Enjoying Your Wife and Loving Your Husband (Part 3)

What does the Lord say about the wives loving their husbands? What does the Lord want you to do?

He wants you to "love your husband". This is the plain meaning of the text; and there's nothing in the context to suggest Paul meant anything else. He assumes that older women already "love their husbands" and he wants them to teach the young ladies how to do the same.

This is a good assignment for ladies, young and old. If you think you've got nothing to do at church, think again. If you've been married a few years, God commands you to help your younger sisters. If you're a new bride, God commands you to study your older sisters and to follow their good examples.

This is the only verse in the New Testament that specifically commands women to love their husbands. One might think, therefore, that wifely love is not too important to God. But if you think this, you're wrong. For:

-A saving knowledge of God assumes love. "If a man says he loves God and hates his brother, he is a liar! For he who loves not his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?" (I John 4:20). The brotherly love John thinks we have does not apply to everyone but your husband! As "heirs together of the grace of life", you should love him with a double love!

-Discipleship assumes love. "By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one for another" (John 13:35). If you don't love your husband, you don't follow Jesus Christ. I don't care how often you come to church or how much you give the poor. It is not church-going and charity that prove your discipleship; it is love.

-The Christian Rule is love. "Love works no ill toward its neighbor, therefore, love is the fulfilling of the Law" (Romans 13:10).

Make no mistake about it: Jesus Christ wants you to love your husband. He wants you to love your husband with "a fervent love".

Do you? No wife will publicly admit to not loving her husband unless she's looking for a way out of her marriage. But answer it in your soul: Do you love your husband? Do you-really? God knows. Coming clean with Him is the first step to recovery.

The Lord wants you to love your husband in a certain way. How is that?

Theologians are helpful here. They have divided "love" into two kinds:

-The love of complacency. This means approval, appreciation, or pleasure. You see something beautiful or sublime, and you can't help loving it.

-The love of benevolence. This refers to the desire to do good; to pity; to help; to be generous.

Ideally, you should love your husband in both ways. You should admire him and do him good.

But let's face it: Not every husband earns the respect and approval of his wife. Some flaws are so great, they can't be ignored; some graces are so lacking, no woman could pretend they were there. If your husband is this way, you're still obliged to love him. Maybe you can't admire him, but you can do him good! And you must do him good!

This sort of love, this benevolence, is wonderfully described in I Corinthians 13. It is not a warm feeling, but a way of conducting yourself. It's not a passing fancy, but a fixed way of life. True love is a disposition that:

-"Suffers long" means "to hold your temper". It assumes your husband does things you don't like. And how does it respond to him? It does not lambaste him; it does not sneer at him; it does not sulk or talk behind his back. That's love. If you do these things you're not loving him.

-"Kind" refers to affection and goodness. Love speaks courteously; love smiles; love is helpful and supportive. Are you "kind" to him? If not you're not loving your husband.

-"Does not rejoice in iniquity" means the loving wife takes no pleasure in her husband's faults. She's grieved by them and doesn't say, "I told you so".

-"Does not parade itself; is not puffed up"means the loving wife does not assume a superior air. She doesn't feel better than her husband, and doesn't tell him she is.

This is a small sample of "what love is". If these words don't describe you-whatever the provocations-you're not living in love.

And so, for a second time, I ask you wives: Do you love your husband? I know your love is not perfect, but is it real? It is real only insofar as it "suffers long, is kind" and so on. There can be no love without these things.