Being built up... (23)

Marriage God’s way… Part 2

“… a man who went to his doctor after weeks of serious symptoms.

The doctor examined him carefully, then called the patient’s wife into his office. The doctor told her, “Your husband is suffering from a rare form of anemia. The bad news is that, without treatment, your husband will be dead in just a few weeks. The good news is that, with proper nutrition, he should get better.”

Here’s what the doctor then told her to do. “You will need to get up early every morning and fix your husband a hot breakfast - pancakes, bacon and eggs, the works. He’ll need a home-cooked lunch every day, and then an old-fashioned meat-and-potato dinner every evening.

It would be especially helpful if you could bake frequently. Cakes, pies, homemade bread - these are the things that will allow your husband to live.”

“One more thing. His immune system is weak, so it’s important that your home be kept spotless at all times.

Last but not least, it would also help if you are intimate with your husband several times a week.”

So, the wife walks into the examination room with a very sad look on her face. The husband, sensing how serious this appeared to be, asked her, “It’s bad, isn’t it, sweetheart? Tell me the truth, what’s going to happen to me?”

With tears welling up in her eyes, the wife blurted out, “HONEY, THE DOCTOR SAYS YOU ARE GOING TO DIE!” (SC)

We all hope that this story is too funny to be true, but each of us, both husband and wife are called to love and honour each other.

Let’s read last week’s Scripture and carry on as we close out chapter 5.

Ephesians 5:21–33 NLT

21 And further, submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. 22 For wives, this means submit to your husbands as to the Lord. 23 For a husband is the head of his wife as Christ is the head of the church. He is the Savior of his body, the church. 24 As the church submits to Christ, so you wives should submit to your husbands in everything. 25 For husbands, this means love your wives, just as Christ loved the church. He gave up his life for her 26 to make her holy and clean, washed by the cleansing of God’s word. 27 He did this to present her to himself as a glorious church without a spot or wrinkle or any other blemish. Instead, she will be holy and without fault. 28 In the same way, husbands ought to love their wives as they love their own bodies. For a man who loves his wife actually shows love for himself. 29 No one hates his own body but feeds and cares for it, just as Christ cares for the church. 30 And we are members of his body. 31 As the Scriptures say, “A man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.” 32 This is a great mystery, but it is an illustration of the way Christ and the church are one. 33 So again I say, each man must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

Verse 28 starts with,

In the same way...

In the same way that Jesus loved the church and gave Himself up for her, in the same way that He is making the church holy and cleansing it through the washing with the word to make it radiant, glorious, without blemish, without wrinkle, spotless, husbands are to be willing to sacrifice their lives so that their wives too can be radiant and express the glory of God in their lives.

In the same way,

Husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies

Why?

A husband who loves his wife as he loves himself...

Ephesians 5:28 (NLT)

28 ...actually shows love for himself.

How do husbands love themselves?

This might seem like a bit of an odd question, but I think that it’s worthy of being asked.

Ephesians 5:29 NLT

29 No one hates his own body but feeds and cares for it, just as Christ cares for the church.

I want to preface this by saying that Satan has launched an attack on the mind. There are people in our society that try to harm their bodies by cutting, starving, attempting suicide, and I’m sure that you can think of other ways that people hate themselves because of their mental health.

With that being said, most people do not hate themselves. We don’t generally buy food that we don’t like, I’m not saying that we don’t buy food that our kids don’t like.

Growing up, I liked most foods, but it took me a while to acquire a taste for beans, beets, broccoli, cauliflower, and turnips, but it’s amazing how our tastes change.

We buy the food we like. We try to buy the clothes we like. We have our favourite colours and we tend to buy things that fit into our colour scheme. What about vehicles, we can’t always afford but we want, but we try to get the vehicle that we like. It might have lots of power, or good gas mileage, it might even be easy on the eyes.

Husbands, we are called to love our wives the same as we love our own bodies. Some might spend more time caring for their bodies than others, but even in the day to day things: we shower, brush our teeth, and we even go to the dentist if we have a problem. We dress ourselves, we trim our nails, some shave, others trim. We use deodorant. These things are necessities in life. Just as we care for ourselves, we are instructed to love and care for our wives just in the same way that we care for ourselves.

This is what Paul says in the second part of verse 29,

Ephesians 5:29 (NLT)

29 No one hates his own body but feeds and cares for it, just as Christ cares for the church.

How does Christ

Ephesians 5:30 NLT

30 And we are members of his body.

In John 15, we have the picture of the vine and the branches. As a believer in Christ, you are members of His body. As a member, He nourishes us, He washes us with His Word, He clothes us in His righteousness, and He makes us holy, radiant, spotless, without wrinkles or blemishes. Jesus did this by sacrificing His very life for us.

Apart from Jesus, we can do nothing, but we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.

John 15:5–17 NLT

5 “Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. 6 Anyone who does not remain in me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. 7 But if you remain in me and my words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted! 8 When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples. This brings great glory to my Father. 9 “I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. 10 When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. 11 I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow! 12 This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. 13 There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. 16 You didn’t choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name. 17 This is my command: Love each other.

Jesus gives us the perfect demonstration of how a husband love his wife.

Paul goes on to say

Ephesians 5:31 NLT

31 As the Scriptures say, “A man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.”

What does this mean?

Exodus 20:12 NIV

12 “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.

How do we still honour our parents, and become one with our spouse?

Marriage is a covenant, not a contract. When a husband and wife marry, they come together as one. As important as family is, parents must take another position as the husband and the wife becomes one.

God is not pleased when families interfere. Dad and Mom mustn’t take precedence ahead of your wife.

The union of a husband and wife is a sexual union, but not just a sexual union, it is a spiritual union as a man and a woman stand before God and pledge their lives to love each other and to become one as God has instituted.

The first marriage took place in the Garden of Eden.

Genesis 2:18–24 NLT

18 Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is just right for him.” 19 So the Lord God formed from the ground all the wild animals and all the birds of the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would call them, and the man chose a name for each one. 20 He gave names to all the livestock, all the birds of the sky, and all the wild animals. But still there was no helper just right for him. 21 So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep. While the man slept, the Lord God took out one of the man’s ribs and closed up the opening. 22 Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib, and he brought her to the man. 23 “At last!” the man exclaimed. “This one is bone from my bone, and flesh from my flesh! She will be called ‘woman,’ because she was taken from ‘man.’ ” 24 This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.

You might wonder why a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife. It was a patriarchal society, so that was the calling of the husband to step out from underneath the authority of his parents and be joined to his wife. This doesn’t mean that you abandon your parents, but they no longer have the same role as they once did.

(LANTC)

When two become one, when one is affected by something, both are affected.

When two become one, we don’t become clones of each other. We still have our unique personalities. God has made each of us unique. We will have qualities that are complimentary, and we’ll have qualities that are quite different, but I believe that God brings couples together for a reason, and when the two become one, let no one put asunder. Let no one separate this couple. Marriages that are Christ centered please the Lord.

Human marriages give us the closest picture of what Christ’s relationship is with the church. Even though we aren’t perfect, it shows a little mystery of Christ and the church.

Ephesians 5:32 NLT

32 This is a great mystery, but it is an illustration of the way Christ and the church are one.

Now let’s look at

Love and Respect...

Ephesians 5:33 NLT

33 So again I say, each man must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.