Submitting to Biblical Authority

There are three special relationships through which we should expect to hear God, three relationships to which the New Testament attaches special importance and even, I would say, sanctity. The three relationships are between pastors and their people, between husbands and wives, and between parents and children. Let’s look at what the Scripture says about each of these relationships briefly. Hebrews 13:7:

“Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.”

The word “remember” there indicates respectful consideration. “Have respect for your leaders, they spoke to you the word of God.” Consequently, if God speaks to you independently, in another way, directly and personally; it should be very important to you that your leaders, who’ve already spoken to you the Word of God, should confirm what God has said. Now I’m not saying this will happen one hundred percent. But if I were in a situation where I were a member of a congregation that had godly leadership, that spoke the Word of God to the people, and I thought I’d heard from God, and when I went to my pastor or the elders or whoever the leaders were and they waited on God and prayed and they came up with the answer, “We don’t feel this is God,” believe me, I would be tremendously cautious about going ahead with that thing. Because, it’s normal and it’s right for God’s people to hear through their leaders.

Then there’s the relationship between husbands and wives, Ephesians 5:22-24:

“Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.”

There’s another sacred relationship. God in His infinite wisdom has made the husband the head of the wife; responsible for caring for the wife and responsible for her spiritual condition. Now I understand that many husbands are not really accepting this responsibility. But nevertheless, the scriptural order is for the wife to submit to her husband. It’s very dangerous for a married woman to claim that she’s heard the voice of God and then to go ahead, even when her husband doesn’t agree and doesn’t give his approval and blessing. I’ve known a good many cases in which women did that and almost always the result has been some kind of spiritual disaster, because it’s contrary to divine order. The kind of spirit in a woman that says, “Well, no matter what my husband says, I’m going to do it!” is not the kind of attitude that really hears from God. That’s a rather hard, rebellious type of attitude and rebellious people don’t accurately hear the voice of God.

The third relationship is similar and also a sacred one, the relationship between parents and children. Ephesians 6:1:

“Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.”

Notice the safeguard, “in the Lord.” If parents demand their children do something morally wrong or totally unscriptural, they’re not obligated. But otherwise, children are obligated to obey their parents. And if God speaks to a child, God can also speak to the child’s parents and cause them to accept what He has said to the child. So there’s a twofold application to these relationships. First of all, the positive. We should expect to hear through these relationships. Secondly, the negative. We should be doubly cautious if we ever think God has spoken to us in a way that ignores or sets aside these sacred relationships.