The Church of Eleven22 - Wk 2: The Husband

Episode Date: September 30, 2018

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, - Ephesians 5:25 See 1 Corinthians 13:4-11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. - 1 Corinthians 13:11 Action Steps: 1. Say thank you 2. Confess and repent 3. Love your wife. Provide. Protect. Pursue.

How are doing, Teres? Doing, Terse doing. All right. I hope you're ready to get real. Fellas, I hope you are ready for this. If you got your Bibles, grab them. We're going to be in Ephesians, Chapter 5. In case you weren't here last week, you missed week one of dysfunctional family.

We talked about God's call in the life of the wife in the family, and so we will talk very little about that. I will say this. Ladies, you handled that message with such grace, and I really appreciate it. I really do. I thank you for the encouragement. via email. Because last week, you know, me talking about the role of a wife is kind of like a, you know, Catholic priest doing marriage counseling. It's just sort of theological. You better trust

the book because what do you know, right? And so, but this week I'm an expert. We are going to talk about husbands. And the reason that I'm an expert is I have a confession to make. I suck. And Gretchen hates it when I say that word, but she's not here. And honestly, I could just make this a four-part series on just confessions of how your pastor fails in accordance with what God's standard for being a husband is. And so this is pretty much, if you don't get anything out of this, I don't care. It'll just be therapeutic for my own soul as I do my own quiet time up here. And here we go. We're going to use the exact same text that we used last week. I think when we talk about husbands and wives in the book of Ephesians, even though the people that

put together there together the ESV and the NIV and the KJV, all those versions of the Bible. By the way, I use the LPV, the large print version, and I think you've got to back up, like we talked about last week, there is a banner over which the husbands and wives' text lives under. We talked about this last week, but let's go ahead and review. It starts in verse 20, giving thanks always for everything to God, the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. Again, this is all review.

But the banner of a good marriage, the banner over which a good marriage lives, is three things. Gratitude versus entitlement. That's the first one. It's gratitude. Give thanks. Husbands, when's the last time you said thank you to your wife?

And just as important, when it's the last time you got on your knees before the almighty king of the universe and said, thank you, thank you, thank you, that you would bring her into my life. Unspoken gratitude is useless so that we should, first and foremost, be thankful. The second part of the banner is this,

mutual submission versus selfish negotiation. And most of the time in our marriage is men. And by the way, ladies, here's your rules. Okay, I don't need any amends. I don't need any preach it, brother. None of those men. None of that. Just receive, okay?

But versus selfish negotiation, because man, we can be incredible negotiators with our wives. And in essence, what we're trying to do is buy them all so that we can get what I want. That's it. And the banner over a healthy, God-glorifying marriage is mutual submission. And the third is the gospel. It says that we submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. versus relational dynamics and communication techniques. Listen, bro, what you have to do, if you don't know Jesus,

I don't know how to tell you to be married because in just a second we're going to see that you're supposed to love her like Jesus loves you, and if you don't know the love of Jesus, you don't know how to fully love your wife. The greatest thing you could do for your wife is love Jesus, period. He will change you in a supernatural way, and the spirit of God that brought Jesus out of the great, will live inside of you when you surrender your life to Christ, and you will have a supernatural power to love your wife in a way that you cannot

without the help of Jesus. And so that's the banner. And then wives, we talked about this last part, wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. Fellas, the implication here is that you are following Jesus. The implication here is that you are following Jesus. Can you say what Paul says in 1st Corinthians 111? Paul says, follow me as I follow Jesus.

Can you say that? What if your wife had the relationship with Christ that you have? Would she be demoted? Or would that be a good thing? See, and a lot of times a bunch of husbands just get really, really lazy in their relationship with Jesus. And you don't understand that your personal relationship with Jesus ain't all personal. It has some serious implications on your household and your children. and your grandchildren, I'm telling you, man, I've been doing this church thing a long time.

So goes dad, so goes the house. I mean, we see it over and over and over. We see a family show up here at 1122, and if the kids surrenders their life to Jesus, maybe something will happen in the family. The mama surrenders her life to Jesus. Maybe something happens in the family. But when the head of the house surrenders to Jesus, I'm telling you almost every single time, whole house is one over for Jesus.

So if you're going to be the head, which is it is a high and noble task to be tasked to be a husband, and you will either be a good one or you will be a bad one. It means that you take on all the responsibility in your house. It means that you begin to understand that the strength given to you by God is not for you. That God gave you this strength. God gave you this mantle of leadership so that constantly, on a daily basis, you would leverage the authority that God has given you for the sake of everyone around you at great expense to yourself. The truth is this, when men lead and love well, everyone flourishes.

Think about this. Most nonprofits that are started is because some man did not do his job. Think about it. some husband some dad some leader did not do his job so that it is a great and noble task that god has called us to now it says wives submit to your own husbands as to the lord verse 23 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 now based on that if you just read these verses if you never read this text before. And if you had only heard the sermon that I preached last week, and you didn't know what the next verse said, you would think it would say something like, therefore husbands, lead like a boss. Or husbands, you're in charge. Or husbands, you're the king.

It doesn't say it anywhere. I can't find one place where it says husbands lead. It says this, husbands love your wife. Now listen, I know in the 21st century people aren't super stoked about the fact that the Bible says wives submit and husbands lead. Think about in the first century what the radical part of this was. The radical part in the first century was not wives submit. In the first century, women weren't even citizens. They couldn't vote. The gospel elevated the role of the woman as God has designed. In the first century, you know what the radical part was? The radical part was that men would love their wives. You see, he says husbands love your wife. as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.

Now, quite honestly, what does that mean? Husband, how do you love your wife like Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her? Now, the word there in Greek is agape. In English, we just have one word for love. It's love. And it means a lot. Like, I love Jesus, and I love my wife, and I love tacos, and I love all kind of stuff, right? Here, the word is agape.

Now, there's a bunch of words. And here, Paul does not say husband's eros. That's another word. We get the word erotic from it. He doesn't say eros, you wife. That means that your marriage is not built on just kind of these romantic feelings towards her. Are those important?

Praise God, yes, they're important. You try to build a marriage on that. It won't last. It won't last. It also doesn't use the word fileto, which means like a friendship kind of love. Is that important? I said last week, a really good marriage is a really good friendship. And yet the kind of love, a husband is supposed to be.

have for his wife is this agape love it is a sacrificial kind of love it's the kind of love that all throughout the new testament it describes god's love for us for god so agape the world for god so loved the world he gave his only begotten son and this is how we are to love our wives man we can spend the whole time just describing what this kind of love is fellas i'll give you seven Number one, pursue her. Pursue her like God pursued you. In our salvation, God is the initiator. You're not the initiator.

You didn't find him. He came and found you. Romans 5.8 says, but God demonstrates his love for us in this. While we were yet still sinners, Christ died for us. That means that if your wife was here last week and applied zero of the message. Your response to that this week and for the rest of your life is you love her and you go first. That you pursue her like Christ pursued you. And you're like, yeah, but it's hard. Look at the cross and shut your face. That's what you do. Okay? Secondly, God lavishes his love on us.

He doesn't give us just enough love to get what he wants. He lavishes. He lavishes. He loves. He lavishes. He is his love on us. Oh, what manner of love the Father has lavished upon us that we would be called children of God. Does your wife feel like you lavish love upon her? Or do you just kind of love her on Friday nights when it pops in your head? Hey, this could go good for me. That's not a lavish kind of love. That is selfish manipulation to get what you want. Me too, man. I get it. Lavish love is, I'll do with less so that you can have more. Lavish love is not, you see here, coming home with some bags from the, from the store, and you're like, what'd you get? That's not lavish love.

Lavish love is, like, for sure, now you can't go into debt for some more shoes. That's what I'm talking about. But you agree on stuff and have a budget and all that kind of stuff for sure. But as you're having those kind of conversations, you are figuring out how you could do less and less and less and less of what you want so she can have more and more and more of more of what she wants. She should feel absolutely spoiled by you, just don't act like it. That's that lavish, like there's a whole bunch of love just way.

waste it all over the place because you keep dumping an owner and dumping an owner and dumping an owner. Like with your words, you should lavish her with compliments, do you? Here's a test, fellas. Just look through your texts. Just look through your last hundred text. And how many of your texts have been lavishing love upon her or have they been critical towards her? You see, God pursues us. God lavishes his love upon us. God takes responsibility for everything. A part of the way husbands are to love their wife, like Christ love the church,

is we take responsibility for everything in our household. And if you got, yeah, but it's not my fault. Shut up and look at the cross. That's what I should have called this thing. Shut up and look at the cross. Think about this. Listen, when you fight with your wife, you've got two options.

You can be right or you can be a husband. Those are your options. Because when Christ came to this earth, he could have been right or he could have been the Savior. Those are his options. Our sin was not his fault. And at the cross, Jesus takes responsibility for our sin, and he had nothing to do with it. And he could have shown up, and he could have been right.

And he could have said, look, man, I'm not dying for you. You're a sinner. I'm perfect. You go to hell. I'm going back to heaven. I'll see you. Actually, I won't see anymore. Peace.

Go to hell. That's what he could have done. And he'd have been right. He would have been right. And yet, instead of that, he takes responsibility for something that is not his fault at all, and he pays the full price, and it was not his fault. And Paul says, that's how you love her. Fault has nothing to do with the scriptures.

Love is about responsibility, and to love your wife, like Christ loves the church, say, I'm taking responsibility. Let me get this real practical, fellas. us, it's not your responsibility, it's not your wife's responsibility for homework and to go to PTA and to have the parent-teacher meetings and all of that stuff. It is all your responsibility. You might decide as a couple to divvy out the responsibilities that way, but it is all your responsibility that is a part of how you love your wife like Christ love the church. Fourth, the way Christ loves us, he loves us with an inexhaustible forgiveness, an inexhaustible

forgiveness. That Colossians chapter 2 tell us that at the cross, our record of debt is nailed to the cross. And let me tell you what we are famous for men. Man, we keep a scorecard. We keep a scorecard. Every time she lets us down, every time she sins against us, every time she drip, drip, drip, whatever, man, we keep this little scorecard. And here's why. When some people fight, they get hysterical. When I fight, I get historical. I'm like, oh yeah, that's how it is. Well, check it out back in 2001, and Christ doesn't keep a score caught on us. Aren't you glad? Aren't you glad that by his stripes we are healed? There's an inexhaustible forgiveness that he offers us. Peter goes to Jesus and says, how many times do we got to forgive people? Like seven? Now, when Peter asked that, Peter thought he was

the junk. Because the Old Testament standard is not forgive. It's eye. It's eye. for eye, tooth for tooth. You punch me, I punch you back. That is the Old Testament standard. And Jesus says, forgive one another. And he's like, all right, well, how many times seven? And Peter thought he was standing there with like a big super disciple and his cape in the wind. And Jesus is like, how about 70 and 7? It'd be like saying a bazillion to us. Seven, the number of completion times seven with a zero on it. It's like a Google. It's a ton, all right? And that's how Christ treats us. And so we should have an inexhaustible amount of forgiveness towards our wife.

A fifth way that we can love our wives like Christ's love the church is this, is to crucify your will. It's to crucify your will. Yeah, you might not get what you want. And in laying that down, in laying that down, actually, man, the closer you get to Jesus, the more what you want will change. because what you'll want is to love your wife like Christ love the church, the scoreboard in your own mind will begin to change,

that you will begin to understand that serving her is a much better win than going fishing that day. And so Jesus is in the Garden of Gassimony. And he says, Father, if there be any other way, take this cup for me, not my will, but your will be done. that he would die for us and the glory of God. And Paul says, that's how you love her. Now, doesn't this make fighting about if you can play golf this Saturday just seem kind of silly?

Shut up and look at the cross. Okay, he died, and I really want him crazy. Husbands, I'll tell you what, 99.9% of our marital issues is this. We took our eyes off of the cross, period. You put your eyes on the cross, I'm telling you, loving her will be like the air you breathe. It's just what you'll do. But the moment you take your eye off the cross and you put it on yourself and our own selfish desires, then that's when everything gets all jacked up.

The sixth way to love your wife like Christ love the church? Jesus. The Bible says, Jesus, knowing that all things had put under his authority, he got up from the table, dressed himself as a servant to show his desire. the full extent of his love. He dressed himself as the lowest of low servants, and he washed his disciples feet. And then he says to his disciples when he gets done with this,

he says, I have set for you an example, you will be blessed if you do likewise. So husbands, part of the way you can love your wife like Christ's love of the church is wash her feet. And usually that's like figurative. It probably is literal for your wife. She's probably ended at rubber feet a little bit. And she would like that probably.

But what it means is you get to wake up every single day knowing that it's your house, knowing that you're the head, knowing that you have the authority, and what you do is you lay down that authority, you leverage that authority to serve her. Here's what it means is that you do the worst job in the house. You take on the worst job in the house as your own so she doesn't have to. What is that? Clean the toilets? Do it. Take out whatever it is, whatever she likes to do,

the least, you make that your number one job. And that's how, that's how you love her. You get, you get an opportunity every day to serve her like Christ serve the church. A seventh one. Look, this is not complete. This is just seven things I thought of. Ways to love our wives like Christ love the church is we don't react, but we respond in love. We don't react. We respond in love. Imagine if Jesus reacted to us the way we react to our wives. we'd all be dead. That's what would happen. We sent against Jesus and he was like, what? And he responded that way. Think about it. Jesus is in the Garden of Gassimini after he prays, not my will, but your will be done. He wakes up the disciples who are supposed to be praying with them and he goes, hey, the time has come. He looks over the Kidron Valley to the western gate of Jerusalem and he sees some men coming with torches and swords and they come walking up to him. And Pete, Reacts to the situation. You see, Peter thinks, you come to take my Lord, well take this, and Peter pulls out a sword and chops off a dude's ear.

In this analogy, Peter is like most husbands. You don't get what you want? You don't get what? React means. Someone acts and then you react. You mimic that kind of behavior. Have you ever reacted your way into deep abiding in thwarting. intimacy with your wife. No, man, when she cusses you and you cuss back, she doesn't think,

you know what, he's probably right. I am being up. No. Never, ever. You're just giving her evidence of how right she is and what a horrible human you are. You see, Jesus picks up the dude's ear and puts it back on his head. Here's the craziest thing. The dude came to arrest him and still arrest him after he puts his ear back on. That's crazy to me. You ever think about that? I think about stuff like that. And he looks at Peter and he's like, really? So when you react to your wife in unloving ways, I'm telling you, I think Jesus looks at you like he looks at Peter. He's like, what? Really? If you live by the sword, you die by the sword. And the Bible says, careless words stab like a sword. In wise words, lead to healing.

And so if your wife, just pretend theoretically, occasionally can be careless with her words. I don't know. Let's just say I've heard before that that can happen. And then you're just careless with yours. I swear you get in this verbal sword fight. And all you got is just people's ears fall off. You don't hear good when you don't have ears. But when you respond in love, I'm telling you, it grows everybody towards Jesus. Now listen, if you write down anything, write this now. few things will reveal your need for Jesus like your inability to love your bride like he loves his

I have been more convicted this week actually over the last since saturated been convicted of this truth few things reveal my need for Jesus in my life like my inability to love my wife like Jesus loves his and that's the call that is the call fellas the most sanctifying thing you'll ever do is get married. You did not know what a wretched, black-hearted sinner you were until God gave you a spouse. And then on a daily basis, he reveals to you. What a selfish, arrogant. I have so many words in my mind, and every way of finishing him in my mind are inappropriate for sermons. I'm really trying to edit this for your own sake right now. You see, man, a lot of Christian dudes. We like to throw around this like leadership, like, hey, I'm the leader. I'm the

of my house, are you? What does that mean? What does it mean to be the head of the house? What does it mean to be the leader of the house? Here's what it means. It means to be the leader of your house. You're going to be the leader of your house? Here's what this means.

You should be apologizing more than everybody else in your house. You should lead the way and I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It should come out of dad's mouth more than everybody else in the house. Why? Because you're the leader. Martin Luther said, when Jesus said, repent that repentant should be.

daily that our kids and our wives should hear us say basically on a daily basis, I am so sorry, I have not done this right. I should repent. To be the leader in your house means that you should be the lead thinker. I mean, let's be honest. If you're married with kids, she does a hundred times more in a day for your family than you do all month put together. Drill. It's all right. You should be the lead disciple. You should be the lead disciple. You should be the one most concerned about the children's relationship with Jesus. You should be the one most concerned with your wife's relationship with Jesus.

You should be the one most concerned about your walk with Jesus. You should never be the one making excuses of why you can't be at church or you can't be in a disciple group or you can't be a part of the spiritual formation of your church. I mean, one of the saddest things we've ever done in human history, and I could walk through recent American history with the Industrial Revolution, and when man went away from the home to work, and things like the lazy boy in the lunchbox were invented, and we left the spiritual formation of our children up to Mama. You should be the lead disciple and disciple in your home.

And if you're like, well, I don't know the Bible. We'll learn it, Scooter. you know a bunch of irrelevant crap at work. You do, man. You know all these numbers and forms, and you know what the NASDAQ's doing. Great. If that's your job, you should know that stuff.

But knowing Jesus is more important than knowing that stuff. You should be the lead servant. You should be the lead servant in your house. I mean, honestly, look, I get it. It's just confession. You know, you get this mentality that you're done. with work. You realize every time you walk back in the house, it's just second shift, bro. It is. And man, in a hot minute, you can just walk in, feel all entitled, get to the couch with the

remote, catch the game, and do nothing. And your wife is serving her tail off. And then we think we're the leader. What are you leading? What ends up happening is you're doing a great job leading these people at work that you barely know and would leave you for a 10% raise like that to the neglect of the people that would stick for you forever. This is true. We should be the lead servant. We should be the lead sacrificer. We should be the first one in our homes to give up whatever for the sake of our family.

That we should be consistently using the authority that God has placed on us to leverage that for the good of everybody that he's placed under our authority. That's what it means to be a leader. You want to be a leader? You see, if serving is beneath you, leadership is beyond you. And in our homes is where it starts. And, man, pray for me. Pray for me. I can lead with such clarity here at this place and go home and just kind of get super lazy.

I'm so convicted by these verses. And last week we said, listen, that a woman's two biggest pitfalls, generally speaking are comparison and perfectionism. Men's two biggest pitfalls are this. Most men either err in one of these two extremes, either selfish passivity or selfish aggression. You see, some men go to selfish passivity. See Adam in the Garden of Eden.

Adam stands there like a dud and lets the enemy have the loudest voice in his wife's life. And the Bible says that he was with her. Literally in Hebrew it means elbow to elbow. And a lot of times husbands, a lot of times we don't love our wives enough to confront sin in their life, to confront them. Because really what we do is we just love, we really just love us. And I'm telling you, it's crazy.

The biggest, baddest, toughest, meanest men in the world are afraid of our wives. And so we just abdicate responsibility. I'm telling you, man, you could want to fight with me. me right now physically or theologically. I'll take either one. I really don't, either one. I'm good at both. You can yell at me out. You yell, race can be good. And I can go home and be afraid of the opinion of my wife, the five-foot, whatever, a hundred, none of your pound business wife. Or sometimes you hear a sermon like this, here's the dangerous thing. You hear a sermon like this, and then you go home and you shot a cowboy up in your like false manhood. And it goes

to like selfish aggression. And then you begin to, we begin to use our strength for us. We begin to use our money for us. We begin to use our authority for us. And neither of those, Jesus never did either one of those. So husbands, husbands love your wives.

As Christ love the church and gave himself up for her. You see, think about this. Just very, I mean, we'll go like first grade level here. As you think about how Jesus loved as you. If you're a Christian, don't you look at that love that he has for you, don't you look at that relationship that you have with him and you think, this is better.

Like, my life is better. Even if the surrounding circumstances in your life and following Jesus, even if they all went downhill, you, on the inside of you, you as a human being, are better. Can your wife say that about her because she married you? That's a part of what it means, to love your wife like Christ love the church. You see, he says, husbands, love your wife, is Christ? Love the church and gave himself up for her that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of the water with the words, 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. This means that when Jesus takes us, we're a hot mess, and then there will come a day after. what we call progressive sanctification that Jesus presents us to the Father as holy and spotless without blemish. That's a process. And then the Bible is saying, and in a similar way, husbands, you meet your wife, and then by the time you're done being married when one of you is dead, that the wife could be presented as better. Now, he says, sanctifying her with the wife. washing of the word, husbands, lead spiritually. Lead spiritually. I'm going to make this very simple.

First of all, we are a Bible teaching church. If you're like, I don't know the Bible, if you don't know Romans right now, then re-listen to it again. We did every word in the book of Romans. Learn it. Learn it. Here's what you learn. You learn what's important to you. You just do. You learn what's important to you. And if this isn't important to you, you're never going to know how to love your wife well. but lead spiritually. This means pray for her out loud. Well, pastor ain't good at praying. We'll get good at it.

It's not hard. Here's what you do. You take your wife by the hand every night before you go to bed or every morning when you get up. And you say, how can I pray for you? And then you know what she's going to do? She's going to say stuff. You know what you should do? Pay attention.

And then you just, here's how you pray. Then you just bow your head. You can write this down if you want. to and just say, dear God, and then you just say the words that she just said to you. And then you say, amen. And when you open your eyes, she's going to be crying. And you're going to say, what's wrong? And nothing's wrong, bro.

Nothing's wrong. You did it good, okay? You know, prayer is the only place that we can fight for the hearts of our wives? It is. Man, there's not dragons to slay. It's had spiritual ones now. And so it is the place that you go to war for her. And you pray for her out loud.

And again, wives, remember last week? Okay? Just remember, don't screw up. Don't screw this thing up. Don't correct his grammar. Don't correct his theology. Don't, as he's praying for you, don't be like, that's not what I said. Don't, okay?

Just the spirit knows before a word is formed on our mouth, okay? And just when you remember last week, I said, Men are like puppies. They repeat what's rewarded. So, rewarding. Give them a treat. Just a heartolyse, hearta leaves. Good prayer, okay? That's it. That's one way. You can begin to spiritually lead if you're not. Another way is this, man, it's not, talk about the sermons. In here, in here, just write one thing down. Just one thing, man. Do you know, the women in our church probably 10 to one take notes as compared to the men?

They do. You got to sit back there like, man, this is good. How do you remember anything, man? Be serious about your discipleship for a second. Write one thing down. When I define one word. When I, you know, agape, write that down. And then later you'd be like, what you think about that? A gape. All right, whatever it is, man. Husbands, you know you got to know nothing to disciple your wife. You just ask a question. And they're like, oh, cool, I'll talk for a lot. A lot. And then you can be like, me too. And I swear, boy, she's going to be like, that was amazing. It's not hard, man. It's really not. Ask a question. Be in a disciple group. That's it.

Have some conversations about Jesus stuff. And you can lead spiritually. Now, here's the thing you have to understand. It is a process. This thing, verses 26 and following, it is a pro. You're not sanctified overnight. And I think a bunch of men. we see our marriage like a snapshot instead of a process.

In Genesis chapter 2, verse 15, God tells Adam. The Bible says that he creates Adam, he puts him in the garden, and he gives him this command. Subdu and cultivate. Subdu and cultivate. And men, a lot of times when it comes to our marriages, man, we crush the subdue and we abdicate the cultivate. Here's what I mean. When we see her, when we meet her, when we're trying to subdue her, man, we got game. I mean, we study her, we ask her out, we go to plate, we eat more freaking frozen yogurt

and you've ever eaten in your life. Who eats frozen yogurt? You know what I'm saying? Guys dating do. Just eating, oh man, I love this. Watch some stupid movies that you would never watch. Subdu. And then you get married, say, I do, and then you're done.

And you're just halfway there. I'm telling you, we were on a hunting trip this week, and I began to think a lot of times men treat marriages like we treat deer hunting. You chase, you study, you pursue, then you bag it, you hang it on the wall, and then you just ignore it the rest of your life. You married? Yep, there she is right there. All right, what you all right. And yet what God has called us to is to cultivate. Cultivate.

Cultivate, man, that's a gardening term. That means create the kind of environment where she can be everything that God has called her. her to be. That we never stop pursuing, we never stopped dating, we never stop. Here's the thing. Last week we talked about the fundamental question every man has is this, do I have what it takes? In the heart of every woman, they have this fundamental question. Am I valuable? Am I lovely? I'm telling you, it's why my little girl puts on a dress and comes and stands in front of me and twirls around because she wants to hear her daddy say, you are so pretty. And I don't care if you're 8 or 88, it's still deep down in here. Am I lovely? Am I valuable? And listen, fellas,

it is tough to be a woman these days. They live in a world that says if you're not beautiful, then you're not lovable. And the standard of beauty on the front of the magazines is literally impossible. Even the girls they take the pictures of to put on the magazines, couldn't even keep up with their own picture because of all the Photoshop. You don't believe me? When you get out of here, don't do it in here. YouTube Photoshop pizza. They took Photoshop, they took a piece of pepperoni pizza and turned it into a bikini model. And you look at it, you'd be like, wow, that is a piece of pepperoni pizza. It's not even a human being. So there's this fundamental question, deep in every woman's soul. Am I lovely and am I valuable? And I'm telling you,

the enemy whispers, nope, not unless you can provide this or look like that or see the approval of men. And yet we know the gospel, the gospel says this ladies, First Christenus chapter 6, you are not your own, you were bought with a price. This is true for all of us, but listen to this. You know how valuable you were to Jesus? Jesus paid it all. All to him I owe.

You know how you know the value of something? The value is not like your sentiment towards it. eBay taught us this. The value of something is what someone is willing to pay for it. So you got some dumb shirt and you think, oh, this is worth $100. Put it on eBay. Nope, worth two, okay? It's just true.

Put you on eBay, Jesus goes, I'll pay it all. That's how valuable you are. Husbands, God put you in your wife's life to be an echo of the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Here's what she wants from you. She wants to be valued. She wants to be valued. And ignoring her devalues her. you see one of the things that I try to ask Gretchen is this I say babe do you feel appreciated do you feel

valued because I feel it all for you in here but if it just stays stuck in here and it's not communicated towards you then then it's it's irrelevant literally ask her this the other day she's like you know how you can really value me and I was like what's that she handed me a thing of laundry glory to God I'm folding everything except the fitted sheet I don't you got to be some kind of voodoo ninja to get that I said, baby, I can't even, I just put my leg in it. Needed help. Hey, fellas, here's somebody who can value your wife. You can value her with your eyes,

meaning you only have eyes for her. She is your standard of beauty. You want to devalue your wife. You let your eyes go to anybody else. And you try to talk yourself into it all you want to, but nothing will devalue your wife like you looking at somebody else, whether it's a picture or a person. Nothing will.

that you fix your eyes on Jesus and then you fix your eyes on her. That's how you value her. You value her with your mouth, the things you say to her. I hope and pray you're not dumb enough to ever cut your wife down or ever make some kind of negative physical comment, you know? And I don't care. Maybe she's put on a few since you got married. You didn't exactly the Tarzan you were back in 76 either, all right, hoss?

Yeah. You speak blessing. over your wife. Again, careless words stab like a sword and wise words lead to healing. In the tongue is the power of life and death. Are you speaking life over her or are you speaking death into your marriage? So you value her with your eyes, you value her with your mouth, you value her with her hands. Every time your hands reach out to her, are they to serve her or to take from her? You think about it for a second. I mean, she's not a sanctified prostitute just because you got married, you get what you want when you want. That is not how this thing works.

man. You love her and you serve her. You use these things to serve her, not just be a taker, takeer, takeer, take her. Boys always take, men serve. And you value her with your time. You see, because she looks at you and you have enough energy and you always have enough time to do whatever you want. And yet when we give them our leftovers, I'm telling you, you would feel devalued too. Look, I'd be real practical. If you're married with children, you that one hobby. Choose wisely. One hobby. There's a whole bunch of golf that I go, no, I can't play. I have one hobby. It's hunting. That's what I do. Any extra time, I'm going to do that. I'm not going to stack this thing up. And I'm going to check with my wife. And I'm going to not, and Gretchen, man,

she does not run a tight leaf. It's not like one of those kind of things. She encourages me to have a hobby. She knows we all do better if I have a little bit of that kind of stuff in my world, because I'm not all crazy, all right? But listen to me, I'm telling you, if all of your time you want to spend not with her, what do you think that communicates to her? And if you ain't ready to do that, brother, you ain't ready to be married. You get ready to be married. You value her. And so he keeps going in verse 28. I love this. In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own body. He who loves his wife loves himself, for no one ever hated his own flesh. Who is this talking to? Men. this isn't talking to your women okay i don't know a woman that loves her flesh no matter how in shape you

are my wife is ripped man and she'd be like look right here when i do like this i got this little thing right here you know every girl i know hates the way they look well we'll you should pray about that we'll talk about that something and every dude i know loves his flesh big old fat hairy out of shape i ain't worked out since the nixon administration catches a little glimpse of himself in a hubcap and he's like yep look at there still got it Ha ha. It's just a fact. So it's talking about men here. When it says in the same way, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies, thinking about this, man, the day you got married, you weren't an expert at taking care of you. You were in, there is no more selfish human being

than a single male, grown man. And here's what I mean. You know you. You know what you want. You know what you need. one has to tell you what you won't need. You know, because you know you. You're driving around in your truck. Nobody has to say, hey, I think you're thirsty. You know you're thirsty. And what do you do when you know you're thirsty? You pull the truck over and you get you something to drink. And you know what you get you to drink? You always get you what you like to drink. You're really good taking care of you. Are you not? And the scriptures say, all right, that's been practice for all these years. and the way that you've learned to take care of your wants and needs, now you transfer that and you become an expert at taking care of her wants and needs.

Without anybody telling you, how do you do this, fellas? You've got to study her. And don't be telling me, well, she's confusing. I understand, man, part of the glory of being married is you get a little bit of a new human every day. You spend that wheel every day, but come on, happy. Give me happy. Happy, happy. You do, man, a little bit of roulette. but it's part of it.

It's a fact. Here's what 1st Peter 3-7 says, likewise husbands live with your wives in an understanding way. Literally in the Greek it says, live with your wives as undenolage. It means you become a student of hers. And I know it's complicated, but so it's fantasy football.

You figure that out. Man, I know when the deer are going to walk. You understand? Some of you fellows know when the waves are coming. So you become a student of her, and you learn her in order to meet her wants and needs. It says, for no one has ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it just as Christ does the church. Here's the definition of love, nourish and cherish.

Some translations use the words, provide and protect. Part of the way you love your wives, first of all, is provide. And that means, yes, food and clothing and living indoors and that kind of stuff. but it also means like companionship providing providing a companion in the gospel and it also means protect

and yes that means defend her for sure you know but it also means that you cherish her that means you fight for her and not with her now the problem is there's a lot of people that provide without cherishing well she knows a lot of people that provide without cherishing Well, she knows I love her because I do to wheat eating and I work and provide for her this home and food.

Look, a possum provides that. We might need to raise the standard a little there, Haas. You understand? And yet there are some people that are like, no, I love her because I cherish her. Yeah, but you don't have a job. I know the Beatles saying all we need is love, but they didn't make it. You understand? In fact, 1 Timothy 5.8 says this, if anyone does not provide for her,

his relatives and especially for members of his own household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. What does that mean? Unbelievers go to hell. You don't provide for your wife? There's like a basement of hell. And they're like, yep, nope, keep going. Keep going. No, you live down there, okay?

That's what this says. And so we are to love, to provide and protect. Verse 30, because we are members of his body. Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to it. his wife and the two will become one flesh. You leave and cleave. Verse 32, this mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ in the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself and let the wife see that she respects her husband. So here's the point. I just stole it from what we already read. Husbands love your wife as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.

So what does it look like to love her? I would see 1st Corinthians chapter 13. Versus 4 through 11. If you want to go back to the Ag Like Men series, I unpack what each one of these phrases mean, and I'm telling you with great conviction as I look through this list of what love looks like, not what love feels like. I feel so much love for my wife.

I'm telling you, if I look at her in the face, I can talk to y'all all day long about Jesus and stay fine. If I look at her in the face for more than 30 seconds and tell her how love her, I turn into Robert De Niro. My face turns inside out, and I'm like, I love you. You talking to me? That's what happens to me. I can't hold it together.

I don't know what it is. I have a lot of emotion for that girl. But when I look at what loving her is, I don't do a very good job. Listen, love is patient and kind. Have you ever used those words to describe me? I mean, honestly, have you ever been talking to somebody like, where you go to church?

I go to 1122. Oh, I've heard about that. Tell me about your pastor. He's patient and kind. Have you ever? See, now he's laughing at me. He hurt my feelings, but whatever. Love is patient and kind.

It does envy or boast. It's not arrogant or rude. See, arrogance is you think you're better than everybody else, and rude is treating them that way. It does not insist on its own way. It's 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. As for prophecies, they will pass away.

As for tongues, they will cease. As for knowledge, it will pass away. We know in part and we prophesy in part. but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. Now, this next verse is getting me. It says, when I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. The childish ways in this context are the opposite of what the definition of love is.

That means when you're impatient, when you're unkind, when we're envious, when we brag, when we're arrogant, when we're rude fellows to our wives and our family. you're acting like a boy you're acting like a child i just told the wives last week that their job was to make you feel like the man well then be the man and be the man is not bowing up your chest and being loud and proud actually being the man according to first christians 13 is to be a loving husband to your wife and so here's your action steps here's what you can do very practically okay i know you're not a complex creature so i'm I'm going to put this on the bottom of shelf. Number one, say thank you. When's the last time you extensively thanked her for all that she does

and for who she is and who God created her to be? And to get on your face before your Heavenly Father and thank him for knitting together in her mother's womb, this woman that then he would put in front of you and join you together for life. Because I'm going to tell you, if you will pray for your wife with a sense of gratitude, nothing will grow your heart for her like that. Say thank you.

Secondly, same thing as last week, this top two. Confess and repent. Confess and repent. And I mean really confess and repent. Don't make a case. Because we're great at making a case and making excuses about while we're not doing our part. Don't do that. Confess and don't defend.

And don't defend. And listen, ladies, don't screw this thing up. the moment he starts, I'm like, it's about time. I've been waiting on this since 1980. No, man, just a couple weeks ago. I wasn't sure if I was going to share this, but whatever. Your pastors take this whole Jesus thing more seriously than you know, and we were getting ready for saturated,

and we have this group called the pastoral leadership team. It's a group of pastors that help me shepherd this thing. And in order for us to be ready for saturated, we just believe we can't we can't expect you to go somewhere we're not going we can't lead what we don't live and so we sat in an office back here and we just with the pastor says what areas of repentance do you need to confess and repent in your life so that we are ready for this revival that God wants to bring our way we're praying for one another and we're confessing sin and God just I just began to think oh my gosh I need to confess and ask for forgiveness in my home for the way I've been treating them.

And so I sat down and I just sent Gretchen a text. And the reason I texted her, she likes to communicate via text. I despise it and she loves it. Because she can, I think she'd gather her thoughts. She can say exactly what she wants to say. You know what I mean? So I just sent her this. I said, I owe you an apology, a confession.

And I'm sure at that moment she thought, oh boy. And I said, I think I have been a, I said a bad word. I'm sorry, I can't read it. I said a bad word. I'm going to say jerk, but that's not what my paper says. I think I have been a jerk to live with, and I'm sorry. I need your forgiveness. Somehow I think when I walk through the door that you should worship and adore me.

And if you don't, then I act, there's another bad word. I act pouty. I am so sorry. Somehow in my mind I've slipped into this mentality that you owe me, this undying gratitude, and if you even disagree with me about anything, then somehow you're being disrespectful. I need your forgiveness for that. I could go on and on, but it hit me today in prayer that I should confess to you and ask for your forgiveness. I love you.

I really do. And I am sorry when I don't love you first. I should, and instead I pout in my own selfishness. I'm sorry. That text, three weeks ago, triggered a work. We have a good marriage, man. We're really into each other. We had great kids.

We've got a great church. We have a good marriage. And that confession and repentance triggered something in our marriage, and God has been doing that work in that thing for the last 20 days or so. That I could only describe as supernatural. So husbands say thank you and confess. Go first. You should be the chief confessor and repenter in your house. And then third, love your wife. Love your wife. This means provide for her. Yes, financially and all of that stuff, but also provide for her spiritually and protect her. You protect her in prayer. You fight for her, quit fighting against her. And you pursue her. And I don't mean pursue her so you can. get what you want, I mean pursue her heart for the sake of her and to the glory of God. Husbands love your wife as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.

Would you please stand and pray with me? Our good and gracious Heavenly Father, God, the only way we pulled this thing off is by a supernatural move of your spirit. God, I also thank you that try harder won't work on this one. Communication techniques and marriage books about meeting each other's needs while they are very helpful tools. They will not be the power. God, we know that the only power is in the gospel of Jesus Christ. God, would you remind every husband and every wannabe husband of the power. of the gospel in our own lives and spirit in a supernatural way, would you feel the husbands of

the Church of 1122 to be able to love our wives as you have loved us? Sacrificially and totally and ultimately to the glory of God. God, I pray for an outbreak of confession and repentance with the husbands of this church. God, I pray that you would put, death, the ego and the pride in which we typically walk. And you would humble us by the blood of Jesus. And God, I pray, I pray for a warm, grace-filled reception from our wives, though we don't deserve it. And God, I thank you for your love. I thank you that we can love one another because you first loved us. And we pray this in Jesus' name. And all God's people said, Amen.