§ Husbands Love Your Wives

The Challenges of Discipleship: Husbands Love your Wives

The Ultimate Husband

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, …” (Eph5:25)

My Brothers in Christ and Fellow Christian Husbands,

Although I am addressing this post to Christian husbands I invite you Christian wives to listen in also, for what I am about to tell the men directly affects you and requires your cooperation so that the Lord may bless you both as a one-flesh unit before Him.

All Christians are called to be disciples because we are destined to be conformed to the image of Christ (Rom.8:29) – which is the divine purpose behind true discipleship. The primary distinctive of such discipleship is to “love one another as Jesus loves” (Jn. 13:34-35), that is through the same “agape”, self-denying Love that was in Jesus and has now been poured into our heart by the Holy Spirit (Rom. 5:5).

For a Christian man, I can think of no better place to work out his calling to discipleship than through the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony, for it is through this sacrament that we prophetically model Jesus’ love for his church! What better training ground for discipleship than this!

However, brethren, I have to admit that “discipleship” was the farthest thing from my mind when I proposed marriage. Oh, yes, I loved my bride-to-be dearly and I still do but the love I had then was not the “agape” kind of love that is at the core of being a disciple. Although it was god-given, it was a natural love, a romantic love, that brought me to the wedding altar. And, yes my love was sincere in that I had every desire to give myself totally to my bride, but in my spirit I retained my personal baggage, that part of my nature that drove me to self-centered fulfillment, essentially, my sin nature. It was a part of me that I unconsciously had not surrendered, not only to my wife but also to God.

Unfortunately, most of us men enter marriage in just such a state. Oh yes, we do respect the sacrament and the covenant it represents and we do firmly commit ourselves to our brides through the promises to “love and to cherish, until death do us part”. But unfortunately our training for marriage does not usually discuss the magnificent challenge of the spiritual discipleship that marriage involves. Nor does that training include understanding the scriptural basis and tools needed to live out such a calling within the marriage covenant.

This lack of preparation at the “spiritual” level ignores the fact that we are all tri-partite beings consisting of body, soul, and spirit.  Yes, we usually obtain some training at the “ body and soul level” that helps us to maintain a relationship to a certain degree. But since many of the problems in a marriage have their roots at the “spirit” level, we leave the newly married couple at the disadvantage of not knowing how to get to that level and the spiritual tools that are available to them to stand against the wiles of the devil and the vagaries of their own flesh that work against the marriage covenant.

For this reason, many Christian couples struggle through their marriages and usually are unable to obtain competent advice or counselors to help them get at the root of their problems. This is because the counselors themselves have not been trained at the spiritual level and thus limit their counsel to the “body and soul” aspect where their competency lies. It is also true today that spiritual advisors such as priests or ministers do not usually have the time or prayerful discernment needed to help these struggling marriages, because, although they have been instructed in the basics of spiritual growth, they are too consumed with just keeping their ministries or parishes going to dedicate prayer time to  individual cases and asking the Lord to guide them in providing help for these marriages at this deeper level.

Since the scripture lays the initiative on the husband to emulate Christ in marriage I am, today, exhorting all Christian husbands to discover how by surrendering yourself to Christ and yoking yourself to him in discipleship you can be God’s instrument of renewal for your marriage, and in walking the walk with Jesus, you, yourself, will grow spiritually closer and closer to Jesus. In that relationship He, Himself, not some intermediary will teach you, through His Word, all you need to know about Divine Love and how to let that Love encompass you and your bride just as He encompasses His bride, the church. You just have to learn to listen to His voice through His Word and through your spirit, in prayer, as the core part of your discipleship.

One of the reasons many of us Christians shy away from discipleship is because we have been given the wrong impressions of what it entails – usually as someone establishing some kind of strict religious discipline to which you have to adhere. Nothing is farther from the truth! As I said before, discipleship is merely the process that you enter into when you yield yourself to the Bridegroom and let Him teach you one-on-one, day-by day, how to be open to His Love and How to express that Love in all of the situations you encounter in marriage (and in life).  I call it the “Sweet Yoke of Love”. He also provides you the covering you need against the attacks of the devil brought on by your fleshly weaknesses. But you cannot come to this point unless you learn to listen to His Voice and Obey it out of Love for the Master.

True Divine Love can only be expressed inside of a relationship, That’s why the Holy Trinity, IS LOVE, because of the relationship of the godhead. It is the Father’s desire to bring us not only into the relationship He has with the Son but for us to share that living relationship with each other so that we truly become the Bride of Christ.  What better place, then, to learn about Divine Love, agape Love, than in a marriage relationship?

It is through such a loving and living relationship that true discipleship occurs, where we, through the Divine Love that has been poured into us, are conformed day-by-day into the image of His Son.  A Christian marriage relationship is designed by God to model the relationship between the Son and His Bride so don’t you think that God will provide you all the help you need to be the husband He wants you to be and all the graces you need to follow the path of discipleship He asks you to follow within the marriage covenant?

What then keeps us from opening ourselves to Him in discipleship and inviting Him into our marriage? I believe that, for us men, there are four main problems:

1)    Pride, plain and simple, pride. We want to retain control of everything  in our lives – even when everything is going wrong;

2)    We are afraid of the Holy Spirit, we are afraid to yield to Him and to the spiritual gifts He offers – the very gifts we need to help us in our situation;

3)    We are not open to the Word of God and the spiritual guidance and wisdom He has embedded in it!   It is this very Word that the Lord usesto conform us to the image and likeness of His Son;

4) We don’t know how to pray, that is, how to have a one-on-one dialogue with Jesus so He can communicate with you, where you can tell him your problems and concerns, and where He can respond to you and teach you! (click on:  Hearing God’s Voice and Obeying it!)

I have touched on some aspects of these concerns in my other posts but unfortunately right now I do not have a comprehensive teaching guide to give you – maybe in the future.  However, you don’t really need me, or any one else, to get started all you need is Jesus!  And He is always available through prayer – the prayer of dialogue, and through meditation on His Word.

I pray, brethren, that what I have just told you has touched a few sensitive places in your hearts. That is why I am proposing to you, my brothers in Christ, if you really and honestly desire to grow closer to Christ and your bride in and through Divine Love, that you sincerely meditate on the challenge posed to us husbands by the apostle Paul and ask the Holy Spirit to guide you to a decision to enter into a discipleship relationship with Jesus:

The Ultimate Bride

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, in order to make her holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word, so as to present the church to himself in splendor, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind—yes, so that she may be holy and without blemish.

“In the same way, husbands should love their wives as they do their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hates his own body, but he nourishes and tenderly cares for it, just as Christ does for the church, because we are members of his body.

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a great mystery, and I am applying it to Christ and the church.” (Eph. 5:25-32)

Of Course, this challenge is really a variant on the challenging command that Jesus gave his disciples (and us): “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. (John 13:34)

It is, however, a more specific variant that raises the bar on what the Lord expects of Christian husbands in their marriages.  Paul’s exhortation challenges us husbands because the love that is requested includes, but goes beyond the human level of love that asks us to “love others as we love ourselves”.  The challenge posed for us husbands is to reach for a much higher goal – the spiritual level of Jesus’ Love for His church – a love that demands a dying to self.

This is an “agape” type of divine, unconditional, Love between husband and wife that reaches the mystical level where it is a prophetic living out of the Love of Christ for His Church!  It is a Love, where we husbands are called to die to ourselves on behalf of our wives in consummation of that love and thus be partakers of  Jesus’ Love for His church.

We cannot achieve such a divine type of love on our own!  This type of love is a  Holy-Spirit-inspired Love, it is a spiritual gift that is activated by faith –  a faith that, Jesus Himself, working spiritually through the Sacrament of Matrimony, will manifest that Love in us and through us as we live out our conjugal covenant. A faith that can only be activated by an act of our will –  a spiritual  act of surrender to Jesus Himself inviting Him to walk with us in our marriage, empowering our love with His, so that we may live out our marriage covenant in the spirit and not in the flesh!

When we willingly surrender to Jesus to let His Love be manifest in us and through us so that we die to ourselves in giving ourselves to our brides, we will find that our brides will respond to that love in the manner that the church responds to Jesus’ sacrifice, namely, by submitting themselves, in turn, to the leadership of love they see in us.

If you truly desire to be a husband thus empowered by the Holy Spirit, I suggest something like the following prayer to get you started in your intent to love your bride as Jesus Loves His Church:

A Husband’s Prayer

Lord Jesus, I believe that you, the Son of the Living God came down from heaven to reveal the Father’s Love to me by suffering and dying for my sins. I believe that through your death and resurrection you have brought redemption and life not only to me but also all else who believe in you. I further believe that it is only through knowing you in a loving personal relationship that I can know the Father and His Love.

It is because I have a burning desire to know you and abide in you that I now yield myself completely to you and your love. I open the door to my heart so you can come in and sup with me and thus begin the special relationship with you for which you died and for which I hunger. At this moment I yield myself to your love. Enter in and activate my spirit with your Holy Spirit so that I can go beyond just mere intellectual belief in you to a personal spiritual knowledge of you and the Father.

Lord, cleanse me from my sins and make me a fit vessel for your presence. Permeate my entire being with your life and your love so that I can truly be an instrument of your Love in this world.

As an act of surrender to your Love,  I especially ask that you send your Holy Spirit to empower me to Love My wife as You Love your Church so that we may both be united in your Love and your blessings in our marriage.

I invite you into our marriage and ask that you permit me to live out that Holy Covenant in your Spirit and your Love. In faith and by your grace I receive You and Your word. Abide in me just as you abide in the Father and the Father in you!  Thank you for giving yourself for me in Love. Amen

May the Lord richly bless you as you enter the “Narrow Gate” of the discipleship of Love!

Your Brother In Christ,

B.R. Timeo, AMDG

© B.R.Timeo and Bartimaeus’ Quiet Place, [2008-2010]

Recommended Link

RE: Book on marriage spirituality

Related prior posts dealing with Discipleship and Love that will help you!

§ Sweet Yoke of Love

§ Enter in By the Narrow Gat

§ Walking The Walk

§ Hearing God’s Voice … And Obeying it