Spirit Filled Marriage

This morning we pick up where we left off last week.

After sharing what our behavior should be like, now Paul turns to a very explicit instruction for the home.

I approach this passage with measured care, quite frankly, some trepidation.

The passages teaches that there is a divinely given order in the marriage relationship and for that matter for children and what I would say will employment relationship.

It also uses the word “submit” which is an incendiary word in our society today.

Most of us grew up during the rise of the feminist movement where women were seeking their rights to be the same as men.

The word submission today is seen as countercultural and has some harsh synonyms like “oppression,” “subjugation,” or “dominance.”

It is easy to be misunderstood when talking about this topic.

I would also say, that this text has been perverted and abused by disordered and sinful men.

When God’s word is put in a religious fool’s hands it do immense damage.

Men are not to be tyrants ruling every aspect of his wife’s life.

Ephesians 5:22–33 CSB

22 Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord, 23 because the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church. He is the Savior of the body. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives are to submit to their husbands in everything. 25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing her with the washing of water by the word. 27 He did this to present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or anything like that, but holy and blameless. 28 In the same way, husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hates his own flesh but provides and cares for it, just as Christ does for the church, 30 since we are members of his body. 31 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. 32 This mystery is profound, but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33 To sum up, each one of you is to love his wife as himself, and the wife is to respect her husband.

This passage follows the command to be filled with the Spirit.

Where Paul called for mutual submission by all believers to one another.

When we are full of the Spirit, we will defer to and serve each other as Christ served.

The emphasis on submission falls into three groups: wives - submit to husband, children - obey parents, and slaves - obey their masters.

On the other hand husbands are told to love their wives, parents not to exasperate their children, and masters to treat their slaves fairly.

This can only be accomplished through Spirit filled lives with mutual submission to each other.

Paul begins with the wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.

This does not mean, as some chauvinists have interpreted it, that wives are to treat their husbands like the Lord, but rather that their submission to their spouses is a duty which they owe to the Lord.

Why Must the Wife Submit?

While this is hard for some, you need to remember that the wife is to submit to her husband who is willing to die for her!

A husband who should be the first to apologize, forgive, and serve.

The headship of the husband means he is to be a servant-leader like the way Jesus practiced servant leadership.

In Mark, Jesus said “I did not to be served, but to serve and give my life as a ransom for many.”

This verse does not give the husband a license for dominance or lordship.

It has its limits.

It can never command what God forbids or forbid what God commands.

It can never be used selfishly.

There is no room for bullying or tyranny.

What Does Wifely Submission Look Like?

First of all, it does not suggest spiritual inequality.

Both sexes are equal.

Both bear the image of God and are equal in their standing and in their spiritual gifts for service.

Paul in Galatians 3:28 says, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus”

Our passage here in Ephesians presents men and women in an ordered equality in which there is no superiority or inferiority — simply differing roles.

Next it does not mean slavish obedience.

Some have taken the phrase, “in everything,” to mean to give way to everything he says or expects.

This is a happy relationship.

Wives freely and responsibly follow the loving leadership of a faithful husband, not a tyrant.

We must reject all improper ideas of this teaching.

Paul is not talking about something akin to slavery, subservience, or of a top-down chain of command, where the subjects have to obey without question.

A wife must never follow her husband into sin.

In fact she has a responsibility to confront his sin to help him return to God’s ways.

To remind him of his place in the marriage.

What about those wives who are marred to a difficult man or non-believer?

Our heart should go out to them because they have a rough time.

Every day is filled with huge tensions and decisions which must be made on principle.

Living in a fallen world can only be done with full dependence on the grace of God.

Peter tells us that a wife in this situation living for Christ can bring her husband to the Lord and she will definitely have an impact on her children.

Paul illustrates what this should look like with a picture of Christ’s love for the church.

He shows us that marriage displays the gospel to the world.

Wives picture the church to the world.

Husbands picture Christ to the world.

It also shows that the ultimate purpose for marriage is to glorify Christ.

Even though most marriages go through hard times, the ultimate issue is are you surrendered to Christ?

Our marriages should provide hope for the world as people see a us turn to Christ in both the good times and the bad, in the rich times and in the poor, and in sickness and in health.

How Must The Husband Be Told To Love His Wife?

This call to love your wife as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her is a call to sacrificial love. Verses 25

Paul wrote this in a time when men used a wife to have legitimate children.

Have a prostitutes for pleasure.

Have concubines for daily cohabitation.

In other words, husbands were pigs.

So Paul comes in with this passage with a radical statement on marriage.

This type of love is sacrificial, Christlike love is going to the cross love.

This love was servant oriented in his foot washing love.

Husbands are told that marriage is a call to die.

Dying to self may involve sacrificing you schedule, and even good ambitions.

It means giving yourself away for the good of your wife.

That involves crucifying your flesh and resolving to be faithful to your wife and not yield to lust, anger, or pride.

It’s a call to serve that takes initiative.

Actively love your wife

It also doesn’t just involve service but is and appropriate attitude of serving like Christ’s.

Secondly, Husbands must love their wives with a sanctifying love. Verses 26-27

Christ’s cleansing happens by two agents: water and word.

The water may mean baptism with word being a personal confession of faith.

But a strong meaning is that Paul speaks of washing, he emphasizes the spiritual cleansing that takes place (cf. 1 Cor 6:11).

The marriage imagery in Ezekiel 16:8–14 and the prenuptial bath in the Jewish customs may have influenced Paul.

So there may be a secondary reference here to the bridal bath (O’Brien, Ephesians, 422).

I take “the word” as the word of the gospel (see Eph 6:17).

The word of the gospel is the means by which we receive spiritual cleansing.

Christ cleanses His bride spiritually, and He does this through the word of the gospel (John 15:3; 17:17).

So what does this have to do for husbands?

While a husband cannot atone for sins or cleanse anyone, there is a sense in which Christ’s sanctifying work is a pattern for husbands.

Practically, I think this means you should love your bride in a way to help her grow in likeness to Christ.

Here is the question: “Is our wife more like Christ because she’s married to us? Or, is she like Christ in spite of us?” (Hughes, Ephesians, 192).

Husbands need to be concerned for her spiritual well-being.

Be in the Word personally.

Talk about the Word with her.

Help her with theological knowledge,

In the practice of spiritual disciplines,

In her service in the local church,

And in her relationships.

Care for her soul.

The third way is through a satisfying love. Verses 28-31

In these verses, Paul reminds us of creation.

He says husbands should love their wives “as their own bodies” (v. 28).

The husband should provide, nourish, and care for his bride, just as he cares for himself (v. 29).

Paul puts Genesis 2:24 underneath this directive, reminding the husband that the two have become “one flesh” (v. 30).

This satisfying love may sound self-serving for husbands or demeaning to the wives, but that is not the case.

This instruction makes perfect sense in light of the fact that the two have become one flesh.

Just as you long to satisfy your own needs, husbands, satisfy your wife’s needs.

Just as you long for intimacy, joy, security, health, peace, companionship, and community, provide them for your bride also.

Ask yourself husbands, how are you doing at nourishing your wife (v. 29)?

Are you physically nourishing her?

Are you cherishing your wife (v. 30)?

Are you admiring her and complimenting her?

Wow, That’s A Lot

God ordained marriage.

Christ set the pattern for marriage.

The Spirit empowers marriage.

That’s a lot to think about and live out in our marriages.

Don’t feel guilty, if you aren’t meeting this standard.

We all fall short, but the love of Christ can help us to be better husbands and wives.

The good news is that Christ died for those who could not keep His demands perfectly.

The Spirit daily renews us and empowers us as we look to Christ for grace and mercy.

This passage should cause to be thankful and praising Jesus our great groom.

Charles Spurgeon put it like this in his sermon “Christ’s Love to His Spouse”

This love of Christ is the most amazing thing under Heaven, if not in Heaven itself. How often have I said to you that if I had heard that Christ pitied us, I could understand it. If I had heard that Christ had mercy upon us, I could comprehend it. But when it is written that he actually loves us, that is quite another and a much more extraordinary thing! Love between mortal and mortal is quite natural and comprehensible, but love between the Infinite God and us poor sinful finite creatures, though conceivable in one sense, is utterly inconceivable in another. Who can grasp such an idea? Who can fully understand it? Especially when it comes in this form—“HE” (read it in large capitals) “loved me, and gave Himself for me”—this is the miracle of miracles! (“Christ’s Love to His Spouse,” emphasis in original)

Dwell on Christ daily and yield yourself to His Spirit and you can live out a Spirit-filled marriage.