Happiness Is Obedience

Ephesians 5:18-6:4
Gary Wassermann | Sunday, January 03, 2016
Copyright © 2016, Gary Wassermann

On this first Lord’s Day of the new year, we are gathering together to renew our covenant with God. By the Holy Spirit, we have been directed to commit ourselves to live according to Ephesians 5:18-6:4. Our resolution is to be filled with the Holy Spirit and to practice God’s kingdom order in our homes, that we might live in the happiness of obedience.

Power to Live in God’s Kingdom Order (Ephesians 5:18-21)

Where does the power come from to live a blessed life, and, particularly, a blessed life at home? That is where we must begin. This power does not come from wine. The people of this world drink to be happy and to have fun, but wine does not lift us up. Jesus warned in Luke 21:34, “Be careful or your hearts will be weighed down with . . . drunkenness.” Literal drunkenness is a problem, and 1 Corinthians 11:21 speaks about people getting drunk in the church, so these are no idle words. But I will take wine to stand for all worldly alternatives to the Holy Spirit. Drunkenness leads to debauchery. There is a drunken revelry and a drunken stupor. Drunkenness prevents a father from ruling in his home. Isaiah 56:10-12 says that Israel’s watchmen were drunks who were blind, who lacked knowledge and understanding, and who could not bark. Do you know what is going on in your family? Do you speak so that people listen? Proverbs 31:4–5 says kings must not crave beer or they will drink and forget what the law decrees, and deprive the people of their rights. A pleasure-centered father is a fool who forgets the commands of his God and the needs of his family. Between husbands and wives, parents and children, and brothers and sisters, drunkenness leads to strife and complaints (Prov. 23:29), mocking and brawling (Prov. 20:1), and, in this passage, sexual immorality. All of these characterize worldly homes. How about yours? The way of this world, as our pastor has lately said, is to accept sin as inevitable, to accommodate it, and to try to make sin safe. Away with all such foolish, superficial dealings with trouble in our lives and in our homes. Do not get drunk on wine!

What should we do instead? Be filled with the Holy Spirit! The Bible sets against the carnal joys of this world the Holy Spirit, who truly gladdens our hearts. The Holy Spirit is Almighty God sent to dwell in every child of God. He is the Spirit through whom Christ was raised unto a new and powerful life, and he is the Spirit who empowers us to live the righteous life that God demands. Being filled with the Holy Spirit is contrasted with getting drunk, which doesn’t happen with just a few sips of wine. In the same way, we are not filled with the Holy Spirit through only a few sips. We must drink deeply. The parallel passage in Colossians 3:16 tells us how: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.” We must resolve to fill our minds daily with the Holy Scriptures so that the Scriptures guide our thinking, regulate our emotions, and control our actions. We must beware of amusements, which cause us to stop thinking. We must be clear-minded and sober, filled with the Word and the Holy Spirit of God.

Paul uses five participles in this passage to describe Spirit-filled people. The first four describe those who are worshiping God, speaking to each other, in agreement with each other, speaking with sincerity and intelligent understanding, and thanking God.

The fifth participle is “submitting to one another in the fear of Christ.” The word is hupotassô. From tassô we get the word taxonomy – order. So hupotassô means to function under someone according to God’s appointed order. This participle is worked out in the coming sections in terms of wives in a marriage, children in a family, and slaves in a workplace. It is not saying that husband and wife should both submit to each other.

Fear of Christ must govern our homes. The carnal heart and the unbelieving eye would not have seen God present in the house of Obed-Edom even though the ark of the covenant itself was present. But by faith Obed-Edom did see God. Likewise, today Christian believers see God by faith in their homes, and the fear of God governs them.

Instructions for Wives (Ephesians 5:22–24)

“Wives, submit to your husbands” (Eph. 5:22). The command to submit is correctly carried forward in our English translations from verse 21, and it is explicitly stated as a command in Colossians 3:18. William Hendriksen states it this way: “The Lord fully realizes that within the family much of the care of the children will rest on the wife, and he has been pleased not to overburden her. Hence he placed the ultimate responsibility with respect to the household on the shoulders of her husband. So the Lord assigns the wife the duty of obeying her husband.”¹ She is to obey her own husband, not all men.

The ground for this command is “the husband is the head of the wife.” “Head” means “the one in charge.” This comes from creation and is not limited to a specific culture. Adam and Eve were created as two, and the two became one in marriage. Within that marriage, Adam was the head of the one new person. Eve had been created from Adam for his help and companionship, and she was named by him.

First Corinthians 11:3 tells us more about headship in terms of three relationships: “The head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God.” Jesus Christ is almighty, eternal God, just as God the Father is; he is not inferior in being. A wife is likewise equal with her husband in being and in bearing the image of God. However, within the Trinity, God the Father is the head. He commands, directs, and instructs the Second Person of the Trinity, Jesus Christ. So Jesus always spoke what his Father wanted him to speak in the way he wanted him to say it, and he did everything in obedience to his Father to please him. In the same way, the wife is to put herself under her husband, to take direction from him, and to do what he wants done in everything, provided it is not against God’s law. She is not to try to manipulate him into leading in a different direction any more than Christ does his Father. When she faces even a minor decision, she should think, “What would my husband want,” and the decision will be easy. In God’s order, the man is not an ultimate or autonomous authority; Christ is his head.

To what sort of people does this command to submit come? It does not come to neutral people. In Corinth, feminism was on the rise, and women in the church were rejecting feminine attire. Today feminism prevails around us, and in many cases, we can see non-submitted women in our own family heritage. So we must be aware of our heritage; Ezekiel 16:44 says, “Like mother, like daughter.”

In our own existential lives, there are two great enemies of submission. The first is fear. Sarah, the wife of Abraham, faced fear in the course of submitting to her husband. I am sure she wondered, “What will my future be if I follow this man?” But she did not give into her fear. Fear and emotions are not the final argument. We can control them, and this passage gives us the key. Paul writes, “Submit in the fear of Christ” (Eph. 5:21), and “the wife must fear her husband” (Eph. 5:33). If you are a wife, your fear of Christ must be greater than your fear of uncertainty, and your reverential fear of your husband, not your emotions, must govern your actions.

The second enemy to submission is the flesh. The curse on the woman after the Fall included a desire to be the master over her husband. If a wife finds that she is unable to submit to her husband, it is because she is walking according to the flesh. This passage gives the key to deal with this as well. Daily we must “be filled with the Spirit.” By the Spirit we can put to death the evil deeds of our own sinful flesh. The Holy Spirit had not been poured out in the same degree in Old Testament times as now. Nevertheless, Peter wrote that “holy women of the past who put their hope in God . . . were submissive to their own husbands” (1 Pet. 3:4–5). Such saints lived in submission to their husbands, and they are now experiencing the eternal blessing that comes from finishing the race.

The wife who submits to her husband is happy and blessed. She walks not only in submission, but also in the four other joyful participles of being filled with the Holy Spirit. In Ephesians 5:23, Paul gives church’s submission to Christ, her Savior, as the pattern for the wife’s submission. The text adds “of which he is the Savior” because the woman is enriched by her husband as she submits. Additionally, the mother is the key to the home. The children learn from watching her, and if she submits to her husband, they will submit to their father.

Instructions for Husbands (Ephesians 5:25–33)

“Husbands, love your wives” (Eph. 5:25-33). This command appears both at the beginning and at the end of the nine verses addressed to husbands. The husband’s authority is constitutional, not arbitrary. The head of the man is Christ. So not only the wife but also the husband must function in the fear of Christ.

Nehemiah demonstrated the difference the fear of Christ makes. Previous governors had lived in luxury at the expense of the poor people by requiring them to supply food, wine, and forty shekels of silver (Neh. 5:14–15). This was a heavy burden, and it reduced some of the people to slavery. Out of fear of God, Nehemiah never demanded the food allotted to him as governor. Rather, he governed powerfully for the benefit of his people. He observed problems, he prayed, he summoned the people to action, he joined in the work, and he saw the work through to completion. The fear of Christ does not make a man weak; it keeps him from using his wife for his selfish advantage.

God commands husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her in death. Christ is calling on husbands to follow in his own footsteps, and sometimes that is literally required. While Philip Bliss and his wife Lucy were riding in a train across a trestle bridge, the bridge collapsed, and the train fell into the ravine below. Philip escaped from the wreck, but the train cars caught fire, and he returned and died trying to extricate his wife.²

Christ not only died for the church, but he lives to sanctify, cleanse, and beautify his bride. The husband’s aim is to help his wife make progress in sanctification. Thus, he builds her up with the word of God. There is never a moment when Christ does not tenderly watch over his church. That is why, Peter tells us, we can cast all our anxiety on him, for we are his personal concern (1 Pet. 5:7). Husbands likewise should receive their wives’ concerns with care and understanding.

God’s command and Christ’s pattern point the way for husbands to behave. But how can a husband do these things? In his flesh, every husband will tend to function with a self-centered despotism that comes from the curse of Genesis 3. But the Hebrews writer tells us that the man Christ Jesus accomplished his redeeming death “through the eternal Spirit” (Heb. 9:14). In the same way, husbands must be daily filled with the same Holy Spirit, who will empower them to love their wives after the pattern of Christ.

In Ephesians 5:28, Paul instructs husbands to love their wives “as their own bodies.” The text is not saying primarily that we are to love our wives in the same manner or in the same degree as we love our own bodies. Rather, it is saying that we are to love our wives because they are our own bodies. The two have become one. The husband is the head of the wife, and the wife is the body of the husband. There is an organic union, and what God has joined together, let no man separate. Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones observed that when we feed and care for our bodies, we do not think simply in terms of nutritional information like protein and vitamins. We eat according to our tastes and preferences. So a husband should know his wife’s particular inclinations and interests, and sow into her accordingly. And as a husband does things for his wife, putting in time and thought, his love for her will grow according to the principle, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” When a husband loves his wife in this way, the wife also becomes very eager to obey.

Instructions for Children (Ephesians 6:1–3)

“Children, obey your parents” (6:1-3). The Bible also speaks to children directly, so I will too. The Greek word for obey is hupakuô, which means “to hear as one who is under,” or, put simply, “to hear and do.” God shows his authority and care through parents, so children are to obey God by obeying their parents in everything. Here are four reasons children should obey their parents.

The first is Jesus’ own example. Luke 2:51 tells us that as a child, Jesus obeyed his parents. He did what he commands us to do, and he can sympathize with us in our weakness.

The second reason is the Holy Spirit. Jesus did not obey in his own strength; he did so by the power of the Holy Spirit. Luke 11:13 says that our Heavenly Father is pleased to give the Holy Spirit to his children who daily ask him. When we have the Holy Spirit, we will be able to obey.

The third reason is that God commands it. Paul quotes the fifth commandment in Ephesians 6:2: “Honor your father and mother.” Honor is a heart attitude of respect and high regard that we express by hearing and doing. When parents speak to us, do we respect them enough to remember and do what they said? We must not say later, “I forgot.”

The command, “Honor your father and mother,” also means that we should not obey reluctantly or resentfully. We should not run up against our parents’ will as though it were a fence keeping us from doing what we want. Rather, the will of our parents should be the path that we seek to walk in. Proverbs 4:11 says, “I guide you in the way of wisdom and lead you along straight paths.” And when we have done what they told us to do, we should come back and ask, “What else can I do?” Children should talk to their parents about all kinds of things, and ask, “What would you say about this?” Samuel demonstrated such immediate, exact, and joyful obedience when he rose up in the middle of the night and ran to Eli when he was called (1 Sam. 3).

The fourth reason is a promise—the promise of a long and blessed life to children who obey. The future and the adult world may look very big and daunting to those who are young, but do not be afraid. As you obey your parents, God will prosper you. And more than that, “long life” points to eternal life. Obedience to parents is the path of eternal blessing for our souls.

A Word to Fathers (Ephesians 6:4)

Fathers are to raise their children after the pattern of our heavenly Father, in the power of the Holy Spirit. We must realize that our children are little people. Their angels in heaven always see the face of our heavenly Father. Additionally, we must remember that we were all once children. So the first command is negative. “Fathers, do not exasperate your children” (6:4). Do not provoke your children. Do not use vindictiveness, sarcasm, or ridicule. Do not humiliate them. Do not demand beyond what is reasonable for their age. Do not neglect them or over-indulge them. Do not abuse them.

The second command is positive: “Instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.” Fathers are to nourish their children. This is the same word Paul uses in verse 29 to describe how a person feeds and cares for his own body. Our raising of our children must be rooted in love, and that love should be evident to them.

Nourishing in love is to be expressed two ways primarily. The first word is paideia (discipline). In Hebrews 12:11 this word is used for chastisement. The book of Proverbs says that the rod has the power to expel folly and impart wisdom. Parents have the responsibility to enforce what they say. Susannah Wesley made subjugation of a child’s will the first element in training. Chastisement should be painful enough to convince the child not to do it again. It is not pleasant for the child or the parent, but later on it produces excellent fruit of righteousness.

The second word is nouthesia (counsel or instruction). This is speaking about verbal instruction. In 1 Samuel 3:13 we read that Eli failed to restrain his children. In the Septuagint the word is nouthesia (in verb form). It means that fathers are to put words into the minds of their children—words that will powerfully direct them in the right way and keep them from the wrong way. The instruction commanded here is the instruction of the Lord; parents must impart God’s word to their children, as we read in Deuteronomy 6:7: “Impress these words of mine on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.” We are to address their particular struggles and situations with specific verses, so they will learn to walk by God’s word.

Fathers, you especially must speak. Sullen silence does not send a powerful message as some men seem to imagine. Paul describes the active ministry of a father: “For you know that we dealt with each of you as a father deals with his own children, encouraging, comforting and urging you to live lives worthy of God, who calls you into his kingdom and glory” (1 Thess. 2:11–12). Our children cannot hear and do if we do not give them something to hear by speaking clearly and directly.

Fathers, you have the authority to command your children to go in God’s way. When I received the assignment to preach on covenant renewal from this passage, I began by renewing the covenant within my own family. I followed the pattern of Josiah: “The king stood by his pillar and renewed the covenant in the presence of the Lord—to follow the Lord and keep his commands, regulations and decrees with all his heart and all his soul, and to obey the words of the covenant written in this book” (2 Chron. 34:31). I promised in front of my family to obey God, particularly in terms of Ephesians 5:18–6:4. And as we read in 2 Chronicles 34:32, “Then [Josiah] had everyone in Jerusalem and Benjamin pledge themselves to it; the people of Jerusalem did this in accordance with the covenant of God, the God of their fathers,” I then told my family to make the same commitment, and they did. God’s design is household salvation as the family follows the father in following God. We seek God to bless and to save, but we must command.

Specific Exhortations for Various Groups

To those who are not yet married: It is God’s general will for you to be married, so let us assume that is in your future. What should you look for in a spouse? Men, are you looking for a “mother” who will take care of you? Or are you looking for a woman who fears God and who will submit to you in the Lord? Women, are you looking for a “boy” who will only operate within your permission? Or are you looking for a man who fears God and who will lead you in the Lord? I urge all of you to seek God’s approved spouse and pray earnestly for God’s provision, because this decision will powerfully impact your life either for good or for bad. Live a godly life now, and be the sort of person a godly future spouse will seek.

To those who are married but do not yet have children: Do not put off having children forever. Malachi 2:15 says, “God made them one . . . because he was seeking godly offspring.” God’s will is for married people to have children, and to pray for your children in advance.

To those who are currently raising children: In addition to the words you heard this morning and at many other times, there is another warning before our eyes. Proverbs 24:30 speaks about a man who observed a field with thorns, weeds, and a ruined wall. What was the lesson he learned from it? “A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest, and poverty will come on you like a bandit.” In every church, there are households that have collapsed; the children have rejected Christ and left. At least we should learn this much: you can fit in well in a Bible-believing church community, you can participate in the life of the church, you can receive and appreciate the preaching of the word from the pulpit for many years, and still have your household crash. Therefore, in times like these, I say with Jonah’s ship captain, “How can you sleep?” Wake up! Know what is happening in your family, and apply God’s word personally and actively.

To those who have lost their children: If you stand with God and with God’s people, with understanding and resolve and against your rebellious children, that is commendable. Then believe that it is God’s will that all God’s people, by abiding in Christ, should bear fruit that will last. Even the eunuch should not say, “I am only a dry tree.” So commit yourselves today to serving the Lord all your remaining days.

All God’s people must walk in daily faith and daily repentance. As we do, we will experience God’s covenant blessing. May we all walk in God’s blessing in the coming year!

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¹ William Hendriksen, Exposition of Ephesians, New Testament Commentary Series (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1996), 248.

² Wells, Amos R. A Treasure of Hymns; Brief biographies of 120 leading hymn- writers and Their best hymns. Boston: W. A. Wilde company, 1945.