Within the economic Trinity there is a Divine Person with a non-divine will that makes Jesus’ submission to God both possible and fitting. Accordingly, the Christ to God authority and submission is not a Trinity consideration per se but a limited consideration of the union of two natures in one hypostasis. Yet the submission of wife to husband finds its analogy to Christ to God not in an ordering of being but in creative design just the same.

A pair of books were recently released entitled: Let The Men Be Men & Let The Women Be Women. As the subtitles disclose, the respective books pertain to God’s Design For Manhood And Marriage & God’s Design For Womanhood and Marriage.
This is not a review of the books but instead I offer a brief analysis on the theological appropriateness of using unqualified persons of the Trinity as an analogy for marriage.
My wife was reading to me a portion from Chapter 2 of one of the books, wherein a passing reference to the Trinity was made. The author said he’d develop the reference more in Chapter 10. Naturally, I took a quick peak at chapter 10 because some otherwise good material on wives and husbands has been disregarded over the years due to missteps having to do with Trinity analogies. One particular egalitarian Anglican-theologian who’s well versed in Trinitarian theology has capitalized on such missteps. Others have as well. Neither Baptists nor Presbyterians should want to throw the baby out with the bath water (pun intended).
In the hope that such books are a success in bringing clarity to the complementarian discussion, I thought I’d make a few comments on some direct quotes from the book on women.
My thoughts as they relate to the doctrine of God, I think, would be shared by most Reformed theologians and pastors. We might recall that they are the ones (along with an Anglican or two) who went after Wayne Grudem, Bruce Ware, and others for their Trinity analogies to marriage in the summer of 2016. What I have, also, found unfortunate is that some biblical teaching on marriage has been dismissed, if not even scorned in the process, due to mistaken Theology Proper.
More than in Reformed Baptist circles, there are thin complementarians in the Reformed Presbyterian community. Many of these men have their Trinitarian theology down pat. So, any Trinity misstep by otherwise good men of God provides occasion for some to dismiss biblical complementarianism. This is understandable, which should cause certain Reformed Baptists to be more careful, if not solely for the sake of putting forth a biblical view of God, and secondly so that others might give attention to sound marriage doctrine.
From chapter 10:
The Trinity As A Model Of Submission

“The Trinity” is a term that defines the relationship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit – one essence and attributes, yet three in distinct work and purpose. (Emphasis mine)

We don’t want to eclipse Divine Simplicity and the inseparable operations of the Trinity. (We might recall, that was a big deal in the Trinity debate in the summer of 2016.)
Each divine Person is operative in all God’s works. Which is to say, the works of the Trinity are indivisible. Indeed, it was the Son who died on the cross, but God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself (by the Spirit). In redemption there is one distinct work and purpose, carried out through the inseparable operations of Persons when Christ, by the eternal Spirit, offered Himself without blemish to God.
Trinity is not a term that seeks to define God by “relationship” within the Godhead, if by relationship we mean personal distinctions of authority and submission. The historical Christian creeds discriminate not by eternal relationships (or economic functions) but by personal properties. Accordingly, any orthodox reference to “relationship” must be interpreted as personal properties ad intra that cash out as eternal modes of being. Any eternal relationship may only be conceived of in terms of relations of eternal origin, not subject to temporal-sequence or personal roles. Historically, the church has defined Trinity in terms of the eternal origins of existence: unbegogtenness of the Father; eternal generation of the Son; and procession of the Holy Spirit.
Paul is not making a theological statement about the Trinity but rather making application about Christ, a divine human being, submitting to his Father. In other words, the focus isn’t on the economic Trinity per se but more narrowly on economic relations of the incarnate Son as he submits as the God-man in his humanity to God, who is Christ’s head. (Matthew 27:46; John 20:17; Revelation 3:2,12) Paul’s focus is on congruous order, not Theology Proper.
Not to parse things too fine, but some have pressed the analogy too far. There is an ordering that is natural and fitting – the woman to her husband; the husband, as head, to Christ; and Christ to God.
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Written by T. M. Suffield |
Sunday, April 30, 2023
We’re meant to grow up into Christ (Ephesians 4). And yet doing so will make us delighted children. There’s something so wonderfully restful about the idea of being able to take pleasure in the same thing over and over again. It’s a sign of the way sin has twisted our tastes and desires that we are unable to do so.

There’s a quote from G.K. Chesterton I’d like to share with you:
Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.
It’s one of the 16 quotes I have pasted up on my wall above my desk where I’m writing this post. I could think about it endlessly.
I wonder if to some of us it sounds oddly irreverent, suggesting that God is like a child, even though he asked us to be like them (Matthew 18). I think his impulse is right, that sin makes us old—in the sense of decayed—and that the regenerating power of the Spirit is new life in the sense of youth.
We should be careful here, we live in an age obsessed with youth in a way that Chesterton didn’t, and it’s also paradoxically true that we are supposed to mature (1 Corinthians 14) through our Christian lives. We’re meant to grow up into Christ (Ephesians 4).
And yet doing so will make us delighted children. There’s something so wonderfully restful about the idea of being able to take pleasure in the same thing over and over again. It’s a sign of the way sin has twisted our tastes and desires that we are unable to do so.
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And therein lies the danger – when the wrong fear compels us to embrace the wrong kind of savior. But our souls are anchored elsewhere – where our real Hope awaits within the Veil. We cannot afford to forget that, no matter how discouraged or desperate we become when we consider how to rescue our country.

Once there was a Christian community which loved its Church, its country and its God.  Its members were patriotic and loyal. Indeed, to be a Christian was to be a member of the national community. To serve God was to serve their country and vice-versa.
Flawed as it was, its constitution was one of the most advanced of any Republic in history. More than any other around it, this nation had successfully integrated a significant minority which had become an important part of its community, contributing to its wealth and progress. Compared to the oppression this minority had suffered in the past, their status since the mid-nineteenth century showed what was possible if freedom and equality was extended to everyone.
But a dark side had emerged. After a recent catastrophic war, this country’s standing at home and abroad had taken a serious downturn. The land these Christians were so proud of was no longer the respected leader it had been.  And they became fearful of the future.
Their fears would come to govern their behavior and justify their actions.  No longer were they governed by a fear of God, but by fear of “the other.”
Their government seemed incapable of governing. Factions, left and right, grew more and more hostile to each other as they battled for control. As one historian points out, The language of politics was permeated by metaphors of warfare, the other part was an enemy to be smashed, and struggle, terror and violence became widely accepted as legitimate weapons in the political structure….proceedings degenerated all too often into unseemly shouting matches with each side showing open contempt for the other, and the chair unable to keep order… Mutual fear, mutual recriminations and mutual hatred between the two parties far outweighed any potential purpose they might have had in common.
The language of many Christians became more and more violent as did their behavior.  At one point a “Fighting League” of Christian students was established at every university.  What began politically led to conflicts in the streets. Many Christians feared the growing power of socialists and communists and the implications of their influence on the morality and the churches. Their anxieties grew.
Open gay lifestyles, pornography, and bizarre entertainment alarmed Christian citizens who wanted only the best for their country and a return to the morality of an earlier era. Older Christians felt angry and betrayed by the new cultural trends that openly mocked older traditions, both religious and political.  There was also the growing belief that the new feminism and sexual openness was seriously eroding the traditional family.  Indeed, as historians note, many conservatives perceived a “crisis of masculinity” and were especially incensed at the public campaigns for gay rights.
Democracy as they understood it wasn’t working.  Serious economic problems threatened the middle classes.  In desperation, many Christians were attracted to extreme right-wing groups that promised to restore the country’s greatness, to overturn the inept system, and to respect and nurture Christianity and the traditional family.  A widely-held belief was that a left-wing conspiracy had overthrown their previous leadership to establish a socialist system.   Loyal, patriotic citizens had been stabbed in the back and betrayed.
Street violence, effective use of new media technology, and political intrigue grew.  Some media even undermined the Republic with their sensational exposures of real or imagined wrongdoings of… politicians.  One major media empire had as part of its mission the “constant harping on the iniquities of the Republic… (and) was another factor in weakening (its) legitimacy and convincing people that something else was needed in its stead.   In place of the feeble compromises of…democracy, authors…proclaimed the need for strong leadership, ruthless, uncompromising, hard, willing to strike down the enemies of the nation without compunction. 
To overturn an unjust, inept, unpatriotic, and foreign system would require actions which were extreme but necessary. We must save our country or lose it. This is what God would want. We have no other choice.
And a leader emerged – uncompromising, patriotic, moral and, above all, effective. The fact that he was a political amateur worked in his favor since he was seen as untainted by the corrupt and inept politicians of the Republic.  Here was a leader whose popularity was largely untouched by scandals that he himself generated. Even a violent attempt to overthrow the government was viewed by most of his patriotic Christian followers as unfortunate, but necessary to save the nation.  Although tried and found guilty of treason, his record only enhanced his reputation to his followers.   Christians flocked to his movement.
He was not alone. Judges routinely ruled “selfless patriotism” as mitigating factors in the extremists’ revolt against the State.  In many ways, the legal foundations of the Republic were being slowly undermined by those who did not believe that the current government was “constitutionally anchored.”
Within the national Christian community, politically liberal sentiments were suspect.  Christians associated with Christian communities in other countries were viewed as unpatriotic globalists.  These nationalist Christian leaders rejected anyone who dared to deny the greatness and destiny of their nation.  Influential media reported that more than half the candidates for ordination were followers of the extreme right.  One Christian leader attending a conference reported that there seemed to be more concern for the economy and foreign policy than there was for theological issues.  However, one clear-thinking theologian warned his fellow Christians in a broadcast that a leader like this could gradually become a “misleader,” making an idol of himself and therefore, mocking God.
Loyalty to the leader and his agenda soon became commensurate with loyalty to the nation. Anything less was branded as treason. Those with opposing political views were no longer merely friendly opponents but enemies of the people. It wasn’t long before Christians so embraced the leader and his movement that even the Scriptures were subject to bizarre interpretations based on the leader’s principles.  The racism that had always percolated below the surface soon became the law of the land. Indeed, most Christians did not object to this increasing isolation of vulnerable people.  After all, didn’t they do it to themselves? They have too much influence.  It’s not our problem.   They are “other,” politically and socially, and therefore, the enemy.  They are vermin and have poisoned the blood of the nation.
One pastor and former war veteran, remembering his fellow soldiers who had died in action wrote that, “We had to fight on so that their death should not have been in vain or forgotten.  But what had become of our country? A land of injustice and corruption, subject to the whims of liberal and conservative alike. Then the Party came into power with a program having a moral and religious basis. That’s why I became a member of the movement.” He went on to say that the leader, as opposed to his followers, possessed a deep morality and religion that could change people’s hearts so that the nation could be reconstructed.
The voices that sought to remind Christians that real power lay in suffering and in the weakness of Christ were ignored or silenced. The prophetic calls to return to the pure word of God were replaced by the word of the leader. Christians traded their birthright for the lure of naked political power. The fear of man had become a snare that failed to save their church and nation they loved. And what is saddest of all is that the leader they clung to in desperation shared neither their faith nor their morality. In private moments he despised their Christianity, their morality, and their sheep-like subservience.  Their desperation borne of fear led them to cling to a leader and system that betrayed them in the end. The actions that their fear generated swallowed them and their nation whole.   The reputation of their country never recovered.
Be careful, my dear brothers and sisters in Christ in what you place your hope. Proverbs 29:25 is just as meaningful today as it was in 1933 Germany. Snares do not advertise themselves. As Michael Horton points out in his magnificent book Recovering our Sanity: How the Fear of God Conquers the Fears that Divide Us, the fear of losing cultural, social, and political power often drives a large number of evangelicals to ‘put their trust in princes.’
And therein lies the danger – when the wrong fear compels us to embrace the wrong kind of savior. But our souls are anchored elsewhere – where our real Hope awaits within the Veil. We cannot afford to forget that, no matter how discouraged or desperate we become when we consider how to rescue our country.
Chris Bryans is a member of Northside Presbyterian Church (PCA) and is a retired professor of history from Eastern Florida State College in Melbourne FL.

*Whether one agrees with Bonhoeffer’s neo-orthodox theology is not the point here.  What is clear is that he was so very convinced that Christ’s commands were not optional.  He possessed an extraordinary command of Scripture as well as its applications. This was missing from what had increasingly become a cultural “cut-flower” Christian faith that characterized much of Germany even prior to the Weimar era. Indeed, liberal theology had so poisoned the Reformed doctrine of Scripture that it was easy to infect Christianity with extremism.  Biblical illiteracy abounded within the average church.  How else could so many believe the view that the Old Testament was a “Jewish book” that needed to be purged from Christianity?  How else could the German Christian movement reconstruct a Christ who had more in common with Norse heroic myths than the New Testament?  I remember hearing Bonhoeffer’s friend, disciple, and his greatest biographer discuss how very strange it was when Bonhoeffer had his seminary students engage in what we would call today “a quiet time” on the seminary grounds.  It wasn’t a part of their church experience.
Sources:
Eberhard Bethge Dietrich Bonhoeffer Man of Vision, Man of Courage (Harper and Rowe, 1977).
Georg Denzler & Volker Fabricius (Herausgeber) Die Kirchen im Dritten Reich Band 1 & 2 Fischer Verlag 1988.
Richard J. Evans The Coming of the Third Reich The Penguin Press, 2003.
Heinz Hürten (Herausgeber) Deutsche Geschichte in Quellen und Darstellung Band 9 Weimarer Republik und Drittes Reich 1918-1945 Reklam, 1995.
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