One of my favorite Youtube channels is “Ready to Harvest.” It is about Christian denominations. Although it comes from a Baptist college, it tries quite valiantly, and I feel successfully, to focus on what is true about different denominations (and Christian-adjacent religions) rather throwing shade and quick judgment.

Curiously, they also like to put polls on their channel to see what subscribers hold to. Today they had one:

“It is God’s plan for man to be the head of the home, just as Christ is the head of the Church.” What do you think of this statement.?

Then one can choose between SIX (6) answers: ”AGREE STRONGLY”, “AGREE MORE THAN DISAGREE”, “DISAGREE MORE THAN AGREE”, “DISAGREE STRONGLY”, “NOT SURE” AND “JUST SHOW RESULTS.” The last two are combined resulting in five discrete options.

Ignoring the last choice, the four options of agreement and disagreement are actually rather difficult to choose between.

AGREE STRONGLY. A majority chose this one. It is understandable that they did. The statement is drawn from a passage of Scripture— Ephesians 5:22-23. To say that one does not agree strongly with the statement might be seen as saying that one doesn’t agree with God’s Word.

However, there is a problem with verse-grabbing. When one takes the verse out of its passage and then suggests that it is a propositional or theological statement, it becomes something different. And that leads to other options.

DISAGREE STRONGLY. The relationship between Jesus and the church differs from the ideal relationship between a man (father-role) and the (presumably nuclear) family. Jesus is physically not present. His direct leadership is through statements from the distant past, much like the Rechabites in the book of Jeremiah are ‘led’ by the guidance of their predecessor. The headship of Christ is more in terms of ‘spiritual’ while the church on a practical, day-to-day setting makes its own way except as guided by what is in Scripture. Jesus relationship with the church is God and humans… with no suggestion in Scripture whatsoever that the father is to have a godlike status in the family. While Jesus’ role with the church is ultimately to become that of benevolent monarch, there seems little suggestion as far as I can see that the ideal leadership in the family is monarchical.

The word “as” is a rather powerful word in the above statement. To me, as means, “in a parallel or corresponding way” when it is taken and put into a theological proposition. As a simple statement— Jesus heads the church and the father/husband heads the family— I believe it expresses a pretty simple truth, or at least ideal. But that word “as” really begins to imply something different.

Given the two extremes above, I would have to say that the truth comes closer to DISAGREE STRONGLY than to AGREE STRONGLY. Still I feel both extremes take things too far (as is commonly the case in such polls). That is why I chose DISAGREE MORE THAN AGREE.

My answer sounds unbiblical, but I think this poll actually points to the danger of propositional theology where a lot of nuance is lost by getting people to agree that a Bible verse is “true” and then take that “truth” far away from what it was trying to say.

Of course, some would disagree. The overall passage is about submission… and we as the human race struggle with that term since we all use the term differently. I would say that “total submission” is to be applied to God alone. Everywhere else it is nuanced. Propositional theology is not that good at nuance.

Now some of you may feel like I am trying to play games with Scripture. However, it is reasonable to ask the question of how the relationship between Jesus and the church informs the relationship between the “man” (husband/father) relates to wife and children. If one says that the relationship is to be understood in terms of divine being and mortal human, I hope most of us would absolutely reject this. (I have heard some the lean in this direction, however.) Or if someone suggests that the relationship is best idealized in terms of an absentee father (since Jesus is away from us, physically, at this time), I certainly hope people would be very skeptical that this is a sound reflection on this passage.

I value similes, metaphors, illustrations, and so forth. However, we take such a language structure and label is as “truth” we risk losing the nuance that made the form valuable in the first place.