Ephesians 5:25-30 – Berris Patience – 2026 02 08

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, 26 so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. 28 So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; 29 for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, 30 because we are members of His body. (NASB 1995)

Transcript:

(Disclaimer: AI generated transcript. Accuracy may vary)

Continue in our study in the book of Ephesians chapter five. Last week we looked at verses 24 and 20 23, 24 or 22 to 24. Sorry, looking at the idea and looking at the topic of headship and submission as it relates to why the wife or the wives and applying that to the individual believer in terms of our submission to Jesus Christ as the head of his body. And of course there’s individual and corporate application to that. This morning we’re going to be focusing on verses 27 to 30, looking at the husband this time. And of course you notice right off the hop, and I’ll mention this again, that Paul has more to say regarding the husband than he did with the wife. So chapter five of Ephesians verses 25 to 30 husbands love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself up for her so that he might sanctify her. Having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word that he might present to himself. He referring to Christ to himself, the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing but that she would be holy and blameless. So us husbands also ought to love their wives, love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife, loves himself for no one ever hated his own flesh but nourishes and cherishes it just as Christ also does the church because he, because we sorry, are parts of his body. God, we’re again grateful that we can be here. Thank you for the truth in your word and may we seek to apply this to our everyday lives. Give us open and receptive hearts to receive your words. And may we walk away not being just hearers of your words but doers as well. So Lord, I pray you speak to us. May my words go with clarity and conviction and authority and may you be honored and glorified and may your people be edified and encouraged as they hear from you and your word today for Christ’s sake. Amen. So again, last week we focused on wives headship, submission and that idea. And today we’re gonna be focusing on the husbands and we’re gonna be looking at sacrificial love and a selfish like love that the husband should have for the wife or their wives. Love by definition means unselfish, loyal, benevolent intention and commitment towards another. The concept of love or the love of God is deeply rooted in the Bible from genesis to revelation. The Hebrew word chessad or hesed, depending on the nuance that is used, refers to God’s covenant love. When you see this specially littered in the Psalm with the word loving kindness, Yahweh is the God who remembers and keeps this idea behind this word as it’s related to God. He’s the God who remembers and keeps his covenant despite the unfaithfulness of his people. So this kind of love is there no matter what regardless of how God’s people react. And we see that again in the Old Testament. We see it even in the church. Not that he’s not gonna discipline on faithfulness again, we see this but he loves them. He loves us despite the unfaithfulness, his faithfulness in keeping his promises proves his love for Israel and he proves also his love for his own. Another word that you find for this term love in the Old Testament is a ha hava and it can be used for human love towards each other. It either for oneself or for another person of the opposite sex or any person in general. This word or this term for love is used for God’s love towards Jeremiah as we see it in Jeremiah 13 verse three where God says to Jeremiah, I have loved you with an everlasting love, therefore I have drawn you with my loving in kindness. So you see both of these words used. There is covenant keeping love and this love that is in general sense. So God’s covenant love is foundational to understanding his nature. It’s foundational to understanding his relationship with humanity is foundational in understanding his relationship with us as as the body of believers his church in in the universal church. That is it reveals the love of God, reveals a God who is both just and a God who is also merciful, A God who initiates and sustains a relationship with his people despite again their constant failures. This love calls for a response of faith. It calls for a response of obedience and also a response to love God in return. We are reminded of this in one John. We love him because he first loved us. So as believers we are invited to participate in the divine covenant through Jesus Christ and throughout scriptures and throughout the scripture. God’s covenant love is a, is a testament again to his faithfulness, to his people. And it’s a source of hope. God’s love is a source of hope for his people. It assures them, it assures us of his eternal commitment and his ultimate fulfillment of his redemptive purpose and purposes in their lives. So this divine love and it’s gonna again apply to the passage that we have before us, is not merely an emotional affection, but it’s a commitment. It’s a covenantal relationship that God initiates and faithfully maintains with his chosen people. The Hebrew word carries the idea of steadfast love. It carries the idea of mercy. It carries the idea of loyalty. It carries the idea of faithfulness, kindness and covenant commitment. So this is a love with backbone, so to speak, love that stays. It’s a love that keeps choosing the beloved even when the beloved fails. This is God’s love for us and this is the kind of love that us husbands are called to mirror in our relationship, in our marriage relationship with our wives. A husband’s love for his wife. When shaped by God’s covenant, love becomes something that is far deeper than affection or duty. It becomes a living picture of Christ’s faithfulness, Christ sacrificial love, Christ promise, keeping love for his people. And that is what Paul is gonna drive home in our text ’cause he deviates from the husband and the wives and say, this is what Christ is, who Christ is to the church that has very concrete everyday life implications and applications. So Paul starts off, husbands love your wives and the term love is a present active imperative. Of course, imperative is a command present active means this is a ongoing thing. This is a habitual, this is a a constant characteristic of the husband. Hence you could read the text Husband keep on loving your wives on a a daily basis. Again, this is so contrary to the culture in which we live. Paul does not command here, if you notice, he does not command authority. He talks about the headship of the husband and he said this is something that the wife should do with voluntarily, willingly. He doesn’t talk about headship or authority here, he doesn’t talk about leadership here. He doesn’t talk even about protection. He commands love, not merely affection but covenantal, volitional self-giving love that characterizes God’s own posture towards his people. This is a high standard that Paul has set for husbands regarding their wives like we saw in the command to the wives last week regarding submission. The bar of this example is Jesus Christ himself. It’s not based on what, based on earthly human beings. It’s not based on what society is picturing or depicting. This is based on Jesus Christ himself. It is rooted in Jesus Christ himself. And again as as I mentioned earlier, you will note Paul has more to say, spends more time dealing with the duty of the husbands here in our passage than he does with the wife as we saw last week. Why is this the case? This is due to the understanding of the man’s role in the relationship in the Greco-Roman culture and the Greco-Roman society in which these believers in Ephesus lived where marriage was seen only as a social contract rather than a relationship that is based on love. The love that Paul is speaking of here is likened to that of Christ in that it is regular or constant as well as it is consistent. So there’s cons, it’s constant, it’s consistent. It is a hallmark of the husband’s responsibility regardless of the behavior of the wife, regardless of the health of the wife, regardless of the appearance or any kind of other deterrent of the wife. He loves the husband, loves the wife by giving himself not asserting himself in the same way that Christ loved the church by giving himself up for her. That again is the analogy of Paul uses in our text. This does not erase leadership from the man. This does not erase the idea of headship. It is not contrary to the headship and the submission that Paul spoke of earlier in the text. They they work together and this redefines headship, it redefines the leadership of the man. It redefines what submission should look like in the relationship of the marriage. So the husband’s authority, excuse me, is not condescending, it’s condescending, rather it’s not controlling. This means he bends down in service not upward in privilege. He’s not haughty with it. What Paul is trying to say here. So the husband creates an environment where the wife feels safe, where the wife feels valued, where the wife feels cherished. This covenant love is steadfast. It removes fear, it should remove fear. His presence should serve as a refuge, not as a threat. It underscores the depth of Christ’s love for his church which is willing to endure suffering even to the point of death for the sake of his church. That’s what Jesus Christ did. This act of giving himself up, which is referring to Christ is the model for the husbands who are called to prioritize the needs of the wife, the needs. I emphasize that and the wellbeing above their own. The sacrificial nature then of this love is called to action, urging husbands to embody a love that is active, a love that is self-giving. And this is a phrase also connected to a broader biblical theme of redemption and the covenant relationship that we see with God and his people. Paul goes on to tell us why the husband should love the wife in the same way that Jesus Christ love the church. In verse 26 he tells us that this self-giving love, the result of this self-giving love from the husband to the wife is for the purpose of sanctification. And the phrase to sanctify her here refers to the process of making something holy, setting something apart for sacred purpose. In the context of Ephesians 5 26, it speaks of Christ’s work with his church that is his bride. So sanctification is a key th term that is seen throughout the entirety of scripture. And this emphasizes a transformation. And the purification of the believers sanctification in the Old Testament involves rituals and sacrifices and we see this throughout the pen to the first five books. But in the New Testament it is primarily a spiritual process accomplished only through the work of Jesus Christ. We see this in Hebrews 10 verse 10, this sanctification that we have in Christ Jesus. There’s two realities about the sanctification of the believer in Christ. It’s positional and this is the believers are declared holy and right through their faith in Jesus Christ. So we positionally we are already being declared righteous. But there’s also the idea of progressive sanctification where the believer is continually growing in holiness and through the work of the Holy Spirit through the reading of scripture and through applying that scripture to our lives, which is obeying the word of God. So those are the two aspects of sanctification. And when Paul talks about cleansing that he may cleanse, cleansing or cleanser by the washing of water with the word cleansing, again refers to a spiritual purification by God. And while ancient rituals of water was used to symbolize the washing away of impurity, the New Testament highlights forgiveness of sins and moral renewal through again the blood of Jesus Christ. This process prepares the church as the bride for union with Christ Jesus. So clearly, clearly Paul isn’t saying here, don’t miss this. Paul is not saying that the husband can save the wife. That would be contradicting to what we believe and what other scriptures teach. We can’t save our wives in terms of salvation. We can’t sanctify our wives in terms of whether it’s progressively or whether it’s positional. We can’t do that. That is the work of Jesus Christ. That’s the work of the Holy Spirit. But we are called, what we are called to do as husbands is to imitate the leadership of Christ in our marriage in a way that Christ is sanctifying the wife through us. That by way of the word, by way of the Holy Spirit of God. This means then it’s our responsibility to take the initiative in the spiritual wellbeing of our wives through prayer and through the studying of the word of God. The phrase conveys Christ’s aim. This is the aim that Jesus Christ has for his church to present her. We see it here that he might present him to himself. So Jesus Christ. The analogy here is a marriage where the the Father and typically in our day and age, a father gives or presents the the the wife or the future wife to the future husband. But Jesus Christ is preparing the bride here to present the bride to himself. That’s the imagery that Paul is trying to paint for us. But he’s preparing the bride so that he will present her to himself to be glorious. It symbolizes a covenant relationship that is honorable, that is purity, that is embedded with purity, that is a spiritual perfection. This of course is a present presentation of the ongoing process of sanctification in the life of the church. And we saw a glimpse of this in Revelation 1978 where the church is described by John as Christ bride clothed in righteousness. I want you to note that although Paul is speaking to the husbands here, he drifts and he and he’ll continue to do this as you. You will see in the text, he still highlights the role that Jesus Christ is playing in his church. And that’s one of the main emphasis in this passage. The universality of Christ’s role or the role of Christ, the role of Christ in the universal church. In this context, he will complete her purification. Jesus Christ is doing that. This is a picture of what the church will look like. This is a picture of what God is working and doing in the midst of the church. A word that word glorious means one day when Jesus Christ returns for his bride whom he has been purifying through the word, through the Holy Spirit of God. The word means that when we see Jesus Christ, we will glow the church of Jesus. Christ will glow in beauty, it will glow in splendor as one completely and morally pure from everything. That’s what Jesus Christ is accomplishing in his church. This word is also used to refer to God himself. This word glorious God in his greatness, God in His majesty, God in his holiness. So this then brings to light what John was saying in first John three verse two. When we see him, we shall be like him. That’s what John was trying to paint for us, that the work that God is doing in the church, again the husbands are to imitate this work in their marital relationship, but the work that God is doing in his church is to make the church look so radiantly beautiful again like the wives, not that the wives aren’t always beautiful, but on the wedding day when they go all out said this is what God is doing and we shall see him, we shall be like him, we shall be radiant and glowing in all our beauty, in all perfection like God is in the day when we see him. This is not that we’re gonna become divine in any way, shape or form. That’s not what John was trying to say to us here in one John three. But in the sense of being fully restored, fully whole, fully radiant with the characteristic of Jesus Christ, we will be like him in moral likeness. We’ll be like, like him in resurrection likeness. The identity of the church will be fulfilled. It is a completion of what began at new birth and what God is continually working through in us. This future reality as well as the present ongoing work of Jesus Christ in the church ought to be reflected in the marital relationship. That’s what Paul is trying to say here. This is what the marriage should look like. That is the aim and the future promise for the church to be presented to God on that glorious day without any wrinkle. Paul says, just radiant, extraordinarily beautiful, no spots. Paul again says to us, says in the text, no stains, no imperfection whatsoever, but she will be blameless. And that is no defect morally. This is moral excellence and beauty at its finest. And that’s what Jesus Christ is working out in his church. One commentator notes that the bride grooms love is defined by both the intent and the ability to bring about complete transformation, attributing qualities to the bride that she does not inherently possess. And of course she goes on to say this far exceeds the capacity of any other husband and reinforces the understanding that this segment of the passage Paul talks about here is focused exclusively on Jesus Christ and his church. Furthermore, it differs from the human analogy in that Christ not only accepts the bride as his own but also personally presents the bride purified to himself. It’s just fascinating. Paul doesn’t begin with marriage, he begins with Jesus Christ. He begins with that as the foundation for marriage. Before a husband ever looks at his wife, he’s called to look at the cross. That’s where the pattern of his love stems from. Christ’s love was not and is not passive. It doesn’t wait to be deserved. It moves first. It bends law and it gives deeply. It is a love that absorbs cause so that the beloved may flourish. When Paul says love your wives, he’s inviting the husbands into a way of life which is shaped by the self-giving heart of Jesus Christ himself. And here it is quite a miracle. When a husband loves like this, he becomes a living parable of the gospel of Jesus Christ. His home becomes a small sanctuary where the characteristic and the character trait of Christ is made very visible. Visible. His wife experiences not just affection but safety, honor and delight and his children learn what grace looks like in motion. Christ’s love is not abstract, it is embodied, it is costly, was costly, it’s steadfast and it is a pattern for every husband who wants his marriage to echo what heaven is going to look like. We gotta love sacrificially but we have to love in a selfish like manner. And Paul says in verses 28 to 30, again reiterating the fact that this is how the husband ought to love their wife. So just repeating what he just said And then he says, just like the husband loves his own body, he who loves his own life or wife, sorry, loves himself for no one ever hates his own body or own flesh but nourishes and cherishes it just as Jesus Christ does. The church, Paul now reinforces his exhortation for husbands to love their wives by calling on them to take care of their wives as naturally as they would their own bodies. Paul is pointing back again to the sacrificial love of Jesus Christ for his church. And he stresses that the husband’s duties to love his wife by using a verb that implies this is a moral obligation. So it’s not contract like the world, how the world view marriage, it’s moral obligation. But this is not just an obligation to a social standard. It’s not for us to just showcase to the world or put on a show to the world. It’s an obligation to Jesus Christ himself. The new thought that Paul adds in this verse is that husband should treat their wives like they do their own bodies. And again, going in the Greco-Roman world, men naturally and even in today’s day and age, naturally care for themselves in every conceivable conceivable way. And pause thought here is that the husband should carefully consider all the ways that they can care for them, their wives and make sure in the same way that you would care for yourself in these ways, in these manner you are doing the same for your wife. Again, this is a high standard set for selflessness and devotion embedded in this idea of their own bodies. The idea of that oneness that we see and oneness that we talk about in marriage, going back to Genesis 2 24 where the husband and the wife becomes one flesh, it suggests a deep intrinsic connection where caring for one spouse is a natural and necessary as caring for oneself. And again this reflects the biblical principle of unity and mutual respect within the marriage. This statement reinforces the idea again of unity in the marriage and it implies that in loving one’s wife, a husband is ultimately benefiting. That’s a policy and is benefiting for themselves again because they’re one flesh. And again, this reflects the biblical teaching that marriage is a partnership where both individuals are interdependent, not independent. It also aligns with the broader um, scre themes of scripture where selfless love as seen in Philippians chapter two where believers are encouraged to consider everyone’s own interest above their own. So to break it down for us men love is not passive, it is active, it is not just emotional, it is covenantal. Love is self invested to love. One’s wife is to invest in one’s own flourishing because of that one flesh union. This love is Christ shaped. This love is like submission, like being wise as we saw ear earlier in our passage like ministering to each other. This kind of love is spirit filled. And this would explain like with submission and the issues that surround submission why we don’t always depict this kind of love because we’re not always led by the spirit. And if you remember we go back to that command, we should always be filled with the Holy Spirit of God. And that hinges on every single thing else that Paul will say in our text that follows. In fact it will hinge on everything that it will say for the rest of Ephesians till the end of chapter six. This is where the Holy Spirit of God comes into a big, big display in our lives when we allow ourselves as men and women to be used and utilized in the confine and in the context of marriage and allow the Holy Spirit of God to lead and direct us as we display heaven on earth through our marriages. So these things are being filled and being led by the Holy Spirit spirit. The natural human inclination is to care again for oneself. And this is in a general sense in the biblical context, the body’s often seen as a temple of the Holy Spirit of God. According to one Corinthians chapter six, highlighting again the importance of self-care, highlighting the importance of respect of one’s physical being. Historically the Greco-Roman world valued physical health significantly. And that’s why Paul uses this analogy, the valued beauty which aligns with the idea of caring for one’s body. This concept is used here to illustrate the inherent understanding of self preservation and care, which is then of course applied to the relationship between Christ and his church. Paul says, unlike hating your body, unlike one who hates their own body, caring for it is highlighted by using two vivid verbs. Here Paul says, we care for our body by nourishing it and cherishing it. Nourishing refers to the care that parents give to their children. And this word appear multiple times in scripture. In fact, Paul will use it in chapter six for the parents nurturing or nourishing and caring for the child or for their children. So that’s the idea behind that. It’s the same kind of care that you would give to a child, give to your children. Meaning you would not leave your child to starve, you would not leave them unclothed, you would not want them to go without shelter and the necessities of life. And the second verb is cherish or cherishes. And this means to provide warmth. And this the idea behind this or the picture behind this word is a mother bird warming her nest. And this of course was metaphorically used later on for the nurturing and caring and affection that is given towards of course here in the context from the husband to the wife. So Paul is employing both terms to describe his gentle treatment here he uses it in sus first Thessalonians two verse seven. And he describes his gentle treatment of the believers there in CEC Oneika. He said, but we were gentle among you like nursing mothers for her own children, Christ. If we again go back to Jesus Christ, Christ cherish the church because we are his body, he’s our head, we are his body. That identity shapes how we treat or should shape how we treat one another. Husbands provide the kind of spiritual, emotional and relational environment in which the wife flourishes. And of course this will make or should, should make submission on the part of the wife so much easier to be to willingly give up. Cherish her with attentiveness, gentleness, sacrificial presence. Treat her growth as your own responsibility, not her achievement. Wives receive your husband’s care as a gift, not a threat. Encourage and affirm his Christ-like leadership. Participate in mutual rhythm of giving and receiving that reflects the gospel of Jesus Christ. And if Christ nourishes and cherishes you, then you care for others. Your care rather for others become an outflow. It becomes a natural part of who you are. It becomes a part of who you are by imitating Jesus Christ and by way of application to the body of believers. How does this apply to us as a church in general? Create an environment where people feel nourished and cherished. An environment where people feel fed, not starved and deprived or depraved, encourager leaders. This is what proclaiming the gospel looks like through our lives, through our in and out our communities. Our actions are not just our words. Encourage believers. This doesn’t mean that we can’t and we ought not to take a stand. So when I’m saying that you’re creating an environment where people feel nourished and cherished, it doesn’t mean that you’re going to say, okay, welcome, come as you are, stay as you are and we’re gonna just accommodate everybody and and meet them where they are. No, that’s not what. ’cause if you really nourish and want to nourish and cherish that individual, you would not want them to remain in the way they are. You would not want to compromise your belief and your system, your your faith just to accommodate them and let them feel comfortable. You’ll be going against what Paul is preaching here and teaching here. If you’re feeling spiritually empty know, know that Jesus Christ cares for you. Know that Jesus Christ is there nourishing you know that Jesus Christ is there cherishing you. Remember that he died for you. Remember that you have been filled with his spirit who guides who comfort to exhort, who convicts. And even when you feel like you’re unnoticed or unvalued or undervalued, his love for you stays constant regardless of the things that you might be going through, regardless of the choices that you may have made in life. But regardless of how unfaithful you’ve been to Jesus Christ, he is his love for you is constant, is never failing. That’s why it’s called His covenant Love, his loving kindness. It doesn’t matter what you are doing. God’s love for you will remain constant and that should not be a license to go and live the way you want because well, he’s gonna love me regardless. No, this should be your motivation to live the way that God, Jesus Christ your head has commanded you to live. This is where you willingly submit and put yourself under the headship and the leadership of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Because his love for you is unfading, is will never vanish. It’s for us to bring ourselves under the lordship of Jesus Christ. Not for us to live the way that we ought to or want to. So if you ever feel Like you’re distant from others or others are distant from you, remember you’re not alone. This is again why it’s so valuable for gatherings like this. You remember that you’re a part of of a larger body. And this is why we associate ourselves with bodies of believers because we cannot do it on our own. We’re not islands. Remember that Jesus Christ is always there with you. Even when you feel distant alone and feel like he has deserted you. The support you receive isn’t just for you. It’s meant for you to show to others, encourage others, tell them the truth about the word of God. Stand on the truth. Use your presence to uplift others. Offer gentleness, offer patience, respect and cherish them. Take today, I want you to take comfort in this truth. Christ cares for you naturally. Christ cares for you. Devotedly that will never change, that will never change. He is the forever faithful one that his care studies your heart brings gentleness to your relationship in the marriage, in this body of believers. And let his love and care and his nourishment and cherishing for you shape how your life is lived for him. Like all the virtues that we’ve looked at in this passage, putting on the wife, putting on submission, the husband, putting on sacrificial love are two of the essential aspects of the marriage relationship. And here’s a beauty, as I mentioned last week, the the misconception and the misunderstanding around submission and headship because of how the world has abused and used and abused these terms. And it’s the same thing with with loving our wives as we ought to not gonna be easy, But with the enablement of the Holy Spirit, going back to chapter four where God has given us his spirit to enable us to accomplish all of these vi virtues that we can put on and to live the life that he has called us to live. That enablement is still there and we can be comforted in that. And just as we are a body that works together by utilizing our gifts to edify each other and to glorify God, so to the husbands and wife, work together for the benefit of each other as they glorify, as we glorify and honor our Lord and our savior. That’s what our calling is as men, as husbands and future husbands love our wives in the same manner in which Christ loved his church. And this is not a love that we see out there in society where it’s love until somebody else better comes along or loves until I don’t feel like loving you anymore. If you analyze these texts, the scripture, you realize that’s not God’s intent for marriage. And next week we’re gonna look in depth of marriage. ’cause Paul is gonna again take us back to the beginning of what God ordained and of course what society is completely trying to destroy and rip. Rip apart. We have the standards set both wives in terms of our submission and their submission, and the husbands in terms of the love the wife submit as they do so submitting to Jesus Christ, the husband’s love in the same way Jesus Christ loves her church, loves his church, sorry, that is our standard, that is the command and that is what God expects of the church. Paul, as I’ve been saying, as we make our way through this intense for the church to look different in every aspect of life than the world out there. How we live individually, how we live as a body of believer and how we live within the confines of our home. Paul says, every single area of our lives as believers should not look anywhere remotely close to being the same as a society in which we live in. And that folks is the standard that God has set for us. And by his grace, we will live out the way which he wants us to live. And by his grace, we’ll continue to grow and mature not only as a body of believer, but grow and mature in our marital relationship and work out those kinks just like we’re working out in our individual and corporate lives as believers. God, we are grateful and thankful for these truths that are in your word. Hard to swallow at times, Lord. But it’s our calling. It’s a high calling and every aspect of this life that you’ve called us to live as a high calling. And Lord, we are grateful. I am grateful that you have given us your spirit and enabled that enables us to actualize these callings and these commands in our lives. I’m grateful for the body of believers that you have gifted individually as you see fit. Again, aiding us. You’ve given examples of marriages and how many years, so many in this congregation have been married for as a testament of your grace and your goodness. And I know that you’ll hear from these individuals that it’s never been easy and it never will be easy. But by God’s grace, we keep looking to Jesus Christ, the one who is our head. And that’s our motivation. So God, I pray in the confines of marriage, in the confines of parenting, as we will see in a couple weeks in the confines of, again our body of, of believers, that we’ll continue to fix our gaze, that we’ll continue to fix our eyes on Jesus Christ, who is our example, who is the one who calls us to this life that is to be lived completely separate from the world in which we live in. And Lord, we thank you for speaking to us, and may your words continue to be imprinted in our hearts so that we can continue to live the life that you’ve called us to live, especially as husbands who are called to live and love our wives in the same way that Jesus Christ has expressed and demonstrated his love for the church that he purchased, which is own blood for Christ’s sake. Amen.