Yesterday, we enjoyed an encouraging Father’s Day. It was a blessing to see so many gather for worship. My appeal to our dads was straightforward: “Husbands, love your wives.” Perhaps it was a surprising emphasis for some. Yet, as I expressed, it could be one of the greatest gifts we bestow to our children, providing strength and stability to marriage that is desperately needed today.
So, husbands, love your wives. The love that is needed, however, is more than romantic love. AGAPE love is required. AGAPE love is the recurring call to love in the New Testament. It is the kind of love that God directs toward us. That said, AGAPE love is a choice, not a feeling. It is unmerited, not deserved. And it must be noted that AGAPE love is active, not passive. Indeed, AGAPE love, as demonstrated throughout the New Testament, is an action, not a feeling. Consider the familiar description of AGAPE love in 1 Corinthians 13.
Paul writes, “Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends (1 Corinthians 13:4-8, ESV).”
How would our marriages be different if this was descriptive of our relationships? For that matter, how might all of our relationships be different if we displayed this type of love toward those around us? Again, I stress AGAPE love is a choice, not a feeling.
The Apostle Paul calls Jesus’ followers (with God’s help) to live out this type of love. He even personalizes it for husbands toward their wives. He writes in Ephesians,
“Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her, that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so 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. In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of His body. “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband (Ephesians 5:25–33, ESV).”
What does Paul call husbands to do? They are to AGAPE love their wives. They are to love their wives in the way they experience Jesus’ love—sacrificially. Even more, they are to love their wives as their own bodies, which means they are sensitive to their needs. I remind you one more time. AGAPE love is a choice, not a feeling. Husbands choose to love their wives sacrificially. Husbands choose to love their wives sensitively.
If this seems beyond one’s natural ability, you are onto something. The truth is that husbands can only love this way with God’s help. And, not coincidently, Paul commands the Ephesian believers to be “filled with God’s Spirit” earlier in the chapter in verse 18. In other words, Paul is calling husbands to love their wives through God’s presence and power. So, what are going to do?
I concluded on Sunday with the following plan of action.
First, yield yourself daily to God’s presence and work in your life. That’s applicable to us all.
Second, read 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 each day this week and live it out toward your spouse. If unmarried, to the people around you.
Finally, for our husbands, ask your wife, “How can I love you better?”
If you missed Sunday services, check it out today (northfortworth.com/media). It is a timely and relevant message for our day.
We return to our series in Matthew on Sunday. I hope you can join us.
