Introduction
Okay, and what comes after this? What sin comes next? The sin of loving Jesus?
Yes, the title is certainly provocative, at least in some quarters. But this merely highlights yet another aspect of the diseased understanding of discipleship that prevails in these troubled times of ours. We tend to simply take it for granted that “being provocative” is problematic. This is yet another characteristic of one of the sins of the age, which is that of fuzzy thinking. What is being provoked? What is the intention behind the provoking? And does whatever it is need to be provoked?
Bear with me, and I think we might be able to come to agree by the end. There really is a sin that we cover over with the white paint of that alluring phrase servant leadership. Not only is it a sin, but it is a black mold kind of sin—hard to identify, difficult to notice, and really destructive. And if the black mold is deep in your walls, another coat of paint is not the solution anybody should be looking for.
Now, Of Course Not
We should start our discussion of this by being careful not to jump to conclusions. The dangerous toxin in the phrase servant leadership is not found in the word servant, but rather in leadership. This is not a rant against sacrifice and service. It is a case against selfishness and cowardice disguised as servanthood.
No true Christian objects to the summons to deny ourselves daily, to take up the cross daily (Matt. 16:24). That is what it means to follow Him. The Lord Jesus Himself was sent into the world, and although He was and remains the eternal God, He took on the form of a slave (Phil. 2:7). While here, He also took up the role of a slave when He wrapped Himself with a towel and washed the disciples’ feet (John 13:4-5). He expressly taught His followers that in the kingdom that He was establishing, the way up was down. “Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant” (Mark 10:43, NKJV). The way to get promoted in the kingdom is to go to the back of the line. When the doors finally open, everyone is surprised to discover that the doors were actually on the other side of the street, and the back of the line is now the front of the line. By example and precept both, the way of sacrificial service is set before all Christians as the path we must seek to walk. So that is not where the problem is. For years now, I have defined masculinity as the glad assumption of sacrificial responsibility, which is a particular form of service that men are called to.
So I am not objecting to the servant part of servant leadership. The concern has to do with the noun that the glorious adjective is modifying. Where do we get this “leadership” business?
Where the Problem Lies
In His case, what noun did Jesus say that the spirit of servanthood modified ?
“If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another’s feet.”John 13:14 (KJV)
Now perhaps you have been to a marriage conference or two where that phrase servant leadership rolls easily off the tongues of the speakers. So here is a thought experiment. Can you imagine any of them, ever, nonchalantly using a phrase like servant lordship? Or servant rulers? What’s that you say? You think they would rather be found dead in a ditch outside of town somewhere?
But why the objection? The adjective servant has not been touched. It is still there, modifying everything. And we do have grounds for thinking that lordship is operative in the home (1 Pet. 3:6). And the same for rulers (1 Tim. 3:5). We know that husbands are called to be servant heads (Eph. 5:23). As men fill out these roles, they should do so with a heart of sacrifice. They should seek to imitate Christ and His heart of service. They should love their wives as Christ loved the church, and gave Himself for it (Eph. 5:25).
But where in Scripture might we go to fill out that ambiguous term leadership?
Perhaps this has been the point all along. If we cannot define something biblically, but the word sounds really good, then maybe we might have the opportunity to smuggle in our own definitions. Hmmm?
And this is precisely where the damage has been done. Modern evangelical husbands have been taught that they are to be servant leaders, and that they are to lead by serving. The idea is that their role is to “build consensus.” That translates into “find out what she wants and make sure it happens.” But to the extent we use the word lead at all, why should it not be that men are to serve by leading? And doing so the way a ruler, or a head, or a lord might do? There is a chasm between serve by leading and lead by serving.
What the idea of servant leadership in the home does is place the husband in a position of adjectival servitude to something, and then if any attempt is made to apply this to the nouns that Scripture uses, to begin sputtering in indignation at the incipient tyranny.
So let’s start calling it servant lordship instead. I mentioned the need to build consensus. Can we build consensus around that? No? Then it is not the servant part we differ on. It is the authority part. But Scripture is unambiguous about the authority part. Wives are to obey their husbands (Tit. 2:5). However, we live in a generation that hates the idea that a husband has genuine authority in the home. A potential elder must rule his household well (1 Tim. 3:4).
And all the feminists bridle at this word—both the feminists who know they are feminists and all the evangelical feminists who call their feminism something like complementarianism, fooling only themselves. But the danger lights are blinking all over their dashboard. What about the possibility of tyranny? Or of bullying? Or of harshness? Or of domineering?
No, no, no, I would reply. I said servant ruler.
Not an Insignificant Bit of Language
“The subtle and far-reaching effects of the change, which are still proceeding, may be gauged by the implication of the fact that those who were once called a nation’s rulers are now almost universally called its leaders”
C.S. Lewis, English Literature in the Sixteenth Century, p. 50
“And you notice that I am guilty of a slight archaism in calling them ‘rulers’. ‘Leaders’ is the modern word. I have suggested elsewhere that this is a deeply significant change of vocabulary. Our demand upon them has changed no less than theirs on us. For of a ruler one asks justice, incorruption, diligence, perhaps clemency; of a leader, dash, initiative, and (I suppose) what people call ‘magnetism’ or ‘personality’.”
C. S. Lewis, Selected Literary Essays, p. 11.
Lewis called it “a deeply significant change of vocabulary,” and I agree. And this is no less true in domestic affairs than it is in the public square. In the home, what is required of leaders is to build consensus, and if we build enough consensus, and do it for long enough, we can eventually drop that pesky word obey out of the bride’s vows.
Been on This for a While
Reforming Marriage was published in 1995, thirty years ago, believe it or not. I was writing about this problem back then, as part of our project to help dismantle the longhouse. I called it the Nice Guy Syndrome at that time. Of course, we didn’t call it the longhouse back then because none of snarky wiseacres had been born yet. It would be a quarter of a century before they could set us straight.
“In the Christian world today, countless marriages have not really been spiritually consummated. The marriage covenant has been made, and there has been physical consummation, but the marriage is still not right. It is not right because a marriage cannot be spiritually consummated if the husband acts the part of a spiritual eunuch . . . Countless nice Christian men have wives in this state of continual frustration. And the more frustrated the wife gets, the nicer the husband tries to be. Unfortunately, this “niceness” is not biblical gentleness. This is not an example of the fruit of the Spirit. It is not the love discussed above; it is abdication, or “wimping out.”
Reforming Marriage, back in the olden times
So, Repenting of Servant Leadership
There are a number of really tough situations where a man sees this problem clearly, and his own sin in it, but his wife is hardhearted, and completely in thrall to the spirit of the age. What is he supposed to do? There is some hope for him, but that will have to wait for its own separate treatment—because there are many moving parts. Such men are at the red wire/green wire part of the movie, and if they disarm the bomb by snipping the wrong one, they will discover that they did not in fact disarm the bomb.
I am writing here for an ordinary Christian couple who are frustrated in and by their relationship. They are not on the brink of divorce, but they do quarrel more than they should, and neither one of them can put their finger on the exact problem. The whole thing is nebulous to them both.
“I will tell you if you really want to know,” said the Director.
“Please,” said Jane reluctantly.
“They would say,” he answered, “that you do not fail in obedience through lack of love, but have lost love because you never attempted obedience.”
C. S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength, p. 145.
So I would suggest something like this. They agree that their marriage is bumpier than it ought to be. She is frustrated with him because she does feel like her needs are being met, and the more he tries to meet her needs, the more frustrated she gets. He occasionally gets exasperated—even he gets exasperated—blows up, and then comes crawling back, hoping to be better next time.
They should do something like this. They should agree together that is time to attempt something radical. The first thing is that he should repent to God for his attempts to be a “servant leader,” and she should repent to God for expecting that from him. Both of them confess this to God as a sin, and they confess it to one another. They both might be muttering to themselves that they don’t know what this even means yet, but wait. There’s more. The second thing I would recommend they do is to have him read Reforming Marriage aloud to her, a chapter a night. Before they start, they both agree not to discuss it. Just read it, meditate on it, go to your respective corners, and pray to the Lord about the issues raised in that chapter. When they have finished the book, he should take her out to a very nice restaurant, and there they can talk about it as much as they want.