STUDY THEME: RELATIONSHIPS WORTH IMPROVING. 5-09-04

“LOVING SPOUSES.” EPH. 5:22-33; 1 COR. 7:1-6

EPHESIANS 5: 21-25, 28-33; 1 COR. 7:1-2, 3-6.

PLEASE OPEN YOUR BIBLE TO EPHESISANS 5.

Next to a person’s relationship with God, the highest relationship in life is to one’s spouse. The Bible’s standard of marriage is a very high standard indeed! Hollywood movies and television programs do not reflect the biblical standard. Christians need to take biblical teachings seriously so that we can honor God and have the type of marriages which will honor God and bless our families.

There is a beautiful description of the first marriage in Genesis 2:18-24. God creates a wife for Adam and institutes the most unique beginning of any relationship. In Mark 10:6-8 Jesus said “In the beginning God made a man and a woman. That’s why a man leaves his father and mother and gets married. He becomes like one person with his wife. Then they are no longer two people, but one.” He said the same thing as recorded in Matt. 19:5-6.

In two letters to different churches, Paul addressed matters concerning the marriage relationship. Paul wrote the Christians in Ephesus about submission and relationships within the body of Christ, and he also addressed the type of relationship husbands and wives are to have. On another occasions, Paul wrote to the Christians in Corinth who did not understand the beauty and sanctity of the physical relationship within marriage. Paul explained the authority spouses have over one another in an exclusive marriage relationship. Paul described sexual relationships in marriage as right and normal.

Today many people stress their rights but ignore their responsibilities. Nowhere is this more true than in marriage relationships. The Bible teaches that marriage involves responsibilities of love and respect, sexual exclusiveness, and marital intimacy. The biblical focus includes what husbands and wives give to the relationship—not merely what they receive from it.

1. PLEASE READ EPHESIANS 5: 21-25.

Paul had just explained how believers are to live and act in the body of Christ, ending in Eph.5:21 on the note that we are to submit “to one another in the fear of Christ.” Paul now addressed this within the context of three specific relationships: husbands and wives, parents and children, and masters and slaves. He began with the relationship between a husband and wife. The uniqueness and value of this relationship can be seen in the parallel Paul drew between marriage and the relationship of Christ and His church.

Women have been known to say that a good man is hard to find. Nonetheless, the institution of marriage shows no sign of declining in popularity. Most women still choose to pursue a man until he finally catches her!

So what’s a man to do once he has caught the woman of his dreams and the wedding bells become a distant memory? He then sets about the business of really learning to love her with unconditional love. He must be willing to sacrifice, focus on her well being, and care for her as much as he cares for himself.

The husband’s love for his wife is compared to the divine example---Christ’s love for the church. That standard is high; it reminds us of how seriously God views the institution of marriage.

God intended for marriage to be a perfect union between one man and one woman in every way. At the time Paul wrote these words, though, the culture’s view of marriage—and especially the role of women—was awful.

Christianity confronted the first-century world with a new way of looking at sex, women and marriage. The first century world was a sexual wilderness. All kinds of sexual sins and perversions were practiced by many and condoned by the rest. Adultery, fornication, prostitution, and homosexuality were common. Many early Christians had committed such sins, and some continued to be tempted by them. The Christian missionaries called for faithfulness within the one-flesh marriage union.

In the Greco-Roman cultures women, for the most part, did not have fulfilling lives. Wives were ignored except to bear legitimate children. Other women were prostitutes or mistresses to the straying men. Divorce was widespread, even in Jewish society. Many Jews felt that a woman was not a person but a thing. Divorce was quite easy to obtain in the Jewish culture. What makes this especially sad is that the Jews had the highest ideal of marriage compared to other cultures.

Genesis 2:24 is the key O.T. verse of God’s plan for marriage. It says “A man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” The verse shows that family is the foundation of society and marriage is the foundation of the family. It presents marriage as the one flesh union of husband and wife. The importance of this verse is seen in how Jesus and Paul used it. Jesus quoted it to show that God’s plan for marriage is the lifetime union of one man and one woman.

Paul quoted it in 1 Cor. 6:16 to show that sex with a prostitute perverts God’s purpose for sex. He quoted it again in Ephesians 5:31 to undergird marriage as a lifetime commitment in a one-flesh relationship, which in some ways is like the union of Christ and the church.

You may remember there arose quite a controversy in the Southern Baptist 2000 Convention when vs. 24 was introduced. The submission of the Christians wives to their husbands was questioned. Some pointed out that vs. 21 canceled out the specific submission of a Christian wife to her husband. Those in favor point out that the wife’s submission is voluntary.

That is, the wife must choose to follow this biblical injunction. No one but God is said to have subjected anyone. Thus no husband is ever told to subject his wife to his authority. Voluntary submission is God’s plan for the wife, but neither God nor her husband does the subjecting.

The wife’s husband shows the kind of self-giving love set forth in vs. 25. In Christian marriage the wife’s submission does not imply any inferiority.

The Baptist Faith and Message, 2000, Article XVIII, states, “The husband and wife are of equal worth before God, since both are created in God’s image.” Peter, as did Paul, called for the Christian wife to submit herself, and he referred to a Christian in 1 Peter 3:7 as “heirs together of the grace of life.”

Throughout Eph. 5:22-33, Paul noted certain parallels of the marriage relationship to the relationship between Christ and the church. The clearest likeness is in vs. 25. Just as Christian wives are to submit to their husbands, so Christian husbands are instructed to love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it. The obedience of Christian wives to their husbands is one expression of their obedience to the Lord.

Having established the foundation principle of submission in vs. 21, Paul applied it first to the wife. The command is unqualified, applying to every Christians wife, no matter what her own abilities, education, knowledge of Scripture, spiritual maturity, or any other qualifications might be in relation to those of her husband. The submission is not the husband’s to command but for the wife to willingly and lovingly offer.

The phrase “your own husband” limits her submission to the one man God has placed over her, and also gives a balancing emphasis that he is hers as a personal intimate possession. She submits to the man she possesses as her own, “As to the Lord.” Because the obedient spiritual wife’s supreme submission is to the Lord, her attitude is that she lovingly submits as an act of obedience to the Lord who has given the command as His will for her, regardless of her husband’s personal worthiness or spiritual condition.

The spirit-filled wife recognizes that her husband’s role in giving leadership, is not only God ordained, but is a reflection of Christ’s own loving, authoritative headship of the church.

As the Lord delivered His church from the dangers of sin, death and hell, so the husband provides for, protects, preserves, and loves his wife, leading her to blessings as she submits.

Though the husband’s authority has been established in vs. 22-24 the emphasis moves in vs. 25 to the supreme responsibility of husbands in regard to their wives, who is to love them with the same unreserved, selfless, and sacrificial love that Christ has for His church. Christ gave everything He had, including His own life, for the sake of His church, and that is the standard of sacrifice for a husband’s love for his wife. (Col. 3:19)

2. PLEASE READ EPHESIANS 5: 28-33.

Vs. 26-33 continue the descriptions of the Christ-church union, seeking parallels to the husband-wife relationship. At times Paul seemed to be dealing only with one or the other. In. vs. 28-29 Paul returned to the emphasis on Marriage.

The marriage relationship, like all relationships, must be nurtured and renewed. This is especially true of the most vital human relationships. Too many husbands assume their marriage can be carried along on impetus from the past. This is not true. The old joke may be too true to be funny. A husband complained. “I told my wife I loved her when we were first married. Why do I have to keep repeating it? She ought to know that I love her.”

The great mystery of vs. 32 is the fact that parallels exist between the Lord’s relationship to the church and the husband’s relationship to his wife. Vs. 33 sums up the two main exhortations of Ephesians 5:22-33—the husband is to love his wife and the wife is to respect her husband. The marriage relationship calls for love and respect.

Vs. 28 is one of the most poignant and compelling descriptions of the oneness that should characterize Christian marriage. A Christian husband is to care for his wife with the same devotion that he naturally manifests as he cares for himself---even more so, since his self-sacrificing love causes him to put her first. In the end, a husband who loves his wife in these ways brings great blessing to himself from her and from the Lord.

Nourishes and cherishes in vs. 29 express the twin responsibilities of providing for her needs so as to help her grow mature in Christ and provide warm and tender affection to give her comfort and security.

In vs. 30 Christ provides for His church because it is so intimately and inseparably connected to Him. If He did not care for His church, He would be diminishing His own glory, which the church brings to Him by praise and obedience. So, in marriage, the husband’s life is so intimately joined to the wife’s that they are one. When he cares for her, he actually cares for himself.

In vs. 31 Paul reinforces the divine plan, which God instituted at creation in Gen. 2:24, emphasizing its permanence and unity. The union of marriage is intimate and unbreakable. “Joined” is a word used to express having been glued or cemented together, emphasizing the permanence of the union. Marriage is a sacred reflection of the magnificent and beautiful mystery of union between the Messiah and His church, completely unknown until the N.T. The intimacy and sacredness of the love relationship between believing marriage partners is to be a visual expression of the love between Christ and His church.

This type of love doesn’t drag another person down but seeks the best for the one loved. Christ’s love is also an unbreakable love. Nothing can separate us from His love.

Marriage should promote unity and oneness. The head is nothing without the body, and the body is nothing without the head. The husband and wife are incomplete without each other.

Unfortunately, the fallen sinful nature has led many men to be unloving, even tyrannical, toward their wives, and it has led many women to desire to rule over their husbands and refuse to practice loving submission. Christ has set us free form our bondage to sin, though, and instead of following these impulses that led us to weaken and cheapen the marriage relationship, we are to follow the example of Christ and His church.

Hopefully, you have experienced the joy hat comes from living in an intimate, loving, submissive relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ, and that wonderful experience is similar to what a husband and wife are to experience together. That is why Paul moved from talking about Christ and the church –his example for marriage—to sum up the marriage relationship: The husband is to love his wife as himself, and the wife is to respect her husband.

PLEASE TURN TO 1 CORINTHIANS 7.

3. PLEASE READ 1 CORINTHIANS 7: 1-2.

The believers in Corinth made up a very unique church. You do not have to dig deep to discover that the church of Corinth was full of problems: even a casual reading of 1 Cor. will make that obvious. Much of Paul’s letter to them addressed the problems in the church. Paul also used the letter to answer some specific questions they asked. We do not have the church’s correspondence to Paul, but we do have his response. Ch. 7 begins Paul’s response to the questions about the things you wrote. We do not know the specific questions the church members asked, but the context of Paul’s responses in Ch.7: 1-24 helps us to see that they did ask questions about the issues of marriage and divorce.

Beginning in Ch. 7 Paul addressed a question the Corinthians raised about the marriage relationship. In particular, they asked a question about the desirability of marriage and the duties of married believers. Why was this even an issue? The Corinthian believers lived in a culture that endorsed and practiced sexual liberty and license. Such immorality is out of place among God’s people, but apparently there was a group within the church that went much further.

These people not only spoke about sexual immorality, but they spoke out against sexual relations of any kind, even between husbands and wives. These people were ascetics, men and women who believed that your spiritual life could be strengthened by denying your self bodily pleasures.

While fasting could be viewed as a form of asceticism, many ascetics take this to extreme, practicing a rigorous self-denial and abstinence. Without the context of what was happening in Corinth, it seems that a group claimed such abstinence applied to all physical relationships---even the sexual relationship in marriage.

Paul summarized this view in vs. 1. It is good for a man to not have relations with or not to touch a woman. The way Paul has summed up the issue, though, leads one to believe that this is he same way he viewed the matter. Later in vs. 32 Paul did say that “an unmarried man is concerned about the things of the Lord---how he may please the Lord.” There is something to be said for remaining unmarried and celibate. There is moral excellence in that lifestyle.

Unlike the ascetics, though, Paul did not hold this to be true in marriage. The ascetics saw celibacy as the absolute good, but Paul did not. Celibacy is good, but because of sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband. Some may wonder if Paul was writing disparagingly of marriage, as though it is second best.

This was not what Paul meant, for such a view of marriage would be contrary to Gen. 1: 18 where God acknowledged that it was not good for man to be alone and created woman to be his companion. Such a view would also run contrary to what we studied earlier in Eph. 5. Paul had a very high and noble view of marriage, comparing it to the greatest relationship of all: Christ and His bride the church.

If Paul had such a high view of marriage, why did he say but because of sexual immorality? This sounds like marriage is good only because it keeps a person from avoiding the sin of sexual immorality. Pal did no believe marriage was the lesser of two options, as though marriage was only for weak people.

Paul was acknowledging the problem that occurs when a man and woman do not enter into an exclusive relationship with each other. The celibate lifestyle is morally demanded before marriage. Celibacy is a “gift from God,” but so is sexual desire. Sexual desire is designed by God to be fulfilled in the marriage relationship; therefore, each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband. If this sexual urge is not rightfully fulfilled in the marriage relationship, it can lead to sexual immorality.

Paul made it clear how sexual relationships were to be handled: Each man should have his own wife. The verb “have” carries the concept of exclusive ownership, as in possessing something, or holding on to something. It is equally true that each woman should have her own husband. There is a mutual ownership that has an exclusive nature to it, eliminating all other physical relationships with other people.

4. PLEASE READ 1 CORINTHIANS 7:3-6.

The Corinthian church was riddled with problems and divisive issues. 1^st Corinthians Ch. 5-7 deals with problems regarding sex. As usual, there were differences in the church. One group apparently was constantly looking for excuses to participate in the many forms of sexual immorality. Their outlook is the background for the chapters 5-6.

Another group seems to have held ascetic beliefs. Their outlook is reflected in Ch. 7. Ascetics believe that things of the flesh, such as sex, could and should be shunned. Thus, judging from what Paul wrote, some ascetic members were advocating marriage without sex.

At the beginning of the lesson, in vs. 3, the words due benevolence sound like a stewardship emphasis. However, the words in this context refer to the responsibility for mutuality in sexual relations between a husband and his wife. “A husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise a wife to her husband.”

When Paul ordered “defraud” or “deprive” ye not one the other, he used a strong word. In what way can a wife defraud her husband, or, a husband defraud his wife? The answer is clear. Refusing normal sexual relations to one’s spouse defrauds the spouse of what is rightfully his or hers. Spouses offer a wide variety of excuses or reasons for committing this sin. Do you think sin is too strong a word? What else would you call fraud against yours spouse and disobedience against your God? This is a very personal issue, and each couple must look at their sexual relationship in light of this and other Bible passages. No area of a marriage relationship is so intimae. What message does one spouse send to the other by refusing normal expressions of their one-flesh union?

Paul was concerned about the pressure on a spouse who was denied bedroom privileges. The first century---like the 21^st---was filled with sexual temptations. Spouses who do not have a normal sex life at home may be tempted to seek it elsewhere. A person who commits sexual immorality cannot excuse such sin, but a spouse who defrauds his or her spouse shares part of the guilt.

In vs. 5 Paul made one “concession” in this matter. He allowed a couple to negotiate with each other for a temporary time of refraining from their normal sexual relationships. He listed four conditions in vs. 5. (l) Abstaining from sexual relations had to be for only a specified period of time. (2) The time of abstinence was to be so the spouses could devote themselves to a spiritual purpose (fasting and prayer). (3) Both spouses had to agree to this plan. (4) Normal sexual relations would begin again after the end of the mutually agreed upon period of abstinence.

Maintaining marital intimacy is a special challenge in the high-pressure world of today’s adults. But a Christian couple cannot ignore this vital aspect of a healthy marriage relationship. If they do ignore this area, they open the door to Satan’s temptation---Otherwise, Satan my tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

NEXT WEEK FROM EPHESIANS 6 AND 1 TIMOTHY 5, WE FIND THAT PARENTS AND CHILDREN OF ALL AGES HAVE RESPONSIBILITIES TO ONE ANOTHER IN DEVELOPING STRONG FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS. altav@swbell.net www://the weeks.org/av/