OpenTheo
00:00
00:00

A Marriage Fit for the King

May 28, 2022
Knight & Rose Show
Knight & Rose ShowWintery Knight and Desert Rose

Wintery Knight and Desert Rose discuss marriage from a Christian perspective. We talked about what WK is looking for in a wife, and what he wants to achieve with marriage. We talked about traditional husband roles: protector, provider, moral, and spiritual leader. We discussed "servant leadership" and "male headship". Rose evaluated an email from a naïve proponent of male headship. We talked about what we learned from our engagement with a Christian feminist.   Please subscribe, like, comment, and share.   Show notes: https://winteryknight.com/2022/05/29/knight-and-rose-show-episode-7-a-marriage-fit-for-the-king  

Subscribe to the audio podcast here: https://knightandrose.podbean.com/

Audio RSS feed: https://feed.podbean.com/knightandrose/feed.xml

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@knightandroseshow

Rumble: https://rumble.com/c/knightandroseshow

Odysee: https://odysee.com/@KnightAndRoseShow

Music attribution: Strength Of The Titans by Kevin MacLeod Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/5744-strength-of-the-titans License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Share

Transcript

Welcome to the Knight & Rose Show, where we discuss practical ways of living out an authentic Christian worldview. Today's topic is Masculinity in Marriage. I'm Wintry Knight.
And I'm Desert Rose.
So Rose, last episode we saw that Christian men should always be focused on God's priorities, including in their relationships with women. And I think that extends into their plans for marriage.
Yeah, definitely. It has to. Yep.
So I thought I would talk a little bit at the start of this episode about my plan for marriage,
and people can kind of get an idea about what sort of things that I would have done to focus on God's priorities. So one thing for sure, I think that God definitely puts a focus on raising children in the faith, in the Bible. Certainly.
Yeah. I'm thinking of like Deuteronomy 6 and
things like that, the Shema. Yeah, exactly.
So definitely producing effective, influential children who would go on to make a difference for Christ in this kingdom would definitely be one of my goals. And I think my frustrations in the church that you and I talked about in a previous episode, I would probably want the marriage to count for that. For whatever reason, married couples seem to be more welcome in the church.
Yeah, unfortunately. Yeah.
Yeah.
So it's easier for them to introduce speakers and politics resources and kind of train people
up because they just seem to be more trustworthy looking. One other thing, when I was a university student, I noticed that there were a lot of challenges to my faith from the professors and from the other students. So I would love for my wife to be able to go onto the campus and help out with a group like Rocio Christi or something like that.
Maybe even invite the college students
over, but basically give college students a place to air their doubts and their questions and even fund and organize speakers who would come on campus. You always need the students to kind of sponsor it and have something to do with it, but I think having an adult there certainly wouldn't hurt. Yeah, that's such a great idea.
I've spoken on many college campuses for Rocio Christi and
had students over to my home to have conversations with them. It's nice. So much fun.
Yeah. And another thing that you do that I think would have been useful is don't you have an influence in your neighborhood? Yeah, I love mentoring the neighborhood kids. We play football, we play Nerf guns, we go for walks together.
They help me walk my dog and we have great
conversations. We have spiritual conversations about even things that their parents don't know. Wow.
Like one of my neighbors recently, I went on a walk with one of the 10-year-olds. I throw the
ball around within the neighborhood and on our walk, I taught him the moral argument for God's existence and he went home and shared it with his family. And his mom texted me later that day and said, "Hey, I don't suppose you know how my 10-year-old knows the moral argument.
Do you?"
And I thought that was so great. I said, "Yeah, yeah, guilty." And she's like, "I love it. Thank you for being a great influence on my children." Yeah, marriage is like it can be difficult, but I think if you partner up with the right person who is having these kinds of influence, it makes it all worthwhile.
So do you know any other areas where you think it would be good
to have an influence? Yeah, well, certainly I would say policymaking. This was my undergraduate degree though and I used to work as a lobbyist for a conservative Christian organization in Washington, DC. So this is something I'm passionate about, but certainly I would, you know, I think it's important for us to be influencing not only the church, but also the culture to the extent that we're able for goodness and beauty and truth.
Right. And you also have your own
apologetics ministry where you do conference speaking, podcasting, blogging, curriculum creation, and even a podcast with me. Yes, yeah, all that stuff is just so much fun.
It's a tremendous privilege to be able to do all of this ministry with my life. I love it. So yeah, I mean, you know, a lot of the things that you mentioned that are marriage goals for you or that you had in mind for your marriage are really kingdom focused, excellent goals that I really think men ought to be interested in for their marriage.
But you don't just, you know,
pick any woman and have her just be able to suddenly do these things or be excited about these things. And so I really think men should be evaluating women during the courting or dating process to see if women are able and or even have any interest in helping them achieve these goals. I mean, I know that a lot of women get upset when you talk about, you know, evaluating them on this basis and have all these reactionary thoughts like, "Don't be judging me." The reality is you're always being judged.
Okay, so women are, you know, they may be, they're either going to
be judged on just their physical appearance or on kingdom values, kingdom purposes. And so I love that you evaluate women for kingdom purposes. I also actually know a lot of men who object to the idea of having a detailed plan for marriage that's intended to serve the boss rather than to serve themselves.
Yes, yeah. So who did they think the marriage should serve?
From a lot of the comments I've read, a lot of men seem to think that marriage is all about serving them. They want women who can, you know, bring them slippers, who can bring them food, and that's about the extent of it.
Not that there's anything wrong with those things. It's
wonderful to make a man his, you know, a meal and to, I'm sure, to bring him his slippers. But I love that you, you know, as a man with a good education, good career, wise financial decisions, who has thought a lot about these things and a lot about your purpose and direction that you have more in mind for your marriage than just those things.
You know, as you often say, to whom much
is given, much is expected. And you're absolutely right about that. Yeah.
So whenever I get kicked
back from women, when I asked some questions about what do you want this marriage to count for in terms of God's priorities, it's usually not a case where they say, well, I have different priorities and they're better for God. That would be a valid answer. You know, if someone said, that's a pretty good plan, but check this out, you know, I've got this plan that's going to be even better for God.
And then, you know, what do you think about that? Should we switch to this
plan? That's not what happens. That would be a good answer. But I think what happens is there's this kind of skepticism about making plans.
They want things to be more spontaneous. And
what I've encountered is spontaneous usually means they want to be the decider and they want to decide on the basis of feelings. And the customer of the relationship isn't going to be God, which is why they're kind of pushing back against this structure.
To me, that doesn't seem like a
good bet. Like you said, I've made good decisions in education, career and finances. Other men who haven't made good decisions may have low expectations, but I have high expectations.
Yeah. And I absolutely love that about you. I also love that you expect and are equipped to be the leader in your marriage.
Should you ever get married? I was wondering, can we talk a little
bit about what leadership in marriage means? For sure. I know that, you know, as a foundation that we've kind of already laid, we've talked about how God is the boss. The man is an ambassador for Christ, a representative on this earth.
He's a steward of God's resources. He's an agent of God.
He serves, you know, in a lot of ways as a spy, spying out the land and finding out what the opposing team with the enemy is up to and preparing and equipping for those and serving as a warrior.
Yeah. And serving as a warrior to fight evil and to defend what is good. And so, you know, we've also talked about how man is accountable first and foremost to God, not to his wife or his peers or his feelings.
You know, we talked in the last episode, I think it was at a minimum,
it was implied that a man needs to be concerned with what is in the best interests of his community, of his family in Christ. But also, I think, you know, in this episode, we'll talk a little bit more about how he also needs to be concerned about the best interests of what is in the best interests of his wife and children if he has decided to get married. So, you've talked a lot about the man's role as protector, provider, and moral and spiritual leader.
Yes. And I'd love to
talk about those. Okay.
So, what does it mean to be a protector today? When I was in my 20s,
I had a lot of friends when I became a Christian, I had a lot of friends who would talk about how important it was to find a man who was a good protector. But then they would also talk about how they needed, you know, they really wanted him to be, most importantly, they wanted him to be tall and handsome and muscular. And so, I mean, you would think from listening to them that what it means to be a protector, you know, in the 21st century is, you know, that a man needs to be good at like wrestling bears or something.
I mean, is this what we mean by protector? What does a
man need to be able to protect from? Yeah. So, that's a great question. So, I've actually heard, you know, prominent people in Christian ministry say, define masculinity that way, that the man uses his physical strength in order to benefit the woman.
So, messing up not only the priorities of
relationships, but also what is the most common threat. So, the most common threat is not going to be physical altercations with other people. The most common threat is probably going to be something like the public school teacher is trying to have my kid change genders or go behind my back and have them, you know, injected with certain treatments that will make them infertile or something.
It's going to be more threats that have to be countered with resources or arguments or
evidence, persuasion. So, let me give you an example. So, for example, suppose that you have a daughter and she gets, you know, pregnant from some guy or rather you want to prevent that from happening.
It would be really good if the man was able to protect her from a situation that could
lead to that by convincing her about the humanity of the unborn. And so, ability in pro-life apologetics is one way that you protect your children from getting into a situation where they have to do something dangerous and bad. Yeah, that's excellent.
I love that you mentioned
apologetics and not simply pro-life. I know a lot of parents have talked to their kids about, you know, don't have sex before marriage because that makes you easy or that makes you a bad person or whatever, but they don't really explain the evidence behind the consequences of that. Right.
Yeah. So, I mean, it sounds like it's a priority for men to be able to protect
the people in his life from lies, like lies of the culture and such. So, one of the lies of our culture that I see all over the place now is kind of this idea of feminism and hookup culture.
I was
reading a quote actually on an article that I found through your blog in which this woman said, quote, "As someone who considers herself a feminist, I always thought that being sexual and unashamed was liberating and empowering. And for that reason, I never stopped myself from doing what I wanted to do." Wow. And I think this is a really common narrative that's being passed on to young women, that being strong and valuable means being sexually promiscuous.
And that's
an absolute lie from hell that has to be stopped. Something else I hear from feminist influence is that in order for a woman to have, to find value the same as a man, she needs to have some great career, which of course means she has to put her kids in daycare and let somebody else raise them while she goes and pursues more money or some impressive title or whatever. But actually, we've seen studies, including one that you've posted on your blog several times about declining female happiness over, since the 1950s when women were staying at home.
So, women have been told
that they're going to be happier if they leave their children to be raised by somebody else and they go out and get a career. But that's not what we've seen. Yeah, it's really important for people, well, for men, I think, to be informed about the statistics and the evidence on issues like this so that when someone says, "I'm going to do what the crowd is doing," and men are able to say, well, men and women are able to say, "20 years down the road, this is likely what you're looking at.
Are you sure you want to go in that direction?" So, we have even a student loan crisis right now, 1.6 trillion in outstanding student loans. So, protecting would just be, "Hey, I know the numbers on this and what major you should study and what is going to get you a job so that you don't get yourself in this situation." You're protecting someone from student loan debt, which could really hamper their ability to achieve goals for the boss, for God. If somebody has six figures of student loan debt, all of their plans are going to be in trouble.
As a man, I basically see myself
having to have some skill in education, career, and finances, some achievement, so that I can talk about things like this to people and talk from the authority of having negotiated this with some degree of success. Right, exactly. Yeah.
And I think of, as you talk about education, career,
and finance, about the crisis we've had, we've seen with a lot of pastors in the last few years, as the culture has gone far left, and pastors have found themselves in the place of having to make the difficult decision of feeding their families or standing by historic Christianity and speaking the truth. And we've seen a lot of people wither in the face of that kind of pressure. And I think that's a huge contrast to someone like you who continues to write and speak about the hard truths on the hard issues, knowing that you don't have any financial dependence on people.
And so, they really don't have any control over you. Yeah, it's really important to be like a tent-making apologist so that you have a business that funds your ministry and then you say what you want. You have freedom to do that.
Another thing that I think is good for protecting
other people is, basically, sometimes people care a lot about what other people think of them. And one way I found to get around that is to kind of build them up with their own achievements. So, for example, in your case, I noticed that you were starting to, in your ministry, you were starting to say certain things that I thought might get you into trouble with certain people.
So,
I kind of encouraged you to learn how to use a firearm and get your concealed carry permit. Yeah, that's been so much fun. I love that you did that.
I love that you encouraged me to do that.
I love that I followed through with that. You've actually encouraged me to learn and grow in several other areas as well.
One of them being learning computer science, which I've been
learning over the past six months or so. And it's just so much fun to achieve and to have that confidence that you know that you can do more. And I've applied those skills in my ministry, not the firearm part.
Not yet, but bears. But certainly with the computer science aspect of
things. Yeah, definitely.
I see it as protecting someone to kind of give them experiences where
they grow in their strength. So, Brad Conkle has a ministry called Maven where he trains young Christians and then he deploys them to various areas where they're going to encounter skeptics. Yeah, I love that ministry.
Yes, I love that you want to talk about that. Go ahead.
Yeah.
So, basically what we're looking at there is someone who is giving people a test and then
training them for the test so that they, and then they go and they have the test and they build their own confidence. Again, you want to protect someone from apostasizing over peer pressure. Right.
Why don't you train them to be able to reason with people with evidence so that they
have reasons for what they believe. And instead of just being swayed by the cool group or whatever it is happens to people on university campuses. I don't know.
I wasn't cool when I was at university.
I just studied and wrote code. Sometimes we were there all night in that computer lab.
So, yeah, protection. I think the financial situation I was just telling you about the stock market. It's not looking too good right now.
So, I think men should be concerned about economic
policy and probably sacrifice spending money now in order to save for future contingencies. I've seen this firsthand actually quite a bit. It's kind of a generational problem throughout my family that there's a lot of spending and very little saving and several generations of people.
Not everybody in my family, but it's not uncommon to have seen some of my grandparents not be equipped at all for retirement and be utterly and completely dependent on others and just be in really scary situations, just completely unprepared. It's as if they thought they could work until the day they died. And that did not happen.
They lived to be in their 90s and were basically kind of
pushed out of the workplace. Yeah. Work isn't fun when you get older.
It's yucky to have to get
in your car early in the morning, in the winter, and drive through snow to get to work when you're like 70 years old. Money also helps you with having options for how to educate your kids or healthcare, things like that. If you have sufficient resources, you can go to private schools or homeschooling.
You don't have to depend on the public schools. You don't help
yourself to outcomes. You have to make a decision that's going to get you the result that you're looking for.
You don't just say, "Hey, I'm going to do what I want now. And later on, my kids are
going to be Christians." It doesn't work like that. You have to sacrifice now in order to get the results you want later.
Right. Exactly. Yep.
And we can apply that to all kinds of examples, but
why don't we go ahead and talk about what it means to be a provider? We talked about protector. Let's talk about provider for a few minutes. Yeah.
I mean, we kind of touched on that
already, but basically, I think men are responsible for making decisions about what to study or what trade to get into, how to pursue their careers, and how to manage their finances. So what I'd like to see is men getting into STEM fields or trades that allow them to earn a decent income. Instead of choosing to study what you like and following your heart, that never works.
You should definitely
pick degrees or trades that are going to allow you to earn 80,000, 90,000, something like that. When it comes to career, try to have a gapless resume. Definitely in your 20s, put in extra hours and save your money because you never know when you're going to need that money for a down payment or to rescue someone from a challenge or something like that.
When you have a lot of money
from your career, you can take over mentoring other people. You can buy them books, you can send them to conferences, you can buy them DVDs, you can fund their speakers. The speaker's on campus.
I do that
all the time with Russia Christie. They want to bring a speaker and I foot the bill so that the university students at that university, whichever it is, are going to be treated to a Christian point of view from someone who's an expert. Speakers like Frank Turek and Jay Warner Wallace in particular are really good.
Yeah, those are great examples. I think I would probably add under provider,
children need their father. We've seen a lot of really problematic changes in our culture, really since the Industrial Revolution when men began working outside the home.
We're living in a time where for a lot of careers, it's very reasonable to have flexible hours or to work from home and to be available and involved in your kids' lives. I know that's not an option for everyone and I certainly don't want to leave anyone with the impression that if you go to an office to work, there's something umbilical about your career. But that's just something to keep in mind when you're thinking about how you can provide for your family.
Financial provision
is not the only way that someone can provide for their family. It's important. They need to eat, they need shelter, but children do need their parents as well.
Yeah, that's a great point. As we're talking about provider also, I think of these two men I know and their wives, their children. I'm thinking about these two different families and how they approached the role of provider very differently.
On the one hand, there's Matt who sees being a provider as
being an ATM. His wife has a credit card with his name on it and she just buys whatever she wants. She comes home with new pets just about every week of the year.
She comes home with new clothes
just about every day of the year. She spends, spends, spends and he prides himself on being the provider of all of this craziness that stresses him out. And then in contrast, I think of a man I know named Ben who also makes a very nice income, but he doesn't spend frivolously and he doesn't condone that for his wife and children.
And so when his wife wanted to start a Christian ministry,
his response was not, "Okay, whatever you want, you've got the credit card." His response was, "Okay, well, why don't you put together a business plan and present it to me and tell me how you hope to achieve this and why you want to achieve this and why it's a need, why this and not something else and how you plan to make this sustainable over time and I'll listen and use my business sense to make a good judgment and pray about it and decide where to go from there." And his wife excitedly did that with excellence. And he said at the end of her presentation, "This is excellent. I'm convinced.
Let's do it." And he has been wholeheartedly in from the beginning. And this
is now a thriving Christian ministry that many, many people are benefiting from. - Yeah, that's the ideal situation.
Why would I sit in a computer lab all night and work 70-hour
weeks? It's so that my wife is going to come to me and say, "Hey, you're working hard so that I can have freedom to stay at home. Let me show you what I can do for our boss." And the answer to that is going to be, "The business plan is wonderful," but the answer is yes. That's what I want my marriage to be about.
That's what I want my wife to be doing. - I love it. I love it.
So really
quickly, what about moral and spiritual leadership? What do you want to say about that? - Yeah. So basically, I think the problem today is that people think that they can pass on spiritual and moral truths to the people around them, like for free. And a lot of people try to do it by being super hyperpious or sanctimonious, but it doesn't work like that.
I think if you want
to defend something like the existence of God or the resurrection of Jesus, you got to have equipped yourself to make a case using evidence. And similarly, people don't think this, but it's true with moral truths. If you want to put forward the pro-life view to other people, or you want to defend natural marriage as being best for children, or you want adults to stop being so selfish and consider that marriage is a stable environment for their child's development, these things don't happen the way that you may see many Christians doing.
You have to put in the time,
in the books, and train yourself, and then you have to show your work to other people. And in addition to that, I think that there is leading by talking and there's leading by doing. So in my case, I blog and we have this podcast where we're constantly talking about the evidence for what happens to children if the parents divorce, or what happens to children if they're missing their mother or their father.
The point is when I talk about moral and spiritual issues, I'm talking about
evidence. And I think that that's how you have the ability to lead. You're not giving your opinion, you're talking about what you know, and that's a big difference.
Yeah, exactly. So I'd love to talk
about servant leadership just for a minute. Do you have any thoughts on that? I know this is really, really popular right now, particularly with like egalitarians.
They want to
kind of cash out the leadership role of the man as being a servant and kind of like literally like being like a butler, you know, or something. But I don't accept that at all. My background is reading military history.
And so when I think of leadership, I think about the man having a good commanding
officer and benefiting from that being grateful to be well led by someone who can read the battlefield and know what to do so that they get the result they want, which is winning and surviving the battle. So I don't think that a commanding officer should focus on serving. I think he makes good decisions.
And that's what his that's what people are looking for. I agree. I agree.
I mean, I love
being led by competent, capable, wise leaders. I don't need a butler. If I if I want a butler, I can, you know, I can hire somebody.
Well, I can't really because I do ministry with my with my money.
Anyway, you know, I hear like Christian feminists say to support this idea of servant leadership, well, Jesus came to serve not to be served. And he washed his disciples feet.
Yes, those things
are true. They're in the Bible. But but that is not, you know, the washing of the disciples feet is not all that Jesus did.
And that's not all there is to the story. But I think it's important to
it's valuable here to point out Ephesians 5 22 to 24. There's a parallel made between Christ as the head of the church and husbands as the head of the wife.
And so Ephesians 5 22 to 24 says, wives
submit to your own husbands as to the Lord for the Lord as the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. So we ought to have this idea of the church and our relationship as the church with Christ when we're thinking about the relationship between a husband and wife, the father, not the church, was the head of Christ during his time on earth.
So the church was not telling Jesus what to do. They didn't give him commands.
They didn't get equal say in decision making.
They didn't have authority over Jesus. Jesus was
the head. He took the initiative, you know, in obedience to his father.
And so this is an
example we have to keep in mind as we talked about this topic. Yeah. And I don't read this passage the way most people read this as a man can just marry whoever he wants to marry based on whatever criteria, you know, he has, oh, she's really attractive.
She's pretty, you know, she's
fun. And then he has to point to this Bible verse and go, you have to obey me. That is not how I read this passage.
I read this, I read this passage is basically saying men, this is,
this is specifying the kind of woman that you should be interested in marrying is, is someone who is, who trusts you and respects you as a leader, and you should be trustworthy and respectable as a leader. So this is more saying to the man, you're going to enjoy being the leader of your own home. So make sure that you pick a partner who enjoys cooperating with you to follow plans and achieve goals.
Right, right, exactly. And again, that's what we see between the father and the son,
you know, they had the same ultimate goals, the same commitments. And so as the father led Jesus, you know, Jesus gladly followed and it wasn't, we don't have any reason to believe this, you know, there was a situation of the father pulling out some trump card saying, obey me, dang it.
Yeah.
Right. And you make such a great point, such a great point.
You know, also in 1 Corinthians 11,
three, it says, I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ. The head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God. Okay, so the man is not just doing whatever he wants, according to his feelings, his head is Christ.
And again, there's this parallel with
the father as the head of Christ as well. You know, people were able to tell Jesus what they wanted. They could make a case for what they wanted him to do, which direction they wanted him to go, you know, what they hoped to get from him, just like the Old Testament prophets did.
But Jesus always had the final say, and oftentimes they did not like his final say, but they, you know, they had to make a decision. Did they trust him enough to follow him or did they insist on their own way? Leadership, if you've committed to follow Christ, you know, is submitting to Jesus and trusting him. And similarly, we need to make a decision as women, if a man is someone we trust and want to follow.
Again, you know, I had mentioned this, Jesus washing the disciples' feet.
A lot of people bring this up as if it's the only thing Jesus did during this time here on earth. It's not, but even if we're just looking at that one event, Jesus chose to wash the disciples' feet.
He initiated it. He said, this is what I'm going to do. It wasn't because the disciples were sitting around going, my feet are dirty.
I need someone to wash them. Jesus, you're, you know, you're
the head. Why don't you do it? That's not the way it happened at all.
Peter didn't even,
Peter didn't even want Jesus to wash his feet. He protested. And then Jesus said, okay, well, if I can't wash your feet, then you can walk away and have no part with me.
And then Peter's like,
okay, go ahead and wash all of me then Jesus. And Jesus said, yeah, no, I'm not going to do that either. I'm going to wash your feet.
So Jesus was, you know, he was very much in control for a purpose
in submission to the father before what was best for the kingdom. And, you know, we do have an example of Jesus asking the father to go a different direction with something in the garden of Gethsemane. Jesus asked the father to take away the crucifixion.
And if there's any other way,
he said, please, let's do it. Let's go with whatever other plan there is. If there's another way.
And the father said no, because he had the mission in mind. He knew what had to be done to accomplish his great purposes. And, you know, he and Jesus did not let the fleshly desires of the moment dictate the decisions that were made.
Yeah, definitely. I think men need to think about
this, think about their plan, and they need to be careful about choosing a wife who helps them to achieve the results that they are trying to achieve for the boss. So don't think, don't think about yourself, think about the boss, and then pick the right partner for the job.
So I wanted
to talk about this email from a reader. And this is a guy who represents the view, like, the kind of patriarchal view, but it's not focused on God. So he wrote to me this, he goes, "With respect to how to submission test a woman, I disagree that the way to go about it is to have her write essays on books or on how to learn apologetics.
That's what we men are supposed to do." And he also said,
"I don't want to see how well she submits by serving God. I want her to submit by serving me, because by serving me, she is serving God." Okay, so it's, she doesn't serve God, she serves him. Women, and he says this, "Women don't have any specific contribution to ending atheism, feminism, or socialism.
The less they have to say about any of these things, the better. Sexual attraction
and submission to their husbands helps their husbands to fulfill their missions and visions, whatever they are." So what do you think about that? Wow, so not a fan. Okay, so he has no plan like yours to influence the neighborhood, the church, the university, nothing.
He, again, you
know, this is one of those guys I was referring to earlier, who apparently wants a woman to bring him his slippers. You know, he's not interested in equipping his wife and children to be influential for the boss. And, you know, my prediction with this is that his wife is going to become really dissatisfied pretty quickly over the meaninglessness of her life.
I mean, you know, he mentioned sexual
attraction and submission to the husband as being important to fulfill, you know, whatever missions there are out there, as if we've been given no direction. I have to say, you know, I really think that if he is concerned about sexual attraction, the way to approach that is going to be to partner with her for kingdom achievements. She's going to be over the top excited when she is equipped, when she has a purpose and value that goes beyond just serving his immediate temporary needs.
Again, I'm not saying that those are bad things or that those are not priorities or
shouldn't be. I'm just saying that women were created for kingdom purposes alongside the man and achieve what God has in store for us. And these are significant, important, eternal participation in the plans of God.
Yeah. Here's the outcome since you mentioned. He wrote, "My children were educated mostly in the public schools.
I wouldn't say they're effective or influential Christians. I'd say
they're working out their own salvation with fear and trembling. No, my marriage and kids don't oppose atheism, socialism, or feminism in any manner other than within ourselves and a local body of believers." So, yeah, so there you go.
That's, yeah, that's exactly what I would
expect. They're not having an impact except within themselves and those who already agree with them. Yeah, his kids are not effective or influential.
Yeah, that's exactly what I would expect.
I think people really underestimate the benefit that having a male-female pair working on these goals has. A while back, you and I were talking to a mutual friend of ours who was starting some kind of apologetics ministry initiative.
And I, the more that she went on about it, the more
annoyed I got with the direction she was taking. And so, I just wrote her a short email saying, "This is not going to be effective. You're going in the wrong direction.
Your whole enterprise
is not going to work." And I stopped talking to her. And I started telling you about what I thought about what this person had said and what did you do? Yeah, so I started paying close attention to what this mutual friend was writing and the direction she was going and evaluating it for the concerns of the boss, which are mutual concerns, of course. And I wrote a whole bunch of emails with advice and with evidence to back up my advice on the direction she was going and the direction that I believed she should go instead.
And ultimately, apparently, my emails were very
persuasive because she did change direction and improve her ministry product quite a bit. So, that was actually a lot of fun. Yeah, in the military terms, we talk about combined arms.
So, there are certain things that infantry can do that artillery can't do. There are certain things that tanks can do that the Air Force can't do. And the way that people fight battles and has been this way since at least the 20th century is that they use infantry tanks and the Air Force altogether in order to achieve their goals.
So, people who cut themselves off from having an
effective, intelligent woman as a partner, even as friends, because we talk about ministry all the time as friends and what's the best way to get things done. I think they're closing themselves off from getting good results. There are times when men don't have the personality or ability to do this and this is one of the cases.
So, now, this woman is going to put out a product that's
been influenced by us and it's going to have a huge influence on a large number of people all because you were able to pick up where I left off and get things done. Yeah, and even a lot of times when the man does have the ability, I believe you probably have the ability but didn't have the bandwidth. And so, at that time at least, and we have different personalities.
I approached it differently, I think, than you would have. But you make such
a good point. I mean, a man is really cutting himself short and cutting his boss short, more importantly, if he's just looking for a woman with an attractive physical appearance and no ability to help him achieve.
Yeah, it's all hands on deck now. We're in a battle.
Right.
It's all hands on deck. Yeah, exactly. And so, single men need to keep in mind.
This is my
encouragement to them. Find a woman who uses her mind for God's glory. Find a woman who wants to partner with you for a life adventure and strategy and effectiveness for the kingdom.
Don't settle
for anything less. And likewise to women, singleness is a great way to serve the boss. Paul talks about that in 1 Corinthians 7. You do not have to be married in order to have an important and significant role in the kingdom.
And so, if you can't find a man who is able to lead you well,
who is respectable and trustworthy and has demonstrated such by his actions in the past, you don't need to get married to just anybody. You don't need to just marry the first hot guy who expresses interest in marrying you. We, as women, need skills in order to evaluate men.
So, we need
to be reading books on apologetics and theology, economics, and worldview. We need to be doing ministry. Sometimes we find out through doing ministry that there are certain ministries that we are terrible at and we want you to know part of that really somebody with different gifts altogether should be doing that.
And then we try something different and we realize, "Wow,
this is my wheelhouse. This is where I want to be." And I would encourage women, learn a marketable skill. Get a job before you're married.
Save money. Don't go into debt. These types of
things are very attractive to men if you do hope to get married.
CB; Yeah. Even if you plan to have a stay-at-home wife and mom, once the children arrive, you're getting a person who has been through a little bit more life experience who is going to be able to raise effective children because she just knows how the private sector workplace works and how the university works and how grad school works. BT; Right.
Exactly. Exactly. Such an important point.
And so, I would exhort women, until you
find a man who fits the description of masculinity that we've been describing, don't get married. Enjoy serving the boss with the gifts that you have and in the community where you have influence. And this is a very valuable use of your time and of your womanhood.
CB; Yeah, I agree. And on the flip side, same thing for men. Until you find a woman who is interested in being led to serve God more effectively, don't get married.
BT; Yeah, absolutely. So good. CB; All right.
I think that's all the time we have today for this episode. If you enjoy the
content and enjoy the show today, please like, share, subscribe, and comment. And we'll always post the show notes on wintryknight.com. That's W-I-N-T-E-R-Y-K-N-I-G-H-T.com. And we will see you again in the next episode.
[Music]

More on OpenTheo

Can Secular Books Assist Our Christian Walk?
Can Secular Books Assist Our Christian Walk?
#STRask
April 17, 2025
Questions about how secular books assist our Christian walk and how Greg studies the Bible.   * How do secular books like Atomic Habits assist our Ch
Mythos or Logos: How Should the Narratives about Jesus' Resurreciton Be Understood? Licona/Craig vs Spangenberg/Wolmarans
Mythos or Logos: How Should the Narratives about Jesus' Resurreciton Be Understood? Licona/Craig vs Spangenberg/Wolmarans
Risen Jesus
April 16, 2025
Dr. Mike Licona and Dr. Willian Lane Craig contend that the texts about Jesus’ resurrection were written to teach a physical, historical resurrection
God Didn’t Do Anything to Earn Being God, So How Did He Become So Judgmental?
God Didn’t Do Anything to Earn Being God, So How Did He Become So Judgmental?
#STRask
May 15, 2025
Questions about how God became so judgmental if he didn’t do anything to become God, and how we can think the flood really happened if no definition o
What Should I Say to Someone Who Believes Zodiac Signs Determine Personality?
What Should I Say to Someone Who Believes Zodiac Signs Determine Personality?
#STRask
June 5, 2025
Questions about how to respond to a family member who believes Zodiac signs determine personality and what to say to a co-worker who believes aliens c
The Resurrection: A Matter of History or Faith? Licona and Pagels on the Ron Isana Show
The Resurrection: A Matter of History or Faith? Licona and Pagels on the Ron Isana Show
Risen Jesus
July 2, 2025
In this episode, we have a 2005 appearance of Dr. Mike Licona on the Ron Isana Show, where he defends the historicity of the bodily resurrection of Je
Jay Richards: Economics, Gender Ideology and MAHA
Jay Richards: Economics, Gender Ideology and MAHA
Knight & Rose Show
April 19, 2025
Wintery Knight and Desert Rose welcome Heritage Foundation policy expert Dr. Jay Richards to discuss policy and culture. Jay explains how economic fre
Is It Wrong to Feel Satisfaction at the Thought of Some Atheists Being Humbled Before Christ?
Is It Wrong to Feel Satisfaction at the Thought of Some Atheists Being Humbled Before Christ?
#STRask
June 9, 2025
Questions about whether it’s wrong to feel a sense of satisfaction at the thought of some atheists being humbled before Christ when their time comes,
Licona vs. Fales: A Debate in 4 Parts – Part Two: Did Jesus Rise from the Dead?
Licona vs. Fales: A Debate in 4 Parts – Part Two: Did Jesus Rise from the Dead?
Risen Jesus
June 4, 2025
The following episode is part two of the debate between atheist philosopher Dr. Evan Fales and Dr. Mike Licona in 2014 at the University of St. Thoman
Bodily Resurrection vs Consensual Realities: A Licona Craffert Debate
Bodily Resurrection vs Consensual Realities: A Licona Craffert Debate
Risen Jesus
June 25, 2025
In today’s episode, Dr. Mike Licona debates Dr. Pieter Craffert at the University of Johannesburg. While Dr. Licona provides a positive case for the b
What Would You Say to Someone Who Believes in “Healing Frequencies”?
What Would You Say to Someone Who Believes in “Healing Frequencies”?
#STRask
May 8, 2025
Questions about what to say to someone who believes in “healing frequencies” in fabrics and music, whether Christians should use Oriental medicine tha
An Ex-Christian Disputes Jesus' Physical Resurrection: Licona vs. Barker - Part 2
An Ex-Christian Disputes Jesus' Physical Resurrection: Licona vs. Barker - Part 2
Risen Jesus
July 16, 2025
In this episode , we have Dr. Mike Licona's first-ever debate. In 2003, Licona sparred with Dan Barker at the University of Wisonsin-Madison. Once a C
Why Do You Say Human Beings Are the Most Valuable Things in the Universe?
Why Do You Say Human Beings Are the Most Valuable Things in the Universe?
#STRask
May 29, 2025
Questions about reasons to think human beings are the most valuable things in the universe, how terms like “identity in Christ” and “child of God” can
Licona vs. Fales: A Debate in 4 Parts – Part Three: The Meaning of Miracle Stories
Licona vs. Fales: A Debate in 4 Parts – Part Three: The Meaning of Miracle Stories
Risen Jesus
June 11, 2025
In this episode, we hear from Dr. Evan Fales as he presents his case against the historicity of Jesus’ resurrection and responds to Dr. Licona’s writi
Licona and Martin: A Dialogue on Jesus' Claim of Divinity
Licona and Martin: A Dialogue on Jesus' Claim of Divinity
Risen Jesus
May 14, 2025
In this episode, Dr. Mike Licona and Dr. Dale Martin discuss their differing views of Jesus’ claim of divinity. Licona proposes that “it is more proba
An Ex-Christian Disputes Jesus' Physical Resurrection: Licona vs. Barker - Part 1
An Ex-Christian Disputes Jesus' Physical Resurrection: Licona vs. Barker - Part 1
Risen Jesus
July 9, 2025
In this episode, we have Dr. Mike Licona's first-ever debate. In 2003, Licona sparred with Dan Barker at the University of Wisonsin-Madison. Once a Ch