A Wife Being a Helper - What Does the Bible Say? Gen 2:18

A wife being a helper – what does it mean?

We see the concept of helper in Genesis 2:18 where the author writes, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.’ (The New Living Translation)

The Christian Standard Bible translates Gen 2:18 as “Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper corresponding to him.”

For many Christians, the idea of a woman being a helper to a man is interpreted as supporting and deferring to the man in the relationship.

Referencing other verses like Ephesians 5:22, many Christians today believe that the author intended to convey that men are to have authority over women because men were created first, and women were created to assist.

Thus, they say, husbands in authority over wives and wives in submission to their husbands is the “divine order.”

But what if we’ve misread and misunderstood Genesis 2:18, and what if our misconceptions have led to actual harm for the ones deemed lower in our created hierarchy?

What Does the Bible Say About a Wife Being a Helper? Unpacking the ‘Helper’ Myth

There’s a video doing rounds on the internet (I’ll include a link to it at the bottom of this post) in which a pastor’s wife discusses her husband’s infidelity.

In the viral clip, Pastor Kelley Steele talks about how her husband would leave her over weekends to be with his affair partner. “Although he would go out for weekends, I would literally get him get ready to go meet his side-chick by ironing his clothes and getting him ready for the night..”

She goes on to say that “God graced her” to do that.

The video has caused a firestorm. A lot of Black women are discussing how the Black church has conditioned women to endure everything their husbands throw their way in the name of love, support, and staying faithful to God. Related Post: 11 Reasons Why Wives Resist Submission in Marriage

This isn’t the first time, nor will it be the last, that a church leader with significant influence shares a “testimony” about how God “saved” their marriage, and their story resembles a script featuring a cruel, sadistic deity.

Believing that supporting your husband in breaking his vow is something a good God is strengthening you to do is a prime example of religious brainwashing and conditioning. And it takes a lot to unhook from, and unlearn that thinking.

Unhooking from Toxic Religious Conditioning

It is important for Christian women to go deeper than modern interpretations of Genesis 2:18.

First off, a wife being a helper is not about helping a husband and marriage destroy her. It is not about laying aside her dignity and personhood so a marriage can survive. “Helper corresponding to him” does not mean women-only deference or men having authority over their women.

In my book The Newlyweds: Pursuing Mutuality, Health and Happiness in Marriage, I talk about what the word “helper” actually means.

“The original Hebrew word for “helper” as it appears in this verse is ezer, which means “one who helps.” Ezer is used many other times in the Old Testament, and most of those instances refer to God as our helper. The same word used to describe God’s helping power is used to describe the woman! Certainly women are not equal to God, and neither are they men’s superiors, but the title nevertheless carries a sense of dignity and power that affirms the woman’s equally important calling and place: she is a fitting partner to the man, an integral part in executing God’s purpose for their lives. Adam rejoices in this partnership in Genesis 2:23 when he says, “This is the bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh.” These words do not convey any ambition to power over his partner but rather emphasize mutuality, connectedness, and equality. There isn’t a whiff of dominance or hierarchy.” Excerpt, The Newlyweds: Pursuing Mutuality, Health and Happiness in Marriage by Ngina Otiende

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The Newlyweds helps you to explore what nurtures connection and what harms it. You can have an amazing marriage – without gender-roles, 24/7 sacrifice or the erasure of your personhood. Check it out!

A Wife Being a Helper: Does God’s Grace Enable Harm?

Kelley Steele reserves the right to tell her story. It is her story, after all.

While she maintains that she is not advising anyone to follow her path, it’s not that simple. Because a big issue with fundamentalist Christian marriage advice is its contradictions.

An individual might say, “I did this harmful thing, but I’m not telling you to do it,” and then also say, “God helped me to do it.” The problem is that in certain contexts, the audience hears, “God wants me to do what she did.”

And that will mostly likely be the case when women married to cheating, abusive men hear Kelley Steele tell them what “God’s grace” enabled her to do.

They’ll think, “I can do that. If God did that for her, He can do that for me. If she did that, I can do that for my husband.” (At the very least, they’ll feel terrible that all their efforts to save their marriages haven’t succeeded like hers seem to have.)

And they’ll re-engage the let-me-save-my-marriage gear because they want their marriages to stop hurting: they want their husbands to change; they want to feel loved; they want their husbands to father their kids; they want a partner. You know, the guy who promised to be one. Related Post: “But Why Doesn’t She Just Leave Him?” 40 Reasons Women Stay in Destructive Marriages

Church leaders like Kelley tell women that even though their man is acting wretched as a pattern, they can make him that guy they need. Eventually. If they just shove their dignity, worth, personhood, and needs to the back of the line, over and over and over again.

Kelley might say, “I’m not telling you to do what I did,” but she also dangles, “God helped me do what I did,” and the unspoken part is, “God can help you do what I did.” Related Post: No Really, We Should Stop Telling Women to Forgive Their Cheating Husbands

What Does the Bible Say About a Wife Being a Helper? A More Liberated View

Kelley has the right to share her story, but she must first free herself from abusive religious conditioning and speak from a place of clarity and wholeness. Only then can her story not perpetuate the oppression of women.

From a more healed perspective, her story could look like: “I did what I did because I chose to survive and that’s how survival looked like at that time. I believe God’s grace was with me. But I wish I had known that the grace was for my wholeness, and liberation. I wish I had known that God was rooting for me…not for the preservation of something that was emptying the life out of me.”

That’s a more wholesome retelling of a personal experience: a story that would help women understand what it means to be whole and healthy. Until then, as it currently stands, her story deserves all the criticism it’s receiving.

**Want to go from “I Do!” to “I Still Do!“… without the baggage of societal and religious conditioning?**

The truth is we can have amazing marriages – without gender-roles, 24/7 sacrifice and the erasure of personhood. We can recognize when our relationship is operating outside the framework of love and honor. We can hold each other accountable. We can hold on to our sense of agency. If you are ready to create a marriage without hierarchies and learn to grow as equals, CHECK OUT THE NEWLYWEDS HERE. (It’s an awesome gift for weddings or engagements!)