Well, I invite you to turn with me to Ephesians chapter 5. Ephesians chapter 5. It's a wonderful portion of scripture where it is describing the way that the life of believers should look in light of what Christ has done for us. Because He has saved us, He's adopted us, He's redeemed us, here's how then we should live. And in this context, we're being taught about life in the Spirit, that believers are to be those who are filled with the Spirit, controlled by the Spirit, and as such, that life should work its way into our very home lives. Last week, we looked at what that means for wives, And this week we will look at what that means for husbands. So Ephesians chapter five, beginning in verse 25. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself, for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband. Let's pray together. Father, we thank you for the rich and deep love of Christ. It is unfathomable, the greatness of his love. And yet we are commanded to love as he has loved. And I pray, Father, by your spirit, you would take your word, apply it to our hearts so that we might love like Christ has loved us. We certainly need your help. We ask for it now. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, this section on husbands is about three times as long as the section on wives. So wives, you got your dose last week. Husbands, you get yours this week and next week. There's plenty here, and we'll see how far we get, maybe through 28, maybe a bit beyond. We'll see. My son asked me this morning, knowing what was coming in the text, he asked me, said, seems like the instructions to husbands are pretty clear. Why do you need to preach on it? It's a good question. It is pretty clear. And the reason I need to preach on it is because husbands don't do it. And so we need to hear it. Oh, they do it sometimes, some better than others, but we always need to grow, don't we? We need to excel still more. We need to hear again and again, husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church. Being loved is an experience that rejoices the heart. When you are loved well, you know it, you feel it, you experience it. By love, I mean somebody who is committed to your well-being, who wants to see you excel and experience good, even at the cost of their own welfare, own preferences, so that you would benefit. That kind of relationship builds confidence, builds trust, and you know that relationship is secure because that person who loves you basically commits to love you, not for a few days or weeks or months or years, but really for life. That is the nature of a true marriage and true love in a marriage where a husband pledges his love to his wife for the rest of his life. You can also experience a lack of love. And that is so disconcerting, so troubling, troubles your soul. You can see through the platitudes and the self-serving nature of the actions of somebody who doesn't love you. You perceive their words as flattery and their actions as mere self-serving. But a person who loves you, truly loves you, lays down their life for you so that you would benefit, it will do good to you. The only one who has this true kind of love all the time is God. It even tells us in 1 John chapter 4 that God is love. And it's the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord that really stirs our souls. This is the kind of love that transforms a life from being one who is lost in darkness to being found by the love of Christ. The love of God in Christ Jesus is what catapults our life into a life of love ourselves. This love of God is staggering because it stems from the God who created the universe, who has all power in His hands, and He is the one against whom we have rebelled, the one who gave us a law, the one who gave us a standard by which we must live, and we rejected it. And that love of God is the love that has come to rescue rebellious sinners from their lostness and from their rebellion. And it leads us to sing songs like, what wondrous love is this, O my soul? Because our souls are so amazed that God would love sinners like us. And so perhaps the most famous and beloved verse in the Bible, John 3, 16, is loved for a very good reason. For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. We love that verse because it expresses God's primary love for us, His first love for us. And God's love is of such a magnitude that it's called in Ephesians 2, verse 4, a great love. But God being rich in mercy because of the great love with which He loved us. You come to know the love of God when you accept the grace of Christ. And this love that God has is not just a feeling kind of love. It's not just a feeling in him, but it is an action that he took. Love is more than an emotion. It is an affection that stirs action. It's an action that would seek the greatest good in the one who is loved with no concern for the cost to oneself. This is why Jesus describes no greater love this way, John 15, 13. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. That's love in action. And Jesus had demonstrated that kind of love just a couple of chapters before in the Gospel of John, in John 13, when he took the role of a slave. and wrapped a towel around his waist and gathered water and washed the feet of the disciples. That was love in action. The action of foot washing, however, was not the greatest love that Jesus had for his disciples. It was rather a foreshadowing of the kind of love that he would show at the cross. That action at the cross was the greatest act of love that was ever on display in this universe. Because there at the cross, the Son of God, who existed for all eternity in heaven with His Father, who possessed all glory, the one whom angels worshipped, condescended to come live among the creation that He made, taking the very form of a servant by taking on human flesh, born into a humble estate, born into a family that had nothing, and lived His life as one of a servant. Lived it perfectly, with complete righteousness, And He came into a world that did not have a heart to embrace Him. He came to the world that He made, but a world that was plunged into darkness by sin. And He came into the light in the world that everybody fled from because they were scared that the light would show their works. So Jesus, utterly abandoned and rejected by His own creation, continues to humble himself by going through a procedure in which he is mocked, ridiculed, despised, beaten, scourged, and crucified. And that was love. That was love because he was rescuing the very people he was being crucified by from their sin. He was doing the greatest good to them. by going to the cross to die. And if you think, what is the greatest good that anyone could ever do to you? The greatest good that anyone could ever do to you is to rescue you from the condemnation that you deserve for the sins you have committed against God. And so the greatest act of love is Jesus Christ, who gave his own life as the penalty for sin, so that you could be spared that penalty, so that you could have eternal life. Jesus' love is the greatest love that has ever been on display in this world. And it was a willful, self-giving kind of love. He sought our greatest good, not under coercion, not by compulsion, but by a willing and self-giving sacrifice. When he was on trial before Pilate in John chapter 19, Pilate questions him in verse 10, Pilate says to Jesus, you will not speak to me. Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you? And Jesus gives this amazing answer to that statement. Jesus answered him, you would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above. In other words, Pilate really is exercising no authority in that moment. He doesn't have authority to kill or release Jesus. This is a willful giving of the Son by His own volition. In John chapter 10, verses 17 and 18, Jesus says this, For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again, this charge I have received from my Father." You hear the language there. Jesus is willingly giving His life for sinners. He lays it down, He takes it up again. We understand why it has to be that way for it to be a kind of sincere love. You can maybe envision a husband who comes home one day with a bunch of flowers for his wife. The wife is touched. She never receives flowers from him. She receives them with a tear in her eye. And then the husband says, I got a speeding ticket. I had to go to court. And the judge gave me this weird sentencing. He said that instead of paying a fine, I had to buy my wife flowers. So here, I'm sure that tear from that wife might turn into something else in that moment. And pair that with a husband who comes and presents flowers to his wife and declares, I love you with all my heart. And this small gift is just here to reflect a tiny bit of the love that I have for you. Totally different. He did it willingly, not under compulsion, versus the other man who did it under compulsion. Jesus, when He laid down His life, did it willingly and freely. He spent His precious blood, not to pay His debt, but to pay our debt. He freed us from our guilt. He rescued us from slavery to sin. In a word, He redeemed us. The law that God gave to both Israel in the Mosaic Law, and then placed on the consciences even of the Gentiles, demands payment when it is broken. And the payment that's demanded is death. The wages of sin is death. And we are told that cursed is every man who breaks the law. Ephesians calls that condition to be children of wrath and sons of disobedience. To be those who have broken God's law is to be a child of wrath, one who is facing only judgment for all eternity. But God's rich mercy flows to us through His great love exhibited in the Son, who laid down His life and shed His blood so that we can be washed, cleansed, and purchased and set free. And so when you look to the cross of Christ, you see a man who is enduring the curse of sin as an act of love for the people he came to redeem. And that redemption that is ours was entirely purchased by him. Furthermore, he didn't do it while we were friends with him. He did it while we were at enmity with him. We were not likable characters. We were not the cream of the crop. He did not look at us and see a bunch of lovely people who had lovely demeanors and lovely attitudes. He saw a bunch of filthy, rotten sinners. And he laid down his life for us. This is the picture in the Old Testament that God paints through the prophet Hosea, who was ordered to go and take a wife of Hortam, Gomer. This was to picture just how unlovely Israel had become by their constant treachery and adultery, and yet God would remain faithful to His promises. This is the way we appear in our sin, vile, full of dirt. This love of Christ is a sacrificial, willing love that came to rescue the vilest of sinners. There is no greater love than this. An eternity of love is here in the blood of Christ. He wraps His arms around His people and claims them as His own. And when He does so, He commits to you that He will be your Savior for all eternity. And He will never let go of you. There is enough cleansing power in His blood that when you are cleaned by that blood, you are clean forever. You are His, and you are His for good. And He will not stop doing good to you. He will never, never, never stop doing good to His people. Once He starts, it is an endless stream of His doing good to His people. Everything that comes into your life, every day and every moment, will not be anything that will separate you from the love of Christ. Jesus, once he extends his love to you, will continue to do good to you. So much so, that no devilish demon, no catastrophe, no persecution, no sickness, can ever separate you from the love of Christ. In fact, heaven and earth will pass away before His love for you passes away. Paul says in Romans 8, 38-39, For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. So this love of Christ then, this sacrificial, this willing, this committed love of Christ becomes the standard of all love. Every other love needs to be compared with that love. This is patient, kind, non-envying, non-boasting, non-arrogant, non-rude, non-insisting on its own way, non-irritable, non-resentful, non-rejoicing in wrongdoing love. That becomes the standard of all other loves. And so in chapter 5 verse 2 of Ephesians, Paul says, walk in love. as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. That is the standard for all believers. Paul narrows down his focus as he applies the Christian life and gives this command particularly to husbands in chapter 5 verse 25. Having laid out for us the standard of love being the love of Christ, he now tells us what husbands are to do. And husbands, you need to hear this. Ephesians 5 verse 25, husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. A few other commands in scripture. drive us to a higher mountain peak of virtue than this. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13, faith, hope, and love remain, but the greatest of these is love. And certainly the greatest love is the love of Christ. So when husbands are commanded to love their wives as Christ loved the church, we really reach the pinnacle of Christian ethics. And it is to be exemplified by husbands toward their wives. This is why I have found on multiple occasions in talking with many different husbands that opening up to Ephesians chapter five, verse 25 invokes fear and terror. Because husbands, you are not giving any wiggle room here. you are instructed to love in the same kind of way that Christ himself has loved his church. And so we come to this verse as husbands thinking, who is sufficient for these things? Who can do this? Who can imitate the love of Christ? And this is why it is so essential to know that this command is cascading after the command to be filled with the Spirit. The only way that a husband can truly fulfill this command and obey this is if he is filled with the Spirit. Spirit dwelling in you, controlling you, leading you. Oh, how you need the Spirit to fulfill this command. This is not by your own strength command. This is by the Spirit command. And so this commandment, although it strikes some fear and trembling into husbands who hear it, it ought to also be a help to you and not really a hindrance. It's not intended to be a stumbling block. It is intended to help you. Few other commands would lift you to the height as this one or place this kind of responsibility on you. But I expect taking a few moments to work through this command will actually be helpful rather than terror inducing. But I have to also address the fact that I'm not speaking to a room full of husbands. And so let me just quickly address the whole church here. As we come to a command like this where it singles out a particular group, and yet we're speaking to a group that is not composed of only this group, I want you to note that when Paul wrote this letter, he intended to have it read to the whole church all at once, all at the same time. It wasn't like he got to this point and said, okay, now husbands, go into a separate room and read this section of the letter and don't tell anybody else what it says. You might wish it did that, but it doesn't. And it shows that there is something functional about coming together as a corporate church, even when addressing a specific group. And the function of that is that husbands, as you are instructed to love your wives as Christ loved the church, everyone else hears you hear that. So they know that you have heard this command. So when you go out and live your life, everybody in the church knows that hanging over your head is this command to love your wife as you, as Christ has loved the church. And there's accountability in that. And that is good. Just as we addressed wives last week, and all the wives in the room heard wives submit to your husbands, and everybody else in the room heard wives hear that. This is so crucial to the way the church is to function. So whether you are a husband or not, it is important that you hear and know this, because this is the responsibility of the husbands that are sitting around you. And by my count, there are about 40 or so husbands sitting around you right now. They need to know that you know that they know that they need to be a godly husband. The whole church needs to know what is expected of husbands. Husbands need to know their role. And this is an urgent command. It's an urgent command in our day and age because the world does not understand the roles of men and women. It gets them backwards and upside down and inside out and every other contorted way that you can contort them, they are contorted. This attitude of the role of wives and the role of husbands is so against the culture that we need to hear this and be refreshed in what God actually expects of His people. And the culture's attitude gets the role of wives wrong, and the culture's attitude gets the role of men and husbands wrong. It seems to me that some of the culture's expectation of men is simply that they know their place, which is basically over there in the corner. And don't look anybody. And don't say anything. And don't do anything. Just stay there. The goal of the culture of late seems to try to emasculate men. The recipe seems to be start elevating bad examples of men, label every act of masculinity as toxic, and tell men to go stand at the corner. And then the same time, while they stand in the corner, taunt them with every sexual indulgence wherever they look. Give them childish games to play so they remain adolescents. And then expect so little of them that when they don't do anything, you can declare that they're worthless. Some men see through this tactic. And they want to again embrace being men. But often that embracing of masculinity comes with imbecility. And so masculinity then becomes defined by how much weight you can lift over your head. I heard one priest describe certain men as feminine based on their thigh size. Masculinity is defined as how many women you can conquer. or how much money you make, or the kind of cigars that you smoke, or how much liquor you can hold, or the kind of truck you drive, or how many guns you own. So on both sides, you get masculinity wrong. How about this? True masculinity is a man who leads his home with virtue, godly character, which is marked by sacrificial love that seeks to make his family as holy as possible. A man who doesn't hand the reins of his family over to his wife, but neither does he dominate her. He has in view nothing for himself, but all for the good of his wife and his family, believing that it is his task to love her with a Christ-like love. A man who shows his kids what it means to love, not primarily by spoiling them with gifts, but by loving their mother with a lifelong committed love. A man who serves others for their good. A man who boldly lives for the Lord Jesus Christ and is not afraid to cast all of his cares upon him and trust him with his eternal soul. How about that for true masculinity? The church at large needs men who will step up and be men and love their wives as Christ has loved the church. So, husbands, you need to know your primary responsibility as a husband is to love your wife. I want to take the rest of our time to consider this command and the example that's given. Husbands, love your wives is the command to command, to love. And it cannot be said too much that the main task of husbands in your marriage is to love your wife. Wives in Christian homes should be loved wives, loved by their husbands. And you can just tell by the fact Paul doesn't waste words when he writes. And if he gives a singular command to a group of people, he is elevating it to be the priority command in their lives. If you have one thing that you're aiming at, husbands, one target that you want to strike with your life, if you have a wife God has given to you, then you have one aim in that relationship, which is to love your wife. That is the main thing for you to do. Paul has already indicated in the section on wives that the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, which indicates a role of leadership. And yet when he comes to address husbands, he does not say, husbands, lead your wives. He says, husbands, love your wives. It's expected that you will lead them, but what kind of leadership will you exercise? Domineering, subjugating one, tyrannical one, despotism in your home, or loving leadership? Paul clearly makes it the case that it is to be loving leadership. There are many men throughout the history of the world and even the current time who wished that his home was his own little kingdom, where every little person in his little kingdom acquiesces to his wishes and desires. And he reigns over his kingdom, expecting that he will get all that he wants every time he wants it, whenever he wants it. If you're married for about 30 seconds, that notion is disproved as being really livable. It's impossible to have your own dominion and rule over it with an iron fist. And so some husbands resort to power plays and domination and manipulation and sometimes even abuse to try to get their way. Or they realize that having their way is impossible, and so they acquiesce to the greater will in the house and let the wife lead and let her exercise her plans for her kingdom. And so the husband lives with his shoulders slumped and given over to the fact that he will be ruled and will never lead like a man. Well, husbands have not been called to build a little kingdom, nor is it theirs to give up their responsibility of leadership in the home. Their call is to love. And husbands, one day you will stand before the Lord and give an account for the role God has given you as a husband. And the question will be, have you exercised your responsibility to lead your home with love? That's the standard. This love that has been commanded is the agape kind of love. This is the sacrificial giving kind of love. One author puts it this way, it is seeking the good of others, irrespective of merit, and even to the undeserving. This is a wonderful definition of love. Love is a voluntary act, and it's not dependent upon your wife fulfilling her role. Nowhere does this indicate The husbands should love your wives as long as your wife is doing exactly what you want her to do. It doesn't say husbands love your wives only if your wife looks exactly how you want her to look. Husbands love your wives only if your wife says what you want her to say. Husbands love your wives when you're in a good mood. It's not what it is. It is just husbands love your wives all the time. whether they deserve it or not. This is kind of closing you in, husbands. You don't have a loophole here. You don't have a way out. How would you like it if Christ stopped loving you as soon as you did something that displeased Him? That would be almost every moment of every day that you'd live without the love of Christ. But this love is also to be noted that it's not coerced by the wife. This is directed to husbands. Husbands love your wives. Wives, you do not need to schedule on your husband's calendar a day that he needs to buy you flowers. This is not your responsibility. You don't have to arrange things so that your husband does what you want, not the way it's supposed to work. Just like you don't want him to subjugate you to submission, but you want that to be voluntary and giving. So too, his love must come from him. That doesn't mean you can't help your husband kind of know some of the ways that it might be nice to be loved. But it does not mean that you should do that in a domineering way. Wives, you are not to take control of your husband's love. This love is to be voluntary from the husband. Sometimes we get this kind of love mixed up with being in love. This is a common cultural phenomenon where our culture would define love almost as being in love. This is not what the kind of love is that Paul's referring to. This is a love that may have emotions attached to it at times, and sometimes may not have emotions attached to it. Husbands, love your wives all the time. Bodhi Bakkam gave a very helpful description of how husbands try to kind of weasel their way out of loving their wives. He describes how a husband would come to him and say, you know, I'm just not in love with my wife anymore. And so describe that and say basically that he doesn't feel he needs to love his wife anymore because he's not in love with his wife. And so it'd be almost an inconsistency in his mind. So Voti would respond, so what? You're not in love with your wife. Love is an act of the will. It's not just about emotions. And so the husband would go on and say, well, we basically live apart from each other. We're basically living separate lives. Vody would say, so what? The Bible says, love your neighbor as yourself. This is your neighbor. You need to love her. Well, the husband goes on and says, well, It's worse than that. My wife is just at my throat all the time. We just fight all the time and voting says, so what? The Bible says, love your enemies. You don't have a way out of this husbands. We get trapped by the culture when it pushes on us these false views of love that focus only on falling in love. And it makes you feel like as soon as the emotions are gone, then the love is gone. And so you can get out of the relationship because the emotions are over and it's no longer sincere. But that is just when love is to begin. Because love is a committed love. A lay down your life for the other kind of love. So young ladies, I want you to hear this. Young ladies who aren't married, if a man comes to you and knows you for about five minutes and says, I love you, you need to say, no, you don't. If you love me, you will stick with me for life and lay down your life for me. This is more than emotions. This command that is given for husbands to love your wives is a unique command. It's not a command that we find in the Old Testament, although it could be implied there. There were other household codes that were in the day that Paul was writing, and this kind of command isn't found there. This command is here. in the New Testament, because with the New Testament comes the greatest display of love that was ever shown in the world, the love of Christ. And so with the love of Christ being made manifest to the world, now we know what it looks like to love. And so husbands, you have an example by which you can love your wife. Husbands, you have a way to picture the love of Christ to the world by how you love your wife. And so Paul gives this example for you for how you are to love your wife. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. This is the example of love and the model for which we are to follow. No height of love greater than this. Christ's love displayed in his sacrifice for the church. He loved the church. He gave himself up for the church. He went through the most horrific torture for the church. He experienced the worst kind of physical pain for the church. He experienced the worst kind of emotional pain for the church. He laid down his life for the church. Husbands, you will have opportunities daily to lay down your life for your wife. You will never go to the lengths that Christ went to. You will never have to suffer like He suffered on the cross. You will never experience that non-repeatable event that Christ experienced. But nevertheless, When you come home from a hard day work and you just want to lay down and put your feet up and have your wife bring you an appetizer, you can tell yourself, Christ went through Gethsemane for me. Christ went through Calvary for me. I can get on my feet and serve my wife. I can love my wife. I can give my life for her. You're going to have so many opportunities, husbands, to do this in the small, everyday events. You come home. You're exhausted. The house smells like diapers. You find that diaper and you change it. You lay down your life. for your wife. Your wife has had a hard day. She's emotional. She wants somebody to talk to. The game's on. It's the biggest game of the year. It's gonna be the best game that's ever been played. You turn that TV off and you talk with your wife. You hear what's going on in her heart. You pray for her. Don't retreat to your man cave. In fact, get rid of your man cave and love your wife. Pay attention to her. You can sacrifice for her. In fact, you're commanded to. Christ had some purposes in mind when he did this for the church. Verse 26, it describes these purposes. that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish, in the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. There are these cascading purposes in Christ's voluntary giving of himself for the church. And the first one is that he might sanctify her. This basically means that he died so that Christ, so that his church would be set apart as uniquely his and fulfilling a unique role. In this case, it means that the church is in a special relationship with Christ Jesus, a relationship that no other people has. Jesus set his heart on his church. and sanctified her. The church has become like those vessels in the temple that were made for special use to make sacrifices and only to be used in the confines of the temple. So to the church has a special purpose. They've been set apart by Christ. And he did this by having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word. It was a a ritual at the time that Paul was writing that brides would take a bath on the day of their marriage. It would be a kind of ritual cleansing for them. As they came into this new role and new life, they would come in clean. Well, Jesus doesn't have the church wash herself, but rather washes the church by the water of the word, which is basically the message of the gospel, the cleansing message of the gospel. bathes us and makes us sanctified, clean and set apart. And having sanctified her and cleaned her, he did this in verse 27, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. Point is that when Christ takes his church to himself, he wants her to be clean. He wants her to be beautiful. He wants her to be glorious. And so he does all of the work. He did it all. And he did this to bring the church, notice, to himself. He wants the church for himself. So committed is he in his love for the church that he's not taking any others. He's just taking his own. And he presents her to himself as glorious. And as he talks about this in this imagery, it's clear that it's not talking about the physical outer self, but it's talking about the inner self that Christ sanctifies. He sets apart. He makes holy. He leads us out of sin. He leads us into righteousness and holiness. And you perhaps get the picture that this perfectly loving Christ has redeemed us, has washed us, made us a beautiful people that he's brought to be his own pure and holiness that will one day be consummated when he comes again and we are redeemed completely on that day. Notice husbands, it says in verse 28, in the same way, husbands should love their wives. as their own bodies. We can conclude from this that husbands, your main aim in loving your wife is not to stockpile her with diamonds and pearls and gold, although it's okay to get her some jewelry from time to time. The love for your wife, husbands, is not primarily focused on making sure that your wife has the house of her dreams, or that you can certainly make her home comfortable. Not your task, husbands, in loving your wife primarily to make sure she has every subscription that she's ever wanted, or every vacation that's ever crossed her mind, or every social outing that she's ever desired. Your primary pursuit in your love of your bride is her ultimate good, which is her holiness. So husbands, as you set your heart to love your wife, this comes with some pretty significant implications. For how can you love your wife toward holiness when you are living in the muck? You need to get out of it. and show your wife the way to live in holiness and purity. But if you're in the muck right now, husbands, don't let that stop you. Some of you need to repent even right now, and admit to the Lord that you've not been living to the standard that you need to live. And you need to come to the Lord Jesus Christ, confess your sins to Him, receive His forgiveness, and begin living in the newness of life that He grants you. And as soon as that starts, you don't have to wait to begin shepherding your wife in love. Seek her spiritual good. Perhaps you can envision the results of this, where the wives in the church are loved by a husband who boldly lays down his life for her good. who wholeheartedly seeks the good of his wife, which is primarily her holiness. Husbands, this is your God-given task, and everyone around you has just heard you hear it. But more importantly, God himself knows you've heard it. May God give you help to live this way by his grace, by his Spirit. Let's pray. But Father, I pray for the husbands that are here in this room. I pray, oh God, that you convict any of them who need to be convicted of their sin and waywardness in this area, that they might repent very quickly and take up the responsibility that you have given them, this wonderful role to love their wife. Oh, Father, give them help. Give them your spirit. Give them your word, strengthen them for this task. I pray that you would open their eyes to the greatness of Christ so that they would be marveling at his love for them, that they might then love their wives as Christ has loved the church. Father, I pray for the wives here, as they may desire greater things from their husbands, but I pray that you'd give them patience. I pray that you'd give them submission in the meantime. Give them hope in Your Word. Sanctify them, O God. And I pray that in this church, You would create marriages where Christ is honored. You are glorified. Oh, Father, we pray that You'd do this for the sake of Your name. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.