Pastor Matt pauses the church’s regular study in Matthew to address the recent assassination of political activist and Christian, Charlie Kirk, framing the tragedy not as a political event but as a spiritual battle between light and darkness. He preaches that Kirk was a modern-day missionary and martyr whose death should awaken the church to the reality of evil. Drawing from the teachings of Jesus and church history, Pastor Matt offers three main points: persecution should be expected by Christians, it is not new (citing the apostles, Stephen, and historical martyrs like Margaret Wilson and Jim Elliot), and it is ultimately not the end because of the hope of resurrection and the subsequent advancement of the gospel. The sermon concludes with an impassioned call for believers to boldly proclaim the gospel in the face of hostility and an invitation for unbelievers to trust in the saving righteousness of Christ.

Sermon Transcript

Introduction and Addressing Charlie Kirk’s Death

It's good to be here this morning, worshiping with you today. If you have your Bibles, I invite you to open to Matthew chapter 5 this morning. We're deviating a little bit from our regularly scheduled sermon series. We are here at the church working our way through Matthew's gospel verse by verse, which is typically what we do here at Christ's King Church. But there are times where we pause that for Christmas and Easter, and we had a series in the summer on the family. And then periodically, there are times where there are certain events that take place that demand, I believe, a biblical framing, a biblical understanding of what's happening. And I believe that the events of the last week certainly rise to that level.

We don't always do this, and I have to confess to you that it's not always obvious what events happen that meet that threshold. It's a judgment call that we as leaders have to make. But as I spoke with our elders this week and asked for their guidance, they unanimously believed that I should address the events that unfolded in Utah and the assassination of a man named Charlie Kirk. In fact, I was scheduled this morning to be preaching in Fredericksburg. You may know that we have a campus there led by Pastor Mike Bell and his wife, Jennifer, and our elders are on a quarterly schedule to be in Fredericksburg to encourage that congregation. I was scheduled to be there, but we thought it would be best if we altered that schedule for this week.

Before we read our text this morning, we're going to be looking at several texts, and the texts are not on the screen this morning, so you're going to have to do it the old-fashioned way. You're gonna have to get your Bible out, or the new-fashioned way, get your iPhone out, and follow along.

A Missionary and a Martyr

Before we get into the text, I want to explain why I think that this topic is worth addressing. Some of you may be wondering why pause the regular schedule and address what happened. And that's a perfectly legitimate question. If you have that question, I want to try to answer it here just briefly. Charlie Kirk was known to many as a political activist. He was known to many as someone who engaged in the realm of politics, and commentary, and reported the news. If all you know about Charlie Kirk is from the news, you might seriously be wondering, why pause to talk about this political pundit?

The reason why is because not only did he engage in the realm of politics, Charlie Kirk was a devout believer in Jesus Christ. He was someone who was unashamedly a Christian, and unashamedly proclaimed the gospel of Jesus. He went to college campuses to debate with people who had other ideas and to engage with them, but all of his ideas that he was engaging with were biblical ideas, lifted straight out of the Bible. In fact, the boldness that he had typifies the boldness that we see in people who are filled with the Spirit of God. He went to these places that were very much against him, and he stood in the midst of crowds that often hated him, and he proclaimed to them the law of God and the gospel, the saving power of Christ.

Now you might not know that. If you just watch what the news says, you would not know that. But if you go online and type in his name, you will not watch very many videos of this man before you come across one where he is sharing about Jesus, about his death, his burial, and his resurrection, and the implications of that for everyone who would hear and listen. Charlie Kirk was someone who took the gospel to the public square and proclaimed it, and called people to repent of their sins and to trust in Christ. In the church, we call that an evangelist. And an evangelist that goes into hostile territory, we call that a missionary. And when someone is killed for their faith and their proclamation of the gospel, in the church, we call that a martyr.

So Charlie Kirk wasn't just a political commentator or a political activist. He was a Christian minister, not ordained by any church, but one who proclaimed the gospel in foreign places as a missionary and was killed for his faith as a martyr. Because one of our brothers was gunned down in our country, we're going to talk about what's going on. That's why we're going to talk about it here this morning.

The Moral Battle of Our Time

Again, if you watch the news, Charlie Kirk will be labeled as a provocateur. He'll be labeled as someone with extreme views. Let me tell you about some of Charlie Kirk's extreme views. He believed that God created the heavens and the earth, so they call him a science denier. He believed that marriage was between a man and a woman, so they label him as a homophobe. He believed there are only two genders, male and female, so they label him a transphobe. He believed that women should not have the right, so-called, to murder their unborn children in their own wombs, and because of that, they called him a misogynist, a woman hater. His extreme views were just vanilla Christianity. Just plain Jane, nothing nuts. Just what you read on the first page of Genesis. And he believed that Jesus died and rose again, that he is seated on a throne as King of kings and Lord of lords. He believed, taught, and preached that all must repent of their sin and turn to Christ.

These are the views that got Charlie Kirk labeled an extreme man. And if you're a Bible-believing Christian, guess what? You hold all those same views as well.

Now, as shocking as it was to watch this godly—not perfect, no, but godly, yes—man gunned down in front of his young wife and children, the images, the video, I don't know if you saw it, it's absolutely shocking. I don't know any other word to describe it. And as shocking as that was, something more shocking still happened. After the moments passed by, and it was pronounced that he did not survive the attack, we saw millions of people in our country—our friends, our family, our neighbors, our coworkers—celebrating, cheering, and applauding the assassination of this man. Millions of people in our city and across this nation said he got what he deserved, said that what happened to him was justified. It's not so shocking to me that there's some lone lunatic out there that would try and do something crazy. What has been absolutely unnerving and eye-opening for me is seeing just how many people thought that was the right thing.

That is a sobering reality. How could it be that millions of minds, millions of souls, watched what we saw this week and celebrated? It's because there is true evil in the world. There is true light and there is true darkness. There is true good, and there is true evil. I know our culture wants to say there's no such thing as right and wrong, no such thing as good and evil, it's all just shades of gray. Friends, this week, we saw there are no shades of gray. This is a black-and-white issue. There is a spiritual warfare, a spiritual battle taking place between light and darkness every single day for the souls of humanity. It has been eye-opening to see just how deep the darkness has gone, how it has captured the hearts of a generation. It is shocking.

Spiritual warfare is real, and it's not a political battle. The problem is that politics, so-called, has swallowed up morality. All of the issues that people say are now political, they're not political issues; they're moral issues. The reason this play is being run on the church—you being told as a Christian that you can't bring your religious views into politics—is because they want to swallow up morality and then advance their dark agenda. That's the bottom line.

Abortion is not a political issue; it's a moral issue. Children in the mother's womb are image-bearers of God. To take the life of the unborn is evil. God detests it. Same-sex marriage is not a political issue; it's a moral issue. Marriage is created by God. Sex is to be enjoyed between a husband and a wife in marriage, for a lifetime. Anything outside of that is a moral issue. The mutilation of confused children, robbing them of their reproduction because they're confused so we chop off their genitalia—that's not a political issue. That's a moral issue.

There is a culture of death that has metastasized into a political movement, but it's a spiritual movement. Millions of our friends, coworkers, and family have had their minds warped with a dark, demonic ideology of death. Murder children? Mutilate children so they can't reproduce? Same-sex attraction is a culture of death because you can't produce life. Now we see in other Western cultures that if you get old and feeble, they just euthanize you. It's a culture of death, and that culture comes straight from the pit of hell.

This is not an issue of left versus right. This is not Republican versus Democrat. Maybe it was that at some point, like in 1970, but we have to wake up. This is light versus darkness. This is good versus evil. This is right versus wrong. These issues animate a generation because they have been indoctrinated with the doctrine of demons. If we can't recognize that, God help us. Many people saw for the first time just how dark things are, not only in the assassination of Charlie Kirk but in the celebration and approval in the aftermath.

If millions of people think that Charlie Kirk should have died for what he believed, hear this: millions of people think you should die because of what you believe. Because they celebrated when he died, they would celebrate if you died. Because you believe the same things. This is not political. This is spiritual.

Point One: Persecution is Not Unexpected

I have three points for us this morning. I want to talk to you about persecution. What we saw on Wednesday was a young man, 31 years of age, who just minutes before he was gunned down, proclaimed the gospel to that crowd. I posted a video of it last night; literally his last words were that Christ is King, He is the Lord of lords, and that you need to repent of your sin and believe in Him. Persecuted for his faith. The only reason he was gunned down, and we have not yet been, is because he was more effective and more bold than we were. That's why he was taken out, because he was swaying the hearts and minds of young people across this nation.

The first point is that persecution is not unexpected. Let's look at Matthew chapter 5, verses 10 through 12.

"Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you."

We should not be surprised when we, as Christians, are persecuted for the truth. Jesus said it would happen. Jesus said it's coming. You can expect it, and guess what? You are blessed when it happens. When it does, you are laying up for yourself treasure, not on earth, but treasure in heaven. The prophets before us were persecuted, and so also will those who boldly take a stand for the gospel. When evil rears its head, darkness will try to extinguish the light. There will be persecution, and we should not be surprised by it.

Turn with me to John chapter 15. Jesus gives this instruction to his disciples the night before His crucifixion, when He instituted communion, which we partook of this morning. In John 15, verse 18, Jesus says:

"If the world hates you, know that it hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you."

We have to, as Christians, stop caring about what the people who hate us think about us. Why do we let what they might think stop us from speaking what we know to be the truth? They hate us because they hate Christ. Jesus says in verse 20:

"Remember the word that I said to you: 'A servant is not greater than his master.' If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me."

Verse 23:

"Whoever hates me hates my Father also."

This is a God-hating ideology. It is anti-God, anti-family, anti-life, anti-Christ, and it's centered in a hatred for God.

Verse 25:

"But the word that is written in their Law must be fulfilled: 'They hated me without a cause.'"

Verse 26:

"But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me. And you also will bear witness, because you have been with me from the beginning."

When we come to Christ and are filled with the Spirit of God, that Spirit isn't just given to us so we can have Holy Ghost goosebumps during worship—which are nice, but that's not the purpose. You have been filled with the Spirit of God to give you power, to give you boldness, to be a witness for Christ.

Continuing in chapter 16, verse 1:

"I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away."

Why would they fall away? Because great persecution was coming.

"They will put you out of the synagogues."

That's being rejected from society; you're not going to be part of the in-crowd.

"Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God."

The person who did this atrocious act thought they were doing the right thing, because we have a whole generation trained that what is evil is good, and what is good is evil. There is a generation filled with passion, believing they are virtuous when in fact they are evil. Only the Word of God and the law of God can expose what is true and what is false.

Jesus warned us about this. This shouldn't be shocking. The reason it's so shocking for us is that for 200-plus years, our nation has run on a certain set of assumptions that everybody just took for granted, and those assumptions were from the Bible. Our nation was founded with the morality of Scripture at its core. There were shared values that you shouldn't gun down innocent people, that murder, theft, adultery, fornication, and homosexuality were wrong. As we have gone further away from those foundations, multiple generations have grown up untethered from that morality, free to do whatever their evil heart devises.

Where is the common sense? Common sense was the common values we shared from the Bible. Without the Word of God as bedrock, we have no more common sense. It turns out it wasn't common; it was divine revelation from God. Our culture is off the rails, speeding headlong over the cliff. The only thing that will stop us from the abyss is if God's people wake up and boldly proclaim the law of God and the saving gospel of Jesus Christ. And when we do that, there's going to be persecution. We must count the cost.

In John 16, verse 33, Jesus said:

"I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world."

Where can we find true and lasting peace? It's only in Christ. This world is passing away. Everything you see with your eyes is temporary. This life is a vapor. In the world, we will have tribulation. But we should take heart and have our souls anchored to the fact that Christ has overcome the world.

Point Two: Persecution is Not New

Persecution for the church is also not new. It's throughout church history, from its very inception. Flip over a few pages to the book of Acts.

In Acts chapter 4 and 5, Peter and John are arrested, thrown into jail, and eventually beaten. What evil deed did they do? They saw a man begging who could not walk. Peter and John said, "We don't have any money, but in the name of Jesus Christ, rise up and walk." This 40-year-old man, whose health was restored, went leaping through the temple, praising God. A crowd gathered, much like the crowd gathered around Charlie Kirk as he was sharing the gospel. The apostles told the crowd it was by the power of Jesus' name. The authorities arrested them, saying, "You cannot preach in this name."

How did they respond? Acts chapter 5, verse 29, a verse that should be emblazoned on the heart of every Christian:

"But Peter and the apostles answered, 'We must obey God rather than men.'"

Look at verse 40:

"And when they had called in the apostles, they beat them and charged them not to speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go. Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name. And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching that the Christ is Jesus."

The apostles eventually suffered martyrdom. Peter was crucified upside down. Andrew was crucified on an X-shaped cross. James was beheaded. Philip was crucified. Bartholomew was flayed and beheaded. Matthew was stabbed. Thomas was speared. James, the son of Alphaeus, was thrown from the temple and beaten. Thaddeus was killed with arrows. Simon the Zealot was sawn in two. Matthias was stoned and beheaded.

In Acts chapter 7, we see the first Christian martyr wasn't even an apostle; it was a deacon named Stephen. He was so filled with the Spirit and Word of God that they couldn't contend with the wisdom with which he spoke. Because they couldn't beat him in an argument, they stoned him to death in rage.

The apostle Paul, who was there when Stephen was martyred, later endured immense persecution himself. In 2 Corinthians chapter 11, verse 25, he details his beatings, stonings, and shipwrecks.

This persecution we are enduring as Christians in this country is not new. During the first 300 years of the church under Roman persecution, many ordinary, everyday Christians faced lions in the Colosseum and were torn to pieces to the cheers of roaring crowds. That same dark demonic spirit that cheered the martyrdom of Christians in Rome has taken root in the hearts and minds of many young people today.

I want to tell you about one ordinary Christian, an 18-year-old Scottish girl named Margaret Wilson. She died on May 11, 1685. She was part of the Scottish Covenanters, people who had the radical idea that Christ was the King of the church, not the King of England. She and an older woman named Margaret McLachlan were sentenced to death because they refused to swear an oath renouncing the Lordship of Christ. They tied them to stakes in the ocean at low tide. They put the older lady out front so Margaret Wilson would have to watch her friend drown, while crowds jeered at her to recant. But this 18-year-old girl said, "I will not deny my Lord. I will go and meet Him face to face. I will close my eyes in this life, and I will open them in glory."

Point Three: Persecution is Not the End

This leads us to our third point: persecution is not the end. I mean this in two ways.

First, we have the hope of the resurrection. When we die, we are ushered into the presence of our Savior. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. When we close our eyes in this life, we open them to hear the words, "Well done, good and faithful servant." Death has been defeated by Jesus when He walked out of the grave, and He promises resurrection life to all who believe. There is a day coming when Christ will return, the graves will be opened, and we will rise with new, resurrected bodies.

Second, persecution is not the end because of the advancement of the gospel. I believe that many people had their eyes opened this last Wednesday. Many who were afraid to be bold for Christ woke up on Thursday saying, "I will be bold for Jesus. I am not going to deny my Lord any longer." I believe a generation is rising up who will advance the gospel with their lives.

The church father Tertullian coined the phrase: "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church." When a martyrdom takes place, boldness arises. The Bible says the gates of hell cannot prevail against the church. There is no power in hell that can stop the advancement of the gospel because Jesus died, rose again, and put His Spirit inside of you. He is seated on His throne, putting every enemy under His feet, and the very last enemy to be defeated is death.

We are His body, the army of God, but our weapons are not earthly. Paul tells us the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, taking every thought captive to obey Christ. This is why Paul says, "I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation." The world wants to shame us into silence, but if we speak up, there is power in the gospel to change lives and turn enemies into apostles.

If the church remains silent and refuses to shine the light, we only invite further darkness. There is a remnant in this nation, but if we hide our light, where is this going? In the 1950s, Jim Elliot and his friends went to preach to the Auca Indians in the jungle. They were warned they would be killed, but they said, "Who will tell them if we don't?" They were speared down, leaving their wives widows. Before his death, Jim Elliot wrote in his diary: "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."

When the news of their deaths went out, his wife Elisabeth Elliot and others stayed to witness to the very men who killed their husbands. The tribe repented and came to faith in Jesus. That's the power of the gospel. And because of their witness, hundreds of thousands of new missionaries dedicated their lives to preaching the gospel. I believe God is going to raise up an army of young men and women who will be absolutely unashamed to proclaim the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

An Invitation to Trust in Christ

I'm going to close today with an opportunity, a call for you to trust in Christ. I think there may be some among us today who do not know where they stand with God. If you were to pass from this life into the next, you don't know whether you would be received into the presence of the Lord. There is an afterlife, and we will live forever in one of two places: in heaven with Jesus, or in hell, tormented for our sins.

Jesus came and died, shedding His blood so our sins could be forgiven. We've all sinned and broken God's law. Jesus suffered the punishment we deserve so we could receive the righteousness He earned through His perfect life. On the day we stand before God, we will either be clothed in the righteousness of Christ—received by faith—or in our own righteousness, which is filthy rags.

If you came in here today trusting in your own self and your own good works to get you into heaven, friend, that is not going to be enough. We must be clothed in the righteousness of Christ. Save yourself from this wicked generation. Confess your sins to God. He is merciful, loving, and gracious. He laid His life down to give you salvation as a free gift. Give your life to Jesus.

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Biblical Fatherhood - All In The Family Week 9

August 10, 2025Pastor Matt Bell

Sermon Summary

In this concluding sermon of a summer series on the family, Pastor Matt preaches from Ephesians 6:4, examining the biblical command for fathers to raise their children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. He establishes that Christ must be the central focus of every marriage and family in order to bear godly fruit. Pastor Matt breaks the text into three sections: the specific persons addressed (fathers, who naturally set the spiritual temperature of the home and reflect God the Father to their children), the prohibition against provoking children to anger (guarding against harsh tyranny and destructive words), and the precept to actively discipline and instruct children (guarding against the common male temptation of passive neglect and abdication). He challenges fathers to accept their God-given responsibility, take practical initiative in leading family discipleship, and ultimately rely on the grace of the gospel, remembering that children are saved by God's grace rather than perfect parenting.

Sermon Transcript

Introduction and Series Conclusion

I invite you to open with me in your Bibles to Ephesians, the book of Ephesians. This morning, we're finishing our summer series where we've been focusing on the family over the last few months here as a church. Today is the last Sunday from this series, from Ephesians chapters 5 and 6.

Next Sunday, we have a special guest who will be with us. I'm very excited and honored that we'll have Dr. Joe Boot here with us this next Sunday to bring the word of God to us. Of course, he'll be with us at our family camp that's happening this week. And how many of you are looking forward to that family camp? I think it's going to be a lot of fun. We sent out an email this week with some information on that. If you are going to the camp and you didn't get that email, please see Pastor Mark after service today to make sure you have everything that you need to get ready for family camp. But we've got family camp this weekend, and then this Sunday, we have Dr. Joe Boot, which will be a wonderful time together.

And so this morning, we're going to focus on verse 4 of chapter 6, the very last verse of our passage, but we will, of course, read the whole passage again together to remind us of the context and the flow of it. So I invite you to stand with me this morning as we read the Word of God together. We stand because we want to set God's word apart in our hearts as holy, as unto him. These aren't the words of men. But these are the words of the true and living God.

Ephesians 5:22 says, "Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. 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 in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 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, because we are members of his body. 'Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.' This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 'Honor your father and mother' (this is the first commandment with a promise), 'that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.' Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."

Opening Prayer

God, our Father, we thank you for your word. It is that precious lamp unto our feet and light unto our path. Lord, without your word, we would be lost. We would be in darkness. Lord, we would stumble through this life, not knowing what it was we were stumbling over, or the traps of the enemy that had been set before us. But God, because of your word, we know the paths in which we should walk. We know the ways in which we should go. Lord, these things are not a mystery to us because you have revealed them to us clearly.

God, I pray that you would help us as we focus on this final verse, this final message in this series. Lord, looking at fathers and parents, that you would help us as parents to raise our children in the ways of God, and to point them in the direction that they should go. And we thank you for the promises of your word, which are yes in Christ. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.

You may be seated.

Christ Must Be All in All

Before we look at this final verse, I want to draw your attention to something that I think we've probably seen already many times, but I want to make it abundantly clear that when it comes to family and family life, when it comes to husbands and wives, when it comes to marriages and raising children, what we see permeating this whole passage is Christ. It is Jesus. And I want to press this thought into you right as we begin here today that Christ must be all in all. He has to be the center of our lives. He has to be the center of our marriages. He has to be the center of our families and the center of our parenting.

This has been the instruction that the apostle Paul has given us when he looked at each of these relationships. So when he talked to the wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. This isn't something separated from Christ. This is something done as unto Christ. When he gives instructions to the husbands, we are to love our wives as Christ loves the church. Children are to obey their parents in the Lord. And then finally here, fathers are to discipline and instruct their children in the ways of the Lord.

Christ is to be all in all. He is to be preeminent. He is to be number one in every area of life. And if Christ is not central in our families, if Christ is not central in our marriages, if Christ is not central in our parenting, our families will not flourish. Jesus said, if you abide in me, if you live in me, if my word abides in you and lives in you, then you will bear much fruit. If we are abiding in Christ, if we are living in Christ, if he is the central focus and the preeminent force of our life, if he is who we are living for, if he is who we are living for his glory, if he is central, we will bear the right kind of fruit that we want to bear in our lives and in our marriages. And if he is not, we won't. Jesus said, without me you can do nothing.

And so if our marriages, our families, if our relationship to our spouse is cut off from Christ, it will be dead, it will be dry, it will not produce good and godly, lasting fruit. But if Christ is all in all, then we will produce the kind of fruit that we want to see and he wants to see from our lives. This is what Paul has been saying from the very beginning. Every single one of these instructions is attached to the Lord Jesus. Marriage is from him; it's to be lived to him. Husband and wife relate to one another in Christ, children and parents in Christ. It's all about him. You see, when we make marriage about us, now we are going astray. Marriage really is about Christ. It's a picture of Christ and the church. It's to be lived out unto his glory. And when we do that, we will bear much fruit.

Christ must be all in all. In every area of life, this doesn't just apply to family. Of course, that's what we're talking about today, but this applies to every area of life. This is why I began our service this morning with the call to worship that from him and to him belongs all the glory. All the glory unto him.

The Persons: Fathers and Children

Finally here, this verse, chapter 6, verse 4, this last final verse of these instructions on family life: "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord." These instructions here to the fathers are broken into three sections. I'll share them with you upfront, and then we'll look at them together. The first is the persons that are addressed. Secondly, is the prohibition, and thirdly, the precept.

Let's first here look at the persons that we are going to look at today. I'm going to invite our projectionist to advance the slide. Thank you. We're looking at the fathers and the children. These are the persons who are addressed here. "Fathers, do not provoke your children."

Now, immediately, because we live in a culture that is the way that it is, I know that many of you may be asking the question, well, what about the mothers? Where are the moms in this? Why doesn't he say anything about mothers? Do mothers have no spiritual impact in the lives of their children? Well, of course not. Of course mothers have great spiritual impact in the life of their children. I, myself, am great witness to that, and many of us here today would say "yes and amen" that our lives have been greatly impacted by the faith of our mothers and even our grandmothers. That would be my testimony, that I learned much as a child of godliness from both my mother and my grandmothers. My testimony is that their impact on my spiritual life was profound, and it continues even to this day.

Even Paul's own protégé in ministry, Timothy—whom he is the pastor of the church in Ephesus, the letter that we're reading—Timothy had been raised by a godly mother and grandmother. Timothy's father was an unbeliever. He was a Gentile. And later, you'll read in 1 Timothy that Paul instructs Timothy to hold tightly to the faith that was handed to him by his mother and his grandmother. And so mothers, of course, have a great spiritual impact on their children. There is no question about that. Much of what I will say here today could be applied to mothers as well in the family. But I think there are several different reasons why Paul singles out the fathers, and I want to highlight them for you this morning.

Why is it about the fathers and the children? The first is that our earthly fathers shape our understanding and our view of God the Father. How our earthly fathers treat us, love us, care for us, influences the way we think about and view God, the heavenly Father. Many of you have struggled with this in your own life because your natural father was not a good, godly representation to you of your heavenly Father. And you have struggled to receive his love or to believe that he loves you because you have struggled with your earthly father and that relationship. And so the first reason why Paul addresses this is to remind earthly fathers that the way you love your children will be a representation in their minds of the way God loves them.

In 1 John 3, it says this: "See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are." That's the revelation that Jesus brought to humanity—that God wasn't some angry God, but that he was a loving Father who is in heaven. This is why when Jesus taught us to pray, he taught us not to pray to the Almighty, not to pray to the Lord of Heaven's Armies, but to pray to "Our Father who art in heaven." And it's an undeniable fact that our earthly fathers leave a mark on us with our view of God. Now that can be for good, that can be not so good. And so fathers, that's why he addresses you.

The second reason is that the spiritual life of the family flows from the spiritual life of the father. The father's spiritual life will dictate the spiritual life and temperature and culture of that family. By addressing the fathers in this way, Paul is not making a prescription. He's not saying this is the way it should be. He's not saying that fathers should set the tone for the spiritual life of the family. He is simply acknowledging that this is the fact of the way that it is. He is simply recognizing reality. Fathers set the spiritual climate for their homes and their families because we, as the head of the household, have been given real authority from God. And this real authority comes with real responsibility attached to it. It flows from our position of headship.

Just as I said earlier in the series that it's not Paul saying the husband should be the head of the house; Paul says the husband is the head of the house. In the same way, fathers, it's not that you should set the spiritual climate for your home; it's that you do. It's not whether you should or not. It's which climate you are setting for your home. You are setting the spiritual temperature of your household.

Now, some of you may be asking, well, what if the father is not a Christian? If the father is not a Christian, him being an unbeliever sets the tone for that family. Some would say, well, what if the father is absent? What if the father has left? His empty seat dominates that family. His absence dominates every aspect of life. Though he's not there, he is still setting the tone for the direction of the family. Now, can a godly mother work extra hard to overcome this lack and this absence? Yes, absolutely. But let's not fool ourselves into thinking that that absence or that unbelief or that abdication of responsibility is not setting the tone that she is then having to work extra hard to make up for.

It's like this. We live in South Texas. Thankfully, we've had a pretty mild summer this year. Jesus, I thank you for that. But we'll remember just a few years ago where we had something like 50 or 60 days over 100-degree weather. It was unbearably hot. Now, I have a house that has four young children in it. And so half of my summer is spent saying this: "Close the door. Close the door." I didn't understand why my parents were always so adamant that we, as children, closed the door until you start paying for the electricity bill. It's so amazing how when you become a parent, all the stuff your parents said just starts coming right out. And so I tell my children, "I'm not paying to air condition all of Texas. I'm only paying to air condition this house."

So how does this apply to fathers? If you leave the back door open when it's 100 degrees outside, can you still cool the house? You can, but you have to run that thing ten times as hard. It is possible. But it is a lot more difficult. It's the same way with a father. If they are rowing in the direction they should be rowing, it's like the door is shut. The temperature can be set. But what I'm trying to say is that the father's temperature, the father's spiritual life, dominates the family. It absolutely dominates the family. Can a godly mother raise her children and make up for the lack? Yes, absolutely, she can. But that's not the way it's supposed to be. It's supposed to be the father training his children, loving his children, showing them a picture of our heavenly Father, and especially not being absent or gone.

It's like gravity. Can gravity be overcome? It can. With enough work and enough effort and enough force, yes, gravity can be overcome. But that's not the natural state of things. And so the father has a gravitational pull to his spiritual life. Fathers, if you love Jesus, and you are passionate about him and passionate about his word, and you have made it your aim to live for his glory, you create a gravity around yourself, and you take your family where you're going.

And fathers, if you are not passionate about the Lord, and you don't care for the things of God, and you only show up at church just to make your wife be nice for the rest of the week, and just so she's not nagging you, but you're checking the score, and you can't wait to get back to the house and to the barbecue and to put away a six-pack... if the central focus of your life is not God, not Christ, not the things of God, you have a gravitational pull to you, and you will pull your family in that direction. It's an inescapable reality. Now, can a godly mother and wife exert enough strength and spiritual life to rescue her children and to pull them out of that destructive orbit? Yes, sometimes. But how much better when the whole family is living for the glory of Christ.

The third reason Paul addresses fathers is that abdicating responsibility is one of man's greatest temptations. I don't have time today, but I would direct your attention to Genesis 3, to Adam in the garden, and his responsibility to care for his wife, to protect his wife, to lead and to guide his wife as the head that God had made him. And his abject and total failure in doing that—allowing his wife to be deceived, allowing his wife to fall into sin, and himself falling into sin after his wife, instead of doing what he should have done and saying, "No, get out of here, devil, you're a liar. We're going to trust and believe in God's word." That's the authority that God had given to Adam, and fathers and husbands, that's the authority that God has given to us. But Adam didn't do that. And when he sinned and God came and asked him why he sinned, what did Adam do? He played the blame game. He said, "The woman you gave me." His first response was to blame his wife, and ultimately to blame God because God is the one who had given her to him. "God, it's her fault. God, it's your fault, but it's definitely not my fault."

That's called abdication. Because we are all sons of Adam, we all have that brokenness in us, that proclivity towards abdication of responsibilities. It is one of our greatest temptations, and so I believe that's another reason why the apostle Paul specifically addresses fathers to remind us of this great calling and responsibility that we have. Mothers typically are more inclined to care for the spiritual condition of their children. I think Paul knows that. And so this is why he specifically addresses fathers to say, "Guys, you've got to get your head in the game." You can't simply delegate this responsibility off onto the shoulders of your wife. This is a burden you were meant to carry and designed by God to carry. Yes, mothers are to be involved in the spiritual formation of their children. That is obvious. But fathers, we have the unique responsibility of ensuring that this gets done. And we cannot delegate this to our wives and say, "It's her job now, I wash my hands of it."

The Prohibition: Do Not Provoke to Anger

The second part of this verse is this prohibition. We see this here in the second part where he says, "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger." He says, do not do this. And in both this prohibition and then also in the precept, he's protecting us from two extremes. This prohibition is protecting fathers from the extreme of tyranny, of harshness, of ruling the home with an iron fist. Some fathers are this way. They have such a heavy hand in their home that everyone in the home is walking on eggshells all the time. These fathers have no joy in their hearts, and therefore because of that, there is no joy in their home. Their hearts are filled with anger, their hearts are filled with bitterness, their hearts are filled with malice, and they take these things out on their families.

And so Paul here is saying, do not be a tyrant. Do not be overly harsh with your children, because if you are this way, the portrait you're painting of God is one of an angry tyrant. And that is not who God is. God is not an angry tyrant at all. The beautiful portrait we have of God the Father is the story of the prodigal son. After that son who was disrespectful, who squandered all of his father's and family's legacy and possessions, after he wasted it on wild living, when that son came home, what did the Father do? He ran to him and embraced him. This is the picture of God the Father. Not one of an angry tyrant, but one who loves and forgives and is patient and is merciful. And when we are angry, when we are overly harsh, when we are bitter, we paint a false picture of God in the eyes of our children.

Another way that fathers provoke their children is in the words that they speak. Instead of blessing their children, they curse their children. Maybe they curse with four-letter words. But you can curse your children without ever uttering an explicit word. You can curse your children by saying things like, "You are good for nothing," or "You will never amount to anything," or "Life was pretty good until you showed up." Fathers, your words carry immeasurable weight.

In James 3, speaking about our tongues, it says with our tongues we bless our Lord and Father, and yet with it we curse people made in the likeness of God. From our mouths come both blessing and cursing. But he goes on to say, "My brothers, these things ought not to be so." It shouldn't be that we bless God, and we worship God, and we come and we sing his praises on Sunday morning, but then we get to the parking lot and we're speaking down to our children. We're tearing them down. We're ridiculing them. We're speaking death into them and death over them with our words. He asks the question, does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh water and salt water? Of course not. From our mouths should come blessing and worship towards God, and blessing towards our children.

Jesus said that out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. What's in your heart will come out of your mouth. That's why your words are so powerful, because they reveal what's in the heart. So the lesson in this is not "try to control your tongue"; the lesson is deal with the sin in your heart. The book of Proverbs says, tend to your heart because from your heart flows all the issues of life. One way we can know what's in our heart is what is coming out of our mouth. Is it blessing? Is it building your children up? Fathers, you are called to speak blessing over your children in the same way that God the Father speaks blessing over us. We need to see our children through the eyes of faith, as sons and daughters of God, through the eyes of the gospel.

This is a great lesson that I take from my earthly father. He was someone who always spoke blessing over us as his children. He wasn't perfect, but he was a godly man. He told us things that I didn't believe and I thought he was crazy for saying, but he constantly said these things over us. Things like, "You're a champion." I'm fourteen and pimply-faced and fat, I'm not a champion of nothing. "You're a champion. You're a victor. You're an overcomer. There's no weapon formed against you that will prosper." He wouldn't allow us to say the word "can't." He would say, "Say you can do all things through Christ." He constantly would speak these words of affirmation and blessing and victory over our lives. I'm thankful to God that I had somebody in my life who believed in me.

Fathers, your children need someone who will believe in them. You might be looking at your child like, "My goodness, I don't know if I can believe in them." But believe in the gospel. Believe in the power of Christ to work and to transform them and to make them into victors in Christ. Does not the Bible say that we are victorious in Christ? Then believe that for your children. Speak those words over them and remind them of the promises of God. The word of God should be flowing out of your mouth, fathers and mothers, because the word of God should be in your heart. If we love Jesus, we will share with them our love for him and our faith. But if our hearts are cold towards Jesus, we will also share that with them as well.

The Precept: Discipline and Instruction

Thirdly here, the precept. "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord." The precept is to discipline and instruct our children. Now, the temptation on the one hand is towards harsh tyranny. That's the prohibition against provoking. But there's another temptation that the precept guards against, and that temptation is passive neglect. Some fathers are not harsh tyrants. They're just in zombie mode. You kind of knock on their forehead—"Hello, anybody home?"—as they're just kind of oblivious, neglecting their families and their children and everything going on around them. That's that sin of abdication.

This word "discipline" is a word our world doesn't care much for today in our culture. We don't hear a lot of people talking today about discipline in any area of life. But we as Christians aren't to be trained by what's fashionable in the culture. Our children need to be disciplined. Of course, it begins with faithful instruction. Consistent instruction. Your instructions to your children should not be a moving target. It shouldn't be a question of, "Well, which version of dad and mom are we going to get today?" But when the instructions are transgressed, when there is disobedience, there must be consequences. We're teaching our children that when we disobey authority, when we disobey the word that's been given to us, there are real consequences in life, and also in eternity. And so we must begin at a young age to discipline our children when they are young, when they are pliable, when they are teachable, before they become hardened and set in their ways.

The book of Proverbs is filled with instructions on disciplining children. The Bible actually instructs us to discipline our children with spanking. Proverbs 13:24: "Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him." I don't enjoy disciplining my children. I don't enjoy spanking my children. In fact, I could go as far to say it's the least favorite part of my job. Yet, it's part of my job to discipline my children. And when they transgress, when they disobey, when they disrespect the authority in their life, there are consequences. Now, we do not beat our children. We do not abuse our children. Spanking should be an investment. It shouldn't hurt or harm the child, but there should be some pain associated with it. The goal is not to injure the child. The goal is to teach the child that when you disobey God, there are painful consequences. It's much better for them to understand that when they're three, four, five, and six, than when they're 23, 24, 54, and 56, and make shipwreck of their lives.

What we do is we always sit down with the child. We ask them, "What happened? What's going on?" We're trying to draw out what's in the child's heart. "Why did you disobey your mother? Why did you speak to her this way?" Then there's a time of explaining that when we disobey God's Word, there is discipline that comes from that. "It's my responsibility as your father to do this. I don't enjoy this, and yet it's something I must do, because if I don't do it, not only have you disobeyed God, but now I'm disobeying God." So there is a time of swatting, and then we always finish with a time of prayer where we teach the child to ask the Lord for forgiveness, because really it's reconciliation with God that we're after. We explain to them sin and repentance in Jesus and his blood. We lead the children in a prayer of repentance. Then I pray for my child, and I pray God's blessing on them. And then when we're done, I say, "That's it. It is finished." We hug each other, I have them apologize, and then that's it. It's under the blood. It's not being thrown in their face. Once it's done, it's done.

It is not just to discipline them; it is also to instruct them. It says to bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Fathers, Paul places this responsibility of spiritual instruction on your shoulders. Hear me clearly: it is not the church's job to instruct your children in the ways of God. It's not Abraham's job as the youth pastor. It's not Richard's job in children's ministry. Fathers, this is your job. Whatever we do here at church is only supplemental. You have your children for 168 hours a week. We have them for one. If you're counting on us to do the job, it's not going to get done.

Now you might say, "I don't know how to do that. Nobody showed me. My dad was a train wreck." Okay. Come and learn. I will show you how to do that. Find a godly man who can instruct you. But what you can't say is, "I don't know how, so I won't." That is not an option. That is abdication.

There are so many wonderful tools that we have to lead our families in worship. Apps, books, catechisms, family devotions. Something we've been doing lately is we're just reading through the book of Genesis chapter by chapter. After dinner, I get out the Bible, read a chapter, we talk about it, pray for our missionary of the month, sing a song, and dismiss. It doesn't have to be a three-hour seminary course. Little children need little nuggets. On the car ride to school in the morning, we have a promise box from my Grandma Bell. I have each of the kids pull out a Bible verse and we talk about it. The point is that Christ is central in our family. Fathers, you shouldn't know more about Victor Wembanyama than you know about Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world. Your kids know what you're excited about. If you're not excited about the Lord, go to him in prayer. "God, I'm not excited about your word. I need your help. I confess this is a sin."

Applications for Fathers

Just a few applications, and then we'll be dismissed here this morning.

Number one, fathers, you need to accept the responsibility. God has placed this responsibility on your shoulders. You need to step up to the plate and say, "I'm not going to be perfect, but God, you've called me to this, and I'm going to step up and do it."

The second thing is you need to take the initiative. You need to start making steps. Men, we know how to get things done if we want to get them done. We know how to chart a course and execute. We need to take the initiative not just in the natural things, but also in the spiritual things. What that means is you just take the first step. You're the one who pulls the Bible out at the end of dinner. You're the one who says we're going to start today with prayer. You don't have to be a theologian. Just take steps and watch how God will bless you.

Number three is we need to rely on the gospel. We need to rely on God's grace. Our children will not serve the Lord because of our great parenting. Our children will serve the Lord because of God's grace in their life. And so we need to be faithful to model God's grace. We need to be faithful to confess sin when we ourselves sin, admit that we are wrong, and ask our children for forgiveness. We need to show that we need Jesus just as much as they do. No one will be saved because of our good parenting. Whoever will be saved will be saved because of the grace of God in their life.

Fathers and mothers, accept this responsibility. You can bring up your children in the discipline and the instruction of the Lord when we make Christ all in all. We are doing this as stewards. Nothing belongs to us. Everything belongs to him, and we are to live everything for his glory. Amen.

Closing Prayer

I want to invite the fathers to stand here this morning. If you're a father here today, I just want to pray God's blessing on you and ask for him to help you in this responsibility. Let us together ask the Lord for help. We can't do this on our own strength. If we tried to do it on our own, it would crush us. But with the power of God and his strength in our lives, we won't be perfect, but we can be faithful.

God, our Father, we thank you for these fathers. Lord, we thank you that children are a blessing from you. And Lord, that you have blessed these men with children to steward, to point their lives in the direction that they should go. Lord, we confess our faults. We confess our sin. We confess that we need your help. Lord, we cannot do this in our own strength. Lord, we cannot do this in our own power or our own wisdom. God, we confess that we are wholly inadequate. And so we need your grace, we need your mercy. We need your guidance. We need your wisdom.

God, help us as we endeavor to be godly fathers who point our children to you, our heavenly Father. Lord, work in the lives of our children. God, save their souls, set them free, help them to be the people you created them to be. I pronounce, Lord, this blessing upon the men of this house and the fathers of this house. Lord, that we will pursue you. We will pursue righteousness. We will pursue faithfulness, and that you will bless our efforts. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

categories 2025
tags Christ is King, All In The Family

Children Obey Your Parents - All In The Family Week 8

August 03, 2025Pastor Matt Bell

Sermon Summary

In this continuation of the "All in the Family" sermon series, Pastor Matt focuses on Ephesians 6:1–3, delivering a message specifically directed at the children of the congregation regarding God's design for their role in the family. He outlines three key instructions for children: the action (obedience), the attitude (honor), and the outcome (blessing). Pastor Matt explains that true obedience to parents must be done "in the Lord" and paired with a respectful heart, serving as a training ground for submitting to God's ultimate authority. He also offers practical wisdom for adult children on how to find ways to honor imperfect parents and stresses the importance of walking in forgiveness. The sermon concludes with an invitation to repent of rebellion and a guided prayer asking Jesus for the grace and help to daily honor and obey both parents and God.

Sermon Transcript

Introduction

If you have your Bibles, open with me to Ephesians chapter 5. We're continuing our series called All in the Family that we're working our way through this passage in Ephesians this summer. Our focus today will be on the first three verses of chapter 6. Next week we'll finish this series. Next week will be the final sermon as we look at the role of the parents, God's design for parents in a family. But today we're going to focus on these first three verses of chapter 6. We'll read the whole passage just to have the context.

After next week, we'll have our family camp, which is coming up August 14th with Ezra Institute. I'm really excited about that. It's going to be a wonderful time together. And then that following Sunday, Joe Boot will be with us on August 17th to bring the word. So that's a little bit of where we are going over the next few weeks, but we've spent the summer just feeling really led by the Lord to make an investment into our families, our family life, and God's design and desire for the family as we see in His Word.

This morning, we're focusing on these first three verses of chapter 6, which speaks to and addresses the children of the congregation. I had a mild heart attack when Josh was dismissing the children, because I was saying, "No, no, no, they have to stay in here today."

Scripture Reading: Ephesians 5:22–6:4

We'll start reading in chapter 5, verse 22. If you'll stand with me for the reading of God's Word. We stand to read God's Word because we want to make sure that it's set apart in our hearts as holy, as unto the Lord. The front of your Bible says "Holy Bible." It's not just any book. This book is set apart. It is the Word of God.

"Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
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 in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 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, because we are members of his body. 'Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.' This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 'Honor your father and mother' (this is the first commandment with a promise), 'that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.' Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."

Let's pray.

Father, we do thank you for your Word. Our hearts are filled with gratitude today for everything that you've done for us in your Son Jesus, and Lord, for the Word that you've given us that reveals you to us, and helps us to live in light of who you are and your work in our lives. Lord, as we address this very important topic today of children, we pray that these words would go down deep into all of our hearts today, and that it would produce good fruit in our lives for your glory, for your kingdom, for the sake of your name. It is in that great name, Jesus, that we pray. Amen.

You may be seated this morning.

Walking Worthy of Our Calling

Just by way of introduction, I want to remind you a little bit of the context of this book of Ephesians. It's maybe my favorite book in the Bible, but certainly at the top of the list of the letters of Paul that is near and dear to my heart. Ephesians has six chapters. In the first three, the Apostle Paul reminds the church of who they are in Christ. He reminds them of what God has done for them in Christ—how God has chosen them, saved them, adopted them, forgiven their sins, and sealed them with the Holy Spirit. They've been saved from their sins by the grace of God. And they've received that grace through faith, through believing in what Christ has done for them. Paul reminds them they are not saved by their own works. Our own works are empty, hollow, and unrighteous. But we have inherited these wonderful blessings from Jesus Christ, our Lord.

Then in chapter 4, Paul shifts from talking about who we are in Christ to talking about how we are to live in Christ. Now that we have been saved, forgiven, and set free from the power of sin, how are we now to live? For the next three chapters, Paul practically shows us how we live the gospel. If you look at chapter 4, verse 1, you can read that shift. He says, "I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called."

To be a believer in Christ is a high calling. I would say it is the highest calling because no one is higher than Jesus. You think of some other high callings in life, maybe serving some noble king or serving in some high position in the government. That could be considered a high and noble calling. But there is no king above our King, King Jesus, and He has called us to serve Him. Just as noble people who have high callings in the natural are expected to live, behave, and conduct themselves in a certain way that reflects well on the person who has called them, how much more the calling we have received from the King of kings and the Lord of lords? We are called to live out our high calling.

The way that we live our lives, good or bad, reflects on the King we serve. We claim as Christians to follow Jesus, and so how we live our lives is a reflection of who it is that we follow and serve. We've spent these last seven weeks looking at the different aspects of the family and how God's people are to approach family life. God has a particular pattern, a particular mold, and a particular structure for the family of His people. But we need to be careful that we don't separate these instructions on family life from what Christ has done for us.

Our calling, as we walk it out in the family, is directly related to what Christ has done for us. It's a response. Christ has given everything for us. He laid down His life, humbled Himself, went to the cross, and died for you and for me. So now, the way we live our lives and seek to obey God's Word is a response. We're not trying to obey God's Word to earn God's favor. God has already shown us His favor in Christ. Now we respond to Him in faith, obedience, and submission to His Word. So wives, if it's submitting to your husbands; husbands, if it's loving your wives; children, if it's obeying your parents—all of it is to be done as unto the Lord, as worship unto Him.

A Direct Message to the Children

Our focus this morning is on these first three verses of chapter 6. Paul here addresses the children in the congregation. This book of Ephesians was a letter that Paul wrote to a church in Ephesus. When they received the letter, they would have gathered together in their worship service and read this letter to the congregation. I find it so remarkable that in this letter, Paul includes specific instructions for the children that are a part of that congregation.

By addressing the children, Paul is showing that they are not just an afterthought. They're not just a nuisance. They're not just, "Let's just shove them over here so that we can get about the real business of the church." No, the children are an integral part of the life of the church. Paul is addressing them because he knows they would be with their parents in the worship service, just as our children are with us today as we practice this on the first Sunday of the month.

Just as Paul addressed the children of the Ephesian congregation, I'm going to address the children of our congregation today. I don't ever remember a sermon specifically to the children when I grew up in church, but that's what we're going to have here today. Children, I'm going to address you today. Just as we address the wives and the husbands, today we are going to address the children who are living in their parents' household.

Children, if you live with your parents today, whether you're two or whether you're twenty, you are under their authority. If you're under their roof, you're under their authority. Of course, as we grow and leave the house, we step out on our own and are no longer under that protection and authority of our parents. But for the children here today who are living with your parents, this sermon is for you. And I know by God's grace, the Lord's going to speak to all of us here today as well.

Paul gives three instructions to the children:

The Action
The Attitude
The Outcome

The Action: Obedience

Children, he begins by saying this. This is the action: "Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right." What is the action? Obedience. That is right.

Who are we to obey? God and Jesus teach us that we should obey our parents. It is God's will for you in your life right now to obey your parents' instructions. Now, you might be wondering, "Why?" Kids are always wondering why. I think the Apostle Paul knew that you would wonder that, because he tells you why. When I was a child, there were a lot of times I did not want to obey my parents. I'm sure there are times when your parents ask you to do something and you think, "I don't know if I want to stop doing what I'm doing and do this other thing."

Why should you obey your parents? It tells you right there in verse 1: "for this is right." God tells us we should obey our parents because it is the right thing to do. In Colossians 3, it goes on to say, "Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord." It makes God happy when you obey your parents. If you love Jesus, you want to please Him.

God has given you your parents to care for you, protect you, and provide for you. They are a blessing from God, and He uses them to help you grow up to be the person God made you to be. As parents, we know that you don't belong to us; you belong to God. For a short amount of time, God has placed you children in our care. So children, you are to obey your parents because they are helping you become who God made you to be. If it's right to obey your parents, then it is wrong—it is a sin—to disobey your parents.

I want to draw your attention to the phrase, "in the Lord." This means we should only obey our parents in what we could obey the Lord in. This protects you from doing evil things. I know if you're a child here in this church, you have godly parents. But sometimes in life, even parents can do things that are wrong. We should never obey our parents if they are telling us to do something that is sinful.

The way this comes up the most in our lives today might be in a family where the father and mother have divorced. There may be times where one of your parents says, "Let's not tell mommy about this," or "Let's not tell daddy about this." They're asking you to lie. Is lying a good thing or a bad thing? It's bad. So if your parents ask you to lie, you need to tell them, "I can't lie, because God's Word tells me not to lie." In that way, you can even bring conviction to your parents.

If anybody—a teacher, another parent, a relative—ever asks you to keep a secret from your parents, they do not have your best interest in mind. If they say, "Let's just have this be our little secret," you need to immediately tell your parents. Now, I can already hear my kids asking, "What about a surprise party for mom?" There's a difference between a surprise and a secret. We don't keep secrets from our parents.

The phrase "in the Lord" also means we are doing it as worship to the Lord. If a child is disobeying their parents, they are also disobeying God. If you are living in rebellion against your parents—and this goes for teenagers as well—you're living in rebellion against God. It's a warning sign that your relationship with God is not in a good place.

Because we obey our parents in the Lord, it means we need the Lord's help. To have the Lord's help, you must first give your life to Jesus. I pray you've surrendered your life to Jesus, asked Him into your heart, and made Him Lord of your life. Then you must pray, "Jesus, help me to obey my parents." You really do need God's help.

When I was a child, there were days I obeyed my parents and days I disobeyed. Nothing good ever happened when I disobeyed. I lived with my parents until I got married at 27. I could not think of one single time in those 27 years that I disobeyed my parents and it went well for me. But I could think of many times that I disrespected them and greatly regretted it. Things never go well when you disobey your parents, because when you disobey them, you're disobeying God.

The Attitude: Honor

So the action is obedience. Now let's look at the attitude. The attitude is honor. We see this in verse 2: "Honor your father and mother."

To honor means you value greatly. It means to respect, hold in high regard, and look up to your parents. Paul is quoting from the Ten Commandments; commandment number five is to honor your father and mother. The reason the Apostle Paul brings up the attitude is because you can obey on the outside but still have a bad attitude on the inside. Jesus is more concerned with your heart on the inside than just your actions on the outside.

When your parents ask you to clean your room, what are some ways we could obey but not honor? We could stomp our feet and say, "Why do I have to clean my room? Look at my brother and sister's room! Mom and Dad, your room is a bigger mess than my room!" That is the wrong attitude. When your parents ask you to take out the trash, the right attitude is, "Yes, Mother. Yes, Father. I am so happy to be a part of this family and to contribute to the well-being of this wonderful institution established by God."

This is a high calling, which is why you need Jesus' help. When your parents ask you to do something, pray: "Jesus, help me to obey my parents and honor them. Help me not to be selfish." You can obey without honoring, but you cannot honor without obeying. If you truly have a heart of honor, you will obey.

Children, many of you know the story of the prodigal son. He disrespected his father, took his money, and wasted it. When he came back home, the father forgave him and threw a big party. But remember there was an older brother. The older brother stayed in his father's house and obeyed his father, but he did not honor him. He obeyed with the wrong attitude. When the father welcomed the younger son, the older brother was angry. We want to be like Jesus, who is our great example of both obedience to God the Father and honoring God the Father.

The book of Proverbs says, "A wise son makes a glad father, but a foolish son is a sorrow to his mother." You can make your home full of joy, or full of sorrow. You contribute to the joy in your home by having the right heart of honor. Pray every morning, "Jesus, help me to honor and obey my parents today."

The Outcome: Blessing

Finally, what is the outcome when we honor and obey our parents? The outcome is blessing. We see this in verse 3. Paul says there's a promise: "that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land." If you obey your parents, there will be blessing in your life.

Godly parents want to bless their children. I love to bless my children, but I can only bless them if they're walking in the ways of the Lord. If they are being disobedient and disrespectful, I cannot reward them for that behavior, because then I am training them in the wrong path. But if you honor and obey your parents, it will go well with you. Blessing will come not only from your parents but from God.

Eventually, you will not be under your parents' authority anymore. But your parents are the first authority God places in your life. We need to learn to honor and respect authority because authority comes from God. Rebellious behavior against your parents is rebellion against God. Honoring and obeying your parents is how you learn to honor and obey God. Your parents are like training wheels keeping you upright until you learn how to ride on your own.

If you live a life of rebellion against God, breaking His commandments, it will take your life down a path of destruction and death. The Bible says the wages of sin is death. We need to learn to deal with the rebellion in our hearts while we are young. When your parents ask you to clean your room and you say in your heart, "I don't want to," that is your chance to say, "I need to ask Jesus to forgive me and deal with my sin." When you learn to do that at a young age, it becomes easier at an older age. The consequences of not taking out the trash are minor compared to the consequences of the greater sins we enter into as adults.

If you live a life of submission to God, you will experience God's richest blessings. Jesus prayed to the Father, "Not my will, but yours be done." When your parents ask you to do something, you can even say, "Not my will, but yours be done, parents," and follow Jesus' example.

Here is a simple formula for the children: Obedience + Honor = Blessing. If you obey and honor your parents, you will walk in their blessing. And when you are an adult, if you obey and honor God, you will walk in His blessing.

A Word to Adult Children

I want to say a word for the adult children in here, which we all are. Sometimes when we grow up, we look back and realize our parents were not the most honorable. How do we, as adult children, honor our parents? I think this commandment transcends all ages. As we leave the home, there's autonomy in establishing our own family, but the command to honor remains.

If you look back on your childhood and see your parents did things that were not honorable, we have to look for things we can honor. We can say, "Yes, they failed in this area, but they did this, and it was a blessing to me." Maybe your father wasn't there emotionally, but he provided for you. Maybe your mother wasn't there the way she should have been, but she put food on the table and clothes on your back. You can honor them for that without bringing up everything they did wrong.

Honoring doesn't mean you agree on everything. My father and I disagreed on everything; all our conversations were debates! But you can still honor and respect someone even when you disagree with them. It manifests in your heart, your tone, and your words. Look at King David before he was king. Saul was trying to kill him, yet David still honored the position Saul held as king, even though Saul was a dishonorable man.

If you have a hard time doing that, it's an indication that there is a place in your heart you need to deal with before the Lord. You may be walking in unforgiveness. Unforgiveness can turn into bitterness, and it never stays isolated; it will always spread to your other relationships. You need to confess that sin before the Lord and ask Him to help you forgive. Forgiveness is a process. It can take many years. You might have to pray, "Lord, help me to forgive," and then pray it again five minutes later. Through that process, the Lord brings freedom from our past.

Conclusion and Closing Prayer

In conclusion today, God wants to bless you. God's heart toward you is one of love and blessing. But just like an earthly father cannot bless his children if they are disobeying and disrespecting, neither can God bless us if we are disobeying Him and the parents He has placed in our lives.

Kids, what does your attitude toward your parents reveal about your relationship with God? If you're not honoring your father and mother, it shows you are not honoring God. This is your opportunity to say, "Jesus, forgive me for disobeying and disrespecting. Help me to obey your Word." If you do that, it will go well with you.

I invite you to stand with me this morning. Our prayer teams will be up here and happy to pray with you. Why don't we just bow our heads and close our eyes here for a minute?

Children, have you been obeying your parents? Have you been walking in obedience and honoring them? Or have there been times you've let your own desires creep in and been disobedient? Maybe you've even lied to your parents. This is our chance right now to have our hearts washed clean before the Lord, to have a new beginning. That's the wonderful thing about the gospel—it's full of fresh starts. It starts with asking Jesus to forgive you and asking Him for His help.

I want to lead us all in a prayer today, especially the children. Let's say it together:

Dear Jesus, thank you for loving me. Thank you for sending Jesus to die for my sin. Help me to obey my parents. Help me to honor them. Forgive me for when I don't obey them. Forgive me for my sins. Help me, Jesus, to live for you. In Jesus' name, Amen.

We can pray that prayer every day, and I believe if we do, it will go well with us as we walk with Jesus. Amen.

categories 2025
tags Christ is King, All In The Family

Unity In Marriage - All In The Family Week 7

July 27, 2025Pastor Matt Bell

Sermon Summary

In this sermon based on Ephesians 5, Pastor Matt explores the biblical design for marital unity, focusing on the profound mystery that "the two shall become one flesh." He outlines five foundational truths: Christ is the only true and lasting source of unity, God is the one who actively joins a husband and wife together, couples must recognize their fundamental oneness, Satan actively attacks this unity through daily spiritual warfare, and the Word of God serves as the ultimate weapon against these attacks. To help couples cultivate and protect their marriages, Pastor Matt provides practical "offensive" strategies—such as praying together, maintaining physical intimacy, and budgeting collectively—alongside "defensive" safeguards, including resolving anger before bedtime, practicing quick repentance, and establishing strict digital and physical boundaries to defend the marriage from external threats.

Sermon Transcript

Introduction and Scripture Reading

If you would open with me in your Bibles to Ephesians chapter 5 this morning. Ephesians 5, we're going to continue our series for the summer, focusing on the family, "All in the Family."

Last week, we had a little bit of a break from our series with my friend, Pastor Ben Bufkin, who was here in town. How many of you appreciate the word that he brought last week about the sufficiency and the authority of God's word and how God's word in our life produces worship and transformation? It was really a wonderful word, and I would encourage you, if you missed it, to get on our website and let it minister to you.

Today, we're back in this series, and we're looking at this text that we have looked at now here for the last several weeks. This morning, we're going to focus on the phrase from verse 31, where Paul says that husband and wife are one flesh. We're going to focus on that phrase this morning, looking at the kind of unity that God desires for us to have as husband and wife in marriage. We'll read the whole passage just so we have the context this morning, but we are going to focus in on that particular portion today. I invite you to stand with me. We'll jump right in to the Word of God today. We'll start here in verse 22:

Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now, as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their own husbands.
Husbands, love your wives as Christ has 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 in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that you might be holy and without blemish. 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, because we are members of his body.
Therefore, a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father and mother. This is the first commandment with a promise, that it may go well with you, that you may live long in the land. Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Father, speak to our hearts today through your word. Lord, I know that there are many different people in here, from many different walks of life. Lord, there are those of us here today who are married. There are those of us here today who are not. There are those of us here who are pursuing marriage. There are those of us whose spouses are no longer here with us, but are there in your presence today. Lord, I pray that you would help us, all of us this morning, to see how we fit into your design for the family, that we might have a greater understanding of your work in our lives. Lord, that your word would have that effect that we heard last week. Lord, it doesn't return to you void, but it produces a great harvest. I pray your word would work in our hearts by your Holy Spirit today, that our marriages, our relationships, would bring you glory. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.

You may be seated today.

The Desperation for Jesus in Marriage

This is the seventh message in this series, and we've walked through this passage, looking at, really verse by verse, the relationship of a wife to her husband, the relationship of a husband to his wife. And in all of it, what we've seen over and over again is just how desperate we are for Jesus to be in the middle of our relationships as married couples. Jesus said, "Without me, you can do nothing." And that certainly applies to this passage. It certainly applies to living a life and having a marriage that brings honor and glory to him. If we don't have Jesus in the middle of it, there's no hope for us in any area of life. We need Jesus.

Today, as I mentioned, we are focusing in on this phrase in verse 31: "that the two shall become one flesh." This unity that God designed marriage to have. This might come as a surprise to some of you, depending on your background and how you grew up or even the marriage you might be in, but God actually wants husband and wife to be unified in marriage. For there to be unity among the husband and the wife. Unfortunately, oftentimes the exact opposite is true. Oftentimes there's not harmony, but great clashing and disunity in a home and a marriage. And when that happens, it does not bring honor and glory to God.

Disunity, disharmony, fighting, bickering, tearing each other down with our words, constantly arguing about every little thing under the sun, in no way gives glory to God in marriage. Jesus said this, that every house divided against itself will not stand. Division and disunity in a marriage do not bring God glory. In fact, they are the pathway to divorce. When there's division, disunity, fighting, that is the pathway to eventual separation and divorce. And if we want to, on the other hand, leave a legacy of God-glorifying marriages, representing well what he teaches here, handing on our example of faithfulness in marriage to our spouse, to our children, and grandchildren—if we want to do that as married couples, we must strive for unity in our marriages. It's something we have to work for, something we have to strive for, something we have to labor for. So this is what we're going to be talking about here this morning.

I want to begin by laying out for you five truths about marital unity. We'll start with some truths and then we'll finish today by looking at some applications, some things that we can do to protect the unity of our marriages.

Five Truths About Marital Unity

1. Christ is the Only True Source of Unity

The first truth that you need to know if you're going to have unity in your marriage, if you're going to be one flesh with your spouse, is that Christ is the only true source of unity. I debated on whether to use the word source or to use the word foundation here. Both are absolutely applicable. He is the only foundation for true and lasting unity.

Now, are there other things besides Christ that can unify and bring people together? Yes, there are. There are many other things in life that people unite around, that bring people together. For example, in marriage, people will often have their feelings for one another be their unifying factor. How they feel about one another will be the source of their unity. That's okay in as far as it goes, but that doesn't go very far because our feelings are temporary. Our feelings change all the time. If my marital unity is based on how I feel in my emotions, the unity in my marriage will be like a roller coaster ride. It'll be all over the place because I feel one way one day, I feel another way the next. I feel all kinds of things all the time, and I know that you are the exact same way.

Some married couples let their physical attraction to one another be their source of unity. That's fine when you're 19 and 20, but we're all eventually subject to gravity, the aging effects of the sun, and poor diet, and all of these things. So if simply physical attractiveness is the source of what brings us unity in marriage, what happens when we're not attracted to each other in the way that we used to be? Oftentimes, that unity that was there disappears.

Every other source of unity, whatever it might be other than Christ, is temporary and will ultimately fail. If a marriage is built on, centered around, the foundation for the marriage is anything other than Christ, eventually the cracks will come in. Now, people can stay together. How many of you have known people who have just stuck it out? Because "I said, 'I do,' and I'm just going to stick it out till death do us part, till Jesus comes, or I die, and I hope I die tomorrow because I can't take this anymore." There's a better way to live as a married couple than just sticking it out. That's to be unified around Christ.

You see, Christ is eternal. He's not temporary, and he never fails. So when we base our marriage around Christ, the only source, the only foundation, we are basing our marriage on something that will last and will never fail. Jesus said everything else is shifting sand. Everything else will not stand the storms of life. There are storms of life. It's easy to get along with your spouse when everything's going well. But when things aren't going well, when there are storms and troubles—and tribulation and storms are promised to all of us—what then is the source of our unity? Christ is eternal, and he will never fail. The reason that I, personally, am devoted to my wife is because I am first devoted to Christ. Because he is my king, he is my savior. He has saved me, changed me, forgiven me, given me an eternal hope. He's my Lord. As I seek to serve him, as I come to his word, because he is number one, his word instructs me on how I am to live in relationship to my spouse. And it's the same with Heather as well. Christ is the only true and lasting source of unity in marriage.

Flip back with me to Ephesians 1, looking at verses 9 and 10. This is speaking of God the Father, what he has done for us through God the Son, Jesus. It says in verse 9:

...making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

This is what God is doing through Christ, through the cross, through the gospel. He is restoring, reconciling, uniting all things back into their proper relationship to him as the Creator. All things united in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth—that includes our marriages. There is no other true source of unity other than Jesus Christ.

Look at chapter 2, verse 14 of Ephesians. Here Paul is speaking about Jews and Gentiles, the strong division that was there. But he says:

For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility.

Oftentimes there's hostilities in marriage. But it's only through Christ that those divisions can be erased, done away with, abolished. The division here he's talking about is between Jew and Gentile. And if God can reconcile Jew and Gentile, he absolutely can reconcile you and your spouse over whatever little squabble you might be having.

Look here at Ephesians chapter 4, starting in verse 1. Paul says:

I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift.

This is how we, as believers in Christ, are called to walk with one another. Humility, patience, bearing with one another in love, maintaining the unity of the Holy Spirit in our marriage, in our homes. Now all of these verses—chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 4—none of them are specifically about marriage. Those are just verses on how to treat one another in the body of Christ. How to treat your brothers and sisters in Christ.

Let me ask you this: Is your spouse your brother or sister in Christ? I'm speaking to Christian couples here this morning. I understand that you may be married to someone who is not a believer in Christ. Paul in 1 Corinthians 7 and Peter in 1 Peter 3 give specific instructions on how we as believers should relate to an unbelieving spouse. But in both of those passages, he doesn't lower the bar. He raises the bar. Because he says, this is how we're to treat one another in the body of Christ, but the bar should be raised when we're treating people outside because we're to be lights to them, that they might come to know and love our Savior. Because we're representing Jesus to them.

But if you're married to a believing spouse, something that we really should meditate on, but I think sometimes we forget, is that your spouse is a member of the body of Christ. If you're a husband, your wife is your sister in Christ. If you're a wife, your husband is your brother in Christ. I don't think we reflect on that enough in marriage. Two believers in marriage share a unity and a bond that will last for eternity. Though our marriage bond here on Earth will not last for all eternity, our union with each other in Christ will. And it's important for us to recognize this, because all of the instructions we have in the Word of God about how to treat our brothers and sisters in Christ apply to our marriage. How awful would it be for us to have this high standard for how we treat our sisters in Christ—I'll just speak to the husbands here—we come to church, we endeavor to live by the Word of God and treat our sisters in Christ this way, and at home we don't do it. How awful would that be? That we don't treat our spouse like our brother and our sister in Christ.

All of the "one anothers" in the Word of God that speak to how we as believers should treat one another apply to marriage. Be at peace with one another, accept one another. Do not grumble against one another. Be of the same mind with one another. Clothe yourselves with humility. Love one another, serve one another, encourage one another, build each other up, speak the truth to one another. Teach and admonish. Be kind, tenderhearted, forgiving one another. Bear with one another. Don't complain against each other. Serve each other. Give preference to one another, prefer one another in honor. Confess your sins. Do not bite and devour one another. Do not envy, do not lie, do not judge, do not slander one another. Yes, they're your spouse. Yes, they're your wife. Yes, they're your husband. But they're also a child of God. We, as believers in Christ, are called to treat the people of God in a particular way. And all of those apply to marriage. Christ being the source of our unity means seeking to obey his word in our relationships with our spouse.

When I was considering pursuing Heather, before I did, I went and sat down with her father, who's here today, Doug Pittman. I asked his permission to begin speaking with her. I told him my intentions. I wasn't saying I was going to marry her. I just wanted to pursue her. He gave me his blessing, and he also said, "Just by the way, if you mistreat her, I can swing a 9-iron really hard." There was a little bit of a joke in that, and a little bit that's not a joke. He was telling me, in no uncertain terms, you better treat my daughter right. If it's that way with earthly fathers, how much more with our heavenly Father? We better treat God's daughters right. We better treat God's sons right. Christ becomes the only true and lasting source of unity as it's an expression of my relationship with the Lord, that I seek to keep God's word towards my spouse. Everything else will eventually fade and fail.

2. God is the One Who Unites Husband and Wife

God is the one who brings husband and wife together in marriage. Flip over with me to Matthew 19. The Pharisees come and ask Jesus a question about marriage and divorce. In verse 4, Jesus says this:

"Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, 'Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh'?"

That portion, we see Paul quoting in our passage, Ephesians 5. But here in verse 6, Jesus goes on to say:

"So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate."

God is the one who unites husband and wife in marriage. It is not the pastor who pronounces them husband and wife who unites them. It's not the priest. It's not the state or the government that makes man and wife one. Marriage is a covenant that is sovereignly administered by God. He uses a minister to make the pronouncement, but God is the one who joins husband and wife together. His argument is: if you didn't do the joining, you don't have the right to do the separating. We cannot break what God has put together.

God's plan is for faithfulness, fidelity, for us to keep God's word towards our spouses, loving them, cherishing them, protecting them, honoring them. We live in a fallen and broken world. Many people do not remain faithful to their vows. Many people, even Christians, try to build their marriage on some foundation other than Christ, which eventually leads to catastrophe. When a spouse separates from you and breaks their vows, you need to understand that you are not the one who did the separating. They broke what God put together. In those circumstances, when there's been unfaithfulness, there enters in sin and separation, and the believing spouse is free. The Apostle Paul is very clear on this in 1 Corinthians 7; the believer is free to remarry in the Lord.

But divorce is not the goal of marriage. Faithfulness, fidelity, humility, bearing with one another in love, leaving a godly legacy, a testimony to Christ and his work is the goal. We all know we can't have the kind of marriage God wants us to have in our own strength. If there's any good in marriage, any faithfulness, any true and lasting and abiding love, it brings glory to Christ because in and of ourselves, that's nothing we can produce.

3. Because God Has United You, You Are One

I know that sounds elementary, but this is a fact that we can forget. Sometimes we think that there's two people in a marriage, but there really is one party. This is what the text says: God has joined them together, there is no longer two, but one flesh. You need to view yourself and your spouse as one. Why? Because you are one. Is that not what the text says?

You need to recognize this and constantly remind your children of this. My children love to pit us against each other. They're experts at trying to weasel their way in between me and my wife to get what they want. I remind my kids all the time: "No, Mom said this. We're one. What she says counts for me. What I say counts for her. You're not going to get us to start disagreeing with one another." I have wonderful children, but just like me, they're sinners too. And where do they get it from? They get it from me, their sinful father. I'm able to recognize it very quickly.

Husbands and wives, you need to understand you are one. You need to remind yourself of this, and this is something God needs to give you by revelation. You might say, "Well, I feel like there's two of us." It's probably because there's some disunity there. There's probably some things you're not unified on that you need to resolve and work through. When there's true unity in marriage, there is this oneness that comes between husband and wife that is glorious and beautiful and is a perfect reflection of Christ and the church. Paul says husbands should love their wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. If I mistreat my spouse, I'm mistreating myself. If I attack her, I'm just shooting myself in the foot, because we are one.

4. Satan Will Attack Your Unity

Because you are one and have been made one by God, Satan will attack your unity. We see this in Genesis chapter 3 at the beginning of the human story. Satan does not even show up until there's a marriage. It's only after man and woman have been brought together that Satan begins to attack them because Satan hates marriage. Good, godly marriage is a picture of Christ and the church. He wants your marriage to fail.

What this means is that every single day of marriage is spiritual warfare. We don't get a day off. Sometimes when we think of spiritual warfare, we think of The Exorcist or magic spells. Listen, that's not spiritual warfare. Spiritual warfare is the battle between truth and lies. That's it. Principalities, powers, strongholds—it's through lies entering in. The lies of our emotions, our feelings, and our misunderstandings are all lies we have to be on guard against. Every day is spiritual warfare, but not spiritual warfare against your spouse. You are one with your spouse. Your spouse is not your enemy or your competition. You are on the same team. Spiritual warfare in marriage is you and your spouse against the devil.

5. Our Weapon in This Battle is the Word of God

Your marriage will be attacked by the devil in a daily battle, and we have one weapon to fight against him: the Word of God. Are you skilled and trained in the Word of God? Do you know it? Are you so trained in the truth that when Satan sows lies into your marriage, you are able to spot them? If you're not, there are things you can do. You can read the Bible every day. You can go to Kingdom Bible Institute (KBI). You can get in a community group together. You need to be trained in the truth. This is a daily thing: God's word daily washing over us, daily reaffirming our commitments to the Lord as we spend time with him in his word.

Practical Applications for Marital Unity

I want to finish today with some applications. How do we apply these truths? The first is that we need to play offense in our marriage; that's being proactive. The second is we have to know how to play defense; that's being reactive. Proactive means the things we're actively doing to produce and protect unity. Defensive means how we defend against the things that come our way.

Playing Offense: Proactive Steps

First and foremost, pray with your spouse. There is something so powerful when a husband and wife pray together and for one another. If you're not doing that, today's your day to start. Don't look back at the wasted years; that's the devil's way of keeping you in bondage. If you have little kids in the house, it's difficult to spend hours in prayer, but you can make it part of your daily life. Just praying together at the beginning of the day as you head off to work, asking for God's blessing and protection, is a powerful weapon. It's very difficult to pray bad things for somebody. When there's friction, praying together forces God to start working in my heart to genuinely ask for their good.

Number two: encourage each other with the Word of God. Share Scripture with one another. Make the Word of God central in your home. It reorients everybody's heart around the truth after we've all gone our different ways throughout the day.

Thirdly, worship the Lord together. You're here doing this today—great. Make this a priority. Here's something we can grow in: when you hear the word of God preached, take that word and chew on it together throughout the week. Spend time on Sunday evening or Monday saying, "What was it the Lord spoke to you? How are we going to live this out this week?" Then hold each other accountable with positive encouragement. Don't let distractions take away the seed of the Word of God before you even make it to the parking lot.

Another thing that protects unity proactively is having consistent physical intimacy with one another. That one-flesh union involves the sexual union of a wife with her husband. Paul talks about this in 1 Corinthians 7:3-4, that this is something we owe to our spouse. We have pledged fidelity to one another. The flip side is making ourselves available to guard and protect each other because our flesh is weak. The Puritans had a beautiful saying for intimacy in marriage: "due benevolence." D-U-E, due benevolence. We owe this love to one another. Try texting your spouse, "We're going to have some due benevolence today." See how it works! But it needs to be a regular part of marriage. If not, Paul says you make room for the devil.

I would also encourage you to have a clearly defined purpose statement for your family. What is your marriage about? If it's only personal satisfaction, that's too low. In my family, we have a very clear understanding that the chief end of man is to glorify God. When you both understand that the purpose of your marriage is for the glory of God, it becomes the lens through which you evaluate everything. You're working together towards the same goal, not butting heads.

I would also encourage you to have a monthly budget. A lot of conflicts arise over money. In marriage, there is ourmoney. You are one. My kids will say, "Dad, she doesn't make money, she stays at home, you decide." I remind them, "It's not my money, it's our money." She contributes to this household just as much as I do. You both bring it to the table, budget together, and decide how you are going to spend it for the glory of Christ.

Finally on offense, carve out time together regularly alone. Get the kids in bed early, and spend time together without the children. Make it a priority once a week.

Playing Defense: Reactive Safeguards

Let me run through defense really quickly. Number one is: do not go to bed angry. Ephesians 4:26 says, "Do not let the sun go down on your wrath." We have arguments, we don't always agree, and sometimes we get angry. But we need to make sure we don't go to bed angry. That doesn't mean we will agree before going to bed, but it means we have reconciled and cleared the air. We reaffirm our love and commitment, saying, "We'll continue to discuss this later, but honey, I love you, you love me, and we love Christ." When we go to bed angry, we make room for the devil.

Secondly, be quick to confess your sins and repent. When you sin against your spouse—and news flash, you are a sinner—be very quick to confess, ask for forgiveness, and repent. Take it to Jesus and get it under the blood as quickly as possible.

Thirdly, guard your spouse from outside criticism. This can come from family, often from a father or mother who is critical of your spouse. There comes a day when you leave your father and mother, and you say, "Mom and Dad, thank you, but you need to be quiet. I love you and honor you, but I'm not going to listen to you criticize my wife or my husband." Husbands, you can't go riding off to Mommy every time you have a spat with your spouse to hear her tell you how good you are and how bad your wife is. Do not allow outside voices to bring criticism.

Next, have proper digital safeguards. This includes blockers on devices and open access. Your spouse should know your passwords. If they ask to see your phone, you should hand it over without hesitation, day or night. If there's hesitation, there's a real problem.

Lastly, put proper physical safeguards in place. This would include things like the Billy Graham rule. My dad taught all his sons never to be alone with a woman who is not our wife. That is an honorable standard that shows you care deeply about protecting your marriage from the devil's attacks. A wife should have the standard never to be alone with another man, and a husband never alone with another woman.

Conclusion and Closing Prayer

The only true source of unity is Christ and his word. As we seek to live under his lordship, we can pursue unity in our marriages for his glory. When Christ is the standard and the unifying factor, he glues us together. The storms of life will come, but with Christ in the middle, our houses will stand and he will be glorified.

I invite you to stand with me as we close today. If you're with your spouse, I encourage you to take their hand. I want to pray a blessing over the marriages that are here today.

Father, I just thank you for the marriages of this house, the marriages of Christ as King Church. Lord, I thank you for the gift of marriage and the godly spouses you have given us. None of us are perfect, but I thank you that you've shown us in your word how we can live at unity with one another. I pray that as we seek first your kingdom, you would produce such unity, peace, love, and joy in our marriages that we would be a reflection of you, Jesus, and the church. Even the watching world would look and take note. We confess that without you we can do nothing, but with you all things are possible.
For those going through a difficult season, I pray you would build their faith to trust and obey your word. Where there's brokenness from past hurts, bring deep and lasting healing. I declare freedom over the marriages of this house from hurts, abuse, and words spoken. We lay those things down at the foot of the cross. Lord, unite our hearts together. Put a love in our hearts for our spouse that is eternal, unwavering, and based on your steadfast love. Help us to live this way, not out of selfish ambition, but as a desire to see you glorified in our homes and our families. In Christ's name, we pray. Amen.

categories 2025
tags Christ is King, All In The Family

The Need For Expositional Preaching

July 20, 2025Pastor Matt Bell

categories 2025
tags Christ is King

The Husband's Duties - All In The Family Week 6

July 13, 2025Pastor Matt Bell

Sermon Summary

In this sermon from the "All in the Family" series, Pastor Matt preaches from Ephesians 5 on the husband's duty in marriage, summarizing it in a single word: love. He explains that a husband's love must be patterned after Christ’s perfect love for the church, outlining four key aspects of this calling. First, it must be a sacrificing love, prioritizing selfless action and giving over mere words. Second, it is a sanctifying love, where the husband takes initiative in washing his wife with the Word of God and shepherding her spiritual growth. Third, it requires a sheltering love that cherishes, honors, and protects her as a delicate vessel against the enemy's deception. Finally, it must be a strengthening love that spiritually nourishes the family through the husband's own vibrant, disciplined walk with Christ. Acknowledging the impossibility of meeting this standard in human strength, Pastor Matt concludes by urging men to humble themselves, confess their inadequacies, and rely entirely on the sustaining grace and power of Jesus Christ.

Sermon Transcript

Introduction

If you have your Bibles open with me to Ephesians chapter 5, we will be again looking at our theme verse on the family. We're in a series called All in the Family. We're spending time this summer looking at the family, God's design for the family, God's purpose for the family, and how each of us are called to live out our lives in relation to that.

Last week, of course, we looked at the wife's duties in a marriage, and this Sunday, this morning, we're moving on, and today we're looking at the husband's duties in marriage. But next Sunday, we'll take a brief break from our series, and we have a special guest speaker who will be with us next Sunday morning, and that's my dear friend, Pastor Ben Buffkin. He'll be here ministering for us next week, and I'm really looking forward to having him here and spending some time with him. He'll have his wife, Estelle, here with them as well. So that'll be next Sunday, a little bit of a break, and then we'll jump back into this family series.

Scripture Reading

So today, from Ephesians chapter 5, we're looking at the husband's duties in marriage. The husband's duties in marriage. So I invite you, if you would, stand with me this morning. We're gonna jump right in today. We're not gonna waste any time getting into God's Word. We're going to be looking at, again, this theme verse. We've looked at it several times, but again, this morning, Ephesians chapter 5 will start here in verse 22. It says:

"Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
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 in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 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, because we are members of his body.
'Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.' This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 'Honor your father and mother' (this is the first commandment with a promise), 'that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.' Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."

Let's pray.

Father, we do thank you for your word. It is that lamp unto our feet and light unto our path. Lord, though our world and our culture and our nation has chosen to walk away from the light of your word, to not follow after the path that your word outlines, nevertheless, God, you have called us out of darkness and into light.
And so today, God, I pray that you would help illuminate our paths by the light of your word. Lord, that this word to us would be your word, not the words of an apostle or the apostle Paul, but your words inspired by the Holy Spirit. And Lord, that you would show us where in our lives we need to yield ourselves more completely, humble ourselves, submit ourselves to you fully, and that we would live for your glory, that we would live shining as lights in a dark and dying world. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.

The Husband's Duty: Love

You may be seated this morning. We did focus on last week the duties of a wife in marriage, and if you were not here last week, if you missed it, I would encourage you to go and listen to that. But today, we are starting here in verse 25 with the husband's duty in marriage.

Now, as I mentioned last week, sometimes we don't like that word "duty," especially as tied to marriage, because often we think that duty and romance aren't compatible. They seem like they are at odds with each other. And I reminded us last week that when we get married, we make vows to one another. And in those marriage vows, one of the things that we promise is that we will perform unto our spouse all of the duties that we owe them as their spouse. Duty does not have to be a drudgery. Duty can be a glorious thing, can be an honorable thing, can be something to be admired when someone is faithful in keeping their word and keeping their vows, even in the midst of great, sometimes hardship and difficulty. And so this is what we're looking at here today. Where do we find these duties that we have vowed to in marriage?

Now, I know that there's many people here today that are not married, and maybe you are looking for a spouse. Maybe you're here a single lady today looking for a husband. As we start to walk through what these duties are, this should paint for you a portrait of the kind of man that you are looking for in a husband. So even though you are not a wife here today or you may not be married here today—maybe you're a single man here today that aspires to be married—you need to know that when you do get married, this is what God is calling you to as a husband. And wives who are here today, you might say, "Well, what does this have to do with me? This is just for my husband." You can even begin to pray and intercede that God would help your husband to be the kind of man that he has called him to be, that we will see here revealed in God's Word. So there truly is something in here for everyone here today.

But the husband's duty can be simply summarized in one word: love. Husbands, your duty is love. To love your wife. And I'm glad that God made it simple for us. One word. Love. What is my duty? Love. And if that's all you hear today, and that's all you take away today, I will have been successful this morning. Love, that is what we are called to. We are called to love our wives. The whole of our duties can be summarized, are encapsulated in this one word: love.

Now, a husband's love for his wife will never compare to the measure of Christ's love. Christ's love truly is without limits. Without measure. The way in which Christ has loved us, has laid himself down for us, we could never, even on our best day, hope to love our wives in the measure of Christ's love. But yet, we are called to pattern our love after the way Christ has loved us. Our capacity as human beings is limited. We're limited in our abilities. We're limited in our capacities. We're limited in even our energy levels. But in all of those things, Christ is not limited. He is eternal. Our motives, oftentimes, even in marriage, are not pure. They are compromised, but his motives are perfectly pure. The measure of Christ's love we could never compare to, but the pattern—the pattern we can imitate the best we can, the kind of love that he displays towards us, his church.

So the question arises, how did Christ love the church? He says that we are to love our wives as Christ loved the church. In what ways does Christ show his love for his church? And how well, husbands, you are able to answer that question will relate directly to how well you are able to love your wife. So if I ask you, husbands, "How has Christ loved the church?" and you say, "Uh, I don't know," that tells me a lot, not just about your relationship with God, but now your relationship with your wife. It tells me you don't know how to love your wife if you don't know how Christ has loved you.

And so this makes meditation and reflection on the work of Christ paramount to the husband fulfilling his duty to his wife. Meditating on the love of Christ is not simply a theological exercise. It becomes an immensely practical exercise, because the better I am acquainted with, I feel deeply Christ's love for me, the better I can then as a husband go and show that kind of love to my wife. So before we even get into how Christ has loved us, I want to ask you husbands, how often do you think about, meditate on, dwell on Christ and his love for us, his love for you? If you don't think much on Christ, you won't be fulfilling, living out the duty to which Christ has called you. We must be well acquainted with the love of Christ, meditating on his love, often, daily, moment by moment, so that we can love our wives the way he has loved us.

So this morning, we're gonna look at five—four. I've cut it down. Four aspects of Christ's love. Four aspects of Christ's love. And you might, like me, after we look at these four aspects today, you might say, "I need to grow in all of these." And that's how I felt this week preparing this sermon. And let me just say, I'm not sharing these with you as the person who lives these perfectly by any stretch of the imagination. My guess is go talk to Heather after church, and she can give you probably a whole list of ways in which I fail in this. I'm not presenting this to you as the person to follow. I'm presenting this to you as this is what God's word says, and this is what God has called us to. And so like me, I'm sure all of you husbands, and even single men who aspire to marriage, would say, "I need to grow in all of these aspects of Christ's love." But as I present these four to us this morning, I want to encourage you: pick one. Pick one. Take one that you are the weakest in, and say, "This week, I am going to endeavor, by the grace of God and the power of the Spirit, to grow in my showing of love, this kind of love to my spouse." This week, and then next week, take the next, and so on. Start where you lack the most because that is the easiest to begin to make up ground.

1. A Sacrificing Love

So number one, we see in this a sacrificing love. Sacrificing love. Husbands, verse 25, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. Jesus sacrificed for us. He gave himself. He loved so much. John 3:16, the most famous verse in the whole Bible:

"For God so loved the world that he gave..."

He gave. So this kind of love, this sacrificing love, this love is an action. There's the famous song that says love is a verb, not a noun. It's a verb. Love is not love without action. If there's no action behind it, there is no love. Love is not expressed simply in words or simply in feelings. The truest expression of love is not in word, but in deed. In living out our love.

Now, words are wonderful. I love words, and we should, husbands, express our love to our wives in our words. And rightly expressed words can stir our emotion. They can even entice romantic feelings, which is great. I am all for that. But some men think that this is the extent of love. That simply making grand statements and gestures and declaring their passion and love is the sum total of what it means to love somebody. But they follow it up with no action. They don't live out what they express. There is no giving, there is no sacrifice. Instead, often these grand expressions are not rooted in a heart of love at all, but end up rather being self-serving.

Sometimes men use charming words to bend young women to their whims and even sexual advances. So young single ladies, do not fall for a man who is simply a smooth talker. Action is what matters. Action is what matters. And if you are with a man who is not respecting you as a woman, by pursuing you outside of marriage, hear me, that man does not love you. He loves himself. He loves himself. He's only interested in what he can get. But Jesus's love is a love that gives. A love that gives, a love that pours out. Jesus gave his very life. He poured out his very blood. There are many smooth talkers in the world who want to talk their way into a young lady's bedroom, but have no intention of commitment, have no intention of sacrificing whatsoever. Don't fall for a man like that. It is much better to be married to an ineloquent man of great character than a selfish, smooth talker who is morally compromised. Action is what matters.

The missionary Amy Carmichael said this about love. She said:

"You can give without loving, but you can't love without giving."

God so loved the world that he gave. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave. It's an action. And what was it that Christ gave? It says he gave himself up for her. This is the love of Christ. It's not always pretty. Sometimes it's a little gritty. When you look at the cross, it's a horrific display, truly. But it's the most beautiful thing in the world. Jesus laying down his life, suffering, suffering for his bride. Taking upon himself what we deserve. Our sin, our shame, so that we could be clothed in his righteousness. There is no greater love than the love of Christ. There is no greater example of love than Christ's love. God showed his love for us in this: while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. He gave himself. He gave all of who he is. He gave his everything. And this shows us that he loved us more than he loved himself.

And this is the type of love that a husband is called to show to his wife. A selfless love. A love that's not about, "What can you do for me?" See, the world's love is totally transactional. It's not really love at all. But it's totally transactional. "I'll love you as long as I get what I want out of this relationship." No, love is not about getting, love is about giving. Christ loved, he gave, he gave himself. He laid his very own life down, a selfless love.

I think that many husbands—and if I ask the husbands in here today, the husbands who are willing to give their lives for their wives, they would be even willing to die for their wives if I asked that. I bet every single husband would stand in here this morning. "Yes, I would be willing to die for my wife." I think many of the husbands in here, we would not hesitate in a moment to stand in the face of great danger if it meant protecting our wives. But the great irony is that sometimes those same husbands who would so quickly lay down their lives, oftentimes are so selfish when it comes to the day in and day out living with their wife. We would die in a moment. But Jesus calls us to die every day. To lay down our life every day. We would go out in a blaze of glory. But we think, "Well, how much glory is there in this daily sacrifice, this daily surrendering, this daily giving?" If we are willing to lay our lives down for our wives in a moment of glory, we should be willing to do it in the small things as well. Amen.

What this shows us is that this headship that it talks about, that Christ is the head of the church and the husband is the head of his wife... Because Christ is our example, he shows us that headship is not tyranny. Headship is not tyranny. Headship is not trampling, just as Christ is not a tyrant in our lives, but he is gentle, he is lowly, he is humble. He serves us. So likewise, husbands are not called to be tyrants towards their wives, but are called to be selfless, not selfish. That's that sacrificing kind of love.

2. A Sanctifying Love

The second kind of love is a sanctifying love. We see this in verse 26 that Christ gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her. And it tells us how he does this: by cleansing her, that's the church, by the washing of water with the word.

Jesus's love is a sanctifying love. It is a cleansing love. Jesus washes us with his word, even right now. As we are receiving his word, it is washing over us. It has a purifying effect in our lives, cleansing out our old way of thinking and replacing it with his way of thinking, which is the reality, which is truth itself. So his word washes us and he himself washes us with his word. But his word not only washes us and cleanses us and purifies us. His word refreshes us. It is a refreshing thing to be sanctified in his word. His word strengthens us. Have you received strength from the Word of God before? The promises of God? His word encourages us. Have you ever been down, discouraged, feeling the weight of the world, and you come to God's word, and it brings courage and builds you up? It lifts you up as you reflect on the all-consuming promises of God that are yes and amen in Christ. So God's word, it purifies, it cleanses, it refreshes, it encourages, it strengthens us. These are Christ's words to us and what they do in our lives.

And in a similar way, husbands are called to sanctify their wives with their words. So two thoughts on this. Number one, husbands, what kind of words are you speaking to your wife? Are they in the pattern of words that Christ speaks to us? Sanctifying words, cleansing words, encouraging words, strengthening words, pure words. Are they those kinds of words? Are they words that build up? Praising our wives for who they are and how they are a life to us, a spouse to us, a companion to us, a help to us. Or are they words that tear down? A critical spirit. Always finding fault. Nothing she ever does is good enough. Always needs a little tweak, always needs a little adjustment. What kind of words are you speaking to your wife? Are they after the pattern of Christ's sanctifying word? Or are they after another pattern of words tearing down?

I think this is an area that we must seriously consider. "Am I building my wife up with my words or am I tearing her down?" Listen, if you're tearing your wife down with your words, you're tearing your own house down. Jesus says, no one ever hated his own flesh. We should love our wives as we love our own bodies, care for our wives as we care for our own bodies. If you tear your wife down, you're tearing yourself down. We are one flesh. What kind of words would you like someone to speak to you? Do unto others how you would have them do unto you. The golden rule. What kind of words are you speaking to your wife? That's the first thought. Are they like Christ's words?

The second thought on this is that the best words you could ever speak to your wife would be God's word. Would be the scripture. This is the only perfect thing on planet Earth. This is it. There's nothing else perfect in this world. Everything else is at fault, everything else is tainted by sin. Even our own love for one another will be imperfect. There's only one perfect thing in this world. Of course, it is the word of God. It's God's word. And so the best words that I could ever speak to my wife would be God's Word. Those words would be perfect. And so how can I do that unless I am hiding God's word in my heart? Unless I am daily spending time in God's word. You can try all your life and you will never find any words better than these. You will never find more powerful words, you will never find more transforming words. So husbands, it is our duty to speak God's word to our wives. Words that cleanse, words that refresh, words that encourage, words that strengthen.

Just as Jesus washes us with his word, and this shows his ongoing commitment to our flourishing in our spiritual life. Just as Jesus takes responsibility upon his shoulders for our spiritual life, for our spiritual condition, husbands, we are likewise called to take responsibility of our wives' spiritual state, spiritual condition. This is something God has called us to. Husbands, the state of your wife's spiritual life, it is our responsibility. God has placed her under our care. We must take this on our shoulders.

Now, of course, wives as individuals are accountable to God for their actions, for the state of their soul, absolutely. I'm not negating that at all. Of course, as an individual, she is accountable to God. But she is also under our care as part of our family. And husbands, it's our job to shepherd our wives' souls. You husbands are your wife's first pastor. Shepherd. This love that is sanctifying. I want you to feel the weight of this responsibility. This means this sanctifying love, it means that we are loving our wives in such a way that they are growing in Christ, that they are flourishing in Christ, that their love for Jesus and Christ and his kingdom, and his word, and his will, and his ways is growing, not diminishing.

Here's a thought I want us to consider today, husbands. Is your wife more like Jesus because she is married to you? Are our wives more like Jesus? Are they growing in the image of Christ because she is married to you, or is she more like Jesus in spite of you? There are positive forces in our growing in Christ, and there are negative forces in our growing in Christ. We can grow in Christ through encouragement, people coming alongside of us, helping us, leading us, guiding us. That's positive reinforcement. And then there's the negative. Where we are being tested, where we are being tried, where our patience is being put to the limit, and we are having to show the love of Christ despite how we are being treated. Husbands, which one are you in the life of your wife? Are you the positive influence helping her grow in Christ, or is she growing in Christ in spite of you, in response to your negative influence in her life?

I pray it is the positive. Because truly that is our calling. That is our calling to shepherd our wives' souls. Sharing the word of God. Making the word of God, and our commitment to the word of God, central to our life together as husband and spouse. That is our calling. Taking this responsibility, not just for our own spiritual condition, but for hers as well, on our shoulders. This requires us to take initiative. To be a leader, to be out front, not to be lagging behind.

I'm going to meddle with you right now. If you didn't think I was meddling, here we go. Buckle up. Husbands, your wife shouldn't be the one to say, "Are we going to church tomorrow?" Ever. In fact, husbands, that should never be a question in your house. It should be a given. Do you think Heather asks me on Saturday night, "We going to church tomorrow?" It's not a question. It's not a question. You say, "Well, that's your job, and you have to show up." Yeah, it is. But, even when we go on vacation, we go to church. It's not even a question. Why? Because this is the Lord's day. And God's people are called to be in his house and worshiping him and taking the Lord's supper and focusing on him on the Lord's day. Husbands, this needs to be a settled issue. As for me and my house, we serve the Lord. On the Lord's day, we're gathering with God's people.

I understand things come up. I understand people get sick. I'm not saying there's no extenuating circumstances, but what I am saying is it shouldn't be your wife driving this bus. You're the head of your household. You should be driving this spiritual bus. If you have children in the home, you should be getting the children ready on Saturday night. It's time to start thinking about tomorrow morning. You know what? I can't remember when it was. It was a few Sundays ago. I wasn't preaching. I think Pastor Mark was preaching, and maybe it was after I had back surgery or something. I woke up on a Sunday morning, and I couldn't believe how easy it was to get here by 10 o'clock. Like, we would have had to try to be late to not be here by 10 a.m. Like, it's so late in the day. We got up, we lounged around, we had our coffee, we read our Bible, we had breakfast. It's like, "Well, I guess we could get the kids up." We got the kids up, we got them dressed. It was the easiest thing. 10 a.m.? 10 a.m.? Like, it hadn't really dawned on me how easy it is to get somewhere by 10 a.m., just until a few weeks ago, when I just came to church, and we strolled in here 20 minutes before church, and it was like, because there's nothing else going on.

Now, if you stay up till 1:00 a.m., 2:00 a.m., 3:00 a.m., watching whatever show you're watching, filling your mind with, you know, whatever, then you're going to be a little bit groggy on Sunday morning. But if you say, "No, we're going to go worship God tomorrow. I want to meet with God tomorrow. I want my mind to be alert. I want my heart to be tuned. I want my heart to be ready." Husbands, drive the bus for your house. Amen. Man, y'all are whatever. Whatever. This is God's word, okay? You don't like it? You take it up with him.

So taking responsibility requires taking initiative. That means you're out front. That means you're the leader. It means you are responsible for the spiritual growth or lack of it in your household. And if there is not spiritual growth, you need to get your gear engaged. You need to say, "Okay, what is going on here? Why is there no growth? Why are we not growing in our sanctification, our holiness, our righteousness, our love for Christ, our love for his word?" Something is not right. I need to work. I need to figure this out. I need to spend more time in prayer. I need to spend more time asking godly men to give me counsel on this. But you can't just sit back and say, "Well, whatever, we're just going to ride this out." No, you are the head. You are the leader. It's your job to be the sanctifying force in the life of your wife and family.

3. A Sheltering Love

Number three, kind of love is a sheltering love. We see this in the word "cherish," where it says that Christ nourishes and cherishes us as his church, and in the same way, husbands are called to cherish their wives.

Listen, when you cherish something, you protect it. When you cherish something, when you care about something, you guard it. Because it is precious to you. Think, husbands, of your most prized possession. How do you care for it? How do you protect it? How do you shelter it? My most prized possession are my grandparents' Bibles and my parents' Bibles. I prize those more than anything else on the planet. I would run into a burning building to grab those. Under that would be some of my guitars, my musical instruments. They were gifts to me from my father. I cherish them deeply. Listen, when you cherish something, you take care of it. You protect it, you guard it, you don't leave it out in the backyard to be exposed to the elements. You bring it in. There's a special place where I keep my parents' and grandparents' Bibles in a case. I keep my instruments in a case, they're locked away. I don't keep them out where—now I do have some instruments that I don't cherish. And I just keep those out, and I let the kids play with it, and there's peanut butter and jelly, and all kinds of stuff all over it. But the ones I cherish, there's a special place for it. They are protected. The destructive forces that are my children, they know, they cannot touch these. They are off limits.

Some husbands put more time and attention into caring for their car than they do their own wives. And just as we don't leave the things we care about exposed to the elements, so also we do not leave our wives exposed to the attacks of the enemy. To the lies and the deception that is so rampant in our world. This is what Adam failed to do in the garden. He did not shelter. He did not cherish his wife. He did not protect her from the lies of Satan. He had the authority to kick the devil out of the garden, and he didn't. And husbands, you have the authority to kick the devil out of your house. This word is a sword. Do you know how to use it? Do you know how to wield it? Are you using it? Are you wielding it? Or is it gathering dust? We have to protect our wives from the lies of the enemy, from the deception of the enemy.

And sometimes—this would be the most politically incorrect thing I say all day. Husbands, sometimes we have to protect our wives from their runaway emotions. Because women feel things more deeply than men. That's part of what makes them awesome. But what is a great strength can also be a great weakness. And sometimes husbands, we have to say, "You know what? We need to tone this down a little bit. We need to dial this back a little bit. There's emotions that are being runaway; a fruit of the Spirit is self-control." Now, husbands, as you share that information, you better be sure you're self-controlled in that moment. Or we might be having your funeral next week. But we have to protect our wives. From the lies of the enemy, the deception in our culture. It is rampant. And Satan is sneaky. He is subtle. We have to be well attuned to picking the weeds that want to grow up in our household, in our souls.

1 Peter 3:7 says this:

"Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered."

This verse says that we are to live with our wives in an understanding way. Husbands, that means if you're not seeking to understand your wife, you're not being the kind of husband you're supposed to be. You might say to me, "I just don't understand her." Okay, great. Are you trying to? Because if you're not, you're not doing what God's word tells you to do. Part of your job is to try to understand your wife, where she's coming from, what's going on in her heart and in her life. The challenges that she's facing in the marriage and in her life.

And then it says to show honor to the woman as the weaker vessel. Now, I know this is, again, super politically incorrect, and who cares? It's the Bible, it's God's word. There's certainly a case to be made for physical strength, and I think we've all seen that play out the last few years, especially when men compete with women in women's sports. They're just totally dominated. You take one of the loser men, and their natural strength has the potential to be much superior. That's obvious to everybody. I'm not saying that every man is stronger than every woman. That's not what I'm saying. But I'm just saying the potential for strength is much greater in men physically.

But I don't think that that's all that this verse is talking about. It says that we are to honor our wives as the weaker vessel. It's an interesting choice of words. What I think this is saying is that wives, women are more delicate than men. They are like fine china. They're special. They're meant to be honored. They're meant to be cherished. They're not the plates you take camping. They're not meant to be beat up. Men are meant to be beat up. We are rugged, we are ugly. We are utilitarian. A woman is not that. She is to be honored. I think as the more delicate, the more beautiful, to be celebrated. I think that's what it means. And here, it says that we are to have that special place in our hearts for our wives.

Husbands, your wives are not supposed to be like you. If God wanted another you, he would have given you another you. If you needed another you, he would have made another you. Husbands so often fall into the trap of, "I wish my wife was more like me." Why? Why? There's already one of you. She's meant to be different. She's meant to have a special place in your life as someone who's different than you to work together to build God's kingdom in your home.

But notice it's really interesting. He says that they are heirs with us, of the grace of life, co-heirs of Christ. But he says that we need to honor our wives so that our prayers may not be hindered. Think about that. How you treat your wife will affect your spiritual life. How does mistreating our wives hinder our prayers? If we mistreat our wives, if we don't love our wives the way we are called to, we will have a guilty conscience before God. And when men have a guilty conscience before God, they hide from God. And we don't pray. We don't spend time with the Lord when our conscience is guilty. We're like Adam. We want to get away from God. And so our prayers will be hindered in the fact that if we go to God in prayer, we know we'll be convicted of sin. That's an uncomfortable thing. And so many men refuse to pray because they have a guilty conscience before God because they know that they mistreat their wives. That's the first way that their prayers are hindered. The second way that their prayers are hindered is they mistreat their wives, but they refuse to admit it. So they're proud, they're boastful, they're haughty. They come before God, not in a state of humility, but a state of pride, and we know what God does with that. God resists the proud. And so in that way, our prayers are not heard, they are resisted by God because we're not coming in the spirit of humility. No men, we must treat our wives in the right way: honoring, respecting, loving, cherishing, protecting, and in that way, we can go to God with a clear conscience and not have our spiritual life and our prayers hindered.

4. A Strengthening Love

Number four, kind of love is a strengthening love. Aren't you glad I toned this down? I had, like, seven points, and I have whittled it down to four. Aren't you glad? Say amen. We're almost done. A strengthening love. We see this again in verse 29 that Christ nourishes and cherishes. So it's this nourishing. And I've said a little bit about this already, so I won't belabor these points, but husbands, we set the spiritual temperature of our home. The spiritual life of our home flows directly from our spiritual life with Christ.

Oftentimes husbands are all too willing to abdicate this responsibility, and instead look to their wives to lead in the spiritual life, in the home. Now, it's not that the wife doesn't have anything to offer in regards to spiritual matters. Of course, she does. Obviously does. She will be a vital part on the right hand, absolutely involved in all of it. But the husband should take the lead. The husband should set the tone. The husband should plot the direction. The husband should take the initiative if we hope to see our families nourished in the things of God. If the husband's relationship with Christ is dead, dry, and lifeless, it will be even more difficult—I won't say impossible, but it will be all the more difficult for the wife and children to have a vibrant, fruitful, spiritual life. However, if the husband himself is actively engaged in his walk with the Lord, the family will naturally follow his lead and fall into that pattern. So husbands, your family will be spiritually nourished from your walk with Christ. Your family will either be spiritually nourished or spiritually malnourished by your time in the word, and by your time in prayer.

I know many guys say, "Well, I don't really know the Bible. I don't really understand all these things." Listen, friends, ignorance is not an excuse. We have more access to Bible teaching, Bible training, Bible curriculum, than any other generation that's ever lived in the history of the world. We literally have no excuses. And you need to understand that this is your responsibility, and you will stand before God. And he will ask you how you shepherded the soul of your wife and the soul of your children. And you will not have an excuse on that day. God will say, "I gave you an app. I gave you a website. I gave you a pastor. I gave you leaders. You had access to God's word in an unprecedented way." And what a shame and an embarrassment that we know the numbers of the players on the sports teams. We know intricate details about the plays and their lives and who was drafted when and at what point. And we are total ignoramuses when it comes to the Word of God. We don't know Ephesians from Philippians. We don't know Paul from Peter. We don't know the Old Testament from the New Testament. But we know how many championships Michael Jordan had. We know why he was a better basketball player than LeBron James. There is no question about it. And we can engage in knowledgeable debates and discussions about sports ad nauseum, but when it comes to the things of God, our mouths are silent because we are babies. And I'm here to say, God's word says, you need to grow up. You need to take responsibility for your own spiritual walk, for the spiritual life in your home, because you're gonna stand before God. This isn't about me and you, this is about you and God. And I pray that you hear the words I long to hear on that day: "Well done. Good and faithful servant." Amen.

I was gonna read John chapter 15 today. We're not going to do that for the sake of time. So husbands, that's your homework this week: John chapter 15. Talks about Jesus being the source of our spiritual life. Husbands, you need to read that this week. You need to study it this week. You need to ask God to show you how to live that this week. You need to pray through it. You need to meditate on it. You need to chew on it. You need to know more about Christ than you know about Trump. You need to know more about the church than you know about what's going on with whatever political problem. Some of you know more about what's happening on the other side of the world than you do that's happening down the hall in your own home. Amen. It ought not be that way. God placed you in that home to be as Christ to that home. To love, to cherish, to sanctify, to sacrifice, to shelter, to protect, to give strength to. That is why he made you. He's called you to himself. He's filled you with his spirit.

Conclusion and Closing Prayer

Brothers, this is a high calling. It is a high calling to love our wives as Christ loved the church, to pattern our lives after the greatest love there ever has been. What could be a higher calling than this? And yet every husband in here today, I feel you should recognize just how daunting this task is. Just how an impossible task this is. It's like standing at the foot of Mount Everest. How in the world could I ever hope to do this? To assume such heights, to love as Christ has loved? Not because of any inadequacy in my own wife, but the inadequacies in my own heart, the sin in my own life, the failures that I battle with daily, the temptations in the world.

If you feel desperate today, good, because we cannot do this on our own. We cannot do this in our own strength. It's only by the grace of God. It's only with the all-sufficient and moment-by-moment sustaining grace of Christ. That we look to him. We engage with him. He is our source. He is our supply. He is who has our attention, our thoughts, our focus, our affection. And it's only when we keep our heart and our eyes fixed on him that he gives us his strength, that he gives us his power, that he helps us to do what he has called us to do. But if you try and do this in your own strength, you will fail, and fail miserably. And even guess what? Even if you try in his strength, there will be days where we fall and we fail. But the Bible says a righteous man, though he falls seven times, he keeps getting up. He keeps getting up.

Listen, I'm here to call on some of you men who, you have given up. You've just, you've tried it and it didn't work. You've fallen into sin. God is calling you here today. Get up. Get up. Get on your knees. Go to Christ, take your sin to him, confess your sin, confess your failures, confess your inadequacies. Call out to him for help. And he will supply. The good news is that Christ has promised to give help to those who humble themselves and approach him in faith.

I don't know what the state of every family is in here today. I don't know which one of these kinds of loves you need to grow the most in. But I do know that we can't do it on our own. I do know that if we try in and of ourselves, we will fall short every time. Our own ability is so limited, we truly have to reach out to him in faith for the help that we need. And the good news is that he is there. Anytime of day or night, at any moment, to pour out his spirit, to bring forgiveness, healing, help, and strength. You don't have to be like Adam hiding in the shadows. God is calling out to you through the cross, through grace, through mercy, to forgive your sins and to put your feet on solid ground. But we must humble ourselves. We must confess our sins. We must be willing to confess our sins to him, and even at times confess our sins to one another. We can either have our pride, or we can have the kind of lives and marriages that God has called us to have. We cannot have both. We cannot have both.

To love our wives as Christ loved the church, we have to humble ourselves just as Christ humbled himself. He suffered the shame of the world on our behalf. And likewise, we have to humble ourselves when we come to God. But hear me, friends, there is an ever-flowing stream that Christ opened for us at the cross. That we can receive new life. New hope. And even new desires as we look to Christ in faith. Amen.

I'm going to invite you to stand with me this morning as we close in prayer. I want every man here to know this. Every husband, especially. That you have what you need in Christ to live the life God has called you to live. I believe that. I know that. I believe in you. I believe in your ability to lead your family as you follow Christ. He has supplied for us everything that we need. If you feel inadequate, go to Christ. If you feel inadequate, seek out help in your community group, but we have, he has supplied for us, all we need, according to his riches and mercy. So let's go to him now in prayer.

Father, thank you for supplying us all we need in Christ. Lord, if we had to do this in our own strength, it would be the most soul-crushing thing that we could ever imagine. How in the world could we ever love someone as much as you have loved us? And yet, through your spirit and through your word, you empower and enable us to pattern our love after your love, to love our wives the way that you have loved us.
Father, I pray that you would help the husbands of this church to have a sacrificing love. A sanctifying love. A sheltering love. And a strengthening love for their wives, as you have loved us. Give us your strength and help us through the power of your spirit. Lord, today we even recommit to being the men, the heads, the leaders of our household that you have called us to be. God, forgive us for our inadequacies, our shortcomings, and our failures, and help us to walk in the newness of life as new creations that you have made us. In Christ's name, we pray. Amen.

categories 2025
tags Christ is King, All In The Family

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Introduction and Series Conclusion

Opening Prayer

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The Prohibition: Do Not Provoke to Anger

The Precept: Discipline and Instruction

Applications for Fathers

Closing Prayer

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Sermon Summary

Sermon Transcript

Introduction

Scripture Reading: Ephesians 5:22–6:4

Walking Worthy of Our Calling

A Direct Message to the Children

The Action: Obedience

The Attitude: Honor

The Outcome: Blessing

A Word to Adult Children

Conclusion and Closing Prayer

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Sermon Summary

Sermon Transcript

Introduction and Scripture Reading

The Desperation for Jesus in Marriage

Five Truths About Marital Unity

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3. Because God Has United You, You Are One

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Conclusion and Closing Prayer

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Sermon Summary

Sermon Transcript

Introduction

Scripture Reading

The Husband's Duty: Love

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3. A Sheltering Love

4. A Strengthening Love

Conclusion and Closing Prayer