“For This Reason”

Ephesians 5:31  “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”

Paul is saying that “For this reason”…this was God’s intent from the beginning, even in instituting marriage. He draws upon the institution of the marriage relationship by our Creator and says that “This is the reason that a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, the two becoming one flesh.” It is for “this reason.”

Marriage is to be a picture of what our relationship with Christ is supposed to look like…we are members of his flesh…we are one with Him. Husbands and wives are to be one with each other in the same way…and as a result the watching world would see a clearer picture and gain a better understanding of why they were created and come to a better understanding of just what their purpose is.

In seeing a husband and wife joined as one, they would begin to discover where their greatest joys may be realized, where they might find their greatest security, where they might discover just what true love is…unconditional, sacrificial, and expecting nothing in return. That they would uncover the Source where this love flows from in immeasurable and unfathomable quantities…and yet at the same time so tangible, so real.

When a husband and a wife are submitted to one another in the fear of God, the world has a continual reminder before them that for this were they created, for this reason they still live, and that the seemingly insatiable yearnings and longings they have burning in their hearts, and souls and minds, to be one, to be joined, to be complete, to find their Helper, were put there by the One who created them, in the hope that they would see and understand just how great the overwhelming and overpowering love of God the Father is toward them.

That love is most clearly displayed in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on Calvary’s cross.

And this is exactly what Paul is saying to us as husbands, that our love for our precious bride is to be the same. It is to be the same as His love towards us is…unconditional, sacrificial, expecting nothing in return. And shame on me, shame on us, as husbands, when we are selfish and more concerned about how we feel, what our needs are, what we want, what we desire, what we think, what our opinion is…than the feelings, the needs, the wants, the desires, the thoughts, the opinion of what our wife is.

Aren’t you thankful that Jesus isn’t this way toward you? He is the exact opposite toward us. He laid down His life for us even when we wanted nothing to do with HIm!

If we truly loved our wives in this way, husbands, you would see your marriage transformed. It’s not them, it’s you. It’s your leadership, your example, your dependence upon your Lord, your Head, to lay down your life sacrificially for your wife, that you would cherish her, and reverence her, and do all that was in your ability (as you are trusting in the Person of the Holy Spirit to empower you) to be a living expression of the love of Jesus. There is nothing more manly, more masculine, more godly than this.