Sermons

In the name of Christ Jesus, the Bridegroom of the Church, Dear Christian friends, The months of June, July and August are by far the most popular months of the year for weddings. Maybe you have attended a wedding or two this summer? Maybe your family is planning a wedding, a son or daughter, a niece or a nephew. From time to time it is good for all of us (married and unmarried) to spend sometime with God's Word concerning what he says about the lifetime promises we make to our spouse on our wedding day whether that day is in past or the future. A wedding promise is a promise for life. It's a commitment. It's a demonstration of faithfulness. Whenever we make a promise we need to be serious about commitment and faithfulness because if we're not, we have no business making a promise. Unfortunately, all too many promises are made without commitment and without faithfulness. Pride and selfishness get in the way of many promises. And as a result far too many marriages promises are broken. In a world that makes light of promises, commitment and faithfulness it is necessary for us to hear about God's commitment and faithfulness. Every promise from God comes from his unending, unselfish and unconditional love for sinners. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life. God's promises of love and forgiveness for us are absolutely essential when we make our marriage promises of faithfulness and life long commitment. Without God's promises our promises are only empty words. It may have been many years since you stood at the Lord's altar and professed your faithfulness and commitment to your spouse. But that doesn't make your ongoing promises of faithfulness and commitment any less true. When we make a life time promise to our spouse we are promising to live each and every day according to the roles which God has established for the marriage relationship of one man and one woman. Today, as we revisit our own wedding day and our wedding vows, may God the Holy Spirit recommit each of us to the God-given roles in our marriage relationship. These God-given roles show themselves by a demonstration of loving headship on the part of Christian husbands and by a demonstration of loving submission on the part Christian wives. I. The Role Of Loving Headship In the words of our text the Apostle Paul lays out the two distinct roles given by God; one for husbands and one for wives. Each is essential for a Christian marriage. God's Word's uses the perfect example of his Son Jesus and his relationship with all believers to reveal his will. The role of loving headship is Christ's role as he serves his Church. The role of loving submission to the Word of God is the role of every believer in their relationship with Jesus. The first role in the marriage relationship that we would like to look at is the role of the husband. To us who are husbands, God says: HUSBANDS LOVE YOUR WIVES JUST AS CHRIST LOVE THE CHURCH AND GAVE HIMSELF UP FOR HER. God's command to husbands is to love. This love is not patterned after worldly ideas. Instead, God tells us husbands: LOVE JUST AS CHRIST LOVED THE CHURCH. And how did Christ love the Church, the fellowship of believers? The Bible clearly tells us that Christ's love for the Church is a sacrificial love, a caring love and an unbreakable love. Christ, the Bridegroom of the Church, demonstrated his sacrificial love as he willingly offered his life on the cross for the sin of all people. Paul speaks about Christ's sacrificial love for the Church this way: TO MAKE HER HOLY CLEANSING HER BY THE WASHING WITH WATER THROUGH THE WORD. The sacrificial love of Jesus for his Church cost him his very life. He wasn't thinking of his own desires, his own wants or what might be the easiest way out for him when he died on the cross. When he gave up his life on the cross of Calvary he was only thinking about his love for his Church, for you and me. Jesus continues even now after his death and resurrection to care for his people through the powerful Word of God. With that Word he feeds and nurtures saving faith in him as the only Savior from sin and death. This love of Jesus we receive every time we read his Word and meditate on it. In that Word he promises forgiveness when we sin, comfort when we are saddened, strength in times of weakness, safety in times of danger and daily bread in times of need. Jesus' love for his Church is also an unbreakable love. Jesus says: I AM WITH YOU ALWAYS EVEN TO THE END OF THE AGE. NEVER WILL I LEAVE YOU, NEVER WILL I FORSAKE YOU. Without a doubt Jesus is the best example of what it means to love. Today that example of love is laid out before us as we recommit ourselves to our marriage promises. Jesus' example of a sacrificial love, a caring love and an unbreakable love is absolutely necessary for Christian husbands to know and believe. For us as Christian husbands, this is the way God wants us to love our wife. Husbands, God may never ask us to give up our life for our wife, but at the very least we will want to live our life for her. Living for our wife means that our love for her is self-sacrificing and self-giving. It means that we have such a tremendous love for her that we would be willing to do anything for her, even die for her. Loving as Christ loves means that we also have a caring love. This type of love focuses on her best interests. It is a love that takes the needs of our wife into account on every decision that we make. It means that our life is in touch with her emotions and her desires. A caring love is a sensitive love. A caring love is a love that works at communicating. A caring love will build up as our wife as our life time partner and as our best friend. And finally, as Christian husbands, God commands our love for our wife to be an unbreakable love. An unbreakable love is just that, unbreakable. It doesn't become disinterested or bored or tired. An unbreakable love is a life time promise of love. This love is unconditional. This love says, "I will love you in spite of your shortcomings." Husbands the only way you or I can make this promise of love and really meant it is by believing that this is the love our Savior has for all the world. The love of Jesus alone empowers Christian husbands to keep their marriage promises and live according to the roles which God has given them. II. The Role Of Loving Submission The second role in the marriage relationship which God's Word addresses is that of the loving submission on the part of a Christian wife. God says: NOW AS THE CHURCH SUBMITS TO CHRIST, SO ALSO WIVES SHOULD SUBMIT TO THEIR HUSBANDS IN EVERYTHING. Wives, what a treasure you have from God in knowing that your husband is commanded by God to love you with a sacrificial love, a caring love and with an unbreakable love. With this knowledge God wants you to receive with a believing heart his Words about your role in the marriage relationship. In order to understand God's role of loving submission for Christian wives, we need to first look at the Church's role of submission towards Christ. The Church, as the bride of Christ, follows all of the Words of Christ as they are found in the Bible. The Church will submit to all of God's Word, not just some of it. The Church as the bride is not under some type of slavery or bondage in its submission to the Word of God. As believers in Jesus we voluntarily submit to Christ and his will. We do this out of love for God's Word. When the bride of Christ, the Christian Church, submits to every word of Jesus, great and wonderful blessings are sure to follow. This picture of loving submission is now taken over by God and applied to the marriage relationship. This role of loving submission is specifically applied to the Christian wife. It has become evident that the world has great difficulty with this teaching of God's Word. But there is no reason to find it difficult or a hard teaching. God's Word spells out the relationship of a husband and a wife in the simplest and clearest of terms. These roles were never intended to determine worth or value or power or control. In fact these roles are based on loving service to each other. "How may I serve you" is the driving force behind each role of either husband or wife. Husbands, God says, "Love as Christ loved," with a sacrificial love, a caring love and an unbreakable love. Wives, realize what a treasure God has given you in your Christian husband. Submit to him in love. Serve him in love. Support him in love. As the God-given roles for husbands and wives are carried out in a marriage relationship we can see the harmony God intends for every marriage. But because a marriage is a union of two sinners we need to realize that harmony is interrupted by sins of selfishness and self-centeredness. For this reason, Jesus as our Savior needs to be the center of every marriage. His forgiveness, his strength and his love enables each of us to love our spouse as God intended. The love of God for us a sinner is the only thing that empowers us to carry out our God-given roles as husband or wife. Some claim that marriages break up because two people just don't love each other any more. That's not true. Marriages don't break up because two people don't love each other anymore. Marriages break up because sin is allowed to enter that marriage, control it and snuff out the fire of loving commitment and service. What do you do when sin begins to control your marriage relationship and cause your love to run low or ever out? Well, what do you do when your car runs out of gas? Do you junk it? Do you throw it away? Do you trade it in on a new make or a new model? Well of course not, that would be absurd and ridiculous. When your car runs out of gas you just go to the gas station and fill it up with gas again. What happens to a marriage when it runs low on love or even runs out of love? Do you junk it? Do you throw it away? Do you trade it in on a new make or a new model. No of course not, that too would be absurd and ridiculous. When your marriage runs low on love you just fill it up with love again. Our marriages need to be filled up with God 's love and forgiveness for sinners on a daily basis. Husbands and wives need to know and believe that good, God-pleasing marriages just don't happen by themselves. They are a result of persistent prayer and study of God's Word. Through the ongoing study of his Word God will grant each of us the strength to live out our God-given roles as husband or wife with happy and joyful hearts. May God ever bless our marriage promises of commitment and faithfulness through his powerful Word, even and especially as we live in this sinful world. May God grant the present and future husbands and wives of our congregation dedicated hearts and lives centered on and around the Word of God. May that Word of truth bring immeasurable blessings to our Christian homes. Amen