of bringing our sermon this morning. Please turn in your Bibles to Ephesians 5. We are going to be reading verses 22 through 33. Ephesians 5, 22 through 33. Wives, subject yourself to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, he himself being the savior of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself up for her, so that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that he might present to himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she would be holy and blameless. So husbands also ought to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself, for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes it and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are parts of his body. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is great, but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the Church. Nevertheless, as for you individually, each husband is to love his own wife the same as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband. This is the word of the Lord. Please be seated. Well, it should be no surprise to Christians that God's glory is at stake in every aspect of our lives. We are either worshiping him or we are spurning his word. So as we talk about marriage today, we will find that every Christian, married or not, is in fact called to stand firmly on the word of God and God's design for this foundational institution. Marriage is the bedrock of every ordered society in our day, and our society is crumbling before our eyes. It has been for decades, in fact. If we think back to the 1960s, we have the rise of the sexual liberation movement, as well as modern feminism. Both of these movements utterly reject God's design for family, marriage, and relationships in general. Now think about this. In 1969, you have the beginning of no-fault divorce. Now, to give you a picture of what this did to our society, in the 1950s, 11% of children who were born to parents would see their parents get divorced in their lifetime. 11%. No fault divorce comes on the scene. In the 1970s, that number spikes up to 50% of children seeing their parents divorced within their lifetime. That number is still about the same today. It's maybe a little bit higher. Fast forward to 2015, we have the Obergefell decision by the Supreme Court that essentially brought homosexuality to a new level across our country. And then just this week, we have the Senate passing the quote, Respect for Marriage Act, which it is, in fact, anything but respect for God's design of marriage. Marriage rates in general are declining at an alarming rate. Young people are waiting longer and longer to get married if they will get married at all. People are proudly planting their yard signs in front of their homes celebrating sexual liberation. And also, I'm sure you've seen it, love is love. Essentially, you decide. It's all up to you. It's all subjective. Every time you see one of these signs, I know for me it's hard not to just kind of shake my head and go, this is utter nonsense. It doesn't even make sense. Love is love. That's just a circular argument. Whenever you see those signs, I challenge you, just ask God to bring the gospel to that home. They need it. They need to know that love is not love. You can't just define it in your own terms. You need something stable. You need something that is true and that is found in the word of God. So let's go back to Genesis 2 and just hear what God said at the beginning regarding marriage. And the Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib which he had taken from the man and brought her to the man. And the man said, this now is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called woman for out of man she was taken. For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and they will become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. Now that is pre-sin. Marriage, even amidst sin, is still an immense blessing and a reprieve from the sin that casts its shadow over our own hearts and all over this world. And the goal of marriage, in general, God's design for marriage, is harmony between two sinners. The only way that that is possible is if these sinners come to faith in Christ. This is the only way to have harmony amidst such sin. And today, before I kind of walk through our text, I do want to give a quick word here for those who are single, but do not have the gift of celibacy, and have a godly desire to be married. God knows your desires. Satan would love for you to isolate yourself, to not come to this very gathering, and to think, woe is me, and isolate yourself away, thinking your feelings are just broken and they will never be fulfilled. Look to Christ, who himself should be your joy, your purpose, and your identity. He will help you faithfully endure and, Lord willing, provide you with a spouse. And at that point, you may in fact be ready for a spouse. If you isolate yourself, you are only asking for problems in that marriage later on. So our plan for today is to examine God's calling on wives, husbands, and the church at large regarding marriage. And I'm going to break it down using the text here that the wife has a position and an action. The husband has a position and an action, and so does the church at large. So, let's look at Ephesians 5 starting in verse 22. We're focusing on the calling for the wife. Wives, subject yourselves to your own husbands as to the Lord, for the husband is the head of the wife. Wives, your position, according to God's design, is under the leadership and care of your husband. That is your position. The husband is the head of the wife. Upon marrying your husband, you entered into a relationship in which you are called to view him as the head. Now, if you think about this imagery, our heads are at the top of our bodies. And what does the head do? The head gives instructions for our bodies. So if I'm going to raise my hand, that started right up here. My hand doesn't, thankfully, just randomly shoot up. You know, I control that using my mind and it's not the Sono. You know, it's just willy-nilly doing its own thing. Instead, we know that this stems from here and flows throughout our body. Our feet lift up the ground or lift up off the ground to walk. Knees bend. Hips can turn. Shoulders can rotate. Now I know for some of you, you might be thinking, they don't move as they once did though. All I can say is what Matt was saying before with ailments, look forward to that glorified, resurrected body that will not ache or have any pain. So the position is under the headship of your husband. And the other thing that the head does is nourish the body. We eat through our mouths. We consume food and that nourishes the rest of our body. So wives, think about it this way. Your husband is to be the one that provides nourishment for your souls. Now don't become this God complex where you look at your husband as though he is God. He is not, and that is putting an unfair expectation upon Him. But He is to be the one that fulfills you spiritually, the one who feeds you spiritually. So he is your head and also whenever we think about the position here, we have a natural tendency to kind of view this hierarchy when we think of head and then the body. I want to just say right now at the beginning that women submission here or being subject to the head does not mean that you are a doormat. to be walked all over. You, in fact, are not called to sin against your Lord, no matter who would call you to that. So in your position, your action is to be subject to your head, to submit to your husband, and also, the text goes on to say, respect your husband. Colossians 3 18 says wives be subject to your husbands as is fitting in the Lord You submit as to the Lord. You do not just submit to your husband. In fact, this is an act of worship. So when you willingly and genuinely and lovingly submit to your husband, you should know that this is pleasing to your Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. You do it for him. You do what he has told you to do. Just imagine this imagery a little bit further. Again, I mentioned a hand doing something that it should not do, that your mind is saying, why are you lifting up your hand? I didn't tell you to do that. Wives, view yourselves as the body of the head. You should not be doing things that your husband is going, where did that come from? What are you doing? What is happening right now? It's not to say that you can't do your own things in life, but everything you do ought to be in a manner that is subject to your husband, who should not be continually caught off guard with your actions. You shouldn't constantly be surprising him in a bad way. There are great surprises, but you should not do things where he constantly, in public in particular, is just going, what was that? Why did you say that? Or anything like that. And husbands, we'll get to it later on how we are to respond to our wives' submission. So I want to close this section off with the position and action of wives by looking at 1 Peter 3 verses 1 through 5. And this is a very important text for us today because I know some in this room might be thinking this call to submission and to be subject under my husband is painfully maybe impossible. You can't imagine it. And it might be because your husband's not a Christian. Maybe he's apathetic, spiritually immature, maybe emotionally absent. Well, 1 Peter 3 says that, in the same way you wives be subjects to your own husbands, so that even if any of them are disobedient to the word, they may be won over without a word by the behavior of their wives, as they observe pure and respectful behavior. That should be empowering to you, to know that the Lord is not unaware of your situation. Live faithfully as unto him, and pray for your husband all the time, that he may become the man that God wants him to be. So now husbands, if you've been paying attention at all, you better not just be sitting back going, that's right, that's right. You'll notice in your text here, there's a little section, few verses to the wives. Husbands, yours goes on and on and on here, because you need to listen. You need to hear the words. So if the wife is to submit and respect you, you need to know this isn't something you inherently deserve just because you said, I do. You need to earn that respect and submission. She should want to respect you and submit to you. That takes effort. Ephesians 5 verse 25 says, husbands love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself up for her so that he might sanctify her having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word. Husbands, your position is in authority over your wife. You have been tasked with this great responsibility. You are the head. So think about this again with this same imagery. If your head looks over here and it keeps going, your body will follow. It has to. If you start veering off this way, your body's going to go that way. So, men, when you are looking at sin, when you are going towards sin, your wife, your children will follow. That is what will happen. It has to because if your face is going this way and being distracted, Christ is there and you're going this way, you're turning your body. Who is that? That's your wife. You are not serving her well and you are certainly not loving her as Christ loved the church. In the family, husbands are the authority figure, and we find this as we read in Genesis chapter 2, with God placing Adam in the garden, giving him responsibility over it, and then providing a helpmate. Again, this has nothing to do with a difference of equality, you know, where the wife is lesser than than the husband, not at all. It is complementary. The wife and the husband come together perfectly when we do what God has told us to do. That is the only way we have harmony. I'm sure every single one of us can think about many marriages that the last thing you would describe it as is harmonious. The very last thing would be harmonious. That should automatically make you look here and go, that makes sense, that God would have a design and a purpose for the husband and wife to compliment one another, rather than them just decide for themselves, how are we gonna make this thing work? How are we gonna be happy? God has given you the blueprints. We simply have to follow them. So husbands, you are in authority over your wife and your action Your position is over your wife, your action then is one word, love. Love your wife. Verse 26 clarifies and qualifies the word love with sanctify and cleansing. So to sanctify is to consecrate or to make holy. And remember, we cannot save our wives. That is not in our authority. God has not given that task to us to save them from sin. Rather, we are to point them to the one who can. So in your words, in your actions, you are to do one thing, point her to Christ. May she always look at you and know that she can faithfully look to you without pause and go, my husband is living as unto the Lord. That is a huge responsibility. To take that lightly is to commit a grave evil against your family, against your wife, and against the Lord. Cleansing, this word, is meant to provoke your memory of the Old Testament, where someone who was sick with a disease was sent away from the camp because they did not want it to spread, but then they would be brought to the priest, and the priest would actually look at them, and if they were clean or something had changed, they would be declared clean. They would be brought back in to the community. Your wife, if she is in Christ, has been cleansed of her sin, and you are to view her as pure and holy and blameless, and to help her stay that way, to be unstained from the sins of the world. A helpful verse that I found in this, with the action of love, is the greatest commandment, when Jesus says, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. Husbands, your first neighbor is your wife. Don't look farther than that. Start there, work on that. Don't start with your actual next door neighbor. They are watching your marriage. They need to see your marriage as faithful and unto the Lord. That is a witness to them and actually allows for more conversation and more opportunity to speak to them and witness to them. So, wives are to submit to their husbands and respect their husbands, and husbands are to love their wives. This means that, husbands, you are to study your wife more than any other person on the planet. You should know her, learn about her, encourage her, challenge her, because you know her best. She also should feel safest with you. Out of anyone in this world, she should feel safe with you. I got the image of a security blanket. My wife loves blankets. And we have lots of them. And tis the season of blankets. It's getting cold out. Husbands, you ought to be that security blanket for your wife where she can come to you and you can just wrap her up and she can let go of all the difficulties that she is facing and that she can point her attention to Christ. So as with when we talked about the calling of wives, we went to first Peter. I also want to go there for the husbands as well. First Peter chapter three says, you husbands in the same way, live with your wives in an understanding way so that your prayers will not be hindered. If you have not caught on to that, this is a huge responsibility that ought to jolt you a little bit. What God's Word is saying here is that if you fail to love your wife, you can't come to Him. Because He's already told you what to do. So if you fail to love her, and you try to go to Him for your own little problems, all He's gonna do is point you to your wife. Say, what are you doing? I'm not listening to that. You won't even love her. Why are you worried about your job? She's suffering and you're just letting it go. Do not fail to love your wife or your prayers will be hindered. There will be a roadblock between you and your Lord because you are disobeying him. So wives submit to their husbands and respect their husbands and husbands are called to love their wives sacrificially. And there's one subject that I do want to address that does apply to both men and women, husbands and wives, and it's found here in this text, it's on the section of husbands, but in verse 28, Paul says, so husbands also ought to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself, for no one ever hated his own flesh. The word body or flesh is often utilized by Paul in the New Testament to speak about the body of Christ. We are members of the body of Christ. It is also used to talk about sin using your actual body. Sins of the flesh. So hear this in 1 Corinthians 6 18, flee sexual immorality for every other sin that a person commits is outside of the body. But the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. Just earlier in this text, we read in Ephesians 5 verse 5, you may be sure of this. Everyone who is sexually immoral has no inheritance in the kingdom of heaven So basically that means our culture is heading for hell We can talk about one subject to prove this in particular and that is pornography The sexually immoral sin of pornography plagues this country It is a great evil that destroys marriages and sets children up for failure in marriage. Think about this result for the person, the husband, the wife, man or woman who's addicted to pornography, who keeps coming back to it, who is not killing this sin, but instead trying to tame the sin. You are sinning against your own body, as we just read. But husbands, who is your body? Your wife. In that action, you are hating your wife. You are sinning against her. And if you are failing to love your wife, what happens? Your prayers are hindered. You are stuck. You are stuck in a sin that will destroy more than just your marriage. It will destroy your children. It will destroy your other relationships with friends. It can even run into this building here, this gathering, and destroy this very gathering of God's saints. May it be so that if you are here today and you struggle with this sin, that it has plagued you for years, don't walk through the doors without confiding in someone about this. Go to your elders, speak to an older brother in the faith or sister in the faith. Certainly you are called to repent of this to your Lord and Savior. But if you're married, you can't just repent of it and hide it. It's already hidden. You can't repent of this hidden sin and act as though that's enough. Your wife needs to know. It's the only way to salvage that relationship and to earn that respect back. This is a sin that plagues the world and plagues the church. It's so easy to think about the statistics and go, yeah, well, that wouldn't apply in this building with these people. It absolutely does. And it's terrible and awful to think about. Sin will beget sin, and God already knows about it, so why are you hiding it? And for husbands and wives, especially those with children, I would just like to point out that this was done in a survey recently. Teenagers in our country view it worse to not recycle than look at pornography. They think it's worse to not recycle than it is to view sexually illicit material online and on their phones. Who does that say is discipling our children more, parents or our culture? May it not be so in this church. May it not be so that we are addicted to sin and stuck in this cycle that destroys marriages. So our last point here is very brief. It's the calling to the church. What is our position at large and what is our action at large? And to find this, I just want to read this same text. We've read it three times now. Look at verse 31 in chapter 5. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is great, but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church. So church, what is our position in this world? It is under the headship of Christ. Wives, husbands, men, women, boys, girls, you are under the headship of Christ. Your action then is to submit to your King. Submit to your King. Jesus says in John 12, 48, the one who rejects me and does not accept my teachings has one who judges him, the word which I spoke. Our church, praise God, does stand firmly on biblical marriage. And that is what we are to do as a, as a collective body here today and moving forward is to not allow the state or anyone else to tell us what marriage is. We bring the word of God out into the world saying real respect for marriage is from the word. one man, one woman, leaving his father and mother to be joined to his wife. Do not sway from that. Do not think you can let go on that one little topic and give ground. You are giving up the truth. So church, as a whole, may we submit to our King who has been so faithful to us despite our many shortcomings. It's pretty clear marriage is no joke to the Lord. He holds it in high esteem. Thank God for all the marriages in this place. Pray for the marriages here. Pray for our elders, in particular, who lead us. Pray for their wives and their families. Remember, we submit to our elders who are our head. If they turn and they deviate, if their marriages break down, you will see couples fall throughout this entire church. So pray for your elders. Pray for the married couples and husbands and wives. Obey the risen Lord. Let's pray. God, we know that we have many shortcomings. We know that we fail. But God, we praise you that we have an advocate with you, the pure and spotless lamb, Jesus Christ, who died on the cross in our place. God, may every sinner in this place turn to him for salvation and forgiveness of sins. We thank you for your love for us. We thank you for a design of marriage. We don't have to figure this out on our own. We simply need to obey. Thank you for your spirit who empowers us to do just that. We pray this in his name. Amen.