Day Four: A picture of your night.
You know who/what else deserves some lovin'? My husband. Why? Besides the fact that he's my husband, you mean? Because this husband had cleaned the entire house by the time I got home. I'm talking dusted, cleaned bathrooms, did laundry, and vacuumed. We usually spend Saturday mornings cleaning together, and I was simply going to neglect the weekly cleaning this week since I was playing ball. Then I come home, exhausted, sick, feeling miserable, to find a lovely clean house. It's his birthday weekend, he worked all day yesterday, and still chose to be a servant to his wife by doing the chores. Not the first time this has happened. What a blessing!
As Christians, we are supposed to serve our spouses; in fact, we are supposed to serve all whom we encounter. This is much easier said than done, especially when God's word can be taken and misinterpreted. In today's modern world, many people know and recognize the verse from Ephesians that commands, "wives, submit to your husbands". When we think of what that says, we associate submission with weakness and loss of power. This is not the case! Dan Lacich, who maintains a blog entitled "Provacative Christian", argues that there is more to the text than just that verse. He references Ephesians 5:21-33 and explains that submission means letting our husbands guide us, but not control us. We should serve them out of love and reverance for Christ, as long as our relationship is built on faith, loyalty, and trust. In the same passage, husbands are called to lay down their lives for their wives, just as Christ lay down His life for the church. Anyone who has been in a relationship probably knows that we should put our loved ones before us, and I also think anyone who has been in a relationship knows how truly difficult this can be at times. However, when we read these verses in Ephesians, we are reminded of the fact that a marriage between man and wife is also used as a metaphort for Christ and the church:
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church— for we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
When we serve our spouses, we are serving God in one of the best ways possible. God is pleased when we put our spouses before ourselves, but He is most pleased when both husband and wife put God first and foremost in the marriage. I am so grateful to have a husband who puts God first and seeks Him daily. Christopher shows me he loves me everyday in many ways; cleaning the house is only one of those ways. But, on a night like tonight, I'm more grateful than he'll ever know!
To view Dan's blog, click the link below:
http://provocativechristian.wordpress.com/2009/10/12/provocative-bible-verses-wives-submit-to-your-husbands/
I challenge you (and myself) to be servants this week in the best way we can find.
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