Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. Those who think marriage is a magic door to happiness should note that half of all marriages fail today.
God intended marriage to develop character, and a hard heart can break the bonds between a couple if one will not repent. From the Moody Church in Chicago, this is Running to Win with Dr. Erwin Lutzer, whose clear teaching helps us make it across the finish line. Pastor Lutzer, what are some of the rewards we can miss if we fail to have repentant hearts? Well, Dave, you know, as we've emphasized in this series of messages, it is so important to see marriage in God's light and not ours. It is a means that he uses to perfect our own spirituality. That is to say, to teach us lessons regarding patience, acceptance, and a whole host of other lessons. And unless we are repentant, we'll miss those, and we will see all the faults of our partner, and we will fail to see our own.
And that is a recipe for disaster. Well, I'm holding in my hands a CD titled In All of His Glory. It's a Christmas concert that was recorded here at the Moody Church Choir and Symphony Orchestra, a great opportunity to remind ourselves that Christmas music is very powerful. It touches all of our hearts. Now you might say, well, Pastor Lutzer, why are you talking about Christmas music when we haven't even celebrated Thanksgiving yet?
Well, the answer is this. If you order this CD now, of course it will be there in plenty of time for Christmas. It includes many of your favorites, such as In All of His Glory, All is Well, I'll Give Him My Heart, and Others. Here's what you do for a gift of any amount. You go to rtwoffer.com.
That's rtwoffer.com, or call us at 1-888-218-9337. Now let us go to the pulpit of Moody Church as again we learn about marriage, the commitment that lasts till death do us part. Prayer, you see, oftentimes is like an air raid shelter.
Its intention is to justify our rebellion. Well, I'm praying about it. Well, stop praying about it and repent about it.
If you were to do that, who knows what God might do? So you say, well, does the husband ever submit to the wife? Sure, there are times, it says in verse 21, submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. We often submit to our wives because husbands, if you think you are off the hook, I have to warn you about what is coming, all right? But first of all, we miss the lesson of submission. We miss that lesson.
If all that we think to ourselves is the way is to bail out of this relationship. Let's go on to a second reward that we miss. The lesson of selflessness. Selflessness.
Now, how do you like this? Verse 25, husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word. Well, husbands, love your wives as Jesus Christ loved the church. Have you ever given yourself up for her? The Bible says love her as Christ did and gave himself up for her.
This is a kind of love that doesn't depend upon how she looks, whether or not she is the same woman as you married. Howard Hendricks likes to tell the story of a guy who said, Howie, you haven't heard anything until you've heard about my wife. Hendricks said, all right, tell me.
And he begins to write one notepad after another, all the things. And then Hendricks says, why in the world would you be so stupid as to marry a woman like that? He said, well, when I married her, she wasn't like that.
Oh, I see. You made her that way, did you? You made her that way. Notice how selfless the love of Jesus Christ is. Despite our fickleness, despite our selfishness, despite our disloyalty, when we make Jesus look bad, he still loves us.
Husbands, love your wives as Jesus Christ loved the church. Camp on that verse for a week and see what it'll do for you. Selflessness. I came across a quotation about what dying to self really is.
And it's from an unknown source, but here it is. When you are forgotten or neglected or purposefully set at naught and you sting and hurt with the insult or oversight, but your heart is happy being counted worthy to suffer for Christ. That's dying to self. When your good is evil spoken of, when your wishes are crossed, your advice disregarded, your opinions ridiculed, and you refuse to let anger arise in your heart or even defend yourself, but take it all in patient loving silence, that is dying to self. When you lovingly and patiently bear any disorder, any irregularity, or any annoyance, when you can stand face to face with waste, folly, extravagance, spiritual insensitivity, and endure it as Jesus endured it, that is dying to self. When you are content with any food, any offering, any raiment, any climate, any society, any attitude, any interruption by the will of God, that is dying to self. When you never care to refer to yourself in conversation or to record your own good works or itch after commendation, when you can truly love to be unknown, that is dying to self. When you can see your brother prosper and have his needs met and can honestly rejoice with him in spirit and feel no envy or question God while your own needs are far greater and in desperate circumstances, that is dying to self. When you can receive correction and reproof from someone of less stature than yourself and you can humbly submit inwardly as well as outwardly finding no rebellion or resentment rising up within your heart, that is dying to self.
Wow. I need to tell you in humble confession today that it has taken me not months but years to see my own selfishness in my relationship with Rebecca. We as men just don't get it until God clobbers us with a two by four, and even when he does that we make other excuses for the pain. God says, serve your wife, don't be her boss for a while, serve her. And you'll notice that the scripture says, as Christ loved the church, don't give me this that she isn't the woman you married or this shouldn't have happened in the first place. The question is now, how do you keep your covenant and how do you let God sanctify you and purify you and bring to the surface all of that hostility and all of that self will and all of that selfishness through the intimacy of marriage.
That's the issue. Number three, purity. Purifying love. You'll notice, what is it that Jesus is up to? Well, he's sanctifying the church. You see men, in case you missed it, you and I are to be Jesus to our wives. I remember counseling a young woman who was going to get married and she didn't know whether or not she should marry this guy and I said, why are you getting married to Jesus? Well, that ended that for her. But that's the analogy. She's to be the church, you're to be Jesus.
I mean, after a while, there should be some family resemblance, right? Now notice, what is Jesus up to? He's washing the church, sanctifying her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word so that he might present the church to himself and ultimately to the father without spot or wrinkle or any such thing that she might be holy and without blemish. And that's what husbands are to do with their wives. They're supposed to be interested in their wives' walk with God and their wives' purity and holiness. And that's why the Bible says that we are to lead the home. It doesn't mean that you have to be a Bible teacher or teach a Sunday school class or know the Bible well, but do you encourage your wife by praying for her?
Do you ever pray together? Is there in your mind an attitude here of service and helpfulness and encouragement as her leader? That's the question that needs an answer. And so what the Bible says here is that we have the responsibility negatively to keep our wives from evil.
This is why there are some women who are working in environments where a Christian woman should never work because it is an environment of temptation and it exposes her to evil. You say, well, you know, I'm single. You're speaking and you're saying, how do I know, young ladies, listen, you're saying, how do I know that the man I'm going to marry is going to be interested in my purity and my sanctification so that when I die, I'm planted and made honorable to Jesus Christ.
Here's a good criterion. How is he treating you during your dating experience? Is he encouraging you sexually? Does he want to convince you to go to bed with him before you get married? If he does, I suggest you take that fish and throw him back into the lake.
All right? I think more of you should have clapped on that one. Many men are out there who say, I love you. What they really mean is I love myself and I want you. Selfish, egotistical, self-absorbed, evaluating only your body, not your mind, not your heart, not your character. And they are unworthy of you, young ladies.
They are unworthy of you. Jesus doesn't want an unholy wife. And because of that, he sanctifies the church and purifies it. And that's what he's doing in our hearts. And that's what our marriages should do. The whole point of marriage is to purify us. And as I've mentioned, there's nothing that brings our sins to the surface as clearly as the intimacy of marriage. Number four, there is intimacy. This is such a rich passage.
Once again, I say to myself, this should have been a longer series, but I'll pick this up at some future time. Notice what the text is saying here. It says, in the same way, verse 28, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. Oh, what have you done for yourself recently? Oh, you say I spent a lot of time making myself happy. Okay, spend an equal amount of time making your wife happy.
And in the process, you will be happy because she's one body with you. You know, if you have a broken arm and you are trying to get help for the arm, it becomes important to you. Why? Because it's a member of your body. And when one part of the body hurts, the whole part hurts. When you have a disgruntled, unhappy wife, you hurt because she's part of your body. So whatever it is that you do to yourself, and most of us are very self-absorbed at this point, you do for your wife because in the process you are blessed. You want to be blessed? You bless your wife and you'll be blessed.
That's what the text says. 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 it and cherishes it, just as Jesus Christ does the church because we are members of his body. And then it says a man shall leave his father and mother and old fast to his wife. That's a separate sermon too, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is profound, and isn't it profound?
Wow. So what he really means is that every time you pursue happiness for yourself, if you put that amount of energy into the pursuit of happiness on the part of your spouse, it comes back to you. Now I told you that the purpose of marriage, the ultimate purpose of marriage, was actually sanctification and holiness, not happiness.
But here's what I want to say now. When we get to this point, when our spouses are fulfilled, we get fulfilled and our happiness is found in their happiness. Summarize it, happy wife, happy life. That's where your happiness is found. And I need to say again that in our marriage, Rebecca often has found her happiness in my happiness.
To my shame, I'm only learning to find my happiness in her happiness. And that's really where happiness really comes from, is the mutual fulfillment of one another when you no longer see your own needs as being superior, that is so easy to justify. In my case, you know, I'm doing ministry.
It's so easy to justify it. And you really get down to what is important and what is God going to hold us accountable for. And suddenly we realize that the answer lies right here. If you win the battle in your marriage, you can almost win the battle anywhere else.
Now, no wonder Paul says this mystery is great. Now, two concluding comments here about us who are married and all of our struggles and those of you who are going to rebuild a broken relationship. And I believe that that's happening, by the way. Even the response from last time sermon leads me to believe that many of you are grappling with building a new relationship. And by the way, don't feel hesitant at all to go for counseling. You know what the problem is? Most people who go for counseling go when everything is in shambles and it's too late. Go early and get some perspective and go willing to learn, not saying, well, what is he going to tell me?
Well, probably something you should know as a matter of fact. A couple of comments. Number one, your response to disappointment in your marriage is just as important as the issue itself. Your response to disappointment in marriage is just as important as the issue is itself. So I was thinking about this yesterday as to how I could say it with a clarity that no one would miss.
This is what came to me. When your mate sins against you, don't respond by sinning against him or against her. You've been sinned against gives you no permission to sin. It may well be that his sin is an entirely different sin. It may be a sin of the flesh. Now suddenly your sin can be a respectable sin. It can be the sin of anger, of the silent treatment, of can be the sin of punishing through what can be called oftentimes a passive aggressive nature.
That can be your sin. Let me give you a scenario. The husband on Sunday morning wants to get to church on time and he has good reason to because he's a Sunday school teacher and he's on his way and he goes out in the car and he's waiting for his wife and he's praying oh God give me patience but eventually he can't help it. He presses the horn. She hears it. Her response is so that's what he's doing to me. I'll just let the old goat stay out there for a little while longer as I take my wonderful time. And so he presses the horn again. She gets into the car.
It is dead silent on the way to church. Finally he says couldn't you be ready in time honey? Well are you the one that got the kids up? Did you make breakfast?
Let me ask you that. I had so many things to do. I didn't see you doing all these things did I? And then he parks his car and her parting shot before he goes to teach a Sunday school class is well what is your class on today? The filling of the Holy Spirit?
She socked him right where she knew she wanted to sock him and she got it all out of her system without raising her voice without so much as shouting but it was exactly what she wanted. If he sinned against her by telling her to hurry doubt whether or not he did but. And by the way those of you who come to church late and that's a whole lot of you. I've often prayed for you.
I've often asked God to forgive your sins and to make you come on time at the judgment seat of Christ. You know maybe we could say whether he sinned against her because of impatience but there's no doubt she sinned against him. That's the way some marriages are. When your mate sins against you don't you dare now sin against him. There are ways to handle conflict and one way is not for you now to sin. Second, your relationship with Jesus Christ stands at the heart of your marriage. Your relationship with Jesus Christ.
Look at the text. Wives submit yourself to your husbands as to the Lord for the husband is the head of the wife. Husbands love your wife as Christ loved the church.
The whole bottom line here was this. When God wanted to demonstrate the relationship of Jesus to the church the whole purpose was he invented marriage. Many of us think that when the Apostle Paul was looking for a good analogy between Jesus and the church he said you know what I think marriage would really work. That would be a good illustration.
That's not the way it was right from the beginning. Genesis chapter 2. The intention was that God wanted our marriages to be pointers to the Trinity. The submission of the son to the father the order that is in the Trinity and the love that the father then would have toward the redeemed and the son in submission redeeming. All of that and our marriages are supposed to demonstrate to the Christian world the truth of the gospel and lying at the heart of it is Jesus Christ and your relationship to him. If you've never trusted Christ as Savior all of this would make little sense to you.
You'd say where is this coming from? Well it's coming from the Christian context of those who have trusted Christ as Savior. They have been redeemed and because they are redeemed they like Jesus who redeemed them are a covenant keeping people and as a result they experience the fulfillment that God promised. You've never trusted Christ as Savior this is your opportunity to do it even as I speak to you the Holy Spirit can be speaking to you showing you your need and showing that Jesus can be your Savior. Receive him and if you know him go home have a long talk with your spouse. Talk about things you've never talked about before except one another and the grace of God will be there to help you. Father we do ask in the name of Jesus that much grace shall be poured into the lives of those who've listened to this message. We pray today Father for those marriages that are in trouble and we ask oh God oh God please be merciful bring fulfillment bring happiness show us our sin teach us the meaning of repentance and we ask Lord God that through your grace our marriages might be pointers to the Trinity and to the love of the Son toward us.
We need you though in Jesus name Amen. Oh my dear friend this is Pastor Luther and I can't help but think that these messages would be so beneficial to those who are in need also to those who perhaps are contemplating marriage helping us to understand where the fault lines are how important it is to be committed and what that means. For a gift of any amount these messages can be yours. The title of the series is till death do us part. Incredibly important in this world when you have so many marriages that are in difficulty. Here's what you do go to RTWOffer.com that's RTWOffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337. I need to emphasize that in a world in which things have gone wrong when people marry for all the wrong reasons and they wonder how they can manage as they continue their lives together this series of messages will be of tremendous benefit for a gift of any amount go to RTWOffer.com RTWOffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337 and let me say that I'm so appreciative of all those who support this ministry with your prayers and with your gifts till death do us part 1-888-218-9337.
You can write to us at Running to Win 1635 North LaSalle Boulevard Chicago Illinois 60614. The family is certainly an endangered species. Fractured, stressed, broken, dysfunctional all these words describe a crisis in society's most basic unit. A crisis that begins when marriages fail. Next time on Running to Win Erwin Lutzer continues his series on till death do us part. Join us as he describes an all too familiar scenario a couple who live miles apart in the same house. This is Dave McAllister. Running to Win is sponsored by the Moody Church.
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