By
Ephesians 5
22Wives,
submit to your husbands as to the Lord. 23For
the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his
body, of which he is the Savior. 24Now as the church submits to
Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
25Husbands,
love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26to
make her holy, cleansing[b] her by the washing with water through the
word, 27and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain
or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28In this
same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves
his wife loves himself. 29After all, no one ever hated his own body,
but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church— 30for
we are members of his body. 31"For this reason a man will leave
his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one
flesh."[c] 32This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the
church. 33However, each one of you also must love his wife
as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
Here is
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In light of Ephesians
5:32, do you think maybe there’s a deeper significance than just “marriage
and gender roles’ in these teachings? You mention unity and
headship very briefly later in the document, but how about the significance
of a counterpart? Since Adam is a type
of Christ (Rom. 5:14), I think it would be worth mentioning how Adam’s
longing desire for a counterpart (and every other man’s as well) typifies
God’s longing desire for a Bride that can match Him, especially considering
the title of this document. The Lord is after a mature
built-up counterpart, constituted of Christ Himself (Col. 3:11), and standing
together in one spirit with one soul (Phil 1:27), having the same love (Phil
2:2), with the same mind, one accord, and one mouth to glorify God (Rom
15:5-6). This is God’s heartbeat
and I can’t help but get excited about it!
This is why “…Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for
her.” The early church was centered on
the apostles’ teaching (Acts 2:42), and the apostles’ teaching was always
focused on the church as the Body of Christ (Eph. 1:22-23; Col. 1:24). If I
have a perfect marriage and miss living in God’s eternal purpose to fulfil His heart’s desire, I miss the mark (1 Tim 1:3-6)
of God’s economy (Gk. Oikonomia).
I may “seek [my] own things” (e.g. marriage) but completely miss “the
things of Christ Jesus” (Phil 2:21).
See also Haggai 1:2-5. |
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