8-24-08
Love Like a Man (cont’d)
Building a Joyful Marriage: Part 7
Eph.5:25-33

Summary: The three marks of masculine love in marriage in the NT are 1) gentleness (do not let familiarity cause you to treat her as common; realize she is weak for your benefit, you are her protector, she trusted you, and you owe her gentle, warming care), 2) selflessness (placing her highest good above all, including your own desires and comforts.  Her best interests are holiness, so bring that about in her through the Word.  This will restore priority which will restore intimacy), and 3) self-interest (not the same as selfishness, because there is never a conflict between her highest good and your best interests.  Be so close to her that what happens to her happens to you, then do yourself a favor by doing her good.)

Introduction: Achieve Masculinity and Femininity
Review
Gentleness
Don’t let familiarity breed contempt
She is weak for you
You are her protector
She trusted you
Gentle Care
Selflessness
Her highest good
What is her greatest good? Holiness (through joy in the Lord)
Protect her from sin
Be the purifying influence in your family
The ministry of the Word
Restores Priority
Restores Intimacy
Self interest
Contradiction?
Her greatest good and your best interests are always the same
Such unity that good for her = good for you
Summary

Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church-- 30 for we are members of his body. 31 "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." 32 This is a profound mystery--but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. 

Introduction: Achieve Masculinity and Femininity

In October of 2006 Al Mohler wrote an article about the increasing gender confusion among children.  Some elementary schools around the country are having to hire staff specifically for dealing with the problem of children who want to be a different gender.  One school stopped having boys and girls line up separately, they let the kids play the opposite gender in plays, and they have a unisex bathroom.  Parents are enrolling girls as boys and boys as girls and some school are trying to adjust to the “gender-fluid” children.  The admissions director for Park Day Elementary School explained these changes in an interview saying, “We had to ask ourselves, what is gender for young children?”  We have both politicians and educators in our country who honestly do not know how to tell a male from a female.  I read an article by Rachel Neumann on this subject.  Speaking of a five year old boy who thinks he’s a girl she says this:
“Will things be hard in kindergarten? Probably, but then it seems to me that while lots of children are acting out socially-approved gender roles by this age, a good many of them still aren't. And five seems a bit young to be forcing them to make a choice ... (actually, any age seems a bit young to me to force someone to choose a gender.) It is not clear what bad would happen to Nicole, and a number of other children like him/her, if they were allowed to just play with being whatever gender they want.”
We are turning into a culture that does not know the answer to the question, “What does it mean to be male or female?”  But knowing what masculinity and femininity are is crucial for achieving God’s ideal for marriage.  And so when the New Testament gives us instruction for marriage it gives different instructions for men and women (Which breaks the normal pattern in Scripture.)  So we are learning what it means, according to our Designer, to be a man and what it means to be a woman in a marriage.

Review
The summary of the New Testament message is, “Husbands love; Wives submit.”   So now we are taking a closer look at exactly how and why we are to love and submit.  We started with the men, and found that there are three emphases with regard to how we are to love our wives.  The first was gentleness. 

Gentleness 

Colossians 3:19 Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them.

In the curse God told the woman that the man would dominate her with a heavy handed suppression – “your desire will be to control your husband but he will rule harshly over you.”  The curse on the man’s side is harshness toward his wife, and so the way back into the ideal of Genesis 2 is to undo that and to turn our harshness to gentleness.

1 Peter 3:7 Husbands, in the same way live with your wives in knowledge as the weaker vessel and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers.

To love your wife properly you must have knowledge and understanding of her unique points of weakness, and you must respond to those weaknesses with compassion.
And one way to gain insight into her unique points of vulnerability is by paying close attention to those topics that she tends to bring up in conversation with great frequency (“nagging”).  I will discuss that when we get to what Scripture has to say to wives, because the instructions about submission have some very helpful implications for that.  But for now I just bring it up to say this: Men, if you are wondering what your wife’s points of sensitivity are, the issues that you feel she tends to nag you about are a great clue.  If she keeps on bringing something up to the point where it is wearying to you, that should clue you in to the fact that it is a point of great concern for her.  And even though you are tempted to respond harshly to her (because nagging is such an unpleasant thing), gentle love will hear that and think, “Oh, she keeps bringing this up…- evidently this is a topic that is creating distress and unrest in her heart.”  And then, instead of spending all your energy just thinking of how to escape the nagging, you can focus your attention on a response of compassion.  Think this way – “What is it like for her to have to carry the burden of worrying about that issue all day long every day with no light at the end of the tunnel?”
I am not suggesting you just cave in to whatever she is pressuring you to do.  If you feel that would be wrong or unwise, then you should not.  However you most definitely should respond to her with a heart of compassion.  Talk to her about it and empathize with her concerns.  Acknowledge how terrible it would be if her worst fears came to pass.  Admit to her that it is possible that you may be wrong, and that those things may indeed come to pass.  Instead of arguing with her or ignoring her, help her find comfort and peace from God’s Word.
You have to do this quick, because when we get to what Ephesians 5 says to wives we are going to solve the problem of nagging and she won’t do it anymore.  But between now and then you have a great opportunity to learn some of her unique areas of sensitivity show you can show special compassion in those areas. 
Don’t let familiarity breed contempt
I mentioned last week that not all roughness and harshness comes from anger or hostility.  A lot of it just comes from mindless neglect and familiarity.  You get so used to your wife being around that you start to treat her as common rather than as special.  Some of us would be doing well if we were as nice to our wives as we are to strangers.  You see a stranger and smile and give a pleasant greeting, and you see your wife and act like you don’t even see her.  When a guest comes into your home, you offer them a seat, ask if they would like something to drink, you tidy up for them before they arrive, you pay attention to them.  What if we treated our spouses like that?
The more familiar we become with one another the less polite we tend to be.  I don’t know who wrote this, but it is titled, “The 7 Years of the Married Cold.”  This is the way a man responds to his wife as the marriage progresses:
First year: “Oh sweetheart!  You’ve got a bad sniffle, and there’s no telling about these things with all the strep going around.  I’m putting you in the hospital for a general checkup and a good rest.  I know the food’s lousy, but I’ll be bringing your food in from Cinzetti’s.  I already have it all arraigned with the head nurse.
Second year:  “Listen darling I don’t like the sound of that cough.  I’m taking you to the doctor, and then you go to bed and rest.  I’ll take care of supper tonight.”
Third year: “Maybe you better lie down honey.  Nothing like a little rest when you feel lousy.  I’ll bring you something.  Where do you keep the soup and the can opener?
Fourth year:  "Now look, dear, be sensible. After you finish the dishes and vacuuming and laundry and get the kids in bed, you need to get some rest.  I think you should go to bed early." 
Fifth year: "Why don't you take some aspirin?   And maybe you should run to the store and pick up some Kleenexes – you’re using them all up."
Sixth year:  “For pete's sake, stop sneezing. Are you trying to give me pneumonia?."
7th year: " If you’d just gargle or something instead of sitting around barking like a seal all evening.  I can’t even hear the TV.”
Familiarity breeds contempt.  When you were first falling in love you opened the car door for her.  Now you are half way down the driveway and she’s saying, “Do you mind if I get my other leg in the car before we start driving?”  Gentle love will resist the slide toward treating your wife as common rather than as special.  The way you greet her and look at her across the room and interact with her should be better than the way you greet strangers.  Give her a bigger smile.  Wink at her across the room.  Find out ways that you can touch her that she especially likes.
She is weak for you
Last week we also looked at 1 Peter 3 and found that we are to be especially gentle with our wives because God made her the weaker vessel.  One thing I did not get into was the question of why she is the weaker vessel.  The reason she is weaker is because God made her to be a suitable helper for you, and part of being suitable includes the kind of comfort, compassion, encouragement and strengthening that only a woman can give.  And much of what enables her to be all of that for you is her sensitivity.  But it is that very sensitivity that leaves her so much more vulnerable emotionally.  The tools that God gave her to make her a suitable companion for you are the very things that also make her more sensitized to pain and injury – both physically and emotionally.
Female skin has more nerve endings than male skin.  So if you take a nail and scratch a man’s arm, and make an identical scratch on a woman’s arm, the woman will experience more pain than the man.  God gave her the advantage of having a superior sense of touch, but the drawback is greater sensitivity to pain.  And certainly that is also true emotionally.  God also gave her the advantage of greater emotional sensitivity.  I do not think many people would argue with the suggestion that women, on average, suffer far more emotionally than men.
Think about that.  She has to go through life with that kind of vulnerability - suffering more emotional pain than you suffer because God made her more sensitive.  And it is all for your benefit – so she can be a suitable helper.  So men, if they have to go through life that way for our benefit, the least we could do would be to be considerate and gentle with them!
If you were at a dangerous construction site, and the big boss forced a fellow-worker to give up his helmet so you could wear it and be protected, and the fellow worker willingly does it – don’t you think the very least you could do is refrain from smacking him in the head all day long?
The woman’s superior emotional sensitivity is a great asset to the “team.”  It is a great asset for carrying out the man’s overall task.  But the very fact that she has that asset makes her more vulnerable and in need of protection.
You are her protector
And if all that doesn’t motivate you to be gentle with her, think about this: Imagine for a moment what it is like for her when you inflict pain on her.  You are her God-given protector.  Think of what it is like for her to be sent by God into this harsh, cruel, hard world with acute sensitivity to pain, only to have her protector in this life be the one inflicting pain on her.  On Judgment Day you do not want to be standing too close to the guy who inflicts pain on his wife that is not absolutely necessary and who is unrepentant.
She trusted you
It is a very serious violation of trust when we are harsh with our wives.  When you asked her to marry you, think of what you were asking.  You were asking her to completely open up her life to you – to let you in to all there is – her most private weaknesses and most embarrassing secrets.  You were asking her to give you access to her most sensitive areas where she is most vulnerable to be hurt.  And in return, you were basically telling her, “Don’t worry.  If you marry me – if you open yourself up to me, remove the fig leaves and let me in to your life, I promise you can trust me.”
So she trusted you.  She took a huge risk.  She made herself incredibly vulnerable to you.  She placed in your hands the ability to hurt her more deeply than any human being in the world.  She trusted you not to focus your attention on her weaknesses and inadequacies.  She trusted you to overlook and cover over her faults.  She took a huge risk letting another human being into her most private world, with the understanding that you were that trustworthy.
So are you now going to focus your thoughts on her weaknesses?  Are you going to violate that trust, and humiliate her by staring at that which is most embarrassing to her?  Are you so cruel that you would announce to her your displeasure in her inadequacies?  Are you so heartless that even though you are the only human being the entire world that she would allow into her most sensitive points of vulnerability, that once in there you would mock and criticize?  Is that how Christ loved the Church?  
Is there any place for helping your wife correct her weaknesses?  Sure.  Tracy and I have a special time set aside twice a year when we ask each other how we can be a better spouse.  But as a general pattern, our goal is not to spend time thinking about the weaknesses and failings of the other.
Gentle Care
Ephesians 5:28-29 He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated his own body but he feeds and cares for it

That word translated “cares” is a beautiful word.  A couple versions translate it “cherish.”  It literally means to impart warmth with body heat.  The only other place it is used in Scripture is in 1 Thessalonians 2:7.

But we proved to be gentle among you, as a nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children.

That is about as gentle and tender a picture of love as there is.  How are you to treat your wife?  The same way your wife handles your newborn baby.
Did you know that is the way the Lord loves you?  It says He feeds you and warms you like a mother holding her baby.  If it were not for the soothing, warming, gentle love of Christ, trying to be a Christian in this world would be like walking naked across Antarctica.  But He shelters us from what we cannot handle, and picks us up when we fall, and heals our wounds, and feeds us and cares for us and watches over us with fierce jealousy, and explodes with anger against those who would harm us.  He listens to every word we say to Him, and is interested in what is on our hearts.  He never gives us anything that is too much for us.  He has deep compassion in His great heart for everything that distresses us – whether it ought to distress us or not.

Isaiah 40:11 He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart.

To be masculine, and to love like a man is to love like Christ.  And so gentleness is the starting point for what it means to love like a man.  Are you gentle in the way you love your wife?  Are you patient with her?  Are you kind?  Are you quick to forgive?  Is your speech soft?  Do you show compassion?  Are you considerate and understanding?  That is the first part of masculine love.

Selflessness 

Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 

What does it mean to be masculine?  What does it mean to love like a man?  To love like a man involves a giving up of self – just like Jesus gave Himself up for His bride.
Her highest good
But it is not just self-denial for the sake of self-denial.  Jesus did not just give up the glories of heaven for no reason.  That would not have done anyone any good.

Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy

He gave up the glories of heaven and took on human flesh and bore the punishment of all our sin on the cross because that was what we needed in order to become holy.
To love your wife with selfless love means to give up your own desires when those desires are in conflict with your wife’s highest good.  If you want a glass of water, and you say, “I’m going to deny myself this water,” and your wife says, “Why?” and you say, “Just to be mean to myself” – that does nothing to honor her.  Self-denial in and of itself is not love.  But if there is only one glass of water available and you deny yourself for the purpose of letting her have it, that does honor her.  If what you want is in conflict with her highest interests, then you prefer what is best for her rather than your own immediate desire.  So the only time when it is necessary to deny yourself is when doing so is required to achieve her greatest good.
What is her greatest good? Holiness (through joy in the Lord)

Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy

Her highest good is holiness – and the way to make her holy is the same way Paul made the Corinthians holy.

2 Corinthians 1:24 Not that we lord it over your faith, but we work with you for your joy, because it is by faith you stand firm.

His ministry was a ministry of working for their joy in the Lord, because that is the basis for holiness.  You do everything in your power to make her happy in the Lord.

1 Corinthians 7:33 a married man is concerned about … how he can please his wife.

Do all you can to please her and make her happy in the Lord.
But make sure you are working to make her happy in the Lord and not in this world.  If you do something that tempts her to find her happiness in this world instead of in God then you are harming her holiness.  In our culture especially we all struggle with materialism, so if your wife is tempted by that, you are not loving her well if you just assist in the process by buying her all the stuff she wants.  You should desire to buy her everything you can possibly buy her that will help her have joy in the Lord, but nothing that will compete with joy in the Lord.

Protect her from sin
Do whatever it takes to protect her from sin.  If you sense some sinful inclination or desire in her heart work hard to help her see it with the utmost gentleness.  (Remember, loving like a real man means loving with gentleness.)  Give a lot of thought to the best way to show her her sin and the best way to help her out of it.  Even if your wife is more spiritually advanced than you are, still you can help her.  You can ask her where she struggles and pray earnestly for her.
And very often protecting your wife from sin will involve some sacrifice.  Just as saving us from sin cost Jesus, so helping your wife fight against sin will cost you.  If you really, really enjoy something, but it causes her to stumble, and so you get rid of it – that is selfless love.

Be the purifying influence in your family
It is the man’s role to be the primary purifying influence in the family.  When it comes to whether or not you are going to have cable TV, or TV period, what is going to be allowed to be watched in your home, what kinds of videos will be shown, what kind of language will be used – some men will gravitate toward whatever level of impurity their wives will allow.  “I won’t rent this video, because my wife wouldn’t approve…but maybe she wouldn’t mind this one too much.”  So the wife becomes the purifying influence, trying to reign in the family as they are drawn toward impurity.  But that is our role, men.  We should be the purifying influence.  We should be the one to say, “No, that’s not pure.  I won’t have it in my home.”
The husband who loves his wife would never drag her into a theater or any situation that will defile her.  He will do everything he can do draw her closer to God.
You are your wife’s protector, and the greatest danger out there is sin.  You would defend her from a mugger, or someone who broke into your home, wouldn’t you?  Then how much more important is it that you protect her from that which can harm her soul?
And keep in mind; women are tempted in different ways than men.  She probably does not need to be protected from the kinds of things that are threats to you.  She is probably tempted by different things.  Since men are stimulated more visually, temptation comes after us in the form of pictures and images.  But women are affected more by relational things.  So Satan comes after them more through romantic fantasy.  Instead of photos in magazines, it comes in the form of a story line in a soap opera.  That is why 90% of the story lines in soap operas involve some illicit romantic encounter or relationship – it is pornography for women.  It also comes in the form of romance novels.  Or maybe just fantasies in the mind.
Whatever the form, you need to be aware of what kinds of things harm your wife spiritually, and in what areas she is tempted, and protect her.  And you are going to have to talk to her about it, because they are things that are different than the things that affect you.
So be the strength in a time of temptation.  Do not stand there like Adam and just silently watch your wife fall to temptation.  Do not turn it all over to her and say, “You decide.”  Step forward and say “No” to impure influences.  Create an edifying, purifying home environment.  

The ministry of the Word
So we work to bring our wives to greater holiness.  And Paul is careful about telling us exactly how that is done.

26 … cleansing her by the washing with water through the word

The way the Lord Jesus Christ makes His bride holy is through the ministry of the Word of God, and that is the same method we should use.  You make your wife more holy not by ignoring her sin, not by humiliating her and belittling her over her sin, not by shallow, mindless comments about how she should change, but by applying the Word of God to her heart.  God’s Word is always the means of purification – even when God is purifying us, He does it through His Word.

John 15:3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.

John 17:17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.

And I know that to many men that sounds very intimidating.  Some of you are married to a woman who knows Scripture better than you do.  How are you going to teach her anything from God’s Word?  Do you sit your wife down at the kitchen table and say, “OK, time for our Bible lesson” and then give a lecture?  No.  For most of us that would not be the most effective method.  Nor does Scripture point to that as the best approach.  The method most heavily emphasized in Scripture is preaching.  Preaching is the method God has designed to be the primary way to deliver the Word of God to the heart.
So if you want to make your wife holy, expose her to good preaching.  This is a really easy thing to do in our day and age because of the Internet and the radio.  Get her some sermons by John Piper, and then some by MacArthur and Swindol and James McDonald and Alistair Begg and Ed Taylor.  Help her find the guy whose preaching she can relate well to.  Buy her a CD player or MP3 or install some speakers in the living room or whatever you have to do to make it easy for her.  If your kids are little put them in the nursery.  And if they are older work hard at teaching them to sit still so your wife does not have to be distracted during the sermon at church.  And listen to preaching yourself so you can talk to your wife about what you are both learning.
Another important method of applying the Word of God to a person’s heart is through private study and meditation.  Get your wife a nice variety of different devotional books and materials.  Figure out something to do with the kids so there is some time slot in her day she could take to be alone with God without interruption.  And set an example for her and for your kids with your own private devotions.  Print out some verses on cards to make it easy for her to memorize Scripture.  
The point is you do not have to be the one who teaches her everything she ever learns.  But if you love her, and you truly believe that what she needs more than anything else is the Word of God, then you will spare no expense to do everything in your power to see to it that the Word of God is delivered to her heart. 
Restores Priority
When we studied gentleness last week we saw that gentle love restores the ideals of companionship, oneness, and intimacy. Self-less love restores the ideal of priority.  When God said, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother” He was showing us that marriage is to be the highest priority in life.  And the reason it is to be the highest priority is because it is supposed to put on display the covenant relationship between God and His people.  So you are to be absolutely committed to your spouse above every other person in the world.
Now, out of all those people in the world, who is the greatest threat to your commitment to your spouse?  Who is it that you are most likely to fall in love with and allow your heart to be drawn away from your spouse?  I can tell you who it is – you!  There is some possibility that your heart could be drawn away by love for another woman, but there is a far greater possibility that your heart will be drawn away by love for yourself.  When your own comforts and pleasures and immediate desires rise up as a higher priority than your spouse’s wellbeing, you have become unfaithful.  When we allow selfishness to take over we cheat on our spouse with ourselves.  If anyone on this earth is more important to you than your wife – including yourself, then you have broken you covenant with her, and you are unfaithful.
Restores Intimacy
So loving like a man means loving selflessly, and that restores the ideal of priority.  And when priority is restored, guess what else can be restored – intimacy (naked and unashamed). We asked last time, “How can you be naked and unashamed after the fall when there is so much to be ashamed of?”  The answer is you can be naked and unashamed when you are in the presence of someone who is more committed to you than he is to himself.
Usually couples do not hurt each other just for the fun of it.  Usually I hurt my wife because I am focused on me, and pleasing myself, and making myself comfortable.  But on those days when I hold Tracy up above myself as my highest priority, she does not have to worry much about being hurt by me. I am still going to hurt her some, just because of ignorance or miscommunication or whatever, but for the most part she is safe.  And when your spouse is safe, that enables intimacy.  You can be naked and unashamed – exposed without any fear of rejection or ridicule, when there is no threat.

Self interest

So what does it mean to love like a man?  Masculine love starts with gentleness, and is governed by selflessness.  Now let’s look at v.28 and we will see a third one.

28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church-- 30 for we are members of his body. 31 "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." 32 This is a profound mystery--but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself 

Paul is saying: Be nice to your wife because doing so is like being nice to your own body.  In other words, just as you are doing yourself a favor when you put food in your mouth to feed your own body, in the same way you are doing yourself a favor when you show love to your wife.  So the point of vv.28-32 is, Love your wife because it is in your own self-interest to love her.
Contradiction?
At first this sounds like a contradiction of the last one.  On the one hand our love should be marked by self-denial, and on the other hand our love should be marked by watching out for our own self-interest.  Is that a contradiction?  No, because remember – the self denial was only when your immediate desires were in conflict with her highest good.  But what he is saying here is that her highest good also happens to be in your best interests.  There is no conflict.  Her highest good and your best interests are one in the same.
This is a principle that a lot of Christians are confused about.  There is a night and day difference between selfishness and acting out of self-interest.  Selfishness is when you care more about your temporary comfort than you do about others.  Self-interest is when you do what will ultimately be best for you.  Selfishness is a bad thing because it places self above others.  Self-interest is a good thing to do because what is ultimately best for you is never in conflict with what is best for others.
Scripture condemns selfishness.  Selfishness is sin.

1 Corinthians 13:5 Love is not self-seeking

Philippians 2:3-4 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others more important than yourselves. 4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

When you place your own immediate comforts above the wellbeing of others that is selfishness and it is sin.  
However, just as strongly as Scripture condemns selfishness, it commands self-interest.  Every time God offers us a reward, that is a command to live according to what is in our own best interests.  God is constantly telling us, “Do this because it is in your best interests to do it.”  Just take the Beatitudes.  Look at the motives God gives us.  He does not tell us to be poor in spirit and meek and to be merciful out of pure altruism.  He tells us to do those things because of what we will get out of the deal.  Matthew 5:3-12 … yours will be the kingdom of heaven … you will be comforted ... you will inherit the earth ... you will be filled … you will be shown mercy ... you will see God ... you will be called sons of God ... yours will be the kingdom of heaven … Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven

Matthew 6:4-20 your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. … 6 your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. …  14 your heavenly Father will also forgive you. … 18 your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you … 20 store up for yourselves treasures in heaven

God commands us to live for reward over and over and over.
The passage I read in Philippians 2 that forbids selfishness goes on to tell us to follow Jesus’ example.

Philippians 2:3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. 4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: 6 Who, being in the very form of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, taking the very form of a servant, being made in human likeness. 8 And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-- even death on a cross!

If Jesus had placed His immediate comfort above our highest needs, He would have just stayed in heaven.  But He was not selfish.  He was selfless in that He placed our need higher than the pleasantness and comfort that He enjoyed in heaven.
But was that devoid of self-interest?  No.  Hebrews 12 says that Jesus endured the cross for the joy that was set before Him.  And ultimately it was in His best interests to do what He did, which is exactly what Philippians 2 goes on to say.

Philippians 2:9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name

Her greatest good and your best interests are always the same
And if all that confuses you or seems like a contradiction to you, maybe it will help to understand this - the reason it is not selfish to do that which is in your own best interests is because God, in His infinite mercy and wisdom has set things up such that what is in your best interests, and what is best for your neighbor, and what glorifies God most is all exactly the same thing!  There is never a time when you have to decide, “Hmmm – should I do what is ultimately in my best interests, or should I do what is best for someone else?”  They are always exactly the same thing.  There is never a time when you have to choose between glorifying God or doing what is ultimately best for yourself.  Whatever glorifies God the most is always ultimately what is best for you, even if it means torture and death in the short term.
That is an incredible gift from God, because the only thing that really matters is the glory of God.  And so God cares more about His own glory than He cares about anything else.  (If He didn’t then He would be guilty of idolatry.)  And so if there were ever a situation in which God had to choose between His own glory and your wellbeing, He would have to choose His own glory.  But in his unfathomable mercy and grace that never happens.  He designed everything so that He never has to choose between the glory of His own name and pouring out love on you.  And He also made it so you never have to choose between what is in your ultimate best interests and pouring out love on your wife.

Such unity that good for her = good for you

So vv.28ff are calling us to love our wives out of the motive of self-interest.  Now, be very careful not to get that backwards.  Do not twist that into a manipulation motive, where you love your wife in order to get her to respond better to you.  That is not what it is saying at all.  That is selfishness.  You do not love her in order to get her to treat you better.  You love her because she is your own flesh and bone.  You are so attached to her emotionally, and your heart is so entangled with hers, and your emotions are so tightly bound up with her emotions, and your hopes and dreams are so intricately interwoven with hers, that whatever happens to her happens to you.  And her happiness is your happiness, and her wellbeing is your wellbeing.  So you make her happy just because her happiness is happiness for you.
You and your wife are like the bow and the stern of the same boat.  If you are the stern you don’t say, “I don’t care what happens to the bow.”  If the bow sinks, the whole boat sinks.  So you do not bring good to her so that good might in turn come to you; you bring good to her because good coming to her IS good coming to you.

That which is not loving is not in your best interests

And a corollary idea to this is that anything that is not best for her is not in your best interests.  If you ever catch yourself saying, “I know this isn’t what is best for her, but I have to do this for me,” realize that if it is not best for her then it is not best for you.  When a man leaves his wife he does it because he thinks he will be better off.  He won’t.  The reason we do unloving things to our spouse is usually because we think it will make us happier.  But harming her is harming yourself.  It is never in your best interests to do something that is not loving to her.

Summary

What is true masculinity?   What does it mean to love like a man?  We could probably say 100 things about that, but the three that are most emphasized with respect to marriage are gentleness, self-lessness, and self-interest.  Keep today’s study in mind as we move through the rest of this series, so that when we hit one of those principles that just seems too hard, and you are tempted to think, I can’t do that.  It’s not my personality.  It’s too hard.  My wife is just too this or that…  Just remember this principle: The Lord who set aside His heavenly glory and descended from heaven and humbled Himself and died on the cross for you is asking you to be selfless in the way you love your wife.  The Good Shepherd who makes you lie down in green pastures and has led you beside quiet waters and has been with you through the valley of the shadow of death is asking you to be gentle in the way you love your wife.  The God who can do you good with all His heart and all His soul because He has made it so there is no conflict between His own glory and your best interests is asking you to love your wife with all your heart and all your soul because there is no conflict between that and your own best interests.  It is not too much to ask when you consider how He has loved you.

Benediction - 2 Thessalonians 3:4-5 We have confidence in the Lord that you are doing and will continue to do the things we command. 5 May the Lord direct your hearts into God's love and Christ's perseverance. 

Devotionals

The summary of the New Testament message to married people is “Husbands love; Wives submit,” and there are three emphases with regard to the way husbands are to love: gentleness, selflessness, and self-interest.
Day 1: Gentleness 
Colossians 3:19 Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them.

The curse on the man’s side is harshness toward his wife, and so the way back into the ideal of Genesis 2 is to undo that and to turn our harshness to gentleness.
Not all roughness and harshness comes from anger or hostility.  A lot of it just comes from mindless neglect and familiarity.  You get so used to your wife being around that you start to treat her as common rather than as special.  Some of us would be doing well if we were as nice to our wives as we are to strangers.  Gentle love will resist the slide toward treating your wife as common rather than as special.  The way you greet her and look at her across the room and interact with her should be better than the way you greet strangers.  Give her a bigger smile.  Wink at her across the room.  Find out ways that you can touch her that she especially likes.
She is the weaker and more vulnerable vessel so she can be a suitable helper for you.  Her sensitivity enables her to have the kind of tenderness and compassion that makes a good wife.  But it also makes her more susceptible to pain.  She has to go through life suffering more pain so that you can benefit from her sensitivity, so the least you could do is refrain from inflicting pain on her!
God appointed you as her protector in this world.  And when you asked her to marry you, you were asking her to trust you not to hurt her.

Ephesians 5:28-29 He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated his own body but he feeds and cares for it

That word translated “cares” is a beautiful word. A couple versions translate it “cherish.” It literally means to impart warmth with body heat. The only other place it’s used in Scripture is in 1 Thessalonians.2:7

But we proved to be gentle among you, as a nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children.

That is about as gentle and tender a picture of love as there is.  How are you to treat your wife?  The same way your wife handles your newborn baby.
Did you know that is the way the Lord loves you?  According to Ephesians 5:29 He feeds you and warms you like a mother holding her baby.  If it were not for the soothing, warming, gentle love of Christ, trying to be a Christian in this world would be like walking naked across Antarctica.  But He shelters us from what we cannot handle, and picks us up when we fall, and heals our wounds, and feeds us and cares for us and watches over us with fierce jealousy, and explodes with anger against those who would harm us.  He listens to every word we say to Him, and is interested in what is on our hearts.  He never gives us anything that is too much for us.  He has deep compassion in His great heart for everything that distresses us – whether it ought to distress us or not.

Isaiah 40:11 He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart.

To be masculine, and to love like a man is to love like Christ.  And so gentleness is the starting point for what it means to love like a man.  Are you gentle in the way you love your wife?  Are you patient with her?  Are you kind?  Are you quick to forgive?  Is your speech soft?  Do you show compassion?  Are you considerate and understanding?  That is the first part of masculine love.

Dear Lord God, thank You for Your gentle love.  You know just what I am capable of handling and what would be too much for me, and you are never overly harsh with me.  There are times of sternness, but you are never harsh in a way that is not good for me.  You still and quiet my soul.  You make me lie down in green pastures and lead me beside quiet waters and restore my soul and stay beside me in the valley of the shadow of death.  You gather me in your arms and hold me close to Your great heart.  You show compassion and tenderness toward my suffering and sorrows.  How tiny and insignificant are my little sorrows in the universe, and yet You care.  You listen whenever I speak to You, and You make Your Word soothing to my soul.  What a privilege to have as my comfort the God who makes the mountains crumble with a single word!  My Maker, who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundation of the earth is the one who comforts me.  Even as I sin against You, You forgive and are so patient with me.  Oh, dear Lord, there is none like You!

Day 2: Selflessness 
Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 

What does it mean to be masculine?  What does it mean to love like a man?  To love like a man involves a giving up of self – just like Jesus gave Himself up for His bride.
But it is not just self-denial for the sake of self-denial.  Jesus did not just give up the glories of heaven for no reason.  That would not have done anyone any good.  He gave up the glories of heaven and took on human flesh and bore the punishment of all our sin on the cross because that was what we needed in order to become holy. 
To love your wife with selfless love means to give up your own desires when those desires are in conflict with your wife’s highest good. And what is her highest good?

Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy

Her highest good is holiness, and the way to make her holy is the same way Paul made the Corinthians holy.

2 Corinthians 1:24 Not that we lord it over your faith, but we work with you for your joy, because it is by faith you stand firm.

His ministry was a ministry of working for their joy in the Lord, because that is the basis for holiness.  You do everything in your power to make her happy in the Lord – not happy in this world, but in the Lord.
Do whatever it takes to protect her from sin.  If you sense some sinful inclination or desire in her heart work hard to help her see it with the utmost gentleness.  (Remember, loving like a real man means loving with gentleness.)  Give a lot of thought to the best way to show her her sin and the best way to help her out of it.  Even if your wife is more spiritually advanced than you are, still you can help her.  You can ask her where she struggles and pray earnestly for her.
And very often protecting your wife from sin will involve some sacrifice.  Just as saving us from sin cost Jesus, so helping your wife fight against sin will cost you.  If you really, really enjoy something, but it causes her to stumble, so you get rid of it – that is selfless love.
It is the man’s role to be the primary purifying influence in the family.  When it comes to whether or not you are going to have cable TV, or TV period, what is going to be allowed to be watched in your home, what kinds of videos will be shown, what kind of language will be used – some men will gravitate toward whatever level of impurity their wives will allow.  “I won’t rent this video, because my wife wouldn’t approve…but maybe she wouldn’t mind this one too much.”  And so the wife becomes the purifying influence, trying to reign in the family as they are drawn toward impurity.  But it is the husband’s role to be the primary purifying influence.  We should be the one to say, “No, that is not pure.  I won’t have it in my home.”  The husband who loves his wife would never drag her into a theater or any situation that will defile her.  He will do everything he can do draw her closer to God.
You are your wife’s protector, and the greatest danger out there is sin.  You would defend her from a mugger, or someone who broke into your home, wouldn’t you?  Then how much more important is it that you protect her from that which can harm her soul?
And keep in mind; women are tempted in different ways than men.  She probably does not need to be protected from the kinds of things that are threats to you.  She is probably tempted by different things.  Since men are stimulated more visually, temptation comes after us in the form of pictures and images.  But women are affected more by relational things.  So Satan comes after them more through romantic fantasy.  Instead of photos in magazines, it comes in the form of a story line in a soap opera.  That is why 90% of the story lines in soap operas involve some illicit romantic encounter or relationship – it is pornography for women.  It also comes in the form of romance novels, or maybe just fantasies in the mind.
Whatever the form, you need to be aware of what kinds of things harm your wife spiritually, and in what areas she is tempted, and protect her.  And you are going to have to talk to her about it, because they are things that are different than the things that affect you.  So be the strength in a time of temptation.  Do not stand there like Adam and just silently watch your wife fall to temptation.  Do not turn it all over to her and say, “You decide.”  Step forward and say “No” to impure influences.  Create an edifying, purifying home environment.  

Dear Lord Jesus, I bless Your name for giving Yourself up for me to make me holy.  You sought to purify for Yourself a people of Your very own, eager to do what is good.  Dear Lord, work that eagerness in me.  Let me be so zealous for good that it brings delight to Your heart and honors the price You paid to make me that way. 
And Lord, teach me to love my wife that way.  Show me areas where I should be denying myself but I am failing to do so.  Open my eyes to areas where I am putting my own immediate comforts above my wife’s greatest good.  Teach me to love her like You love me, that I might have the joy of walking in Your love.

Day 3: Selflessness (cont’d) - The ministry of the Word
How do we bring about greater holiness in our wives?

Ephesians 5:26 … cleansing her by the washing with water through the word

You make your wife more holy not by ignoring her sin, not by humiliating her and belittling her over her sin, not by shallow, mindless comments about how she should change, but by the method Jesus used to make His bride holy - applying the Word of God to her heart.  God’s Word is always the means of purification – even when God is purifying us, He does it through His Word.

John 15:3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.

John 17:17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.

And I know to many men that sounds very intimidating.  Some of you are married to a woman who knows Scripture better than you do.  How are you going to teach her anything from God’s Word?  Do you sit your wife down at the kitchen table and say, “OK, time for our Bible lesson” and then give a lecture?  No.  For most of us that would not be the most effective method.  Nor does Scripture point to that as the best approach.  The method most heavily emphasized in Scripture is preaching.  Preaching is the method God has designed to be the primary way to deliver the Word of God to the heart.
So if you want to make your wife holy, expose her to good preaching.  This is a really easy thing to do in our day and age because of the Internet and the radio.  Get her some sermons by John Piper, and then some by MacArthur and Swindol and James McDonald and Alistair Begg and Ed Taylor.  Help her find the guy whose preaching she can relate well to.  Buy her a CD player or MP3 or install some speakers in the living room or whatever you have to do to make it easy for her.
If your kids are little put them in the nursery.  And if they are older work hard at teaching them to sit still so your wife does not have to be distracted during the sermon at church.  And listen to preaching yourself so you can talk to your wife about what you are both learning.
Another important method of applying the Word of God to a person’s heart is through private study and meditation.  Get your wife a nice variety of different devotional books and materials.  Figure out something to do with the kids so there is some time slot in her day she could take to be alone with God without interruption.  And set an example for her and for your kids with your own private devotions. 
Print out some verses on cards to make it easy for her to memorize Scripture.  
The point is you do not have to be the one who teaches her everything she ever learns.  But if you love her, and you truly believe that what she needs more than anything else is the Word of God, then you will spare no expense to do everything in your power to see to it that the Word of God is delivered to her heart. 

Restores Priority
Gentle love restores the ideals of companionship, oneness, and intimacy.  Self-less love restores the ideal of priority.  When God said, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother” He was showing us that marriage is to be the highest priority in life.  And the reason it is to be the highest priority is because it is supposed to put on display the covenant relationship between God and His people.  So you are to be absolutely committed to your spouse above every other person in the world.
Now, out of all those people in the world, who is the greatest threat to your commitment to your spouse?  Who is it that you are most likely to fall in love with and allow your heart to be drawn away from your spouse?  It’s you!  There is some possibility that your heart could be drawn away by love for another woman, but there is a far greater possibility that your heart will be drawn away by love for yourself.  When your own comforts and pleasures and immediate desires rise up as a higher priority than your spouse’s wellbeing, you have become unfaithful.  When we allow selfishness to take over we cheat on our spouse with ourselves.  If anyone on this earth is more important to you than your wife – including yourself, then you have broken you covenant with her, and you are unfaithful.

Restores Intimacy
So loving like a man means loving selflessly, and that restores the ideal of priority.  And when priority is restored, intimacy (naked and unashamed) can be restored.  How can you be naked and unashamed after the fall when there is so much to be ashamed of?  You can be naked and unashamed when you are in the presence of someone who is more committed to you than he is to himself.
Usually couples do not hurt each other just for the fun of it.  Most of the time I hurt my wife because I am focused on me, and pleasing myself, and making myself comfortable.  But on those days when I hold Tracy up above myself as my highest priority, she does not have to worry much about being hurt by me.  I am still going to hurt her some, just because of ignorance or miscommunication or whatever, but for the most part she is safe.  And when your spouse is safe, that enables intimacy.  You can be naked and unashamed – exposed without any fear of rejection or ridicule, when there is no threat.

Oh, dear Father, make me a lover of Your Word.  Increase my appetite.  As I taste and see, let the tastes be so sweet to my mouth that a deep craving begins to develop.  Let me have an appetite for Your Word that is so voracious that my wife is inspired and moved by it.  Let it be contagious so that she begins to long for the life-giving food and drink from Your Word.  Forgive me, dear Lord, for my neglect of such a treasure.  Open my eyes to see wonderful things in Your law. 

Day 4: Self interest
28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church-- 30 for we are members of his body. 31 "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." 32 This is a profound mystery--but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself 

Paul is saying: Be nice to your wife because doing so is like being nice to your own body.  In other words, just as you are doing yourself a favor when you put food in your mouth to feed your own body, in the same way you are doing yourself a favor when you show love to your wife.  So the point of vv.28-32 is, Love your wife because it is in your own self-interest to love her.
At first this sounds like a contradiction of selflessness.  On the one hand our love should be marked by self-denial, and on the other hand our love should be marked by watching out for our own self-interest.  Is that a contradiction?  No, because remember – the self denial was only when your immediate desires were in conflict with her highest good.  But what he is saying here is that her highest good also happens to be in your best interests.  There is no conflict.  Her highest good and your best interests are one in the same.
There is a night and day difference between selfishness and acting out of self-interest.  Selfishness is when you care more about your temporary comfort than you do about others.  Self-interest is when you do what will ultimately be best for you.  Selfishness is a bad thing because it places self above others.  Self-interest is a good thing to do because what is ultimately best for you is never in conflict with what is best for others.
Scripture condemns selfishness.  It is sin.

1 Corinthians 13:5 Love is not self-seeking

Philippians 2:3-4 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others more important than yourselves. 4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

When you place your own immediate comforts above the wellbeing of others that is selfishness and it is sin.  However, just as strongly as Scripture condemns selfishness, it commands self-interest.  Every time God offers us a reward, that is a command to live according to what is in our own best interests.  God is constantly telling us, “Do this because it is in your best interests to do it.”  Just take the Beatitudes.  Look at the motives God gives us.  He does not tell us to be poor in spirit and meek and to be merciful out of pure altruism.  He tells us to do those things because of what we will get out of the deal.
Matthew 5:3-12 … yours will be the kingdom of heaven … you will be comforted ... you will inherit the earth ... you will be filled … you will be shown mercy ... you will see God ... you will be called sons of God ... yours will be the kingdom of heaven … Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven

Matthew 6:4-20 your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. … 6 your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. …  14 your heavenly Father will also forgive you. … 18 your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you … 20 store up for yourselves treasures in heaven

God commands us to live for reward over and over and over.
The passage in Philippians 2 that forbids selfishness goes on to tell us to follow Jesus’ example.

Philippians 2:3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. 4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: 6 Who, being in the very form of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, taking the very form of a servant, being made in human likeness. 8 And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-- even death on a cross!

If Jesus had placed His immediate comfort above our highest needs, He would have just stayed in heaven.  But He was not selfish.  He was selfless in that He placed our need higher than the pleasantness and comfort that He enjoyed in heaven.
But was that devoid of self-interest?  No.  Hebrews 12 says that Jesus endured the cross for the joy that was set before Him.  And ultimately it was in His best interests to do what He did, which is exactly what Philippians 2 goes on to say.

Philippians 2:9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name

Day 5: Self-interest (cont’d)
If it is confusing to think of selfishness being wrong and pursuing self-interest as being good, it may help to understand that the reason it is not selfish to do that which is in your own best interests is because God, in His infinite mercy and wisdom has set things up such that what is in your best interests, and what is best for your neighbor, and what glorifies God most is all exactly the same thing!  There is never a time when you have to decide, “Hmmm – should I do what is ultimately in my best interests, or should I do what’s best for someone else?”  They are always exactly the same thing.  There is never a time when you have to choose between glorifying God or doing what is ultimately best for yourself.  Whatever glorifies God the most is always ultimately what is best for you, even if it means torture and death in the short term.
That is an incredible gift from God, because the only thing that really matters is the glory of God.  And so God cares more about His own glory than He cares about anything else.  (If He didn’t then He would be guilty of idolatry.)  And so if there were ever a situation in which God had to choose between His own glory and your wellbeing, He would have to choose His own glory.  But in his unfathomable mercy and grace that never happens.  He designed everything so that He never has to choose between the glory of His own name and pouring out love on you.  And He also made it so you never have to choose between what is in your ultimate best interests and pouring out love on your wife.

Such unity that good for her = good for you

So vv.28ff are calling us to love our wives out of the motive of self-interest.  But be very careful not to get that backwards.  Do not twist that into a manipulation motive, where you love your wife in order to get her to respond better to you.  That is not what it is saying at all.  That is selfishness.  You do not love her in order to get her to treat you better.  You love her because she is your own flesh and bone.  You are so attached to her emotionally, and your heart is so entangled with hers, and your emotions are so tightly bound up with her emotions, and your hopes and dreams are so intricately interwoven with hers, that whatever happens to her happens to you.  And her happiness is your happiness, and her wellbeing is your wellbeing.  So you make her happy just because her happiness is happiness for you.
You and your wife are like the bow and the stern of the same boat.  If you are the stern you don’t say, “I don’t care what happens to the bow.”  If the bow sinks, the whole boat sinks. So you do not bring good to her so that good might in turn come to you; you bring good to her because good coming to her IS good coming to you.

That which is not loving is not in your best interests
And a corollary idea to this is that anything that is not best for her is not in your best interests.  If you ever catch yourself saying, “I know this isn’t what is best for her, but I have to do this for me,” realize that if it is not best for her then it is not best for you.  When a man leaves his wife he does it because he thinks he will be better off.  He won’t.  The reason we do unloving things to our spouse is usually because we think it will make us happier.  But harming her is harming yourself.  It is never in your best interests to do something that is not loving to her.
What is true masculinity?  What does it mean to love like a man?  The three aspects that are most emphasized with respect to marriage are gentleness, self-lessness, and self-interest.  Keep this study in mind as we move through the rest of this series, so that when we hit one of those principles that just seems too hard, and you are tempted to think, I can’t do that.  It’s not my personality.  It’s too hard.  My wife is just too this or that…  
Just remember this principle: The Lord who set aside His heavenly glory and descended from heaven and humbled Himself and died on the cross for you is asking you to be selfless in the way you love your wife.  The Good Shepherd who makes you lie down in green pastures and has led you beside quiet waters and has been with you through the valley of the shadow of death is asking you to be gentle in the way you love your wife.  The God who can do you good with all His heart and all His soul because He has made it so there is no conflict between His own glory and your best interests is asking you to love your wife with all your heart and all your soul because there is no conflict between that and your own best interests.  It is not too much to ask when you consider how He has loved you.