22Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23For the husband is the
head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is
himself its Savior. 24Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should
submit in everything to their husbands.
25Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself
up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of
water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in
splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and
without blemish. 28In the same way husbands should love their wives as their
own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29For no one ever hated his
own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church,
30because we are members of his body. 31"Therefore a man shall leave his father
and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh."
32This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the
church. 33However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the
wife see that she respects her husband. Ephesians 5:17-33
The mystery of Marriage! Now you've done it Pastor. Now you've gone too
far--claiming to have the answer to one of those mysteries that has gone
unsolved throughout the generations of history. How dare you!
Well, no. I haven't gone too far. And I am not being particularly daring,
either. I am only reporting and confessing to you what God has clearly
proclaimed through the apostle He called and sent: 32This mystery is profound,
and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.
And there you have it! The mystery of marriage does not lie so much in the
differences between the sexes, though certainly there is that. The mystery of
marriage lies in that is refers to Christ and His Church, i.e. our relationship
to God.
Since as sinners our relationship with God is broken, our view of marriage,
each other, and even our own roles is broken.
The problem that underlies and is the source of spousal abuse, adultery, and
divorce is that broken relationship with God.
And that broken relationship with God leads us to get things backwards. We
measure and construct an image of Him based upon our sinful perceptions,
thoughts, and desires.
This is what Paul is writing about in his letter to the Romans:
For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to
them. 20For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine
nature have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in
the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21For although they
knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became
futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 2 Claiming to
be wise, they became fools, 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for
images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
So the Israelites decide to worship God according to their own image and
imaginations of Him and they build a golden calf.
But it goes further than that.
24Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the
dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25because they exchanged the
truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the
Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.
26For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women
exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27and the
men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with
passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving
in themselves the due penalty for their error.
Still today, sinners exchange the truth about God for a lie and worship and
serve the creature rather than the Creator.
We have seen that this past week at the ELCA convention, wherein they have
voted to accept practicing homosexuals as candidates for placement in the
office of the holy ministry.
Dear people of God, this is an abomination before the Lord. Not just because it
is an abuse of our earthly bodies, but most heinously it destroys the image of
our relationship with God. Marriage of man to woman is one of those things that
have been made God ever since the creation of the world by which the nature of
God is to be perceived by men.
In the beginning, "God created man in his own image, in the image of God he
created him; male and female he created them." Genesis 1:27
"Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his
wife, and they shall become one flesh. Genesis 2:24
Clearly Paul isn't speaking his own thoughts or opinions when he describes the
marriage relationship and the roles of men and women in our Epistle lesson
today. Notice the language of Paul's letter reflects the creation language of
God in Genesis. That language is such that it does not allow for anything but
one man and one woman when it comes to human marriage.
Make no mistake about it. What was endorsed by the ELCA in convention this past
week, like other idolatrous people before them since the fall of man, is not
only unLutheran. It is unChristian and an abomination before the Lord-and this
on two levels, earth and heaven. It is destructive of the most essential
relationship of men upon which all civilized, harmonious society is based. And
it rejects God as the fountain and source of all things and turns Him into the
partner that is dependent upon what we bring and give to Him when and where and
how we want to-which, by the way is the definition of idolatry.
Changing the definition of marriage and the God created roles of men and women,
especially within the visible church on earth, "exchange[s] the truth about God
for a lie and [leads us into idolatrous] worship serving the creature rather
than the Creator."
And that is not a problem limited to the ELCA, or non-Lutherans, or even
non-Christians. We have plenty of marriage and worship problems in our own
synod and our own congregation and our own lives, don't we? So rather than
taking this ironic coincidence of the church calendar's Epistle lesson and the
events of the ELCA convention as an opportunity to speak shame on them and
gloat in our superiority, let us examine our own personal and church lives that
we may repent of our self-centered, idolatrous ways and return to the
relationships for which our Lord has created us.
Why? Because the relationships that God has created, the way He has created
them, are the way of life here and to eternity. And to pervert or part from
them is the way of death.
Since we have, and continue to do just that-pervert and part from God's created
relationships-Paul reveals the mystery of Christ who restores those created
relationships.
As we have touched upon, a major part of God's creation account in Genesis is
His "let there be" command that created a partner and helper for man.
But that partner and helper was not to be another beast of burden created to be
subdued and dominated. No, the partner and helper called woman was, and is
"flesh of man's flesh and bone of his bone. Therefore a man leaves his father
and mother and cleaves to his wife."
More than just the duty of a man to his wife, which is a duty of love and
sacrifice for her sake and the sake of his children, this cleaving to his wife
is the relationship of Christ to His church-to you and all believers in Him.
Jesus, the only begotten Son of God, left His Father's side in order to cleave
to His dearly beloved bride, the Church, which was taken and formed from the
water and blood that flowed from His side. Now risen and ascended back to the
right hand of the Father, this Christ of God continues to cleave to His holy
bride in the water of Holy Baptism and the blood of His new testament in the
cup of Holy Communion. In these things he gives her strength in her own
weakness and bestows upon all of her members the inheritance of eternal life.
So our Lord has Peter back Paul up by exhorting husbands to "treat [their
wives] with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious
gift of life, . . . (1 Peter 3:7b)
What? Weaker? How dare you! And that reminds me, I still don't like all that
chauvinistic talk of wives submitting to their husbands. You've got to be
kidding me! How stone-age can you get? Aren't women equal to men in God's
sight? Haven't you ever heard of the Equal Rights Amendment?
Well, yes. Men and women are certainly equal in God's sight and under the law
of the land. But Scripture, salvation, and eternal life-indeed, even faith-are
not about equality or rights. They are about your relationship to God and to
each other. In either case, these relationships are established by and held
together by God, in Christ.
The primary relationship of the flesh, of our earthly life, is the relationship
of man and wife. In this relationship, from which all bodily life proceeds, God
has established that "the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the
head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church
submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their
husbands." (Ephesians 5:23-24) So, as we covered earlier, this relationship of
husband and wife finds its perfection in the Mystery of Marriage, that is, the
relationship of Christ to His church-to you and all believers in Him.
Why is a wife to submit to her husband? Because her husband has been given by
God to cleave to her and it is his vocation, his call from God, to take care of
his wife and their children even to the point of giving his own life for them.
Of course, sinner that every husband is, no husband fulfills this vocation
perfectly or selflessly. Yet, thanks be to God, the sin of man does not negate
His gift. Every believer as a member of the bride of Christ, His church, fails
to submit to her husband and Lord let Him be the husband He desires to be. Yet
the Son of God never leaves her or forsakes her-never divorces her, or you-for
lack of submission. He remains faithful in His relationship to you forever-in
the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Respectfully submitted in service of the Word and His people,
Rev. Kurt Hering
Layton, Utah
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