Well, with Christ's love for the church providing the typological pattern or the archetype for a man's love of his wife, it's no surprise that we get a lot of emails from husbands who don't know if they're on the right track here. What does Christ-like love look like in the life of a husband's daily life?

It's the question today from a listener named Zachary. "Pastor John, this winter I will be married and I have little to no experience with men in my life leading their wives well. What are some general parameters for me and for all new husbands to know whether we are leading our brides in a way that honors and reflects Christ's love of the church?" Okay, Zachary, here it is in a nutshell.

Make Ephesians 5, 25 to 33 your lifelong charter of how to love your wife and what it means to live in the covenant relationship which God designed in order to show the world the beauty of his own covenant love for the church. Make it your lifelong charter. It is an inexhaustible passage.

It will break you down and then build you back up again and again as you discover more and more deeply the wonders of the mystery of marriage. Very few people in our day, even in the church, think of marriage as deeply and seriously and gloriously as God intends. We have by and large, it seems to me, absorbed the world's superficial views about marriage and its glories and we've utterly neglected what it is really about.

And then add 1 Peter 3, 7, one verse, to this lifelong charter. So now you've got two pieces to the charter. Ephesians 5, 25 to 33 and 1 Peter 3, 7, where you have this phrase, "Fellow heirs of the grace of life." You will never get to the bottom of that phrase, ever.

Not in this life, probably not in the next. Fellow heirs of the grace of life. Two people, a man and a woman, both of whom are utterly and totally sinful and therefore utterly and totally dependent on grace for this life and the next. What would that look like? What a glorious thing that would look like of two brokenhearted, saved, grace-dependent people living together.

But now let me get specific, just a few specific questions because I'm sure that's what you want me to do. Ephesians 5, 25 to 33 is designed as the redemption of what was destroyed in Genesis 3. Let's start there. Just realize that connection. When Adam and Eve fell from the beautiful plan that God had for them, Ephesians 5, 25 to 33 is the rebuilding of what was destroyed.

Now let's read what was destroyed. You'll see it. You can see at least three terrible destructions. Then the eyes of both were opened. So Adam and Eve, they'd just eaten of the forbidden fruit. Then the eyes of both were opened and they saw, they knew that they were naked.

And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths. And they heard the sound of the Lord walking in the garden in the cool of the day. And the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, to the man, step up Adam.

He called to the man and said to him, where are you? And he said, I heard the sound of you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself. And God said, who told you you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree, which I commanded you not to eat?

The man said, the woman, you gave to me. She gave me the fruit and I ate. Good night. Notice three catastrophic corruptions to this beautiful relationship. Number one, the man and the woman felt shame for their nakedness. They weren't safe with each other anymore. We've all tasted this, right?

He or she may see me in my most vulnerable condition, naked, and they may say something utterly devastating about me that would wound this relationship for the rest of our lives. Number two, they hid themselves not just for each other, but from the Lord. They were afraid. I was afraid because I was naked.

So the relationship horizontally and vertically was ruined. And what a universe of misery entered the world. Number three, the man's first reaction to this new ruined set of relationships is blame her and blame God who gave her to me. The woman you gave me, she gave me the fruit.

So there's the tragic result that Ephesians 5 is intended to heal. Shame, fear, blame, guilt shifting. And what you know, Zachary, you know this as a Christian, Jesus Christ came into the world to save people from all that relational destruction. That's why he came. And his central, all-important way of saving us from shame and fear and blame and guilt shifting is to die, to die in our place and on our behalf.

Rise from the dead, give us eternal hope. In other words, Jesus deals with our sin in such a way that fear and shame and blame and guilt shifting are destroyed in his redeemed family. And he does it by dying, dying. Now what this means for you as a husband who is called to be the head of your marriage and your family, Ephesians 5.23, you are the head, and to love your wife as Christ loved the church, Ephesians 5.25.

What this means is that you now take the lead. That is, you feel a special responsibility to take initiatives for creating an atmosphere and putting in place the means of grace that replace shame with honor, 1 Peter 3.7 says, and fear with joyful confidence and blame or guilt shifting with forbearance and forgiveness.

You feel a special responsibility for putting in place an atmosphere and means of grace that accomplish those glorious ends. In other words, you yourself first receive the redeeming work of Christ in your own brokenness and sinfulness. And then you bend it, you bend it outward after the model of Christ to show it to your wife and your children.

But notice carefully, get this, tune in, you and your wife are fellow heirs of grace, 1 Peter 3.7, which means that she is experiencing from the Lord Jesus directly by faith, not through you, the same redemption. And she too has a responsibility to bend it outwardly and horizontally toward you and the children.

That's why I said as a head, as a leader, you have a special responsibility as the head to take initiatives for creating and sustaining a spiritual and emotional and physical atmosphere where your wife feels protected and safe, safe from verbal put downs and other wounding that might come from you or the children and where she feels provided for and where she feels that she doesn't have to push because you're already moving in the direction of establishing a gracious and godly atmosphere in the home.

So Zachary, here's one little guideline, one little practical test to see if you are fulfilling your calling in this regard when you get there. Pose this question, who in this family is saying, me or my wife, who in this family is saying let's most often in regard to establishing a healthy family pattern of life, prayer patterns, Bible reading patterns, church attendance patterns, patterns of moral guidance for the children, patterns of pace and schedule, patterns of how you handle the iPhones, patterns of financial responsibility in living within the budget and on and on.

The husband as head should not leave a wife in a position where she feels like these things are being neglected and she must push on you in order to initiate the necessary conversations. Spiritual leadership from a husband who is a saved sinner, dependent on daily grace, readily confessing his own sins and flaws to her, to the kids, to his friends, such spiritual leadership does not mean one-sided decision making.

It means saying let's. Let's talk about the budget, honey. Let's talk about the way we discipline our kids. Let's talk about the most helpful pattern of prayer and Bible reading for both of us. Let's talk about church and participation there. Let's talk about the moral vision we want to have for a family in this community.

The reason you lead with let's instead of unilateral commands is because you're not Christ. You are only as Christ. Can you make that distinction? That as, lead her, love her as Christ loved the church, that as means you take into full account your own sinfulness and finitude and how a sinful finite leader creates the fullest joy and fruitfulness in the family.

And you may find, you will find, I dare say, you may find in any of these cases that your wife has greater wisdom than you do, which is just fine. That doesn't mean she suddenly becomes the leader. She will be thrilled that in your initiative taking leadership, you are humble enough to receive a wise word when you hear it.

No worthy leader, president of the United States, general of an army, no worthy leader assumes he has all the wisdom he needs. So Zachary, there is so much more and the Lord will show it to you if you make Ephesians five and first Peter three the lifelong charter for your calling as a husband.

Yeah. And on behalf of all men who married smarter women, amen, Pastor John, thank you. And thank you for listening and making the podcast a part of your day and commute. Three times a week we publish and you can subscribe to our audio feeds and search our past episodes in our archive and even reach us by email with a question of your own, especially if you have a question about the very foundations of what we do on this podcast.

If you want to ask about sort of the theological underpinnings that drive everything that we talk about, we love questions like that. Marriage questions as well. Send all of those to us through desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn. You'll see a button there to submit your question via email. Well Wednesday we're going to talk about preaching.

Specifically we're going to look at six subtle ways that preachers unwittingly undermine the authority of scripture in front of their congregations. You will not want to miss this one. I think it's going to be relevant for preachers and aspiring preachers and to congregants as well. I'm your host Tony Reinke and we'll see you then and have a wonderful Reformation 500 celebration on Tuesday.

We'll see you back here on Wednesday. 1 Page 2 of 2