Husbands, love your wives

I preached on Col 3.19 yesterday. This is an excerpt from the close of the sermon. May it bless you, challenging you as husbands to love your wives, and challenging you as wives to pray for your husbands and to do everything in your power to make it easy for them to love you and treat you as a queen.

Husbands, the most important thing you can do for the happiness of your homes, your wives, and your own selves is to love your wives as Christ loves the church, and not be harsh with them (Col 3.19). This will not be easy. It requires you to submit yourselves, your own will, and all your desires unto Christ so that you can: love her as selflessly as He does, treat her as tenderly He does, respond to her weakness and sins as patiently and compassionately as He does, and deny yourself and put her first, just as He does. But this is your calling from God; and this is what will transform your marriage into the most blessed estate on earth.

And husbands, Paul says “don’t be harsh with them.” The reason Paul adds this statement is because a husband’s love proves itself in no way more than how he treats his wife. Just as “love your wives” comprehends all the duties you owe her, so “don’t be harsh with them” comprehends all the ill and wrong you can do her. Harsh, cruel, mean, insensitive, demanding, and controlling conduct towards your wife will crush her spirit more than anything else.

God has not given you a perfect wife any more than He gave His Son Jesus a perfect church. Your wife is a sinner with many imperfections. But you’re to love her as if she were perfect and you’re to treat her as your queen––because that’s how Christ treats us. He doesn’t treat us as our sins deserve, and neither are you to treat your wife as her sins deserve. You are to treat her as your queen.

You can clothe your wife in the finest clothes and feed her with the finest delicacies; you can buy her the finest house and the finest car; you can make a point to come straight home from work and be home every night with her; but none of these will matter to her at all if you’re harsh with her. Because she doesn’t need a new pair of shoes, or a new dress, or a new house, or a new ring––she needs a tender, loving husband, a husband whose love provides a safe and happy place for her in his arms. And if you’ll just does this, everything else will fall into place, and she’ll be the happiest woman on earth.

Your call and challenge is not to show consistent loving-kindness to a perfect wife, but rather to model Christ in showing consistent loving-kindness to an imperfect wife who has numerous shortcomings. And your goal is to love her so powerfully and sweetly that you influence her to grow in grace. Because there’s nothing so powerful and attractive as a husband’s Christlike love. It’ll draw out her kindness, sweetness, and submission. It’ll melt her heart. It’ll soften her tones and sweeten her speech. It’ll overcome her and do her the best and most Christian service you can.

So don’t abuse her, don’t neglect her, and don’t take her for granted; but rather, nourish her and cherish her as Christ does the Church. Compliment her daily. Learn what pleases her and do your best to do it. It’s your calling as a husband to put God first, your wife second, and yourself last.

The bottom line is this husbands: you’re to show your wives Christ. You’re to love them in a way that reminds them of Christ’s love. Your love should savor of the love of the Savior. Your love should cause your wife to render thanks to God for giving her such a husband as you. And your love should create such a place of safety and rest that she feels no where more at home than in your arms.

And if you’re harsh with her, not only do you do your best to trouble the marriage, but you make it very hard for her not to wish she’d never married you. Because in a true Christian marriage, a wife submits to her husband, not because she’s found a master for her life, but because her heart has found its rest. When a wife knows she’s loved, she’s “all-in.” She’ll do anything for a husband who loves her. A husband who treats her as a queen will find himself being treated as a king.

So love your wife as Christ loves the church. Give her a safe place in your arms, a warm place in your heart, and a tender place in your speech. Do everything in your power to make her submission easy and delightful. Don’t make it hard for her to be a godly wife by being an ungodly husband. Your wife is not your slave and you’re not her master. Your authority over her is to be overtly marked by tenderness, compassion, understanding, patience, forgiveness, and whatever else is a sign of true Christlike love. And when you love her in this way, not only will you make her submission easy, not only will you make her happy, but you’ll draw out everything good and pleasant in her–to your own benefit and happiness. It’s a win-win, all to the glory of God.