Monday, March 26, 2012

Husbands, Love Your Wives

Eph 5:25-30  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.   ESV

 I became a husband when I was 52 years old, nearly 10 years ago. Both then and now I consider this to be one of the greatest blessings, privileges, and responsibilities of my life.

The longer I've been a husband, the more I realize my standard for loving my wife DebbieLynne should be measured by how Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her. He did what the church needed and no one else could do. He went to the cross as the only sinless sacrifice whose death could pay the penalty for our sins.

Jesus did that because He loves us and that was what we needed.

That's the example all who are husbands should follow. We should love our wives by doing what we can for them to care for them. Just as we would do what we can for our own bodies.

I long to do all I can for DebbieLynne. I ask for your prayers that I can continue to do for her as much as I can.

Today when the personal care attendant coming to get both of us up called to say she'd been in a car accident, it shook us. I so wished I could get my darling wife up out bed and into the bathroom and dressed. But I couldn't even get myself up. All I could was pray with her and make some phone calls.

God did provide somebody to get me up and somebody else to get DebbieLynne up, and then I did what I could for her, like feed her breakfast. I did what I could for her today until it was time to lie down and get some rest this afternoon.

There will be times when I won't be able to do even what I did for DebbieLynne today. I ask you to pray for us during those times. And for those of you who are able to help in practical vital ways during those times I hope you will do so.

I also urge all of you who are husbands to not take your wives for granted. Be thankful you have a wife. Love her. Love her like Christ loves the church and gave Himself for her. Do it while you can. Do what you can for her while you can.

OK, that's all I can post for today. Thanks for taking the time to read my blog.

6 comments:

  1. John, you and DebbieLynne are in my prayers. It breaks my heart to think of you both at home with no one to help you this morning.

    Thanks for loving her so well!

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    1. I will gladly love my darling DebbieLynne as long as God makes it possible for me to do so. Thank you so much for your prayers.

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  2. Wives should never take their husbands for granted, either. Deb is very blessed:)

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    1. You are right, and I am blessed to have a wife who lets me know how much she loves and respects me and considers me a wonderful husband.

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  3. Oh my but that post brings tears to my eyes. God bless and keep you both.

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  4. God does bless us. For about half the day we didn't know if we'd have anybody to get DebbieLynne out of bed tomorrow morning. But then God came through and a woman from our church became available. Our monthly Missions meeting of our church met at our apartment tonight and the other 3 members who were here prayed for both of us before they left. God is getting us through, one day, one moment at a time.

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