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In many ways, marriage has become a wilderness in contemporary America. In this extraordinary text, Paul describes the action points for both husbands and wives. They arise from a vision of sacrificial love—an imitation of the very gift that Jesus gave to his bride, the Church. As long as husbands wives are depending on their partners to provide happiness, they will always be disappointed. God alone can fulfill our deepest expectations for love and intimacy. Marriages that are "in Christ" are positioned to receive the grace that he longs to share with us.

 

Ephesians 5:22-33

Some texts of the Bible are much loved.Other texts are much dreaded.This is interesting, when you think about it.The same God whose kindness and grace comes shining through those much loved passages also happens to be the author of whatever Bible verses make us feel threatened, confused, or afraid.As we come today to a text has long been associated with malpractice and misunderstanding, let’s begin with a statement of hope:Whenever we open God’s Word, good things are about to happen.We are opening our very lives to the One who cares much more about how our lives turn out than we do.

Let’s turn together this morning to Ephesians 5:22-33.Whether reading from your own copy of Scripture, or looking up here at the screens, or reciting this block of 12 verses that is unquestionably deserving of our best efforts at memorization, let’s stand together and speak aloud this part of God’s Word:

 Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies.He who loves his wife loves himself.After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church –

for we are members of his body.

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”This is a profound mystery – but I am talking about Christ and the church.However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.  

It’s no surprise that the apostle Paul – in this letter in which he is describing what it means to follow Jesus in every sphere of life – now turns his attention to marriage.Marriage is the ultimate crucible for discipleship.This is where we find out what it really means to trust Christ – especially on those days when our feelings, our friends, and the culture at large join as co-conspirators, urging us to abandon our marriage vows so we can go chasing after that elusive goal of personal happiness.

Now I know that a number of you this morning are not married.Some of you have been married in the past, and the loss of your spouse to death or divorce has taken you down paths you have hardly been able to bear.Marriage may or may not be part of your future.I recently read a quip that married couples are like flies on a screen door: Those on the outside want in, while those on the inside want out.No matter where we are today, the Bible depicts marriage as so central to human experience that all of us can learn from it, even if we’re not currently participating.

While some of us consider marriage to be, humanly speaking, our greatest source of ongoing joy, I also know that a number of you are not married happily.Some marriages die long before either partner does.Perhaps you’ve been secretly paging through the Bible looking for escape clauses.What does God have to say about a marriage in which the light has gone out, in which the original fires of passion have burned down to the last ember?

What the Bible says is that there is hope.It is never too late to choose God and God’s ways.Jesus does acknowledge, sadly, that the wounds of unfaithfulness may prove fatal in certain marriages.But in this room right now there are men and women who have gone all the way to the edge of the relational abyss, only to discover that God’s faithfulness in keeping his promises to them has renewed their ability to re-make their promises to each other.

To be very blunt:Can your marriage be saved, no matter what its current condition?Absolutely.More than that, can your marriage be healed and restored in such a way that it can become a source of joy both for you and the Lord?Remember that Jesus came to bring the gospel.That means “the good news.”There is good news for every heart, for every relationship, and for every family that turns today to Christ.

As we pivot our attention toward this text, it’s important to keep three things in mind.The first is the way in which Paul sets the table for this entire discussion.In Ephesians 5:21 he says, “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.”We spent all of last Sunday morning spotlighting just those nine words, and if you weren’t able to join us I encourage you to read or listen to that message.What we need to keep in mind is that Paul’s discussion of submission and headship in the marriage relationship is preceded by God’s command that every follower of Jesus must submit to every other follower of Jesus.Wives must submit to husbands, and husbands must also submit to wives.

The second thing we should note is that when Paul wrote these words about marriage, his teaching was considered highly dangerous by non-Christians.Followers of Jesus were accused of destroying first century society because this teaching was so liberal.The Christian emphasis on freedom and love threatened the social order.Ironically, modern-day non-Christians are also convinced that Ephesians 5 is a threat to society.In the 21^st century, however, these teachings are considered outrageously conservative.Paul’s teaching was on the cutting edge in the ancient world, and his words are still on the cutting edge in most parts of the modern Middle East and the developing world.

That brings us to our third important background consideration.When Paul wrote this letter to the Ephesians, the level of respect given to women around the Mediterranean was deplorable.The Greek philosopher Plato taught that females were simply accidents of birth.Their mothers should have had little boys, but while they were pregnant they were influenced by what Plato called “a malign south wind.”Jewish rabbis instructed men that it wasn’t wise to spend time talking to women, and that included their own wives.A number of Pharisees awoke every morning and thanked God that they had not been born female.

Women were viewed as inferior in every regard.They were considered less intelligent than men and less capable of good character.In a Greek city like Ephesus, women weren’t even allowed in the same parts of the house as their husbands or sons.They would eat all by themselves in a separate room unless they were specifically invited to dine with the men.If a woman spoke to a man in public, or if she spun thread in her doorway so that outsiders could actually see her at work, she was regarded as morally corrupt.We learn a great deal about the standing of women by noting just one line from the Greek historian Herodotus:“Cleomenes died childless, leaving behind only a daughter.”

After generations of such deeply embedded prejudice, here comes Jesus.And here comes Paul.The gospel proves to be gender game-changer.Just imagine a house church in Ephesus where men and women are worshipping in the same room, calling each other brother and sister, and openly sharing the Lord’s Supper.This was deeply threatening to ancient society.

Therefore we have to keep in mind the cultural starting point for Ephesians 5.For those who live in the modern West, Paul’s words sound restrictive.But for those who first received this message, Paul came across as a spiritual and social radical.Together let’s look specifically at what he has to say to wives; the commands that he gives to husbands; and then the most important piece of all – the fact that marriage is like a mirror that reflects the oneness that every Christian shares with Christ.  

Ephesians 5 should not be confused with a marriage counseling manual.It doesn’t address specific marital issues.Nor does it succumb to sentimentality.In the movie The Princess Bride, the pastor officiating at Buttercup’s wedding memorably declares, “Meh-widge – that dweam within a dweam.”Ephesians 5 never suggest that marriage is particularly dweamy.But it does provide a spiritual foundation on which a healthy, God-honoring marriage can be built.

Paul begins with these words in verses 22-23:“Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church...”He then ups the ante in verse 24: “As the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.” He adds in verse 33 that “the wife must respect her husband.”This appears to be a feminist’s worst nightmare.How can we draw any conclusion other than that the Bible demeans women and promotes a functional dominance of husbands over wives?

As we saw last week, however, submission is God’s call to everyone.It means to take our own issues and needs and “arrange them under” the priorities and concerns of someone else.In these verses there is not the least hint of female inferiority.In fact the equality of men and women is proclaimed clearly in verse 31, where “two become one” in marriage.

Nowhere in the Bible are wives called to be subservient to their husbands, and there is nothing in the writings of Paul that suggests a wife must obey, even though a few centuries ago that verb unfortunately managed to work its way into the standard Western wedding vows. Nowhere in Scripture do we see a husband given the license to compel his wife to submit. Instead, the submission of a wife is her own free decision to surrender her self-centeredness and to promote the interests of her husband.The Bible declares that this makes good relational sense.As we read in Proverbs 14:1:“The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish woman tears hers down.”An unsubmissive spirit in any family member threatens the wellbeing of the entire household.

Furthermore, submission isn’t so much about trusting your husband – who is unquestionably a flawed human being – but about trusting the Lord.Will you obey God by consciously seeking to advance his interests and by being a blessing to his life?  

Unfortunately, these verses have been tragically abused over the years.Men have claimed that they have biblical carte blanche went it comes to decision-making – all the way from who gets to hold the remote control to whether a wife is free to work, to have certain friends, or even to leave the house.Pastors have committed grave sins by counseling battered wives to return to their abusive husbands.Yes, we are called to submit to each other – but never when submission becomes destructive.

What about husbands?The citizens of Ephesus were almost certainly shocked by verse 25:“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.”As far as we know, the Bible is the only ancient document that ever assigned any kind of relational responsibility to a husband.And what a responsibility we have!Husbands are to give up their lives for their wives, with the same kind of self-emptying, unconditional love that Jesus demonstrated by going to the cross.

This immediately helps us grasp what Paul means when he says that a husband is the “head” of his wife. It’s all about service.It’s all about sacrifice.Headship is a God-ordained reality, and we are not free to ignore this verse.God has clearly given husbands a particular kind of authority.But this authority is not a trump card that empowers a husband to do whatever he wants.Remember the teaching of Jesus.He said that if you were the greatest person on earth, that doesn’t mean everybody would serve you.You would serve everybody else.In the same way, if you are the “head” of your marriage, that doesn’t mean you’re the boss. It means you are required to excel at care and concern for your wife.Marriage is a relationship of mutual submission where equal partners live out different roles for the express purpose of being a blessing to each other.

It’s worth noting that Paul has at least twice as much to say to husbands as he does to wives.That’s because the authority that comes with headship also includes accountability.If anyone is on the hook in Ephesians chapter five, it’s the husband.He is ultimately responsible for his marriage being a safe place – physically, emotionally, and spiritually – and for providing his wife with a level of care and sacrifice that rises to the highest standard in human history:the love that Jesus displayed in laying down his life.With regard to decision-making, it seems obvious that shared wisdom and joint responsibility would be an asset to every couple, and a significant way for a husband to honor his wife.  

One my earliest spiritual mentors used to say, “God must have a sense of humor to think that men and women should live together.”We really are different from each other.Men Are From Mars and Women Are From Venus was the fashionable way of expressing that 20 years ago.Now we’re hearing that men are like waffles and women are like spaghetti.An actual horse race last month featured a sprint to the finish between a horse named My Wife Knows Everything and another horse named My Wife Doesn’t Know.And the winner was… My Wife Knows Everything, of course.Have you seen the book entitled Everything that Men Know About Women?It is 200 pages long.Every page is blank.Gentlemen, start your engines:We have an extraordinary God-given task, and we have a very long way to go.

Even though Paul says that a husband is the head of his wife just as Christ is head of the church, these two kinds of authority are decidedly different.Christ is the Lord over everything.Men are lords over nothing.The real head of every marriage is Jesus himself.Thus the analogy that Paul is making has to do with sacrificial love, not with privilege or power.

It’s frightening to realize how many people come to marriage in the hope that they will be saved.Their partner will save them from their problems, their boredom, their fears, or their hopelessness.But nowhere in the Bible does a couple get married and then live happily ever after.Marriage doesn’t save anyone.Only Jesus can do that.Marriage is not the fulfillment of our personal dreams.It is more like grad school for people who want to learn how to grow up, how to be faithful, and how to trust God.

This brings us to Paul’s startling words at the end of the chapter.He goes all the way back to the book of Genesis and quotes God’s original vision for marriage:“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”Then Paul adds, “This is a profound mystery – but I am talking about Christ and the church.” In other words, men and women aren’t just married to each other.Those who trust Christ are spiritually married to Jesus.He is the husband.The church is the bride.We are to serve each other and sacrifice for each other in the same way that Jesus gave his all so that we could be one with him.

What do we learn from Scripture?We learn that sinners marry sinners.That’s the primary difference between a marriage of two humans and our spiritual marriage with Jesus.Jesus never fails to express unconditional love.Husbands and wives, however, fall well short of the mark.I’ve mentioned before that my friend David Henderson, who’s a pastor up in West Lafayette, points out that most of us enter marriage carrying a picture of the perfect partner.Unfortunately, we marry an imperfect person.Then we have two options.We can either tear up the picture and accept the person, or we can tear up the person by trying to hold on to that picture.

David points out that there are two very different ways to imagine the marriage relationship.The first one, which is by far the most common, looks like this:“I enter this relationship with the expectation that you will meet my needs:my hope for love and understanding, my desire for intimacy and affection, my longing for admiration and respect.”It’s all up to you.If we were honest we would come right out and announce to our partner, “Congratulations!You’re the one.Of all the people on earth, you’re the lucky person who has the privilege of making me happy for the rest of my life.Thanks for using your little plastic pail every day to fill up my ocean of need…for as long as we both shall live.”

Quite often, husbands and wives dive into this self-absorbed marital project with great optimism that they will actually be able to meet each other’s needs.They are powered by infatuation – a God-provided, drug-induced state of elation that is generated by brain chemicals called endorphins.This is the body’s special way of jump-starting a new relationship.But when the chemicals wear off – and they always do – the couple now faces the real work of developing authentic and longer-lasting love and intimacy with each other.

What all couples experience in their sincere quest to meet each other’s needs is failure.And if you should fail me often enough that you continually break my heart, I will consider that to be permission to initiate a search to get my needs met in some other way.That might be my job, or a hobby, or having kids, or trading up for a new partner who will surely be a better happiness provider than you turned out to be.

There is another way to picture marriage, however.It is far less commonly pursued.It is based on what we learn in Ephesians chapters one and two – that my real and authentic need to be loved, and chosen, and forgiven, and appreciated every day of my life has already been met by God.No human spouse could ever do such a thing, and to insist that our partners try to pull off such a feat is to place an intolerable burden on them.But when husbands and wives find their ultimate security in God, they actually become gifts to each other – freely sharing the love and grace that they have already freely received.

What’s the difference between a healthy marriage and an unhealthy marriage?It’s not whether or not a couple has problems.All couples do.It’s not whether or not a couple gets into fights.If you’re wearing a wedding ring, you will experience some measure of conflict.A healthy marriage is one in which a husband and a wife choose to repair the damage that they have either received or inflicted, instead of running away or becoming emotionally disconnected.

Christian marriages are just like any other marriages:They are filled with heartaches and disappointments.Sometimes the primary struggle is that one partner has significantly greater spiritual commitment or maturity than the other.But God is equal to every one of our circumstances.And those who are in Christ bring a supernatural resource to their marriage.Paul says in Ephesians 5:25 that we are to love “just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.”This never-ending, willing-to-suffer, unconditional love of Jesus – which he is able to put into our hearts – is the only way that any of us will experience real love.  

When Mary Sue and I got married I was fully ready to lay down my life for her.In my mind I would put her into the last lifeboat, while I would stay on the Titanic.I would donate my organs so she might live on.I would stand between her and a school of hungry piranhas.Interestingly, not one of those situations has ever happened.But almost every day for the last thirty-five years, we both have been called to die in some small way that inevitably has the capacity to transform our relationship.Every day we die to the picture we once had of being married to a perfect person who would never make us feel unhappy.And in the midst of all those little deaths, by hanging on to a power far greater than our own, the God who raised Jesus from the grave miraculously keeps giving us life.

As we close, how can our actual marriages look more and more like the ideal that God presents in Ephesians 5? We must make three resolutions.First, resolve to be 100% committed to your relationship.If you have a great marriage, resolve to make it even better.If you’re currently in a world of hurt, determine to do whatever it will take to experience God’s healing.Don’t lose heart because of the relational debris field that is otherwise known as the United States of America.Any marriage can be restored.But each partner will need to make a 100% commitment to get there.Many times I have heard a spouse say something like, “I’m not sure how things are turning out.I’m going to wait and see what happens.”But that makes you a spectator to your own life.We cannot be on the outside of our own relationships looking in.What kills most marriages?It is the erosion of hope.But hope can be revived when we choose to re-engage, even in the smallest of ways.That’s simply how God designed us.

In their book Yes, Your Marriage Can Be Saved, Joe and Michelle Williams tell about a couple who separated from each other in great anger.They set a time to meet to divide up their assets.The husband, who had moved out, suggested that when he came over to the house he might mow the grass.The wife invited him to bring along his clothes basket.She could do the laundry while he mowed. They started talking again.In small ways they chose to be kind to each other.Hope was renewed, and they fell back in love.

Don’t give up.It may be that for you, right now, being 100% committed means being 100% open to whatever means God might use to heal your hearts.

Second, resolve to answer the higher call of depending on Christ to meet your needs.If we know that our needs are met by a Savior who will never let us down, we can be released from the trap of waiting for our partner to go first, or to respond a certain way, or to come through with the love we think we deserve.If I know that my needs are already met by the Lord, I am freed up to love you without the painful expectation that you simply have to pay me back.

All marriages are less-than-perfect marriages.Where’s the good news in that?A less-than-perfect marriage has the amazing capacity to draw both its partners closer to the Lord – if they will give their hearts fully to him.

Third, and finally, resolve to show up in your own marriage today.Be present.Don’t walk away literally or drift away emotionally, even if you feel hurt or disappointed or bored.That can be as simple as making good eye contact; listening carefully to your partner; or refusing to let your mind become fixed on your fantasy football team or that grocery list you ought to be making right now.

Choose to hope again.Refuse to settle for a relational cold war.Trust God moment by moment.Resolving simply to show up and to keep our promises to each other keeps us in the presence of the God who will never break his promises to us.