Welcome everyone that is here and we welcome to those that are online and I think Roy who's been was injured in a car crash has been watching us online. He usually, that's ironic because he usually records I think he recorded for, I don't know, three or four years and never missed a thing. And then a car hit him and thankfully he's able to recover and not in the hospital and healing up. So, pray for his healing. Doug, we talked, Doug also watches online. So for those of you watching online, a warm welcome. Happy Mother's Day. This is May the 12th, 2024. Welcome to all the moms. Happy Mother's Day to all of you. So you should have a handout. Today, we're going to be looking at Colossians 3, verses 19 and 20 planned. And we might get that far, but we've planned on that. And if you'll turn in your Bibles to Colossians 3, verses 18 through chapter 4 verse 1. I'm going to read that. That's our overall context that we're looking at. And we're on a section called Guidelines for Christian Life. You remember chapters 1 and 2 were doctrine and actually some pretty deep doctrine was about Christ and how he's supreme and he's the creator and he's also the origin of the church, created the church and he's the head of the church and he's the head of creation and Now we get into three and four and it's the practical outworking of our salvation and that doctrine and We begin chapter 3 talking about what we should be like as the new man and Now we are you see under outline of our passage dead in the old we're to mortify the old man and we're to develop the new and Colossians 3 12 through 17 and if you want to hear those you can go back and look at them it's very easy to on Church one to go back and and to hear those or sermon audio.com either one and to find it and it and I'm actually in a separate classification that's funny because it's listed by names of people and And then we're currently on one called desire Christ-like relationships. So the relationships should be the outworking of what we've learned as far as what we should, what we are in Christ, and then what he's doing through us as Christians. And we're currently on the family, and we're on the husband's relationship to the wife, and we are on the children's relationship to the parents. So you should have that. And so we'll go through those. And then later on, we'll get to the following, the D, E, and F under Roman numeral two. So let's take a minute and pray and ask the Lord to be with us and help us as we come to him and that he would make things very clear to us. And this would be a blessing to everyone. Father, we thank you for, the opportunity to share your word and study it. What a privilege that is. We know that from your word is how we know who you are, what you've done for us, and what you are doing, and what we need to be doing, Father. I pray that you would help us on this topic of husbands loving wives and not making them bitter and children obeying their parents. Help us to see that. We've read it many times, most of us, but help us to see that in the depth and in the context that you have for us in Colossians. We pray that you would be with all those that are sick and ill and hurting, pray that you would lift them up and restore them, reduce their pain, those that are... fighting difficult situations and have emotional disturbances and challenges. We pray, Father, that you would be with them and encourage them. And we pray for our service today. We thank you that our children's choir will be singing, and we look forward to hearing them. Pray that you'd bless the service to follow. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Okay, so Roman numeral two, well, we're gonna read the scripture first. If you have turned in your Bible to Colossians three, I'll start and just read verse 18 through chapter four, verse one. Wives submit yourselves unto your own husbands as it is fit in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and be not bitter against them. Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing unto the Lord. Fathers, provoke not your children unto anger or to anger, lest they be discouraged. Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh, not with eye service or as men pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing the Lord. And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men, knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance, for ye serve the Lord Christ. But he that doeth wrong shall receive for the wrong which he hath done, And there is no respect of persons, chapter 4 verse 1, masters give unto your servants that which is just and equal, knowing that ye also have a master in heaven. So, I'd like to read a larger passage so we get the context there. So, before we get into desire Christ-like relationships, and item B there, the husband's relationship to the wife, and you know, on the outline, that letter B corresponds to the position it is in Roman numeral two above, so you can see that. Okay, so, I found a quote because I wanted us to get kind of a biblical perspective on the church, the Bible's view of women. And I found a great quote from Grace Community Church down in Southern California, John MacArthur's church. And this is part of their statement about women. And I was just looking, I was searching for some quotes and stuff and I found this. It said, And I don't know if MacArthur wrote it, but he agrees with it. Somebody perhaps from his church wrote it. From the very beginning, women filled a vital role in the Christian church. And he gives a number of passages, Acts 1, Acts 9, Acts 16, Acts 17, Acts 10, Acts 18, Acts 24, Romans 16, 1 Corinthians 16, 2 Timothy 1, and 2 Timothy 4. But they had a vital role in the Christian church, but not one of leadership. The apostles were all men. The chief missionary activity was done by men. The writing of the New Testament was the work of men. Leadership of the churches was entrusted to men. Although Paul, although the apostle Paul respected women and worked side by side with them for the furtherance of the gospel, he's going to make, I'm going to point out, he pointed no female elders or pastors. Now, I looked at Romans 16 and 1st Philippians 4-3 and Romans 16 is him greeting all the people in Rome and one of them was Phoebe. Phoebe's name means bright and radiant and Paul writes of her as if she reflected that. And there's another Mary. You know there's like six Marys in the New Testament but this doesn't appear to be related to any of the other Marys that we know of. Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of Jesus and the others. This seems to be a separate Mary. He also mentions Priscilla and Aquila. Now you know Priscilla and Aquila, Aquila was the husband and They, Priscilla was a wife, they were tent joint, they were co-business persons with Paul in tent making. And that's, they were, in fact, that became such a phrase when a pastor's working to support his Pastoral ship in a church they call it tent making because he's working to earn a living and not receiving support from the church and they go sometimes they call that tent making but they were even they were so Influential that when Apollos came with the wrong doctrine they said they told polish you're believing wrong. This is the right way to believe so In fact it mentions that Priscilla and Aquila It says they literally in the King James. They they put their necks on the line for him and so they saved I had something to do with that the incident is not recorded, but they saved his life and there's a junia in verse 7 of Romans 16 and also verse 12 a Typhena and a Tripsia and they were apparently were twin sisters. We don't know anything about them. We just know their names. I kind of wish the Holy Spirit had given us a supplement. Robert was talking about a book that talked about all the names of the people and who they were and what they meant and all that. I said, I kind of wish the Holy Spirit had let us know about these people. That would have been fascinating. But I guess, you know, like the Catholic Church does, he probably would have had more statues to those people. So the people would have worshipped them instead of worshipping the Lord. So it's interesting. There are many women that were in the New Testament far more than we really realize that had a very powerful. What if Timothy's grandmother and mother hadn't been as influential in raising him? They had a tremendous impact on Timothy was very influential. He wasn't an apostle, but he was certainly a great follower. He wrote one of the two, he wrote, he pastored a church and Paul wrote a letter to him. And so very interesting. There were a lot of women in the church that really did many great things. They weren't in leadership, though. He's going to make a point about that. Because it seems in our minds, in our 21st century minds, we think, well, if you can't be in charge, then you're not equal. You're oppressing somebody. And that's not true. Paul appointed no female elders or pastors. In his letters he urged that men were to be the leaders in the church and that women were not to teach or have or exercise authority over men, 1 Timothy 2.12. Therefore, although women are spiritual equals with men, And the ministry of women is essential in the body of Christ. Women are excluded from leadership over men in the church. So let us look here. going on to quote this from Grace Community Church, men and women stand as equals before God. And we read, I think, Galatians 3.28 last week, and it shows that they are equal before God. Both bear the image of God himself. However, without making one inferior to the other, God calls upon both men and women to fulfill the roles and responsibilities specifically designed for them, a pattern that can be seen even between the Father and the Incarnate Son and the Holy Spirit, 1 Corinthians 11, 3. In fulfilling the divine given roles taught in the New Testament, women are able to realize their full potential because they're following the plan of their own creator and designer. Only in obedience to Him and His design will women, and I would add men too, and children, and slaves, and masters, Will they be truly able in the fullest sense to give glory to God? So I really like that article because it was fairly concise and it really addressed a key issue that's often in our society very, very contentious. Okay, so now we're looking at the husband's relationship to the wife and I just wanted to add, the theologians have said that Paul entrusted Phoebe so much that he let her take all the letters to all the churches and distribute them. And Priscilla and Aquila, Aquila didn't have any type of education. So Priscilla, as his wife, kind of strode him along and helped and kind of took the forefront because he couldn't, whether it's reading, writing, you know, theologians haven't proved that. But they do know the reason she took the forefront was because his education was lacking so much. I'm not sure, I think Phoebe may have delivered the letter to Romans. We know that Tychicus or Tychicus, however you want to pronounce it, and Onesimus delivered the letter to Colossae. And Tychicus delivered some of the other letters, Ephesians, etc. So, the prison epistles. But yes, thank you for that. Yes, that reminds me of my situation with my own mom and dad. My dad had no education, and my mom did, and she kind of helped him. But he taught. He taught Sunday school and other things. He didn't preach, but he taught Sunday school. So, yes, there's a very important role that women have that is underappreciated and underrecognized. And so the husband's relationship to the wife, verse 19, husbands love your wives and be not bitter against them. So. The husband's duties, number one, be one middle of page one, two duties. are mandated by Paul for the husbands. There's one positive, there's a to-do, and there's one negative. Don't do this, all right? And so this is so simple. Love your wife, positive, and don't be bitter against them. That's negative, don't do that. Now these two duties are given in great contrast to the ancient world and the prevailing customs and culture in these times. And I was trying to get a little background on the culture at that time, and I did not really find a good authoritative source, but women were considered Property in a man's world, they had few rights and privileges. In most cases, they couldn't inherit property. They couldn't own property. They couldn't buy property. They had to be certain places at certain times. They couldn't be in the, there's, I think there was a woman's court and a synagogue, but there was a lot of restrictions on women, incredible number of restrictions. In Greek homes, the women were confined to their own areas and they couldn't even eat with the men. So we know that it was a different culture, but the Bible transcends cultures. One of the reasons I read that biblical perspective on women is to show what the Bible taught, and there's equality but different roles, different functions. So the first thing that husbands are to do, A, right below number one. Husbands are to love their wives. And you think, well, that, duh, that's simple. I would say to you, no, that's not. That's a challenge. Not because women are unlovable, but because we're all human. And the Greek word here means a love determined by the will And that will is, there's a concern by the person who is loving for the wife's, the husband is to be concerned about the wife's well-being and welfare, not simply an emotional or amorous attachment or an infatuation or something in the wife that Causes the husband to be very attracted. No, it's a selfless love that wants the best for the wife. So. I wanted to read something from Charles Erdman who said, who really talks about some aspect of the love I hadn't thought about. He says, however, Charles Erdman in his book on Colossians, however, the real limitation upon the authority of the husband is expressed in the words which follow, husbands love your wives and be not bitter against them. If not strictly a limitation of authority, perfect love, the love that a husband is supposed to have for his wife, a godly love, transforms and controls the exercise of authority. So love has an effect. And on the type of authority that's rendered toward the wife. And he says, it makes tyranny, that's the wrong kind of authority, tyranny and unkindness, selfishness and cruelty, Absolutely impossible. If you have a godly love for somebody, you love them as an act of your will and you want their best. You're not going to be tyrannical. You're not going to be authoritative. You're not going to act like a Hitler. It's going to control the exercise of authority. And it makes those things impossible. Tyranny, unkindness, selfishness, cruelty. He goes on to say, it removes, love removes from the submission expected of a wife, all that is distasteful or difficult. Indeed, it places a husband in the position of actual subjection himself, for he is compelled by love to obey every claim the wife may make for support, for sympathy, for protection, for happiness. Love is unselfish. It's patient. It's self-sacrificing. It's unfailing. Love makes it possible for one to be bitter. That is harsh and unfeeling. A wife never need fear to obey a husband of whose love she is sure. So I really love that thought. And I thought, oh, that's really good because it shows the love tempers the misuse of authority. And it tempers the, and it actually helps the wife to be easier to be subjective because in reality, when you love someone, you're subject, you're in subjection to them. So Matthew Poole said, I quote here, this is, I'd like this, he said, this is short, he said, Agape love, and that's the word here, the godly love that God shows to us. He says agape love is to sweeten, on the one hand, the subjection of the wife, and to temper, on the other hand, the authority of the husband. It it moderates the authority and it limits the authority to what is right for the husband and it makes it easier and sweeten the authority and subjection of the wife. On the other hand, I thought that was really good and moving on so. It's a selfless love that wants the best from her, reading from the handout directly there. For the word for love is the verb agapeo, which means, which describes godly love. And it's the same word that's used in John 3, 16. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." Our salvation is due to God's love, and the expression of that love is the Lord Jesus Christ, who died on the cross for our sins. And also, in the noun form, agape, A-G-A-P-E, in Romans 5.8, but God commended His love toward us while we were yet sinners. Christ died for us. There was nothing about us that was commendable to God. We had no merit. God didn't save me because I was a good talker, which I'm not for sure. And he didn't save me because I had one little ounce of my little pinky finger that was pretty good. No, God saved me through grace, by faith. And it was his merit that saved me, not my merit. Okay. God committed his love toward us while we were yet sinners. Christ died for us. Okay. Now, Another quote here from Expositor's Bible Commentary, Agapeo does not mean affection or romantic attachment. It rather denotes or means caring love, a deliberate attitude of mind that concerns itself with the well-being of the one loved. Self-devotion, not self-satisfaction is its dominant trait. We always think Generally, we love somebody because there's a reciprocation. There's some merit about that person. They went to the same school, they were in the military, they're a veteran, or they're a construction person, or they are in the same society that we're in. or they have they share a view that we political view that we subscribe to so we generally attracted to people with God's love is a love of will that we make a choice and that's what he's going to we're going to talk about here and and Abbott Smith's Greek lexicon reading from the handout defines the word for love to feel and exhibit esteem and goodwill to a person to prize and delight in a thing or person. It also states, love is fitly used in the New Testament of Christian love to God and man, the spiritual affection which follows the direction of the will and which therefore, unlike that feeling, emotion, that preoccupation, that attraction, which is instinctive and unreasoned, I don't know why I love you, I just do. You know, that sounds great on TV, you know, but we're to love and there's certainly a lot of affection associated with love and a lot of emotion, but the will is the primary driver of willing. Because there's sometimes, Cindy does not feel like loving me because I'm a Because I'm a stubborn, hard-headed, difficult person at times, and I'm setting my ways. Yes, yes, he says, keep coming, right? And so I'm hard to love at times, but she looks past that because the will is there, and she wills to love me with the godly love, and overlooks my faults, and loves me in spite of them, and cares. It's a spiritual affection which follows a direction of the will and which therefore unlike that feeling which is instinctive and unreasoned Can be commanded as a duty husbands love your wives because you hear now people say Well, I fell in love with somebody and that's great. And then they say well, I really fell out of love with somebody. Well, that's not biblical That's not biblical And well people we grew apart and all those type things and that that's that's unbiblical We're married someone we make a commitment to them This is a love that's demonstrated reading back from the handout by God's ultimate example of sending his son Jesus to die on the cross in our place for our salvations and he that's I Ephesians 5.25 tells us that husbands love your wife, even as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself, a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish. Paul here lifts up marriage to a high institution saying it pictures our relationship with Christ. Often we hear the bride of Christ and it pictures the church. Christ is a head and the church is the bride. So it pictures the church and he gave himself for it. Also, there's a number of other places where this word is used and I know that you can't get this and I started to give it as a handout, but I thought it would be TMI, too much information. So what I want you to do is just listen to it and hear all of the things that God commands us to do in using this word. This is by Bruce Hurt. He says, what is agape love? Well, we could answer with a number of lexicon. definitions, the best answer is to see what God says. Notice that agape, the noun, is best defined as a verb shown below. So, in other words, agape is love in action. In 1 Corinthians 13, when you look at that, it shows all of what love does. It doesn't try to describe the feeling of love. It talks about what love does. He says agape is not static, but dynamic. And so he goes through scripture, and I'm sure this isn't all of them, and he picks out what love is, what love is to be doing. Love is Commanded of believers, John 13, 34, and John 15. Love is empowered by the Holy Spirit in the heart of the surrendered saint. Galatians 5, 22, the fruit of the Spirit is love. The first fruit of the Spirit is love. In fact it says the greatest of these is love. Love is commanded of spirit-filled husbands for their wives, even as Jesus demonstrated for his bride at the church, giving himself up for them. We just read that, Ephesians 5. Love is to be manifest or shown to wives in the same way the spirit-filled husbands love their bodies, Ephesians 5, 28. Love is the love which the Father loved the Son and those who belong to Him, John 17. Love is a debt that we're always to seek to repay but can never fully discharge, Romans 13. Love is taught by God, 1 Thessalonians 4. Love is manifested by specific spirit-enabled actions and attitudes, 1 Corinthians 13, that's all that description, love never fails. and not puffed up, all of those things. Love is shown not just by words, but by deeds, 1 John 3. Such love and action is a manifestation of genuine faith, James 2. Love is shown by keeping God's commandments. Now, you say you love God, are you keeping all His commandments? He says, if you love me, you'll keep His commandments. Love is the response Jesus called for one to demonstrate to his or her enemies in Matthew 5. Love which calls for one to love, the love which calls for one to love one's neighbors oneself, Matthew 19. Love that seeks the recipient's highest good, not activated by virtue in the recipient, any merit, but It's undeserved. That was exemplified by John 3.16. Love is not based on affection, sentiment, or emotion, but upon a decision of the will. Love is given or offered even if the love is not received or reciprocated. Love differs from the phileo love, that's like brotherly love. Philadelphia is a city of brotherly love. Phileo is a Greek word used for brotherly love. Well, love differs, this type of godly love differs from phileo which is based on affection. And love, this is a love that finds its perfect expression in Jesus Christ and the cross. This is the love of the overcomers in 1 John 5, and it's the love that in Revelation, for those who did not love their life even to the death, Revelation 12. This is a love that cannot be manifested by the unsaved individuals in its true biblical sense of being spirit enabled as well. And I'm sure there's more, but I thought that was enough. Man, if you could meet those standards, wow, you'd be some kind of Christian, wow. So, love. Ephesians 525, husbands love your wife even as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it. It was an act of his will. Love is a deliberate attitude. This is a quote by Curtis Vaughn. Love is a deliberate, deliberate means I deliberately did it, a conscious act of the will. It's a deliberate attitude of mind which concerns itself with the well-being of the one loved, a love which makes it a delight for a wife. to subject herself to such a husband. Now, I know I've hit you with some tough quotes, but one of the best things that I found on love was in Vine's expository dictionary. This is a great book. You look up the English word and it will give you, the one I have based on the King James, it will give you the words that are used for this English word in the King James Version. And then it'll tell you where the reference is. And it's linked up with Strong's. So it's kind of really helpful. So it talks about the verb and the noun, okay? Agapeo and agape present the characteristic word of Christianity. He is saying here, that love is the hallmark, if you will, of Christianity. It's a characteristic word. And since the Holy Spirit of Revelation is used to express ideas previously unknown until the New Testament, inquiry into its use, whether in Greek literature or the Septuagint, that was an early translation of the The Bible throws only a little light upon its distinctive meaning in the New Testament And he's saying here you have to look at what there's no there's no there because that culture was so foreign to what this love is We couldn't go back. We can't look back to that culture for examples We have to look to the Bible agape and agapeo are used in the New Testament one Let me say A, to describe the attitude of God towards His Son. It's used to describe the attitude of God towards the human race, God so loved the world. And it's also used to describe His attitude towards believers. He loved the Son, He loved the human race or the world, and He loved believers. Also, it's used to convey his will to, that's B, it's used to convey his will to his children, It's used to convey his will to his children with the attitude of love towards one another and toward all men. So he's trying to convey his will. He does in the scriptures, the New Testament, conveys his will to his children regarding the attitude of love for one another and toward all men. So, we need to love one another, we need to love all men, okay? And then finally, it expresses the essential nature of God. God is love. He's a personification. I know that was hard to pass along verbally. Thanks for your patience. OK, so I'm going to continue. He says love can only be known from the actions it prompts. Often when we try to describe an intangible, you cannot tell me what love looks like by itself. You have to describe a manifestation or an expression or, you know, I might say, Cindy loves Scotty so much she gave him a great birthday present, you know, or When he came home from work, she gave him a big hug and a kiss. It's an expression. You have to describe the manifestation or the revealing of that love. You can't say it's the box by about two inches and it's wrapped up in a nice ribbon and only pink ribbons. No, you can't do that. It can only be seen and known from the action it prompts. God's love is seen in the gift of his son. But obviously this is not the love of complacency, Vine says, or emotion. That is, it was not drawn out by anything, any merit in us or the objects. It was an exercise of the divine will. It was a deliberate choice that God made to send the Lord Jesus Christ to die on the cross for our sins. It was made with no assignable cause. In other words, he's saying there was nothing in us that would cause him to do that, except in the nature of God. He's loving. He is kind. He is gracious. He wants what is best for us. It's his will. I know that's hard. Now I saw some people frowning. Questions? Okay. So love had its perfect expression among men and the Lord Jesus Christ. And he was He was a revelation of God to us and love was shown when Christ died on the cross and love is, Christian love is the fruit of the Spirit, of His Spirit in Galatians 5.22. And Christian love has God for its primary object, and it expresses itself, first of all, in obedience. So who are we to love primarily? We're to love God. That's what the man, 1 John 4, 19 says, we love because he first loved us. We are focused on God and love him because of what he has done for us. He sacrificed His only begotten Son for us. And our love is expressed back. He says, if you love me, you will obey me. So self-will, that is self-pleasing, is a negation or a is a negative as far as the love of God. It negates it. It goes on to say, Christian love, almost done, Christian love, whether exercised toward their brethren or exercised toward men, is not an impulse from the feelings. It's not an emotion. It does not always run with natural inclinations, nor does it spend itself only upon those who have some affinity or attractive quality. Love seeks the welfare of all and works no ill to any. Love seeks the opportunity to do good to all men, especially to them that are of the household of faith, that is, believers. And that's from Hogg and Vine. I love that guy. That's two guys that wrote a a commentary on 1 Thessalonians. So, in respect of agapeo as used of God, it expresses the deep and constant love and interest of a perfect being, God, expresses a deep and constant love and interest of a perfect being towards entirely, here's the whole point, entirely unworthy objects. And that produces in us a reverential love towards Him and towards those who are our brothers and sisters in Christ. So, and He's the giver. I know that was challenging. I read that through a number of times. Let's look at page two. And what we'll do is this next I think I'm going to stop here, because I have several quotes I wanted to do that. Husbands are not bitter. They're not to be bitter against their wives. And this is the negative part of that. So I'm going to stop there. Questions? Any questions? There's an old saying, Scotty, about love that people don't always hear what you say. Yes. They always will remember how you make Right, right. And a corollary to that. And I really believe that people don't care what you know, till they know you care. And when I was in business, I really tried to develop business relationships with people. Because when there was a struggle, I'd push, I'd kind of rely back on that relationship, they knew I was reliable, dependable, gone the extra mile for them and, and an expression of Christian love in my mind, but in their minds, just being a good work, good business person, and therefore, I could fall back on that relationship, but there's a real thing people want. They don't, that's really good. Thank you for sharing that. God doesn't want our achievements. What he wants is He doesn't want any part-time Christians. He wants us to give him all of our love and to live in our hearts. We're going to talk about, next week, children choosing how they obey. Children, the parents tell them to do, and so they'll say, well, I'll do A and B and C. And you could say, it's not multiple choice. God wants all of you. He wants all of the above. I read that about what he asked, how love, agape love is in the scripture. And it's just incredible, all those things. And that's a real high standard. It's hard to love unlovely people. Let me tell you, you know, if you don't think so, just try to love me. It's hard. It's hard. People are frustrating. And these are difficult times. Yes. about what they do is about what we're supposed to do. Cindy always helps me remember that. Cindy always helps me remember that. Yes, yes, yes. And that's true. That is absolutely, you know, not based on, if it's not a, you help me, I help you, that's important that we do that. But my helping you is not dependent on whether you deserve it. Because truth be told, who does deserve anything? Based on our standing before God, before salvation, there's no merit in us. The merit we have now is what the Lord has done for us. Other comments, those are fabulous comments, thank you. Okay, let's have a word of prayer. Brother John, would you close our time together and ask the Lord to bless us, serve us to follow, please.