A husband’s willingness to embrace their leadership responsibilities reflects a husband's willingness to follow Jesus example...

At the church where I serve, we are in the middle of a sermon series entitled family daze to family days. We began this series by explaining that God has a design for relationships. God has designed specific roles within relationships and God has designed specific goals that those relationships are to accomplish. And because of that reality, for us to experience relationships as God designed them to be experienced requires that we be influenced by God’s Spirit, because our relationships are influenced by what influences us.

Last week, we talked about the reality that nowhere in our culture today is God’s design for relationships more misunderstood, misapplied, or resisted then when it comes to the relationship that men and women are to experience within a marriage. Last week we focused like a laser beam on a wife’s role and goal within a marriage relationship. We discovered the timeless reality is that a wife’s willingness to embrace and place themselves under a husband’s godly leadership reflects a wife’s willingness to follow Jesus leadership. Just as followers of Jesus are to willingly place themselves under His leadership as they exist in community with one another, wives are to willingly place themselves under the leadership of their husbands in a way that follows their leadership in a marriage relationship.

This week, I would like for us to spend our time together focused like a laser beam on the men. So let’s pick up where we left off last week, as Paul continues his conversation with the members of the church at Ephesus, in Ephesians 5:25:

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her,

Paul begins this section of his letter with the members of the church at Ephesus by addressing God’s divine design for the role that men are to have in a marriage relationship with a command. Now it is important to understand that this is not a suggestion or a goal to strive for; this is a command: Husbands love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her”.  Paul makes a parallel between the relationship between husband and wife and the relationship between Christ and the church to reveal for us the reality that God commands husbands to love their wives the same way that Christ loved the church.

Paul is reminding the men of the church at Ephesus, and men throughout history, that they are so selflessly and sacrificially love their wives, just as Jesus selflessly and sacrificially loved humanity all the way to the cross. Jesus left the glory of Heaven, laid aside His position and His prominence and entered into humanity in order to live a life as a homeless, itinerant preacher and die the most humiliating and painful death imaginable. Paul is basically saying "Men that is how you are to love your wives. You are to love our wives as Jesus loves His church." Paul then continues by unpacking the results that Jesus love has on His relationship with the church in verses 26-27: 

so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.

Here we see Paul reveal two specific results that Christ’s selfless and sacrificial love had when it came to His relationship with the church. First, Paul states that Jesus loved the church selflessly and sacrificially so that He might sanctify her. Now this word sanctify is a big fancy church mumbo jumbo talk word that literally means to include a person in the inner circle of what is holy. Paul here paints for us an amazing word picture of a person who was once an outsider now being made a part of a family. Paul’s point is that Jesus love for His church resulted in those who were once on the outside when it came to having a relationship with God were now being able to be an insider and a part of the family of God as a result of Jesus life, death, and resurrection.

In addition, when Paul uses the phrase, “having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, he is reminding the readers of this letter of what occurs at baptism. The phrase with the word refers to one’s confession of faith that occurs during a baptism. At baptism, one publicly identifies themselves as being a follower of Jesus. And part of that process is sharing one’s testimony of how they became a follower of Jesus. Paul’s point here is that the church reveals and reflects the relationship with God that they were created for and brought into as a result of Jesus selfless and sacrificial love when people publicly proclaim and identify themselves with the inward transformation that has changed their lives through believing, trusting, and following Jesus.

Second, Paul states that Jesus loved the church selflessly and sacrificially so that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. In other words, Jesus love for the church was so that the church would be made glorious. Jesus loves His church and desires that His bride the church would possess and inherent quality of splendor and purity that is extraordinary. Jesus loves the church so that the church would be without spot or stain or blemish.

Jesus loves the church so that the church would be without any cracks or flaws. Jesus loves the church so that his bride the church would respond to His selfless and sacrificial love by being devoted and dedicated to Him. And Jesus loves His bride the church with the desire that His bride would respond to His love with a life that reflects His character and His conduct; a life that is faultlessly focused on pleasing Him.

Now men, here is a question for us to consider: Do we love our wives like that? Do we love our wives in a way that brings them closer to Christ? Do we treat them like an outsider or love them as an insider? Do we love our wives in a way that makes them glorious?  Do we love our wives in a way that is motivated that they would become extraordinary women? Extraordinary in their spiritual splendor and purity? Do we love our wives in a way that results in pointing them to a deeper devotion to God and the mission that He has given us? Do we love our wives in a way that provokes in them a desire to reveal and reflect Christ in their character and conduct?

And if those questions are not challenging enough, Paul continues by applying Christ’s love for the church even more clearly to the relationship between a husband and a wife in verses 28-30:

So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are members of His body.

Now when Paul uses the word ought here, this word literally means to be under an obligation to meet certain expectations. And husbands, this is the obligation that we are supposed to meet: Husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies. Paul then makes an interesting statement that we sometimes pass by when he states that he who loves his own wife loves himself. But what does that mean? Paul here is anticipating the potential pushback these commands by drawing another parallel between a marriage relationship and the relationship that Christ has with His bride, the church. We see Paul begin to unpack this parallel in verses 29-30.

 First Paul states that, when it comes to men, no one hates his own flesh; instead they nourish it and cherish it. In the athletic culture of the city of Ephesus, the physical body was of exceptional importance. And just like today, men in the city of Ephesus trained and worked out to compete in games. And just like today, men took care of their bodies when it came to what they ate. They made sure they had the proper nourishment so that they could perform well. When Paul uses the word cherish here, this word conveys the sense of comfort.

The point that the apostle is making here is that just as men intuitively take pains to provide for the care and comfort of our physical bodies, we are to do the same when it comes to how we treat our wives. Men, we are to strive to provide and we are to care about the comfort of our wives physical, emotional, relational and spiritual needs.  The reason we are to do that is because that is exactly what Christ does for His body the church. As we have talked about in past sermon series, the church is divinely designed to be the vehicle that God uses to reveal Jesus to the world. Jesus Christ is the head and we are the body or the vehicle that reveals and reflects Jesus to the world. And Jesus provides and cares for the physical, emotional, relational and spiritual needs of His body, the church. 

And it is here that we see Paul reveal for us a timeless truth when it comes to how a man’s response to God’s design can reveal a great deal about where they are spiritually in terms of the depth of your relationship with Christ. And for husband's that timeless truth is that a husband’s willingness to embrace their leadership responsibilities reflects a husband's willingness to follow Jesus example. Now, men, just like the ladies last week, you may be here this morning and you may be pushing back by thinking “but Dave you don’t know my wife. Paul would not have written that if he knew my wife”.

My response would be yes, He would have. Because this has absolutely nothing to do with your wife. And this has everything to do with you. You see, Jesus never asks us to do something He has not already done men. Jesus died on the cross for your selfish rebellion and sin. And He was fully aware of your rebellion when He selflessly and sacrificially loved you to the cross. And He expects you to reflect that selfless and sacrificial love to your wife.

Now ladies, you may be wondering “why doesn’t my husband love me like that”? Ladies, the reason that your husband may not love you like that is the same reason why you push back against the idea of willingly placing yourselves under your husband’s leadership in the same manner that you are to place yourself under the leadership of Jesus.

Tomorrow we will answer that question…