Latest / Passing On The Faith / The Calling of a Husband

Transcript

The Calling of a Husband · Passing On The Faith

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Because a husband might have said, Oh, no, she's not, uh, if you speak to an unbelieving husband and and he says, No, I I care for myself, I care for my own body, I'm married to my wife, but she's she's not connected to me in that way.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: But Paul is reasoning from the fact that the Genesis chapter two said, Husband and wife are one flesh.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_01: They are one.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: They are united at that level.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: And he's reasoning from the fact that Christ and the church are in spiritual union with one another.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_01: We are members of his body.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so on both grounds, on the grounds of creation and on the grounds of redemption, husbands need to know that their wives are in a one-flesh relationship with them, and therefore, if they just like they would naturally care for themselves, when they care for their wives, they are caring for themselves.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: You're listening to Passing on the Faith, a podcast from generations.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Every week we bring you a powerful moment from one of our sermons, audiobooks, webinars, or conference talks, handpicks to help you build a strong biblical foundation for your family.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: This week's episode is a sermon from an equipping series at Reformation Church of Elizabeth, entitled The Calling of a Husband by Joshua Suisseau.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: You can stand with me now as we read the scriptures, Ephesians 5, 22 through 33 is our text once again today.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: Ephesians 5, verse 22.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: Let us hear now the life-giving word of God.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord, for the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church, and he is the Savior of the body.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands and everything.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for her, that he might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that he might present her to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: He who loves his wife loves himself.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: For this reason man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_01: This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: Nevertheless, let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: This is the very word of God.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: You may be seated.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: Let's go to the Lord in prayer now.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: Our God and Father, we're thankful for your life-giving word that brings such light and clarity and life to us.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: We pray that you would guide us by the Spirit, that we would be able to better understand Ephesians 5, perhaps in ways that we have not previously seen, and that we as a church would walk in these truths and in these commands.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: We pray in the name of Christ.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well, this is number seven in this equipping series, and just wanted to say a word about that.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: We don't currently plan to have any other equipping messages in the immediate future, but the idea is that from time to time we as pastors might add to the list as we think of different topics that would be good to address in this format.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: So we may do that in the future as it seems uh wise and helpful for the body.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: I also wanted to clarify that these two messages, last week's and this week's, is specifically about marriage, though you will find some overlap to Pastor Kevin's messages on sons and daughters, because Kevin was speaking about how sons and daughters are growing up into these things, and my goal here is now to apply them directly to marriage.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: So we're coming today to the calling of the husband.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: We dealt last week with the calling of wives, and we did that because Paul addresses wives first.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: He is making direct application of verse 21, where he said, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: And then Paul gives specific applications of what it means for Christians to submit to one another in the fear of God by illustrating and detailing the calling of wives to submit to their husbands, the calling of children to obey their parents, and the calling of servants to obey their masters.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_01: So that was the foundation there of what we did last week.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: And this particular message is going to be structured very similarly to last week.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, I risk re-preaching a good deal of what I said last week, but I'm willing to risk that repetition because I want to make sure we lay the right foundation once again.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: So you'll find that the notes at the front end look quite similar to last week, and that is intentional.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: And as we look at the section on husbands, you'll notice that the section for husbands is longer than Paul's section directed to wives.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: Interestingly, 1 Peter 3 reverses that, where the section to wives is longer and the section to husbands is shorter.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_01: But because Paul is particularly addressing how husbands are to imitate the love of Christ, there's so much material to work with that you can see why Paul had to expound this in great detail to show us something of the vastness and the greatness of the love of Christ that husbands are to imitate.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: So I do want to lay this foundation once again before we get to the specific command of husbands, which is, first of all, that marriage is a God-designed illustration of Christ's redeeming love.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: We saw this last week where Paul is drawing this analogy or connection at point after point.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: He says, wives, submit to your husbands as the church submits to Christ and everything.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: Husbands, love your wives, and then he details all the ways in which the love of Christ is revealed.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so we need to keep this analogy before us.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: We need to remember that Christian marriage is to be a reflection, a living illustration of the gospel.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: It is the gospel incarnated in our lives.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's us living out the life of Christ step by step, with every word that we speak, with every action that we take.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: It is to be this beautiful, comprehensive picture of gospel living.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so this analogy is very important.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: And as I applied last week, there are two applications that we need to draw from this analogy.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: The first application is that our marriages have the potential to be one of the most powerful illustrations of the gospel in the world.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's true that our lives as Christians should be reflective of Christ as we grow.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: And there can be many ways in which the gospel comes out in our words and our actions, of course, by speaking the gospel as well as by living the way that Christ lived and walking the way that he walked.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: Marriage is a particularly powerful illustration of that because it is a living picture of the church in Christ and this union that the church enjoys with Christ and the love that Christ continually pours out upon the church.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: And you won't see that kind of one-flesh union in other human relationships.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: You'll only see it in marriage.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: It's the only human relationship that illustrates that kind of thing.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: The second application is that our marriages will only become like Ephesians 5 if we have all of Ephesians 1 through 4 as the foundation and the rest of chapter 5 as well.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: Ephesians 5 comes after so many important foundations that Paul has laid concerning redemption, concerning Christ, concerning God's plan for the universe, concerning the church.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: There's so much there that must be kept in mind.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: You cannot get an Ephesians 5 marriage if you don't have everything else that Paul has already talked about in Ephesians.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I detailed some of this in a survey last week just to remind us of what are all these weighty, powerful, amazing things that Ephesians has already given us.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I want to do that again, perhaps hitting on a few different passages that I did not mention last week.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: If we pick up in those earlier chapters of Ephesians, we recall these foundations that Paul has laid.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: He has talked about how God has, by his eternal counsel, predestined us unto adoption as the children of God.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: He has detailed how the Lord has revealed abundant grace through Christ.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: He has lavished love upon us through the Son.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: He has told us that we've been given the down payment of our inheritance, the Holy Spirit of God that has sealed us for the day of redemption.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: He's talked about how we have been brought from death into a state of life.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: We are not only risen with Christ, we are ascended with Christ.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: We're seated in the heavenly places with him, we're reigning with him, we're living out this reality of new life.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: And then when he comes to Ephesians chapter 3, I read portion of that as we opened our time of worship.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: Paul was praying for the church.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: He prayed that they would be rooted and grounded in love, and that God's power would enable them to achieve a certain thing.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: And that the power that he prayed for was that the church would be able to better comprehend the love of Christ.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: Now think about how this connects to marriage, brothers and sisters.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: How does it matter for a husband or a wife to better comprehend the love of Christ?
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_01: How does it affect your marriage as you better comprehend the love of Christ?
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: Think about a man or a woman that is so captivated by the depth and the greatness of Christ's love for them.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: They're astounded by the forgiveness that they've received through Christ.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: They are in awe of the love of Christ displayed upon the cross, displayed through the whole life of Christ, and they are so captured by this that it changes them, it shapes them into a different kind of man or woman.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: They love because they have been loved.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: Loved very deeply by Christ.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so Ephesians 3 is so important in that regard.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_01: And then as we walk through into Ephesians 4, we're reminded that Paul says, you are resurrected people, and you can't live like the Gentiles.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: They're dead, they have futile thinking, they're at enmity with God, they live for their lusts and passions.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's not you anymore.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_01: You are risen.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: You have a new calling.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_01: You have to walk worthy of this high and glorious calling.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's a whole new life.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: You are, in essence, starting to live in the new creation right now, because you are a new creation.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: You're awaiting the new heavens and the new earth.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, there's sin.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, there's difficulty, there's death.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: But Jesus has already risen you from the dead in a spiritual way.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: So you can't in your marriage any longer live for your own lusts.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: You can't live with bitterness, wrath, anger, and clamor.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: You can't keep letting the sun go down on your anger, because that's not what resurrected people do.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's so contrary to your new identity.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: You are now called to this new way of life.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: It is the calling of gentleness, humility, patience, bearing with one another in love, long-suffering.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: Your past life was filled with ungodly speech, ungrateful speech, unclean speech.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: But now you're learning more and more to speak in such a way that you always give grace to the one who hears you, especially your wife, who you should talk to a lot, and your husband, if you're a wife, you speak to your husband a lot, and you're giving grace in your words because you're a resurrected person alive with Christ.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: Now you are the children of light, and you're called to put off these sinful things.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: You're now filled with the Spirit, which is the down payment of your inheritance.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: You have this empowerment to live differently.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: You have the ability to walk in the spirit.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so as we come to the commands of Ephesians 5, we remember that this is the direct application of the Spirit-filled life.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: Do you want to know what it looks like to see a husband walking in the spirit?
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: What will he be doing?
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: He will sacrificially love his wife, he will nourish her, he will cherish her, he will give everything for her.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: All of his affection of love will be placed upon her.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_01: That is a man walking in the spirit.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: Where do you find a wife walking in the spirit?
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you find a wife that is submitting to her husband in love, and she is walking in respect towards her husband.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: She's living out the spirit-filled life of Ephesians 5.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so, what I want us to understand here, brothers and sisters, is that we will not have beautiful, flourishing marriages that reflect the redeeming love of Christ unless we have Christ.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: Unless we know Him.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: Unless we have been taught by Him through the Spirit, unless we are filled with the Spirit of God, we can't do this.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus said, Without me you can do nothing.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_01: Marriage is one of the most wonderful of relationships, but also one of the most challenging of relationships because you've put two sinful people in covenant and made and said, you have to live together for the rest of your life, and you always have to forgive, you always have to restore, you always need to work through things.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: That's hard.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: Are you going to do Christ without that?
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: Are you going to do marriage without Christ, I should say?
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: Are you going to try to live this out without him?
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's impossible.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: Ephesians 1 through 4 and 5 is essential if we will it rightly apply Ephesians 5.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so now I want to move to the specific commands given to husbands.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_01: Husbands, love your wives as Christ also loved the church.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I want to detail the scope and the nature of this love that is found in Ephesians 5.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: Now, as we do so, I want to point out something that's very significant about Paul's teaching about the Christian household.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: If you take the household table, as it's sometimes called, which is this whole section from Ephesians 5 to Ephesians 6, and if you go and you compare it to the ancient writings of the Greeks, or even the writings of the Jewish people at the time of Christ, you will find some striking differences between them.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_01: You'll find the Greek philosophers and other Greek writers, they would write about household relationships quite a bit.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: They talk about the different roles of husbands and wives and children and parents and masters and servants.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: So that's not uncommon.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: And the Jews would write about these things as well.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: But as you look to those household tables, you find something missing that Paul has and the others don't.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's a very important thing.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: And when Paul says to husbands, love your wives, so far I have not been able to find anything in the household tables of the ancient world that parallel that command.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: It's simply missing.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_01: You find lots about husbands ruling over their wives.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's common.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_01: Aristotle talked about it.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: You can also look at Philo, the Jewish writer, and he talked about a husband's rule over his wife.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: That was common, that was understood and standard, but you don't find any of them really speaking much about love.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have that word love show up.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: And you certainly don't have love your wives as Christ loved the church.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: They all miss that, of course, that essential foundation, of course.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_01: They don't know the gospel.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so they cannot give that kind of instruction to husbands.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_01: This sets Ephesians 5 apart from everything else in the world.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: You're only going to find this in the New Testament, the written word of God given by the Lord Jesus Christ to his people.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: And this is so important that we understand the ground or the motivation for a husband's love for his wife, because it is rooted in the redemptive love of Christ.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's one thing just to say, husbands love your wives, it's another thing to say, as Christ loved the church.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: That kind of love.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so, brothers, if you will not love your wife as you should unless you first receive and know the love of Jesus Christ.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: And unless you study that love.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: He is your model, he is your guide.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: He shows you at every step what it means to love your wife.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: Now, because we're going to talk about love here, this is not just applicable to husbands.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's true that the particular frame of teaching that Paul gives here is directed at husbands, and there are specific ways husbands love their wives that are not applicable to every other Christian relationship.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: However, there is much for us to learn from this because here what we are doing is simply studying Christ's love.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: And we know that every Christian is called to walk in the love of Christ, to imitate the way in which he walked.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think there's much for all of us, husbands, wives, children, singles, all of us, we can learn and apply the love of Christ in different ways in our relationships.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: So what I want to do here as we look at this command is in dividing it into three sections, just to summarize something of what Paul's giving us in Ephesians 5, and the three things are these.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: The love of Christ is, first of all, a sacrificial love.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: Secondly, it is a sanctifying love.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: And thirdly, it is a nourishing and cherishing love.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: Those are the three that we want to look at.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so we begin with sacrifice, because that is the predominant note that Paul strikes immediately at the beginning as he gives this command.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: Husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for her.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: So, husbands, we we must meditate upon these things.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: We need to keep before us the sacrificial love of Christ.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_01: He loved the bride.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: He gave up his life for her.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_01: Long before the bride had any interest in the husband, the husband set his love upon the bride.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: And he determined to do everything necessary for her salvation, to redeem her, to do all that it took to secure her, to save her.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_01: And brothers, in like manner, we must be the first to love.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: Even if our wives were unloving and therefore more difficult to love, we must lead in love.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: We must take that first step, just as Christ took that first step in love toward the bride.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, it's pleasing to God when both husband and wife do all that they do in love.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: But what if your wife was unloving, harsh, irritable, unforgiving?
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: Do you respond with the very same kind of thing?
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: Or do you love her despite that?
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: Remember, brothers and sisters, above all, let us have fervent love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_01: That's applicable for both husbands and wives.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so what does it mean to exercise a sacrificial love like the love of Christ?
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_01: It means that a husband puts his wife's needs and interests above his own.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_01: To love sacrificially is to give up something that you would otherwise want for yourself so that the highest good of your wife can be sought in that process.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: You give up your selfish interests in order to sacrificially love and care for the needs of your wife.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so we go on here to the sanctifying love that is described here as well.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: Ephesians 5, verses 26 through 27.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: One of the ways in which Christ's love was for the sanctification of the bride.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_01: It says that he might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that he might present her to himself, a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she might be holy and without blemish.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_01: So the Lord Jesus, he set his heart and love upon the well upon being with his bride, and in order to be with his bride, the bride needed rescuing from sin and death.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_01: The bride needed rescuing from Satan, the evil one, who had the bride, the church, in his grasp.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so Jesus humbled himself.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_01: He became man and he poured out his own blood to set his bride free from the penalty of punishment and sin.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: And through his blood he cleansed the bride.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: He then washes the bride with the water of baptism, which shows forth that cleansing, that cleaning, that washing that he does for his bride.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: And then he gives the bride his word.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: He feeds the bride with the word.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_01: He sanctifies the bride with the word.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: His word has a sanctifying effect.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: His aim, Christ's aim is not only to rescue the bride, but also to make the bride beautiful in every way.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: It is the plan of Christ to beautify us, the church, by cleansing us from every spot and blemish that is upon us.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: That we will not have any more sin whatsoever.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: That day is coming.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: The perfect purification of the bride is coming.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: And so that is what Christ aims at.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: He aims at the pure beauty of holiness for the bride.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: And because the bride is so precious to Jesus, he continually cleanses and sanctifies the bride.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: He is making the church more and more beautiful, more pure, more loving.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so what we see here, brothers and sisters, is something of the depth of Christ's love.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_01: It is a sanctifying love.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: He aims at the ultimate well-being of the bride in every respect.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: And that means for us being completely cleansed of all sin.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: That is what we need so much, is to not have these defilements of sin anymore and not struggle with any of these sinful passions which bring such sadness to our lives and such destruction to our lives.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: Now, as we think about the sanctifying love of Christ, you might wonder, well, how does a husband imitate that?
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, he's not Jesus.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_01: That's certainly the case.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: The husband is not the Holy Spirit either.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: He can't replace those things.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_01: So what is his role in terms of this imitating this sanctifying love?
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_01: Well, husbands must absolutely know that they are not Jesus Christ, and like any good pastor or counselor, they should not point to themselves as the solution.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_01: They need to point their wives to the Lord Jesus as the ultimate solution.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: Just like John the Baptist never pointed to himself.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_01: He always said, Jesus must increase, I must decrease.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_01: And so a godly husband who's seeking the well-being of his wife, he's going to direct her to Christ.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: Husbands are not the Holy Spirit.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: They do not have the power of God to change and transform their wives.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: That would be a trap to think so, as if they could do that in their own strength and make their wives to be a certain way.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: But in what ways can a husband imitate the sanctifying love?
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: Well, just as the Lord Jesus Christ aims at and will secure the sanctification of his bride, husbands ought to prioritize the spiritual well-being of their wives.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_01: This should be of great importance to them.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: It should be of great desire to see their wives growing in godliness.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: How do they do this?
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, they pray with and for their wives.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: Both are important.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: They bring the word of God to their wives.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: They give wise counsel and direction to their wives, trusting, hoping that they have wisdom from the word that they can offer to their wives in those situations.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_01: And another way in which a husband loves his wife with a sanctifying love is to be a good example to her.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_01: A husband has a unique opportunity because of the intimacy and friendship he has with his wife to be an example in her life, to be a guide of what it means to follow Christ.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_01: That's a high calling.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_01: To be an example to his wife.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: In contrast, a harsh, cold, impatient, and unforgiving husband is preaching a false gospel by his actions.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_01: He was supposed to exemplify Christ, but he exemplifies the exact opposite.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_01: He exemplifies the life of the Gentiles, the harsh, bitter, cold, unforgiving, impatient life that the Gentiles lead.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: That's not what he was called to.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: And unless a man repents of such behavior, he becomes a living illustration of the unredeemed life, the life lived outside of Christ, without hope and without God in the world.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_01: He doesn't know what it's like to walk in the love of Christ.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: And husbands, if we have new life in Christ and we have the indwelling Spirit of God, it ought to cut us to the heart any time we preach a false gospel by our actions.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_01: How tragic it is if we are harsh, impatient, cold, or unforgiving with our wives.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_01: This is not how we learn Christ.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_01: This is not what he has taught us.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: If we know Jesus, if we have been taught by him, what have we learned?
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: What have we been called to do?
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_01: To walk just as Jesus walked before us.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so, husbands, you have a unique opportunity, you have a unique position in terms of your relationship with your wife to seek her spiritual well-being, to seek her sanctification, to pray for it, to bring the word to her, to be an example to her.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_01: This is such an important way in which we imitate the love of Christ.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_01: So we go on here to a nourishing and cherishing love, thirdly.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_01: Verses 28 through 30.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_01: He says, So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_01: He who loves his wife loves himself.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_01: For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church, for we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_01: So Paul gives us some further points of connection here.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_01: He appeals to something that's very natural.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_01: He draws out the fact that if you talk to any human being and you ask them, what is your practice when you get injured?
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_01: If you were to have a major cut to your arm or your leg and you're bleeding out everywhere, what do you do?
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: You take care of your body.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_01: You do everything in your power to take care of your body.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so Paul does something with this.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: It's very, very wise of him.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_01: He says, that part's natural, but now you need to know that your wife is your body.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: Because a husband might have said, No, she's not, if you speak to an unbelieving husband, and he says, No, I care for myself.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: I care for my own body.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_01: I'm married to my wife, but she's not connected to me in that way.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: But Paul is reasoning from the fact that Genesis chapter 2 said, husband and wife are one flesh.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_01: They are one.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: They are united at that level.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: And he's reasoning from the fact that Christ and the church are in spiritual union with one another.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_01: We are members of his body.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so on both grounds, on the grounds of creation and on the grounds of redemption, husbands need to know that their wives are in a one-flesh relationship with them, and therefore, if they just like they would naturally care for themselves, when they care for their wives, they are caring for themselves.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_01: That's what he says.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_01: He who loves his wife loves himself.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_01: We see this union of Christ and the church in so many ways throughout the New Testament.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_01: I was I was thinking about Paul on the road to Damascus in Acts 9 when the Lord Jesus confronts him, and Paul says, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus doesn't say, Why are you persecuting my people?
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_01: Why are you persecuting my organization, the church?
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_01: He says, Why are you persecuting me?
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_01: Why does he say that?
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_01: The wounds of the church are the wounds of Christ.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_01: When the church suffers, Christ is experiencing that suffering.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_01: In the sense that he is touched by it.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_01: It is his body.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: He loves his bride.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_01: He cares about his bride.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_01: And so as we think about this point of analogy, brothers, we we see here that we are to see the well-being of our wives as of paramount importance in our consideration.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_01: And that to love and care for the well-being of our wives is caring for yourself as well.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_01: Is your wife hurting in some way?
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_01: What would you do if you were hurting?
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_01: Would you do something about it?
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_01: You jump to action, you take care of your body, you do something about that pain.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_01: Is your wife physically suffering?
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_01: Well, your priority should be to do everything in your power to care for her and to take the utmost care of her.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: She is the precious, weaker vessel.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_01: She is your crown.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_01: Treat her well.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_01: Nourish her, care for her.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_01: Is your wife having spiritual challenges, whether it be temptations or doubts or sin in her life or discouragements?
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_01: What are you doing to help her with those spiritual discouragements?
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_01: If you are facing spiritual discouragements, or if you are, what do you do about it?
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: Do you do anything?
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_01: Do you care?
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_01: Then you ought to care for your wife.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_01: She is connected to you.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_01: She is the body.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so nourishing and cherishing is caring for the physical and spiritual well-being of your wife in every respect, just like you would naturally for yourself.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_01: Puritan William Gouge, he said, Such affection ought husbands to have to their wives.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_01: They ought more willingly and cheerfully to do anything for their wives than for parents, children, friends, or any others.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_01: Though this cheerfulness is an inward disposition of the heart, it may be manifested by a man's eagerness and readiness to do his wife good.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_01: When his wife shall no sooner desire a kindness than he will be ready to grant it.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's what we're seeking as we imitate the love of Christ.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so if you are a husband that is disaffected and disinterested in how your wife is doing, that is the polar opposite of the love of Christ for his church.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_01: If you don't know how your wife is doing and you don't care as you should, you're missing the high calling of love that Paul has set forth here in Ephesians 5.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_01: Well, one thing that should be very clear as we reflect upon this calling of love, brothers, is that we have not exhausted the call of love.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_01: We have not reached this apex of imitating the love of Christ.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_01: We have so much to learn.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_01: Both husbands and wives have so much to learn in this calling of love for one another.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_01: The love of Christ is so vast, it can't be measured fully.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's unfailing in its durability that we husbands will never reach in this life the full extent of love that we are to pour out upon our wives.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_01: And thankfully, even though this is such a high calling, with the help of the Spirit of God, we can become more and more like this.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_01: We can become men who love our wives in a way that astonishes the world around us.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_01: May it be that when people see the love that we have for our wives, they're taken aback because they have not seen such sacrificial, nourishing, cherishing love elsewhere.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_01: May that be the case.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_01: May that be the prayer that we pray, brothers, and for the sisters in our church, that, and for everybody that prays for marriages in our church, let us set our vision upon such a high calling and not settle for anything less than what Ephesians 5 has given us.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_01: Well, as I did with the last message, I want to deal with some misunderstandings and controversies around these topics, and in doing so, my aim is not simply to deal with controversy or misunderstanding for the sake of dealing with it, but to actually bring clarity to how we think about these things.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so this really is meant to further clarify this calling of love that God has given husbands.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_01: So what I want to do with this last section here is to first of all deal with the most common wrong application in marriage, which is to uh to talk about headshius love.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that would be a severe error in misunderstanding and misapplying Ephesians 5.
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_01: So I want to deal with that first.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: And then secondly, I want to deal with a few uh controversies around terminology, words that are applied to husbands, and think through something of the implications of those terms and why they matter in our conception of the husband's calling.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_01: So let's uh first deal with here this wrong application of Ephesians 5, and that would be to seek to apply the headship of the husband, which is described earlier in Ephesians 5 before the command to husbands, and to effectively absent love in our application.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I don't know if anybody specifically sets out to say, I want to do headship without love.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not, I don't know that I've talked to any husband that specifically says it that way.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_01: I would certainly rebuke such a consideration, but what really happens is simply what you have in these situations is an unloving man who doesn't walk in love.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_01: And that's of course the natural bent of our hearts if Christ does not cleanse them and change them.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_01: We're just unloving people without Jesus.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_01: So you end up with people that take part of Ephesians 5 and then they don't walk in love and they just talk about headship.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_01: So here's a few things to consider about this.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_01: I pointed out last week that neither in Ephesians 5 or 1 Peter 3 is the husband directed to make his wife submit to him.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_01: The command, if we just focus ourselves upon the commands of the text, is for husbands to love their wives.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_01: And then if we add 1 Peter 3 on here, it says, Husbands, live with your wives with understanding and showing honor to her.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_01: These are the commands that husbands have been given.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_01: So once again, husbands, wives, focus upon what God has told you to do.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_01: This will be very helpful if we walk in these things.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_01: Now, how do we configure the relationship of headship and love?
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_01: How do these go together?
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_01: How do we how are these harmonious?
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_01: Because what we know when we look at the Lord Jesus Christ, that he is a loving head to the church.
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_01: We ought to have no doubts about the love of Christ for his people as the head of the church.
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_01: So apparently these are harmonious.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_01: How are they harmonious?
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_01: What we note is that headship is a fact stated in the text, but love is the command.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's interesting.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_01: Headship is the fact, love is the command.
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_01: So if you had a husband whose only interest was in the fact of his headship and all that that entailed in terms of giving him authority, but he ignored the commands that were directly given to him, he is not rightly reading or applying the word of God to his marriage.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_01: Now, in pointing that out, my intention is not to diminish the fact that the doctrine of headship does assign real authority to a husband and father in the home.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_01: It does involve real authority.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think that that's I don't think that's in dispute here.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_01: But the first thing I want to make clear about this misunderstanding of love and headship should be obvious, but it's worth saying.
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_01: A man who acts like a tyrant and ignores the instruction of Scripture to love, to honor, and to understand his wife is sinning against God.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_01: And without love, he will use that authority that God has given him for destruction rather than for edification.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_01: I appreciate how William Gouge speaks about this.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_01: He said, he warns against this kind of tyrannical behavior.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_01: He says, Did God at first take the wife out of man's side that man should tread her under his feet rather than set her at his side next to him above all children, servants, or any other in the family, however near or dear to him?
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_01: None can be nearer than a wife, and none ought to be dearer.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_01: So he draws out this illustration of how the woman was taken from the man's side, and he points out one of the implications of that is that she was to be beside him, not tread underneath his feet, not subjugated in this tyrannical kind of way.
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_01: He was to cherish her, value her, see her as the nearest and the dearest companion he has in all the world.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so a husband ought to exercise the authority that God has given him in the most loving, cherishing, nourishing manner that he can.
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so this is very important that we keep in mind the commands that Ephesians 5 has given us so that we can rightly configure its teaching.
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_01: Now, next I want to deal with two different terms that have been brought up to describe the husband and think through the positives and negatives of these terms.
• 46:45
  SPEAKER_01: And in talking about terminology, I want us to be clear that what's most important is what you actually do.
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, let's be clear about this.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_01: At the end of the day, what the Lord Jesus is most interested in is not what you call yourself or how you describe yourself, but what you are doing.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_01: However, these particular terms have sometimes been used in ways that I think have been unhelpful or not clarifying to what the text of Scripture actually gives us.
• 47:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so I do believe that they have some relevance.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_01: And we can think through the value of these different terms and why the scriptures say what they say.
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_01: So the two particular terms I want to interact with for a few minutes here is the term servant leader and the term patriarch.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_01: And you'll find this as you interact with people in the Christian blogosphere that are talking about these things, or if you read Christian books about these discussions around husbands and wives, you'll find these different terms.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I actually think that both of these terms, for the people that particularly want us to use one or the other, they're both trying to guard against something.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_01: I think in the case of the language of servant leader, the particular desire is to guard against a tyrannical conception of a husband's authority.
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_01: The goal is to make sure that we see him as a Christ-like servant-oriented person.
• 48:14
  SPEAKER_01: That's of course a good thing to seek to uphold.
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_01: And then in the case of patriarch, though it's obviously the more unpopular term, there are people out there that want us to bring this term back.
• 48:27
  SPEAKER_01: They say we need to uphold patriarchy.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_01: We need this term.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's important to understand that men are called to rule.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_01: That is the emphasis of using this term.
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_01: They're called to rule in the church and in the home and in the state, and we need to uphold this.
• 48:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so those, I think, are some of the concerns that are driving the different use of terms here in relation to a husband or a father.
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_01: Now, should we adopt either term or either one of these helpful terms to describe the husband's role, as Ephesians 5 sets it forth?
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_01: Well, one thing I do want to be careful about is useless wranglings over words that Paul warns us against.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_01: At the same time, I also want to uphold the fact that words have meaning and they sometimes connote a particular way of doing things.
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so I want us to dig into that a little bit and see.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_01: Basically, my I'll tell you my conclusion at the front end.
• 49:29
  SPEAKER_01: My conclusion is that we should use the language that Ephesians 5 gave us, that it's sufficient.
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's my conclusion.
• 49:36
  SPEAKER_01: But let's think through each of these terms.
• 49:39
  SPEAKER_01: So, first of all, the term servant leader.
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_01: This particular term became popular in the 1980s and 1990s with the rise of complementarianism, which I believe was a very helpful movement in the Christian church to seek to respond to the inroads of feminism and to have a restored understanding and uphold that understanding of what God has made men and women to be and called them to do.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_01: And those are very good desires.
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_01: If you look at the book Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, you see there the authors they define what biblical headship is, and they emphasize the servant leader terminology.
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_01: They say biblical headship for the husband is the divine calling to take primary responsibility for Christ-like servant leadership, protection and provision in the home.
• 50:31
  SPEAKER_01: That's how they define it, biblical headship.
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_01: I like everything in that list.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_01: That's great.
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_01: Husbands are called to take responsibility.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_01: They are to exercise a servant way in imitation of Christ.
• 50:44
  SPEAKER_01: They are to protect, they are to provide.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_01: Those are all good things.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_01: Should we have any objections to this term, servant leader?
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_01: It includes a very biblical word, servant.
• 50:56
  SPEAKER_01: And we must all agree that the Lord Jesus Christ is the model servant in Ephesians 5, sacrificially giving of himself.
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_01: You think of Mark chapter 10.
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_01: For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.
• 51:14
  SPEAKER_01: Should husbands serve their wives and children in a similar manner as Christ does?
• 51:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yes and amen.
• 51:20
  SPEAKER_01: We can't disagree with that.
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_01: Do we want the leadership of a husband to be exercised in a Christ-like manner, which includes a husband laying down his life for the good of his wife?
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yes and amen.
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_01: We saw that in Ephesians 5.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_01: And what happens, though, in some cases, as this term is used, is that it has come to mean for some functionally that a husband always defers to the desires or interests of his wife.
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_01: There are some that would apply it that way.
• 51:55
  SPEAKER_01: To be a servant leader is to always defer to the interests or desires of your wife.
• 52:03
  SPEAKER_01: So what should we think about that?
• 52:05
  SPEAKER_01: Is that what headship involves?
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_01: And how do we deal with those situations where a husband or wife have different desires or interests or perspectives?
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_01: How do we work through those things?
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I think one thing we should be clear about is that to lay down one's interests is not an abdication of authority.
• 52:29
  SPEAKER_01: It depends what interests you're laying down and why, but it's not an abdication of authority.
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_01: Now, what do the scriptures say of Christ?
• 52:36
  SPEAKER_01: Romans 15, verses 2 through 3.
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_01: Paul says to the whole body, he says, Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, leading to edification.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_01: For even Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, the reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me.
• 52:55
  SPEAKER_01: So Christ is the head of the church.
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_01: He didn't abdicate his authority by not pleasing himself, but he laid down his interests from a personal standpoint, we might say, for the good of the body.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_01: So how do we think about a husband deferring to his wife or giving up his interests for his wife's desires or interests?
• 53:19
  SPEAKER_01: Now I'm using different words here.
• 53:20
  SPEAKER_01: Some of these are have different implications to them, but let me put it this way if the term servant leader means that in practice a wife always gets her way, or that a husband fears his wife and defens to her in everything, then he is not acting as he ought to.
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_01: Headship involves setting the course in the relationship, taking responsibility for mistakes that are made, but also making decisions which in some cases may be contrary to his wife's own desire.
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_01: A husband may make decisions at times contrary to his wife's wishes if he has prayerfully come to the conclusion that the decision he is making is the most God-honoring decision he can make and the one that is best for the family.
• 54:10
  SPEAKER_01: Now, as I mentioned last week, it's a very good thing, and it ought to be our aim that a husband and a wife can agree on the vast majority of decisions they make.
• 54:19
  SPEAKER_01: Indeed, it would be the desire that we make everything in 100% agreement, if possible.
• 54:24
  SPEAKER_01: And a couple's growth for love uh growth and love for one another and their deepening oneness will often enable that to happen.
• 54:30
  SPEAKER_01: I think if you speak to godly older couples, uh you'll find that they don't, they're not constantly tussling over decisions and disagreements, and there's a unity there that's developed.
• 54:43
  SPEAKER_01: But the key thing that I'm trying to bring out here is the difference between a husband laying down his selfish interests, which he should always do, and not simply just being a passive, indecisive, fearful man that always does whatever his wife or his children want, that he doesn't really have any sort of direction in his life.
• 55:08
  SPEAKER_01: He just does what other people want him to do.
• 55:10
  SPEAKER_01: There's a difference between those two things.
• 55:14
  SPEAKER_01: A husband should be constantly laying down whatever would be his own selfish desire because the scriptures say that love does not seek its own interest.
• 55:22
  SPEAKER_01: It does not insist on its own way, 1 Corinthians 13.
• 55:26
  SPEAKER_01: And so this would be, I think, the key dividing point that a husband needs to consider is am I insisting on my path because I'm selfishly wanting my own interest to be fulfilled?
• 55:37
  SPEAKER_01: Or is this really the best, wisest, most God-honoring thing that I believe we ought to do?
• 55:45
  SPEAKER_01: Then he should lead.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_01: He should lead with conviction, he should lead with faith, he should lead with love, patience, gentleness in the process.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_01: But what I'm saying is that a husband ought not to be a people pleaser, including just being a people pleaser of his wife, if that's not going to be the wisest path.
• 56:04
  SPEAKER_01: It is possible for a husband to fear his wife and not fear God.
• 56:09
  SPEAKER_01: That would not be good.
• 56:10
  SPEAKER_01: That would be a misconfigured relationship.
• 56:13
  SPEAKER_01: But should a husband love his wife and sacrificially lay down his own interests, yes and amen, he ought to do that.
• 56:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so I bring out this term servant leader, not because the phrase is bad, it really brings out some valuable things, but to simply make sure that we conceive of this in the way that Ephesians 5 describes it.
• 56:33
  SPEAKER_01: And notably, Ephesians 5 doesn't specifically use this language.
• 56:37
  SPEAKER_01: It still emphasizes the language of he is the head of his wife.
• 56:41
  SPEAKER_01: And we ought not to have any fear of using that language.
• 56:46
  SPEAKER_01: Now, what about the term patriarch and patriarchy?
• 56:49
  SPEAKER_01: I'll go a little faster on this because Pastor Kevin already dealt with this term several weeks ago, if you recall some of the things that he said then.
• 56:59
  SPEAKER_01: But uh the word patriarch is basically a combination of two words.
• 57:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's the word father and uh arche, which usually means a rule.
• 57:10
  SPEAKER_01: It can also mean source or beginning, depending on the context.
• 57:14
  SPEAKER_01: So, what should we think of this terminology?
• 57:17
  SPEAKER_01: For those that advocate the term patriarch, they want to emphasize the rule of a husband or a father.
• 57:25
  SPEAKER_01: And there is a distinct emphasis in those that want to bring that term back.
• 57:28
  SPEAKER_01: You'll hear them talking a lot about rule.
• 57:30
  SPEAKER_01: Husbands need to rule their own home, and they draw that from the translation of scripture that we sometimes find for those terms.
• 57:39
  SPEAKER_01: But what should we think about this terminology?
• 57:42
  SPEAKER_01: Should we embrace this term?
• 57:44
  SPEAKER_01: Is this a helpful term?
• 57:46
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I'll just point out the obvious that the word is not never used of husbands or fathers in the scriptures, nor of church elders either.
• 57:57
  SPEAKER_01: Where do we find the word in scripture?
• 57:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we we find the word patriarch or patriarchs in the New Testament only applied to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, the twelve sons of Israel, and David.
• 58:06
  SPEAKER_01: That's all that we find, because they were the first fathers.
• 58:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh they were those uh significant founders of God's people.
• 58:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so they're given this term patriarch here, but notably this language is never used of husbands or fathers.
• 58:24
  SPEAKER_01: And this is just a fact.
• 58:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's you can do with it what you will, but it's a fact that this terminology is not used.
• 58:31
  SPEAKER_01: Now, why is it important to distinguish uh the scriptural language of the husband being the loving head of his wife from the term patriarch?
• 58:41
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the one time that we find part of that word used in the New Testament elsewhere, which is archos, is applied to civil magistrates.
• 58:51
  SPEAKER_01: We are to pray for the rulers and authorities, the archos in 1 Timothy chapter 2.
• 58:57
  SPEAKER_01: Now, there's a significant difference between a civil ruler and a husband, isn't there?
• 59:03
  SPEAKER_01: There's quite a vast difference between a civil ruler and a husband.
• 59:10
  SPEAKER_01: You might think of President Trump or Governor Polis, and you you come to reflect upon the fact that he does not have a one-flesh relationship with any of his citizens.
• 59:22
  SPEAKER_01: There is a vast disconnect between that authority that they exercise, that role they have as rulers, and the fact that we are not that connected to the president or the governor.
• 59:34
  SPEAKER_01: But what is so powerful about the language of head is how the head is connected to the body.
• 59:43
  SPEAKER_01: So valuable to keep these things connected.
• 59:48
  SPEAKER_01: You think about your own physical head for a moment, the head that God's given your body and what it does.
• 59:54
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, we think of our brains here, this significant control center that directs us where we go.
• 1:00:00
  SPEAKER_01: Now, does the head ever act in such a way as to harm the body intentionally?
• 1:00:08
  SPEAKER_01: Only for those that are insane or suicidal.
• 1:00:12
  SPEAKER_01: It's the only people, or demon-possessed, the men of the Gatherenes, he harmed his own body.
• 1:00:17
  SPEAKER_01: So you can if you're demon-possessed, insane, suicidal, those are the kinds of people where their head harms their body.
• 1:00:24
  SPEAKER_01: But not so for everybody else.
• 1:00:26
  SPEAKER_01: What does the head do?
• 1:00:27
  SPEAKER_01: What does our head naturally seek?
• 1:00:29
  SPEAKER_01: The well-being of the body.
• 1:00:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's so valuable to understand the husband as the loving head of the wife because, yes, it's true, he directs, uh, he has a kind of government or authority as the head, but we need to see more importantly what the emphasis of headship is earlier in Ephesians 5.
• 1:00:53
  SPEAKER_01: What does it say?
• 1:00:54
  SPEAKER_01: He is the head and the savior of the body.
• 1:00:58
  SPEAKER_01: The emphasis here is that the head is acting in pursuit of the well-being of the body.
• 1:01:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so a husband, if he's thinking in a Christ-like way, is thinking as a head who is in intimate connection with the body, and in every case is seeking the ultimate well-being of the body at every level.
• 1:01:24
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, we're using God's priorities here, the spiritual, physical, uh, well-being and wholeness of our wives, that is what the head aims at.
• 1:01:35
  SPEAKER_01: The head is to exercise that authority with a deep, fervent, Christ-like love that seeks the well-being of the body.
• 1:01:43
  SPEAKER_01: So, my conclusion then on these terms is that the Holy Spirit already gave you the terms that you needed.
• 1:01:49
  SPEAKER_01: You didn't need to come up with new ones.
• 1:01:51
  SPEAKER_01: I would actually advocate that you primarily emphasize the ones that the Holy Spirit gave us, because I believe that the Holy Spirit is wiser than any Christian author over the last 2,000 years, and certainly wiser than most of the Christian blogosphere.
• 1:02:05
  SPEAKER_01: These are good words for us.
• 1:02:07
  SPEAKER_01: We have what we need in the Word of God.
• 1:02:09
  SPEAKER_01: As we so often find out, after we've gone down this path, we come back to what the Word gave us, and we say, Oh, God had wisdom for us.
• 1:02:17
  SPEAKER_01: Let's receive it.
• 1:02:19
  SPEAKER_01: So, in conclusion, brothers and sisters, I want to speak to each of us and our different callings and places in life.
• 1:02:26
  SPEAKER_01: First of all, to the husbands.
• 1:02:27
  SPEAKER_01: Your calling and my calling is clear.
• 1:02:30
  SPEAKER_01: There are heights of love we have not scaled.
• 1:02:34
  SPEAKER_01: Your love to your wife is to be a sacrificial, sanctifying, nourishing, and cherishing love.
• 1:02:40
  SPEAKER_01: There is no greater love than anyone can have than to lay down one's life for his friends, and your best friend is your wife.
• 1:02:49
  SPEAKER_01: Lay down your life for her.
• 1:02:52
  SPEAKER_01: There is no person on earth that should be nearer or dearer to you than her.
• 1:02:58
  SPEAKER_01: To those brothers here who are married, you have been given a precious gift.
• 1:03:04
  SPEAKER_01: An excellent wife is the crown of her husband, Proverbs 12 says.
• 1:03:08
  SPEAKER_01: How are you treating your crown?
• 1:03:11
  SPEAKER_01: How are you valuing and cherishing that crown that God has given you?
• 1:03:15
  SPEAKER_01: And to the wives, when you fulfill the role that the Lord has given you to submit to your husbands and to respect your husbands, as Ephesians 5 says, with humility and graciousness, you make everything sweeter.
• 1:03:28
  SPEAKER_01: The sweetest marriages are those where a husband is loving with a fervent Christ-like love, and a wife is lovingly submitting to and respecting her husband.
• 1:03:39
  SPEAKER_01: This is a marriage made in heaven, filled with the Spirit, touched by the grace of God.
• 1:03:44
  SPEAKER_01: That's what it looks like.
• 1:03:46
  SPEAKER_01: To the singles in our church, whether older singles who are unmarried or just young adults and children who look to get to be married in the future, I would urge you to regularly keep the marriages of our congregation in your prayers.
• 1:03:59
  SPEAKER_01: The health of the marriages of our church is critical to the health of the church.
• 1:04:03
  SPEAKER_01: It affects children, it affects all of our relationships, it affects our witness to the world.
• 1:04:08
  SPEAKER_01: It is so important.
• 1:04:09
  SPEAKER_01: Make it to be a regular topic that you pray for the marriage of your father and mother and also for the marriages of our church in general.
• 1:04:18
  SPEAKER_01: And to all of us, I want to end with this, as I did last week.
• 1:04:22
  SPEAKER_01: The redeeming love of Jesus Christ has the power to fix all of our sin problems and therefore all of our relationship problems.
• 1:04:31
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus Christ came to fix everything that is broken in this world.
• 1:04:35
  SPEAKER_01: That is his mission.
• 1:04:36
  SPEAKER_01: He is the fixer, mender, physician of souls, and the one who has all power to do that.
• 1:04:43
  SPEAKER_01: He is able to save to the uttermost those that draw near to God through him.
• 1:04:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so let us do that.
• 1:04:49
  SPEAKER_01: Let us draw near to Christ right now and day by day as we live out this calling as husbands and wives.
• 1:04:57
  SPEAKER_01: Let's pray.
• 1:05:04
  SPEAKER_01: And we thank you, Lord Jesus, that you are the redeemer of the world and also the redeemer of marriage.
• 1:05:12
  SPEAKER_01: We ask, Father, that you would, through Christ, bring this redemption to our marriages.
• 1:05:17
  SPEAKER_01: We acknowledge that we have many sins, we have many weaknesses, we have things that get in the way of this high calling.
• 1:05:26
  SPEAKER_01: So, Father, grant us humility and repentance and faith and love to turn in the right direction wherever we have gone the wrong path.
• 1:05:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I pray, Lord, that you would bring healthy marriages to our church, that we would see the gospel being lived out.
• 1:05:43
  SPEAKER_01: We pray this in the name of Christ.
• 1:05:45
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 1:05:48
  SPEAKER_01: This has been a production of the Generations Media Network.
• 1:05:51
  SPEAKER_01: For more information, go to generations.org/slash media.