From Dream to Deliverance
Tuesday, September 14, 2004
My Prayer Today
Heavenly Father, I thank You for the order and structure You give to marriage. First, I thank You for creating men and women as unique and different, for creating a “complement” one for the other. I thank You that in the fabric of creation You provided an amazing and incredible means for humanity to flourish and reproduce. I thank You for how the difference between men and women come together in marriage to produce what can become an amazing analogy of Jesus Christ and His church. As we continue to study the relationship of husbands and wives, I pray once again that You will bless marriages everywhere, and that You will lift up husbands and wives so they may live in accordance with Your plan and will. Fill me today with Your Holy Spirit that I may do my part in seeing that Your will is done in every relationship of which I am part. These things I pray in Jesus’ name and for the sake of His ever-expanding Kingdom. Amen.
God's Word For Me Today
Ephesians 5:21-28a; 6:1-4
21And further, you will submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. 22You wives will submit to your husbands as you do to the Lord. 23For a husband is the head of his wife as Christ is the head of his body, the church; he gave his life to be her Savior. 24As the church submits to Christ, so you wives must submit to your husbands in everything.
25And you husbands must love your wives with the same love Christ showed the church. He gave up his life for her 26to make her holy and clean, washed by baptism and God’s word. 27He did this to present her to himself as a glorious church without a spot or wrinkle or any other blemish. Instead, she will be holy and without fault. 28In the same way, husbands ought to love their wives as they love their own bodies.
1Children, obey your parents because you belong to the Lord, for this is the right thing to do. 2“Honor your father and mother.” This is the first of the Ten Commandments that ends with a promise. 3And this is the promise: If you honor your father and mother, “you will live a long life, full of blessing.”
4And now a word to you fathers. Don’t make your children angry by the way you treat them. Rather, bring them up with the discipline and instruction approved by the Lord.
Reflecting on God’s Word
What does it mean to you for a person to be a servant-leader?
A Deeper Exploration of God’s Word
What commands does the Apostle Paul give to husbands in today’s Scripture? (5:25-28a)
To whom does Paul compare the husband and wife relationship in verses 25-28a?
Understanding God’s Word
Why do you suppose that Paul used marriage between a husband and wife as an analogy for Jesus’ relationship with the church?
What would be the practical outcome if Christian husbands took this command seriously?
Applying God’s Word to Our Lives
What is the key application point of today’s Scripture in Your life right now?
Thoughts...Husbands, Love Your Wives...
Talk about a God-given dream: Husbands love your wives! This love of which Paul speaks is not just a romantic feeling, or a strong sense of “like.” It is a self-sacrificing attitude toward another that will even give up one’s life if necessary! That’s the dream God has given to His people for husbands in marriage. Without a doubt the decision a husband makes with regard to this command is eternal in its impact. That’s because as a husband decides to love His wife as Jesus loved the church and gave Himself up for her, everything changes in that family. The world’s way of “ladder-climbing” ends. Servanthood becomes the model for leadership. Without a doubt there will be delays, difficulties and dead-ends for those men who decide to follow this dream, because Satan wants to destroy us, and that destruction starts with the basic unit of human relationship—the family. If he wins there, he wins. Thus, husbands will find that they are battling against themselves, the world, and sometimes even their wives and children if they truly seek to follow the dream of loving their wives. But the reward of following this dream to deliverance is a family that is whole, that is blessed, that bears the fruit of righteousness, and which ultimately passes the faith on to the next generation. What a dream—and by God’s grace and power it can move through all the struggles to deliverance!