If you have seen the movie “Fireproof,” you probably remember the scene of the salt and pepper shakers glued together. And if you have attended weddings, you have probably heard the minister say to the bride and groom that the two will become one flesh. Do you know where to find those words in the Bible? They can be found in Genesis 2:24 and again in Matthew 19 where Jesus uses them to answer a question put to him by the Pharisees.
There is something wonderful and mysterious about Christian marriage as it is described in the Bible. Even for non-believers, marriage is viewed as the perfect union of body, mind, and spirit between a man and a woman.
When a couple from outside the church asks us to marry them, we insist not only on several counseling sessions, but we also ask them to participate in the life of the church for a period of time before we marry them. That may seem like a strange thing to ask when all they want is 30 minutes of our time to tie the knot, but it is not only that we want them to have a spiritual foundation for the rest of their lives, we want them to begin to understand the church because the fact is, it is impossible to understand marriage without understanding the church. Let me say it another way: You need to understand the church in order to understand marriage.
That statement might shock some people, but Ephesians 5 has made that conclusion absolutely clear to me and I hope it will be clear to you.
As we have pointed out in previous messages, the first three chapters of Ephesians describe the transformation from:
• a godless life to a God-honoring life,
• from a life of darkness to a life lived in the light,
• from a life of ignorance to a life of wisdom,
• from a life based on falsehood to a life based on truth and the contrasts go on and on.
You see, God is in the business of changing the world – breaking down barriers, tearing down walls, reconciling people, making them one new humanity – all through his Son Jesus Christ. And as we saw in Chapter 2, his primary instrument for bringing people together is the church.
Last Sunday, Sue pointed out from Chapter 4 that the way we live as followers of Christ affects the lives of others:
• We should speak truth instead of lies,
• When we become angry, we should be careful not to hurt others,
• We should build each other up through the words we use.
• Above all, as we see in 5:1,2 we are to live together in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us. Keep that thought in mind as we move to Chapter 5 where we get instructions for living as followers of Christ in our homes.
When we get to the part of Ephesians that talks about marriage in Chapter 5, our tendency is to begin with v.21, but I want to start with verse 18 where we read, Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit. I won’t take the time to explain this contrast of wine and the Spirit in detail, except to say that even though many people may think that alcohol makes them happy, it actually depresses the brain, not stimulate it. Alcohol depresses the highest centers in the brain and leads to lack of control, judgment, and self-discipline and it can lead to waste and destruction. All of us are acquainted with the term DUI, driving under the influence. I have often wondered what it would be like to drive a car with one of those yellow license plates with red letters that let everyone know what you have done. I think it would be humiliating.
The Holy Spirit, on the other hand, works in exactly the opposite way. The Spirit stimulates the heart, invigorates the soul, producing energy and joy. Just this past week, we met a man who used to spend his time in drugs and alcohol and he said his life kept spiraling downward. But when he met Christ, the Holy Spirit took control of his life and now you can tell by the first words out of his mouth that he is full of spiritual vigor and vitality. He is completely energized by the Spirit. What if we had license plates that showed we are under the influence of the Holy Spirit?!!
So what kind of behaviors can we expect in people whose lives are filled with the Spirit? Paul lists some of those behaviors beginning in v. 19:
• Singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves
• Singing and making melody to the Lord in your hearts
• Giving thanks to God the father
• Submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. The first three speak of our relationship to God but the fourth one speaks of our dealings with one another - submitting to each other, it says.
Unless you have the NKJV or the English Standard Version, your Bible probably starts a new paragraph and says “Be subject to one another,” as though it were a separate command. But it is not separate. Grammatically speaking, v.21 is number 4 in the list of what happens when we are filled with the Spirit, namely “submitting” or “being subject” to one another. And following this list, Paul describes how this principle of mutual submission to one another plays out, especially in the family, beginning with the marriage relationship.
As the Bible makes clear in several places, the church is made up of many members, just as the body is made up of many parts, and these parts work together so the whole body can function properly. If you understand that, you understand that what is important is not that you are a part of the body, but that you a part of the whole body. In the church that means you will consider not just what is good for you, but what is good for the whole church. And in marriage, (1) you will consider not just what is good and what is pleasurable for you, but for your spouse and the marriage relationship.
Verse 22 says, “Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord.” Some women get irritated when they read this because it sounds like they are to be docile little creatures who must do whatever their husbands say. But that is not what this verse means. We need to remember that Paul is talking first of all about the church and its loyalty to Christ. What’s more, Paul has already said that within the church we submit to one another, so it is within that framework that he gives this directive. It other words, we are not all off on our own whether it be in the church or in our marriages. There should be an order of roles and functions both in the church and in marriage.
Maybe we could use an example from sports since today is Super Bowl Sunday. Every team has a captain; every team has a coach. Suppose that Steeler team members all decided they want to look out for themselves and said, “We can be our own captains. We can each call the plays as we like.” What are the chances the Steelers would win?
Paul’s point is that our life in the church is not just for what we can get out of it. We are not here to have our own way and to please ourselves as individuals; we are here to please Christ, to contribute our best to the life of the church, and so we need orderliness in the church. Christ is the head of the body, or maybe we could call him the coach, and we follow his leading. The Bible tells us in several places that we all have different roles in the life of the church. Not everyone can be a teacher; not everyone has the same gift. There is a division of labor, an understanding of functions. In the same way, (2) marriage works best when we follow the order God has provided, so that life together can go smoothly. (There is much more we could learn from this verse grammatically, theologically, and practically, but we don’t have the time.)
When we get to v. 25, we see that husbands have an overwhelming responsibility in marriage. (3) “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” Remember that Paul is helping us understand, first of all, the relationship of Christ and the church. Several places in the Bible refer to the church as the Bride and Jesus as the Bridegroom. How much did Christ love the church? He loved the church so much, he was willing to sacrifice his own life on the cross.
Using the example of Christ’s love, then, Paul says that husbands should love their wives in the same way that Christ loved. In other words, love goes beyond romantic feelings, as wonderful and exciting as they may be. Love requires sacrifice. It requires giving and living and even dying for the sake of their wives. Did you ever consider that romance and sacrifice go together?
Some of you have heard about the young man who had fallen in love with his girlfriend. One night he told her that he loved her so much he would do anything for her. He would climb the highest mountain, swim the deepest sea, run the longest marathon. And then when he was ready to go home that night, he said, “I’ll see you tomorrow night—if it doesn’t rain.”
How many people do you know who love each other as long as things are going well, but are ready to split when the going gets tough? One of the strangest cases I have heard of is the woman in New York who received the gift of a kidney from her husband and two years later divorced him. He is now suing her for $1.5 million or the return of his kidney. He said, “I saved her life and then to be betrayed like this is unfathomable.” (www.pcdmisforum.com/showthread.php?t=13014 - 41k)
We all know that loving someone does not guarantee that the person will love you back. Jesus can tell you about that. Some of you may be able to tell us about that, too. But the love Paul is talking about is the kind that puts the interests of the other person above one’s own interests. It is never what you can get out of it, but what you can put into it.
In this short time, I have only scratched the surface of the meaning of Ephesians 5. Are you beginning to see why we need to understand the church if we want to understand marriage? All of the values of the church are included here: salvation, love, respect, mutuality, sacrifice, oneness. There is so much more we could learn from these verses.
Even our brief look at these verses today challenges our thinking both with respect to the church and to our marriages.
1. For example, how can we live so that we focus on the best interests of our marriage relationships when all around us the voices and values of society urge us to please ourselves above all?
2. How do we balance the idea of submitting ourselves to someone on the one hand with the command to love that person on the other?
3. What does it mean for husbands to love their wives as Christ loves? I’m sure that every wife would welcome such a husband with open arms, but where will she find one? I have met some wonderful men, but I doubt that any of them were perfect in that regard.
All of this, as Paul says, is a great mystery – the church, Christ’s love, even marriage itself -- but God is at work in our world and we can trust him to accomplish what he has set out to do. Let’s not miss the opportunity to work with Him.
Resources: Thomas R. Yoder-Neufeld. The Believers Church Bible Commentary: Ephesians. Herald Press. 2002.
D.M. Lloyd-Jones. Life in the Spirit: Ephesians 5:18-6:9. Banner of Truth. 1973.
