Love Her Like Christ

 In our last post we demonstrated that the priority of the husband toward his wife is to help her flourish. We ended that article with the last and most important way a husband helps his wife flourish, and that is, to love her, “as Christ loved the church” (Ephesians 5:25). I wanted to give this topic its own post because it is so important. 

As we unpack the main passage that calls husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church, we discover there are three directives essential to remember. 

 

A Husband Is To Love His Wife Like Christ By Sacrificing For Her.

In verse 25 we read: “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her....” Jesus Christ humbled Himself by taking on flesh and being born in the likeness of man so that He could live, die, and be raised in the place of His bride. Though he could have said, “The penalty for the sins of sinners is not mine to pay, I don’t deserve this, and I deserve not to do this!” Yet, He was willing to suffer so that His bride, whom He loved (wanting her to flourish in the greatest of ways) could be saved. 

 

It is, however, easy for husbands to ignore this. After all, why should we want to love our wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her? This goes against so much of what we naturally want and what our culture tells us. Where we find help is by seeing that are a number of deep, strong motivations given in Ephesians. 

 

1. God Commands It.

Since Paul is “an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God” (1:1), and Paul commands husbands to love in this way, it means our Lord is commanding husbands to do this. Men should do it if we have a reverence for Christ (5:21).  

 

2. It Glorifies God. 

Since God saves for His glory (1:6, 12, 14) and marriage give a picture of the gospel behind that salvation (5:32), husbands must realize just how important their love of wife is. It accomplishes the greatest and most lasting of purposes. 

 

3. It Fits With New Life.

When God effectively calls us to salvation and transforms us (4:1), this enables the Christian to live like the new man they are, that is, like Jesus Christ (4:22-24). When we live in this manner, it also demonstrates the worth of God, as was seen in the previous motivation. 

 

4. It Is Part Of The Spirit Leading Husbands.

After Paul highlights how husbands have been changed in Jesus Christ—including the fact they are the temple of God (chapters 1-3), he exhorts them to walk worthy of God (4:1), and to allow the Spirit of God to fill them, as God’s glory filled the Old Testament temple (5:18). This means they allow the Holy Spirit to lead and to be in control of their lives. The call to love wives is a direct outcome of all this (5:25-27). 

 

5. It Addresses The Heart Of A Man.

God has designed men to flourish when they are strong and courageous (Joshua 1:9; 1 Corinthians 16:13). So, if men keep their focus on what all their sacrificial love for wife accomplishes, even beyond her own flourishing, it motivates the man to be the one who goes without something if someone must, works the extra hours before the wife does, helps her with work around the house, and wants to fulfill all his responsibilities.”

 

It is one thing to focus on these motives and to offer a few examples of sacrificial love, but what are the main ways a husband sacrificially loves?  This is revealed in verses 26-27. 

 

A Husband Is To Give Priority To His Wife Knowing God. 

In verse 26 we read that a husband is to love sacrificially his wife, as Christ loved the church for this purpose: “that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word....” (26) Jesus gave himself for His bride that she would be cleansed and justified (1 Cor. 6:11), as well as set apart to live for and to serve God, in other words, that she would be saved (Acts 16:31). Husbands should pray for their wife to be saved, if he is not sure about that, should commend the gospel to her through his love for her, and should look and pray for open doors to share the gospel with her (Col. 4:3).

 

The second way that Paul says a husband sacrificially loves has to do with his wife’s growth in Christ.

 

A Husband Is To Give Priority To His Wife Growing In Christ. 

In verse 27 Paul uncovers the second key purpose for a husband sacrificially loving and it is this: “so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.”

 

Here Paul uses the picture of a wedding when a bride stands before her husband in all her beauty as the future goal of the ultimate bridegroom, Jesus Christ for His bride. Unlike most husbands who have nothing to do with their wife’s beauty, Jesus Christ must make His wife, the church, beautiful (cf. Psalm 149:4) and this to redound to His glory. This is another way of saying that Jesus Christ lived, died, and was resurrected in the place of His bride that she might someday be sanctified in the ultimate sense when she is in His presence.

 

The model this sets for the husband is that he should be praying for, caring for, and sharing God’s Word with his wife for the sake of her sanctification (her becoming more like Jesus Christ: 2 Cor. 3:18). 

 

Husbands, this passage sets a high bar for you as the head of your wife. However, as Paul says elsewhere in the letter to the Ephesians, you can be strong in the Lord Jesus Christ and the strength that comes from His might (6:10), remembering that you are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works (which includes loving your wife as Christ loved the Church) which God has prepared beforehand that you can walk in them (2:10). 

 

Joyously Loving Like Christ With You,

Tom

Help Her Flourish

There are very few biblical teachings that are vilified any more than that husbands are called to lead their wives and families. For many it wreaks of harshness and seems to be so old-fashioned. This take on it also seems to make even husbands themselves feel like there is something wrong with providing leadership in their marriage. And so, they draw back from it. 

 

Husband, if this describes some of the struggle you have in being the “head” of your wife, I want to put you at ease. This will happen through what should be the very first purpose in how you lead your wife. You should lead her in such a way that you help her flourish. In other words, lead her in such a way that she grows luxuriantly, finds success in how God wants her to live and to serve Him, all so that she prospers to His glory. If this is your priority with her and you lead her toward that goal, there will be nothing harsh in your headship. 

 

So what I want to do in the rest of the post is to make the case biblically for this being your priority toward your wife. 

 

First, we know this to be true because when God first created man and woman, He revealed that He created them in His image, with authority in the world to be His vice regents, to fill the world with God-worshipers, and to help the world and all in it flourish for God’s glory and their joy (Gen. 1:26-28; Psalm 8). This includes how husbands and wives treat each other. What is more, we need to see that this command to help each other and others flourish, a command from the very beginning of time and creation, stands above all other commands and commissions, including God’s wise revelation that husbands are the head of their wives. We can never think of the husband’s responsibility toward his wife apart from this Creation Mandate. 

 

Next, we discover that since we are created in the image of God, to resemble, represent, and to reflect Him and His glory (Gen. 1:26-28; Psalm 8) and since God ordered creation as seen in Genesis 1:1-31 so that it was very good and so it provided an abundance of resources and gifts to enable humans, other living creatures, and the world itself to flourish, it follows that one of the ways we glorify God is by helping others flourish. This is heightened when we remember that God is the King of kings and we are only his vice-regents, and so if God leads and governs in such a way that we will flourish (and He does! See Rom. 8:28), then we must lead in that same way. 

 

What is more, since God is the one who is the source of life (Gen. 2:7), “the fountain of living waters” (Jer. 2:13), and the “begetter” (1 John 5:1), He who has always lived and existed, is by His very nature a giver of life and vibrancy. Since this is true and since God leads in this way, and we are created in His image, husbands, we also must lead in a way that increases the life and vibrancy of our wife. 

 

Additionally, we also discover that since God’s image (twisted but not lost due to sin) is being renewed in us and this means we are becoming more like Jesus Christ (Rom. 8:29; 2 Cor. 3:18) and since Jesus came that we may have life and have it more abundantly (John 10:10), it also follows, husband, that your goal toward your wife is not only to make sure she has true life, but also that her life is abundant and thriving. 

 

This leads to many applications, but here are a few to stimulate your thinking.

 

1. As Jesus came not to be served but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many (Matt. 20:28)—and this is to provide a model for Christian leadership (Matt. 20:20-28)—we should approach our leadership of our wife as a servant. You must be the first one in your family to sacrifice, if needed. You should remember that you are to have the same way of thinking toward your wife that Jesus Christ did in His humble, sacrificial love for us (Philippians 2:5-8)

 

2. We discover in Scripture that true lasting happiness arises when we are living underneath the rule of our King (Matt. 5:3-10), that is, we hear and guard His Word so as to obey Him (Luke 11:28). This means we are leading our wife in a way that prays for, talks with her about, and encourages her in her relationship with her Lord and Savior. Since this includes using her spiritual gifts to serve the Lord and others to His glory (1 Peter 4:10-11), you do all you can for her to flourish in successfully using her gifts (1 Cor. 12). 

 

3. We listen to what she says about her needs, desires, and what makes her happy, and we ask for her input in how you as a couple and you as a family operate (Prov. 18:13). We realize listening is a form of love and is necessary in her flourishing. 

 

4. As Paul teaches in Ephesians 5:25-27, a key way for husbands to serve as head to his wife is to love her as Christ loved the church. There is no more important and powerful way of helping her flourish. This is so important that we will look at it in our next post. 

 

Joyously Leading Like Christ As Your Joyful Pastor,

 

Tom