Husbands (Part 1 of 2)

There are some marriages that suffer from neglect. But that's not how God intends for marriage to be today untruthful life weekend.

Alastair Ben continues his series on the Christian family by teaching us what marriage looks like when a husband loves his wife as Christ loved the church, states versus Colossians 319 husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them is very straightforward, they could readily say which part of that.

I do not understand at Peterson paraphrases it husbands go all out and love for your wife's, do not take advantage of them and JB Phillips paraphrases it husbands. Be sure that you give your wives much love and sympathy.

Don't let bitterness or resentment spoil your marriage and we noted last time that the authority to which we to fair is none other than the authority of the Bible itself, that the mystery is that of the relationship between Christ and the church, the piety or godliness is equally to be on display in the context of the husband's role in the child's role as it is in the wife's indeed piety is to be worked out in the context of home life where for better or for worse, each of eyes are truly ourselves and it is true to say, as someone has said that if our Christianity does not work at home. Our Christianity does not work and if our professions of obedience to the Scriptures.

I do not find their outworking in the interplay of human relationships within the home. And of course were in trouble and the fourth word was the word freedom or liberty and that liberty we said was to be discovered in obedience to the commands of God. I came across a quote during the week on this very subject from CS Lewis, who wrote as follows. If the home is to be a means of grace. It must be a place of rules. The alternative to rule is not freedom but the unconstitutional and often unconscious tyranny of the most selfish member identity right in a follow-up comment observes, as in improvised music spontaneity and freedom do not mean playing out of children, so the freedom that is found in the fulfilling of God-given roles is a freedom which is founded grounded and bounded by the authoritative statements of Scripture. Now is the last time that the great temptation to the wife is to rule over her husband. When you think of the responsibility of a wife to fulfill her role in the temptation that she has, to rule over her husband Alla at what we discovered in Genesis (remember the story of the fictitious story of the individuals who had all arrived at the in the realm of heaven and petering some of the others were getting. The man is organized as they could and the fellow step forward and say not what I want you to do is I want you to just get ourselves organized here. I'm going to put you into groups over here on my left. I like to have all the men whose wife's frankly dominated them in their athlete pilgrimages.

Wife's ruled the home and then over on my right hand side. I like to have all the men who exercise leadership in jurisdiction, in their earthly pilgrimage and the recession just to shift over the left-hand side just droves and roles of men and when they finally assemble themselves. Peter looked and there was just one man standing over here and Peter said you're probably quite lonely over there.

How come you're there and he said my wife told me to stand over here while you're very gracious. It really wasn't worth it. But anyway, last time we had four words for the wife. Tonight we have five words for the husbands in Ephesians 5 Paul addresses the wives and 40 words he uses 115 in instructing the husbands that might give us some hint of what's involved here.

We might also be tempted to debate you may have a coffee later this evening with your wife or someone in debate whether God is given the husband or the wife more demanding role invite you may already have begun to think that out last time we pointed out and tried to do so quite clearly that the wife's submission to her husband is one evidence of her submission to Christ that for a wife to declare the Lordship of Jesus will be borne testimony to within the fabric of home life in her submission to her husband. Now we come to the reverse of this and we recognize that in the selfsame way for a husband to declare that Jesus is Lord demands that he serifs his wife and by doing so makes it clear that he is serving Christ. I me to say this in case I forget later on children growing up in a Christian hole should actually be able to see the gospel modeled in the way their father loves their mother with a sacrificial love, the love of Jesus for his church and the way the mother submits to the father as an expression of the church's submission to the Lordship of Christ. As soon as we put things in that framework taking them out of the realm of the superficial.

Many of the preoccupations which are not irrelevant but are not really germane to the central issues and we realize what a high standard. The Scriptures call us to and particularly this notion for the man how characteristically New Testament is this that husbands are commanded to love their wives commanded to love.

This is not unique. Here you'll find the same thing is true in second John and in verse six and indeed, in Titus, we studied it years ago. Now you remember that the older women are to help the younger women to train them how to love their husbands. So in other words, this notion of love is not the victim of human emotion.

It is rather the servant of our human will. The real issue for both the husband and the wife is whether we are going to bow our need bend our will to what the Bible says or whether we're going to try and go on our own by the word that Paul is employing here for love is an important word.

It's not the word eardrops for sensual or sexual love, nor is it either the two words that would be used for brotherly and sisterly affection for human affection stored in the or for Leo. But it is a some of you will know the word I get paid I love which considers the other before the self and then acts on that premise element come to our words will do so quickly. Some of them will go faster through than others. By the first word is the word sensitively. Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. What is it mean for the husband to love his wife and not be harsh with her letter means that first you must love for sensitively now romantic suggestions and sentimental expressions are easily come by ending the phrase I love you as easily come by. It can become just a routine phrase, but those sort of sentimental expressions on their own will offer only the thinnest of disguises.

If there is a failure on the part of the husband to pass this most practical test it in a practical test is not if it simply said husbands love your wives. Then, of course, that would be okay. It would immediately lead to resolve the group in relationship to his correlative statement, but when he says and do not be harsh with them is that all our rights, or is Phillips Bridget don't let bitterness or resentment. Spoil your marriage and that notion of spoiling something is the spoiling that can so often happen over a period of time. As a result of neglect. Few marriages disintegrate as a result of some cataclysmic moment in time. Most disintegrate like the leak in a tire on a freeway which finally the car is found rule pulled over in the center reservation and something that is gone undetected over a period of significant time over a long number of miles finally has shown one of the ways that that can happen is so easily in the realm of neglect and is husbands. If we are not careful. And even if we attempt to be careful.

We may cultivate a harsh tone not only in our voices, but in our attitudes which is fueled by bitterness, a bitterness which often stands from disappointment I disappointment that is grounded in our wife's failure to live up to our on realistic ideals and you get is is our hardships, which is found in a bitterness that is tied to a resentment which is fixed in a failure on the part of our lives not to be good wife's but if failure on their part to live up to unrealistic expectations established by Mr. harsh, who holds his wife to a standard that he is no right to hold or to either emotionally, physically, spiritually or otherwise. I get so often we as husbands make huge mistakes.

When we think to replace love with faultfinding and with nagging one of the pieces of work in Andrew Lloyd Webber's or above musicology is is the show aspects of love, which I've never seen but somebody gave me a male voice choir from Wales singing everyone in my home thinks is a huge joke and when I put it on the ground of the room or just laugh. That's all part of the husband's role in the joy of being a dad. But anyway I'm not bitter about it in the slightest.

I refuse to say anything harsh about that at all. But you have this male voice choir and you know the song love changes everything. Love, love changes everything, hands and faces. Earth and sky. Love, love changes everything. How you live and how you die love and make the summer fly or a night seem like a lifetime.

Yes, love, love changes everything. And now I tremble at your name. Nothing in the world will ever be the same love changes everything days or longer. Words mean more love, love changes everything. Pain is deeper than before.

Love will turn your world around that world will last forever.

Yes, love, love changes everything brings you glory, brings you shame. Nothing in the world will ever be the same as written from a purely secular perspective, there is a measure of sentimentality and it.

But when we take that and recognize that poured into the essence of that is the self giving love of Jesus in the life of a Christian then surely we understand what a challenge and privilege it is to love our wives in this sensitive way. All of that is in direct contrast to the insensitivity which is become a hallmark of so many a husbands life.

Remember the song by Shel Silverstein, and in contrast to that notice that I don't remember it well that's okay because I remind you of it now to remember the song put another log on the fire. Cook me up some bacon and some beans and go out to the car and change the tire wash my socks and so my old blue jeans, baby, you can fill my pipe and then go fetch my slippers and blow me up another pot of tea then put another log on the fire babe and come and tell me why you're leaving me now.

Don't I let you wash the car on Sunday. Don't I warn you when you're getting fat in I going to take you fishing Sunday. A man can love a woman more than that and I always nice to your kid sister I digger driving every night just sit here at my feet as I like it when you're sweet and you know it in famine and to fight long baby that's that's the average guy's attempt sensitivity right there. Secondly, sensitively, naturally, naturally struggled for a long time of this word and I figured it. If this is actually the right word go back to Ephesians 5 and verse 28 and 29 husbands are to love their wives as their own body.

He loves his wife loves himself.

In other words, men want to give their wives the love that they naturally have for their own bodies and the love a man gives his wife is the extending of his love for himself, enfolding her in himself. If you like. So in one sense it is entirely unnatural for a husband not to love his wife. In this way, you see all of this again is grounded in the creation ordinances and what happened in the very beginning when God made man and woman and so much of Paul's argument relates to what God did when he made woman and man said after the woman had been given to the man man said this is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh, she shall be called woman, for she was taken out of man. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and they will become one flesh. The order of that is very important. The sustaining of that is vital to a healthy marriage leaving cutting the cord cutting the apron strings moving on new affection, a new devotion not the absence of parental love or childhood (by the changing of that love because of the explosive power of a new affection and it is in that leaving that there is then a cleaving that it is not leaving that there is then a union and there is in that union some profoundly mysterious guy mentioned that take place hands the monstrosity of sexual intercourse outside the framework of marriage as God intended it is it is a silly, stupid, ugly, meaningless thing when it is removed from the framework in which God establishes it. The one flesh union of a husband and a wife purity before marriage fidelity in marriage union in the context of marriage freedom the security the delight that is wrapped up in that and in the very heart of it is this natural affection on the part of the husband and I'm not sure that I understand it all, but somehow in some profound way.

The Bible says that a man's wife is part and parcel of his living three and vice versa.

I think this must be one of the reasons why people say as couples grow older there starting to look like each other is not strange and it is more than just an observation.

There is a measure of truth in it.

I think somehow or another. It is wrapped up with this very notion that the husband's love for his wife is both in Christ supernatural and within the framework of Genesis 2. It is also natural rights. My good friend Sinkler for husband not to love his wife, who has become one flesh with him is not only to be a poor husband.

It is to be a dysfunctional Christian now once again it is at this point you will see there as we follow on from that in Ephesians 5. It's at this point. Driving home this truth, the Paul references again. This profound mystery and what is the mystery well it's Christ and the church who is Christ and the church. Well it's the ultimate couple. The bride and groom and the bride and what he's saying is that when a husband loves his wife. In this way, they man as husband and wife is bride and bridegroom. They point to the ultimate couple and that the interface between the bride and bridegroom. Christ and the church in husband and wife as Paul moves back and forth between them is an unassailable point that needs to be bowed to in the 19th century.

Charles Hart commented on this and this is what he says is a fairly long quote so you can just listen out for a moment married love rights college is as much a dictate of nature and self-love and it is just as unnatural for a man to hate his wife as it would be for him to hate himself on his own body. A man may have a body which does not altogether suit him. He may wish it were handsome or healthier, stronger or more active still, it is his body, it is himself and he feeds it and cherishes it as tenderly as if it were the best and most lovely in the world so a man may have a wife whom he could wish to be a better or more beautiful or more agreeable but still she is his wife and by the Constitution of nature and the ordinance of God. Part of himself in neglecting her or abusing her. He violates the laws of nature as well is the law of God. Now when a husband treats his wife with disregard and disrespect. It is frequently because he has hopes and notions which he is projected and which he now expects her to subscribe to and to fulfill and if he's honest, it is often a cover for his own sense of personal inadequacy and so instead of looking within to address the issues of his own heart.

Life psyche soul body fitness whatever is easier to do with what is unnatural and that is to abuse. She was one flesh with we will return to this topic next week.

In part two of a message titled husband your listing to Truth for Life with Alistair Begg. Scripture teaches a lot about God's design for the Christian family. If you're looking to die even deeper into this topic. You can read the written transcripts that correspond with this series, simply visit Truth for Life.org. Click on the Sherman's option in the top menu bar, then you can select sermons by topic or by Scripture by other filters. If the sermon has a transcript, you'll see it right below the player box when you select a message or you can select the has transcript filter to browse all of the sermons that have a transcript available. You can also supplement what you hear on this program by reading books that our team selects the book were currently recommending is for preschool and elementary age children. It's called the God contest. It tells the exciting story of Elijah and the prophets of bail and the victory of the one true God. This is a book full of bright, colorful illustrations, expressive characters that will grab the attention of children as you lead them from Elijah's contest with the prophets of bail on Mount caramel did Jesus ultimate victory on Mount Zion. The God contest is a wonderful way for parents, teachers, anyone who interacts with young children present Bible stories and the gospel simple, understandable and entertaining way. Request your copy of the God contest today by visiting Truth for Life.org Bob Lapine can join us again next weekend when Alister will continue teaching on the topic of marriage by explaining how husbands should love their wives sacrificial Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life with the Learning is for Living