If you will, open your Bibles in the New Testament this morning to Ephesians chapter 5. We're going to be looking at Ephesians chapter 5 both this morning and in our worship together this evening. Our text today will begin at verse 25, or this morning at least, will begin at verse 25 and go down to verse 33. As you're turning there, I want to say that the handouts to this morning and evening sermons are available in the foyer. If you didn't find those before you came in today, you're welcome to pick one up on the way out. They were also emailed out to our list earlier this morning. And what I have wrestled with in preparation for these sermons is the reality that we have far and away more material than I intend to cover. That is by design, but it makes me somewhat reluctant to begin what I'm about to do in this sermon because of the fact that there may be those who listen to the sermon later and are without those notes. And if you only listen to the sermon and do not get the notes, your experience of this will be incomplete. I hope it will nevertheless be helpful. I believe that it will nevertheless be true, but it will certainly be incomplete. And so the sermon this morning needs to be understood as the presentation of what needs to be a larger subject for study and personal inquiry. And that's what the notes are there to help you with. And I look forward to continuing that conversation even in the days and weeks ahead. Before we read God's word, let's bow together and ask his blessing upon it. Our God and Father in heaven, we come this morning to a very important text in your word that speaks to us about Christ's love for his church. And we pray, O Lord, that this truth might be the foremost in our minds, that though we look with an interest, O Lord, in the ethics of marriage, in the proper behavior and attitude that we, particularly as husbands today, ought to show to our wives, that nonetheless, O Lord, that we would be keenly aware that the love that we are called to exercise is but a reflection, a dim, an imperfect reflection of the perfect and heavenly love that Your Son has shown unto us. We pray, O Lord, Your blessing that You would give us eyes to see and ears to hear this day as we read and study Your Word together. In Jesus' name, Amen. Hear now God's Word. Ephesians chapter 5, beginning at 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. Thus far, God's word. May he add his blessing to it. Oftentimes when people turn to Ephesians chapter 5, they feel they must explain, defend, or apologize for what Paul says in verses 22 to 24 with regard to wives. We're going to look at that text together this evening. It is assumed that that command to wives to submit to their own husbands places a heavy burden of responsibility upon women in general and wives in particular. And as we'll see this evening in our study, Lord willing, there are indeed important duties for wives to fulfill. But this morning, I want you to consider the husband's responsibilities by contrast. In this passage, three verses are directed to wives, but seven verses are directed to husbands. The wives are, in fact, called to submit to their husbands and to respect them. But the husbands, by contrast, are commanded to love, sacrifice themselves for, and serve their wives in the same way that Christ did the Church. Wives do have a serious responsibility, and it can be a difficult burden to bear at times. But there are not many women, and I would go so far as to say there are no godly wives who would not gladly submit to and respect a husband who actually loved her in the way that the spirit commands. I want to be fairly rough on us this morning, brothers. I want you to listen carefully to me. I'm preaching first to myself, but I'm also speaking to you. God is speaking to you. When we come to Ephesians 5, you should not see what Paul says to your wives about their role. What should be impressed upon you in a manner that you cannot escape, that you feel overawed by, is the magnitude of duty that confronts you as the head of your wife and the leader in your home. This passage is not about our rights. It is not about anything that we may demand of our spouse. The passage before us today is about our duties and responsibilities. There is no passage in scripture that I am aware of that commands husbands to enforce rule over their wives. And that is sometimes assumed, and you'll find that even in Christian literature on this topic, that the husband, because he is given leadership in the home, is responsible to see to it that his wife obeys what Paul says. But Paul does not say husbands see to it that your wives submit to and respect you. When he speaks to wives, he speaks to them about what they ought to be and to do. And when he speaks to husbands, he tells us what we ought to be and to do. He does not charge either party with enforcing or ensuring the other's compliance. He addresses each one about their own responsibilities. And let me immediately take the ammunition out of the gun that you're loading up right now and say, but if I'm the leader, I'm supposed to speak truth. Yes, indeed, you are supposed to speak truth. You're supposed to love her and lead her the way that Jesus loves and leads his church. And that is by word and by example. It is not by compulsion. It is not by an authoritarian exercise of domination. It is by word, it is by speaking truth, which is far more comprehensive, as I hope you'll see this morning, than just what we sometimes think. It's by speaking truth and it's by living as an example, loving her as a shepherd who goes before the flock, showing them the way. A husband is to lead or rule his household, but that is his duty, not his privilege. It is not a right to be asserted. It is a responsibility to fulfill. In fact, Ephesians 5 doesn't even use this language, although there is a sense in which it could properly be used in this context. Ephesians 5 never says anything about ruling one's house. Instead, it talks to husbands about loving, sacrificing, and serving your wife. That is how you and I are supposed to lead, brothers. You say we are in a position of leadership. Yes. And I mean, what does that mean? What does that look like? Loving her the way that Christ loved the church, laying down your life for her, the way that Christ laid down his life for you, serving her. the way that he has served you. In a God-honoring marriage, the wife's submission is given voluntarily, and she gives it because she desires to honor and obey Christ. The husband does not personally deserve, nor may he authoritatively demand it. So sometimes, as a pastor over the years, I have husbands who come who are unhappy because their wives do not respect them, because they do not submit to them in the way that their husbands believe God intends for them to do. Now, if she is a member of the church, then you should pursue counsel and help from your elders. But let me tell you what you must stop doing first, and that is stop whining. We do not need husbands that whine because their wives just won't cooperate. I'm in charge and she doesn't act like she knows it. That's pathetic. You need to stop whining and stop feeling sorry for yourself. Scripture calls us to be godly men, to be strong, not by demanding our wives' compliance, but by loving her in the gracious, sovereign, persistent way that we have been loved by Jesus Christ. You and I, brothers, are to be concerned to be the kind of husbands that God commands us to be, demands that we be more concerned about that than we are about the behavior or attitude of our wives. Marriages never improve by waiting on the other partner. If you don't hear anything else that I say this morning, hear this. Marriages do not improve by waiting on the other partner. If you want a better marriage, you have to change because you can't change her and she can't change you. You have to change. Christ has proven his love by giving himself for the church, and husbands are called to love their wives in the very same way. Now, when we think about loving our wives, we tend to define that and think about that in terms of our modern cultural context, but that is very far removed from the biblical idea. Christ is the model for the husband's love toward his wife. Love in this text is a verb. It is not a noun as if it were an emotion or idea. Love is something that you do. It's not just words that come out of your mouth. It's not something that you feel in your heart. It's a way that you live. It's something that you pursue and practice. And Jesus' example of love is the pattern that we are to follow. You are not merely to tell your wife that you love her. That's easy to do. You are to show her your love. You are to live in a way that exemplifies this love that we ourselves find in Jesus Christ. Husbands, Paul says, are to love their wives as themselves, as we love our own bodies. In other words, our love for our wives are to operate on the same sort of automatic self-preservation that we already have for our own lives. This is not commending self-love. It is placing our duty to love our spouses on the same level as our innate protectiveness and preference for ourselves. And you and I are very good at this. We'll talk about this in a minute. We're very good at this naturally. You say, no, no, I'm just I'm wearing myself out serving other people. Yes, but you protect yourself. You do. And I do, too. And Paul says that's the kind of automatic posture that we should be in with regard to our wives, that we are immediately protecting her. We are always cherishing her. We are constantly nourishing her so that it would be as abnormal for us to neglect our wives and their emotional, spiritual, and physical needs. It would be as abnormal for us to neglect her as to neglect our own survival. What does that look like in practice? Jesus says it this way in Matthew chapter 7, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them. Don't tell me how your wife is failing to be and to do what she ought to be. How are you behaving toward her? She is not going to change because you are berating her with the teaching of Scripture that speaks to her responsibility. If you want someone else to treat you in a certain way, you should treat them in that fashion. What you hope to receive, the respect, the love, the support that you desire to get, You must first give. And if you're sitting there wondering, but what about her? Isn't she supposed to be unselfish? Isn't she supposed to be serving me? If you're thinking that, brothers, respectfully, you're missing the point. This is not about your wife. It's about you and Christ. This is all about our relationship as men with Jesus. That's exactly what Paul says. He comes to the end of this long section on marriage and he says, this is a great mystery, but I'm actually talking about Christ in the church. Nevertheless, nevertheless, I mean, the point stands that I've made about marriage, right? He's not vacating the teaching that he's done on marriage, but he says this is not the point. The point is the church's relationship to her Lord. Marriage is given to us typologically to help us understand it. better. How you treat your wife is between you and the Lord Jesus. It is not between you and her. And if you act selfishly towards her, you are violating your duty to him and you will answer to him. So how do I love my wife? Well, it's better described in scripture than defined. Listen to how Paul describes it. First Corinthians 13. Love suffers long and is kind. Love does not envy. Love does not parade itself, is not puffed up, does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil, does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. That's what it that's what it means to love your wife. Is there anybody that wants to stand up today and say, yep, that's what I'm doing day in, day out? If you're ready to make that claim, we have counseling appointments available this week. Jesus says that we are to love our spouses the way that he has loved his bride, the church. We are to lay down our lives. We are to sacrifice ourselves for our wives. Jesus's love brought him into this world. He laid aside the privileges of glory and the position that was rightly his. It was love that prompted him to take upon himself human flesh and soul and to submit to many forms of suffering that he never otherwise would have known. It was love that sent him to the cross to die in a cruel way and endure the pains of hell for the sins of his people. The Lord gave himself, his life, his liberties for those that did not love him, for those that were unworthy of that love, for those who deserve punishment and not kindness. And if Christ is our model for loving our wives, what sacrifice is too great for us to accept? Where's the line where you say, no, that's it. I'm out. Done my part. Check that box. I don't have to put up with you anymore. Right. I already folded the laundry. You have to do the dishes. Right. Is that the attitude that we see that we learn from the example of Christ? What pain is too much for us to endure? What could ever justify our selfishness and pride if you think that it is her selfishness and her sin that makes our reluctance to serve or our neglect acceptable? You're missing the point. Look at Jesus. Look at the cross. There's your paradigm. There's the pattern. You say that's not fair. Exactly. Exactly. It's not fair. The son of God carrying your sins on that cross. Enduring the or is that the unfairness that you were thinking about? That's what's not fair. Jesus being punished in your place, Jesus leaving heaven to suffer and die for you, the son of God becoming man so that you could be a son of God. That's that you're right. That's not fair. What does that teach us then about our marriages? What excuse can we offer for the way that we treat her and for the way that we fail to lay down our lives for her? Many men who would gladly die for their wives in a gun battle won't get off the couch to help wash and dry the dishes. Men who would fight to protect her person will treat her feelings with contempt and resentment because why? I'm sure that I am right. I'm always sure that I'm right. If I thought that I was wrong, I would change my mind. I'm always sure that I'm right. Even when I change my mind, then I'm sure that I was right to change my mind and that now I'm right. And we use that confidence as a justification for all kinds of neglect in our own homes. Brothers, Christ gave himself and we are called to do the same. This is a duty that you owe not to your wife, but rather to your Lord. Paul says that Christ sanctified his bride. And that's part of the pattern for us as well. Are you sanctifying your spouse? Are you making her special to you? She is special to you covenantally, whether you recognize that or not. The book of Proverbs is full of instruction about this. We won't take the time to read it today, but in the wisdom literature we find in the book of Job, the wise man asking the question rhetorically, I have made a covenant with my eyes. Why then should I look upon a young woman? Maybe because she's attractive. Maybe because she's good to look at, maybe because it's pleasing to look upon her in this way. But he says, but I have a covenant obligation. I have a covenant with my God. This is between me and the Lord. That's what holds me back from a lustful look. That's what keeps my affections attuned toward the things of God. That's what Job is saying. We need to put our responsibilities in this regard in the broader covenantal context. Have you sanctified your wife in your heart and your life? Is she special and set apart in your eyes and affections? Do you jealously protect her position, not only in your life, but in your heart, in how you think about her? So many people in our society, even professing Christians today, are missing this point grossly. That keeping a respectful, emotional distance from other women is not merely because you can't trust yourself or trust them. It is because you respect, honor, and cherish the special place that your wife has in your life. And that is a position of intimacy that no one else is entitled to. It's what it's about. And even among professing Christians, that idea of keeping some emotional distance from other women is being mocked, is being scoffed at. And you are missing the point. It's because your spouse is precious. It's not because you imagine that I'm going to fall into sin or the other person is going to fall into sin. It's because there is only one person who belongs in that place. It's because you have a covenantal conception of relationship. This isn't just your bed, brothers, it's your heart, it's your affections, it's your mind and imaginations. You have to sanctify your wife there. Starve your eyes so that you can gaze upon her. Meditate on her beauty, not that of another woman. Pray that God will help you to see her glory and treasure her in your heart. And remember that she is not just a body there for your satisfaction. Her beauty is as the daughter of God. That doesn't have anything to do with her physical appearance. It has everything to do with who she is. C.S. Lewis talks about that. He talks about the fact that if we could actually see people as they will be one day in eschatological glory, we would probably fall on our faces because we wouldn't be able to stand to be in the presence of so glorious a being. Do you realize what it is to be in the presence? Do you realize more than that what it is to be in a covenant relationship, an intimate communion with an image bearer of the triune God? That's who your wife is. And if she's a believer, she's an adopted daughter of the heavenly king. She's a fellow heir of the grace of life. You need to see that beauty. It's not about what she looks like. It's about who she is. Jesus cleanses his church. He washes her with the precious water that symbolized in baptism, the water of his word as it is applied by his spirit. The church must be bathed and cleansed and purified by this ministry of her bridegroom, Christ. We must be cleansed of our sins and the stains which are left behind have to be scrubbed out. Our minds have to be renewed. And that ongoing work is because the false doctrine that stubbornly clings there, the faulty ideas, the faulty ways of thinking, the cleansing work of Christ not only delivers us from guilt, it breaks the power that sin once had over us. The Lord intends us to be holy without and within so that even our desires and thoughts and affections are cleansed by his word and brought under his control. And Paul brings this up as part of the paradigm, as part of the pattern to say, husbands, this is what it looks like. This is how Jesus loved his bride. You are to love your wives in the same way. You say, but I can't, how can I cleanse my wife? I can't wash away your sins. No, you can't. We cannot do what Christ alone can do. And yet, nevertheless, Paul is calling us to follow in the example of Christ and how we love and serve our spouses. And part of this is by our eagerness to forgive our wives and never hold grudges against them. It's also by cleansing her with the word of truth, with that word that purifies and heals by speaking grace and encouragement. Our wives often carry wounds from hurtful experiences in their past. Their hearts may be burdened by grief and guilt, either from their own sin or from someone else's sin against them. They may have false beliefs about themselves that are making it difficult for them to know our love, and more importantly, to know God's love. And husbands, our job is to speak truth to our wives that cleanses them of that way of thinking, that washes that away. that helps them be fresh and new and able to see what they could not see before. Paul says this about our speech in Ephesians chapter four. Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers. Your words are to be a ministry of grace. And if that's true of our words to one another and even to unbelievers, how much more true is that? Let's reason from the lesser to the greater here. How much more true is that of our words to our spouse. We have to learn to use our words as Christ uses his word to cleanse our wives. to free them from negative thoughts, from painful histories and self-destructive false beliefs. We need to be concerned to build her up rather than tear her down. Encourage her in holiness and godliness. Point her to Christ as the Savior of sinners and as the one who heals all of our infirmities. And she may carry scars, and you and I may not be able to do anything about that, but Jesus can heal the injuries. He can heal the wounds. And helping her experience that, helping her get to heaven is your most sacred task. There is nothing more important that you will ever do in your life. Do you realize this, brothers? I don't care what job you have. I don't care what role you play. There is nothing more important than helping your wife first and foremost, and secondly, your children know the Lord and get to heaven. There's nothing more than that. And yet oftentimes, that's the responsibility that we're neglecting. Because these other things are so important, right? This report is due. This project has got to get done. This meeting's got to happen. These things are so important, aren't they? But viewed in context of eternity, they're just not important at all. You cannot save your wife, but you can continually point her to the one who is able to save her. Paul says that Christ presents his wife in glory, in splendor, in beauty without spot or wrinkle. And in the same way, husbands are to present their brides in the splendor without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. You are to prepare and present your wife to God in glorious attire. And again, let me say this has nothing to do with her physical appearance. It may be appropriate. I think it is appropriate for you to appreciate and be interested in her physical appearance. This is about her personal, spiritual, and emotional well-being. It is about her glory in Christ. You are married, if you're married to a believer, you are married to a daughter of God. You are married to an eternal creature who will be robed with the glory of Christ forever. That's who you're married to right now. And you say, yeah, but I don't like the way she does her hair. I don't like that new dress that she bought. You realize how ridiculous that sounds, how petty our complaints are, because we're not thinking in terms of the eschatological glory that our wives already possess in Christ. Your marriage already is and is to be more and more a glorious thing. But that doesn't happen simply by getting married. You have to work to make your marriage glorious, just as Christ has worked to glorify each one of us. You have to pay attention. You have to be willing to work long hours for many years. You have to be unselfish in sacrificing for her because beneath her weak, mortal and perishable frame is an extraordinary being that will one day be with Christ and robed in divine glory. And you need to live today with your wife with that end in view. Paul says that Jesus nourishes his wife and in the same way we ought to nourish our wives, that we ought to nourish and cherish them as we would our own bodies. We're to care for them as we would care for ourselves. And please don't miss this analogy. Some of us do a terrible job of taking care of our own health and our own bodies. That's not what Paul's recommending. What he's appealing to is the basic human instinct for self-preservation. And you do this well. Even when you are neglecting your long-term health, you take care of yourself quite well. You are more likely to shove an Oreo in your mouth than a knife into your leg. You eat sweets, you eat fat, you take it easy when you ought to push harder, but we don't always show that same kind of care to our wives. We're not concerned to nourish and pamper and protect her as we often are our own comfort. Husbands, we are responsible for providing for the needs of our wives. And that may or may not be financial, but it certainly is physical, emotional, sexual, and spiritual. A wife needs more than a paycheck and a protector. And in fact, some wives don't need either of those. Some wives, they're perfectly fine financially and in terms of their physical safety on their own. But that doesn't mean that she doesn't need you. She needs you to be supportive of her. to encourage her, to enable her well-being and success, to see to it that her needs are being met while she is spending and being spent taking care of everyone else. Most wives expend a lot of energy nourishing other people, children, grandchildren, aging parents, neighbors, friends, high-maintenance husbands. You are there to nourish her and to make sure that her needs are not neglected and that her well-being is not forgotten while she is caring for you. You're to nourish her. and to cherish her. And a man naturally cherishes himself. Some men are complete narcissists. Some women are, too. But that isn't what Paul is referring to. He's simply elaborating on this point about nourishing and cherishing. Just as a man nourishes and cherishes his own life and his own body, he should nourish and cherish his wife as well, because you are one flesh with her. You see that? That's not true of anybody else in your life. That one flesh union. And sometimes this is difficult. The little things that you found cute when you were dating now drive you up a wall. You may more often look at your wife with annoyance than with natural affection. And that's by the way, that's not always the case as couples grow older. Praise God. But remember, a lot of these servants are coming out of experience in pastoral counseling. It's often enough the case that you need pastoral counseling. And brothers, we should not train our hearts in this direction to say that every time I'm looking at my wife, it's kind of with a deep sigh and a roll of the eyes. What does she need now? Nourish and cherish. I want to say this very clearly. If you do not love and cherish your wife, you need to look in a mirror to find the problem, because the problem is you. It is not her, because nourishing and cherishing her has nothing to do with her. It is not about her appearance. It is not about her attitude. It is not about her behavior. It is about your relationship with Jesus. Nourish and cherish her does not mean insofar as you find her attractive, fulfilling, appealing. It means nourish and cherish her the same way that you take care of yourself, even though there may be many things about you that are far from perfect and even things that you don't like about yourself. We're not told to cherish our wives when they're easy to live with. We're told to cherish our wives, period. And that is our responsibility before God to Christ. At the end of this section, Paul talks about Genesis chapter two and the responsibility for a man to leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife. That verse at the end of Genesis chapter two has profound implications for a covenantal understanding of marriage. The reality is that in the ancient world and in many places today, sons who got married would bring their wives home because the family, in a multi-generational fashion, lived together, if not in the same house, then certainly on the same estate. Leaving your father and your mother has nothing to do with geographic proximity. It has everything to do with covenantal relationship and responsibility. Prior to marriage, the parent-child relationship is the primary analogy of our relationship to God. And it's the most important covenantal connection we have among men. After marriage, that cannot remain the case. You have to leave father and mother and cleave to your spouse. And unfortunately, the failure to do so is at the root of many different marital difficulties. Parents, as your children grow, it is your job to prepare them to detach from you and to attach to their future spouse. If they remain more committed to you than they are to their mate, you have to refuse to cooperate. You have to send them away. Put them out. Tell them to go home and work things out with their husband or their wife. And that does not mean that parents should not counsel or cannot encourage. Of course, we can and we should. But continuing to try to fix their problems for them promotes covenantal confusion. They are no longer part of your household. That's the point of Genesis 224. Even if they are always your children, they have to establish their own family and make their own way, as you did as well one day. Husbands, your wife is not your mother. She is your spouse. God did not give her to you to replace your mother or to take care of you. He gave her to you so that you can take care of her for him. It's a responsibility in Genesis 2. The verb that Moses uses in Hebrews 2 to describe this idea of cleaving is a word that means to pursue, to overtake, to adhere to. Adam was standing right next to Eve in the garden when she spoke to the serpent and it violated God's command not to eat the forbidden fruit. But he failed to speak up. He failed to stretch out his hand. He failed to protect his spouse. And because the first man failed to protect his wife, the entire world fell under a curse and died. Do you understand? That's how significant this is. You are to leave father and mother. You are to cleave to your wife. And that means you stay by her. You adhere to her. You pursue her. You protect her. You have a connection and communion with her that you don't have anywhere else. And the failure to stay close and guard his family destroyed the good world that God had made in Adam's case. That's how important. This really is God's plan is for us to be joined to our wives as one flesh. And that language is not only sexual. In fact, I would argue if we had more time, I'll just tease you with this idea now that the sexual union is only a tangible experience and picture of an invisible reality. In other words, when the Bible says that the two shall become one flesh, he's not talking about sex. Sex is pointing to that statement in Scripture. Sex is the picture, the sexual relationship between a man and a woman is a picture of that covenantal reality. One flesh. Intimate, covenantal union and communion. Physically, emotionally, and spiritually. You must not allow anything to come between you and your spouse except devotion to God. Your relationship with her is a part of your devotion to God. In fact, viewed rightly, obedience in marriage is obedience to God and is the outworking of love and loyalty to Him. So we've walked through a lot of different categories this morning, but I want to notice one final point before drawing all of these ideas together. I want you to look again at the text that we've kind of been walking through, verses 25 to 31, and ask you to see what the command is. Because most of this passage is not actually given in the form of a command. There's one command, and then there is this elaborated description of how to fulfill that command. The command is, love your own wives as Christ loved the church. And in verse 28, even though a lot of English translations don't bring this out clearly, that is what you owe. You are indebted to love. Who do you owe that to? Who are you indebted to? Not your spouse. the Lord. Yes, you owe it to your spouse because you are in covenant with her, but fundamentally, the debt is to God. The rest of the text is not a list of commands to husbands to obey, but it's actually a description of the love of Christ for his bride. And that's because marriage is given to us to teach us about Christ in the church, not the other way around. But it also helps us to understand what it looks like to love in this way. So how should I love my wife? By sacrificing myself for her, by sanctifying her, consecrating her as special to me, saving my heart, my eyes, my life for her alone. By cleansing her of sin, by speaking the truth in gracious words that bathe her heart in God's promises and bring her comfort and peace. By presenting her glorious, making her beautiful, by lavishing upon her the love and loyalty that God uses to glorify us as well. by nourishing her, seeking her welfare and all things above my own, by cherishing her, so fixing my affections and attention on her that no one else can capture my eyes or heart, and by cleaving to her, remaining loyal and faithful, leaving my father's house in order to make one for us alone, together, protecting her, standing by her and for her. That is how Christ loved. us brothers. That's how he loves his bride and that is how we are to love God's daughters who are our wives.