Head of the Household

Automated transcript of the sermon audio, generated with OpenAI Whisper (small.en). It has not been checked against the recording and may contain errors, especially in names and Scripture references.

Grant asked me if I wanted handheld or lapel. I might be moving my hands, so I prefer the lapel. Before I start, I’m gonna pray real quick. Father, thank you so much for your kindness. I pray for wisdom and humility. Please give me clarity and thought and in words that I would honor you and help to encourage and edify our people, in Christ’s name, amen. So, this is my first time in this capacity before you guys. You’ve never seen me here in this way. So I could say a couple qualifiers as to my age and inexperience. I could do that, but I will not. What does it matter? I’m already up here. And so if you have some kind of problem or concern, there will be a Q&A afterwards.

You could let me have it then. So any kind of qualification questions are welcome for the Q&A afterwards as well. I’m sure you will disagree with something that I say. But I would like to give you a warning. It’s not a qualifier, but a warning. It’s not an excuse. This is just for your own benefit, for your own good. Sooner or later, maybe today, maybe at some other point if I have another opportunity like this, you will probably hear me mispronounce something. Most likely that will happen.

I do try to Google pronunciations ahead of time of words that I might not know, but there are a lot of words that I didn’t know that I am mispronouncing. And so thanks to a lot of you guys. Like if you hear a T when I say, apostol, just know that I am starting to hear it too. So. So with that out of the way though, we can move into our session.

Last time Sean did introduce the evening series of the Lord’s household. And he talked about our mindfulness in the matter. So he had four points just to recap. He talked about us being mindful of the Lord’s interest in the household so that he is watching, he cares about how we structure our household. For us to be mindful of the Lord’s resources, so his word and his spirit, for us to draw from those resources. For us to be mindful of the Lord’s priorities, namely the spousal relationship in the household. For us to be considerate of that and mindful of it. And to be mindful of the Lord’s pleasure, namely submission, so the idea of submission within the household and within those relationships.

Those were Sean’s four points from last time. The household is God’s idea. The family is God’s institution. He enacted it, and the family as an institution reports to God directly. God designed the structure of the household. He defined the roles within it, and he directed its mandate. So the household’s design, definitions, and direction is all connected and coming out of God. That is God’s idea. That’s not something that we get to mess with. It’s not something that we get to make up on our own. It’s something that we can learn about and then submit under. That is our approach to when it comes to the idea of household.

So working through that learning about it and even being reminded of it is only good. So within a household, each of us fills different roles. And the more our household grows, the more roles we take on. So maybe at first we’re only a child in the household, and then when we grow up and we form a new household, we take on more roles, and then we take on more roles. So a father is playing the role of a man, an image-bearer. He’s playing the role of a husband and he’s playing the role of a father all at the same time. And those roles are not meant to be marginalized. They are meant to overlap. That’s by design. We’re not supposed to be living compartmentalized lives.

God designed us to be living those roles all at the same time when we’re interacting within our household. But it is helpful to compartmentalize the roles when we’re learning about them. So when we’re talking about husbands, it’s helpful to identify the role of the husband and its design definition and direction, namely as that role, to help us. When we are center stage, the spotlight is on us for us to be able to know what lines we are to say at that time. Because when we’re talking about a husband, there is a lot of things that we can say. And I can tell you now I’m probably going to go over the 25-minute mark.

I will try to make it within 30 minutes. So hopefully, no more than 30 minutes. And there’s a lot of stuff that I will have to miss. Just the role of husband encompasses a lot. So if you think of stuff that like, hey, why didn’t he talk about that part of husband’s work, a husband’s role, just know that it’s because I ran out of time. But so specifically in the husband’s role, I’m going to be talking about that role as it pertains to his relationship with the wife. So I’m going to try to ignore a lot of the other parts about being a husband, but specifically his relationship to his wife, how that role is to be defined, what’s the design with that.

Because every role that we play assumes a relationship. The role of image-bearer assumes him whose image we bear. The role of father assumes a child. And the role of husband assumes a wife. And that role is also defined within that relationship. That role is defined and played within that relationship. And that relationship of husband and wife is the fundamental relationship within a household. It’s on that role that a household begins. Before those roles exist, or before we take on those roles, we don’t have a household. So before I took on that role of being a husband, there was no Philip Kuleshov family. Mine and Nellia’s wedding, apart from other things, was the beginning, the start, of our participation in this ancient institution of household and family.

That is the beginning. And so while I’m talking about that role as it pertains to the relationship with the wife, I’m going to have three main points. So three main points when defining the husband’s job description. So what is the husband’s role? Will be number one. What is the husband’s assignment in that role? And then what is the husband’s objective in that assignment? So who is he? What is he supposed to be doing? And what is he trying to get accomplished? his role, his assignment, and his objective. And I will be in Ephesians 5, so you guys could keep your Bibles open to Ephesians 5. I mean, it has to be Ephesians 5.

So in our congregation, we all know that the Bible presents the husband as the head of the household. The Bible presents the husband as the head of his family. I think it was Anna Leiden. Anna’s not here. But Anna, one of our life-to-lives, said that when they originally came here, one of the things she kept hearing all the time was, what does your husband think about it? What does your husband think about that? And to her, that came off like all of our women are man lovers, like the women are into their men. And so that was something that she was encouraged by and liked. What does your husband think? Who cares what your husband thinks?

Well, God does. God cares what the husband thinks as it pertains to his relationship with his wife. The husband is the head of his wife. So when I’m talking about headship, this is the moment I’ve been waiting for for a long time. I get to talk about covenant.

So undermining all of Sean’s dispensational efforts. No, I’m just kidding. The covenant household does not… Yeah. Although it can be crammed into a covenant theology framework, it doesn’t have to be, and I don’t think it even should be. So we’re friends. Yeah. I don’t believe I’ll be in any trouble with any of the elders when I talk about the covenant household, or household as a covenant. When a man and woman form a household, the household is bound up in a covenant, promise that each of them make and then seal with their marital union. The marriage covenant is made between a man and a woman and made before their maker.

And in that covenant, the man is the head. Ephesians 5, 23, For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its saviour. The Bible does not give male headship as an imperative, meaning it does not command the man to be a head. That is not a command that God gives to the man. It says the husband is the head of the wife. The Lord has decided it to be so. It is the way it is. That is just God’s reality. It’s not a command to the man. It’s the way it already is. He can pretend that in an egalitarian world that definition is wonky. Husbands can pretend that they’re not the head and can choose to abdicate.

Wives can pretend that their husband is not the head and can refuse to submit. But they will have to deal with the generational consequences that come out of a prudent reality. In God’s design, the husband is the head of his wife. So what does that mean? doesn’t mean that the husband is the head. In short, it means that the husband is responsible for everything. The husband is responsible for everything within his household and specifically in this relationship, the husband is completely responsible for his wife. The head is responsible and again this is not a command from the Lord. This is the way he designed it to be for the man to be responsible for the wife.

And the man is responsible for the spiritual and physical condition of his wife, and for her spiritual and physical actions. He’s responsible for her condition and her actions, who she is and what she does. Even though Eve sinned first, God called out to the man. God demands an account from the husband as to the condition of his household, the condition of his wife. Blame shifting and finger pointing like Adam won’t get us out of this responsibility. Yes, the wife is responsible for her sin, but the way headship works within a covenant is that the covenant head is the stand-in. He stands in front of his wife. And this is because the covenantal responsibility means two things.

First is that he represents her, And second is that he rules over her. The man represents his wife, and the man rules over his wife. As the head, he is her representative ruler. The husband represents his wife. He’s her stand-in. He doesn’t get to abdicate or neglect or blame-shift. The head is responsible for the condition of his wife. All of her needs, all of her issues, all of her sins are his personal burden to carry before his maker. There’s no way out of that. When the husband tries to have the wife carry the burden, he is in sin. He is in disobedience. Her actions are his responsibility. But representing her also means that the husband’s actions, whether public or private, affect her, whether she knows it or not.

When the representative acts, he does so on behalf of his wife. And she is either benefited or harmed by his actions. There are covenantal consequences to the husband’s decisions. The husband represents his wife. But the only way that he can actually represent her is to stand in for her as her equal. He must be her equal. And he is her equal. Both the man and the woman together are God’s image. They are called mankind because man is the head, but them together is how God’s image is demonstrated. Being her equal means that he identifies with her. He is connected to her. He draws her to himself. And instead of pushing her away, he brings her along.

When us men hear that we are responsible for our wives, There’s a way for us to immediately turn that upside down and to think to our wives, or maybe even tell her, did you hear that? I’m responsible, so you better get your act together. That is the opposite of what it means to be responsible. That’s the opposite of what it means to carry that burden. That’s not what it looks like. The husband deals with his sin and then deals with hers. He does not run out in front in such a way as to distance himself from his wife. leaving her to carry her own baggage. Hey, when you get your stuff together, you could catch up and join me.

He is with her as her equal. He identifies with her and carries the responsibility of her condition. Being her equal means that he is her friend. He is her companion. He enjoys being with his wife. They have fun together, whatever that may look like. I do think that the approach of my wife as my best friend could be kind of weird. One is the wife can’t really replace mail companionship. My wife does not enjoy a cigar and a glass of whiskey as much as eating her Max mite. And second is that the wife is more than your friend. She’s your friend, but she’s more than it. But she ought not be less than your friend. If you don’t enjoy spending time with your wife, if you don’t enjoy that relationship, that should be a red flag that is pointing to an area that probably needs work.

Spouses are to be companions. It’s not good for a man to be alone. As her representative, you are her equal, her companion, her friend. And within that context, as her stand-in representative, as her equal, as her companion and friend, the husband as head also means that he is to rule over her. Headship is representative rule. His role as the head is an authoritative role. The husband has the authority to make decisions and execute on those decisions on behalf of his wife. Now, if you’re somebody who gets really excited about the word ruler, like if you say, who wants to be a ruler? And it’s me. Pick me. I want to be ruler.

You should probably relax a little bit and downgrade that to the word leader. Just use the word leader if you’re overly enthusiastic about ruling. But if the word ruler makes you uncomfortable, If that word sounds too strong or too authoritative, perhaps for you, you should use that word a bit more often until it grows on you. That’s the word that the Bible uses. That’s the description that the Bible gives, that the husband is to rule over his wife. And this idea of the husband as a ruler means two things. First is he initiates. He’s the one who goes first. He doesn’t merely respond or react to his wife’s initiatives.

He is the one to initiate. There is a sort of leadership passivity that fails to properly respond to a problem that is happening or to something that is going on that is amiss or askew. And simply abdicating or avoiding an existing problem is definitely not taking responsibility. A husband who responds to the problems is better, is doing closer to faithfulness than the one who doesn’t. However, always being in a position that to respond is not a ruling position. The ruling position is the one who initiates, the one who goes first, the one who’s making that decision. A husband who is only his wife’s friend, only his wife’s supporter, who only provides an encouraging ear is an unfaithful head.

Because although he may be representing her, He may be her companion, he’s not leading her. The leader has clarity of vision for the future and brings his wife along as he goes first, as the ruler he initiates. And the second way that he rules is he vetoes. So as the ruler, he vetoes. The wife not only can but should be making decisions within her domain and making commitments for what she is responsible for. But the husband as the head has the responsibility to either confirm or cancel her commitments, and if he has to, pay the price for them. Numbers chapter 30 from verse 10 just gives us an example of how this works.

And if she vowed in her husband’s house or bound herself by a pledge with an oath, and her husband heard of it and said nothing to her and did not oppose her, then all her vows shall stand and every pledge by which she bound herself shall stand. But if her husband makes them null and void on the day that he hears them, then whatever proceeds out of her lips concerning her vows or concerning her pledge of herself shall not stand. Her husband has made them void and the Lord will forgive her. Any vow and any binding oath to afflict herself her husband may establish or her husband may make void. But if her husband says nothing to her from day to day, then he establishes all her vows or all her pledges that are upon her.

He has established them because he said nothing to her on the day that he heard of them. If he makes them null and void after he has heard of them, then he shall bear her iniquity. The husband’s silence is still an authoritative silence. The wife’s decisions are always the husband’s concerns. So the ruling husband sets the course and sets the pace for his household as he leads his family. His wife follows him because he’s going somewhere. It’s somebody to follow. He’s not just responding to her outcries. The ruling husband judges, decides, decrees, and acts. This is the role for him to play before God and for the sake of his wife.

The husband’s role is the head of the household. Another way to say that is he is to be the representative ruler. He’s responsible for her and therefore has authority over her. So that’s point number one, is the husband’s role, the head of the household, the representative ruler. The second main point to answer is what is his assignment within that role? So assignment as the head of his wife. Ephesians 5.23 says, the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church. And that is followed up in verse 25 in giving the husband his assignment. Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.

What is the head supposed to do? He is to love his wife by dying for her, just like Christ. Notice what Paul did not say. Paul did not tell the husband to be ready to die for his wife. He did not tell the husband to be willing to give himself up for her when that time comes. The wording is past tense. It’s already accomplished. Love your wife, Paul says, like Christ loved the church and gave himself up. The husband’s assignment is to love and to die. The husband is to wake up every day already having given himself up for his wife. Paul explains specifically what this looks like for a husband to love his wife in verses 28 and 29.

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 and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church. A husband loves his wife by nourishing and cherishing her. To nourish is to feed, to provide for, and to cherish is to keep secure, to protect. It’s interesting that God uses very similar language when he gives Adam his commands to care for the garden. Genesis 2.15, the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. Work it and keep it. Nourish and cherish. Provide and protect. Providing for and protecting his wife as her representative ruler is how the husband loves her. So his love is to be provisional. It nourishes her. It feeds her. He’s to provide for all her needs and to do so in a way that is reliable and personal.

The man does not provide for his wife the way the Amazon drones give us our next day deliveries. I’ve never actually had that happen, but it’d be really cool if it did. But if it did, that’s not how the husband ought to provide. Drop ship and back out. His provisional nourishment is in the context of his companionship, in the context of his personal friendship. He provides for her as her representative ruler. But the nourishing and providing cannot be just for her physical condition. It definitely includes that, so her food, clothing, shelter. But in the context of Ephesians 5, it’s also about her spiritual nourishment.

The husband is to make sure that his wife is being fed spiritually. The place God’s word gets within your household Is the responsibility of the husband? Are you and your wife in the word? Is your wife being fed in the consistent weekly assembly of believers? This is the husband’s responsibility. Is she involved in community with other believers that encourage and edify her in her growth? Is she involved in some sort of discipleship the way Titus 2 teaches? These are all responsibilities of the husband to nourish and provide for his wife. He is to make sure that she is fed well, and he is to cherish her. So when the husband loves his wife, she is secure and protected by him.

Whether it’s him responding to direct danger to get in front of her at the moment, or taking preventative measures ahead of time, the husband protects his wife. He creates a secure environment for her. And again, both physically and spiritually. So yes, it’s the husband’s responsibility to make sure that he’s ready to protect his wife in case of a physical confrontation. Being ready for a potential threat is important. But again, in this context, we’re also talking about spiritual security and protection. The husband must be studying God’s word and paying attention to his own obedience as he walks unto the Lord to make sure that he is not only not compromising his wife’s spiritual condition, but is ready to protect her against spiritual threats, against false teaching.

For him to be well equipped in the spiritual sense to protect her, she should feel safe and secure in his loving protection. This also means that she should never need protection from him. She used to feel safe and at peace under his wing, not threatened or being any kind of physical, verbal, or emotional danger. Protection means stable security, the way you cherish a treasure, nourish and cherish, work and keep, protect. Husband, love your wives. But what if she is not lovable? What if she’s difficult? What if she nags him every single day? What if she is outright disrespectful, ungrateful and emotionally manipulative.

In that case, the husband is off the hook. He is free to not love, no need to nourish or cherish. If she is getting on his nerves by being emotionally manipulative, then he can be harsh and cruel with her, except not. I’m glad you guys are laughing. There is no condition under which it is okay for him not to love her, for him not to be her companion, for him not to lead her, for him not to nourish and protect her. If he doesn’t love his wife the way Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, already have given, he is wrong. No matter the reason for it, if a husband refuses to die to himself every single day in order to nourish and cherish his wife, he is wrong.

If he puts his need to be respected by his wife, which is a legitimate need, he does have a need to be respected by his wife. But if he puts that need as a condition to love her, he is wrong. Love that refuses to sacrifice is not love. Love that refuses to sacrifice is not love. Talk about alter living. Maybe your house and your spousal relationship is an alter that you must be consumed on. So be it. Go and die. Love your wife. Be her equal companion. Rule her without fear. Nourish her. Cherish her. This is the one you are to love by giving yourself up. And this brings us to point number three, which is the husband’s objective.

His role as the head of his wife, his assignment to love her, and his objective. Ephesians 5, 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, so that he might present the church to himself splendor without spot or wrinkle or in any such thing that she might be holy and without blemish. As her head, as her representative, and her ruler, in loving her to death by nourishing and cherishing her, the husband’s objective for his wife is her loveliness. If the way the husband demonstrates his headship and his love is not sanctifying her.

If it isn’t growing her, if it isn’t maturing her in Christ, if his wife is not becoming more lovely, then either he is doing it wrong or he needs to continue in his labors of love. If the husband sees unloveliness in his wife, his assignment is to double down in his effort of nourishing and cherishing her. His work is to build her up, not tear her down. This is God’s prescription. Love her unto loveliness. Yes, the husband is her ruler, and he himself is under a ruler. Christ is the man’s head. 1 Corinthians 11.3, but I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God, which means that the man’s ruler, Christ, defines the man’s aim in his ruling over his wife. And that aim is her sanctification. That aim is her loveliness.

Our call as husbands is to die in order to give life to our wife. Now, if you’ve noticed, I have not mentioned anything about fruitful living as an objective, about taking a wife as a help-meet to go and conquer something together, to grow a family, to take dominion, to cultivate. I haven’t said that that is the objective. And in part, because I don’t have enough time, I’m already over. But in another sense, I don’t think it’s necessarily helpful to start with that. what I believe is a man’s greatest temptation in his relationship with his wife. What I think gets most in the way of husbands actually ruling their wives the way that God prescribes as their representative ruler by loving them into loveliness is that husbands really don’t like being bothered by their wives.

It’s interesting that Sean made this point this morning about our approach to public life as well. But I think even more than in public life, husbands resent being bothered by their wives. It could be for different reasons. Sub-Ben fear their wives. They’re scared to confront the dragon that’s trying to keep their wife to grow into loveliness. A lot of men are scared to lead their wives. are scared of that confrontation, what Edwin Friedman calls a failure of nerve. They know that if they start acting responsible, there will be uncomfortable confrontation. So in their fear, husbands become embittered, angry, resentful, and hostile towards their wife.

They become passive-aggressive, weak, and impotent. They retreat into private sin and resort into having a pseudo-piece in their home that is built on fear and lies as long as there’s no ruffled feathers. Other men might just be lazy. It’s work to get involved in the mess. They don’t want to have the necessary confrontations. It’s complicated. Colds into diamonds requires pressure. And if the wife is the gold that’s being refined in the fire, the husband is the tongs that is holding that gold chunk secure also in the fire. It’s hard work to gain clarity for the family’s future. It’s hard work to study and learn what you need to in order to be out in front of your wife.

Loving a woman into loveliness is messy work. It’s emotional work. It demands self-control. So men are tempted to avoid the problem, to abdicate their post of leadership, and to let their wife figure it out on her own. Men don’t like being bothered, And sometimes being on mission in our vocation could be a cop-out to avoid your wife’s problems, to avoid the problems at home. We shouldn’t be bothered with being on mission if we won’t even be bothered by our wife. Christ is our model for our headship. Christ does not avoid being bothered by us. He identifies with the church. He loves her as his body and gives himself up.

He has done that work and is continuing to do that work. He gets in the mess and continues to grow the church into loveliness. The husband’s role is to be the head of his wife, her representative ruler, to be her companion and to be her leader. The husband’s assignment as her head is to love his wife by nourishing and cherishing her, by providing and protecting her. And the husband’s objective as her head, His aim is his wife’s loveliness. No matter how messy or bothersome that is, his aim is his wife’s loveliness. There you go. So now it’s time for questions.

I do not have any questions prepared like Sean did. So I’m not asking you any questions. If you have questions, you could hit me. It could be about this, it could be about Max sent me a couple questions ahead of time. It was like, it was a little clip, it was funny. Like what gives you the right? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, my wife doesn’t like a cigar, I said, right? So like, I do think that there, yeah, there is male companionship that a man ought to have with other men, so you can’t just beat his wife’s friend. Like this is my only friend. So there are things that his wife cannot offer to him that other male companionship can.

Brotherhood, camaraderie. That’s why there’s no women allowed at the camaraderie. But yeah, so I think in that sense, it’s not that this is my best friend, that she gives me everything I need within a friendship, right? There’s things that she’s unable to give me that I need to get from other men. So if that’s what I meant. Yeah, I would think so. I would call my wife my confidant. There’s definitely, our conversations are a lot more personal and close about, you know, my problems, my discouragements, whatever else I’m going through, maybe even more than I would share with other men. So there is a certain kind of closeness, nearness, companionship that the wife, that the man should be getting from his wife. I would say that. But yeah, some people call it best friend. That’s fine. It’s just kind of a weird term. Right, right.

Where it’s like, I get all of my needs from friendship from my wife. You can’t really No problem. So he’s asking about the idea of husband as ruler, that that was something that God told Eve as a consequence of her sin. So when Eve sinned, he said that your desire will be to rule over your husband, but he will rule over her. So how does that work with, you know, man’s authority? I would say that man’s authority over the woman was demonstrated before sin when, first off, she came from him.

And also that he is the one who got to name her He’s the one who who called her woman for she came out of man And so and then even God identified them together as image bearers and he called it mankind He identified it as man. So so male headship The husband’s rule is there before a sin. I think that the The the struggle that sin brought into place is that now she will desire to rule over him or before she was happy to submit Under him to follow his his headship now She will struggle and continue trying to supersede or undermine his his headship but Anybody else has any thoughts on that as well totally could be free-for-all discussion Signs of if the man is abdicating his role as the head Yeah, I think that, I guess, a couple things.

If the woman, okay, you guys will totally, you can totally hate me, that’s fine. So I’m answering Ian’s question. Just me and Ian having a conversation. This is the camaraderie, yeah. I do think that if the woman is isolating herself from community, that is a, could be, could be a sign of frustration. And if she is, when in community, frustrated or irritated, not growing into loveliness, could be a sign of his abdication. I think that, again, if the work over time isn’t resulting in her growing into loveliness, growing into maturity, I think that is signs of the husband avoiding his post or leaving his post, in some sense there.

So for the husband to be even watching that, and that should be triggering something in him. Yeah, I would think that that idea of representative ruler, then it starts with his relationship with the wife, but then it comes into play with the whole household, including the children. So how he is standing in for his children, how he’s providing and protecting his entire household, he’s nourishing and cherishing, and then how he’s ruling them as well. So that idea, I think, starts and grows within the wife and that spouse relationship being foundational, but then it plays out with other kids. So that kind of abdication could also be with men not wanting to be bothered by their kids, right?

I’m in the middle of a conversation, my kids having a meltdown, I don’t wanna be bothered by that so I’m gonna continue in this. So I think it’s a similar idea of refusing to be bothered. Right, yeah, I think that kids who grew up in a household where the roles were, submitting to the way God designed them, have a privilege that they need to check, you check the privilege.

No, so these are definitely kids that are really privileged, really blessed. And that is awesome. And so many of us didn’t have that, for sure. And so I think the first step is God’s word, to be sanctified and transformed by the renewal of our mind, to understand God’s will for those roles. What is his design? What is his definition, his direction for the household? And then the church body, for sure, like absolutely. Our idea within our church of intergenerational life-to-life community. We don’t have age-focused groups, even with like men to men or Titus two, once they’re in junior high, they’re encouraged to be a part of that so they could see how these men are talking about and what they’re doing with their families, what are the young girls seeing in older women, those relationships, for sure.

Yeah, I also think for the husband to be responsible to find those relationships, OK, what older men can I look at? I’m a new husband, or I just now realize that I need to learn this. What relationships can I build with older men who seem to have this figured out? And then also to be looking at his wife, not to try to manipulate his wife or try to push her, hey, you need to be better, so go learn from this woman so that you can become a better wife. Make it easier for me. But again, in a way to help nourish and feed her to make sure that she is getting the nourishment that she needs to grow it into maturity as well.

Yeah, church is awesome. Yeah, so, yeah, everybody heard it, right? But, you did not? Oh, you’re asking about the relationship of the man’s mission and his wife. So should he be on mission before even getting a wife? Should that mission be with the wife? Go ahead and figure that out together. What order, what priority does mission play within his marriage? Right, yeah. So I do think that even though the man’s objective with his relationship to the wife, so the husband’s objective with his wife is her sanctification, I would not say that the wife is his mission. The wife is not his calling from God. I think that relationship is still a means to an end in the way that the man is given a mission to cultivate, to subdue the earth, to take the dominion, and the wife is given to him as a help-meet.

So overall, in the big scheme of things, the mission to the man came before his help-meet, to help him in that mission. However, I don’t think a young guy should be refusing to find a wife until he finds his mission, until he finds his vocation or his calling. So I’m not in any place to look for a spouse until my mission is really clear. It could be that you get really clear on your specific vocation before you have a wife. It could be that that gets worked out with the wife. But I think even that mission, if it gets worked out, I think most of the time it does way later in life.

It’s still the man’s initiative. It’s still the man’s calling. The wife is speaking into it. He’s even getting ideas from her or whatnot. But he’s the one who’s charting the course in the path, figuring that out. And she is there to help and support him on that mission. So, I don’t know, but if there’s more thoughts. Dave, you look like you wanna say something? Right. And I do think that, though, there is a big thing of, even when men or husbands have clarity as to their mission, their vocation, whether it’s in church, at work, whatever else there is, that could be used, and he’s used a lot as a cop-out to leave the house in disorder, to leave the wife messy.

And so, hey, I’m busy on mission. I’m focused on my work. I’m focused on church, whatever else I’m doing. Right. So that’s why I did not focus on that as like, this is the objective, but in that relationship, we need to make sure that that relationship is ordered, and that fellowship is sweet and growing, and the companionship is there, and then moving into mission, as opposed to neglecting, you know, I’m not bothered by my wife because I’m bothered by my mission. It seems like that’s misaligned. And yeah, loveliness, at least the way I mean it, is not just physical beauty or attractiveness. Beauty is fading. Charm is deceitful.

The woman who fears the Lord. So loveliness is definitely, I think, includes fruitfulness. And so it’s part of that maturity. So yeah, for sure. Kids is part of the woman’s loveliness. And even she is sanctified in childbirth. Man, this is going to cost me my affirmation. Yeah. So we don’t actually know what happens behind all the closed doors. So there is external internal realities. My judgment, I have to make a judgment. I do think that a lot of our guys, or more of our guys, maybe not a lot of our guys, More of our guys, if they were to fall on one side or the other, are guys who don’t like to be bothered by the mess, by the personal mess within the home, with their wife, or with their kids.

I do think there’s more of that than the guys that are authoritative jerks and are trying to keep everything in strict order. I also think that a lot of that kind of authoritative jerkness that is very strict order, also comes out of a refusal to be bothered because I don’t want to be bothered with actual deeper heart issues. Just do what I say and mold your behavior as opposed to getting into the mess of the heart. And so even that kind of leaning also comes from not being bothered. But if I were to have to choose something, I do think that not wanting to be bothered is more of, or could be more of our issue than the jerk patriarch.

Don’t shoot me. Or shoot me. Yeah, I think our failure as husbands to love our wives the way Christ loved the church, that failure is messy. That failure is messy within our own heart, our own sinful ego. is messy and is what gets in the way of all of that. And I think it’s when we, when we not just understand, but then actually try to live it out that we start seeing more of the mess, more of it starts coming out. And then that is driving us to prayer. Christ, you are our model. Teach me to love my wife the way you love the church. And so it is that dependence. I think that is part of what trying to live up up to the standard is supposed to be doing.

And so we are coming to Christ for strength. We’re coming to God for Him to fill us with the Holy Spirit to do that. And then we continue living that out. So for sure, that’s a really good point. You have to speak through your husband. He represents you. I’m just kidding. Go ahead. No, go ahead. Please. No, go. That was a joke. I had to say it. It was like, are you the first woman who asked the question? You’re the first woman. Good job, Suzanne. Are you asking, how do you pass the understanding of the roles in that relationship? Or how do you pass on understanding of who to find? Because they’re already grown. They’re out of your house.

Do you guys hear her question? So with the grown children, it’s not like little kids as they’re already there, but they’re grown. And how do you continue to influence them in that role? I would say the first is still your example, your model. So even with grown children, the model and example of you and your spouse, how is that relationship being modeled? When they’re coming over, how is that being modeled? When it’s not modeled correct, do they see repentance? Do they see correction in that way as well? If there is in the past when things weren’t modeled correctly, is there a change of course or repentance for that as well?

hey, when we were doing this, this wasn’t right in that way. And then also, if there are issues that are coming up that they’re coming up with questions, I mean, that’s very clear. But I think that modeling, that example, whether it’s in those older parents, or then again, with the church, in those relationships, and then in the Word. But yeah, I don’t know, what do you guys… And growth is, it’s not overnight. And it’s not like, hey, here’s a 10 steps to how to become the biblical head, or the biblical woman, or whatever. And it’s working, and it’s growing, and it’s doing that. And we see immaturity in ourselves.

We see immaturity in our kids, and other people. And then working that over time is what Christ is doing in the church, what we’re all hoping and praying for. So just continue persevering in that, I think, is there. Yeah, I would think that, I mean, probably not every single sin that you’ve ever done. But if there is categorical missteps that were done in the past and your children are grown, I think it’s helpful. It’s a good opportunity for the parents to say, hey, this was misaligned. We were doing this wrong. Not only were we treating each other wrong, we gave you the wrong example. This is our sin to be restored in that way.

I think would be helpful, yeah. Pray, okay, I’ll pray and then we can be done. Father, thank you so much for your kindness to us. Thank you for all these people. Thank you for our church community, our body. Thank you for the sharpening that we could have amongst each other. Thank you for the laughter. Thank you for your grace. Thank you so much for your institution of household, for your design and definitions for the family, for the different roles. Thank you, Lord, that you have made it clear. Thank you that you convict us and encourage us and edify us to submit unto your design, to submit unto your definition and in your direction of all of that.

Please equip us with your spirit. Please help us, Lord, to look to you for strength, to look to you for encouragement, to look to you for more grace. Please help us husbands to be the kind of husbands that you have designed and called us to be. Please help us to submit to you as our head and then to be able to lead our wives, to represent them well as their head, that we would love them into loveliness, that we would nourish them and cherish them, and that the women within our church community would grow into loveliness under the leadership of their husbands. Thank you for all your kindness in Christ’s name, amen.