Why “Just Be Submissive” Is Spiritually Lazy Advice
Key Takeaways
(Short on time? Start here.)
➤ Telling a woman to “just submit” without understanding her context often produces loneliness, not holiness.
➤ Biblical submission is not silence, passivity, or approval of apathy—it is discerning, courageous obedience directed first to Christ.
➤ When Scripture is stripped of context and relationship, it stops forming faithfulness and starts excusing spiritual laziness.
“Just be submissive.” The words hung there, awkward and heavy, while my brain scrambled to catch up with what had just been said. I knew immediately my strong, thoughtful friend wasn’t going to receive it. Not because she’s someone shouting “down with the patriarchy” (she isn’t), but because the advice itself was lazy.
Does she struggle with submission? Of course she does and so do I. Genesis 3 made sure of that. But she wasn’t resisting obedience. You see, she had tried… like really tried again and again and she was met with what can only be described as complete apathy. And sometimes, being told to “just submit” when no one is actually leading doesn’t produce holiness. No, it produces a very special kind of loneliness.
Before we go further, here is my disclaimer: this blog isn’t a call to reject biblical womanhood. I wrote this as a call to stop weaponizing it.
“Just be submissive” can sound faithful, but far too often it functions as a shutdown. A way to quiet a woman without actually understanding her. A way to offer advice without the cost of a relationship. A phrase that allows you to bypass discernment and complexity while still quoting Scripture.
Before telling a woman to “just submit,” you should probably ask what she’s submitting to. Silence? Absence? Spiritual apathy? Emotional distance? Not because these are required, but because without knowing the story, you cannot help.
Because submission isn’t meant to be a spiritual gag order and obedience to God was never designed to erase a woman’s voice. Biblical counsel requires more than a verse and a shrug. When advice ignores context, even if it may sound biblical, it risks quietly avoiding biblical responsibility. Who actually benefits when women are told to submit without context?
What Biblical Submission Actually Requires
Biblical submission is far more demanding than the lazy advice people offer in its name. First, submission is to the Lord, not approval of a man. Paul is explicit: “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.” That phrase doesn’t mean “treat your husband like he’s Christ.” It means your obedience is directed upward, not sideways. Your husband is not the object of your submission; Christ is.
That distinction matters because it immediately raises the bar. If submission were merely about agreeing, complying, or staying quiet, it wouldn’t require much spiritual strength at all. But submission to the Lord assumes something far heavier.
It assumes discernment.
A submissive wife is not a passive one. She must be able to distinguish faithfulness from fear, obedience from avoidance, humility from self-erasure. Discernment requires thought, prayer, and spiritual clarity. None of that is lazy.It assumes courage.
Submission often costs something. It costs comfort. It costs control. Sometimes it costs being misunderstood. A woman who submits to God when circumstances are uneven or leadership is lacking is not weak, she is brave. Courage is not the absence of voice; it is the willingness to obey Christ even when obedience is costly.And it assumes spiritual maturity.
Biblical submission is not for the spiritually disengaged. It requires a woman who knows God well enough to trust Him, who is anchored enough to stay soft without becoming small, and who can hold faithfulness without turning it into resentment.
This is why Paul doesn’t start with wives at all. Before he ever addresses marriage roles, he says, “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ” (Ephesians 5:21). Mutual submission is the soil where godly marriage grows, not a loophole to escape responsibility. It establishes the posture of the entire household: humility, service, and reverence for Christ. Only then does Paul move into specific roles. Not to simplify obedience, but to deepen it.
When we rip Ephesians 5:22–24 out of its context and hand it to women as a one-line solution, we don’t honor Scripture. We cheapen it. Biblical submission is not easy advice for complicated marriages. It is a high calling that demands clarity, courage, and deep trust in God.
Anything less isn’t submission. It’s spiritual laziness dressed up as wisdom.
Why the Phrase Is Spiritually Lazy
“Just be submissive” is spiritually lazy because it avoids the hard work real discipleship requires. It sidesteps the responsibility to teach men to lead, to help couples actually grow, and to confront sin when it’s present. Instead of engaging the complexity of a marriage, it offers a one-line solution that sounds biblical but costs nothing to say.
That phrase quietly places the burden of peace on the woman. If there’s tension, she’s told to yield more. If there’s distance, she’s told to be quieter. Obedience becomes synonymous with silence, and faithfulness is measured by how little disruption she causes. But biblical obedience was never about keeping the peace at all costs. It was about walking faithfully before God, even when it’s costly and uncomfortable. Lazy theology always creates casualties.
What Submission Looks Like When Leadership Is Lacking
When leadership is lacking, submission doesn’t disappear; it deepens. This is where clichés fail and clarity matters. Biblical submission is a posture, not passivity. It chooses prayer over pressure, going to God more often than going after your husband. It chooses encouragement over criticism, watering what you want to grow instead of shaming what hasn’t yet emerged. It takes initiative without control, inviting rather than managing. And it practices faithfulness without mothering, refusing to confuse love with supervision.
Submission is not proven when everything is balanced and easy. It’s tested in imbalance. If you want to go deeper into what this looks like in real life, including the tensions and questions women are afraid to ask out loud, you can read the full piece here.
The Cost of Getting This Wrong
When we get this wrong, the damage is rarely loud. It’s quiet, slow, and deeply personal. Marriages begin to hollow out emotionally. Two believers share a home but not a life, and loneliness settles in where intimacy once lived. Sexual withdrawal follows, not as rebellion, but as a symptom. When the connection dies, desire usually does too. Women don’t pull away because they’re defiant; they pull away because they feel unseen, unsupported, and spiritually alone.
Resentment then creeps in, subtle enough to survive undetected. It gets baptized as righteousness. Silence is praised as maturity. Endurance is celebrated while joy quietly disappears. Women burn out under the weight of faithfulness, applauded for their strength while being slowly emptied.
If this sounds familiar, you may want to read more here: Why Women Don’t Want Sex. Getting submission wrong doesn’t protect marriage. It slowly starves it.
This will offend some people. That’s inevitable. But before dismissing it, it’s worth asking an honest question: Does the advice you give actually produce fruit—or does it leave women exhausted, silent, and alone? Good theology should lead to life, not quiet burnout.
If you’re willing to look deeper at what biblical submission really asks of a woman when leadership is lacking—and what it does not require—you can read the full piece here: How to Submit When Your Husband Sucks at Leading
Read it slowly. Let it challenge you. And measure the fruit.
TL;DR
“Just be submissive” sounds biblical, but it’s often spiritually lazy advice. Most women struggling with submission aren’t rebellious. They’re exhausted. They’ve prayed, yielded, trusted God, and tried often in marriages where leadership is absent. Telling a woman to “just submit” in those moments doesn’t produce holiness; it produces loneliness.
Biblical submission is not silence, approval of a man, or erasure of a woman. It is obedience to the Lord, and it assumes discernment, courage, and spiritual maturity. That’s why Paul begins with mutual submission (Eph. 5:21) before addressing wives at all. Submission is a high calling, not a one-line solution. When we misuse it, we avoid the harder work of discipleship: teaching men to lead, helping couples grow, and confronting sin. The burden of peace quietly shifts to women, obedience gets confused with silence, and faithfulness is measured by how little disruption she causes.
The cost is steep but quiet: emotional loneliness, sexual withdrawal as a symptom, resentment baptized as righteousness, and women praised for endurance while slowly burning out. Submission, rightly understood, is a posture of strength, not passivity—prayer over pressure, encouragement over control, faithfulness without mothering.
The question isn’t whether advice sounds biblical. It’s whether it produces fruit or fatigue.
Read more: How to Submit When Your Husband Sucks at Leading
Related: Why Women Don’t Want Sex
Measure the fruit.
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Telling women to “just be submissive” often bypasses real discipleship, placing the burden of peace on women while avoiding the harder work of biblical leadership, discernment, and shared spiritual responsibility.