Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. Marriage is designed to satisfy the deep desires of both husband and wife.
Today, we'll spend some time understanding what those desires are and how to deal with the conflicts that arise when expectations sometimes go unmet. Stay with us. 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, your wife Rebecca once said that the most important thing each partner must be is a good forgiver.
And you know, Dave, we've been married for more than 50 years and that is still true. One of our favorite passages of scripture comes to us from the fourth chapter of Ephesians where it says, Be tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ has forgiven you. No matter how long we live, we disappoint one another, but we're committed to each other.
We rejoice in God and we continue to grow. I want to thank the many of you who support the ministry of Running to Win. Even as I'm speaking right now, I'm visualizing our family in all parts of the country, in all corners of the world, partners together for the cause of the gospel.
Would you consider becoming an endurance partner? Many of you have already given regularly. Some of you have never connected with us. This might be a great opportunity for you to do just that. At the end of this broadcast, I'm going to be giving you some contact info. Meanwhile, even as you listen to this message, I want you to be praying and asking the Lord a question.
Are you willing to be involved financially in helping us get these messages to the countries of the world? Meanwhile, let's listen. There is a story about two men in a cemetery and one was overhearing as the other was standing at a grave. And the man at the grave kept saying, how could you do that to me?
How could you do that? Why did you die? Why did you die? So as they were about to leave, they fell in step and the one said to the other, you know, I just want to give to you my condolences because I heard you say, you know, why did you die?
How could you do that to me? I'm sure that that was the tomb of your wife. He said, no. He said, that was the grave of my wife's first husband. Why is it that marriage that has such great potential for good things can sometimes go badly? We should not be surprised that there is conflict in marriage. A couple of hundred years ago, Richard Baxter said this to men about marriage. Remember still that you are both diseased persons full of infirmities and therefore expect the fruit of those infirmities in each other.
And make not a strange matter of it as if you had never known of it before. If you had married one that is lame, would you be angry at her for limping? Or if you had married one that had a putrid ulcer, would you fall out with her because it stinketh? Did you not know beforehand that you married a person of such weakness as would yield you some matter of daily trial and offense? If you cannot bear this, you should not have married her. If you have resolved that you could bear it, then you're obligated to bear it now. Resolve therefore to bear with one another and remember that you both took one another as sinful, frail, imperfect persons, not angels or as blameless and perfect. Well, he says, you can't take two sinners, self-willed, different backgrounds, throw them together and then expect complete total harmony all the rest of your life. Realize that conflict is part of marriage. Well, speaking of that, I have two true stories for you very briefly.
Both are ones that I know about. The wife speaking to me about her husband says, he's so oppressive that sometimes I think I'm in a concentration camp in Auschwitz, yet he expects me to make love with him. I feel as if it would be like a guard coming to a woman in a concentration camp for intimacy and expecting her to enjoy it. Well, here's another one from a husband. The minute my wife comes home, she's on the internet.
If she does cook, it's just warming up some food she bought in a store. Then beginning about 7 p.m., she goes upstairs to her computer and is on a social website till about 11 p.m. She has a group of friends that she connects with. These friends are obviously more important than I am. So we live in the same house, receive mail at the same address, but that's about all.
What makes this doubly bad is that I'm a pastor and she works as a counselor in a Christian counseling center. Well, I'm going to have something to say to both of these couples before this message is over. Let me say that the purpose of this message is to discuss the needs that we all have. It is to discuss conflicts and we're going to look at conflict and we're going to take it apart. We're going to get at the essence of conflict. We're going to look beyond the superficial and get to the heart of it.
It's going to be like hitting a piñata at a Mexican festival. Finally it's all going to come together and we're going to find out what in the world is inside of this business of conflict. Why so many arguments that are never resolved?
Today you're going to find out why. And then the other purpose of this message is to give us a way out, to give us a way of ending arguments of understanding one another and living happily ever after. Do you think that one message can do all that?
Well, you know, I don't think so. Because there are some of you who are going to listen to this message and you're going to say, I finally got it. Now I understand why we can never get on the same page. And there are some of you who will not get it. Because no matter how much truth, it's going to be like bullets off of Batman's chest.
It's just not going to penetrate. And because what I have to say is so incredibly important and for some of you, your marriage might be at stake. My message can't do it. Only God can, but I pray that he might use this message, but ultimately only God can do the miracles that we're looking forward to today as a result of what I have to share with you. So would you bow with me in prayer and let us ask God, I want everybody listening, no matter what means you're listening by, I want you to pray right now and say, God speak to me, may I get it. Father, I have the faith to pray that as a result of this message, some homes where there is only noise will finally have harmony and where there's been conflict and arguing that at last there will be some peace. Show us Lord in our own lives what we lack and show us what we need to do with such clarity and conviction that we don't miss the message. We pray in Jesus' blessed name. Amen. I need to say that the major insight in this message, I'm indebted to a book entitled love and respect by a man by the name of Emerson Edorichs.
It's spelled like egg and then richs. One of the things that he notices is in the fifth chapter of the book of Ephesians, and that by the way is our text for today, Ephesians chapter five, please find it there in your Bibles. If it happens that you just happened to walk out of the house today without a Bible, it's never happened before, but it's happened today, you'll find it on page 979, I believe if your Bible is like mine, 979. He believes that the main emphasis, the thing that is the essence of it is found in Ephesians chapter five verse 33. However, let each one of you speaking to husbands love his wife as himself and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Now here's the bottom line. A wife's primary need is to be loved by her husband. She needs to know that she is number one in his life, that she is to be cherished and treasured.
That's her number one need. The number one need of a man is that he might be respected. If he's not respected, he is not having a fundamental God to given need met.
So think about this for a moment. What happens is this, what does a wife do if she doesn't feel loved? If she doesn't feel loved, she lashes out in a way that is very disrespectful. So all that he has coming to him is this disrespect.
Now that he is receiving disrespect, how is he going to react to this disrespect except to come across as very unloving? So you have two people arguing. Their basic needs are not met and the more they argue and the more they disagree, the more their fundamental needs are not being met.
And so Egerich calls this the crazy cycle that goes on year after year after year after year. Nobody having their fundamental needs met, nobody understanding why they can't get on the same page and why they can't stop their arguing. She's saying love me, treasure me and I promise you I'll be different. He's saying respect me and I'll treat you differently and neither of them are giving each other what they need. Now if that were the whole story, it would be bad enough but it's worse than that because you know there are men who maybe love their wives but the wife doesn't feel as if she's loved.
So what's this guy supposed to do? And there may be wives who respect their husbands but the husband feels no respect. Do you see how difficult this becomes? And then add to that the fact that we see our own faults very differently than we see the faults of other people.
We magnify them and we see ours under a microscope and it's so small. Maybe now we can begin to understand why General MacArthur used to tell the troops at West Point, gentlemen don't even think of getting married until you've mastered the art of warfare. We now get it, don't we? What we're going to do is to look at the Bible and see what love is and find out what respect is and see whether or not at last we can put an end to all these crazy arguments that never end and we can all get on the same page. Are you with me so far? How many of you are with me? Can I see your hands please?
I'll go with 40%. First of all, what are the needs of a wife? Now I'm picking it up in verse 22 of Ephesians chapter 5. Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. 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.
Fundamental need is a wife desires that her husband lead so that she can follow. Some of you wives read this passage of scripture and already jitters are going through your body. You are full of fear. What do you mean? Submit. If I were to submit, am I supposed to be a doormat?
Can't you just hear it? I'm supposed to be a doormat. He's going to misuse me. He's going to mistreat me. He's going to even abuse me. By the way, that word abuse, that's a heavy laden term and that's why the last message in this series on marriage is going to be on abuse.
But most of you aren't in that category. What you're simply saying is I don't like the fact that I have to be under his authority and it's because you don't trust God. That's what it says in 1 Peter 3. It says the ancient women, they hoped in God and then they were submissive because you're trusting God. You're taking a risk to be sure, but the fact is if you do not respect your husband and if you are not under his authority, you're going to have conflict in marriage.
That's just the way it is. Now I do need to clarify that when we talk about submission, it doesn't mean that you agree with your husband about everything. Obviously you're not. It doesn't mean that you're going to stop thinking on your own and become a robot and stand in the middle of the room and watch him bark out orders and tell you what to do next.
That's not what we're talking about. It doesn't even mean that you shouldn't try to change your husband's mind if he has crazy ideas. I think for example of Rebecca, she saved me an awful lot of stupid decisions.
I wouldn't make a major decision without consulting her and asking her input. So that's not what we're talking about, but what we're speaking about as Piper likes to say is a disposition on your part that you are going to follow while he leads and grant him that respect. Oh, but what if he's out of line? You don't lecture to him, you don't put him down, but you do entreat him and say, you know, I want to respect you.
I want to follow you. But you know, considering how you're acting over here, it's making it very, very difficult for me. Is there some way that we can resolve this? Because the Bible says that wives should submit to their husbands as the church submits to Christ. Take that in faith. Now, obviously, what else does she need? She needs love. Husbands love your wives. You knew that it was coming up here in the text, because now we're in verse 25. Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.
That's the analogy. I perform many weddings here at the Moody Church. As a matter of fact, I could write a book of cartoons of funny things that have happened in weddings. Get six pastors together and you'd have enough cartoons to fill a good sized book. But when the wife is coming down the aisle, standing here to greet her is Jesus Christ.
That's what Paul is saying. Husbands, you are to be Jesus Christ to your wife. Now, how many of you wives would say, I married Jesus? I know mine wouldn't.
But that's the analogy. We're supposed to be Jesus Christ to our wives and love her as Christ loved the church. We say, well, how can we do that? Well, think about Jesus Christ's love for the church for just a moment. Does Jesus listen to you? Have you ever prayed and Jesus in effect said, look, I don't have time to listen to you now. Don't you know that there are huge world events going on and I'm preoccupied? No, Jesus listens to you. Gentlemen, there are some things I'm going to share directly from my heart to you and the ladies don't even have to listen if they don't want to.
It's for you. Our wives need communication. It's happened a hundred times. I think that's a man who said amen.
I don't know where this is going. It's happened a hundred times in our home. Rebecca will tell me something and two minutes later I'm asking her about it. Clearly I wasn't listening. Our wives need to talk and we need to listen. And if you ever become impatient listening, ask yourself, does Jesus become impatient and say, Hey, you know, you've prayed long enough. I've got other things to do.
The other thing is servant leadership. Now the Bible says that Jesus gave himself up. You have so many men who say, Oh, you know, I'm willing to die for my wife. Well, I hope that you are.
I hope that I am. But you know, most of our wives, that's not where they're at. My wife is wondering, why don't you see that the garbage needs to be carried out and start there and then let's talk about dying for me further down the road.
Gentlemen, listen. Please you don't have to, but you can if you want. Let us suppose you had a plant in your room or in your house, a real plant, not artificial, the real one. You walk by it and you notice that it's got all of these brown leaves and it shriveled up and it's not looking very good. And as you leave, you know, you say, Hey, look at these brown leaves and you throw them in the air. Say, you know, I'm so sick of looking at that plant. It doesn't look very good. I think it's time for me to get a new one.
It's called divorce. Let me have somebody, you know, that still has some vibrancy. Let me find a plant with some green leaves and with some fruit on it. None of this dead stuff.
I'm in a dead marriage. That's one response. The other response is to say, Hmm, brown leaves. I'd like to do an analysis of the soil and let's study the soil in which it grows. Let's make sure that the plant has water and know how much to water it and when to water it. And also let us make sure that it is fertilized.
And let's see whether or not this shriveled plant can't begin to grow and to have green leaves again. I'm giving you reality in this message. All right. We are the soil in which our wives grow. And if we want to have a vibrant wife, if we want to have her satisfied and my dear friend put this up as a banner, use it as a bumper sticker. Happy wife, happy life.
All right. What we need to do is we need to understand her, her needs because we're the soil in which she grows. We are the soil.
Jesus is the soil in which we grow and he gave himself up for the church. That is really love. We have to protect our wives. In one of the books I was reading, a couple was going through a museum and they were looking at a Rembrandt painting. And of course you're not supposed to touch paintings when you're in a museum. And their little child was reaching up to touch the painting and the mother grandma said, you don't dare touch that.
That's Rembrandt. My dear friend, if you don't touch a Rembrandt painting because you're honoring it, why do you allow anyone or anything touch your wife who's created in the image of God. She is heir with you of the hope of promise. She is the one that you swore to love. It is our responsibility to protect our wives.
And then the Bible says to cleanse her with a washing of the water through the word. Men, you should take the initiative to pray with your wife. You say, well, I'm not very good at prayer. Most of us aren't, but your wife will appreciate the fact that you are taking that initiative. You are the spiritual leader.
And if you aren't, learn to be in small ways and God will bless you and enable you to lead her in bigger ways as time goes on. And then again, you guys, I don't know, this is for us. We have to do something that Jesus never has to do. He never has to ask for forgiveness and say, I'm sorry.
But we do and we need to do it often. I think Rebecca will testify that in our marriage, one of the things I've tried to do, no matter how upset I might be about something, I always like to be quick to say, look, I'm sorry, I messed up. Will you forgive me? I don't see any possibility of a happy marriage without. That's why you remember I told you the story of here we are at the airport in Minneapolis, St. Paul, and a woman comes and sits next to us and says, you must have been married for many years because she had seen Rebecca buy something that I like to eat and we're sitting there in harmony eating. And we said, yes. And then she said, I'm going to get married.
Remember that story? And she said to us, what word of advice would you give to someone who's never been married before? And Rebecca, just as quick as that, I was rolling my eyes and saying, I don't know where in the world this is going. Just as quick as anything, Rebecca said, learn to forgive. And I thought, well, now, Rebecca, you should turn to me and thank me for the many times you have been able to practice that particular virtue considering the man that you married.
A wife's primary need is to be led and to be loved. Well, my friend, I'm so glad that you have the opportunity of listening to the ministry of running to win. And even in this last illustration that I gave to have a small window into my own marriage, my lovely wife, Rebecca and I have been married for more than 50 years. Would you consider helping us get these messages to even more people?
Presently we are in 50 different countries in seven different languages, and we'd like to even expand. I'm holding in my hands a letter from someone who says, I really appreciate how Pastor Lutzer reminds me to move forward and stop looking back. You share hope for the future.
Well, indeed we do because we believe in Jesus Christ. Would you consider becoming an endurance partner? That's someone who stands with us regularly with their prayers and their gifts. I want you to go to this website, go to rtwoffer.com. Go to rtwoffer.com and when you're there, click on the endurance partner button. There you'll receive the information that you've been praying about as to whether or not God might use you to continue to help us financially. Once again, go to rtwoffer.com, click on the endurance partner button, or if you prefer, call us at 1-888-218-9337.
That's 1-888-218-9337. You can write to us at Running to Win, 1635, North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois, 60614. Running to Win comes to you from the Moody Church in Chicago. Next time, tune in for more Words to Men on being the kind of husbands that are sensitive to the needs of their wives. Thanks for listening. For Pastor Erwin Lutzer, this is Dave McAllister. Running to Win is sponsored by the Moody Church.
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