LOVE AND RESPECT
Greetings church family!
In terms of physically being at the Foothills Community Church campus on Sabbaths, I have missed you all the last two Sabbaths. A huge thank you to Drew McSherry and Tom McSherry for sharing the sermon messages in my absence.
Last Sabbath, at the church campout, our “sermon” was really a group discussion centered partially on the passage below.
Ephesians 5:21-31 - “Submitting to one another in the fear of Christ. Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord, because the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church. He is the Savior of the body. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives are to submit to their husbands in everything.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her to make her holy, cleansing her with the washing of water by the word. He did this to present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or anything like that, but holy and blameless. In the same way, husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hates his own flesh but provides and cares for it, just as Christ does for the church, since we are members of his body. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This mystery is profound, but I am talking about Christ and the church. To sum up, each one of you is to love his wife as himself, and the wife is to respect her husband.”
An interesting thing about this passage is Paul’s choice of the word “submit.” In verse 21, he calls for followers of Jesus to submit to one another out of their reverence of Jesus. Then, he elaborates upon this idea of submit by applying it to specific types of relationships. Ephesians 5:21-31 applies the word “submit” to the marriage relationship (In Ephesians 6:1-4, he applies it to the parent-child relationship, and in Ephesians 6:5-9 he applies it to the servant-master relationship). When speaking to the husbands, Paul uses the word “love” in place of “submit.” When speaking to wives, Paul uses the word “submit” initially, but later states that “the wife is to respect her husband.” Submitting for husbands looks like loving their wives, and submitting for wives looks like respecting their husbands!
Love and respect!
Here’s a quote from the book LOVE AND RESPECT, by Emerson Eggerichs.
“Dr. John Gottman, professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Washington, led a research team that spent twenty years studying two thousand couples who had been married twenty to forty years to the same partner. These people came from diverse backgrounds and had widely differing occupations and lifestyles. But one thing was similar - the tone of their conversations. As these couples talked together, almost always there was what Gottman calls “a strong undercurrent of two basic ingredients: Love and Respect. These are the opposite of - and antidote for - contempt, perhaps the most corrosive force in marriage.
Gottman’s findings confirm what has already been in Scripture for some 2000 years!"
Husbands, you have the wonderful privilege of studying Jesus’ life and meditating on how he revealed his sacrificial love for people. In addition, you have the wonderful privilege of asking the Holy Spirit to fill your heart every day to help you love your wife in the same way Christ loved the church. Don’t miss this next part. You also have the wonderful privilege of asking your wife how you can better show her love every day!
Wives, you have the wonderful privilege of studying Scripture and meditating on how Christ’s followers are called to show reverence to Him. In addition, you have the wonderful privilege of asking the Holy Spirit to fill your heart every day to reveal to you how to show respect to your husband in the same way Christ’s followers are to show respect to Christ. Don’t miss this next part. You also have the wonderful privilege of asking your husband how you can better show him respect every day!
Scripture and science agree - love and respect are the glue in a Christ-centered marriage!
Church family, God is for you, God is with you, and God loves you!
Pastor Chris
