As the culminating act of creation, God makes man and woman in His image. Placing them in the garden—a safe place to walk with God and learn from Him—He joins them together and gives them a weighty, beautiful role in it all.
He gives them authority over all the other creatures, commanding them to tend to His harmonious garden. He blesses them with the ability to multiply and expand the garden-life throughout creation as His representatives of goodness and light.
This union is the first marriage, and its commission remains every married couple’s to this day: to join together in a supernatural union as representatives of God, bringing order to the chaos, as we fill His creation with imagebearers.
Two Become One
God created man to rule together, yet provided for each one a distinct role in the relationship. This distinction was not one of hierarchy but of function. Man and woman were to work together in unison to accomplish the mission entrusted to them. They were each expected to support the other; each meant to direct the other’s attention towards God; each supposed to support the other with faithfulness, gentleness, and love.
Both were made in God’s image. Both were made to complement the other.
This is the heart behind Genesis 2:24, where we read, “This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one” (NLT).
The Marriage Covenant
Though Genesis doesn’t give extensive nor explicit roles for each person in a marriage, there are other passages of the Bible that give us deeper insights. One of the most notable is Ephesians 5. In this chapter, the apostle Paul gives an overview of God’s intention for men and women in the context of marriage. For both, he calls us to submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Notice how he establishes the same type of mutual submission and support that is alluded to in Genesis 2. The main takeaway is that both men and women are to humble themselves before the Lord and one another as they endeavor to reflect the Gospel through their marriage covenant.
The Role of Women
The next passage zooms in on the wife’s specific dynamic in marriage:
For wives, this means submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For a husband is the head of his wife as Christ is the head of the church. He is the Savior of His body, the church. As the church submits to Christ, so you wives should submit to your husbands in everything (Ephesians 5:22-24 NLT).
First and foremost, we must address what this passage is not saying. Paul is not commending husbands to assume the role of lordship over their wives. Just as we, the bridegroom of Christ, submit to His goodness, provision, protection, and guidance, so too can women expect their husbands to do for them. Notice that in the relationship between men and their wives and Christ and His Church, the focus is on Christ’s sacrificial service: He is the Savior of His body.
The Role of Men
If then, women are to be able to trust their husbands enough to submit in this way, the husband must live up to his commission:
For husbands, this means love your wives, just as Christ loved the church. He gave up His life for her to make her holy and clean, washed by the cleansing of God’s Word. He did this to present her to Himself as a glorious church without a spot or wrinkle or any other blemish. Instead, she will be holy and without fault. In the same way, husbands ought to love their wives as they love their own bodies. For a man who loves his wife actually shows love for himself. No one hates his own body but feeds and cares for it, just as Christ cares for the church. And we are members of His body (Ephesians 5:25-30 NLT).
Notice the elevated call of Christ, and why Paul associated husbands with the Lord in the prior verses. If we are to faithfully interpret this passage, we’re not to see the husband’s responsibility in marriage as holding absolute power, but to be absolutely selflessly loving, sacrificial, and faithful to his wife. He is to love her as he would love himself—knowing that what is best for her is ultimately best for him as their marriage embodies the love of Christ.
Call Back to the Garden
It’s no coincidence that Paul ends this passage on marriage by quoting Genesis 2:25. The goal for all marriages is return back to the garden state—where dominance and lordship fall aside as partnership in garden living becomes the center of every couple’s good endeavor.
