As Christ Loved (Ephesians 5:22-33)

Ephesians chapter 5, starting in verse 22.

Ephesians 5 · chapter mention

Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord, because the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ is the head of the church.

He is the Savior of the body.

Now, as the church submits to Christ, so also wives are to submit to their husbands in everything.

Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church, and gave himself for her, to make her holy, cleansing her with the washing of water by the word.

He did this to present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or anything like that, but holy and blameless.

In the same way, husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies.

He who loves his wife loves himself.

For no one ever hates his own flesh, but provides and cares for it, just as Christ does for the church.

Since we are members of his body, for this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.

This mystery is profound, but I am talking about Christ in the church.

To sum up, each one of you is to love his wife as himself, and the wife is to respect her husband.

Let's pray.

Lord, I pray that this morning we would come before you humbly, that we would come before you with open ears and open eyes and open hearts, open minds to all that you have for us in this scripture.

Lord, I pray through this that we would understand our relationship with Jesus better, and we would understand our relationship with our spouse if we're married better as well.

So we pray that you would speak to us and that you would change us by your word here this morning to make us more and more like Jesus, we pray.

In Jesus' name, amen.

You may be seated.

So just a heads up this morning, I'm gonna be asking you a lot of questions.

Because I want you to engage in this mentally and think about some of these things before we actually look at the next verse and uh and start to expound on it a little bit.

So just be prepared for that.

So the first question that I have for you is what is the purpose of marriage?

What is God's purpose for marriage?

And that is to give us an earthly relationship that mirrors our relationship with Jesus.

To give us this concrete example here on earth that we can relate to since Jesus is our eternal groom and we are, as the church, we are his eternal bride.

Even if you're single here today, that doesn't mean that you can't learn from this as well.

I talked about this as uh last week a little bit.

You are not in a lesser position if you are single, or God has called you to singleness.

You know, Paul speaks extensively in 1 Corinthians 7 and says that it's actually better to be single because you can actually be more effective for God's kingdom because your interests aren't divided.

But that is really something that you need to be called to.

It's a gift that some have, and it's a gift that some do not have.

But even if that's you, God still wants you to learn from marriage about our relationship with Jesus.

So that's the purpose of marriage.

But what's the goal of marriage?

When you're in a marriage, what is the goal?

And we learn this from Genesis 2 that the two shall become one flesh.

And that word become is so important.

It's a process of becoming one flesh.

And that's the goal.

So entangled in each other's lives, emotionally and spiritually and physically, that you can't really tell where one begins and the other ends.

And the goal really is as uh for spouses to become more like Christ.

And then that leads to us becoming more like each other.

I love to use this example of this triangle.

That's just a great picture.

You see, we start off here as husband and wife when we say, I do.

But it's as we grow closer to God that we're growing closer to each other.

As we mature in this relationship, as this oneness is taking place, it's as we get closer to God that we're gonna find each other getting closer as husband and wife.

Now, another question: why would God make oneness the goal of marriage?

John 17 speaks a lot about that.

If you remember when we were going through this together, and this is part of Jesus' prayer for his disciples.

He says, Holy Father, protect them by your name that you have given me, so that they may be one as we are one.

A little bit further down in the chapter it says, May they all be one as you, Father, are in me, and I am in you.

May they also be in us.

A little farther down he says, I am in them, and you are in me, so that they may be made completely one.

Jesus desires this oneness in our relationship with Him.

The same kind of oneness that He has with the Father.

And He wants us to experience that and even witness that oneness in marriage as well.

Even if we are witnessing it in somebody else's life, in somebody else's marriage, we can look at it and see, like, oh, okay, this is the oneness that God's talking about.

So keep that in mind in this passage.

Oneness is intended to take place as we grow closer to Jesus and closer to our spouse at the same time.

At the same time is so key.

It's getting closer to God is when we get closer to our spouse.

And really, that's why Christian marriage is so different.

And why it cannot be defined as anything other than what Scripture defines it as.

Because it's a mirror of our relationship with Jesus Christ as the eternal groom and the eternal bride.

You know, if you remember last week, it was about living a spirit-filled life, yielding to the will of God, walking by the Spirit.

And this is a continuation, it's not an accident that that was the verses right before this.

Because what we're talking about this morning is a spirit-filled marriage and what a spirit-filled marriage should look like.

And you cannot expect to do anything that we're going to be talking about here without being filled by the Spirit.

What's the first fruit of the Spirit?

Anybody want to remember?

Love, right?

Now, we're about to look at a word that makes some people bristle a little bit.

And that's the word submit.

So before we read verse 22, I want to ask something else.

Should our modern day culture dictate how we interpret scripture?

No, absolutely not.

The second question: do you believe Paul wrote this?

Or the Holy Spirit inspired these words to be written through Paul?

Good answer.

You guys are doing great already.

All scripture is God breathed, is inspired by God.

So we can't look at this and say, Paul's a chauvinistic jerk, and you know.

This is inspired by the Holy Spirit.

So look at verse 22.

Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.

Now we need to understand biblical submission for what it is.

And if you have in your mind, when you're talking about submission, a hierarchy of importance or a hierarchy of value, and that's your view of submission because of our culture and the way we use that word in our language, we need to clear this up.

Another question.

Do you believe that Jesus and God the Father are equal?

Yes.

Good.

I'm glad to hear that.

The first article in our statement of faith, which you can find on our website, says, we believe that there is one living and true God, eternally existing in three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Equal in power and glory, that this triune God created all, upholds all, and governs all.

Yet, Jesus submits to the Father.

You know, we saw it multiple times as we were going through John.

That's because biblical submission does not have to do with hierarchy of value, hierarchy of importance, hierarchy of equality.

It has to do with roles and order when we're looking at biblical submission.

Think about what Jesus did with his authority over us.

He gave himself completely for us.

He loved us sacrificially to the point of death on the cross and never once committed a selfish act against us, having complete authority over us.

That doesn't sound like the American idea of submission and authority, does it?

And the role of the husband is that of Jesus in the home, as the head that is called to sacrificially lay down his life for his bride, denying his flesh just as Jesus did, and never committing an act of selfishness against her.

Now, women, a question for you.

Would that be hard to submit to if your husband was loving you like that?

We as husbands, unlike Jesus, we're gonna fail in this role daily.

But thank God for grace and forgiveness.

Hopefully not only from Jesus, but from our wives as well.

Right, wives?

Okay.

Okay.

You know, I said last week, more authority in God's kingdom means more responsibility to seek God's will and to die to self.

For those that are subordinate to you if you're in a place of authority.

Authority does not mean you get to press your own will, it means you get to promote God's will.

Husbands, leading your family means seeking God's will and promoting God's will.

Not ordering people around in order to accomplish whatever you want them to do for your own selfish gain.

And wives, it says, submit.

And not only that, he didn't stop there, but submit to that authority that God has given your husband.

1 Corinthians 11 3 says, but I want you to know that Christ is the head of every man, and the man is the head of the woman.

This is in the context of marriage, and God is the head of Christ.

So if you're single and you want to get married, choose wisely.

You want to choose somebody that will seek the will of the Lord and love you like Christ loves the church.

Because when you say I do as a woman, you're choosing that authority over you.

And to submit to that authority.

So do not compromise in your choice of a husband.

And wives, and those that will be wives, submission does not mean silence.

It does not mean turning your brain off and just doing whatever.

But I want to show you what submit does mean.

In the Greek dictionary, it's really, really long.

So I'm going to just give you a couple of highlights I think that sum it up well.

The first thing is submit means to arrange under, to subordinate.

Subordinate.

And then in the context of uh when it's used in military terms in the ancient Greek, it means to arrange troop divisions in a military fashion under the command of a leader.

Because you can't have an army that doesn't have ranks, right?

Or with everybody being the same rank.

There has to be some order.

Someone has to give direction and then disseminate information.

Now, in a non-military use, it means a voluntary, remember that, voluntary attitude of giving in, cooperating, assuming responsibility, and carrying a burden.

Do you know the difference between submitting and obedience?

Because there's a big difference between those two words.

You can be obedient with a horrible attitude.

Okay.

Wives, God doesn't call you to obedience, he calls you to submission.

Look at that non-military definition again.

Submission is voluntary, it is submitting yourself unto something.

Here's an example.

If you and your husband have been seeking the Lord and praying and really talking something through and struggling with a decision, and you end up coming to opposite conclusions, what should you do?

And you have to make a decision.

You have a deadline.

Well, submission is not, you know, fine, we'll do it your way.

But I'm gonna say I told you so, and all of this falls apart because I know it's gonna happen, you know.

Submission is, I don't see it.

And I actually don't agree with the conclusion that you're coming to, but I know you sought the Lord.

And I know that you love me as Christ loves the church.

And I'm not only gonna go along with your decision or along with your plan, but I'm gonna support you in it.

And I'm gonna root for it and try to make it succeed as if it was my own desire.

Women, that is why you should choose wisely.

Because we're talking about something that is very hard to do.

Even when talking about Jesus in the church, Jesus has loved us perfectly always.

Yet submission to him can be really, really hard, can't it?

He tells us to do something, and we're like, mm-mm.

No, I don't see it.

I don't want any part of that, I can't do it, whatever.

That's hard.

But especially for a wife to a husband, it can be really hard to submit to that authority.

But that's why you are called to submit as unto the Lord.

Not making your husband a God, it's not what it's talking about.

But also not only submitting when you feel like he's making the right decision, but as to the Lord, with the trust and confidence that your husband always has what's best in mind for you.

Which the Holy Spirit will explain here in verse 23.

Look at it with me.

Because the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ is the head of the church, he is the savior of the body.

Wives are to submit because that's their role.

And it's the same role that the church has in relation to Jesus, that you and I have in relation to Jesus.

You know, do you think Jesus wants a body of believers that says, fine, we'll do it your way, but you're gonna see Jesus.

You don't know what's best for me.

Like, that's a horrible example, isn't it?

Wives are to be a visible example of the church.

You represent us, all of us, the men and women that are the bride of Christ.

And as verse 23 says here, Jesus laid down his life for his bride to save his bride.

And husbands have that same role.

Laying down their life for their wife is part of being the head of the home.

You know, there's an element here of a husband protecting and guarding and providing here as well, just as Jesus did and does for us.

But again, that kind of really rubs up against our American social norms, though, doesn't it?

Now look at verse 24 with me.

Now, as the church submits to Christ, so also wives are to submit to their husbands in every way.

Again, this is the role that God has chosen for you as the bride.

So, wives, I have another question.

How do you mirror and exemplify and portray our relationship with Jesus by your faithfulness to submit?

And before we go any further, I want to tell you we're not talking about the what-ifs.

You know, what if there's abuse?

What if there's infidelity?

What if there's sin?

What if the husband is asking the wife to sin?

Remember, this is written to Christians in Ephesus who are a part of this triangle that we're talking about, or at least trying to exemplify that triangle that we've been talking about.

So it is written for those both pursuing oneness with Christ and oneness with each other.

Not talking about the what-ifs that we might come up with in our head.

And you'll find instructions for husbands and wives that are married to non-believers.

That's in 1 Corinthians 7, if you want to go look at that on your own time.

Um, but remember, we're not talking about the what-ifs.

We're talking about two people that are seeking Christ, becoming one with him, and becoming one with each other.

Now, I'm gonna start picking on the husbands, right?

That's enough for the wives.

But you'll notice Paul actually has a lot more to say to the husbands than he does to the wives.

Look at verse 25.

Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.

Read all four Gospels, and you'll see Jesus sacrifice from start to finish.

Not just on the cross, that's usually where our mind first goes, but coming from heaven to earth.

That's where the sacrifice started.

Coming in the form of a man, taking on the flesh of his own creation, being born of a woman.

Jesus was under persecution from infancy.

Putting up with his disciples that questioned him and tried to counsel him at every turn.

He was put in a place or put himself in a place where he was tempted by Satan.

He was under constant scrutiny by the religious leaders of the day.

That was all before he willingly took on the sin of mankind and died the death that we deserve.

Like I said earlier, not one selfish act.

He just constantly gave himself.

But there's so much more to his love than the sacrifice.

You know, you might remember in chapter four we were covering what Jesus has called us as a church to love each other like.

He said, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.

The gospels are filled with Jesus' kindness and his grace and his long-suffering and his mercy and yes, his sacrificial love as well.

Husbands, this is how we are called, this is our role.

This is how we are called to love our wives.

Just as Jesus did.

And it says at the end of verse 25, and gave himself for her.

Your role is to be like Jesus.

Where people can look at you and say, I know the love of Jesus because I've seen that man love his wife.

That's convicting, isn't it?

I'm getting convicted out of here.

It should be sobering, you know, it should be challenging.

Um but that needs to be our goal.

Because that is the role that we've been put into as husbands in our relationship with Jesus in our relationship with our wife, because it's a mirror of that relationship.

Jesus gave himself for the bride.

Now look at verse 26 to make her holy, to make her sanctified and cleansed.

You know, the whole reason Jesus died and rose again was so that we could be made holy, to dwell with him forever and to be set apart for God.

As the head of your home, of your wife, husbands, your actions and how you love her and how you lead her affect her relationship with God.

Loving your wife like Jesus, being that example, actually helps draw her closer to Jesus.

And it's not when we do it, you know, because we feel like she deserves it, you know, waiting until she deserves to be loved before we show that love, waiting for her to earn that love before we show that love.

That's not how Jesus loves us, is it?

Think of how many times Jesus has forgiven all of us, forgiven our infidelity to him, and loved us when we were as unlovable as we could possibly be.

Now, if Jesus can love us through our offenses, there's no reason for a husband to not love his bride.

Our bride, our earthly brides, if you're married, can never sin against us as much as we have sinned against him.

Think about that.

And if we're accepting freely the love of Jesus Christ and the forgiveness of Jesus, and we don't extend that same love and forgiveness to our bride, that's the definition of a hypocrite.

And verse 26 goes on to say, cleansing her with the washing of water by the word.

You know, we have to understand how Jesus did this before we can apply this to husbands.

Now, typically, when we're talking about the canon of scripture, our Bibles, the Bible will use the word Lagos for word, the word that we're looking at in our verse right here.

And that's usually the canon of Scripture.

Many people read verse 26 and say, you know, I need to read scripture to my wife, and then they move on to verse 27.

But the word for word here in verse 26, it's not Lagos, it's Ramadi from the word Rhema.

And I want to tell you that definition.

It says, that which is or has been uttered by the living voice, things spoken word.

Any sound produced by the voice and having definite meaning.

Some examples of how this word Rhema is used in Scripture would be like in Luke 1, 3.8, where it says, When the angel told Mary she would conceive of the Holy Spirit, Mary replied, May it happen to me as you have Rhema, as you have said.

In Luke 3, 2, said God's word, Rhema, came to John, speaking of John the Baptist, the son of Zechariah in the wilderness.

John 6, 6, 3, the spirit is the one who gives life.

The flesh doesn't help at all.

The words, Rhema, that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.

So verse 26 says, cleansing her with the washing of water by the Ramati, by the Rhema, by the living voice.

I believe, it's fine if you disagree, but I'm not going to die on this hill.

But I think this is telling husbands so much more than to just read the word to your wife.

I think this is talking about seeking God's will in Scripture with your wife together.

And the Holy Spirit will give a Rhema, will give a word.

This means that husbands are to be so in tune with their wives and praying for them and praying with them that the Holy Spirit will give them a word to speak.

And like I said, feel free to disagree with me, but I think this is so much more than reading a chapter to your wife and then turning the TV back on.

Now look at verse 27.

It goes on.

He, speaking of Jesus still, did this, made his bride holy, to present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or anything like that, but holy and blameless.

Jesus did this for us to love his body, the church.

Now, husbands, look at verse 28.

In the same way, husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies.

Remember, what's the goal of marriage?

To become one flesh, right?

Where you can't tell where one begins and one ends.

You know, we all have this innate desire to look out for number one, don't we?

I really was tempted to bring a slingshot with nothing in it and just go like this to see everybody, you know, kind of like I thought, I don't want any heart attacks this morning.

But we have this innate desire.

Something's coming at us, we duck, we close our eyes, we put our hands up or whatever.

Nobody has a problem looking out for number one.

But if we're one flesh, look at what the second half of verse 28 says.

He who loves his wife loves himself.

For no one ever hates his own flesh, but provides and cares for it, just as Christ does for the church, since we are members of his body.

If you're truly one flesh, what's good for your wife is what's good for you.

And what's good for you will equally be good for your wife.

Again, think about that triangle that we've been talking about.

Now look at verse 31.

Quoting from Genesis 2 here.

For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.

Genesis 2.24.

In-laws can be tricky.

Anybody agree with that?

I'm very fortunate.

I have good ones.

It's been pretty easy for me.

But it's hard for a lot of couples to go from whatever their relationship was with their parents to leaving and cleaving to their spouse.

And really, and this happens in the matter of time that it takes for a wedding ceremony to begin and end.

And when you think about it, wedding ceremonies are kind of crazy.

All of a sudden, there are a bunch of boundaries that once were that are now gone.

And then there's new boundaries that are drawn in our relationships in the time that it takes to say I do.

Like with parents and every other relationship that we have in our life, those boundaries change as soon as we say I do.

And leaving and cleaving is one of those first steps in that process of becoming one.

You never stop honoring your father and mother.

But your loyalty is now first to your spouse.

Again, we're drawing parallels with our relationship with Jesus here.

When we're saved and we become a part of the body of Christ, yeah.

Our loyalty is now to Christ first.

And nothing should compete with that relationship that we have with Jesus.

Those are called idols, when there's things in our life competing with that relationship that we have.

Our loyalty is now to Christ first, and nothing else should compete.

It's the same in marriage.

Leave and cleave.

Those priorities have to change when you say I do.

Now look at verse 32.

This mystery is profound.

But I'm talking about Christ and the church.

Again, remember the purpose of marriage?

To understand our relationship with Jesus better, to be a concrete example that we can physically see and look at here on earth.

It needs to represent Christ in his body.

Our marriages need to do that in every way possible.

And Paul says it's a profound mystery, but he's explaining it to us in these verses.

Now look at verse 33.

To sum up, each one of you is to love his wife as himself, and the wife is to respect her husband.

You know, I feel like I could do a whole sermon just on this last verse here.

Now, as an example, if I walked up to any man in this room and I told him, I love you, you're gonna see that guy, like, ooh, that was awkward.

Like, I don't even know how to respond, and what is this guy, you know?

But if I walked up to that same man and I told him, I respect you for your work, ethic, and your integrity.

He'd say, Oh, well, you know, thank you very much.

It's a different response.

For you ladies, if a woman walked up to you and said, I respect you, you'd be like, Oh, that was nice.

But if a woman walked up to you and said, I love you because I see your innermost beauty and who you truly are on the inside, and it is beautiful, she'd be like, oh, go on.

And on and on and on.

You know, we're created different.

Both, both in God's image, but both showing different attributes of God.

You know, when I do marriage counseling with people, so often it comes down to this last verse.

The woman's feeling unloved, and the husband's feeling disrespected.

When a woman feels unloved, do you know what her natural reaction is to her husband?

It's to be disrespectful.

When a man feels disrespected, do you know what his natural reaction is to his wife?

It's to be unloving.

You see how that can spiral really quickly?

But the opposite's true, which is what this verse is about.

When a woman feels loved by her husband, her reaction is to respect her husband more.

And when a man feels respected by his wife, his reaction is to show his love for his wife more.

Look at verse 33 again.

It says, to sum up everything that we've talked about here this morning.

Each one of you is to love, that's the Agapeo form here, the Agape love.

Each one of you is to love his wife as himself, and the wife is to respect her husband.

This word respect here is a it's a big word.

It's the same word that's used throughout the New Testament regarding having the fear of the Lord.

Not being scared of God, not being scared of your husband, but a deep reverential respect.

Husbands, when's the last time that you really showed your wife how much you love her?

Not just saying it, but sacrificially loving her.

And wives, when is the last time you told your husband how much you respect him?

When's the last time you showed how much you respect him tangibly?

All of this boils down to these two points here.

Kind of like Jesus boiled down the entirety of the law to love God and love others.

A husband can love his wife as himself, and a wife can respect her husband.

It really sums up the rest.

But here's the problem.

I think our tendency within a marriage is to wait for the other to do it.

Well, I'll love my wife when she finally starts showing respect.

Or how can I respect my husband when he's unloving?

I will show him respect once he starts to love me.

The thing is, we're responsible for our end of the deal, not theirs.

And Jesus gave us the perfect example of loving his bride.

Loving perfectly long before we became lovable.

He shows us an unconditional love that is not based on circumstance and is not based on feeling, and that is what we are called to toward our spouse.

I want to encourage those of you that are married to uphold your end of love and respect, regardless of how you feel.

And the thing is, if you're both doing that, if the husband is loving his wife unconditionally, and the wife is respecting her husband in this way, I think you're gonna find yourself in a very enjoyable, loving marriage.

Because it's God's word.

Each one of you is to love his wife as himself, and the wife is to respect her husband.

What's the purpose of marriage?

To be a reflection of Jesus and the church.

The goal is to become one flesh.

Let's pray, Lord.

These were some hard and convicting verses this morning for myself, Lord.

I pray that you would show us how to do this well.

Lord, this is a profound mystery that we're looking at here this morning.

How marriage on earth can be a reflection of our relationship as the church with you, Jesus.

And we want to do that well.

First, as your bride, as the bride of Christ, but also in our earthly relationships, in those marriages, we want to be a reflection of you.

Lord, as husbands, we want people to be able to look at us and know your love for us because of how we love our wives.

Would you show us how to be better husbands in that way?

Would you fill us with your Holy Spirit to be able to do these things because we cannot do these things on our own.

Our flesh cries out for the opposite of everything we just went over.

Lord, I pray to you for the wives that you would show them how to have a deep respect for their husbands, that you would show them how to submit well in a way that represents the church body here this morning.

That represents what the bride of Christ should look like and should be doing in relationship to you.

We thank you that you have outlined this, that you've shown us what the roles are.

So I pray that you would show us how to live in them well as a great representation of who you are.

God, we love you so much.

We want to become like Jesus.

Help us to submit in that way to you.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.