The following article is not a well polished piece of writing. It is a sermon I preached about seven years ago at a very fine Baptist church in Pineville, New York. I would ask every husband, or husband to be, who reads this sermon to prayerfully consider its meaning and practical application.
"HUSBANDS, LOVE YOUR WIVES, JUST AS CHRIST ALSO LOVED THE CHURCH AND GAVE HIMSELF FOR HER..."
My message begins with a confession: a confession which causes me a great measure of shame, a confession which ought to cause each man here a great measure of self examination. I have a healthy marriage, a marriage in which my wife and I work very hard in our relationship with one another. "Until death do us part," is the covenant we intend to keep all the days of our life. Yet, our marriage has not always been this good. There was a time when I nearly destroyed it. So serious was the threat of divorce, the subject could be discussed more rationally than emotionally. The details shall remain private, but one fact I will freely confess: the fault was entirely mine. God says, "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her." I almost lost my wife because I absolutely failed to obey God's command. This sermon was not hatched in my study; it was ground out in the crucible of real life. I plead with you to listen carefully. I pray that the Lord would enrich your marriage through the truth of his Word.
"Command" and 'context" are two words you should keep in mind whenever you meditate on Ephesians 5:25. The text, "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for her," is structured as a command. The verb "love" is in the present imperative active tense. This means that we must love our wives as Christ loved the church- it is not optional- and that we must do so continuously. Our text falls within the larger context of Ephesians, chapter five. This is significant because chapter five begins with the exhortation to be imitators of God. The rest of the chapter tells how to fulfill that exhortation in the struggles of everyday life. We are to imitate God by walking in love; verses two through seven explain how. We are to imitate God by walking in light, according to verses eight through fourteen. And we are to imitate God by walking in wisdom, as explained by verses fifteen through twenty-one. In this larger context of imitating God by walking in love, light and wisdom, we find the command to love our wives as Christ loved the church. The connection between the command and its context is obvious. We are Christian men, or so we think, therefore we must be imitators of God. The question is: are we walking in light, love, and wisdom by loving our wives in the manner commanded by God?
Sometimes my wife asks why I love her. Usually the best answer is something sexy or romantic. Believe me- sexy and romantic words from the heart are what a wife wants to hear. Sometimes I do it right. But sometimes my answer is, "I love you because I want to." It may not be the most romantic or sexy answer, but it is the most important one. Christ loves the church because he wants to. His love for his elect people is strictly sovereign. It is not performance based. Because Christ's love is volitional on his part it cannot be acquired or lost by our obedience or disobedience. Because Christ's love is not performance based it gives us a real measure of security even when we are doing lousy spiritually. Christ loves his church by choice, likewise we are to love our wives by choice. It is a matter of our will- not the performance of our wives. The Greek word for "love" in our text is "agapao." It means to love with the will. It is love rooted in volition- instead of eros or pathos- though it certainly excludes neither in the bond of marriage. Loving my wife because I choose to gives her a definite sense of security since she knows she does have to buy my love with her behavior. It gives her the freedom to be human.
When a man loves his wife as he should he does not make the stupid mistake of seeing love simply as sex or solely as emotion. Certainly his love for his wife ought to heartily embrace both the sexual and emotional elements- what a terrible tragedy if it did not. However, when marital love is foundationally volitional then sex and feelings are servants of the will, not its master. This is critical. How many marriages break up because the husband allows his love for his wife to take a nose dive when she does not sexually or emotionally simulate him as much as she once did? Often the perceived solution is an affair or a divorce. Both are needless travesties. If a man loves his wife as Christ loves the church- because he chooses to- then he will love her despite the emotional and sexual problems. And he will work doubly hard to find their godly resolution. Two people living together- each with their own personality and problems, each with their own needs and desires- makes marital harmony an elusive quarry, but one well worth pursuing. A deer hunter on the trail of an eight- point buck has a one track mind, and that is to get his trophy. A man ought to go after his marriage with a single minded purpose. He ought to consider his wife as a prime trophy. He probably should not shoot her, but he ought to pursue her. The deer hunter who does not embrace the headaches of the hunt will soon give up the chase and lose his trophy. Likewise, the husband who does not embrace the headaches of marriage stands to lose his trophy as well. Volitional love, the kind of love that Christ has for his church, causes a man consider the problems as part of the pursuit. I love my wife for a lot of reasons, but most importantly, I love her because I want to. This is what God requires, and his command grants my marriage a foundation which will not be fractured by the stress of sexual, emotional, or interpersonal upheaval.
Christ's loves the church volitionally, he also loves her sacrificially. All that Christ did in his life, death and resurrection he on behalf of the church. She was the object of his love and gave himself for her. He sacrificed the glory of heaven for the humility of earth. He sacrificed the fellowship of his Father for the fellowship of sinners. He sacrificed his life through death so that through his death we might have life. From his incarnation to his resurrection Christ served the needs of his people without a self interested regard for the cost. We can approximate this kind of love for our wives by serving them without complaining about the personal cost of self sacrifice.
Serving our wives is not a popular concept in our culture; it never has been. The women's role is to take care of the man, is it not? She is to do all the housework, cook all the meals and watch all the kids. Meanwhile, the husband gets to watch television, fart, belch and ask for another beer- after all, he works all day. Is this the way it is in your home? God forbid, if it is! Most men will not do much of anything to help around the house, and what little they do they whine about. This is not love. Loving our wives as Christ loved the church is extremely practical. It means sacrificing a day of fishing to take her shopping. It means taking out the trash without griping when you would rather be playing with your computer. It means listening to her cry on your shoulder instead of watching the ball game on T.V. It means buying her a nice necklace instead of buying yourself a new fishing rod. It means having sex when she wants to as well as when you want to. It means sacrificing your desires for her needs. Sacrificial love for our wives is very costly. The price tag is the loss of selfishness. The process is painful because it means we have to serve someone besides ourselves, not occasionally, but continually. Is it worth it? It all depends on whether or not we view obedience to God as its own reward. Normally, laying down our lives for our wives yields incredibly high dividends, but that is not the prime objective. God wants us to be godly husbands, not marital mercenaries. The godly husband is one who sees the command of God, not the response of his wife, as the primary reason for sacrificial love.
Christ loves his church volitionally, Christ loves his church sacrificially, and Christ loves his church redemptively. According to verses twenty-six and twenty-seven Jesus gave himself for the church, "that He might sanctify and cleanse her," and, "that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle." In redemptive love Christ gave himself to save his people from their sins. His love for the church includes sanctification as well as justification. He gave himself to redeem his people from the practice of sin as well as the penalty of sin. Christ is concerned about the practical holiness of his elect, and we ought to be concerned about the practical holiness of our wives. The relationship my wife has with God ought to be every bit as important to me as my own relationship with God. Redemptive love for my wife means that I am vitally concerned that she knows God and obeys Him in her daily life. If I love my wife redemptively, I pray with her and for her regularly. If I love my wife redemptively, I insure she guards her devotional life. If I love my wife redemptively, I protect her from the world, the flesh and the devil by constant encouragement, exhortation and instruction from the Word of God. A man who does not pastor his wife is a man who cannot possibly love her as Christ love the church.
Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church! Love them volitionally! Love them sacrificially! Love them redemptively! But know this: you can only love your wives as Christ loved the church- if you love Christ yourself. The command of text is also a call to self examination. It requires you to make sure that you actually know Jesus as your Lord and Savior. It is a divine summons to sacrifice your proud male ego on the altar of faith in the Son of God. It is a command to flee to Christ, lest you perish in your sins!
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�copyright 1999, Perry Fuller
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