D. Scott Meadows

“Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church” —Ephesians 5.25.

20 MARCH PM, MORNING AND EVENING BY C. H. SPURGEON

What a golden example Christ gives to his disciples! Few masters could venture to say, “If you would practice my teaching, imitate my life;” but as the life of Jesus is the exact transcript of perfect virtue, he can point to himself as the paragon [perfect example] of holiness, as well as the teacher of it. The Christian should take nothing short of Christ for his model. Under no circumstances ought we to be content unless we reflect the grace which was in him. As a husband, the Christian is to look upon the portrait of Christ Jesus, and he is to paint according to that copy. The true Christian is to be such a husband as Christ was to his church.

The love of a husband is special. The Lord Jesus cherishes for the church a peculiar affection, which is set upon her above the rest of mankind: “I pray for them, I pray not for the world” [John 17.9]. The elect church is the favorite of heaven, the treasure of Christ, the crown of his head, the bracelet of his arm, the breastplate of his heart, the very center and core of his love. A husband should love his wife with a constant love, for thus Jesus loves his church. He does not vary in his affection. He may change in his display of affection, but the affection itself is still the same. A husband should love his wife with an enduring love, for nothing “shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” [Rom 8.39]. A true husband loves his wife with a hearty love, fervent and intense. It is not mere lip-service. Ah! beloved, what more could Christ have done in proof of his love than he has done? Jesus has a delighted love towards his spouse: He prizes her affection, and delights in her with sweet complacence.

Believer, you wonder at Jesus’ love; you admire it—are you imitating it? In your domestic relationships is the rule and measure of your love —“even as Christ loved the church?”

On Ephesians 5.25

This exhortation is directed toward believing, married men. Only those who already know Christ as Savior have the requisite grace to hear and heed it. The verb translated “love” is in the typical form of a command. This ethical direction is a moral imperative. It is not optional; transgressions and shortcomings in this regard are sin. Each and every husband in Christ has a moral duty to love his own wife, as there is no exception stated or implied in the case of an unbelieving wife or any other case. The adverb translated “even as” draws a parallel with Christ and His church. His love is eternal, divine, infinite, absolute, and incomprehensible, and ours never could be. Nevertheless, in certain respects declared by Paul, Christ’s love is to be the aim of our lives, translated into real practice within our marriages. “The church” here is used in its universal sense of all God’s elect from the beginning of the world to the end, those whom Christ loved in particular, and for whom He died, to save them from their sins and to redeem them for God’s kingdom of grace and glory. The unquoted part of Ephesians 5.25 continues, “and gave himself for it.”

It is extremely important to note that Christ as Savior lays a foundation for Christ as Exemplar. Scripture testifies abundantly to both of these. Antinomians emphasize the former without the latter, as if our forgiveness is all that matters and a Christian’s ethical life is unimportant. Legalists shamefully do the reverse, as if practical holiness could be attainable without or divorced from our free justification in Christ alone. Spurgeon illustrates the biblical position by glorifying Christ’s gracious love for the church and holding it up as the example for husbands, precisely like Paul does in Ephesians 5. We must guard against licentiousness and moralism.

The structure of this devotional message

I. Christ’s Example for Husbands

II. Christ’s Love and a Husband’s Love
A. Special
B. Constant
C. Enduring
D. Hearty
E. Delighted

III. Is Your Love like Christ’s?

Points for further reflection

1. Christ is the “exact transcript of perfect virtue” (para. 1). He is the very righteousness of God; He is also the one and only Man (Adam) tested and confirmed, found to be perfectly conformed in heart and conduct to the moral law in Scripture (Psa 40.8; Heb 4.15).

2. Christians “reflect the grace which was in him” (para. 1). Actual righteousness in God’s sight is only found in those enjoying union and communion with Christ. This righteousness is not manufactured by each one who has it but may be traced to its Source in the Head and Fount of all saving and sanctifying grace, even Jesus.

3. Jesus “may change in his display of affection, but the affection itself is still the same” (para 2). Any and all change is in the creation, not the Creator (Mal 3.6; Jas 1.17). “Behind a frowning Providence, He hides a smiling face” (William Cowper).

4. “Special, constant, enduring, hearty, and delighted” love makes marriages a foretaste of heaven on earth. For a husband to be a one-woman man, loving her every day whatever happens with all his heart, as his companion by covenant and the apple of his eye, induces her ever-greater happiness, too. This is the marital bliss only possible by gospel grace. Ω