Dearly Beloved Children Love and Respect

 

Dearly Beloved Children

Love and Respect

Love & Respect

They were made to be given - not taken!

Submission is never a problem until you disagree.

So how do you handle disagreements?

There are 3 key elements

to properly handling a disagreement:

·       Submission

·       Love

·       Respect

These three describe the relationship between…

Christ and the Church

 and…

a husband and wife.

Ephesians 5:22- 33 needs to

be taken as a package deal.

Disagreements will go unresolved

if one of the three elements

Submission, Love, or Respect is missing.

It is not hard to submit to someone who loves you.

But if you do not see care, love and concern,

you have a hard time respecting. 

Submitting to someone you do

not trust is almost impossible.

You may conform on the outside,

but on the inside you are being eaten up.

So when the church, wives and the rest of us,

find ourselves in a disagreement

and submission is hard,

we need some answers.

The answer is NOT - “just submit”.

If, we as the church,

are finding it hard to submit to Christ,

we need to ask Christ

to help us see things the way He sees.

This is good advice for wives,

and the rest of us,

because it is easier to submit

 to something you understand.

But there are times when

a decision needs to be made

before understanding is achieved.

This is where trust is needed.

Sometimes it is not as much the issues,

but the person you don’t feel love

or have lost respect for

that is the one you are to submit to.

  

When this is the case,

rebellion is not part of

the element to agreement.

Our goal should be to restore

the elements of love and respect.

One of the best ways to accomplish

this is to communicate.

Wives and the rest of us need to

communicate our desire to please God

and find favor in the eyes

of those we are to submit to.

Then we need to share

in a non-confronting way

why we are struggling.  

The people we have to submit to

are not perfect - they are just like us.

So sharing your feelings of insecurity

can be an opportunity

to renew love and respect.

God wants wives to submit to their husbands;

and God wants husbands to love their wives.

The husband that loves his wife

will find his wives’ respect,

even though he is not perfect.

The point is simple:

Husbands and wives have to work together

in order to have the winning combination of:

Submission, Love and Respect!

Scripture Reading

Ephesians 5:22-28 THE MESSAGE

22 Wives, understand and support your husbands

in ways that show your support for Christ.

23 The husband provides leadership to his wife

the way Christ does to his church,

not by domineering but by cherishing.

24 So just as the church submits to Christ

as he exercises such leadership,

wives should likewise submit to their husbands.

25 Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives,

exactly as Christ did for the church

— a love marked by giving, not getting.

 26 Christ's love makes the church whole.

His words evoke her beauty.

Everything he does and says is designed

to bring the best out of her,

27 dressing her in dazzling white silk,

radiant with holiness.

28 And that is how husbands ought to love their wives.

They're really doing themselves a favor

— since they're already "one" in marriage.

(from THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved.)

Colossians 3:18-19 THE MESSAGE

18 Wives, understand and support your husbands

by submitting to them in ways that honor the Master.

19 Husbands, go all out in love for your wives.

Don't take advantage of them.

(from THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved.)