Earthquakes, Cowardice and the Biblical Call to Protect

In my previous post I highlighted the ethical aftershocks regarding a teacher who chose not to protect his students during the May earthquake that struck China. I understand this person’s cowardice to be heightened because he is a man. That invites the question: Does the Bible teach that men have the greater call to protect by virtue of their being created male?

Some realities in Scripture are so deep in the bedrock of the authors’ inspired understanding that they don’t need explicit argumentation. Rather, those realities emerge subtly, but powerfully, in the narrative of the text. Such is the idea of a man’s unique call to protect in Scripture. Examples abound of men rising up with humble initiative to serve, keep and protect the women and children around them. One thinks of Joseph, David, and Hosea as excellent models. 

But examples alone don’t convince. What follows are four brief observations from the Bible on why I think Scripture calls men to take the lead in protecting.

1. God the Father Presents Himself as Protective Exemplar for Human Fathers

First, consider that God presents himself to us as our Heavenly Father in part, as an example for earthly fathers to provide and protect. Psalm 68:5-6, “Father to the fatherless and Protector of widows is God in his holy habitation.” God is the protective Father who holds us safe in his hand (John 10:29). 

Since God protects, earthly fathers must own His example to protect, even more so than mothers.

2. God Means for Male Physicality to Help Protect Others.

Proverbs 3:27 says, “Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it.”  This applies to both men and women. But the presence of ‘power’ in the verse means that those with greater ability have the greater burden for good. Because a man, by virtue of God’s creation, usually has greater physical strength than a woman, this verse suggests that he use that power to serve the good of those in his care. 

I tell my developing 12-year-old son often, “The reason God gave you muscles is never to harm, but always to help others.”

This is exactly the point the Apostle Peter makes in I Peter 3:7. “Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel…”  ‘Weaker’ here means in general women have less physical strength than men. But that is precisely what is needed for protection in many situations.  

I am not saying that physical ability alone determines protective responsibility. Rather, I am saying that such a responsibility arises as a general truth from Proverbs 3. God’s will that men protect is not solely rooted in ability – but it helps.

3. Woman is Made From Man and is to be Protected as One Flesh with Him.

Paul, writing to the Corinthians and alluding to Genesis 2 says this: “For man was not made from woman, but woman from man” (I Corinthians 11:8).  One of the implications of this verse is that man can and should care for the woman with the same zeal with which he cares for his own body. Since man was God’s first human creature and from man’s flesh woman was created, man has a ‘birth order’ charge to provide and protect the woman and not the other way around.

Genesis 2:24 includes the phrase “hold fast” to signify this kind of protection. This phrase ‘hold fast’ is used often in Scripture to refer to keeping or protecting something precious (e.g. Job 27:6, Luke 8:15, Hebrews 10:23, Revelation 3:11). Women are never asked to ‘hold fast’ to men. Yet, in Genesis, men are called to ‘hold fast’ to their wives. 

This is exactly the conclusion the Apostle Paul arrives at in Ephesians 5:28ff,

“Husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”

It is not that women are called to nourish and cherish their husbands as Christ did the church. Just the reverse, men are called to emulate Christ and care for their wives as they do their own bodies, because they are united as one flesh.

4. The Nature of the Curse Implies Male Protection

In the curse pronounced by God upon the newly guilty Adam and Eve the distinctive nature of each part of the curse implies the need for men to protect women. The facet of the curse spoken to women includes vulnerability to the serpent, risk and pain in child-bearing and the spiritual danger of desiring to master her husband. Distinctively, the curse upon men includes difficulty in all matters of the earth, and in providing for oneself and family.  

When we look with a gracious eye at the overlay of unique gender features of the curse, one could argue that women are meant to sustain men in their fruitful labor on the earth and men are meant to protect women from the physical and spiritual dangers afoot.

There is a vast landscape of chivalrous male protection of women and children in the pages of Scripture. The Father’s example, a man’s physical strength, the created order and even the fall, all unite with an inner echo of God’s design in our hearts to produce a wide consensus that men have a unique call to protect those in their care.