The Battle for the Home
Ephesians 5:21-6:4
At the annual family-reunion picnic, a young bride led her husband over to an old woman busily crocheting in a rocker. "Granny," she said, touching the old woman's hand affectionately, "this is my new husband." The woman eyed him critically for a long moment, then asked abruptly, "Do you desire children?" Startled by her bluntness, the young man blushed and stammered, "Well-uh-yes, I do very much." "Well," she said, looking scornfully at the large tribe gathered around the six picnic tables, "try to control it!"
When we talk about family and marriage, I want to begin by talking about grace. The difficulty in preaching a sermon like this is, you do not want those who have had a failed marriage, for whatever reason, to feel condemned. God is a God of “other chances.”
However, we do not want to do anything but encourage the existing marriages to hang with it. That is the purpose for these sermons; to help existing marriages to succeed.
We try to strike a balance there, that there is restoration for any choices that we make or that may be handed to us by another. Perhaps the right balance of grace can be found in 1 Cor. 7:26-27. “I think that in view of the present distress it is good for a person to remain as he is. Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be free. Are you free from a wife? Do not seek a wife.” Paul goes on to say other things in this passage, and we may need to look at them later.
Our position on the home, the family, is that the home should be a fortress of rest against the battles of life and not a battleground all its own. However, since the beginning, the home has been a battleground targeted by Satan. Satan tempted one side of the first marriage. Brother killed brother in the first family. Husbands lied about their wives being their sisters to preserve themselves. Brother betrayed brother, stealing the birthright and the blessing. The list is exhaustive in the scriptures. Incest, rape, hatred, jealousy, greed…. All under the roof of the home. The Bible never shelters us from this dark side of religious life. The Bible does not create the impression that Bible characters were better at home than they were in their lives.
This honest look at the characters of Saints reminds us that there is no perfect family. No home is without need of more love, forgiveness, intimacy, compassion and tolerance. Christ’s presence in our life has not insured success in the home, although it makes an improving home a possibility like no other time in history.
Despite that reality, as the divorce rate has increased in the general population, it has risen in the Church and in Christianity in general. Somewhere, the battle for the home is not being won by the power of Christ given to us.
It is not Christ’s fault, the absence of the Holy Spirit, the lack of guidance from the Scriptures. It is probably our failure to teach the way of victory in the home. I hope today we can tackle this subject thorough enough to help improve your home life, no matter how good it may be right now. I pray there is enough instruction here to help your marriage, no matter how bad it may be.
Introduction: Marriage difficulties:
Marriages today are in trouble because the battle for the home cannot be won if the battle for the mind is lost. If you did not get the previous message in the series, copies are available of the transcript in the foyer. It begins there, winning the battle of the mind, but the Bible gives us more instructions to increase the peace we can have at home.
The top three failures in marriage fall into the following categories.
1. Expectations. Married life and the spouse is not what was expected, and love is not
2. Selfishness. Lack of surrender to each other, holding out something for self.
3. Distractions. Exterior pressures becoming interior issues. Whether in laws, finances, jobs, hobbies and pastimes, things and others become a priority over the relationships of family.
Marriage counseling primarily involves aligning these three things; the differing expectations of the wife husband, the recognition and confession of selfish emotional hold-outs, and the elimination or minimization of distractions to a peaceful marital relationship. A successful Church who fortifies successful marriages addresses these three things on a regular basis. Paul addressed these very things in a wonderful way in our text.
I. Dual Submission (5:21). Eph 5:21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
This verse is the tail end of a long sentence telling us how to worship together and live a life of praise. But it ties into our “family instructions with the common word “submit”. Before Paul, through the Holy Spirit’s leadership, gets to the topic of family life, he instructs us to live lives in submission to each other. Marriage does not overshadow this instruction, so we begin here.
As Paul introduces family life in the Kingdom of God, he reminds us that we are to live for the betterment of others. This is the foundation of a strong marriage and family life. The remaining instructions are seen through the lens of a life lived for the benefit of each other.
A. Submission of the wife (5:22-24).
Eph 5:22-24 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 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. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
This is one of the most hated passages in the New Testament because it is often abused. It must be seen in light of its context or human weakness and selfishness will cause us to warp the meaning. The wife is being instructed to submit to a man who meets two qualifications in the Christian home. Why was this put so, to submit to the husband? Because God’s full plan works beautifully.
The first thing I want us to notice is that when there are two ways; one is right and one is wrong. Where there is darkness and light, light is good and darkness is representative of evil. Where there is cold and warmth, cold is bad and warmth is good. Same with good and evil as it is represented in all things.
This is true in order and disorder, as well as authority and anarchy. Authority is good and protecting and anarchy is bad and destructive. When it comes to God’s directions, there is no such thing as too much good. God placed order and authority in the home because He loved us and He loved the good the home would produce.
Where on the scale of order and disorder is the preferred place of a marriage? Where on the scale of authority and anarchy is God pleased with a marriage? It is natural and understandable that a God of order and authority would place order and authority in the home. I may not like it sometimes when the responsibility of authority doesn’t fit comfortably on me. My wife may not like it sometimes because submitting to me is not comfortable. But God shows us His Character in this instruction because “God is not the author of confusion” 1 Corinthians 14:33.
We could expand this coverage by going into Genesis and showing you that man receives his value in a relationship through respect, so this is how his helpmeet is instructed to complete him. We should also mention that this authority, though given for good, outside of God’s purpose is used for evil. That is the greatest fear of the wife; that the sin nature of the husband would abuse his God-given authority. Unfortunately, there are more examples of this than there is a Godly use of authority.
Notice our next verses.
B. Submission of the husband (5:25-33).
Eph 5:25-33 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 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. 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." 32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33 However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Husbands, authority is abused and damaging when you do not submit to God. You do not submit to God until you submit to your wives.You submit to your wife, not by falling under her authority, but you using your God-given authority to love your wife.
This is done with Christ as our model. He loved the Church and gave Himself for her. You submit yourself to your wife by loving her and giving yourself to her. This very type of loving draws out her submission to God and to you.
Ill. A little orphan boy was up for adoption. He met the prospective parents and they asked to have a meeting with him. In the meeting the couple, the husband said. “Young man, we want to adopt you with an agreement with you. We are asking you to obey us. We want you to mind us when we instruct you, follow our leading when we correct you and love us, even when things don’t go your way.”
The little boy asked, “What will you do for me?”
The father said, “We will love you, feed you, clothe you, make sure you have a good education and training, try to see that your life is as fun and fulfilling as possible, and we will love you like you have never been loved.”
The little boy didn’t even think about it. He said, “Let’s go.”
When a husband tells his wife, “I want to love you, bless you, honor you, live for you, use my authority to please you, bring you joy and happiness, protect you, even if it takes dying to myself. I will love you second only to our God.” There is not a woman I know who would resist that. There is not a woman I know who would not surrender to a man who puts God first and uses the authority God gave him to please her. This is how the proper use of husband authority cleanses his wife like Christ cleanses His bride. This is done by the husband using his authority to put his wife ahead of himself. “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.”
This is done by the husband putting the wife ahead of any other family member. "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh."
Again, we could go into Genesis and show how a woman receives her value in a relationship by how she is loved. Therefore, in this way, the husband completes her in the marriage.
May I put a little opinion into this that is commonly shared in commentaries and teachers? The portion of this passage that catches in the craw of the world is the easier part. The attack on the Baptist Faith and Message 2000 is the idea of the wife submitting to the husband. That would be far easier than telling the wife she had to love her husband like Christ loved us.
That’s the hard part. Gentlemen, instead of squirming at the message, too many times we point at evidence of the wife not submitting. We need to be live in constant repantance for our failures to love our wives as Christ loved the Church.
II. Shaping of the Children (Ephesians 6:1-4).
Eph 6:1-4 Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 "Honor your father and mother" (this is the first commandment with a promise), 3 "that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land." 4 Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.
The next section is about the children in the home.
A. Children are products of the relationship between parents.
God uses the physical to demonstrate universal truths. When the husband and wife come together to have a child, the child produced is a product of the physical union. The child is also a product of the emotional union of the parents. The child is also a product of the spiritual union of the parents.
Let me point out that this appears to apply both to nature and nurture. First, a child will inherit traits of both birth parents, both emotionally and spiritually. But just as important, a child will adopt traits, both emotional and spiritual from the parents who raise him or her.
The one spiritual exception to this is when one of the couple is not saved, God’s grace extends spiritually over the children so there is no barrier from coming to Him. This is why Paul had to make a clarification on what he had taught about this, particularly when a believer is married with an unbeliever. 1Co 7:13-14 “If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him. 14 For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.”
Nature is set, so what you deal with now is the nurture portions. Children will become expectant in their lives by how the adults in their lives respond and react to each other.
B. The most important relationship in the home must be, therefore, the relationship between the husband and the wife.
C. When this is working well, you will see three characteristics transferred from the RELATIONSHIP of the marriage into the children’s lives.
1. Courage - 1 Chronicles 28:20 “And David said to Solomon his son, Be strong and of good courage, and do it: fear not, nor be dismayed: for the LORD God, even my God, will be with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee, until thou hast finished all the work for the service of the house of the LORD.”
Children were hardwired for struggle and pain. That is good, because life is full of struggle and pain. As the child wrestles in the struggles and pain, he or she either grows strong and courageous or timid and fearful.
The gift of courage is learned by the children by their observance of their parents’ vulnerability towards each other. IF the mother and the father live in constant defensive positions against each other, the child will not learn to give themselves in love at the risk of pain. Courage will not be learned by this timid and socially awkward child.
However, if the parents deal with each other with trusting vulnerability, the child will learn not only courage in live, but the ability to deal with pain in an acceptable way.
2. Compassion - 1Jn 3:17-18 “But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? 18 Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.”
When parents are vulnerable to each other and accept the pain the other causes, responding correctly to conflict and pain, the child learns compassion. Children learn love, not only through the warm and fuzzy times between their parents, which should be many.
They learn from the times of conflict that love is “…patient and kind; does not envy or boast; is not arrogant or rude; does not insist on its own way; is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. For love never ends.” 1 Cor. 13:4-8.
Either this, or the child comes to believe that if something does not go his or her way, it is equal to rejection, a cause for war, or because the child is unworthy of love.
3. Connection - Gal 4:6 And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, "Abba! Father!" 7 So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.
We want our children to understand that they are worthy of love and belonging. That worthiness is not “…not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.” Titus 3:5.
The child’s worthiness for love is based upon being created in God’s image and being offered redemption by God’s only Son. Those are two unshakable truths that will never change, regardless of the child’s mistake.
Here is the catch. When a child sees his parents treating each other as if the other were worthless, the child natural is wired to believe he or she is a product of that worthlessness. If mommy treats daddy as worthless, than I surely must be worthless, because daddy is more complete than me. If daddy treats mommy as worthless, than I surely must be worthless, because mommy is more complete than me. And the child deducts, “If I am worthless, I am unworthy of love and cannot connect with others. I must hide myself or punish others for reminding me of my worthlessness.”
Yet, when the husband honors the wife with self-sacrifice, and the wife honors the wife with submission, the child will be able to follow the model of godliness and connect with others.
Rudyard Kipling once wrote about families, "all of us are we--and everyone else is they." A family shares things like dreams, hopes, possessions, memories, smiles, frowns, and gladness...A family is a clan held together with the glue of love and the cement of mutual respect. A family is shelter from the storm, a friendly port when the waves of life become too wild. No person is ever alone who is a member of a family.
