Crossroad Online
Silent Night
Hi, this is Pastor Ken. Generally, on Thursdays I bring you my thoughts about some currently notable subject or personal story from my life and connect it to a scriptural truth. However, for the past three years on the Thursday before Christmas I have shared with you a Christ-centered Christmas poem or Christmas story by another author that I found valuable. This year I decided to bring the words of a well-known Christmas Carol and the back-story behind its writing. So here are my Christmas thoughts on this Thursday, December 21st, 2023…Silent night.
Allow me to begin by reading the words from the now famous song. I find that we often sing songs that are well known almost automatically giving voice to the lyrics. This auto-response to the melody sometimes conceals the depth of each stanza’s true meaning. So I thought…its Christmas…let’s open the gift of the originally intended meaning and expose each verse free of its melodious wrapping.
Silent night, Holy night. All is calm, all is bright. Round yon virgin, mother and child. Holy infant so tender and mild. Sleep in heavenly peace; sleep in heavenly peace.
Silent night, Holy night. Shepherds quake at the sight. Glories stream from heaven afar. Heavenly host sing al-le-lu-ia. Christ the savior is born; Christ the savior is born.
Silent night, Holy night. Wondrous star, lend thy light. With the angels let us sing, Al-le-lu-ia to our King. Christ the Savior is born; Christ the savior is born.
Silent night, Holy night. Son of God, love’s pure light. Radiant beams from thy holy face, with the dawn of redeeming grace. Jesus, Lord at thy birth; Jesus, Lord at thy birth.
In the New Living Translation Isaiah 7:14 says, The Lord Himself will give you a sign, Look! The virgin will conceive a child! She will give birth to a son and call Him Emanuel (which means) God is with us. Just two chapters later we read in Isaiah 9:6-7; For a child is born to us, a son is given to us. The government will rest on His shoulders. And He will be called; Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. His government and its peace will never end. He will rule with fairness and justice from the throne of His ancestor David for all eternity. The passionate commitment of the Lord of Heaven’s armies will make this happen!
There can be no argument that the evening that the virgin Mary gave birth to the Lord was indeed a Holy night. That night the glory of God was revealed in human form! The word of God recorded for us in Isaiah 7:14 was fulfilled on that Holiest of nights. Was it a silent night? That I am not so sure of. A baby was born, in a stable…in the small city of Bethlehem. Luke 2:1-7 tells us about it. At that time the Roman emperor, Augustus, decreed that a census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire. (This was the first census taken when Quirinius was governor of Syria.) All returned to their own ancestral towns to register for this census. And because Joseph was a descendant of King David, he had to go to Bethlehem in Judea, David’s ancient home. He traveled there from the village of Nazareth in Galilee. He took with him Mary, to whom he was engaged, who was now expecting a child. And while they were there, the time came for her baby to be born. She gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him snugly in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no lodging available for them.
We do know that it was not a silent night out in the pastureland where the shepherds were. Luke 2:8-20 tells us about all the noise in the normally quiet fields outside the city. That night there were shepherds staying in the fields nearby, guarding their flocks of sheep. Suddenly, an angel of the Lord appeared among them, and the radiance of the Lord’s glory surrounded them. They were terrified, but the angel reassured them. “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I bring you good news that will bring great joy to all people. The Savior—yes, the Messiah, the Lord—has been born today in Bethlehem, the city of David! And you will recognize him by this sign: You will find a baby wrapped snugly in strips of cloth, lying in a manger.” Suddenly, the angel was joined by a vast host of others—the armies of heaven—praising God and saying, “Glory to God in highest heaven, and peace on earth to those with whom God is pleased.” When the angels had returned to heaven, the shepherds said to each other, “Let’s go to Bethlehem! Let’s see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.” They hurried to the village and found Mary and Joseph. And there was the baby, lying in the manger. After seeing him, the shepherds told everyone what had happened and what the angel had said to them about this child. All who heard the shepherds’ story were astonished, but Mary kept all these things in her heart and thought about them often. The shepherds went back to their flocks, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen. It was just as the angel had told them. It was a Holy night to be sure…Silent? Not so much…at least not as far as the angels and shepherds were concerned. Their excitement and jubilation was however the only reasonable response to finding out that the Messiah had finally come to set His people free, once and for all time!
So what is the back story for this well-known Christmas Carol? Allow me to set the stage. It was Christmas eve in the Alps. A new church had just been built in a small village near Salzburg Austria. In the new church Father Joseph Mohr prepared for the midnight service. He was upset because the new church organ was not working properly yet which he felt would ruin the musical part of the Christmas Eve service. Father Joseph was about to discover that our problems are often the hand of God working in ways we do not yet understand.
It came to Father Joseph that he should write a new song, one that could be easily sung without the organ. He hastily wrote down the words, “Silent night, Holy night all is calm, all is bright”. Taking those and the words that followed to his organist, Franz Gruber, Father Joseph explained the need and asked Franz to compose a simple tune for the new song.
That night, December 24th, 1818 “Silent Night” was sung for the first time as a duet, accompanied by a guitar at the aptly named Church of St. Nicholas in Oberndorf.
A short time later a craftsman named Karl Mauracher came to repair the organ. There he heard the story of the new song that the broken organ had made necessary. He acquired a copy of the lyrics and melody and spread it throughout the Austrian Alpine region. He called the song, “Tiroler Volkslied”
The song came to the attention of the Strasser family who had four children who sang the song at many fairs and festivals. They were once even invited to perform it for the king and queen of Austria which ensured the growing fame of the song. As a result of their regular performances of the tune, they became famous folk singers in the region much like the Von Trapp children a century later.
“Silent night was first published in a German church hymnal in 1838. It was used in German churches in America and first appeared in English published in a book of Sunday School songs in 1863. If it had not been for a broken organ in a newly built church 45 years earlier…there would have been no “Silent Night”.
I have become accustom to closing out my podcasts by telling you to “Go Be Awesome” But this week I think I will simply wish all of you a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year filled with Hope. However, I do think it fitting just this once to borrow a different sign off line, one much more famous than mine. As the late Paul Harvey would have said at the end of a recording such as this one about “Silent Night”…”So now you know the rest of the story…Good Day!”
Order and Structure of a God Shaped Marriage Vol. 5
Order and Structure of a God Shaped Marriage Vol. 5
Hi, this is Pastor Ken welcome back to another edition of the Monday Marriage Message where we search God’s instructions to experience a highly successful marriage. We will continue today with our look at the scripturally given order and structure of a God shaped marriage.
Since the beginning of this series, I have directed your attention to the God-given order and structure of a God Shaped Marriage found in 1 Corinthians 11:3. Once again, that passage in the Amplified Bible reads as follows: But I want you to know and realize that Christ is the Head of every man, the head of a woman is her husband, and the Head of Christ is God. As the focus of this series is order and structure, I felt it doubly important to follow the very order and structure of this focal scripture. Therefore, I dedicated the past several episodes to men as husbands, following the lead of Christ. We looked carefully at several different scriptures and noted just how husbands can interact with their wives, just as Christ our overseer, interacts with His bride the church.
We will now shift our focus to the second portion of this passage “The head of a woman is her husband”. Before we push further into the exposition of this verse allow me to clarify a point that I feel important to address. My concern is that there could be an unfortunate misunderstanding when considering this verse void of its context. One could take this verse to be indicating that a wife’s relationship with Christ must go through her husband. This is simply not true at all. Scripture is clear that a personal relationship with Jesus Christ is possible for anyone who believes in Him (John 3:16). Others speak directly to believing wives who have unbelieving husbands, which should negate any argument that a woman (wife) cannot have a direct relationship with Christ. (1 Corinthians 7:10-16). Furthermore, Paul wrote in Galatians 3:28 that in Christ there is actually no distinction between men and woman, meaning that both are capable of joining with Him. With that concern addressed let’s move forward.
Just as I did concerning husbands’ interactions with their wives, we will now look at what the bible has to say about how a wife should interact with her husband. A wife’s position in a God Shaped Marriage is one of incredible importance. Eve’s God given title was that of a helpmeet. This is not a word commonly used in contemporary vernacular but the meaning has not been in any way diminished with its use. The idea of a helpmeet comes from the original Hebrew words [ezer] pronounced [ay’-zer], and [Neged] pronounced [neh’-ghed]. As I explained in the first edition of this series, these words used together, according to Strong’s Exhaustive Bible Concordance, mean an absolute counterpart to a perfect set. Eve was created the absolute counterpart to Adam. She was so in every way having been literally created from Adam’s own flesh. God then proclaimed His desire to recreate that same result in others going forward. He decided that a man would leave his father and mother, be joined to his wife, and the two of them would quite miraculously become “One flesh”. Marriage is God’s process of recreating the one flesh experience of Adam and Eve in every man and woman that enters into this sacred relationship. Ladies, if you believe that it is God who joins a man and a woman in marriage, then you must also accept that when you marry, you become your husband’s helpmeet, his absolute counterpart.
Scripture describes God’s hand in the marriage process. Proverbs 19:14 in the Amplified Version says; Houses and riches are the inheritance from fathers, but a wise, understanding, and prudent wife is from the Lord. Men, it is high time we begin to understand that though God may not have put each of us to sleep, removed a rib and created for us a wife of our own flesh, she has been given to, and joined with us, by Him. What is the greater miracle, to create a perfect counterpart from our own flesh, or make us one flesh with someone in marriage and in so doing offer to us our absolute counterpart?
In the New Living Translation Proverbs 31:10-12 say this… 10 Who can find a virtuous and capable wife? She is more precious than rubies. 11 Her husband can trust her, and she will greatly enrich his life. 12 She brings him good, not harm, all the days of her life. The idea of this passage isn’t that such a wife doesn’t exist or can’t be found, but rather that it would be beyond difficult for us to do so without God’s direction. There are two schools of thought concerning this. Some believe as I do that God loves us so much and cares so deeply for His institution of marriage that it matters to Him who we marry. Others believe that it is completely up to us who we marry and God restrains his work in our lives within the bounds of our absolute free will. Regardless of your belief about the level of involvement God exercises in who we marry, the following is still true. Jesus said that when a wedding takes place, God joins that man and woman and creates of them a “One flesh” condition identified as marriage. A man and a woman, as husband and wife, are the only ones who can experience that unique human relationship. God is integrally involved in every marriage, and so His Son Jesus concluded, “What God has joined let not man separate” (Matthew 19:6 & Mark 10:9)
So, how does a woman interact with her husband as his absolute counterpart in a God Shaped Marriage? Remembering that the point of a God Shaped Marriage is to reflect Creator God let us begin by revisiting our focal scripture. But I want you to know and realize that Christ is the Head of every man, the head of a woman is her husband, and the Head of Christ is God. (1 Corinthians 11:3) In this verse, when we look at the Godhead that marriage is supposed to reflect, we see that the Head of Christ is God the Father. Jesus is one of the three persons of the triune Godhead. The Trinity as we refer to it, is beyond our human ability to completely define but there are some truths we are able to extract from our limited understanding of it.
- The Trinity consists of Father Son, and Holy Spirit
- They each have differing functions but perfectly united purpose
- God the Father is God, but is not and does not act as Jesus the Son or the Holy Spirit
- Jesus the Son is God, but is not and does not act as the Father or the Holy Spirit
- The Holy Spirit is God, but is not and does not act as the Father or Jesus the Son
- Each One is completely God, and united, they are the one true God
Why is the notation of all of that important? Because ladies, if you are to correctly understand your equal value to your husband in the marriage and gladly adhere to the scripturally defined order and structure of your marriage, you will need to be able to see that just as Christ is your husbands example of how to love you, He is also your example of how to be a godly helpmeet. The Apostle Paul made the point in our focal scripture that the head of Christ is God the Father, but it is also important to look at what Jesus said Himself about that concept?
In John 10:30 it is recorded for us that Jesus said of His relationship with God the Father, “I and the Father are One. Here Jesus is making an incredible statement, He is self-identifying as being equivalent with God. This was so outrageous to those who heard it that they were ready to stone Him for blasphemy! In John 5:30 however, Jesus said “I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me”. Are these statements contradictory? Not at all. In the one in John 10:30 Jesus is identifying that He and The Father are both equally valuable persons in the Trinity, just as a wife and husband are equally valuable persons in a God Shaped Marriage. In the second example from John 5:30, Jesus is illustrating that He and the Father work together toward their united purpose and the necessary structure and order to the Godhead that makes that work successful is identified by Paul in 1 Corinthians 11:3.
Jesus also made further statements that showed His voluntary submission to God the Father as a decisive act of cooperation bringing about the fruition of their united goals. In John 12:49 Jesus said, For I have never spoken on My own initiative or authority, but the Father Himself who sent Me has given Me a commandment regarding what to say and what to speak. (Amplified Bible) In John 14:31 Jesus told His disciples, “But so that the world may know [without any doubt] that I love the Father, I do exactly as the Father has commanded Me [and act in full agreement with Him]” (Amplified Bible) In John 15:10-11 Jesus made this interesting statement. 10 “If you keep My commandments and obey My teaching, you will remain in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and remain in His love. 11 I have told you these things so that My joy and delight may be in you, and that your joy may be made full and complete and overflowing”. This statement identified Jesus position as one in authority over us, as well as one submitting to the authority of the Father to serve our need. He said that His joy and ours is fullest when God ordained order and structure of relationship are followed. Ultimately, Christ’s submission to God the Father was summed up in His exclamation while under extreme duress in the garden of Gethsemane the night before His crucifixion, “Father if there is any other way…but not my will, but your will be done”!
In the next installment, we will delve deeper into the much-misunderstood concept of submission. However, I felt it critical before we did so to take time to lay the groundwork for the following statements.
- Submission does not equate to inferiority
- Scripture illustrates for us that even in the structure and order of the Triune Godhead authority and submission to authority are necessary components for success.
- Christ (God the Son) voluntarily offered His submission to the will of the Father so their united purpose could be accomplished.
- Though Jesus’ submission to God the Father was voluntary it was not optional.
- Jesus Submission to the order and structure of the Godhead was necessary to the completion of the united will of the Godhead.
- If marriage is to reflect the framework of the Godhead as designed, the prescribed marital structure and order must also be adhered to.
- A wife’s submission to her husband is voluntary…however; it is not optional to success of a God Shaped Marriage.
So now, with willing hearts as both husbands and wives to act in the ways that Jesus does to the betterment of your God Shaped Marriage…go be awesome!
Under Construction
Hi, this is Pastor Ken, I want to welcome you to my Thoughts on a Thursday Podcast where I take some regular occurrence or personal story from my life and connect it to a scriptural truth. So here are my thoughts on this Thursday, November 30thth 2023…Under Construction
About 20 years ago I fulfilled a lifelong desire. I built a house. When I say that, I don’t mean that I sat down with an architect and planned the size and shape of the house. I also don’t mean I paid someone to construct a home for me. I mean that I actually drew up the plans, submitted them to the governing authorities for approval and then personally put hammer in hand and built the house. From the footers to the ridge cap including everything in between, if it was a part of that house, I was the one who constructed it.
It was important to get each part of the build done right, but thankfully at each stage there are almost always allowable tolerances. Some level of variation is expected both in materials and workmanship. As long as the building is constructed within reasonable parameters, all goes well. Early on in the process however there was one task that was critical to everything that would follow. It was crucial for that particular job to be accomplished with incredible precision. There the allowable tolerances are as my grandfather (who was also a carpenter) used to say “next to nil”.
When it came to laying the foundation, the footers could be a little out of square or even less than perfectly level. They are poured wide enough that the block foundation can vary slightly from the centerline of the footer if need be to remain straight and true. The cement blocks can even be shaved if necessary to provide a perfectly level wall once it is completed. What has nearly no room for error is the placement of the initial corner block. If that one singular block is not perfectly positioned exactly 90 degrees to the corners perpendicular to it, nothing…and I mean nothing constructed on top of it will come out right. That one block determines the success of the rest of the project. In this day and age, it is the placement of that initial corner block that garners all the attention. In days gone by, however before the advent of cement blocks, the perfect stone also had to be found. A corner stone had to be one that had all of the necessary qualities to position it correctly and to build upon.
Furthermore, a good cornerstone is a promise of a successful building project. When you possess a good true cornerstone, you can build with total confidence that the entire structure will be strait, level and true because the corner stone is all of those things and it defines the foundation’s characteristics as a stable building surface. Certainly the integrity of the other building materials matter, but without the best possible foundation, beginning with the cornerstone, all you will ever have is problematic structure and a pending pile of rubble.
Ephesians 2:19-22 speaks of a spiritual building project. It says, Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, 22 in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.
These days I am busy with a new construction project. This time I am not the architect, the general contractor or the builder. I am counted among the building materials. In a way this verse says that I am listed among the acceptable list of materials that are being used to build a holy temple. Essentially through the work of Jesus on the cross I have been invited to be incorporated into a house that is being constructed in His honor…for Him to live in. That house is being framed up and completed by my life and the many lives of others given to Him to use in His construction project. Our lives have been turned over to Him to use as He sees fit. The walls, and roof (our lives) are built upon the foundation that is made up of the apostles and prophets. In other words, those who were willing to follow God before we came along, and who were willing to express loudly the need for a temple like the one currently being fashioned.
This scripture also says that the foundation was laid with Jesus Christ as the chief cornerstone. Remember the importance of the cornerstone? It is the promise that a correctly constructed temple will be the result. Jesus set the direction so that the lives of the prophets and apostles could line up strait, true and level alongside Him. Without Him none of that would be possible. If it were not for Jesus, the Son of God, the temple would be constructed solely on a human foundation. The building process would have been flawed from its beginning and would eventually have become nothing more than empty ruins. Someday that house I built will degrade and fall down if it is not deemed in the way of bigger and better things, and bulldozed first. Either way, it was constructed by human hands…my human hands and will someday be on the ground again. Only those things built by the eternal God are eternal. That is why it is vital that Jesus be the cornerstone of His house, the church.
It is only as the entire building is constructed together based on the integrity of the Cornerstone that the project can be an eternal success. We are being fitted in. As you and I dedicate our lives to Him, He helps us discover our value as building materials in His church. I can only fulfill my purpose, and you yours in His building project to the extent that we align ourselves with Him. It is only because of His integrity that we can become straight and true. 1 Peter 2:6 says Therefore it is also contained in the Scripture, “Behold, I lay in Zion A chief cornerstone, elect, precious, and he who believes on Him will by no means be put to shame.” As we trust in Christ, and follow His lead we will never be put to shame, meaning, we will be the best we can be as we allow Jesus to be our guide.
Occasionally when I have to go into the city where I built that house, I drive by it just to see it standing there. It is not a beautiful house; in fact, it is quite plain as houses go. But I like to drive by none the less to see the house that Ken built, it was after all, a dream I have had since I was a boy. When I am there I am reminded of many of the days during its construction when I would stop after a day’s work and step back and just look at what I had accomplished. I am convinced there isn’t anything wrong with doing that, but if you want to see something really spectacular, step back and look at the house that is being built of you. You can’t take pride in it because you aren’t the builder. Nor can you necessarily point to what your contribution has added to it, because without Jesus as the chief cornerstone, our contribution wouldn’t matter. What you can do is step back and be amazed at what God is building and the fact that He can make something so beautiful from such flawed materials!
So now, thanking Him for wanting to make you a part of His construction project, and being grateful for a perfect cornerstone to set the course of your life straight…go be awesome!
Order and Structure of a God Shaped Marriage Vol. 4
Hi, this is Pastor Ken thanks for joining me once again for the Monday Marriage Message where we search God’s instructions to experience a highly successful marriage. We continue today with our look at the scripturally given order and structure of a God shaped marriage.
Thus far in this series we have discovered that there is in fact a God-ordained order and structure to a God Shaped Marriage. We have identified where that order is outlined for us in scripture (1 Corinthians 11:3) and have acknowledged that order is reflective of the framework of authority found in the triune Godhead. In the last episode we began to look at how a God Shaped Husband interacts with His wife. There we focused on Ephesians 5:25 and the command given there for husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church. We recognized it must be a selfless love, one where the husband puts the needs, cares, and desires of his wife above his own. Just as Christ did for his bride when He left the glory of Heaven to come to earth to fix her sin problem. We also saw that a Christ-like husband will understand the differences between himself and his wife, seeing them not as flaws requiring change but rather as things of beauty to be cherished. With this understanding, a righteous husband will be gentle with his wife, especially when she responds in different ways than he might.
Today we will continue with our look at Ephesians chapter 5 and how it illuminates the actions and attitudes of a Christ-like husband. Allow me to read from that passage again beginning with verse 25. Ephesians 5:25-27 says; 25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, 26 that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, 27 that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.
Last time we looked at what it meant for a husband to love his wife as Christ loved the church. We carefully considered what the scripture meant when it says Christ’s love for the church was exemplified by His giving of Himself for her. I talked about the fact that this did not only elude to the fact that Christ died for His bride, though it was His ultimate sacrifice, and He offered it willingly for her good. In addition, we discussed some of the various ways we as husbands are given opportunities every day to lay down our lives for our wife. There the connection and application of the command were clearly defined. However, let me be abundantly clear here. The second part of this passage does not indicate that because Christ is in process of making His bride perfect for Himself, as men we can take license to direct our wives how they could be made perfect in our eyes. Remember, Christ is superior to His bride. He is perfect in every way, and we (His bride) are not. Therefore, in order for Him to become one with us, our perfection becomes a necessity. With that in mind there is a need for Him to sanctify and cleanse us so that He can present us to Himself the perfect match, just as He presented Eve to Adam, the perfect match. We on the other hand husbands, are not superior to our wives. Their imperfections do not render them incompatible to be joined with us because we too, are imperfect. Therefore, there is no need for us to interact with our wife in this same way.
If that is the case, why mention it here following the command to love our wife as Christ loved the church? Excellent question…I am so glad it has an excellent answer. When we take a closer look at the totality of the three verses I just read, we can see an interesting truth. In the past Christ loved the church by offering remedy for her sin problem that she was unable to fix by dying in her place. He offered His life as a substitutionary sacrifice and satisfied the high cost of her sin. The bible tells us that the wages of sin is death. In effect then, Jesus ransomed us by dying in our place, and so as that verse concludes, the gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 6:23). In the present, He is sanctifying His bride and cleansing her with the washing of water by the word. This simply means that right now, Christ is through His word making us perfect for Himself, a perfect match in every way. It is through our obedience to His word that we become cleaned. Jesus told Peter at the last supper, “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.” (John 15:3) In the future, this same passage tells us that He will present us to Himself…perfect…without blemish, spot or wrinkle or any such thing. He promises us that in the future He will take us to live with Him forever in His Father’s house. There, as His bride, we will have access to everything He has access to, just as a wife ought to have joint ownership of all that is her husbands’. From this passage we can conclude that Christ loves the church by taking complete care of her, past, present and future. There is no time when His focus is not on what she needs and what He is trying to bless her with. In this moment, Christ is trying to position us, His bride, to be able to take hold of all of the immeasurable blessing He has for us. In that way husbands, we can love our wives as Christ loves the church. We can love her all of the time and we can give our full attention and effort to the goal of making sure she is positioned to receive every available blessing.
This passage then continues with that very idea. Verses 28 & 29 say, 28 So husbands ought to love their own 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 the Lord does the church.
The point being made here is that as Christ-like husbands, we give our wives the place of high regard that we give to our own bodies. This means two things. First, we meet our needs…and second, we avoid harming ourselves. We eat when we are hungry, because our body asks us to. We clothe ourselves when we arise from a warm bed, because our body asks us to. We seek medical attention when we are sick, because our body asks us to. We rest when we are tired, because our body asks us to. I could go on and on listing all of the ways we meet the needs of our body because our body calls out to us, pointing out its need, and we respond accordingly. We do not respond in anger, frustration or intolerance. We simply respond because there is a need. These verses make the point that when our wife voices a need…we should simply respond by meeting the need. Remember from our discussion last time that we don’t necessarily have to see her need as a need we also have. We are to interact with her by meeting her needs with the understanding that her needs may be different than ours, but that makes her or her needs no less valuable than ours are. So, as this verse points out, we meet our own needs, we should then also meet the needs our wife has in order that we might love her as Christ loves the church.
The second way I noted that we take care of our own bodies is that we do our best to avoid personal injury. The list I mentioned a moment ago highlighted how we meet the needs of our own body, but now I want to take a look at how we cherish it. Because we cherish this physical body God has given us, we try to keep it safe from harm. Some of that is done consciously as we take measures to make sure we don’t get hurt. For example, when we undertake a particularly risky activity such as cutting down a tree with a chainsaw, the wiser of us use specialized personal protection equipment to avoid injury. Other protective measures are purely instinctive, but still invoked because we cherish our body and we don’t want to get hurt. This would be illustrated by our instinct to run if we sense the tree we are trying to cut down begins to fall in our direction. In either case we do these things consciously and unconsciously because we cherish our body. In this scripture we are admonished that if we are willing to do these things for our bodies, meet our needs and protect ourselves, we must also be equally willing to do them for our wife because we are joined with her in a one flesh condition. As this scripture points out, He who loves his wife…loves himself, and Christ our example is busy doing these very same things for His bride, the church.
The next 3 verses are of great interest and offer an incredibly close-up view of how our marriages are intended to be reflective of God in a unique way. Many times I have used a mirror as an analogy for marriage. I conclude that analogy by saying that our marriages are intended to be a marital mirror that God desires to look into and see Himself. In the next few verses that analogy is taken to a new level. An infinity mirror is one that is actually made of two mirrors connected to one another and positioned such that what is reflected in one is reflected by the other and so on and so on…seemingly forever. These next verses illustrate how the marital mirror is actually intended to be an infinity mirror. Ephesians 5:30-32 reads as follows: 30 For we are members of His body, of His flesh and of His bones. 31 “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” 32 This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church.
This scripture applies to both the husband and the wife. However, as we are currently engaged in a discussion of how men can be God shaped or Christ-like husbands, we will continue with that intimation and return to this passage later in the series as our focus shifts to that of a godly wife. Here men, we are reminded that as Christ followers, we are members of Christ’s body. We are His chosen bride. However, we do not enjoy that distinction alone as men. The Apostle Paul pointed out that we are equal heirs in the grace of God. In other words, our wives are also members of the church if they are Christ followers. Therefore, they are also members of His body. If we take more than a moment to consider this, then a new and profound truth is realized. If my wife is a believer, then she is one with Christ. Because they are one, how I interact with her is in actuality how I am interacting with Christ! Men we all know that if someone is unkind to our bride, we take it personally. Christ is no different. If I act negatively toward my wife, Christ says that He considers it the same as if I have acted negatively toward Him. I don’t know about you other gentlemen, but that isn’t something I want to occur. If someone is kind to our wife and offers help that is needed, we are grateful to that person, as if it were us they helped or were kind to. Jesus said He sees it the same way when we are kind to our wife. If our wife has placed her faith in Jesus Christ, the way that we interact with her is the way we are interacting with Christ himself according to this passage. For more on just how personally Christ takes our actions toward our spouse, I would encourage you to read Matthew 25:31-46, though I won’t be covering them here.
The passage in Ephesians 5 ends with its instructions to Christ-like husbands with the beginning of verse 33 – Nevertheless, let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself. The command here is simple and selfless, but never easy. Men, love your wife like you love yourself. Meet her needs… not the ones you think she should have; the ones she tells you she has. Avoid her being harmed. She reacts differently than you do, consider that and be understanding. Avoid allowing her to be injured even if such action would have no ill-effect on you. Love her like Christ loves the church…like Christ loves you.
So now, learning be a Christ-like husband like it matters…because it matters…Go Be Awesome!