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Covenant Peanut Butter & Jelly (What is “Reformed” Anyway? Part 3) (King’s Cross)

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INTRODUCTION

One of the great recoveries of the Reformation was the notion of covenant. The doctrine of the covenant steers a biblical “middle way” between sacerdotal mysticism on the one hand and subjective mysticism on the other. God’s covenant is His objective personal relationship with human beings in history, with attendant blessings and curses. And because God deals with us in this way, we also deal with one another broadly through covenants in our families and nations. 

The Text: “The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law” (Dt. 29:29).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

The Bible teaches that there are inscrutable thoughts and ways of God far past our finding out, but His covenant Word to us is not one of those things. That Word is the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and it has come down to us by particular promises to particular people in history, sealed with sovereign signs, culminating in Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh for us and for our salvation. This sure Word of the Covenant is for us and for our children forever that we might walk with God under His blessing. 

COVENANT OVERVIEW

In the beginning, God made a covenant with Adam commonly called the Covenant of Creation (also Covenant of Works/Life) in which Adam, as the federal head of the human race (Rom. 5:12-19), was promised life for obedience and death for disobedience (Gen. 2:15-17). When Adam disobeyed and broke that first covenant (cf. Hos. 6:7), God in His mercy made a second covenant, called the Covenant of Grace, in which He promised that the seed of the woman would one day crush the head of the seed of the serpent (Gen. 3:15). God demonstrated that grace in the substitutionary blood and skins of beasts by which God clothed and covered the nakedness and shame of Adam and Eve (Gen. 3:21). This Covenant of Grace was renewed with Noah after the flood and signified by the rainbow (Gen. 9:9-13), with Abraham and signified by circumcision (Gen. 12, 15, 17), with Moses and signified by the law and the sacrifices (Ex. 19-24, Lev. 1-7), and later with David and signified by the kingdom and the temple (2 Sam. 7). 

These older administrations can all be referred to as the “Old Covenant/Testament,” types and shadows pointing to the coming of Christ, and now fulfilled in Christ. We call this new administration of the Covenant of Grace the “New Covenant/Testament” in His death and resurrection, and His heavenly rule and ministry for us and for the whole world, and it is signified by baptism and the Lord’s Supper (1 Cor. 10-11, Heb. 8-10). So we usually speak of one overarching Covenant of Grace with two administrations (Old and New Covenant). 

COVENANT PRINCIPLES

Woven into this broad storyline is a pattern of God’s dealings with people as corporate bodies, specifically as families and nations. The Bible calls marriage a “covenant” and children are the natural, organic fruit of that covenant, such that Joshua can speak on behalf of his household (Prov. 2:17, Mal. 2:14, Ps. 127-128, Josh. 24:15). Every husband is the covenant “head” of his wife just as Christ is the head of His bride, the Church (Eph. 5:23). We see this covenant structure still in force when the promises of the covenant are applied to Gentile kids in Ephesus (Eph. 6:1-2). This is also why Job can pray and offer sacrifices on behalf of his grown children (Job 1:5). Peter preaches the gospel promises for “you and your children” (Acts 2:39), and Paul tells the Philippian jailer that if he believes, he will be saved and his household (Acts 16:31). 

On the political side, Abraham made a “covenant” with Abimelech (Gen. 21:27), Isaac did the same (Gen. 26:28), and Jacob made a covenant with Laban (Gen. 31:44). Later, Jonathan and David made a covenant (1 Sam. 20:16, 23:18), as did Ben-Hadad and King Ahab (1 Kgs. 20:34). While Israel was a uniquely “holy nation” prefiguring the church (1 Pet. 2:5-9), there was also a civil aspect of the covenant renewed by faithful kings, re-committing to be faithful as a nation to God, as did Ezra and Nehemiah (2 Chron. 23:16, 34:31, Ez. 10:3, Neh. 9:38). All of this implies that while there is one, overarching Covenant of Grace administered through the Church, God has also established the covenant entities of family and nation, which are bound together by particular oaths and constitutions, according to their assignments under Christ.

APPLICATIONS

You Are Not Your Own: One of the central temptations of the Devil has always been toward self-centered individualism. Follow your own heart, find yourself, look out for number 1 are all slogans of this false gospel. If you try to find your own life like that, you will most certainly lose it. But if you lose your life in Christ, you will surely find it. And you will find it in your various covenant assignments to your family, church, and nation. You are who God says you are (Ps. 100:3). This world is what God says it is: marriage, justice, truth, goodness, and beauty.

Objectivity of the Covenant: Everyone born from Adam is born objectively under the death-curse of his covenantal disobedience. Just as God objectively marked Abraham’s descendants with a sign of His intention to save, so He does the same thing with baptism in the New Covenant. What is outwardly signified must be inwardly embraced and affirmed, but no amount of denial can erase that mark of God. This is how we may speak of faithful covenant members and unfaithful covenant members. And all of this means that we can trust His word. Let God be true and every man a liar (Rom. 3:4). You can hold God to His personal Word.

Real Blessings & Curses: Sometimes, friendly critics might accuse us of finding “covenants” everywhere and pretty soon we will be talking about covenant peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (and why not?). But the real point is that there is no neutrality anywhere. Everything is either pleasing to God or not. This is God’s world. While it is true that for all those in Christ, the curse of death has been taken away (Gal. 3:13), there are still blessings and curses in the New Covenant (1 Cor. 10-11). But this is a matter of great comfort for all who believe: “let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not” (Gal. 6:7-8).

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Chestertonian Calvinism (What is “Reformed” Anyway? #2) (King’s Cross)

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INTRODUCTION

Pastor Wilson has used this phrase “Chestertonian Calvinism” for a number of years to describe the flavor of Calvinism we are aiming for. It’s a riff on something C.S. Lewis once said about the Puritans: “On many questions, and specially in their view of the marriage bed, the Puritans were the indulgent party; if we may without disrespect so use the name of a great Roman Catholic, a great writer, and a great man, they were much more Chestertonian than their adversaries.” 

In other words, far from the morose and harsh caricatures, the legacy of John Calvin is joy and gladness, astonishment and relief, and the early accusations were that, if anything, they were too celebratory when it came to the gifts of bed and board.  

So as we go over the basics of what has come to be called “Calvinism,” we want to do so in an obedient and humble way, which is to say: the right kind of humility before these high doctrines ought to result in a robustly earthy joy. 

The Text: “Moreover all these curses shall come upon thee, and shall pursue thee… Because thou servedst not the LORD thy God with joyfulness, and with gladness of heart, for the abundance of all things” (Dt. 28:45-47).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

These verses come in the midst of a fierce litany of promised curses ranging from their cities to their fields to their bodies, weather, plagues, war, insanity, pestilence, and famine (Dt. 28:15-44), concluding with horrific descriptions of sieges, disease, homelessness, and slavery (Dt. 28:48-68). And here at the center of these terrible warnings is the explanation: a joyless disobedience. The curses will be God’s sign to the world of their sin (Dt. 28:46). And the central sin would be a failure to serve God with gladness of heart, with hearts overflowing (Dt. 28:47). 

WHAT IS CALVINISM?

John Calvin lived from 1509-1564, spending most of his life and ministry in Geneva, Switzerland after being converted through the influence of Martin Luther’s preaching and teaching spreading to France. Calvin’s most famous work is his Institutes of the Christian Religion which is a lengthy commentary on the Apostles’ Creed. Calvin’s system of doctrine included Bible teaching on worship, sacraments, church government, civil government, family life, as well as salvation and prayer. But in popular parlance, people sometimes refer to the “Five Points of Calvinism,” which were actually the result of the Synod of Dort in the Netherlands from 1618-1619. Calvin certainly taught what the Synod concluded, but his teaching was much broader.

The primary concern of the Synod was to settle a controversy began by the teaching of Jacob Arminius (1560-1609), theology professor at Leiden University. After Arminius’s death, 43 of his followers presented Articles of Remonstrance to the States General of the Netherlands in 1610, seeking government protection for their teachings that 1) election is based on foreseen faith, 2) the universality of Christ’s atonement, 3) the free will and partial depravity of man, 4) the resistibility of grace, and 5) the possibility of a lapse from grace. The Canons of Dort are the confession that resulted, answering each of those five points with the Bible’s teaching on the 1) Total depravity and inability of man to choose God, 2) the Unconditional election of God’s grace, 3) the Limited or definite atonement of Christ’s work, 4) the Irresistible or efficacious grace of God, and 5) the Perseverance or preservation of the saints (hence the shorthand “TULIP” acronym). And the central thing is that at every step of salvation, God gets all the glory.  

CHESTERTONIAN JOY

G.K. Chesterton himself either misunderstood Calvin or had the misfortune to only interact with the worst sorts of Calvinists, and therefore took routine potshots at the name in his writings. But there is a strong case to be made that he was actually far more Calvinist than he realized, and at the very least Calvin and his descendants were far more “Chestertonian” than he knew.

What do we mean? First, Chesterton’s conversion was coming to an almost giddy, childlike joy in God and how He ruled His world: “A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality… they always say, ‘Do it again’; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough… It is possible that God says every morning, ‘Do it again’ to the sun; and every evening ‘Do it again’ to the moon… In short, I had always believed that the world involved magic: now I thought that perhaps it involved a magician… I had always felt life first as a story: and if there is a story there is a story-teller.” 

Calvinism simply affirms the same point and that the Magician, the Great Story-Teller has reached down into their sorry, sinful lives and made them alive by His sheer grace. Perhaps the word that best describes what a true Calvinist ought to feel is astonishment – that begins with the sheer grace of eternal life and overflows: “In whom [Christ] also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will…” (Eph. 1:11). “He that spared not his own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?” (Rom. 8:28, 32)

APPLICATIONS

Bacon & Beer: Yes, God chose you from before the foundation of the world, and He chose you so that you would rejoice before Him for the abundance of all things: this includes forgiveness, adoption, and Scripture, but also bacon, beer, and the marriage bed in this life, and infinite joy in the world to come. “In Thy presence is fullness of joy; at Thy right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Ps. 16:11). True biblical Calvinism results in deep gratitude for all of God’s gifts. 

This is our Father’s world: All the nations belong to Christ. He made them. He purchased them with His blood. He governs all things for our good and His glory. We are more than safe; we are more than conquerors (Rom. 8:37). Far from turning this world into a grim, faceless, grinding machine, the sovereignty of God turns the world into the greatest adventure story, and we get to be bit parts. True biblical Calvinism delights in serving the King in every area of life.

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The Majesty of God (What is “Reformed” Anyway? #1) (King’s Cross)

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INTRODUCTION

As a newer congregation with many newer folks, I want to spend the next few weeks going over some of the basics of what mean when we say we are “Reformed.” Historically, this name goes back to the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century, but it is fundamentally based on the supremacy of God, revealed in Scripture, as the perfect Word of God. To say we are Reformed is to say that we want everything we think, say, or do to be God-centered and obedient to His Word. This is not to say that we have arrived, but it is to say that He is worthy. 

As we do this, we really do want to stand in the “old paths” and hold fast to the “faith once delivered for the saints,” but we want to actually live in this glorious house and not merely become the next museum curators. Or to change the metaphor, we want to fire these cannons at real, modern enemies, not merely polish them and rehearse how they were once used in the glory days of yore. 

The Text: “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!…” (Rom. 11:33-36).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Having defended the absolute sovereignty of God over salvation, and arguing for both the salvation of the Jews and the Gentiles, the apostle breaks into this doxology of praise for God’s wisdom and knowledge and judgments (Rom. 11:33). Specifically, this wisdom is unsearchable and past finding out (Rom. 11:33). And Paul poses three rhetorical questions to explain what he means: Who has known what God is thinking? (Answer: Nobody). Who has taught God anything? (Answer: No one). Or who has given God anything such that God owed them anything? (Again: Nobody ever) (Rom. 11:34-35). And the doxology closes with the insistence that everything is from God, through God, and for God, and therefore all glory and praise and honor for all things belongs to Him, and Amen (Rom. 11:36). 

THE “GOODNESS” OF GOD

When we say that want all that we do to be God-centered and obedient to Him, it is important to define which God we are talking about. Instead of worshiping the true and living God, human beings are constantly twisting pieces of creation into idols that we call “the true God,” and center everything around that false god. Remember, Aaron called the golden calf, the “god who brought you out of Egypt” (Ex. 32:4). But many who say, “Lord, Lord” to Jesus do not actually know Him, and Christ says that He will say to them, “Depart from Me, I never knew you” (Mt. 7:21-23). Christ says that the difference is between those who obey Him and those who do not. True obedience requires a deep and abiding humility: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Is. 55:8-9). This is what we might call the “Godness” of God, His absolute lordship.

God is the “I am,” the Lord of Heaven and Earth, their Maker, their Governor, and He does whatever He pleases (Ex. 3:14-15, Ps. 115:3, 135:6). “And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?” (Dan. 4:35, cf. Rom. 9:15-20). 

THE GREATNESS OF GOD AND MAN

Sinful men naturally think that the higher the view of God the smaller and more insignificant the view of man. This was the offer of the serpent: Demote the Word of God in order to be promoted to Godlike wisdom. The slander is that God is greedy with His greatness, holding us back, and therefore, such a high view of God turns Him and anyone who worships Him into a moral monster, withholding good and therefore crushing human beings. But the exact opposite is actually the case: every attempt to pull God down always results in the degradation of creation. It is the utter transcendence of God that makes God able to condescend to man freely for our good. But this transcendence is His utter sovereignty and freedom and our absolute dependence (Acts 17:28). Man stands the tallest when He lies prostrate before His Maker: “God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time” (1 Pet. 5:5-6). But if you stand on your tiptoes trying to be great, trying to pull God down, demanding your life, you will only lose it. 

APPLICATIONS

God is Lord of Creation: Nature is not infinitely malleable: male and female, human sexuality, sin and righteousness, good and evil. You cannot redefine marriage as any sleeping arrangement. You cannot redefine justice as whatever the human judges decree. You cannot rename theft as taxes and government programs. He is Lord of all things because “of him and through him and to him are all things” (Rom. 11:36).  

God is the Lord of lords: All human authority is derived from the Lord Jesus, who was given all authority in Heaven and on earth at His resurrection and ascension (Mt. 28:18). This means that all human authority is limited. Only God has absolute, unlimited authority. Therefore, no human authority is free to change, usurp, or abdicate the assignments God has given: family – health, welfare, and education (Dt. 6, Eph. 5-6, 1 Tim. 5); church – word, sacrament, worship (Mt. 16, 18, 28); state – punishing crime (Rom. 13). In our day, family and church governments have largely abdicated their assignments, and civil government has usurped its assignment, with a myriad of self-deifying “programs,” in direct defiance of the Living God. 

Worthy is the Lamb: When finite human beings are granted a vision of the greatness and majesty of God it is humbling, but it is a joyful humility, a doxological humility that breaks out in grateful praise and worship. Every form of idolatry is a crushing weight, but submission to the Lord of Heaven and Earth in deep gratitude is what we were made for and sets us free. Because God is Lord of all, we are free to just be people. “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing” (Rev. 5:12).

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Biblical Sexuality Sunday 2024: The Pride of Women & Cowardice of Men (King’s Cross)

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INTRODUCTION

In January 2022, the Canadian government enacted Bill C-4, effectively criminalizing Christian preaching, teaching, and counseling that upholds Biblical morality for human sexuality. Many pastors in Canada have determined to preach messages annually until the law is repealed and have invited American pastors to join them in proclaiming God’s truth about sexual sin and the gospel of grace. 

The Bible teaches that when God judges a people, it often comes as a kind of suicidal sexual madness. Apart from God there is only sorrow and destruction, but sometimes when people defy God for a while, He turns them over to their degrading demands. Ezekiel describes the fruit of this “sexual liberation” as self-mutilation, murder of children, and complete destruction. 

The Text: “Thus saith the Lord God; thou shalt drink of thy sister’s cup of astonishment and desolation, with the cup of thy sister Samaria…” (Ez. 23:32-49).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

God calls the northern kingdom of Israel (Samaria) and the southern kingdom of Judah “harlots” (Ez. 23:3) whom He names “Aholah” and “Aholibah” (Ez. 23:4, 36), which mean “her tabernacle” and “my tabernacle in her.” Samaria had built her own sanctuaries in Dan and Bethel with golden calves (1 Kgs. 12:28-29), imported from her adultery with Egypt (Ez. 23:8), and God delivered her into the hands of her Assyrian lovers (Ez. 23:9-10). But God says that Judah (Aholibah) was even worse, lusting after the Assyrians and the Babylonians (Ez. 23:11-31). 

So God declares that Judah will drink the same cup of judgment as her harlot sister (Ez. 23:32-33). The effect of God’s judgment will be a kind of violent, drunken madness that will result in them breaking the cup into pieces and cutting off their own breasts (Ez. 23:34-35). This madness also included murdering their own children in service to their idols, even while continuing to pretend Sabbath keeping and worship (Ez. 23:36-39). And even while these judgments were falling, Judah had the audacity to put on her makeup and get dolled up for additional rounds with other lovers (Ez. 23:40-44). God says that the just penalty for this kind of high-handed adultery is death so that all women may be taught not to act with such lewdness (Ez. 23:45-49).    

THE FRUIT OF FEMINISM

While God is certainly using symbolic language to condemn the idolatry of His people, the conclusion is not at all symbolic: “Thus will I cause lewdness to cease out of the land, that all women may be taught not to do after your lewdness” (Ez. 23:48). While men were responsible for and contributed significantly to the idolatry of Israel and Judah, women played a significant role. There is perhaps a foreshadowing of this in the harlots who came before Solomon, fighting over a baby (1 Kgs. 3:16ff), but of course Solomon went after many women who turned his heart away from the Lord to other gods (1 Kgs. 11:1ff). Ahab married Jezebel who imported Baal worship into Samaria (1 Kgs. 16:31ff). By the time of Josiah’s reformation, the houses of the sodomites were “where the women wove hangings for the grove” (2 Kgs. 23:7). And there were many wicked mothers in Israel (1 Kgs. 15, 21:1, 19, 23:31, 36, 24:8, 18, 2 Chron. 24:7). 

Feminism is no new heresy. It began in the Garden of Eden when Eve ignored God’s clear word and led her husband into temptation. And the fruit of feminism is elective mastectomies and abortion (Ez. 23:34, 37). Feminism always destroys women, children, families, and nations.

HANDED OVER TO OUR IDOLS

Ezekiel says that God gives wicked people over to this judgement. He causes them to drink this cup of madness (Ez. 23-32-34). Likewise, Romans 1 says that God gives people over to uncleanness and lusts to dishonor their own bodies with one another in sexual perversion because of their idolatry (Rom. 1:24-27). And what are those idols? They often incarnate in images of wealth and power, but they can often be boiled down to two fundamental sins: the pride of women and the cowardice of men. 

Scripture says that Adam was not deceived in the garden, but the woman was deceived (1 Tim. 2:14), and this is one of the reasons given for why a woman may not have authority over a man in the church and be an elder or preacher (1 Tim. 2:9-14). What is it that causes a woman to dress immodestly, to try to use her body to manipulate men, or to usurp true masculine authority? It is the blindness and deception of pride – often pride in beauty, power, or smarts. 

But if Adam was not deceived, then why did he accept his wife’s offer? The most likely answer is that he despaired. Instead of fighting the dragon for his wife, instead of offering to die for his wife, he chose the cowardly path. Husbands and fathers who do not protect their wives and daughters continue in the same path of cowardice as Adam. We live in a nation overrun by male fear of female sin. But we ought to take a lesson from King Asa whose own mother made an idol, and Asa removed her from being queen and destroyed her idol (2 Chron. 15:16).

APPLICATIONS

Jesus said He came for prostitutes and tax collectors. He did not come for those who think there is still time to fix things, to make some adjustments. He came for the blind who knew they had no hope of receiving their sight. He came for sinners who know they deserve the full wrath of God (Rom. 8:23). He came for those who know that pride and cowardice are destroying them.

God’s judgement is a cup: “Thus saith the Lord God; thou shalt drink of thy sister’s cup deep and large: thou shalt be laughed to scorn and had in derision; it containeth much. Thou shalt be filled with drunkenness and sorrow, with the cup of astonishment and desolation” (Ez. 23:32-33). Our families, our churches, our nations are full of drunkenness and sorrow. The corpses of our babies make the Nazi’s look tame. And now we have young boys being given puberty blockers and girls mastectomies. And all of this is come upon us because of our sins. 

When a culture gets to this point there is no going back. There is no political solution. There is no structural solution. We have driven the train off the tracks and into the canyon and we are in freefall. It is in this place of absolute inability that the announcement of the gospel comes. 

And this is the announcement: Jesus Christ the Righteous drank the cup of God’s wrath for you. Either we will drink the cup or Christ has. The glorious news is that if you will surrender all your pride, all your cowardice before Him, if you will acknowledge that you deserve His judgment, you will find that He has already suffered in your place. And you are forgiven and set free to be the man or woman God created you to be.

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A Marriage Tune Up (King’s Cross)

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INTRODUCTION

As we begin a new year, it’s worth reviewing some of the most basic assignments we have in our marriages. The central paradigm is the gospel, and the central duties are love and respect. But as with many of these things that we hear often, it is incredibly important that we determine by God’s grace not to be merely hearers of the Word but doers.

The Text: “Wives submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and He is the Savior of the Body…” (Eph. 5:22-33).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

The Bible teaches that marriage is one of the central pictures of the gospel (Eph. 5:23-25, 32), and therefore generally speaking, the state of marriage in a land will tell you a lot about the state of the gospel in that land. This gospel is embodied by a wife submitting to her own husband as to the Lord Jesus (Eph. 5:22), and each husband taking responsibility for his wife just as Christ does as the head of the church (Eph. 5:23). This means that a wife is to obey her husband as the church obeys Christ in everything (Eph. 5:24). And husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the church, laying down his life for her efficaciously, making her pure and holy (Eph. 5:25-27). This love is exemplified in the way a man cares for his own body, nourishing and cherishing, again, just as the Lord does the Church (Eph. 5:28-30). A man leaves his father and mother to become one flesh with his wife, and this is all a great mystery that proclaims Christ and the church (Eph. 5:31-32). Therefore, a man must love his wife, and a wife must reverence her husband (Eph. 5:33).

HUSBANDS LOVE

The command is for husbands to love because men need to be reminded to do this and because it is what a wife particularly needs. A man more naturally tends to respect, but that is not the particular command given. Christ is the model of this love, and what the Bible particularly points out is the duty of taking responsibility for her as her head and sacrificing for her good (Eph. 5:23, 25-27). This requires you to understand the difference between responsibility and guilt: you may not be personally guilty for some sin of your wife, but you are responsible for all of it, just as you may not be guilty for some injuries in your body but you are responsible (Eph. 5:28).

This love also requires thoughtfulness about your wife’s needs. You are not to love her aimlessly. You are to love like Christ, which is to say efficaciously. You are to give yourself for her to make her more holy and pure (Eph. 5:25-26). And you are to do this in order to present her to yourself more glorious and lovely, just like Jesus does (Eph. 5:27). Loving your wife well doesn’t mean doing whatever she wants; it means doing whatever it takes to make her a better woman.

WIVES RESPECT

The command is for wives to respect because women need to be reminded to do this and because it is what a man particularly needs. Women tend to more naturally love, and while that is certainly good (Tit. 2:4), the particular command is for wives to respect (Eph. 5:33). And this is also word for single ladies: your standard for a man needs to be not whether you do or could love him; your standard needs to be: do you respect him?

What is respect? Respect is honor, looking up to, thinking highly of, including the kind of trust that willingly submits to and obeys (Eph. 5:22, 24). Just as we live in a world that despises fathers; we live in a world that despises true husbands. And unfortunately many Christian women feel free to dishonor their husbands openly, making fun of them, talking them down, complaining about them, or simply being difficult for them, and it is often all dismissed with the hand-waving excuse, “but I love him.” However, the example a woman is given is the obedience of the church to Christ. How would you have the Christian Church submit to Christ? Then show the world in your submissive respect for your husband.

FELLOWSHIP MULTIPLIED

This love and respect is designed by God to result in a glorious unity and fellowship. But sin has twisted every son and daughter of Adam, and the curse has particularly attacked marriage, creating tension and hurt where there was none before (Gen. 3:16). This is why the only way for a marriage to have true Christian fellowship is by the blood of the Lamb: “If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all unrighteousness” (1 Jn. 1:7). If this is true of Christian fellowship in general, it is most certainly true of Christian marriage in particular. But the thing to underline here is that marriage fellowship is one of the primary contributors to all fellowship. What you are sharing with one another is either true Christian fellowship (koinonia) (1 Cor. 10:16, 1 Jn. 1:3) or else it is some kind of Satanic, pharisaical cancer. You are one with your spouse, and when you come here, you are sharing that with one another (1 Cor. 11).

CONCLUSIONS

Never forget that these instructions come as part of the great “therefore” of Ephesians 4:1. We love because He loved us first. We work because we are His workmanship (Eph. 2:10). Which is to say that all of this is only possible by God’s grace. But grace is not something vague, like a Christian version of “luck” or “good vibes” or random windfalls. Grace is the personal favor and blessing of God in Jesus Christ. It begins with His personal forgiveness, but it also includes the wisdom and power to obey all of His commands: we stand in His grace (Rom. 5:1-2).

There are particular strengths and glories that men and women bring to the world, and they take shape as men take responsibility and love their wives and as women submit to their husbands and respect them. Harmony is not the result of everyone singing the same music. Harmony happens when each part sings the part assigned to them.

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