“The Marriage Mystery”

A Sermon Based Upon Ephesians 5: 21-33,  NRSV

By Rev. Dr. Charles J. Tomlin, DMin.  

Flat Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership

Pentecost +17,   September 20th, 2015

Early in their marriage, Everett and Cindy Hall bought a nice little starter home in the Headlands neighborhood of Mentor, Ohio.   They had had lived there for several years, when one day Cindy overheard “Ev” on the telephone giving out our address to somebody.  Ev spelled the name of their street Glen Lodge with two n’s which was incorrect.  When he hung up, Cindy couldn’t resist laughing at him and said “Honey, we’ve lived here for 2 1/2 years, and I can’t believe you don’t even know how to spell the name of your own street!”   Ev was not amused and said “What are you talking about? It’s Glenn Lodge.”   They argued for a few minutes, both certain of course that we were correct, and getting nowhere dropped the issue.

Several weeks later they were in the car together and at the corner, remembering their little argument, Ev pointed to the sign proving that he was right.  It said Glenn Lodge, -- two ‘n’s’.”   Wait a minute,” Cindy said, “turn around and go the other way.” A s they approached the other end of our street, much to their amazement, the sign read Glen Lodge, with one ‘n’.   They  were both right!  Their house was located in the middle of the block, and they never realized that she had always approached it from the south end, while Everett always entered via the north end of the street.   It gave them a good laugh and they enjoyed a rare moment when we could both win the argument and be absolutely right!  http://www.funnymarriage.com/winning-the-argument/.

When we are married, we need to laugh more.  We don’t need to laugh at each other, but we do need to find ways to laugh together.  Marriage is not an exact science.  It is not like 1+1= 2, but should be more like 1+1=1.   All the way back in Genesis, the Bible calls those who marry into the mystery of ‘oneness’.  But what is that?   In fact, the Apostle Paul is the one who calls marital “oneness” (5.31)  “a great mystery” (5.32).   

We can understand how marriage is the greatest mystery because marriage is about two not so perfect ‘strangers’ coming together from different personalities, different backgrounds, different ideas, different values, and sometimes even different beliefs and trying to make their relationship work.  In marriage we are legally ‘tied together’ in a knot in hopes that the ‘knot’ will not come loose, when many things work against untying that knot.   How some couples make their marriage work can be astounding, if not miraculous.  Why other couples, even a majority of couples can’t make it work no matter how hard they try, can be disheartening and heart-breaking.   Understanding this great ‘mystery’ may be finally impossible, but to try to understanding it, and to live into and for the mystery,  can have magnificent and wonderful rewards.  

MUTUAL SUBMISSION IN LOVE

So what makes the difference so that a marriage will work?   Social Scientists have studied and still study the characteristics of marriages that succeed and marriages that fail.   Still, this does not solve the ‘mystery’.  Some marriages that should fail don’t.  Other marriages that shouldn’t fail do.   Again, it is hard to turn love and marriage into an exact science no matter how many statistics you have. 

In Ephesians 5, the apostle Paul writes in some detail about the relationship between a Christian husband and a Christian wife; not from a scientific standpoint, but from a religious, faith-oriented, and Christian standpoint.   Why does Paul move from discussing religion to relationships?   If the gospel is transforming and it is about new ways of living, then should it not only have an impact on our personal and private lives,  but it should also be life-changing for our relationships, both personal and public. 

What may be most challenging about this text is not what it says about the marital relationship, but what it doesn’t say, but people often think it says.   Unfortunately many have misused Paul’s words about the husband being ‘the head of the wife’ (v. 23) to control, abuse, or manipulate their wives.  Such wrong-headed views (please excuse the pun) overlook how Jesus told his disciples not to ‘lord over each other’ (Mark 10.42).  This command must include husbands and wives in a marriage too.  Wrong-minded interpretations of this also omit the fact that Paul has just written that the husband and wife are first Christians, being ‘be subject’ to one another ‘as to the Lord’.   It is NOT so that the husband can dominate his wife that the wife should submit, but the wife only submits out of a caring relationship of love and devotion.   This kind of submission is reserved only for her loving husband (not all males) because it is deserved in their unique relationship.  The wife only submits to a husband who loves her unconditionally and is prepared to ‘give up’ his own life for his wife (5.25).     

Again, we must be clear.  It is not a “Christian” marriage relationship when one person dominates or controls the other.   The submission and devotion pictured here is freely offered out of mutual submission of love, equality and partnership because in Christ there is neither  ‘male’ or ‘female’ (Gal. 3.28).   Paul is not picturing a Christian husband who dominates or forces his rule over or against his wife.  That is not very Christian.  Paul is picturing a call to spiritual leadership for the husband, and upon the wife’s acknowledgement of this leadership because it is earned, deserved, and agreed upon as they come together ‘in Christ’.  This is why Paul says that the ‘husband is the head of the wife JUST AS Christ is the head of the church….”  (5.23).  

We all know that Jesus did not become ‘head’ of the church by force nor domination, but Christ leads the church by humility, sacrifice, and servanthood.   Being the ‘head’ of a home is not about claiming physical power, but it carries with it the idea of having the spiritual responsibility which only God gives---which is portrayed as a husband ‘loves his wife as Christ loves the church’.    There can be no Christian ‘headship’ without both ‘hearts’ beating as one in the Spirit.  No marriage can be rightly called Christian unless both husband and wife are already mutually submitting to each other under Christ’s lordship. 

Paul’s presumption of ‘mutual submission’ is most important to any kind of leadership, not just in a marriage.  Think an open, respectful, and transparent relationship, either at church, work, or at home, where people rely upon each other’s distinctive talents, gifts and assigned roles.   It is only a relationship of mutual respect, trust and responsibility that ever really works.  Who would want to be in a relationship or marriage where the only one ‘leads’ has to be right 100% of the time?   My wife Teresa and I, had to, and still have to work out how our marriage works and who ‘leads’ when and where, as all couples do.   I don’t want nor need to assume all responsibility, and neither should she.  We all come out of different backgrounds with different needs and this has to be navigated and negotiated.   Teresa came from a large family with 7 children and she was the oldest.   I came from a family of 3 and was an only child.  The way you thrive and survive in a household of 9 is very different from how you thrive and survive in a household of 3.   There was a lot of freedom and room for discussion in my home.  There was limited freedom, and very little room for discussion in Teresa’s home.  Her Father was dominating at times, sometimes too dominate.  My Father was passive, and was sometimes too passive.  But you can understand the differences because the needs were very different in those homes.  Fortunately, we both had good homes with good parents who figured out how to relate with each other and were good role models for us.  But how we would make our marriage work is something we had too and still have to work out ourselves, in Christ.

The good thing about ‘mutual submission’ before any kind of ‘headship’ or ‘leadership’ by the husband is a relationship that takes the pressure off of either  having to be perfect in the relationship.  None of us can be 100% right all of the time but we do have to find ways to agree together, and we always have give ourselves to Christ first, and then we also have to submit to each other second, before we can begin to think about what comes next.   Only when a  couple come together in Christ and give themselves to each other, only then, should the wife ‘submit’ to the strength and leadership of her husband, which comes out of her own willingness, her own weakness, and her own need, not out of male power, male dominance nor male rule.  Some women liberation groups still don’t want to admit that such a caring, loving, submissive relationship will work, but a majority of Christian wives know this is still the only kind of relationship that will work.  Only when a couple submit to Christ and then to each other, should a wife freely submits to her ‘Christ-like’ husband out of reverence to Christ (v. 21) and out respect  (v. 33) and for her husband, whom God has chosen to lead.  This is not the only kind of relationship that might work, if agreed upon, but it is the kind of relationship that works best, and do you know why?

WILLING SERVANTS FOR LOVE

Paul says that a wife should ‘subject’ or to ‘submit’ to a loving, caring, devoted husband only as the devoted husband ‘loves’ his wife ‘as his own body’ (vs. 28).   The point here is that as a husband loves ‘nourishes and tenderly cares for his own body’ he should ‘love, nourish, tenderly care’ for his wife ‘as Christ does for the church’ (vs. 29).  What should be unmistakable in a Christian marriage could be misunderstood and mistaken in a secular.  The goal of a Christian marriage is not only a person meeting their own personal and relational needs, but the goal of a Christian marriage is also meeting the personal and relational needs of the other.  This is why Paul requires that the wife meet the need of her husband for ‘respect’ (v. 33) by submitting to him, and that the husband meet the need of the wife, for ‘tenderness’ and ‘love’ (vs. 25, 28-29).  

In a demanding and challenging way, the wife is expected to ‘serve’ her husband in a way that will be hard for her to do (submission),  and the husband is expected to do what could be hard and difficult for him to do, which is to be ‘tender’ , compassionate, and be nurturing.   They are each called not only to companionship, but they are challenged in Christian discipleship to serve each other in their marriage, in ways the other needs most, so that they may truly become one.  

Many years ago, before Gary Chapman, associate pastor at Calvary Baptist in Winston-Salem, wrote his best-selling book, “The Five Love Languages”, he came to a pastor’s meeting I attended.   At that meeting, he gave all of us pastors a copy of his first book on Marriage, entitled: “Toward a Growing Marriage”.  One of my favorite chapters in that book with the heading “Who’s Going to Clean the Commode”.  But perhaps the best story comes right before that chapter where Dr. Chapman answers a question he had to answer in his own marriage: “Who’s going to close the drawers?” 

Chapman says that that when he and his wife Karolyn first got married, he noticed almost immediately that she was not a ‘drawer closer’.  His wife was definitely a ‘drawer opener’ but not a ‘drawer closer.’   He didn’t notice it that much at first, but after a few years of marriage it began to irritate him ‘greatly’.   He eventually ‘confronted’ her about it, but it didn’t work.  Every time he found unclosed drawers he fumed.  He even used his educational skills to try to give her a visual imprint of how drawers worked;  he emptied all the draws, showed her how a drawer worked on a wheel and how good an invention it was.  It was all to no avail. 

Then came the time when Chapman’s young daughter had to go to the hospital for stiches because she had run into an drawer that had been ‘left open’ by his wife.   It was in this moment that Chapman finally came to realize that his sweet wife Karolyn was not going to change.   He had a decision to make.  As he saw it, he had only one of three options:  (1) He could leave his wife because of the ‘unclosed’ drawers, or (2) he could get mad at her every time he came home to find a drawer left open,  or (3), he could accept that she would not and could not change, and he would ‘serve’  his wife by becoming the ‘drawer closer’ in their home.

On the day Chapman made his decision, he came home to announce it to his wife.

      “Karolyn, do you know the thing about the unclosed drawers.” 

      “Oh Gary,” she answered.  “You’re not going to bring that up again, are you?”

      “No,” he said.  “But I have an answer.  From now on, you don’t have to worry about it.  You don’t have to ever close another drawer.  I’m going to accept that as one of my jobs.  Our drawer problem is over!”  

Chapman concludes, “From that day on those ‘open drawers’ have not bothered him.   He feels no emotion.  No hostility.  No animosity.  Now, when he gets home he just closes them and all is well (From “Toward a Growing Marriage” by Gary Chapman,  Moody Press, 1979, p 99-100). 

While we all need to have room to grow, changed and be challenged in our marriages,  we also need to have room to accept those things we cannot change about our spouses.  This means that when we can’t change them,  we need to find a way to change ourselves, our own attitudes, and the greatest attitude anyone can have to make a marriage work, is to want to ‘serve’ the other.   It is the willingness to serve each that both the way of ‘submission’ and the way of ‘love’ will call for in our marriage.  Until we answer the challenge and demand of servanthood---toward Christ and for our spouse, we cannot rightly call it a “Christian” marriage.  For there is no marriage in Christ, without being “Christ-like” that you ‘serve’ and give your life as ransom (Mk. 10.45) for the other.  

Let’s conclude by applying this Christian idea of Christ ‘giving his life as a ransom’ in a marriage to where Paul says a husband is to ‘give up his life’ for his wife (v. 25.

SACRIFICIAL WITH OUR LOVE

When you apply the Christian gospel to marriage, eventually you will get to the bottom line.   The bottom line is neither submission of the wife to the husband, nor is it each one serving the other in ‘tender, nourishing love’.  No, the bottom line of a Christian marriage is the same as the bottom line of a Christian’s life.  It is the cross.  This is why Paul now writes, that since the husband is the ‘head’ of the wife he now has the primary spiritual responsibility of making the marriage and the wife holy.   Listen to how Paul states it so poetically, beginning in verse 25: 

“Husbands, love your lives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, in order to make her holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word, so as to present the church to himself in splendor, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind---   yes, so that she may be holy and without blemish.” (5: 25-27).

Now, to some so called ‘liberated’ persons, this will sound like the epitome of male chauvinism, saying that the love of a devoted husband will make the wife clean and holy as Christ cleanses the church.   But before anyone jumps on this anti-chauvinistic bandwagon, we need to recall that in 1 Corinthians 7:14, Paul wrote that both the husband and the wife sanctify and make each other holy.   In a marriage, holiness and marital health is not a ‘one-way’ street, but it is a ‘two way’ partnership so that a healthy and wholesome relationship strengthens and purifies both. 

But if this is true---that each one assists the other in being a Christian---why isn’t Paul saying it that way here?  Why is he now putting most of the responsibility for the success or failure of marriage upon the husband?   Well, this should be rather obvious, shouldn’t it?  The ancient world was very much a ‘man’s world’ and because of this, if the marriage was going to work, the primary responsibility was to be placed upon the husband.   This is why Paul only requires that the wife ‘submit’ to the husband, but requires that the husband ‘give himself up’ for his wife.   Paul is putting a greater responsibility upon the husband because this is how it was, and still is, in many places in the world.  With the privilege of being the head,  the ‘husband’ also bears call to the greater sacrifice, to show a love to his wife that not only willing to serve, but is willing give up everything, even his own life.

I’ve told you the story about my getting to know a Shepherd’s wife in Germany.  I met the Shepherd only once, but I met his wife several times when I went to borrow some of his equipment for using in our Bible School with children.   When I noticed that her husband was seldom home, but always ‘out’ taking care of the sheep, I asked his wife, why she would marry a man who was most often not at home.  “Why did you marry a Shepherd?” I asked.

       She told me a story that went something like this.  “Once when we were dating, and we were out there watching over the sheep,  one of the young lambs feel into a swirling pool of water.  We did not know how deep the water was and it was certain that the little lamb would drown.  Without giving it a second thought, even though the water was cold and who knows how deep, he jumped into the water and risked his own life to save that lamb.  When I watched him do that I thought to myself, “If he cares that much, then I know he will also take care of me.”  That’s the day I decided that I would marry him.  I knew that he was capable of the greatest love and devotion, even if it would require giving up his own life for his wife.

When we marry, we no longer only bear our own cross, but because we are one, we begin to bear the ‘cross’ of each other, with each other and for each other.   This unconditional love is not unique to Christianity, but it is, without doubt, the greatest kind of love.  This ‘cross-bearing’ love not only keeps marriages together when they could easily fall apart, and it also the kind of love that keeps the mystery going until the day when we all come to ‘know’ as we are now ‘known’, by the one who knows us best and still loves us most.  If the great mystery of marriage is ever solved, it will be solved by an even greater mystery, the mystery of God’s own sacrificial and unconditional love.   Amen.