The Model for Christian Marriage

Ephesians 5:21-33
I think that all of us are aware there is a marriage crisis in our country and culture that has spilled over even into the church.

In more and more states, the union of two men or two women is being called marriage-and there are church bodies that support this legislation. Fewer and fewer people are getting married and those who do are getting married at later and later ages and the vast majority of them have lived together before marriage—including Christian young people. And even those who call themselves Christians have a divorce rate that is similar to those who are not believers.

And so what is the solution to what ails us as a country and culture and church when it comes to marriage? How can we have better marriages that will stand the test of time and be a blessing to those around us? What can we lift up to our children as what they ought to hope for when it comes to marriage?

What is needed is a return to God’s Word and the guidance that comes from the Creator of man and woman and marriage. What is needed is a renewed commitment to follow the model for Christian marriage that we have before us in God’s Word. The Bible says: Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

The heart of Christian marriage—the very center of our lives as husbands and wives is not the love we have for one another—but the relationship we have with Jesus.

The husband/wife relationship is not just a list of rules-- but the living out of who we are in Christ-- and so to be a better husband and to be a better wife—we need to grow closer to God through faith in Jesus. If you are single and want to have a happy marriage—make sure that the person you marry is a committed follower of Jesus Christ. His work for us that makes us Christians and enables us to be better husbands and wives is found throughout these verses. The Bible says that…

Jesus saved us from our sins on the cross—laying aside his divine dignity and honor out of love for us. He gave us his own life in Holy Baptism. He made us members of his body so that we are perfectly united to him. He nourishes our faith with his own body and blood. And he is working in our lives every day to bring us to heaven.

This is what Christ has done for us and we respond to him with reverence. This life of reverence has a particular shape in our marriage: it looks like Jesus’ own life as we live out our faith in the context of our lives as husbands and wives.

It is out of reverence for Christ that we submit to one another in marriage—not just because of our love for one another—not because of how we feel, which can change. But we submit to one another as husband and wife because of who we are in Christ.

That is the foundation for all that follows in God’s guidance for married couples.

Now, what does it mean to submit? It means that we recognize that God has established a particular order in marriage and family and as husbands and wives and parents and children we gladly take our particular place in it out of reverence for Christ—wives respecting their husbands and husbands loving their wives. The Bible says:

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

God is a God of order. There is a God-given order in creation. Mankind was given dominion over the other creatures but man is answerable to God for that dominion. There is a God-order in the church. Christ is the head of the church and he rules by his Word. There is a God-given order in society with the government acting as God’s ministers. And there is a God-given order in marriage for the husband and the wife.

Christian wives, out of reverence for Christ, are called upon to confess their belief in God’s “order and design” by submitting to their husbands as the head of their marriage just as the church recognizes that Christ is its head and submits to him.

This is a submission that is based upon love not fear. The church does not fear Christ but serves him in glad obedience on account of his great love for us. So, Christian wives are called by God to show their faith in Jesus by respecting their husbands.

This God-given order goes all the way back to the creation of marriage in the Garden of Eden. It was Adam who was created first. He was the one who named Eve. She was given to Adam by God as a helper fit for him. This has nothing to do with the fall into sin—it predates it. This is God’s enduring will for marriage and so wives are to submit to their own husbands in everything.

Now what does the Bible mean by that word “everything”? It means everything pertaining to their lives as husbands and wives. A husband is not permitted to ask his wife to sin or to tell her to abandon her faith. She does not have to submit to those requests.

Neither does it mean that the husband will make all the decisions. Just as in the church where there are many, many things left free to us as Christians, so the wise Christian husband will give his wife wide latitude in how their home operates and how their children are raised and how the money is spent.

But at the end of the day, the husband is the head of the wife and he is the one who sets the tone and direction for the marriage relationship in a Christ-like way. The Bible says:

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

Husbands also are to recognize that there is an order that God has established in marriage and submit to their place in out of reverence for Christ by loving their wives like Christ loved the church.

And how did Jesus do that? Was he bossy and high-handed? Did he demoralize her and beat her down? Did he keep her at arm’s length? No! He loved her and laid down his life for her on the cross. He sacrificed everything for her. He took her into his confidence and trusted her with his mission.

So the husband is to put his wife’s welfare above all other earthly priorities. He is to lift her up and encourage her. He is to share his heart with her and trust her with all that is important to him. His life is to be given in service to her.

This is what Christ-like love of a husband for his wife looks like and it does not change with the times—it is not there one day and gone the next—it is constant and enduring, just like Christ’s love for us.

The love of Christ for the church is especially directed towards her eternal welfare. Christ has done everything for our eternal salvation and this too is the Christian husband’s first priority when it comes to his wife.

He is the one responsible for her spiritual well-being—seeing to it that family devotions are held and that time is made for church and Christian giving is a priority and that nothing he says or does tears down, or undermines his wife’s faith in Jesus. The husband’s life is to be lived so that his wife grows closer to Christ and deeper in her faith.

He does this because he is a Christian and reverences Christ with his life. But the husband also does it because he and his wife are united together as one flesh in God’s sight and what he does to bless her is also a blessing for himself. The Bible says:

In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”

Every time Christ and his apostles taught on marriage, they turned to this verse written by Moses in Genesis: that marriage is the one flesh union between one man and one woman. Jesus used it when the Pharisees asked him about divorce. Paul used it here to remind us what marriage is and how we are to live as husbands and wives. This verse from Genesis is God’s institution of marriage.

So-called homosexual marriage is impossible because there is not a man and a woman-- and two men or two women cannot establish a one flesh union for which man and woman were created by God.

Cultural values may evolve and a nation’s laws may change --but the creative purpose and plan of God cannot change: one man and one woman joined to one another in marriage become one flesh and produce the fruit of their love in the children they conceive and bear.

When God’s Word and will are simply accepted, all questions about living together- and divorce- and the purpose of sexuality- and the possibility of homosexual “marriage” -simply fall by the wayside.

For Christians, there is even more. This one flesh union of a man and woman in marriage not only goes back to creation, it is emblematic of Christ and the church. Just as we are members of Christ, united in his body, the church—so husband and wife are one body.

And just as Christ cares for his body the church by feeding it with the bread of life -and clothing it with his righteousness- and holding it close to his heart- so the husband is to care for the needs of his wife and cherish her as his bride—demonstrating in their marriage the relationship that exists between Christ and the church. The Bible says:

This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.
However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

When Christian husbands love their wives- and when Christian wives respect their husbands -they are not only bearing witness to their love for one another --and they are not only living out the Creator’s command to be fruitful and multiply-- they are giving witness to a great mystery: the love that exists between Christ and the church.

That is why our lives together as husbands and wives can never be merely a private arrangement between two consenting adults as society would have us believe—but marriage is a sacred vocation for the sake of Christian witness to the world.

God intends that those around us would learn something about Christ and his church as they view the love and respect that exists in our marriages.

We cannot cure all of society’s ills when it comes to marriage-- but what we can do, by God’s grace and help, is to begin today showing our reverence for Christ by how we live in our marriages: Christian husbands loving their wives and Christian wives respecting their husbands. Amen.