brings that truth to bear directly to the church.
The risen and exalted Christ is not merely Lord somewhere out there in the world, though he is. He is head over all things, and in particular, God has given him to the church.
The church then belongs to Jesus Christ. That is the main issue here in these two verses.
Christ is head of the church, and if Christ is head of the church, then the church must learn to trust and love and obey him. We need to continually examine ourselves and repent where necessary in the church, being ready to change whenever and however necessary to conform ourselves to his Word.
So if you will, stand with me this morning for the reading of God’s Word.
I don’t know if we have all of it up here. Good. Or at least through 21. You might have to have your Bible open for the last two verses.
Listen, I’m telling you, we need a Donna. We need the Donna to be back. And we are so grateful to see you here this morning, Donna. Amen. That is an answered prayer. Amen.
Beginning in verse 15 of chapter 1, God’s Word says this:
“For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love towards all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in all my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe, according to the working of his great might, that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come.
And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.”
Father, this morning as we take a look at the head, at our head, at our gift that you have given to us, as we look at Christ this morning and we see what a glorious gift he is to us, Lord, I pray that you would hide these things in our heart, that they would change and mold and shape not just who we are, but how we see you, how we see your Word, how we see Christ, so that we can better understand ourselves and the church that you’ve called us to be part of.
Lord, this morning in these two verses that you have inspired, that have come from your mouth, would you do what you have intended to do? Would you teach? Would you rebuke, correct, and train us in righteousness so that we may be complete, equipped for every good work?
Would you do this by the power of your Holy Spirit and the enlightenment of your Spirit and for the glory of our head, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ? In his name we pray. Amen.
Would you please be seated?
God has subjected all things under Christ and has given Him as head over all things to the church, His body, which He fills with His life and rule.
First, Christ rules over all things.
It says here, “And He put all things under His feet.”
So we’ve got to remember who the “he” and the “his” is here. Knowing that from the context, if you’ve been here for the last few weeks, you know who we’re talking about. We’re talking about, “And He,” the Father, God the Father, put all things under His, that is Jesus Christ, the eternal divine Son of God, feet.
He put all things under His feet.
The phrase “all things” here is what is emphasized. We’ve already discussed the fact that He is risen and exalted above all things. But just to make the point even clearer, as He often does, He repeats Himself, but He uses a little bit different phrase.
He’s not just far above, but from where He is above, all things are under His feet.
All things.
Paul wants us to recognize the immense scope of Christ’s dominion. He’s not over some things. He’s not even over most things. He’s not over even all things except for Satan.
He’s over all things.
Everything.
Paul says that all things have been put under Christ’s feet.
That kind of sounds like a strange way to put it. We don’t necessarily talk about having authority like that. But that would’ve been more common back then. That’s how they thought of their rulers, their subjects, those that they would, especially not just those of their own citizens, but those who they would conquer and take in and rule them then as well.
They would talk about them as if they have been put under their feet.
And what Paul says here about Christ is all things are under His feet. That doesn’t mean we are under the ground. That means we are under Him.
He rules.
That language also is found in Psalm 8, where God gives mankind dominion over the works of His hands and put all things under His feet. So in the same way we have dominion over this earth that God has given us, everything is under our feet.
Christ is over all things and we and everything else are under His.
That promise of a man having dominion over all things is not ultimately fulfilled in us. It’s fulfilled in the God-man, Jesus Christ.
While we have some dominion and we exercise that not always so well in this world, Christ’s dominion is perfect. He is the true and better Adam. He’s the one reigning victorious King.
To put something under His feet is then a picture of conquest. He has dominion and rule over all things. It is the defeated enemy beneath the feet of the conquering king. That is the idea. That is the expression.
So Paul is saying here that Christ doesn’t just have authority theoretically. He truly reigns. All things are under Him. Everything is subject to Christ.
Now clearly, we need to be honest and look at things. I’m not saying that when you look around at the world that everything is submitting to Christ.
No.
Clearly, there are a lot of things, there are a lot of people, there are a lot of what we experience now today visibly is not in subjection to Him. We still see sin. We still see death. We still see evil, persecution, all the confusion and weakness in not just the world, but even in the church.
But Paul is speaking about Christ as being head over all things and having everything under subjection to Him, not because everything is doing what it’s supposed to do, but to point to the fact that He is already reigning, like we talked about last week.
He is already enthroned in the heavens. Everything is already under Christ.
And 1 Corinthians 15:25 says that Jesus Christ must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet. There will be a day when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.
So he’s talking about a reality that is waiting its ultimate fulfillment in the end, but making sure we understand that Jesus Christ’s reign is already real. Again, we were reminded of that last week.
But it also guarantees, it keeps us focused on the fact that the final victory over death and sin and evil and everything else is absolutely certain because He’s already reigning.
So that should bring some correction to how we look at the world today. As out of control as it seems, it is not out of Christ’s control.
And as weak as the church is, and we is weak, okay? I know sometimes we can maybe pat ourselves on the back and go, “Well, we’re at a better church here at Tumbling Shoals.”
Well, I hope that’s true, but don’t forget, we is just as messed up as everybody else. We’ve got sin. We still deal with trials and temptations and tests, and we don’t pass them all the time.
But as certain as that is true, nothing is outside of Christ’s control.
The enemies of Jesus Christ are not acting outside of His rule. Like we were reminded last week, even when evil seems so strong and prevalent, it is not the ultimate.
Christ reigns, and that means that the church must not live as if Jesus needs our permission before He rules.
He is ruler. He does not receive His authority from us. You didn’t vote Him into office.
As much as we love being American and having a voice about who’s in control of us, and who’s in charge of us, and who’s our leaders, and I’m not opposed to any of that, and I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, I’m saying you didn’t have a voice in this one.
You don’t get one.
“Well, that’s not fair.”
Too bad.
He’s God.
He rules. He reigns. We subject ourselves to Him.
So then when Christ speaks, we must listen to Him. When He commands us, we must say, “Yes, sir.” When He brings correction through His Word, we must repent. And when Jesus Christ trains us in righteousness through His Word, we must follow our leader.
Jesus Christ rules over all things.
“And He put all things under His feet.”
Second, “and gave Him as head over all things to the Church.”
Christ has been given as head to the Church.
What a remarkable statement. God the Father gave Christ the Son to the Church as a head over all things.
Once again, just like being under His feet is a term of subjection, the term head here also refers to authority, to rule, to having a superior rank.
Paul, again, has been speaking about Christ’s exaltation and His reign, His authority, His dominion, His supremacy. So when he says Christ is head, he means that Christ rules as the supreme authority.
He is head over all things.
Again, we looked at that last week in particular, and then even in that first phrase. He is over all things, but notice the wonderful grace of this particular statement.
God gave this exalted Christ, this reigning Christ, this supreme Christ to the church.
The one who rules all things is given to the church as our head.
That means then that Christ’s authority, His universal authority, not just His authority here right now and around us, but His universal authority is primarily for the good of His church.
Now, ultimately for His glory. Everything exists and everything is done for the glory of God alone. That’s the ultimate on everything. But primarily, it is worked out for the good of His chosen people.
How good is that?
Because He could just be out there, and we could be existing as the church and just kind of hoping that that ruler up there might give us some attention.
No. He’s our head. We’re His body.
Both are important, the fact that He’s head of the church and over all things. Because if He were only head of the church but not head over all things, then His care for us is going to be limited, isn’t it? He doesn’t really have ultimate authority, so that means that forces outside of His control will have some influence.
But Paul says He’s head over all things to the church.
Both.
There is no power that stands above Him. There is no ruler that outranks Him. There is no enemy that escapes Him. There is no providence that surprises Him.
The church has been given the gift of the risen and exalted Christ as our head.
This is one of the most important truths that the church has to recover and remember today.
Yes, there are churches all around us that say, “We worship Jesus. We love Jesus. We love Jesus. We praise Jesus.”
But is Jesus head over that church? Or is He the guy you just talk about? Is He in charge and you do what He says? Or is He there to help you?
You see, we’ve lost that.
Christ is the only head of the church.
There’s not some multiple-headed weird serpent, like we’ve got Jesus and the elders and the deacons and the apostles, and all of them are all heads of the church.
No.
There’s one head. It’s Jesus.
It’s not the elders. It’s not the deacons. It’s not you, congregation. You’re not in charge of this church.
I don’t care what you think or how you feel about that. Jesus is in charge, not you.
So it’s no one within the local church. It’s not a denomination. It’s certainly not the state. And hopefully it’s not tradition, but I think that’s what’s the head of most churches today, in our area at least.
And it most certainly shouldn’t be, but again, maybe is in many churches, it’s certainly not public opinion.
Christ alone is head of the church.
If any of those other things you see as most important, more important, you’re wrong and you need to repent.
Christ is head of the church.
Now, I want to say that clearly and I want to say that strongly, but I also want to follow that up and not mean, okay, well, let’s just throw out everything else and just say, “Well, Jesus is head, so we’ll just go randomly.”
No.
Jesus is head, and He has determined how He wants His church run. Amen.
So that doesn’t mean the pastors or elders, deacons, or even the congregation doesn’t have any responsibility. You do. We do.
Pastors and elders are the under-shepherds to the Shepherd. Deacons are the servants of the great Servant. The congregation, you, we all have real responsibilities, real duties as part of the church that God has given us, that Christ has given us in His Word.
We have to make real decisions. We have to do things in a way that God has determined in His Word.
Christ being the lone head of the church doesn’t mean then we just sit back and do nothing. That would be a wrong view of it.
The point is, no one in the church has independent authority.
Nobody.
All true church authority then serves under Christ. It does not stand over Christ’s Word.
If we are to be submitted and serve under Christ, if we are going to serve under the authority of Christ, what does that mean? We serve under God’s Word. Amen.
We are structured by Christ’s Word. He gets to determine how His church functions, how His church works, and how the individuals within the church live.
So if you’ve come here because you want to feel good about your life, leave. But if you’ve come here because you want to feel good about your life, but now you’ve heard something maybe better than that, just go ahead and stick around.
God’s Word is sufficient because it is Christ’s Word.
We stand under His authority. We serve under His authority. Everyone who serves in the church serves under Christ’s authority.
So no church, not just us, but no church, no local congregation gets to invent its own doctrine. We don’t get to just do worship however we feel like it. We don’t get to think about membership in the church in a way that functions in the most businesslike or professional way possible. We don’t get to do discipline in the way that seems least confrontational, which means usually no discipline whatsoever.
And we by no means get to determine what our mission is.
Christ is head, and He rules His church by His Word.
Colossians 1:18 says, “And He is the head of the body, the church.”
Ephesians 5, we’ll get to a couple years from now, says, “Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its savior.”
So your question about the church and about being a part of the church and about how the church functions shouldn’t be, “What do I like? What do I prefer? What do I want from a church?”
The question should be, “What has Christ commanded? What has Jesus said about preaching? What has Christ said about baptism and the Lord’s Supper? What has Jesus said about membership in the church? What has God said about elders and deacons? What has Jesus said about church discipline? What has Christ taught us about living holy lives, being united in love, about forgiveness? What has Christ said about what our mission is?”
If Christ is head, then His Word must rule His church.
That should humble us. Not one of us gets to determine how God’s church functions.
But knowing that, having that, understanding that also helps us.
Goodness gracious, if you’ve ever been a part of some of those churches who are constantly trying to reinvent themselves in order to be more relevant, that’s tiring. It’s a never-ending cycle, always seeking for more, always trying to do better or keep people happy, or this, that, and the other.
You throw Jesus out the window when you have that kind of mentality because it’s not about what Jesus wants. It’s how do we keep people in here?
And that’s not what Christ wants. He wants faithfulness to His Word.
So it should help us to know that He rules us, He rules His church through His Word. We don’t have to reinvent it. We don’t have to come up with some idea. We don’t have to be clever and figure out new ways to do church.
The church is His to command, and He has already given us His orders in His Word. Praise the Lord.
There’s a term that’s constantly in the back of my mind. Well, sort of. It’s not in Latin, but here’s the Latin form of it: ecclesia reformata semper reformanda.
Here’s what it means. Calm down. I’m not walking off without just telling you what it means.
It means the church reformed, always reforming, and that’s an important thing.
There’s a difference between always reforming and always trying to do something different because the always trying to do something different has no standard. You’re just trying whatever.
The always reforming is constantly seeking what does God’s Word say, and how can we more line up with what God’s Word says?
We don’t have to go searching. It’s right here. We gotta go searching in here. We gotta dig deep. We gotta dive in.
Get into His Word. We have a book.
So then the always reforming aspect is whenever our practices or our priorities or certain traditions drift us farther from Christ’s Word, we have to be willing to humbly return to the authority of our head.
True reformation then is simply a renewed submission to Jesus Christ.
A church that refuses correction is acting as though Christ is not really King. But a church that will gladly submit to His Word shows that we recognize His sovereign rule over us.
So Christ has been given as head to the Church.
And then third, the Church is Christ’s body.
It says, “which is His body.”
Well, that makes sense. He just said Christ is our head. Now He says the Church is His body.
Now that metaphor is not just here. It’s used in other parts of Scripture. If you’ve been through the member class since I’ve been here, you’ve heard this. We’ve used this illustration, I think it’s in the second or third week of the class.
We talk about the fact that the church is the body. We have mutual responsibilities to one another within the church. It talks about this in Romans chapter 12, 1 Corinthians chapter 12. Paul uses this body metaphor to show that church members belong to one another and need one another.
But the focus here is on the relationship between Christ and His church.
Jesus is the head, and the church is His body, which means, I know this is a big stretch, the church is united to Him. It is dependent on Him. It is governed by Him. It is supplied by Him.
Think of what the head does for the body. That’s the analogy.
So the church is not just an organization. Again, that’s what some of the other churches try to do. They run it like an organization so that they can keep it up and keep it going.
The church is not like that.
The church is a body.
It does have structure. God has given it. Again, He has given us the structure that He wants for His church in His Word. The church has officers. The church has membership. The church has the ordinances we’re supposed to keep. We have discipline. And all those things matter because Christ has commanded those in His Word.
But the church is more than just an organization.
We are the body of Jesus Christ.
That means the life of the church comes from Him. The direction that the church should go should come from Him. Any growth that comes to the church comes from Christ.
Here’s a statement that won’t be real hard for you to grasp. Are you ready?
A body detached from the head is dead.
You see a bunch of bodies walking around without heads? No. Why? Because they’re dead.
This isn’t hard. He uses this analogy because it’s a pretty basic thing that all humans can grasp.
If Christ is head and we’re His body, we can’t survive without Him. We can’t exist without Him.
And funny enough, this connects us to where we’re going next. Chapter 2 verse 1 says, “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked.”
Why were we dead? We didn’t have a head.
The church has to remain dependent on Jesus Christ. He is our head. If we try to walk away from Him or do things differently from Him, it doesn’t work.
A body detached from the head is dead.
So that means this illustration, this analogy here, should shape how we view the local church.
The church then is not like some people think. It’s not a religious service provider where I’ve paid my $59.99 a month, and I expect service in return.
No.
This isn’t some sort of spiritual marketplace. It’s not a place where consumers gather together to evaluate the preaching, to evaluate the music, to evaluate the programs, to evaluate all the things to make sure that they match the preferences that they have.
Your preferences mean nothing.
I’m not saying you can’t have them, and I’m not saying we don’t have them. But if Christ commands us to do one thing and it goes against what we prefer, guess who gets to win?
It ain’t you.
It’s Him.
He gets His way.
We don’t.
I mean, we can get our way, but you don’t want your way. Ultimately, that way leads to you detaching yourself from the head, and what is that?
Dead.
We’re getting it.
The church is the body of Jesus Christ, which means then regenerate church membership matters. Unity among the members matters. Service to one another in the church matters. Church discipline and accountability towards one another matters. Worship with one another matters. Learning and knowing and keeping sound doctrine matters. Loving God and one another matters.
You cannot love the head and despise His body.
Like I said a few weeks ago, you can’t say you love Jesus but hate his bride. Same here. You can’t say you love Jesus as head and refuse his body.
It doesn’t work.
Again, the church has problems, and I’m not saying you have to like all the problems that the church has, but Christ loves his body. Jesus loves his church.
And I know there’s times when you’re like, “I don’t like those people.” And sometimes it’s probably me, but Jesus loves me. So you should, too.
Jesus loves his church. Amen.
So you should, too, problems and all.
Because ultimately, Christ nourishes his body, he sanctifies his body, and one day he’s going to present his body holy and blameless before him.
So if the church is Christ’s body, then we’ve got to treat each other seriously, with humility, patiently, lovingly. And we must always be willing to grow in all of those things.
Again, that semper reformanda is not just about correcting doctrine. It’s about the body increasingly reflecting the character and will of Jesus.
So as Jesus sanctifies his church, he continues to reform us, to change us, to mold us, to shape us in our life and our practice. So we will be different over time. We will be changed over time as we follow our head.
Doesn’t mean we will be perfect until this life ends, but we will continue forward, and Christ will continue to sanctify us and continue to correct us and continue to reform us because he is our head.
And finally here, it says, “the fullness of him who fills all in all.”
The church is filled by Christ.
Now, to be fair, this is a more difficult phrase in Ephesians. It says, “The Church is the fullness of him who fills all in all.”
So we don’t really need to try to untangle all the grammatical issues here. The point is the church is filled by Christ.
That does not mean that Christ is incomplete without us. It’s not like he needs us in order to be fulfilled. He doesn’t lack anything. We cannot say that because Scripture is clear that he does not need anything.
He’s the eternal God. He is the eternal Son of God, the risen, exalted, reigning King of kings and Lord of lords. He does not need us to fulfill him or to fill himself up.
Rather, Paul is saying that the church is filled by Jesus.
The church becomes the place where Christ’s life, his rule, his grace, and his presence are displayed today.
Christ is the one who fills all in all. He fills all things in every way. He’s not just a local deity. He’s not limited to our geographic location.
He fills all in all, every corner of creation. He fills all things.
But in particular, once again, he fills his church with his life, his grace, his Spirit, his gifts, and his power. That is where Christ is most clearly displayed. It’s through the church.
So then this protects us from a couple of different things.
First of all, it protects us from thinking that Christ is distant from his church. Again, like he’s just up there going, “Hey, Church, do this. I’ll be up here waiting till later.”
No, he is actively involved in the church. He is exalted above all things, yes, but he’s eminent. He is seated above all things, yes, but he is active.
He fills His body.
And second, it protects us from thinking that the church is self-sufficient.
You don’t generate your own life within yourself.
Again, what is the body without the head?
Dead.
We’re going to get this by the end of the sermon.
So that means that the church doesn’t need all those man-made substitutes for spiritual life. You don’t need the gimmicks. As much as you might like it, you don’t need the little wristbands. You don’t need the little Jesus with you. You don’t need the cross necklace.
“Oh, my goodness, that’s heresy. Don’t say that.”
You don’t need all that stuff.
The church doesn’t need manipulation tactics, trying to stir people’s emotions.
The church doesn’t need entertainment dressed up like worship.
We don’t need Star Wars figures dancing and singing up here to make it more relevant so you go, “Ooh, I’m excited about Jesus.”
No, you’re excited about Star Wars.
And you’re like, “What are you talking about?”
There are churches who have characters on stage on Sunday mornings doing plays, singing and dancing. They’re not even Christian songs because they’re trying to draw people in.
Again, it’s entertainment dressed up like worship.
We don’t need that kind of stuff.
We don’t need worldly wisdom then to keep the church going. You know, best business practices are great, but they’re not necessary to keep the church running.
The church is not kept by clever preachers. The church is kept by Christ, and Christ has given the church all the means that we need for nourishment, for strengthening.
We have the preaching of the Word. We have prayer. We have baptism, the Lord’s Supper. We have discipline and fellowship, worship, all of the care for one another, all the one anothering that we do.
We have everything we need.
He doesn’t need us to add anything or take anything away from what He has given.
So we must simply let Christ rule, and we must simply let the Word do the work. Be preached and taught and counseled. The church must be equipped. The body of Christ must serve one another. The gospel must be proclaimed. We must practice the ordinances. We must discipline those who need to be restored. We need to be praying for one another. We need to be worshiping together.
We don’t need anything else.
We don’t need to become something that Christ never commanded. We simply need to hold fast to Him.
And that means we must keep coming back continually, again and again and again, to Him, to His Word, to making sure of ourselves that we are constantly lining ourselves up, examining ourselves individually and corporately as His church to His Word to make sure we’re on track.
This is the standard.
We don’t need new methods. We don’t need the latest trends. We don’t need to be creative. We just need to continually go back again and again and again and again and again to Jesus and His Word.
He fills all things, and His filling makes us full.
Now again, what wonderful providence that we happen to be here on Father’s Day.
I think it’s fairly clear, the connection, but church, we need to see here that the doctrine of Christ’s headship doesn’t apply just in the church as we gather together, but it also applies in the home.
Jesus connects these things. God connects these things. God’s Word connects these things.
Paul, later on, again, in chapter 5, we’ll get there later on, keeps this together. He says, “The husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior.”
Go read 22 through 33. Colossians 3 says similar things. 1 Peter 3 says similar things. He talks about the husbands who are to lead and love their wives and their children.
So men, if we are going to speak clearly about Christ being head of the church, we also need to speak clearly about what headship means in the home.
Biblical headship is not selfish control of your home. That’s not what it means. It’s not being harsh. It’s not saying, “My way or the highway.” It’s definitely not being passive and then strapping on Bible verses.
It’s not a husband demanding his way while refusing to die to himself. That is not Christlikeness. That’s a misunderstanding of headship.
Christ being the head of His church then teaches us that the authority in the home, the authority you have as father, as husband, is a delegated authority.
You don’t have it just by right. You don’t just have it because you’re a dude. You don’t have it because you were born into it. You have what God gives you. Amen.
When you step beyond the authority that God gives, you’ve stepped outside the boundaries of biblical headship.
Christ’s headship teaches us that our authority is delegated. He is still the head over the husband. He has given the husband authority in the home to serve, to protect, to provide, to love, and for the holiness of the family.
Christ leads His church by giving Himself for our good. He nourishes us. He cherishes us. He sanctifies us by His Word. That’s what Ephesians 5 tells us.
So husbands, fathers, your home doesn’t need you to be a dictator. It definitely doesn’t need you to be absent.
Your wife and children need you to lead like a Christian man under the authority of the head, Jesus Christ. They need you to love like Him. They need you to teach like Him, to repent—not like Him. He didn’t need to repent.
And they need you to speak truthfully, to serve humbly, and to take responsibility before God.
If Christ is head over the church, then every lesser headship must be exercised under Him. If it’s not done His way, it’s not proper authority.
A husband is not God of his home. Christ is Lord of the home.
A father is not free to lead according to how he feels, to his own preferences or laziness or his temper. He must lead under the Word of Christ.
So that means the first place that many of us men need to learn how to practice submission to Christ being head over the church is not in the church’s business meetings. It’s in our homes with the people who know us best.
Men, while this can sound like a little bit of a browbeating, let’s remember Christ has given us the greatest example for how to be husbands and fathers, and we don’t need to look or settle for anything less than the best as we seek to lead our homes God’s way.
Ephesians 1:22–23 then shows us that Christ is head of the church. All things are under His feet. He has been given to the church as head. The Church is His body, and He fills the Church with His life, grace, and rule.
So we don’t need to try to invent a better church. We need to simply seek to be the kind of Church that Christ has commanded us to be.
We need to submit to Him. We need to hold fast to Him. We need to trust Him. And we need to be willing, both as the Church and as individuals, to be continually reformed by His Word, seeking ongoing repentance and renewed conformity to Christ.
Beloved, the Church belongs to Jesus Christ.
Amen.