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Welcome to the Hope Community Church! Hope is a multi-site church community with locations around the Triangle in Raleigh, Apex, Northwest Cary, Garner, and Fuquay-Varina. We are here to love you where you are and encourage you to grow in your relationship with Jesus Christ! We strive to speak the truth of the Bible in a way that is easy to understand, helpful in your current life circumstances, and encouraging. No matter who you are or where you come from, you are welcome here!
It is good to see the people of God.
It's good to see the church of God in the place.
Come on, let's stand to our feet.
Those of you joining us online, welcome.
We're gonna read from the book
of Isaiah chapter 40 in verse six.
It says this, A voice cries or a voice says cry.
And I said, what shall I cry? All flesh is grass.
And all its beauty is like the flower of the field.
The grass withers, the flower fades.
When the breath of the Lord blows on it,
surely the people are grass.
Verse eight is why we're here.
It says, the grass withers and the flower fades.
But the word of our God will stand forever.
Can we thank the Lord that his word will stand forever?
Jesus said that heaven and earth will pass away,
but his words will never pass away.
We celebrate that today. Come on. Hallelujah.
We thank
you,
Set
You
If you said I'll.
How Good.
Hallelujah. Well, hey,
before we go into the next song, why don't you turn to two
or three people and welcome them to Hope Community Church.
And if you're joining us online
and you, it's your first time, hey, go in the chat.
Let us know that you're new so that we can reach out to you.
Let you know about all the things that are going on here at
Hope
Faithful. He's
Faithful, church, Faithful,
All
Beautiful Savior.
I'm glad we are declaring now that we are the kind
of church that stands on the word of God.
We stand on the Bible.
It means we know his promises are true. Amen. Come on, I,
My
is,
I don't want
give.
I don't
see it again, the Earth, the
Lord, you are great.
We are thankful for time
and space to express that to you today.
Father, Whatever we have going on in our lives,
when we never forget
that you hold our victory in your hands, you are with us
no matter what We give you praise for that today,
fathers, we open your word.
We ask that you speak to us.
Speak To us today.
Do a mighty work in each and every one of our lives.
God, we give you this time.
We love you in your precious and holy name we pray. Amen.
Church, it's been wonderful worshiping together.
Why don't you grab a seat?
I love our times of worship. I love to worship Jesus.
Even at times. I love to do it alone,
but I never enjoy it alone as much as I do with the people
of God, with the family of God.
Well, welcome. My name is Doug.
If we haven't had a chance to meet yet,
and I want to welcome you to this gathering of Hope,
hope Community Church.
We are a family. We're a family who loves God,
follows Jesus and shares hope.
And we want you to be a part of this family.
And if you are new, a very special welcome to you.
If you're in the room at the end of the service,
we would love for you to stop
by our next steps area in the atrium so we can meet you
and answer any questions that you have.
And if you happen to be watching online, we just want
to thank you for taking this time out of your schedule
to join us online.
And we pray that, that you feel
engaged with what's happening.
And if you're new, just go ahead in the text chat there
and say, Hey, I'm new.
And somebody will, will reach out to you
and help you get connected.
But last week we kicked into a brand new series
of messages called Family of Families,
where we're diving into all things family, from family
of God to parenting, to marriage and everything in between.
And today we are looking at God's design for marriage.
But listen, this is not just a message for married couples.
If you're hearing single, this is important for you
to understand God's creation, God's design for marriage.
If you were married and now divorced, if you were married
and lost a spouse, this is still the truth of God's word.
See, marriage is his creation.
Never a social construct or a government's idea.
It's God's idea. We're gonna see God's design today
for the marriage relationship.
But we wanted to let you know, particularly if your parents,
that because of God's design for marriage, some
of the things we may be talking about in this message may be
of a sensitive nature.
And so perhaps this is kind of a PG 13 message.
Just wanted to let you know that.
But also before we jump in, we've got an incredible story
of life change to share with you.
You're gonna see a story of Jeff, one
of our members here at Our Hope family.
And this year I was going into 2025.
Jeff felt like this was gonna be a year of yes, saying yes
to serving, saying yes to being all in with God.
And one of those yeses Jeff made was to be baptized
as a follower of Jesus Christ.
And I would love for that to be a challenge for you
or for you online if you have, if you're a follower of Jesus
and you've never been baptized in water, we would love
to celebrate that stuff of faith with you.
And if you're interested in talking with us more about that,
just simply text the word baptism to 7 2 9 8 9 right now.
Let's check out what God has been doing in the life of Jeff.
Hey, I'm Jeff Wallace. I volunteer.
I'm a roadie every other weekend right now.
I've made this year, the year of yes, in answering all
of his calls, I need to live my life better and live day in
and day out, uh, for Jesus following him
and spreading the gospel and trying to be his hands
and feet, join a small group, started serving
and I've jumped, you know, both feet in
and just yes to anything that he asked.
This small group's just so amazing in that like they saw
that the food pantry didn't have cereal
and put it out in the, the group text.
And within an hour, there's 110 boxes
of cereal in the bins up front.
It's just amazing to see what he does.
We joke in the small group that, you know,
you can't join our small group unless you serve.
A lot of us are roadies. Some of us are in next steps.
And it honestly brings me joy to be the first face
that somebody sees when they walk in and, and greet them
and good morning and, you know,
help them find a parking spot
and, you know, help them get
in and find where they need to go.
And it's just, it's, it's amazing.
From the last, you know, six months to a year,
I've fully immersed, got into small groups, decided
to rededicate myself through baptism.
My daughter asked to be baptized.
She is, she was seven when she asked. She's eight now.
Honestly, God just kind of laid it on my heart.
I mean, without the journey that I've been on, like I,
I don't feel like I would be nearly as close to God as I am.
You know, you come in and what can church do for me?
And I sit down and I listen to a sermon, to how can I serve?
How can I spread the, the news of Jesus throughout my life,
through just people I interact with every single day.
Every week we're, we're bringing new guys in
and, you know, trying to help them walk without that group,
my journey wouldn't even be the same.
Like, you need that core group of men that follow Jesus,
that can support you in your walk
and you support them in theirs.
And that community keeps growing.
The biggest encouragement I can get
to anybody is just jump in.
Just dive in, do it. I guarantee you that it'll be worth it.
Well, I am grateful that Jeff
and his family are part of our Apex Campus family.
And, uh, it's just great to hear him share his story.
And that story is actually the perfect setup for my sermon
because you clear, you see his clear response to the gospel.
And, and that's what we're talking about today, our response
to the gospel, uh, as it pertains to marriage.
And so speaking of marriage, if the first words
that you hear your wife say are, Hey,
are you even listening to me right now?
And you think to yourself, well, that's a strange way
to start the conversation, then, uh, you,
you're already in trouble.
You've got, as I see it, two options.
One, you can just lie
and say, yeah, of course honey, I'm listening to you.
And, and just roll the dice and pretend that there is no,
and pray that there is no follow up.
That's, that's a really bad option.
There's always going to be follow up.
So I recommend option two.
This is the option I choose
after 23 years of marriage, when my wife asks me,
are you even listening to me?
Right, right now I just say, no, and I apologize.
And she starts over.
And, uh, I'm not even saying that that's right,
but at least it's honest.
I, I think my problem is I have whatever the
opposite of a DD is.
I can like focus on one thing
and only one thing at a time with like crazy amount
of concentration and I block out everything else around me.
Does anybody else know anyone like that?
Anyone married to someone like that?
I don't think I'm the only one,
but sadly what I'm thinking about mostly in
those times is me.
It's my things. It's my sermons, it's my meetings
and lessons that I'm trying to, uh, prepare for.
It's me. I have a selfish heart problem.
And I tell you this because I don't stand
before you today as the expert on all things marriage.
I'm not the perfect example in all things marriage.
I stand before you today
as a co struggler among you in marriage.
I'm part of the problem. I'm selfish.
And to make matters worse, all of us have an enemy
who knows about our selfish heart problem.
And you see in scripture
that the first thing Satan attacks is a married couple.
And he's up to the same things today.
It's what he's going after all the time.
And he's actually having, uh, a, a, a pretty good run of it.
As the marriage pastor of hope,
perhaps more than anyone else on staff, I get to see a, a,
a front row view of marriages that have busted
through the guardrails and careened over the cliff
and landed in despair.
I, I I watch over
and over the wake of destruction
of broken marriages impacting generations.
Honestly, it's, it's overwhelming. It's heartbreaking.
There's times when I'm in my office
and I just close the door and I weep
because the voicemails keep coming.
The emails keep coming.
Uh, the prayer requests keep coming in from hurting couples.
And sometimes as I sit with struggling couples, I think
to myself, I, I wish we could have had this conversation
years ago because God's truth could
have changed everything.
But also as the marriage pastor, I want you to know,
not every day is like that.
I also get a front row view of something else.
I also get to see God do some incredible things
that you might think are impossible.
I've seen separated couples
and even divorced couples get back together
and begin to thrive in marriage.
I've seen couples survive the devastation of infidelity
or the tragedy of a lost child
and then still find harmony in their marriage
as they faithfully, uh, uh, as they stay faithful
to each other and to God.
I've seen angry, prideful, resentful husbands
and wives exhausted and worn out.
I've seen them fall on their knees
and accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
And later I've been able to,
to perform their vow renewal ceremonies for all the days
that I want to weep.
There are just as many days where I just wanna
sing about God's saving grace.
'cause he is so good. You know what, all these stories,
well, the good ones that I wanna sing about, you know
what they all have in common?
Every single one of them,
these couples fell in love with Jesus.
And importantly, they decided
to follow his word even when it was heart.
In other words, God's truth changed
everything in their stories.
I I want you to know,
I have prayerfully agonized over this sermon
in, in my preparation.
I don't think I've, I've ever agonized more
or any sermon I've ever, uh, prepared for.
I, I feared that it might come across as too harsh
or too judgy or I might lose the room
or that I won't connect with one
of the unique perspectives that you bring today.
Maybe I'll miss someone who's single or dating or engaged
or married or divorced
or widowed, that I just might miss someone.
Or, or as I'm sharing God's word with you,
sharing God's truth that it might land in your lap like a
grenade going off.
But we need God's truth
because we believe God's way is best.
God's word is alive. It's living, it's active.
It wouldn't be loving if I don't share it.
So today I'm choosing to stand on this.
I'm choosing to stand on God's word,
but I pray that I will teach it as faithfully and accurately
and as graciously as I can
because we definitely need His grace.
I believe the problem in marriage today
is we've forgotten what his word says.
Think about the state of marriage today
that's contrary to God's design.
Cohabitation before marriage is the norm.
Sex before marriage is expected,
it's assumed believers are dating and marrying unbelievers.
We petition the government to legalize
what he never designed.
We, we, uh, are addicted
to pornography rather than cultivating a sex
life with our spouse.
Divorce is always a valid option on the table as soon
as our needs are no longer being met in marriage.
And again, I'm not even talking about outside the church.
I'm talking about right here.
We say around here that we are a family
of families and I love that.
So married or single, this includes all of us.
But a united church must have united marriages
for our family of families.
To be a healthy family of families, we have
to have healthy individual families.
I envision our church, like the name on each
of our buildings, says as a beacon of hope for families,
that we would be a refuge, that we would be a hospital
for broken hearts and broken relationships.
That we'd have an army of men and women that are equipped
and committed to sharing God's gospel, his grace,
and also the guardrails of God's truth with family.
So that, that, that this would begin even in our own homes.
But that whenever we gather and
whenever we gather, that people would encounter right now
real life encouragement from God's word
that can reunite families back together
and reunite them back to God, that, that families,
that hope would be thriving.
So I ask you today, what story
do you want your marriage to tell?
You can answer this even if you're single
and one day want to be marriage.
What, what story do you want your marriage to tell?
And if you're married today, what story is your marriage
telling right now?
Well, here's some good news.
It's not too late
to change the story your marriage is telling.
We're gonna find the instructions in God's word today,
instructions that I've seen save hundreds of marriages when,
because they followed what he says.
And I'll save you the suspense.
The instructions today are really, really hard.
There's no quick, easy fix to this.
But applying these truths to your marriage is nothing short
of of earth shattering it.
You can experience harmony, you can experience joy,
and yes, you can experience pleasure in marriage.
Do I have your attention? And it's all for the glory of God.
God wants your marriage to thrive.
So today we're looking at two stories, the gospel,
and we're looking at marriage.
'cause we will not think rightly about marriage
until we think rightly about the gospel.
So turn with me if you have your Bible
to Ephesians chapter five.
We're gonna start in verse 22.
And I'm gonna read the entire passage in its entirety.
It's, it's a little bit long, but we have
to keep the entire passage in context.
We can get in trouble if we take certain
parts apart from the whole.
And as I'm reading, what I want you to see is that no,
not only are we talking about marriage, uh, but Paul
and his passage is also talking about the gospel,
about a relationship with God.
So starting in verse 22, it says, wives submit
to your own husbands as to the Lord.
For the husband is the head of the wife, even
as Christ is the head of the church's body
and is himself its Savior now
as the church submits to Christ.
So also wives should submit in everything to their husbands,
husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church
and gave himself up for her that he might sanctify,
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, husband 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'm 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.
You see, from Genesis
to Revelation in this story in the Bible, we get
to hear the love story of God as he works to redeem
and to unite all things together in him.
Marriage is a part of God's creation.
In the beginning it was his design.
It's not man's invention,
but with the first married couple, instead
of following God's instruction,
the first married couple followed their selfish hearts,
just like you and I do sometimes.
And it comes with horrific consequences.
We see it unfold in Genesis three,
that shame is introduced for the first time.
Death becomes a reality.
Work becomes arduous, childbirth becomes painful.
And look at the words that God says to Eve.
He says, your desire shall be contrary to your husband,
but he shall rule over you.
In other words, sin is going to cause an ongoing struggle
for leadership and control in marriage that instead of the,
the harmony, the joy
and the pleasure, all for God's glory, that we were designed
to experience, that there's gonna be opposition.
That husbands and wives will be fighting for their needs,
for their independence, for their,
their control and their freedom.
And once sin is introduced into families in the story
of the Bible, things get ugly quick.
Like on the very next page, Adam
and Eve's children start murdering each other.
And the story sadly, is marked
by repeated infidelity to God.
But several times throughout the Old Testament,
we see something remarkable.
We see this shocking marriage proposal
that God himself offers a covenantal relationship
with his unfaithful bride.
It's like God says, do you take me as your groom?
And the people literally reply in Exodus 19 eight, we do.
But there's a massive problem that's unaddressed.
See, being the bride of a holy God requires
that the bride is made holy
and God's bride, God's people continue in infidelity.
And despite our repeated infidelity,
God never gives up on his bride.
It's what makes this so beautiful is
what makes the gospel so astonishing.
Uh, out of his relentless love for us.
The Father sends his only son, Jesus Christ, God himself,
to be our bridegroom five times in the gospel
as Jesus refers to himself as our bridegroom.
And Jesus love. His story is completely different than ours.
He tells a completely different story.
Instead of selfishness,
Jesus lives in constant submission to the Father.
And, and he lives in self-sacrifice,
self-sacrificing love for his bride.
Remember those two things, submission
to the father's instruction
and self-sacrificing love for his bride.
We're gonna come back to those two ingredients later.
And then Jesus, he suffers the ultimate penalty
on our behalf, pays the ultimate sacrifice going on a cross
that you and I deserve, paying the penalty for our sin.
And he dies. But Jesus does not stay dead. He's risen.
He's alive today and he's ascended and
and he's seated at the right hand of the Father.
And he upholds the universe by the word of his power.
And he doesn't even leave us by any
who put their faith in him.
He sends his Holy Spirit so he could be with us.
But that's not even the end. You guys.
Have you ever read like the very end of this?
Have, do you know how the story ends? It's amazing.
It's a wedding celebration.
The bride of Jesus.
The church is finally presented to the bridegroom, not
as unfaithful, but as pure,
as stunning dressed in dazzling white.
You gotta read about it. You can,
you can check it out in Revelation 19 through 22.
It's the stunning conclusion of this, this ultimate marriage
that unfolds, that gives every single one of us hope today.
Now, we need to keep that gospel story in mind
as we think about our marriage
because it's that gospel story that has the power
to change the story that our marriage is telling today.
The entire section of scripture that, uh,
we're looking at today is called the household,
the household code.
And Paul sets it up with the verse right before.
So again, if you're, if you're, uh,
tracking along in your Bible, if you look back to verse 21,
it says this submitting to one another,
and then Paul's gonna like break that down.
Specifically what that means is submission means first wives
to their husbands, then children to their parents,
and then bond servants to their masters.
And then in that same verse, he gives our motivation to this
out of reverence to Christ.
Like every single one of those stories
that I I told you about that make me want to sing Jesus
is the motivation.
And keep in mind who he's talking to here,
he's talking to Christians.
This motivation would be meaningless
to anyone who's an unbeliever.
But that's not who he's talking to.
He's talking to people that were once dead in their
trespasses and sins
and are now made alive together with him.
In light of that good news, we can live in a new way
and it can completely change the story
that your marriage is telling.
So again, what story do you want your marriage to tell?
Well, I'll tell you, God's desire, his desire is
that your marriage tells the story of the gospel.
Because when it does,
that's when your marriage is gonna begin to thrive.
That's when you're gonna experience the harmony and the joy
and the pleasure, all for the glory of God.
So how do we do this? How do we accomplish this?
Well, we gotta look at God's word for the answer
and I'll, I'll save you the suspense.
It's the opposite of selfishness.
Remember those two ingredients we saw in Jesus submission
to God's instruction and self-sacrificing love.
Those, those are the two ingredients we're gonna see here,
given to wives and to husbands.
So as Paul begins his instructions to wives in verse 22,
I want you to look how often he connects marriage again
to the gospel, to our relationship with God.
He says, wives submit to your own husbands as to the Lord.
For 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 wives, you are instructed
to submit to your husband as to the Lord.
Now, popular or not, it's not actually difficult language
to understand here as to the Lord.
It means that, uh, your attitude
behind your submission should be as joyful as you coming in
and and enjoying worship here today to God.
In the word submit, it means to arrange under.
But let's go right after it.
Let, let's go right to the verse
that you're hoping I would skip right over.
Look back at verse 24.
It says, wives should submit in
everything to their husbands.
Like, like in everything, everything.
It it like, is he serious?
I I feel like I probably should have had a joke ready here
'cause I can, I can sense this is the moment the
tension is, is building.
But that that internal tension you feel is actually proof
that Genesis three is true.
That your desire will be contrary to your husband,
but he will rule over you.
But I wanna give you five helpful
observations helpful for all of us.
And husbands, I want you to pay specific instruction
to these, uh, because many of them are addressed to you.
So five helpful observations here about submission.
Number one, it's not superiority or inferiority.
Nowhere in these verses is Paul declaring wives inferior
that man and woman are equal in dignity.
That they're equal in redemption
and they're equal as heirs of God's grace.
You can look at one Peter three if you
wanna find evidence of that.
Two, it's not disregarding nowhere is Paul suggesting
that we shouldn't listen to our wives.
When I choose to ignore my wife.
Trust me, it doesn't go well.
We can be driving along in the car
and she'll say, honey, your turn's coming up, don't forget.
And I'm like, come on.
I know my turn's coming up and what do I do?
I I miss my turn. Of course it happens all the time.
But it's not just the small things that I need
to pay attention to her.
It's, it's the big things that I lean on.
Her wisdom, it's career decisions, it's parenting decisions,
ministry decisions, financial decisions.
I, I thank God for my wife's insights
because she is a wise woman.
Three, it's not abdicating responsibility.
Paul's not suggesting even for a moment
that a husband can just check out of his responsibilities
and, and just, you know, sit on the couch
and leave everything to his wife.
Husbands, we need to reject passivity in our homes.
Four, it's not demanded.
I was meeting with a couple once, uh, husband and wife
and they're sitting on my couch
and the husband looks at me, looks right at me
and he, his wife is sitting right there.
He says, Dave, will you please tell her she
needs to submit to me?
I said, no, no,
I will not tell her this poor woman.
This is not what Paul is saying here.
Nowhere in this passage is a husband given permission
to demand submission.
God is not setting up a tyranny here.
A husband who verbally demands submission
of his wife is already failing his wife.
And the self-sacrificing love that God requires
of him to his bride.
Five, it's not unconditional obedience.
I know it says submit in everything,
but a wife should not submit to her husband
as he disobeys God or he leads her or the family into sin.
You can look at, uh, Peter's words in Acts 5 29.
He says, we must obey God rather than men.
And I wish I didn't have to say this,
but a husband has no right to physical
or sexual abuse over his wife
by the misapplication of these verses.
No, right. Quick time out 'cause it's getting heavy.
Any brides to be in the room
or any, any woman who's dating someone here,
if you're not comfortable with the idea
of one day submitting
and everything to the man you're dating, do not marry him.
Break up, run away.
You are worth waiting for someone that you can trust,
that you could confidently submit to
because he's also committed to self-sacrificing love
to you the way Jesus loves the church.
So, question to wives as we wrap up this section.
Wives ask, is my submission to my husband telling the story
of the church joyfully submitting to Jesus?
Alright, husbands, it's your turn,
says in verse 25, husbands love your wives
as Christ loved the church
and gave himself up for her
that he might sanctify having cleansed her by the washing
of water with the word.
So 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.
See after the previous section to wives submitting
to their husbands, you might assume that, okay,
the instruction to husbands is gonna be to rule their wives.
It's not husbands.
You're not commanded to rule, you're commanded to love.
And the the word that Paul uses here for love is agape.
It means sacrificing love.
So husbands, what you're commanded here is
to sacrifice your agenda to set aside YY your desires
to provide unceasing care
and loving service to your wife's entire wellbeing.
Agape love leaves no room for you
to act in an overbearing fashion.
It's it, it's patient, it's kind. It's not arrogant or rude.
It doesn't insist on its own way.
It's that every area of love
for your wife would be characterized by self sacrifice,
giving, serving, forgiving.
Look at the words Paul uses in verse 29,
nourishing cherishing as Christ does the church.
These evoke an image
of incredible tenderness and gentleness.
God did not set you up as the dictator of your marriage.
Husbands God set you up
as the ultimate servant in your marriage, in the model.
And the measuring stick he gives
to husbands is Jesus himself.
And Jesus went first in self-sacrificing love, didn't he?
So husbands, you cannot wait
for your wife to love you first.
Husbands. You go first and the big decisions
and an everyday decisions sacrifice your own interests
to nourish and to cherish your wife.
Just, just be a gentleman. Open the door for her.
Kiss her when you come home for work. Tell her you love her.
Wait for her to get her food
before you start digging into your own food.
Like a, like a savage.
Don't stay late again and again and again at work.
Don't spend every weekend on the golf course
or on the boat away from your family.
Prefer her over yourself.
Watch the movie that she wants to watch
and go to the restaurant that she wants to go to.
Most of our date nights, they end up
at the Mexican restaurant.
You wanna know why? 'cause my wife loves steak tacos
and quesadillas in an occasional margarita responsibly.
Okay? That's why we end up there.
And I know what you're thinking.
I know, I know if only my wife would actually tell me
where we want to go to eat when I ask her.
Right. I I know. I feel you.
Well husbands, you can step up
and you can lead in this area.
Pick a place that you know she will like
otherwise, just come hang out
and get tacos with Cindy and me.
We'll make it a double date. Sound good?
Um, look, husbands, in all seriousness,
the weight of our responsibility is overwhelming.
Not only are we to tend to tenderly care for a wise,
physically and emotionally, we're also specifically
and especially called to care for her spiritually.
Look at the words that that are used
to describe how Jesus loved.
He cleansed her by his words so that she might be holy.
He talks about sanctifying her husband's.
We need a wake up call in this, in this regard.
Uh, in the the last reengage, uh, class, I, uh,
had asked every husband
and wife separately
to write out a prayer request for their marriage.
And, um, they worked on this individually,
they turned 'em into me and I committed to praying
for those, for those prayer requests.
About two thirds of the wives in that room
prayed something like this, that my husband
would lead me spiritually.
It's heartbreaking. Husbands are, wives are yearning for us
to lead them in this area.
Note also, there is this sense of already,
but not yet that's unfolding in this passage, especially
to the husbands here, that Jesus already gave past tense.
He already cleansed past tense so
that he might one day future present his bride
to himself in splendor.
This is what literally moved me to tears.
One day, Cindy is gonna stand before Jesus in eternity.
And a couple years ago I thought that
that day had come early.
What the Bible is teaching us,
what the Bible is teaching me is that I need to live
my life, all of it as a husband in such a way
that's preparing her for that moment when she stands
before Jesus, oh, I how I failed her.
Forgive me, Cindy, may I set aside my agenda,
my selfishness and may, may the things
that I talked to her about.
The tenderness that I show her made the love of God's word
that I share with her may the way that we,
we spend time in prayer
and in worship and in serving others.
The times that we go for walks and we just pause
and we look at the marvel of God's creation, may everything
that I do prepare her for that moment where she stands
before Jesus and gives an account.
Husbands, we have a big role to fill.
We are to play the role of the ultimate
servant on behalf of our wife.
So my question to husbands, does my self-sacrificing love
for my wife tell the story of Jesus dying for the church?
Well, Paul reminds us then
of God's original design for marriage.
He quotes Genesis 2 24.
He says, therefore, man shall leave his father and mother
and hold fast to his wife.
And the two shall become one flesh.
Some really important observations here, marriage
by God's design includes one man and one woman.
There's just no gray area in God's word.
It's on page one and page two, marriage is meant
to be lifelong and monogamous, one plus one.
And note order matters.
It's leave mom and dad, marry your wife
and then become one flesh.
In other words, we can't start the cleaving part
and still until we've done the leaving
part, you know what I'm saying?
Let, let me make it real clear
'cause you're looking at me like you're not tracking
because sex is a gift from God
designed exclusively for a husband
and wife in a covenantal marriage
relationship, God's way is best.
I just want you to see the practicality of this.
I would argue that the purpose of dating is evaluation.
You're, you're evaluating everything.
Am I ready to get married?
Is that the person that I'm dating ready to get married?
Are they the person that I want to join
and vow my whole life together with those questions?
They take time to answer. You need time to evaluate.
But because sex is so powerful,
it like bonds us physiologically.
Like there are chemicals that release in our brains.
The same chemicals that are released between a,
a nursing mother and her infant child are the same chemicals
that are released that bond, uh, uh, the person to
that you're having sex with.
This is a beautiful thing in marriage,
like amazingly beautiful.
And it's potentially really dangerous outside of marriage
because you cannot objectively evaluate the
person that you're sleeping with.
If you want confidence that they're the one for you,
try not sleeping with them.
You might find you don't even like 'em.
It's just so hard to stop the train Heading toward marriage
is what I find that, that once you're living together
and once you're sleeping together, that even when
that evaluation part starts to go sideways
and you're like, I don't know, A lot
of couples just find it either too inconvenient
or too expensive or too embarrassing to do anything else.
So they figure we might as well get married.
Now, watch it happen. So if you're dating today
and you're sexually involved or you're living together
before marriage out of reverence for Christ,
it might be time for you to have a difficult conversation
with your significant other.
Let me know if I can help, or
even if I could just pray for you.
And then Paul sums up everything in verse 33.
He says, however, let each one of you love his wife
as himself and let the wife see
that she respects her husband.
You guys, this is your to-do list if you want
to have a thriving marriage,
Paul's summing it all up for you right here.
Husbands love your wife with self-sacrificing love.
Be the ultimate servant in your marriage.
Notice in this part,
he actually addresses the husbands first.
And I think that's intentional.
So husbands, you go first in leading the way
and brides wives respect your husband's servant leadership
with joyful submission.
These are different instructions, different commands,
but they both describe the same heart disposition
to reject your own selfishness in marriage
and to follow Jesus's example that he gave for us.
But you know, what's painfully missing in all of this?
What if my spouse never loves me back?
What if my spouse never respects me in return?
Well, you can look again.
Nowhere in here does Paul say, as long as he loves you back
or only if she submits to you, that that's just not there.
And I know this is hard
because I have these conversations all the time.
I know there are countless people who say like,
I am holding this thing together year after year
and I'm worn out, I'm exhausted.
If that describes your experience in marriage,
it may be perhaps the hardest thing you ever face in this
world, in this life culture will tell you,
give up, kick 'em to the curb.
You gotta fight for your so-called independence
and freedom if your marriage is in a rough spot,
what I'm not saying to you is to grit your teeth and,
and just deal with it in misery.
I'm not saying that. What I'm saying is get help.
Invest in your marriage.
Take a next step, make a change
so you can get unstuck from the rut that you're in.
Look, you cannot fix everything about your marriage today,
but you can change the direction you're heading right now.
In other words, the story that your marriage is telling
can change and it can thrive when you follow these, uh,
these words God gave us.
So how do you do this? I have three quick action steps
that I'll close with today.
Number one, run to the father in dependent prayer.
Every day before I leave work, Cindy
and I hold hands and we pray together.
We ask him for his help.
And in doing this, holding hands
and praying it, it, it gives us
what we call course corrections.
That if I had wronged her the day
before, I'm not gonna just take her by the hands
and pray with her like that.
That's weird. I'm not gonna ignore it. I'm not.
I'm gonna have to deal with that. I'm gonna have
to ask her for forgiveness.
And so as we pray together,
what happens is every single day
before I leave work, I have a fresh, clean slate
with my wife and I have a fresh, clean slate with God.
Guys, this is huge.
Every day I leave for work and I know Cindy
and I are okay Every day I leave for work.
And our kids see this.
They think, ah, mom and dad love each other.
And that is huge.
Husbands, I dare you take your wife
by the hands today and pray for her.
Trust me, she doesn't care if it's not fancy.
In fact, neither does God. There's nothing more important
than you can do then to turn to God
and ask him for his help in your marriage.
Two, find biblical community.
There's lots of ways around hope you can find this.
And, and look, sooner or later you need to take, re-engage.
And, and I know it's full, it's wait listed
and it's mean for for me to even bring it up right now.
But re-engage goes beyond the theology
to provide you like practical tools on communication
and conflict and sexual intimacy.
We talk about it all. You need to take that sooner
or later if you're engaged.
You need to sign up for our premar class.
It's called Premar Prep.
We've got a team of mentors that are ready
to walk alongside you and help or call me.
I'd love to get you started
or join a men's group or a women's group.
Like Jeff's story today, one
of the best things you could do for your marriage.
I can't imagine what my life would be like without the
encouragement, without the accountability
and the time that we spend together in God's word
with the brothers that I've allowed into my life.
My marriage is stronger because of it.
And finally, remember his grace.
Some of you're sitting here
and by God's grace, your marriage is rock solid.
We'll, praise God, you're experiencing the joy
and the harmony and the pleasure that God designed
for you to experience.
Praise him for his grace.
And some of you here today, you're single
and you would do anything not to be.
Remember His grace. Continue to remember that as you wait,
as you ask him for patience.
But some of you sit here today and you're heartbroken.
And this has been a hard message.
'cause the, the story your marriage
is telling isn't a good one
or perhaps the marriage story has already ended in divorce.
Remember, God's story with us is not over.
Remain faithful to him. Our God is a God of new beginnings.
He's a God of reconciliation. He's a God of resurrection.
Last week, uh, Jason, uh, had us closed
by standing up and holding hands.
I'm not gonna do that. But what I am gonna do,
if you're married and you're here, husbands, if you're here
with your wife, would you just kind of quietly take her
by the hand as I close us in prayer?
Let's pray together. Father God, we ask today
for your help because we believe you are able.
God forgive us for neglecting your truth.
God, when we fail, would you remind us
of your grace by your spirit?
Would you strengthen us so that we can take
that next step today toward the thriving marriage
that you desire for us?
We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.
The story of the gospel is a beautiful story.
It was God's idea. A marriage was God's idea.
And it's a beautiful story.
And our marriages and our lives, married
or not fall woefully short of the gospel
or depicting the gospel, playing out the gospel.
We need Christ's help daily and we need each other's help.
So if there's anything that we can do as your church family
to help you take that step.
If you are a married couple
or if there's something that the Lord spoke to you,
maybe it has nothing to do with a marriage relationship
'cause that's not where you're at.
But I believe that the Holy Spirit may have spoke a
different truth, his truth to you.
Like here's a change you need to make.
We would love to help you take a step in your relationship
with Jesus, whatever that is.
If you're new, please stop by our next steps
or tell us you're new online, we'd love to connect with you.
Or if you're here and you want to talk to somebody about
what that next step in your marriage,
maybe go to next steps.
If you want to take a step in your discipleship,
you're following Jesus, go to next steps.
Stop and talk to one of us.
We want nothing more than for Jesus to be alive
and well in our marriages and our relationships
and in our church
and to follow him with our hearts and lives.
And let us know if there's anything
we can do to help you do that.
I wanna thank you again for being here together
with us at this gathering,
and I encourage you to come back next week
as we continue on learning what it looks like
to be a biblical family of families.
God bless you. We'll see you next week.
If it doesn't make sense right now, we.