You Are Your Brother’s Keeper

Ephesians 5.21
DBC 2-19-06

You Are Your Brother’s Keeper

“Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.”

-Prayer-

Anna said to Amy the other day, “[She said in her biggest most sophisticated three year old voice:] When I get older and bigger than you Mama, I’ll take care of you . . .” Amy understood what she meant.

The greatest charge Christ gives to us is the well-being of one another. He gives us responsibility for each other’s well-being. Scripture says to each of us and to all of us, “love one another,” and “bear one another’s burdens.”

I’m responsible for your well-being and you are responsible for my well-being. In the sense of well-being, you are my keeper and I am your keeper . . .

Paul writes to the house church at Ephesus, “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.”

Before we tackle the meaning of this verse and its application for our life and church let us first consider its connections to previous and hereafter verses:

First we must not forget the written context where verse 5.21 is placed.

In 5.18 Paul admonished the Ephesians to be continually filled with the Spirit. I wish we had much more time to talk at length about this point, for it’s the height of Christian maturity (to be continually filled with the Spirit).

Let me only briefly say here, about being filled with the Spirit, that it only happens when we freely surrender and lay down our lives (wants, desires, ambition, will, dreams) before the Lord and confess that unless we have God and his love and power in our lives we have nothing, not a thing, of lasting significance or of everlasting value.

You will never accomplish all of what God commissions of you and you will never achieve supremely and intimately knowing Christ (in you) and the fellowship of his sufferings unless you freely surrender and submit your all of your life to him.

Surrendering your life to Christ means carrying your cross; and carrying your cross means dying to yourself.

When God fills our lives with his Spirit, he intends for us to pour his spirit and lives into one another. The greatest love and reverence we show Christ is when we love and submit to the needs and well-being of one another.

-Being filled with the Spirit produces harmony in our relationships.
-Being filled with the Spirit enables us to fully love one another.
- Being filled with the Spirit is the only thing that can bring unity to any church.

5:21 qualifies all of the following verses in chapter 5 and all the way through 6:9.

Paul was speaking to the early church, which was a house fellowship that consisted of people from all walks of life. Just from this context we know that slaves and masters, children and parents, and wives and husbands were all equally apart of the same church and fellowship. We know this because Paul addresses each one of them in his letter, which was to be read to the entire church at the same time.

The equality that the Gospel presented is truly amazing, in its day and age, to women, children, and slaves.

In order to better understand Paul’s words “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ” we must also understand the cultural and historical context, which Paul wrote in.

The cultural and historical context of Paul’s day was a patriarchal society. Men were chief in such a society; they had authority and ownership over their wives, children and slaves. It was quite a different culture and world than our present day (that we a familiar with).

One of the most common biblical interpretation eras we make (when we try to apply the Bible to our lives) is when we ignore the cultural and historical context of the Scripture.

Have you ever been in another culture different than your own? The first time I ever traveled outside of the United States was when I went meet Amy’s parents who were serving as missionaries in Albania, Eastern Europe (across from Italy and the Adriatic Sea).

I was surprised to observe the cultural differences there compared to how I (and you most likely) grew up with. For example, when you shake your head up and down there that means no and when you shake your head side ways that means yes; also, when it’s time to celebrate birthdays over there, the one having birthday buys all of their friends and loved ones gifts of appreciation! These are just a few cultural differences.

You can easily imagine how not understanding cultural differences could get one in a little or much trouble (i.e. Like driving on the left side in England!)!

So when we read and seek to apply the Bible we do well to pay attention to the historical and cultural context it was written in.

Paul was writing to a small house church that consisted of members who were wives, children, slaves, masters and fathers who lived in a patriarchal society (where culturally men we authoritative and dominant).

Let me say here, that while the Gospel and Scripture did not primarily deal (at great length anyway) with the inequality and injustices of slavery and patriarchal domination of women and children, the eventual momentum and socially freeing impact of the gospel would change the scope of every civilization where it was fully lived out and proclaimed in.

Bob Utley notes that, “The NT never attempts to address the unfairness of these cultural pillars of the ancient world. Possibly because to do so would have meant the destruction of Christianity. Yet the gospel through time is abolishing both [male dominated patriarchal societies and slavery]!”

The single most important understanding of verse 21, however, is that it concerns mutual submission, reciprocal submission. Paul used the term submit (huptasso) (hoop-o-TASS-o) in the imperative middle voice form in emphasizing the voluntary nature of being submissive to one another.

Sometimes people proudly and self-righteously proclaim what the bible says in plain English . . . The only problem is that the Bible was not written in plain English, but in a very nuanced and ancient Greek and Hebrew language; this is why it is also important to not only pay attention to the historical and cultural context but also the grammatical context of the Scripture as well.

The three principle relationships that Paul instructs to such mutual and reciprocal submission are:

1. Wives and husbands. (Look carefully at 5.23)

Here it important to understand that women are in no way spiritually inferior to men (Acts 2.16-21 and Gal 3.28 also Proverbs 31 and Gen 1.27, also all of women prophets, judges and deacons that are mention throughout Scripture.)

We do well to understand the correct meaning of the term head in 5:23. It is not the authoritative ruling term (head of) that our English cultural connotation implies. There were two word choices for Paul to choose from at this point in his letter. One of those choices was arche (archangel or archbishop). Paul did not use this term (arche), rather he deliberately used the term kephale (kef-ah-Lay) which commonly had one or two meanings: 1.) The part of one’s body (origin) or 2.) *One who went before the troops in battle (This better describes Christ as being our head and leader- first born from the dead).

The term kephale (kef-ah-Lay) was never used to mean: leader, boss, chief, or ruler. For a more in depth study, consider how and when rosh is translated into kephale or arche in the Septuagint (the Greek Old Testament read by Jesus and Paul).

The Husband and wife (bodies) belong to one another (1 Cor 7.4)

For those who argue that women are to be submissive to men (Eve to Adam) because of the fall (Gen 3.16), then does not the curse end with the advent of Christ and humankind’s salvation in him (Gal 3.13).


2. Children and Fathers. The voice and concern that Paul gives here to children is culturally striking. In a patriarchal society children were subhuman, mere property. Fathers are not to break their Spirits (6.4) and children are to obey and honor their parents (6.1).

3. Slaves and Masters. Slavery, as human exploitation, was never God’s original intention. In fact, we know Paul’s greater concern for the topic in Philemon 12-21 (and Gal 3.28 “Neither slave nor free.”). Paul does, however, advocate his spiritual slavery for the sake of the Gospel.

With the understanding of the voluntary nature of the mutual and reciprocal submission the (culturally radical) application of 5.21-6.9 then is:

That wives must submit to the out-front-risk-taking by their husband’s sacrificial love for them; husbands must submit to all of the needs of his wife and do so with Christ like sacrifice and love; parents should submit to the needs of the children by bringing them up in the ways of the Lord; Children should submit to the parents responsibility of looking out for them and raising them in the Lord; slaves and masters should submit to the needs of one another.

We are to serve one another the way Christ served us!

“If anyone wants to be first [“important” & “powerful”], he must be the very last, and servant of all.” (Mark 9.35)

Do you remember the story of Cain and Able, Adam and Eves’ boys? Able tended to flocks and Cain worked the soil. They both offered sacrifices to God, but Able’s sacrifice was better than Cain’s sacrifice (Hebrews 11.4). Cain became jealous of his brother and killed him.

The Lord called out to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?” Cain replied, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4.9). You’re the keeper of my well-being and I am the keeper of your well-being.

Oh how the promise keepers and Southern Baptist Convention (Baptist Faith Message 2000 version) have it all wrong when it comes to interpreting the 5.22 and verse 23!

It’s not about who is in authority or in control, it is about who is most like Christ and most self-sacrificial (last and least) servant to all! In this way:“Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.”