Ephesians Devotionals
Bob Morris
Christ Lives for and Dies for Love of the Church
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, people have never hated their own bodies, but they feed and care for them, just as Christ does the church – for we are members of his body. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This is a profound mystery – but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself…
5: 25-33a Part 2: Christ Lives for and Dies for Love of the Church
Last week we were looking at this passage in the light of husband-wife relationships. Let us look now at what it says of Christ and the church. Paul says that in talking of husbands and wives he is talking about the relationship of Christ and the church – a great mystery.
First of all, Christ loved the church. He loved us to the extent of identifying himself with us. When the man who wrote this letter to the Ephesians was called Saul, he set out systematically to persecute the Lord’s disciples, breathing out murderous threats against them (Acts 9). On the road to Damascus he heard a voice say, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” and the speaker identified himself as “Jesus, whom you are persecuting”. On another occasion Jesus said, “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me” (Matthew 25: 40). To persecute the church is to persecute Jesus; to bless the church is to bless him, so closely does he identify with those he loves.
Jesus gave himself up for the church, to make her holy and blameless. You’d wonder if there weren’t an easier way to do that, but apparently not.
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Cor 5: 21).
He himself had said to the disciples,
Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends (John 15: 13)
Jesus is not only the model for our love for each other, and specifically for husbands’ love for their wives, but he is also the means of achieving it.
Thirdly, Jesus feeds and cares for the church. Those who drink the water he gives us will never thirst (John 4: 14). He himself is the bread of life. Whoever comes to him will never go hungry (John 6: 35). Another part of his caring for the church is his constant intercession for us (Heb. 7: 25).
Finally, there is a sense in which Christ left his Father’s presence to become one with us, his church, just as a man leaves father and mother to be united with his wife. We celebrate that love every Advent season.
In all these ways, Christ’s relationship to the church parallels the relationship husbands ought to have with their wives. It is a daunting and humanly impossible task, but one that he calls us to fulfill by God’s grace.
Lord Jesus, your love for your body the church is so great as to be unfathomable. Still, you call us to emulate that love and we commit ourselves to loving one another as you have loved us.
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