It's a Naughty Word Today

There are plenty of absolutely benign words that for some reason or another have developed negative connotations over many years of cultural shift. Words like manipulation, liberal/conservative, masculine/feminine have simple, unemotional definitions and are not innately negatively nor positively charged words. Our culture has shifted such that these words take on extreme emotional connotations in common use though. I could spend time on why each of these have been co-opted and how under the original and basic definitions they should be allowed to flow in conversation/debate without offending our discussion participants. However, I want to cover another word that has suffered this fate. This is a word used frequently in the Bible and is a core evidence of someone who is living out a Christian faith in their life.

Submit. Say that in the wrong timing or to a person not expecting nor prepared for it, and I promise you a heated argument/discussion will certainly ensue. Such a simple word that seems to spark some of the deepest emotional responses from many in our current American culture. I wish I could say this reaction was only when the word lands in discussions with non-Christians, but it has become just as much of a trigger for professing Christians as non-Christians. This is not something that can be allowed to continue though, right? After all, submission to the Lordship of Christ is really about as core to a Christian faith as anything. So, how can one follow Christ without submission? Oh yeah, we can't.

Here are some of the places where Submit (or some variant) show up in the Bible, and for some sarcastic fun my rating on how dangerous that text would be to share with someone that is offended by the word Submit (FYI, 36 total uses in NIV not counting synonyms):

Reference	Topic	Safety Rating
Hebrews 13:17	Submit to Church leaders	All good here, unless someone recently experienced hurt FROM their church, so probably better to be careful with this one.
Hebrews 12:9	How much more should we submit to the Father	Doubt too much offense at this one. One caution: compares earthly father discipline to Heavenly Father. Could get touchy.
James 4:7	Submit to God, resist the devil	Surely this one is a safe zone. Wait, James as a whole is pretty offensive to the point Augustine suggested he wanted it out of the Bible (I think that was mostly in jest though).
Ephesian 5:21	Submit to one another	This one on its own is safe. After all we are making sure to be on equal footing with the other party AND the rest of the phrase is "out of reverence for Christ." So, for any Christian, we should be fine here. EXCEPT THE NEXT VERSE is…
Ephesians 5:22	Wives submit to your husbands	WARNING WARNING WARNING! From experience I can tell you, this is NOT a safe use of Submit in our world today. (Usually people are offended here because they misread the next verses where basically Paul says "husbands, likewise submit to your wives". Two-way street people.)

Ok, I am stopping there. A few more times in Ephesians and another grouping in Colossians and again in 1 Peter if you want to go find some more. But you get the point I hope; the Bible doesn't treat Christian Submission as a bad thing. Problem is our culture has taught us that submission equals loss, failure, giving up and forces the constant negativity that goes with loss and failure. The cultural definition of Submit now excludes a Christian perspective that says "giving up" to Christ is gain. In Paul's words in Philippians 1:21, "For me to live is Christ, to die is gain." That is submission to Christ, willingly doing what a Christian is called in the face of having to give up everything.

Now, counter those words from Paul against someone I wrote about a few years back, the rich young ruler. Jesus tells him all he has to do is "give up" all of his possessions and follow (um, synonym for Submit). The young man's response, bye bye Jesus. He was unwilling to submit to Jesus as leader of his heart. And that is exactly the same type of message our current culture tells us today. No way you can give up anything for anybody, else you will not be successful.

Here are some phrases I think we hear today that that make "submit" so hard to handle:

• You're no better than me, so don't think you KNOW better than me.
• I have a right to my own opinion on things and you can't define what I think is right/true. (Relativism)
• The Bible doesn't apply the same way to current culture in many areas and must be reinterpreted based on today (why do we teach Biblical Interp then?)

Sure, there are plenty of others, but that's a few, and I would rather not drag in too much politics as that is NOT where this lands. Where it does land is that I know the world does not want us to submit to each other and certainly does not want us to submit to Jesus. The world stands against Jesus and expects us only to submit to it and the calls for selfish ambition, self-indulgence, and power creation/gathering.

For the Christian though, our power is only in submission to and acknowledgement of Jesus as Lord and Savior. Whether or not the world around us is offended by a word, we submit to Him. Still, does this mean I proudly go around shouting at people to "submit to your spouse,"  or "Submit to Jesus?" knowing how offended they might be? That's a tough one really. Part of me says yes. After all, the Gospel offends all. However, I also know Paul's words about "all things to all people," where I think we should then carefully consider our words to best present the Gospel in a way to allow all ears to hear it in Christ's love not our culture's connotated perspective of a single word.

Do we submit? As Christian, absolutely! Do we intentionally offend others for the purpose of preserving a single word? I hope we instead are slow to speak and prayerfully consider the evolution of words as frustrating and difficult as it is. Word meanings do change over time, unless it's Latin of course. I don't speak Latin, so I think I am stuck with being considerate to the possible offense of others as best as I can. Christ's story is certainly more important than my own personal feeling about a single English word.