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Despite sin entering the world, the duty of the husband to be the loving covenant head of his marriage and family remains. When the Bible says that the husband is the head of his wife, it is not stating that a man should be the head, but rather that he simply is as Jesus is the Head of the church. The only question, therefore, is whether or not a husband is a good or bad head.

For Adam and his sons since, God promised that everything under their dominion would be cursed and fight against them; providing for their families would be a cursed experience that would show us how difficult it is for God to be our Head when we disobey Him.a

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A husband who is a good head will not abuse, abdicate, abandon, or avoid responsibility. Instead, he will accept it humbly and seek by God’s grace and the Holy Spirit’s power to obey God’s command in Ephesians 5:25–28, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish. So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself.”

A godly man is continually learning that to be the head of his home means to take responsibility for the well-being of his wife and children much as Jesus Christ has taken responsibility for him. As the covenant head, you cannot remain distant, unwilling to get involved in the messiest parts of your family life, or tell your wife to get her act together apart from your loving inclusion. This is not to say that your wife bears no responsibility for her own sin, but that you bear it with her out of love. We see this perhaps most clearly in Genesis 3, when the first married couple sinned. Though the wife sinned first and was held accountable by God, the husband was called out by God and held responsible for both his sin and his wife’s sin.

Being the responsible head does not mean that a man does everything in the family, but rather that everything gets done. This includes him lovingly carrying his load for the family, helping his wife do the same, and making sure the children do as well. This means that whoever is best at something and is willing to do it assumes that responsibility. For example, if your wife is a great accountant and you are not, she can run the family finances. Or if you’re a chef and she cannot make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, you may do a lot of the meal planning and preparation, help teach her, or encourage her spiritual gift of picking up takeout. And if you do not have the time or skills to work on the cars, you can do as I do and pay someone else to do it.

As a general rule, when a man does accept the responsibilities God requires of him as the lovingly humble servant leader of his home, his wife and children flourish. When he does not, the results are not pretty. Sadly, a myth has become quite popular that there is no difference between the quality and holiness of Christian and non-Christian marriages and that the incidence of things such as adultery and divorce are essentially the same between the two groups. This myth is based on some research that only asked people if they were Christians and failed to ask any follow-up questions.6 Jesus Himself predicted that many who would profess faith would in fact not possess faith.a Therefore, in addition to asking people what they believe, we must ask them how they behave to ascertain if they are truly Christians. And when all the facts are included, it becomes very clear that those who both profess and practice Christianity have markedly different and better marriages than those people who do not.

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W. Bradford Wilcox has conducted the most helpful research done on the difference active Christian faith makes in a marriage. He is widely recognized as one of the most distinguished sociologists in America.7 Wilcox