Playing the Roles of Christ and the Church

Introduction: The Grand Stage of Marriage

Today’s message is the second of a series on marriage, singleness, and family. However, I want to make it clear that this message is not mainly about marriage, because marriage is not mainly about marriage. As we see in our text, my hope is that you will leave here today with a fuller and more glorious understanding of our relationship to Christ as a church and that may fuel your marriage and point it in a godly direction.

I’m going to begin by continuing the metaphor of a stage play in which there are actors playing out the roles of different character’s to give life to the events of a true story. By definition, the less of an actor you see, the better the actor is. The more of the characters and story you see, the more the play has hit its mark.

When you see bad acting on the screen, you can usually point it out. I remember seeing Liam Neeson playing Jean Valjean in a 1990’s film version of Les Miserable. What awful casting. In the same way, many Christians find themselves playing a role that just doesn’t feel suited to them. The role the wife is to play is submission after the submission of the Church to Christ, which is a humbling role to play and as a result they continue to play it badly. The husband is also tempted to leave his role for another, perhaps the role of a tyrant or the role of a passive man, rather that the loving care that Christ gives his church as mentioned in our text.

This morning, we will look at marriage as a play in which we are the actors, commissioned by God to perform so well that the actors disappear, and the great story of Christ’s redemption and sanctification of his Church is played out.

The Woman’s Role: The Church

Right at creation, the image bearer of God was created with a need, something that wasn’t good in his perfect paradise in the Garden of Eden: He was alone. Now, this doesn’t mean he was lonely, for the Lord’s presence was with him, but God looked at his situation and declared that it was not good for Man to act alone as a representative of God. In order to model the Trinitarian God in creation, this man had to be in fellowship with somebody. But God does not create more men, neither does God make woman as a separate creation from man, but the creation of woman is distinct and unique. He creates woman out of the man’s own body, out of his rib. This is truly significant, especially since God brings the woman back to him to be one flesh with her. The bond they share goes as deep as Adam’s own bones, and the fellowship he shares is from his own flesh, which faintly mirrors the Trinitarian fellowship all members of the Godhead share. Though they are one God, they are separate persons. Though Adam and Eve are separate people, they share one flesh, and so they better mirror the role of being image bearers together.

And just as each member of the Trinity plays different roles in the history of salvation, the Son submitting to the Father and the Spirit submitting to the Father and the Son, each member of the Christian Household also has a role to play. These roles, our text tells us, line up with the roles Christ plays and the roles the Church plays.

The Church and Christ

The Church has a special and exclusive relationship to Christ. On the cross, Jesus died to create a people for himself, a true Israel, one united in faith, in hope, and in mutual love for the Saviour. She is his body, in the same way the wife is one flesh with her husband, and the Church has a singular calling: to present herself to her husband as faithful, fruitful, and helpful in all submitting.

Faithful in her devotion to the Lord. There is no room for idols here. All the things of this world that cry for attention cry for worship, validation, and adoration, but she must leave those behind. She clings to her husband and finds favour with her Saviour. The Church is made for him from his own flesh, and she faithfully pursues him in prayer, in worship, in fellowship with the saints and gathering to offer herself to him. When we meet as a church, it is like an engaged couple going to a date, exchanging loving glances, holding hands, and longing for the day when they will be united in marriage.

Fruitful. The Church is like the woman of Proverbs 31. She does the work necessary to please Christ, for whom she was created. The Church is fruitful in the work that God has given her to do, which is to make disciples, love one another, and grow in the fruit of the Spirit.

Helpful in all submission. Does God need help with anything? No. But he does create us to be useful as a church in the work of his Kingdom by gracious providence. The Church is by Christ’s side as his Kingdom tears down false doctrines, trains people in the way of the Gospel, exhorts, encourages, evangelizes, and more. If Christ is doing something in the World for the sake of his Name and Glory, the Church is there with him and in him doing those things in his name that he commands her to do. For this, she is greatly rewarded, and the good deeds she and her members do in his name are the jewels that adorn here.

The Wife’s Role

So having looked at the ways the Church fulfills its role to Christ, how can wives make sure that they are accurately and obediently reflecting that role as God has given her in her marriage?

Submission

We will stay with out text and go to the first thing Paul says in verse 22: submission. Submission is a taboo word in our day, and the ideal of breaking bonds and living with complete liberty in yourself is what prevails both in entertainment media and cultural values. We live in a world where “I can do whatever my husband can do and more” is applauded as a brave stance of liberty, rather than a shameful attitude of rebellion. That statement may not be incorrect technically, but the spirit in which it is said is opposed to a spirit of submission.

Of course, this is all in response to an over-emphasis on submission that saw women having very few personal rights and invited the abuse of power from the husband, which we will address later in this sermon. Wives are one flesh with their husbands, and thus have equal standing in the marriage just as Christ has equal standing with the Father, though he submitted to his will. Submission does not speak to the dignity or inherent value of the wife, but rather the role she is to voluntarily plays in an equal relationship. A wife cannot be forced or coerced to submit, but must do so freely in order to fulfill this passage.

But this submission is necessary to play that role, and playing that role is key to honouring Christ. This is because the submission is really to Christ through the husband, Jesus being glorified in his saints portraying the Gospel.

So what does Paul mean by submit to your own husbands?

In Greek, this is not a single sentence, but one that is part of verse 21. We are all called to submit to one another, and wives are then called especially to submit to their own husbands. This is a special submission that is born out of submitting to all believers, which itself is born out of the idea of loving our neighbours as ourselves. This is all done “out of reverence for Christ”. You are not submitting to your husband as an end, but as a means to submit and honour Christ. Calvin says, “wives cannot obey Christ without yielding obedience to their husbands.”

Submission is an attitude of the heart, not simply acting out tasks. It’s not a works things, but a heart disposition that will carry itself out in works. You must be devoted in your heart to serving your husband this way, so as to serve Christ. This is also true in the common submission we render mutually to each other in the church.

The attitude is one of divine ministry. Note Paul says as to the Lord. This is a godly calling and a way in which you serve God. God’s commands are not ones we can pick and choose, we must obey him and worship him through every daily experience, and that includes our marriages. You cannot to be submissive to God if you are not submissive to your own earthly head, your husband.

Submission means subjecting yourself to your husbands leadership. This is the root idea of the word. It means giving up personal ideas and rights for the sake of letting your husband lead you and thus honouring Christ. In a Christian marriage, the husband is the chief, the head of the wife, and treating him this way is how you treat Christ.

What does this look like practically? It means letting your husband have the final say, it means helping him accomplish his goals, it means occupying the place in the home where he sees you as most needed to the best of your ability, all the while having the attitude of respect that Paul mentions in verse 33. This is how a wife loves her husband, by setting herself up to be helpful to him and supporting his direction for the family.

However, this does not mean following her husband into sin. While responsibility for that sin would fall heavier on his shoulders, she is responsible to keep herself only for the Lord. Her submission is obedience and worship to Christ first and foremost, how can she then submit to someone who is telling her to sin? In such cases, she should, as respectfully as possible, rebuke her husband for the sinful command and continue to strive in submission in the areas she is free to do so in good conscience. The same attitude should be adopted by Christians in all their relationships with authority.

With that said, I’ll give a few practical helps for wives looking to obey Christ and submit to their husbands.

Find a mentor. This can be difficult, but finding an older, wise woman who has been married for many years and has the quiet, humble heart that God finds so attractive in his daughters. Let them help you learn the wisdom of submission from their experiences and share a measure of the grace God has poured out on them. And you women who have lived long with your husband and have learned many things, share them with a younger woman.

Titus 2:3–5 ESV

Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.

Pray for your husband and your marriage.

Give your husband lots of good advice and encouragement without pushing to have your way.

Get behind what your husband wants to do.

Speak honourably about your husband when he isn’t there.

Be a good example to an unbelieving husband.

1 Peter 3:4 ESV

but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious.

Even if its not precious to your husband, even if they don’t appreciate it, it is very precious in God’s eyes and is viewed as worship to him.

Meditate on Proverbs 31.

This is a hard bullet to bite because your husband is not like Christ, he is a sinner. You could have the best husband in the world and he would still sin against you and fail in his role as a loving leader from time to time. The same, it turns out, goes for men who are trying to be good leaders but are not married to perfectly submissive wives. This is where love truly shines. In the roles of husband and wife you have two sinners who are going to fail at their roles. In the marriage between Christ and the Church you have one who fails to fulfill their role all the time and one who succeeds. Christ gives an example to both wives and husbands that the faithfulness of the other partner to their role is not something which should affect our own faithfulness. I cannot stress enough that the point of your submission is serving Christ, not serving your husband. It is a holy service that goes beyond the man you made vows with, it is your relationship to Christ that should fuel that submission. Do it patiently, humbly, and endure knowing that your reward for such service is in heaven where you will serve the Lord Jesus personally with gladness forevermore.

The Man’s Role: Loving Care

Now we get to the much longer section of the text, the role of husbands, which extends from verses 25-30. These roles compliment each other, and so we see that there is a particular way that a husband is to lead his wife. The wife’s submission does not in any way give the husband authority to do whatever he wants. Rather, he is bound to follow Christ’s directive to nourish and cherish his wife in all love and selflessness.

Again, we are struck by the picture being painted in marriage with the husband being a gentle leader as Christ is. The husband’s role is taken up in what Christ does for the church, and he ought to imitate Christ in every way possible. Of course, not all that Christ does for the church is possible to imitate. We cannot make our wives holy, nor can we spiritually cleanse them, but we can follow this formula to the best of our ability.

The Goal: Presenting our Wives and Families to Christ.

Husband, your main duty in marriage and even fatherhood is, in the best of your ability, to create a family that most closely resembles what Christ does for the Church. That means everything you do, every decision you make, everything you lead your wife into must be governed by God’s plan to purify the Church for Christ. Remember that your bride is part of the church, and your family is the smallest subset of the church. So on you there is the pastoral responsibility to lovingly direct your family is a way that is pure and holy in the eyes of Christ, so that they may contribute to making the church pure and holy.

This does not mean being a religious tyrant, as we will see. Rather, it means primarily loving care and godly instruction. It means making decisions for your family that will lead you all in a Christ-ward direction. Many husbands have taken their role and corrupted it by using it to pursue their owns passions, fulfill their own petty needs and wants. I want to tell you now that the position you are in is one of giving, not receiving. The honour shown to you by your wife is so that you may direct her, not towards your personal wants, but towards Christ as her “live-in” pastor so to speak. That is what it means to be a godly husband.

We get this from how Christ is said to sanctify and cleanse his bride by the washing of the Word. You, husband, are called to read the Bible with your wife and family. Family devotions must be the norm in every Christian household where, once a day at least, you sit down and read the word with your wife and with your children. This has the effect of washing them, sanctifying their minds to be conformed to Christ. We send our children to school every day so they may learn how to live in this world, will you then only instruct your family from the Word by bringing them to church once a week? This word that prepares us for life in eternity?

This has the effect of presenting the Church to Christ without spot or wrinkle. She is not bruised with the marks of abuse, she is not hungry and frail from lack of nurture and care, she is not clothed in rags because of financial irresponsibility, her hands are not worn and her face is not wrinkled from being overworked and overburdened, she is beautiful both in dress and countenance. She is truly happy to be with her beloved, and this is the image of what a husband ought to do with his wife.

The Means

How does a husband accomplish this? The parallel to Christ cleansing and washing with the water of the Word in our text is found in verse 29, “but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the Church.” So hear me clearly, a husband’s main responsibility to his wife is to nourish and cherish her like he does for his own body and person. The godly husband does not save all the best things for himself at the neglect of his wife, he doesn’t put himself first in anything, but rather sacrifices himself for the sake of his wife just as you might sacrifice certain things to make your own life better. Notice Paul’s description in verse 28, “husbands should love their wives as their own bodies.” Whatever care, whatever pleasure, whatever enjoyment you give to yourself should be done after you have made sure the cares and needs of you wife have been properly met.

The words nourish and cherish are key. The godly husband should treat his wife like a princess, for that is how Christ treats his church. To treat your wife in any other way is to deny the Gospel, plain and simple.

Conclusion

The mystery of Christ and the Church is the inexpressible truth which marriage tries its best to paint a picture of. The mysterious relationship between Christ and the Church goes much deeper, beyond what human minds can understand, but Paul tells us that the best way to understand it is through marriage. Therefore, let our marriages be holy pictures of this truth.

And what truth is that? That God loved the world, that Christ loved those elected by the Father, that he chose to put her first and gave her the Holy Spirit so that she chooses to follow and submit to him. He died on the cross, lovingly providing her cleansing from her sin. He bore every wrongdoing so that he might make her a beautiful bride. And she does not take advantage of her husbands kindness, but lovingly submits to him in complete trust by following him wherever he leads.

That is the main message from the text, the mystery of Christ and the church. However, that doesn’t negate the domestic duties of the home.

The husband is to love his wife as himself, treating her as a member of his own body with all the needs and privileges that entails.

The wife is to respect her husband. The word used here for respect is literally fear, in the way we fear the Lord but to a lesser degree. Respect is a humble state of the heart, not simply doing the right actions.

Without these things, a godly marriage, and indeed a godly life, is impossible. You cannot separate the two.

With these being practiced, even if its one sided, although it shouldn’t be, you will experience God in your marriage.

It will be a delight for you. Don’t see this as a burden, for all good things come from God. Trust that if you embrace your role, he will make it a joy for you.

It will be humbling for you, both for husband and wife.

It will draw you closer to God as you play out, in character, the great relationship of Christ and the church. You will see past the picture and gain closer fellowship with God.

You will see the love of Christ in a new way, whether it is through the submission to him who loves you and has eternal plans to make you part of his bride, or loving leadership where you have the privilege to play out that love so purely from your own heart.

You will serve in the church harmoniously and effectively.

You will be able to raise godly children in a godly environment.

As for this mystery, it is profound. However, rather than trying to more deeply understand what we do not, Calvin encourages us that it is better to“labour to feel Christ living in us, than to discover the nature of that intercourse.” As we draw closer to our spouses by filling our God-ordained roles, let us cast our eyes more fully on Christ, who loved us and gave himself up for us to make us his bride, holy and submissive to his wonderful plan of drawing us close to himself.