The other day, as I was leafing through the pages of my Bible, I notice a diagram I had made from either a sermon or a teaching some years back. The diagram depicted a simple truth. God loves us and because of that love we are to love others. You can find that in Matthew 22:37-39 when Jesus condensed all of the Law into two commands – Love God and Love Others. Also in 1 John 4:19 – We love because He loved us first. Love is so important which is why Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 13:1-3
“If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.”
That love is at the root of a marriage relationship or should be if that relationship is to glorify God and be what He intended it to be. If the relationship is based on something else, then it will fall short. Well – there’s more – in Ephesians 5:25 – Paul wrote that husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the Church. Meaning that the husband must be willing to lay his life down for his wife. Give up his dreams even. The husband has been given great responsibility as the head of the wife. With responsibility comes authority. The problem is that many men want to cling to the authority part and shirk their responsibility as the “spiritual” head of the family. In 1 Peter 2 and 3, Peter wrote about submission. That wives should submit to their husbands. Submit to what? His God-given authority and his god honoring exercise of that authority and responsibility. In today’s “progressive” culture, many woman struggle with this. Why? Because they don’t trust their husbands to NOT abuse their authority and shirk their responsibility. But – Peter goes on to say “Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers.”
In Ephesians 5:22-24 Paul talks about mutual submission out of reverence for Christ. “Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do 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.”
All of this love and submission is in the context of our faith and not our natural life. The problem is that many see it as problematic because they are looking at it through the lens of their natural, sinful life and not with spiritual understanding.
The
bottom line is that success in marriage is dependent upon both partners
mutually submitted to each other and both submitted to the Spirit of God–
loving each other with the love of God. And if things don’t seem to be working that
way – you need to evaluate your heart.
When a marriage fails, most assuredly the culprit will be our sin
nature. And if you are unevenly yoked to
begin with – meaning one of you is not a Christian – that does not relieve the Christian
of their responsibility to obey God.
There is so much more to be said – but so many have already said
it. Love each other just like Jesus and
the Father loves you. It takes faith to do that.
Let your light
shine and give God the glory.
By Faith Alone By
His Grace Alone And For His Glory Alone
No comments:
Post a Comment