It is good to be back with you. We always miss RBC when we’re away. Today, we’re back continuing our expositions from Ephesians. Today, the long-awaited “Christian husbands.” I said to my wife this morning with complete love and sympathy, “I’m so sorry, hon. She won’t be able to be there this morning to hear the message on husbands loving wives.” She made me know really quick that she will be listening online.
Ephesians chapter 5. Let’s begin our reading with verse 22:
Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is 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 the wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way, 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. This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Let’s look to the Lord in prayer. Our Father, for the sake of our homes, for our happiness, for our joy, and for your glory, we pray that you would work this, your word, into our hearts and minds so that we may live it out in our homes and display the gospel as you’ve intended. Help us, we pray, in Jesus’ name, amen.
The Bible, of course, is a wonderful story of God coming to the rescue of his rebellious creatures, restoring them to himself in love at enormous cost to himself. The story, as you know, begins in the garden. God has created man and woman in his own image, and they therefore have responsibility to image him and to obey their Creator faithfully. And of course, they rebelled against God and fell under judgment. And yet at the same time, God came in promise. In grace, he promised a champion who would come to remedy this whole mess and restore humanity to himself.
That promise, as you know, is unfolded and unpacked throughout the Old Testament until finally we come to the New Testament and we have what we call the Incarnation—God the Son becoming one of us. God the Son made flesh, becoming man to situate himself as one of us. The Lord Jesus Christ has come to our rescue. We read what is remarkable: the cost, the means by which he rescued us, and that is he gave himself for us. That’s how Paul characterizes it here in verse 25: “Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.”
The goal of it all, we read in verses 26 and 27, is “that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.” That is, the Lord Jesus has come from heaven, become one of us, and in substituting himself, in standing in to bear our curse, we not only go free and are set free from judgment, but he sets in process this transformation at work in the hearts and the lives of his people until finally, ultimately, we are presented at the end as his bride before him, spotless and made pure by his blood.
The Bible, of course, captures that wonderful story with that big word: love. In fact, it’s a love that is triune-shaped. God the Father, in love, chose a people whom he would save. God the Father, in love, sent his Son to an awful task to rescue those rebel sinners to himself. God the Son, in love, willingly came, condescended to become one of us, and in love gave himself on the cross to bear the penalty of our sin. God the Spirit, in love, pursued us, drawing us to Christ, and continues to pursue us, as James says, yearning after us even when we sin, drawing us in love back to fidelity, to faith in Jesus Christ.
In fact, not only is this whole story captured by the word love, the whole story is characterized in Scripture with a metaphor—many metaphors actually. But one of the dominant metaphors to capture that whole story is this metaphor of marriage. And if you’ve read through the Bible at all, I’m sure you’ve noticed this here and there coming along. It’s prominent in the prophets. God’s relationship to Israel is a covenant relationship. They have responsibilities to him. He in turn has taken responsibilities to himself. Israel for its part was unfaithful to its covenant responsibilities. And so God sometimes refers to not only himself as Israel’s husband in this covenant relationship, but refers then to Israel as the adulterous wife. Sometimes you’ll see that expression in the older versions translated, “Israel went a-whoring after other gods.” Unfaithful to her covenant vows, unfaithful to God as she had pledged to be, she is now God’s unfaithful wife.
We find it especially, of course, in a vivid way in the prophet Hosea. The prophet himself marries a woman who, it turns out, is a prostitute. She gives herself to other men, has children by other men, and ends up living with another man. Finally, she’s destitute and sold into slavery. And Hosea goes off and buys her back out of slavery to become his wife again. All of this illustrating the love of God for his people that he pursues and he pursues even his sinful and rebellious wife.
And in that kind of a context, we can’t miss when we read the Song of Solomon that not only is that a celebration of marital love in itself, but in this canonical context, we have to see it as illustrative of the love of God for his people. Or as we come to the New Testament, it is the love of Christ for his church. Christ, the bridegroom; the church, the bride of Jesus Christ. And all of that comes to a climax finally, as you know, in the book of Revelation. We get to the end, where we have this great marriage supper of the Lamb. And we have this consummate union of Christ with his people, where we dwell in his presence in glory.
Revelation chapter 19, verses 6 through 8: “Hallelujah, for our Lord God Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give Him glory, for the wedding of the Lamb has come, and His bride has made herself ready. Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear.” And of course all of this has its own symbolic value, but here this metaphor is given, this metaphor of marriage that carries the whole story of the Bible. It’s been observed that the Bible begins with a wedding and it ends with a wedding. And way back at the very beginning when God brought that first woman to the first man, He was there already symbolically telling us what he intends to do with his people. They will become rebellious, but he will bring them back to himself and he’ll marry them. He’ll make them his.
And so again, this is one metaphor that carries the whole story of the Bible. And at the outset, God tells us, illustrates it for us. Throughout the story, he reminds us of this theme, with this theme coming up throughout the Scriptures. And then at the end, it comes to its climax. And the Apostle Paul, in Ephesians 5, verses 25 and following, is an important link in that thematic development through the Scripture, where Paul tells us:
Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.
And so Paul tells us Christ’s work for his people is that of a bridegroom, and yet it’s a redeemer bridegroom. He has come to the rescue of his people. He has made them clean. Ultimately, they will be glorified and stand clean and pure in his very presence.
The striking thing—the striking thing throughout, the striking thing about this story—is the kind of love that is displayed in it all. This is the God who made us. This is the God to whom we are accountable. This is the God against whom we have rebelled. This is the God against whom we have sinned over and over and over and over and over again. And yet he sacrifices himself in order to rescue us from the plight of our rebellion against him. And he “gives himself up,” as Paul says in verse 25, “gives himself up for her,” using the language of Old Testament sacrifice. Just as the sacrificial lamb was offered in place of the people, the sin of the people given to the lamb, so the sin of God’s people is given to Christ and he offers himself up in sacrifice to God, making satisfaction to him on their behalf. And now he has restored them to himself and he has set out to protect them, to continue this process of transformation until finally they are purified and glorified in his presence.
It’s a wonderful story. It’s a wonderful message. Among God’s purposes in revealing all of this to us is to serve as a model for our own marriages. And that’s how the Apostle Paul uses it here. When the Apostle Paul comes to give commands to wives and to husbands regarding their role in their relationship in marriage, these are not just isolated commands that happen to come to mind. They are not bare commands that God has given him on the spot. These are not commands that are unconnected from the gospel. They are not commands that are unconnected from the Bible story. But in fact, these commands, he tells us here explicitly, have a specifically gospel focus. Gospel issues are at stake in the husband-wife relationship.
There’s a larger biblical context that is to inform marriage and marriage roles and marriage relationships and the way we treat one another in marriage. Explicitly here, Paul tells us that our marriages—the relationship between husband and wife—is to reflect the gospel. He tells us that over and again through this passage, that in the gospel, in the love of Christ for his church, we have the model. Now in this passage, verses 25 and following, the model for husbands to love their wives.
He connects it all in verse 31. He connects it all with Genesis 2, verse 24, where Moses gives the comment after the original marriage: “For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” We’ll see a little bit more of that as we go along, but Paul connects this then with the whole Bible story. So, not only is this relationship of husband and wife a gospel issue, not only is it reflecting the larger biblical story, but in restoring us in this way and bringing us to this model, he’s restoring us to the original perfection of marriage—the original model brought back to that through Christ. The model is given of Christ’s love for his church and now “husbands, love your wives this way.” And in this—wives submitting to your husbands as to the Lord; husbands loving your wives as Christ loved the church—in this, we have a restoration of the original perfection of marriage.
And so it’s a passage that is, in one sense, an important passage in developing this big biblical theme. And yet at another stroke, it is, of course, a passage that is directed specifically to husbands and to wives, with very practical counsel as to how we can live together, not only joyfully, but live together in a way that, in restoring its original order, will bring glory to God. So in verse 32, Paul tells us explicitly that marriage was designed, in its first instance, to portray the gospel. Marriage is, first of all, not about our love. Marriage is, first of all, about Christ’s love for his church. And it is this Christ’s love for his church that sets the standard for our love, and it is to serve to shape our love for one another in marriage. And again, as I say, in doing this, it will restore the created order to its original perfection and design.
So here’s how marriage can be honoring to God. Here’s how a marriage will be fulfilling in the way that it was originally intended. Here’s how it’s going to work: “Submit yourselves to your husbands as to the Lord. Husbands, love your wives as Christ has loved the church.” Basic to a good marriage. And keep in mind through all this, we say so often here, it is not only for the glory of God, although that’s enough. But it is not only to the glory of God; it is to your own joyful fulfillment as well. Basic to a good marriage is a faithful display of the relationship of Christ and his church. So that in a nutshell is what we’re aiming at. How can we have a marriage that is honoring to God, a marriage that is fulfilling to us? Answer: I want to set out in my marriage to have a relationship that reflects the relationship of Christ and his church. That’s got to work. There’s a gospel design to marriage, and that affects then both parties, the husband and the wife.
Love Your Wives As Christ Loved The Church
Now, for the husbands: verses 25 and following. The first and the basic responsibility of husbands, verse 25: “Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church.” What does that mean? I suppose we could spend the next number of weeks expounding: how does Christ love the church? How is his love for the church displayed? And then work from that to applications as husbands: love your wives that way. That is exactly Paul’s point here. In fact, if you’d like, husbands—well, wives, you may want to buy this book for your husbands—a friend of mine, Pastor Larry McCall in Indiana, has written a wonderful little book entitled Loving Your Wife as Christ Loves the Church. I think it’s just called Loving Your Wife as Christ Loves the Church by Larry McCall. What he does is he takes this passage and then he expounds in chapter after chapter in practical ways how Christ has loved the church and therefore how husbands are to love their wives. A very helpful book. If you’d like an introduction to it, go to our website at booksataglance.com. We’ve interviewed him, we’ve reviewed it, you can see a summary of it, and then you can buy the book if you’d like.
Let’s take a few minutes with this at least. What does it mean to love your wife as Christ loved the church? Just a few things that I’ve noted here.
Number one: it must be an unrivaled love. An unrivaled love, or if you’d like to say it this way, an exclusive love. The love of Christ for the church is not merely the general kind of disposition of Christ toward his church. That’s what we have with Christ, with God, the triune God, with regard to the world. We have an expression for that in theology; we call it common grace. It’s a marvelous teaching in its own that God has a kind disposition toward the world. And so you see God giving the rain, both to the just and the unjust. You have God showing kindness in various ways to people who are wicked in every way. And God sustaining his creation for people who don’t deserve it and who rebel against him constantly. Common grace—it’s a wonderful thing. But when we speak of Christ’s love for the church, we’re not talking about that, are we? We’re talking of another kind of love, another category entirely. This is an unrivaled kind of love, an exclusive love reserved for his people in which he devotes himself entirely and utterly to them and to their well-being and commits himself to them. It’s an unrivaled love.
Second: it is a relentless love. A relentless love. That is, husbands, if you are going to love your wife as Christ loved the church, you will always be pursuing her. Despite the disagreements. Despite the wrongs. Despite the problems. Despite the faults. Always pursuing. Always pursuing. Persevering endlessly. To love your wife as Christ loved the church means you’ll never give up.
Third: if we are to love our wife, husbands, if we’re to love our wife as Christ loved the church, it must be, by the nature of the case, it must be a forgiving love. Always willing to pardon. Not holding a grudge, or perhaps more commonly, determined not to treat in kind. When she fails, our response is not, “Well, I can do that better than you can,” but always pursuing and always forgiving.
All of that’s implicit here. What is explicit is verse 25: to love our wife as Christ loved the church, it will be a sacrificial love. A sacrificial love. That’s verse 25: “Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” There was nothing he wouldn’t do for his bride. There was nothing he would not do. There was no obstacle too big, no sacrifice too great—he gave himself up. And remember the model here. This is the Lord of heaven, the second person of the eternal Trinity, condescending to become one of us, and that to go all the way to the accursed cross, bearing the sin of his people. You cannot imagine a greater distance traveled; you cannot imagine a greater sacrifice made. And yet he says, “Husbands, that’s the standard. Love your wives sacrificially. Nothing you wouldn’t do for her betterment. Willing to give up all for her.”
Fifth: if we love as Christ loves the church, then it must be a providing and a protecting love. A providing and a protecting love. Well, we have that in verses 26 and 27: “He gave himself up for her that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor without spot or wrinkle or any such thing.” He’s giving himself for her benefit, for her protection, providing for her in all of the most needed ways.
And so to love our wives as Christ loves the church, it must be an unrivaled love—exclusive. It must be a forgiving love, a relentless love, a sacrificial love. And it must be a providing and protecting love. And even we could say in that last one, a sanctifying love. As Christ has died to make his bride holy, so we husbands give ourselves to our wives for their sanctification, for their growth, to lead them from one level of glory to the next.
Bottom line of all of that is simply we give ourselves in selfless service. Put it another way: marriage is not intended, husbands, marriage is not intended to be for what you can get out of it. Marriage is intended for you to display the love of Christ for his church and in giving yourself in sacrifice for her betterment. I want to have a little bit more to say about that as we go along.
I want to point out something before we go any further. I want you to notice—this is very important and it’s important for some practical reasons—I want you to notice that although the command given to the wife is submit, “Wives, submit to your husbands,” the corresponding command to husbands is not “lead.” “Wives, submit yourself to your husbands. Husbands, make sure you’re the boss.” It’s not what it says. Now, whatever implications there are of the man’s headship in the home with regard to her command, “submit to your husbands,” and whatever implications there are of that elsewhere in Scripture, that’s not the corresponding command given here. The command, “Wives, submit to your husband,” is complemented by, “Husbands, love your wives.”
The first obligation of the husband, then, is to love. Now there was a teaching that was going on 30, 35 years ago that was becoming very popular. One very good preacher, I think, made a mistake here, but he’s a very popular preacher and had a lot of influence with it. And he took from verse 21—”submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ”—the idea of mutual submission. And what we are all to do is submit to each other. Well, of course, it makes chaos of the language that’s being used. In fact, it’s been shown and demonstrated. I think even he’s backed off of that teaching now. But it was very popular for a long time. We’re all supposed to submit to each other.
Well, he’s close. The idea here is not that a husband is to submit to his wife. What comes then of this relationship and headship and the command of the wife in the first place? It ends up being nonsense. But he’s close in the sense that what Paul is saying here—and we might say it this way—he is to submit to the needs of his wife. Or let’s just say it better: he is to serve his wife as Christ has served the church. In the relative responsibilities, yes, her obligation is to submit. And yes, there is a headship and a leadership involved in all of that on his part. But the command given here now is that he is to love. And in loving, he is to serve her best interests.
In other words, then, both roles are gospel-shaped. I said this is very important for practical reason. Let me illustrate it. I’ll illustrate it theologically. That’s a reverse, isn’t it? Often in law-grace discussions, discussions of law and gospel and how they relate in all of that, the discussion comes up of the relative value of law or gospel with respect to sanctification. That is, what is the most compelling motive: law or gospel? What is it that will motivate you to serve Christ? What is it that will motivate you to be faithful? What is it that will motivate you not to sin? “Thou shalt not” or the love of Christ in the gospel?
Now, no one that I know would ever argue, therefore, there’s no place for the law. Well, of course, the law has its rightful place and it is important for the informing of the conscience and all of that. But when it comes to its sanctifying influence—to use Bunyan’s illustration in Pilgrim’s Progress—you don’t give the broom back to Moses. You want to sweep the room clean, you give it to the gospel. There’s value in the law being preached as well. If I hear a sermon, for example, or if I read a command in the Scripture, “Thou shalt not,” whatever—take your pick. Or if, as we’ve seen recently in Matthew chapter five, where the Lord Jesus commands us not only not to commit adultery but not to lust; he commands us not only not to murder but not to be angry—just seeing that command has its value. It’s an important step in it all.
But you know, when you hear a sermon expounding the love of Christ and the gospel, the great sacrifice of Christ in giving himself up for us, and the great cost of our redemption, there’s something about that, isn’t there? You walk out saying, “Gee, I want to be like him.” The motivating value and the motivating force of love. We have that reflected, I guess, several places in the New Testament. John, for example, says his commands are not grievous but joyful. Why? Jesus says in Matthew chapter 11, “My yoke is easy, my burden is light.” Paul can say in 2 Corinthians chapter 5, “the love of Christ compels us.” I think this is the whole backdrop to the New Testament imagery of bond slaves. We are willingly bond slaves. We willingly give ourselves in service to Christ because of what he has done for us. Sometimes this is referred to as evangelical obedience—the sanctifying value of the gospel, a deep consideration of the love of Christ. You’ve heard me deal with this many times here. What drives us to serve Christ most effectively is not someone holding a club over our head and threatening us. What drives us most forcefully is the reminders of the love of Christ in the gospel.
Now husbands, can you see that your love for your wife is to be such that it makes her submission to you easy? You see how that can work? Can we push it a little further? Your love for your wife is to be such that it makes her submission joyful? Yeah, she’s responsible in any case. There are no qualifications given in verses 22 through 24. She’s to submit in everything to her husband and all of that. Yeah, we saw all of that. And yeah, it’s true that some women are just more rebellious than others and some are more crabby than others. Just like a lot of men are more crabby than others and more rebellious than others; it works all across the board. But you will, husbands, you will not see submission on the part of your wife in any meaningful sense by simply demanding it of her. You’ll not force it out of her. You’ll not beat it out of her. But you just might love it out of her. And that’s the command here: “Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved his church.” This standing in contrast to her command, “Submit to your husband.” Love, husbands; love your wives.
Love Your Wives As Your Own Bodies
Now notice he gives another illustration in verses 28 and 29. So far it has been: love your wives as Christ loved the church. Now in verses 28 and 29, he switches the metaphor:
In the same way, 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.
And then he cites Genesis 2:24: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother, hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”
All right, here he appeals back to the original created order, Genesis 2, and the oneness in marriage that was established there. This expression that’s given—”the two shall become one flesh”—obviously speaks of physical relations, sexuality, and marriage, but it’s very clear the way it is used, not only in Genesis but the way it’s unpacked through the rest of the Bible. It’s meant to entail much more than that—that these two have become, as is symbolized in their physical relationship, one person. There’s a sense in which it’s right when we say, “She’s my better half.” These two have become one in some profound sense. Yeah, there’s still two individuals, of course, of course. But in a profound sense, they have become one. And in their physical relationship, somehow the personality of one becomes stamped on the other. That’s why premarital sex, extramarital sex, and all that is treated with such awful disdain in the Scripture. That’s one of the implications of it. There’s this oneness that is established in it that is to be reserved only for the marriage relationship of commitment.
Paul is appealing to all of that. That’s established in Genesis chapter two. And in the end of it all, as we read through this, he’s not simply saying, “Husbands, love your wife as you love your own body,” but by the time you get through with it all, it’s “love your wives because she is your own body,” because she is you, because she is your other self, because you two have become one. You are one flesh and you cannot be separated. Husbands, your wife is more closely related to you than those family members who share your DNA. The two have become one.
This viewing of marriage as a true union, a oneness, is enormously important in practical ways. Before ever there is a conflict in the marriage, there is a failure, first of all, to think of the two as one. Instead, they keep thinking of each other as two separate individuals. Before ever there is legal divorce, there’s mental divorce. “I still have my life to live. I still have my interests. Why do I have to be enslaved in this home?” Or he comes home from work in a bad mood; he needs his time. And there’s this continual viewing of husband and wife as two separate individuals rather than as two who have become one together. And everything begins to fall apart from there.
And again, there’s an important gospel connection here that Paul makes. He tells us here—just as Christ and his church—that marriage is not the only metaphor that’s used to portray this story and this union of Christ with his people. We have another prominent metaphor in the New Testament, don’t we? The church is the body of Christ, of which he is the head. And in all of that symbolism, the headship of Jesus is not only that for leadership and control and governance and all of that, although it is that, but it’s for enablement and provision and protection.
And so Paul says, you love your wives as your own body because she is you; she’s one of you. And because you two have become one, just as Christ provides for his body, just as the head provides for his body, so you are to provide and protect your wife. No one has ever said, “I hate myself, I hate my body.” Normal people don’t talk like that, don’t think like that. Just as you care for yourself and you want to see yourself nourished and yourself healthy and yourself happy, so also he says, “Husbands, you love your wives that way. You want to see her healthy and happy, as Christ does the church.”
Selflessness In Christian Marriage
Maybe we can summarize a lot of this by simply saying: Christian marriage—this is very important—Christian marriage demands selflessness. This is enormous. Christian marriage demands selflessness both with regard to the wife, who must submit to her husband, and with regard to the husband, who must love his wife as Christ loved the church. In both cases, the focus is not on self, but on the other. For the wife, this means that she must surrender her rights of independence and self-rule and submit to her husband. For the husband, this means he must surrender his own rights, first of all, and give himself to serve his wife and to love her faithfully and sacrificially.
You pursue your marriage with your own interests first, you’ll ruin it. The world could not have it more backwards: “You’ve got to love yourself first. If you can’t love yourself, how can you love anybody else?” What kind of convoluted reasoning is that? And the homes fall apart following that counsel, and they don’t know what in the world’s going on. The apostle gives us here what the Scripture gives us everywhere: the model is Christ, who surrendered his rights and gave himself to serve his bride. And so, husbands, you love your wife in that kind of sacrificial way, pursuing her interests first.
Now, that requires some effort. That requires some intentional thinking on our part, husbands. We’ve got to think: “How can I better serve my wife? How should I deny self a little more in order to serve her better?” What a horrible fate would be ours if Christ had demanded his own rights first. The glory and the joy of our relationship with Christ hinges—it hinges on Christ’s surrendering of his rights. The glory and the joy of your marriage will hinge on the same: surrendering of your rights for the good of the other. That’s what love is. And so we must learn to serve.
To surrender your rights may mean that at times you’ve got to learn to hold your tongue. To surrender your rights may mean that you have to say, “I’m sorry.” It might mean you need to say, “I forgive you.” It might mean that in other circumstances it calls for self-control, restraint, giving yourself, serving one another more faithfully. Determine to reflect the gospel in the way that you relate to one another.
Marriage is not, in the first instance, about self-fulfillment. Pursue it that way, you’ll ruin it. Marriage is not, in its first instance, about romance. Marriage is not, in its first instance, about sex. Marriage, by the nature of it, is about commitment. And that’s why the Bible calls it a covenant relationship. Commitment to one another in permanent roles that reflect the gospel. That’s what marriage is about: commitment to one another in permanent roles that reflect the gospel faithfully. Romance and sex—well, that has its place, and it’s designed to express that relationship. It’s even designed to foster that relationship further. Romance and sex are not themselves the foundation. That’s too unstable.
Again, the world has it exactly backwards. Sex and love cannot be viewed commercially. We’ve talked about that before, right? You can’t have a commercial view of it—you get it for what you can get out of it. That’s the way the world views it. And that’s why when it begins to lose its sizzle, and she or he begin to lose his or her appeal, you go shopping for something else. It’s a commercial view of sex and romance. But in a covenantal view, a biblical outlook on marriage, commitment is at the heart of it. You set yourself to serve the other. And that then demands self-denial. Commitment demands self-denial.
And you know the irony is, as difficult as that sounds—to deny self, it sounds so oppressive—the irony of it all is that only here, only here in this self-denying commitment to your spouse, only there will you find the joy that you really seek in marriage. Only there will you find the fulfillment you’ve both been looking for. So long as you insist on standing taller, having it your way, you’re going to ruin it. The beautiful irony of this is that as we follow this model of Christ and his church giving ourselves and serving the other, this marital perfection of its original design is restored and we experience the fulfillment of it.
Now, lurking somewhere in the background of all of this is a haunting realization that this is going to be difficult. Let’s talk about that just a minute. The reason it’s difficult—let’s face it—the reason it’s difficult is because we are fallen, we are sinful, and let’s be specific: we are all naturally selfish. And given all of our complex mass of imperfections that we have, he is never going to be a perfect leader. For her part, she never wanted to submit in the first place. How in the world is this going to work? In any given marriage, what you have is two very flawed people brought together.
Now, let’s just admit it straight up. Speak for yourself individually. Don’t speak for your spouse. You—you—you at times can be difficult to live with. I’ll admit that if you will. Husbands, we’re just likely to abuse our position, abuse our muscle. Wives, they’re likely to rebel; they’re likely to stake out on their own. We’re all a mess. Now, if that’s true of you, why would it surprise you that the same is true of your spouse? Of course it is. So, understand that, get over it, and move on to help and encourage one another to be the husband, to be the wife that God has called you to be. Commitment.
Tim Keller addresses all of this in, I think, not only an insightful way, but a graphic and memorable kind of way. He argues, first of all, that recent generations have way overplayed the idea of finding that perfect soulmate or the idea of compatibility. It’s been way overplayed. “I will not be whole, I really won’t be complete, until I find that woman,” and we’ve got that idea in our head of what that woman is. And it’s usually something like a brilliant novelist-astronaut-supermodel with a perfect temperament, and most importantly, she understands that I am the finest specimen of male humanity ever to have lived. We’re probably not going to say it quite that way, but the fact is, we do have unrealistic expectations. We forget that every one of us is a flawed person.
And so, this raises a question, and this is the question that Keller raises: is marrying just the right person even possible? And he says, “No, it’s not possible because there are no ‘right persons’ out there.” We’re all flawed. Ladies, not every woman can have the best-looking, the funniest, the wittiest, the most compassionate, lovable man on the earth. He’s already taken; my wife got him 36 years ago. Guys, not every husband can have the most beautiful, the most loving, the most affectionate, kindest, sweetest wife in the world. I got her 36 years ago.
Fact is, every marriage is a union of two very flawed people. And yet—and I want you to hear it—and yet, for Christians under new management, being transformed and in process of transformation, enabled by the Spirit of God to become this new humanity in Christ—and not only enabled, but having already embraced that wonderful, perfect model of Christ and His Church—there’s hope.
And so here’s how it’s going to work: “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. Husbands, love your wives as Christ has loved the church.” Strive to have a marriage that is worthy of and reflective of the gospel. That means commitment. That means self-denial. It means serving one another. It means looking out for one another’s best interests and one another’s happiness. Not for what you can get out of it, but for what you can give as Christ has given himself for his church.
There has to be just a Copernican kind of revolution in your thinking—a complete reorienting of your focus, a reorienting of your outlook, where you’re looking not to what you can get out of it, but for what you can give in reflecting the love of Christ for his church. Brothers and sisters, that has to work. And I’ll say it again: it means that when your kids get older and the neighborhood kids remark to them, “They see that your marriage is sweeter than most that they’ve seen,” your kids ought to be able to respond and say, “Oh yeah, that’s because we’re Christians. That’s what we believe.” “What do you mean?” “What it means is we believe that Jesus Christ has sacrificed himself and given himself for us. There is nothing he would not do for us. And in turn, because of his great love for us, there is nothing we would not do for him. We love him. My dad—you see how there’s nothing he wouldn’t do for mom. You see mom—because of that love, there’s nothing she wouldn’t do for him.” That’s the gospel reflected in our homes and in our relationships with one another.
The marriage is sweet precisely because it is gospel-shaped. As such, in our marriage, God has restored us to that original design. Your marriage will work well and it will honor God only as both of you have not only embraced but seek to display the gospel in your relationship together. So once again: wives, submit to your husbands; husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church. And if you think that that’s too much to ask, I want you to recall the provision that was reminded to us very back in verse 18 that set up this whole passage: “Be filled with the Spirit.” Whatever else is involved in that, it speaks of enablement. Enablement by the Spirit of God to bring about in us what God requires of us—what God commands. He provides every resource, every enablement.
Isn’t this a great gospel? Isn’t it a great Savior? He rescues us. He provides for us this perfect model. He commands us to follow that model, and yet not just commanding, he restores us and transforms us to be like him so that we can display that model in our marriage together for his glory and for our joy.
Let me suggest one more thing before we go. Husbands and wives, let me suggest that you go home and you talk about this. I’ll leave it here. Go home and talk about: “How can I get the gospel to be better displayed in my relationship with you?” Keep this model in mind: “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord, just as the church does to Christ. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” How can that work out more faithfully? How ought you, wives, to reflect better your submission to Christ in your submission to your husband? How ought you, husbands, to reflect better the love of Christ for his church in your sacrificial, relentless, exclusive, providing, protecting love for your wife? Talk it over. Work it out. You believe the gospel, you have embraced the gospel—now go home and put the gospel on display for the glory of God and for your own happiness. Amen.
Let’s pray. Our Father, it is a wonderful message, a wonderful story of redemption—that our great God would condescend to give himself in love to us, to restore sinners to himself, and yet so sacrificially give himself. How can we not but love you and give ourselves in service to you? We’re grateful for this truth, and we ask, Lord, that you would so work it into our minds and hearts until it becomes our reflex to display that same message of grace in our relationships together. Lord, we ask this for your glory, for the good of our homes, for the furtherance of the gospel by us. In Jesus’ name, amen.