wives and husbands.
i've spent countless hours over the last few years seeking a better understanding of God’s idea of marriage. Through my own experiences in this area, I’ve realized that so few of us actually enter marriage with any real concept of what is in store for us. I don’t know where we get the following ideas, but we all have them: picture perfect families who have a certain number of kids with the correct proportion of sons to daughters; a mom and dad who don’t fight, have great sex, and no need to worry about their bank accounts; family vacations where no one fights; family dinners where everyone smiles; teenagers who stay off drugs and don’t even think about the opposite sex until marriage; and at the end of it all, the successful parents of this perfect family celebrate their 75th wedding anniversary and die of old age. We can all probably count on one hand how many families we actually know who have followed that pattern. I know the world I live in here in Cape Town—places like Capricorn—can’t even relate to that ideal.
Divorce was quite possibly the most painful experience of my entire life. Throughout it, I read books about marriage. I wanted to understand what God had in mind when he created marriage. And this morning, I have been reading Ephesians 5 for the millionth time. Perhaps the things I’ve gleaned from it today will be useful to you. I simply feel I need to share them.
This chapter of the Bible states two very simple commands from God: one for wives and one for husbands. From these simple ideas, so much can be understood about God’s heart for marriage.
Verse 22. “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.”
The reason a wife’s main instruction from God is “to submit” is because the heaven-ordained purpose of a woman in a man’s life is to create, build up, sustain, and validate his manhood through her submission. It’s often not a conscious working-out of how this is done. Through faith and obedience to God’s command, He takes care of the details.
Eve didn’t submit to Adam, she led him. Not only that, but she led him into sin. A man is only a man when he leads and she follow in faith (in God and in him under God). I submit to God because He is my leader. When I do my own will, I go astray and take God off His throne. But when I submit, I lower my head and surrender my own (often reckless) will and trust Him to lead me beside still waters.
Therefore, my submission to a man will make him into the man he is destined to be. God designed it that a woman’s submission creates and completes the making of a boy into a man.
(Even as I type this, I think of all the acts of abuse and injustice done to women by men. I think of men who use these verses to oppress and mistreat women, to deceive them and lead them astray. Obviously I cannot touch on every point of contention against this verse. I write this to the audience of those whose hearts are seeking to follow God’s intentions for marriage. Anyone who comes into it with selfish motives and ambitions, or looking to satisfy their own desires, cannot be pleasing to God. He opposes pride. Therefore, I trust that if you are reading this and wanting to argue with me on these points, you either don’t believe women should submit or you’ve been on the abusive end of these ideas and cannot trust God in this area. The former I don’t have the intellectual energy or desire to debate you on, and the latter I relate to 100% and still am in a process of working through myself.)
Verse 25. “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the Church…”
Likewise, a man creates and completes a woman (from that of a girl) by loving her. Her deepest desire is to be loved unconditionally, faithfully, to be made clean by that love. It is ultimately a longing that only God can fulfill, because no human can complete us. But I believe God wants men to be the precursor to Himself in this area of a woman’s life.
The chapter goes into talking about how a man must first love himself and his own body if he is ever going to try and love his wife and her body. He must feed and care for it, not mistreat and abuse it, and uphold it as a temple of God.
Oh, how Satan tears men to shreds in this area. The creation of visual, physical, and emotional temptations that ultimately make men abuse their bodies rather than love them is a real threat to the sanctity and holiness of marriage. Can a man love his wife if he also loves pornography? Can he care for her with gentleness and wash her clean with the word of God if he also shares his own body with that of an adulteress?
I recently read a book about sex addiction, and it gave me such compassion for men…especially those who struggle with any form this addiction takes on. The author gives the following statistic: “We spend more on pornography in one year than the annual sales of the Coca-Cola corporation.” My jaw dropped when I read that. That’s A LOT of money, and therefore A LOT of porn.
And yet, the Bible is clear on this point: our bodies are temples, given to us by God, with clear instruction on how to care for them and use them to worship Him, rather than gratify our flesh. A body is not a tool to be used for evil, whether it’s your own body or another’s body. It is a creation of God to be adored and cleansed and kept holy and spotless.
Not a single one of us does this perfectly, so don’t let these verses condemn you. And yet the expectation from God cannot be compromised: If a man can love himself, he can love a woman. He must value and desire purity above all else, because Ephesians 5 says it is only by the cleansing of a woman with the word of God that she is made into the fullness God intended for her. Then she is presentable to Him at the end of the age.
Now more than ever before, marriage is a sign to this lost and sinful world—a sign of the gospel. A sign of Christ taking on flesh in a totally selfless pursuit of that which he loves: His people. Giving up everything, even his own life, even his place next to the right hand of His father in heaven where he received unceasing worship and adoration. Laying it all down for love. What a story!
And how desperately the world needs this story, more than ever before. Faithful love and sacrifice. It is the story God chooses to tell over and over and over and over, throughout all generations. The symbol of marriage is the imagery God saw most fitting to convey his heart, and that is an incredible thing to meditate on.
It is in marriage that both man and woman are taken from flesh into spirit, from selfish into selfless, from two into one. It is in this that both learn to die to self and are made ready for eternity with the original—the first bridegroom. Marriage on earth is the dress rehearsal for eternity with Christ, where we are made complete, totally healed, and finally in a place of unending rest.
(Let these thoughts of mine uplift and encourage you, rather than condemn or uninspired you for your life pursuits of love and marriage. God would never have handed this idea of marriage over to us if he didn’t think we could pull it off. But, like all things, John 15’s message of abiding in Christ makes us capable of such radical obedience and endurance. None of us are exempt from the war Satan still wages on the human race. However your humanity manifests itself, be it in overt or covert ways, we are all on level ground before God. He believes in you, and with Him you can accomplish all more than you ask or imagine, one day at a time.)
Books I recommend that helped shape my thoughts for this blog:
-False Intimacy by Dr. Harry W. Schaumburg
-The Mystery of Marriage by Mike Mason
Divorce was quite possibly the most painful experience of my entire life. Throughout it, I read books about marriage. I wanted to understand what God had in mind when he created marriage. And this morning, I have been reading Ephesians 5 for the millionth time. Perhaps the things I’ve gleaned from it today will be useful to you. I simply feel I need to share them.
This chapter of the Bible states two very simple commands from God: one for wives and one for husbands. From these simple ideas, so much can be understood about God’s heart for marriage.
Verse 22. “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.”
The reason a wife’s main instruction from God is “to submit” is because the heaven-ordained purpose of a woman in a man’s life is to create, build up, sustain, and validate his manhood through her submission. It’s often not a conscious working-out of how this is done. Through faith and obedience to God’s command, He takes care of the details.
Eve didn’t submit to Adam, she led him. Not only that, but she led him into sin. A man is only a man when he leads and she follow in faith (in God and in him under God). I submit to God because He is my leader. When I do my own will, I go astray and take God off His throne. But when I submit, I lower my head and surrender my own (often reckless) will and trust Him to lead me beside still waters.
Therefore, my submission to a man will make him into the man he is destined to be. God designed it that a woman’s submission creates and completes the making of a boy into a man.
(Even as I type this, I think of all the acts of abuse and injustice done to women by men. I think of men who use these verses to oppress and mistreat women, to deceive them and lead them astray. Obviously I cannot touch on every point of contention against this verse. I write this to the audience of those whose hearts are seeking to follow God’s intentions for marriage. Anyone who comes into it with selfish motives and ambitions, or looking to satisfy their own desires, cannot be pleasing to God. He opposes pride. Therefore, I trust that if you are reading this and wanting to argue with me on these points, you either don’t believe women should submit or you’ve been on the abusive end of these ideas and cannot trust God in this area. The former I don’t have the intellectual energy or desire to debate you on, and the latter I relate to 100% and still am in a process of working through myself.)
Verse 25. “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the Church…”
Likewise, a man creates and completes a woman (from that of a girl) by loving her. Her deepest desire is to be loved unconditionally, faithfully, to be made clean by that love. It is ultimately a longing that only God can fulfill, because no human can complete us. But I believe God wants men to be the precursor to Himself in this area of a woman’s life.
The chapter goes into talking about how a man must first love himself and his own body if he is ever going to try and love his wife and her body. He must feed and care for it, not mistreat and abuse it, and uphold it as a temple of God.
Oh, how Satan tears men to shreds in this area. The creation of visual, physical, and emotional temptations that ultimately make men abuse their bodies rather than love them is a real threat to the sanctity and holiness of marriage. Can a man love his wife if he also loves pornography? Can he care for her with gentleness and wash her clean with the word of God if he also shares his own body with that of an adulteress?
I recently read a book about sex addiction, and it gave me such compassion for men…especially those who struggle with any form this addiction takes on. The author gives the following statistic: “We spend more on pornography in one year than the annual sales of the Coca-Cola corporation.” My jaw dropped when I read that. That’s A LOT of money, and therefore A LOT of porn.
And yet, the Bible is clear on this point: our bodies are temples, given to us by God, with clear instruction on how to care for them and use them to worship Him, rather than gratify our flesh. A body is not a tool to be used for evil, whether it’s your own body or another’s body. It is a creation of God to be adored and cleansed and kept holy and spotless.
Not a single one of us does this perfectly, so don’t let these verses condemn you. And yet the expectation from God cannot be compromised: If a man can love himself, he can love a woman. He must value and desire purity above all else, because Ephesians 5 says it is only by the cleansing of a woman with the word of God that she is made into the fullness God intended for her. Then she is presentable to Him at the end of the age.
Now more than ever before, marriage is a sign to this lost and sinful world—a sign of the gospel. A sign of Christ taking on flesh in a totally selfless pursuit of that which he loves: His people. Giving up everything, even his own life, even his place next to the right hand of His father in heaven where he received unceasing worship and adoration. Laying it all down for love. What a story!
And how desperately the world needs this story, more than ever before. Faithful love and sacrifice. It is the story God chooses to tell over and over and over and over, throughout all generations. The symbol of marriage is the imagery God saw most fitting to convey his heart, and that is an incredible thing to meditate on.
It is in marriage that both man and woman are taken from flesh into spirit, from selfish into selfless, from two into one. It is in this that both learn to die to self and are made ready for eternity with the original—the first bridegroom. Marriage on earth is the dress rehearsal for eternity with Christ, where we are made complete, totally healed, and finally in a place of unending rest.
(Let these thoughts of mine uplift and encourage you, rather than condemn or uninspired you for your life pursuits of love and marriage. God would never have handed this idea of marriage over to us if he didn’t think we could pull it off. But, like all things, John 15’s message of abiding in Christ makes us capable of such radical obedience and endurance. None of us are exempt from the war Satan still wages on the human race. However your humanity manifests itself, be it in overt or covert ways, we are all on level ground before God. He believes in you, and with Him you can accomplish all more than you ask or imagine, one day at a time.)
Books I recommend that helped shape my thoughts for this blog:
-False Intimacy by Dr. Harry W. Schaumburg
-The Mystery of Marriage by Mike Mason
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