Obligatory Valentine's Day Post

This past week, our deacon/soon to be priest gave the sermon. He was talking about the relationship between husband and wife as it applies in Ephesians 5:21-32. He did a very good job, and I thought I would add my own little comments.

Ever since this was written, it has been hotly debated. If I had it my way, there would be view after view and comment after comment on this blog about it. Well, one can only dream. Anyway, I digress.

Part of the first section (22-24) deals with how wives should treat their husbands. It says that wives should submit to their husbands, just as they would to Christ, because the husband is the head of the wife. This passage has been used to justify many different things. I get the image in my head of the guy sitting in a recliner, drinking a beer, watching football, and demanding that his wife make him a sandwich. This is not what the passage is instructing us (husbands) to do. 

Some people use this passage to say that wives should blindly follow their husbands, as in get them the sandwich without any delay. This would only be true if we were to blindly follow Christ, which we are not. We're not? You ask. We are not called to blindly follow Christ, in a sense that we are slaves. Slaves, by definition, serve and Christ did not come to be served, but to serve. What Christ did for us, was out of love, and not a desire for us to blindly serve Him.

Funny I should say that. The people that use the above passage to justify clearly unbiblical actions did not read on. Verse 25 says that we (husbands) are to love our wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. Verse 28 goes on to say that husbands are to love their wives, and that he who loves his wife, loves himself. In the same manner, it could also be said that he who disrespects, mistreats, abuses, or otherwise neglects his wife, does the same to himself. Verses 29 and 30 go on to say that a man feeds and cares for himself, just as Christ does for the church (church meaning us, as in people, not just husbands), for we are part of his body. Meaning, if husbands disrespect their wives, then we too are disrespecting Christ.

Ephesians goes even further saying that when two people are married, they are no longer two people, but one. Verse 31 says "a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." This means that what was said in verse 28, that he who loves his wife, loves himself, is not meant to be taken figuratively, but literally.

What does all this boil down to? People are only reading certain parts of this passage, and justifying their actions based on that. What is truly being said is that we, as husbands and wives, are to submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. This is verse 21, the first verse of this passage. Kind of hard to ignore the truth of this passage, when you read other parts of the Bible as well.

Amen.