Some Responsibilities Of The Husband In The Home

Responsibilities Of A Christian Husband

Eph. 5:21-25, 6:1-4 "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so [let] the wives [be] to their own husbands in every thing. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; . . Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. Honour thy father and mother; (which is the first commandment with promise;) That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth. And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord."

The great British Field Marshall, Montgomery reportedly said to his young soldiers one day, "Gentlemen, don't even think of marriage until you have mastered the art of warfare!" Is his evaluation of the difficulties involved in marriage valid today?

Every form of media in every land is filled with stories that can be directly related to broken homes and marriages. Not only has divorce become the norm, but society has placed it's stamp of approval upon every form of short and long term relationship imaginable; even perverted relationships outside the sacred bonds of holy matrimony. Recent news indicates that well over seventy percent of Afro-American children born in America last year were born outside of wedlock. The figure for the culture as a whole has reached thirty percent. So-called homosexual unions are creeping ever closer to being culturally and legally accepted nationwide in the U.S.

The record is at least equally appalling in our own nation, Australia. Some eighty percent of young couples between the ages of eighteen and twenty-eight that live together in our State of Queensland do so outside the bonds of matrimony. In large areas populated by those in lower socioeco- nomic situations, sixty to seventy percent of families have single parents; usually a single mother. Pastors, counsellors and social workers increas- ingly hear ever more tragic horror stories from brokenhearted husbands, tearful wives and disillusioned children; stories of misery and unhappiness in the home.

Many studies have been made in recent years designed to identify the

basic causative factors in marriage breakup and family destruction. Results are not too surprising. Moral breakdown in society, the technological and media revolution, social and peer pressures, economic and financial pressures that result in mothers and fathers spending less and less time with each other and their children, homes without a father or a mother as positive role models, materialism and the spirit of uncontrolled acquisition; and so the list of those things contributing to the destruction of the traditional family goes on and on.

However, in all these studies a basic fact seems to be ignored. Since God created man and instituted the union between man and woman, called marriage, by marrying the first couple in the garden of Eden and commanding that couple to be fruitful and multiply (create families), it is obvious that the basic problem in the home is spiritual.

The story of the very first family in history confirms this. If you examine the story closely, you will find that an abdication of leadership responsibility by the first husband and the desire for leadership by the first wife and the subsequent reversal of roles clearly contributed to the first spiritual problem in the first family. Later, sibling rivalry, jealousy, and envy made their entrance into the relationships within that family. The tragic story culminates with the first blood being shed by man - within a family! All this had its roots in the spiritual problem of rebellion against God and His way. The way of Cain then became a Biblical synonym for the spiritual problems of man. Many of these problems still find their most hurtful and harmful manifestation in dysfunctional homes.

It was God who said that it is not good that man should be alone and then made him a help meet. It is the Bible that gives the rules and regulations governing marriage and family that have been successfully implemented to create happy Christian marriages throughout the generations of man. It follows that the real basic reasons for breakdown and unhappiness in the home are spiritual. We have departed from the Word of God and no longer acknowledge His plan for the family. Family members no longer seem to understand God's way for relationships in the family. Or they refuse to accept their particular roles and responsibilities as outlined in the Bible. God warns that if we depart from His plan for the family or any of His ordained institutions, we will be in serious difficulty and the happiness of the home will be in danger.