The Divine Directive to Married Men, Part 2

Q: What does the Bible say about husbands honoring their wives?

The Bible instructs husbands to honor their wives as fellow heirs of the grace of life, recognizing their intrinsic worth in God’s design and redemption. In 1 Peter 3:7, husbands are directed to dwell with their wives according to knowledge and to give honor to them as joint heirs of the grace of life. This instruction emphasizes that husbands are not only to understand their wives as the weaker vessel but also to respect and honor them based on their shared inheritance of God's grace. This honor is not merely a recognition of physical differences but an acknowledgment of the spiritual equality in Christ that both husband and wife share. Christian husbands are called to treat their wives with dignity and love, reflecting the worth that God has bestowed upon them through salvation.

Q: How do we know that husbands must live with their wives according to knowledge?

The Bible explicitly commands husbands to dwell with their wives according to knowledge in 1 Peter 3:7, highlighting the importance of understanding the marital bond. The command for husbands to dwell with their wives according to knowledge comes from 1 Peter 3:7, which emphasizes a thoughtful and informed approach to marital relationships. This directive indicates that husbands bear a responsibility to acquire accurate knowledge about their wives, including their unique needs as women and the biblical roles they fulfill within the marriage. By recognizing and understanding these aspects, husbands can create a supportive and loving environment that fosters growth and intimacy. The duty to dwell according to knowledge urges husbands to reject cultural stereotypes and instead embrace a scriptural understanding of their wives' roles and contributions in the home.

Q: Why is it important for husbands to recognize their wives as fellow heirs of grace?

Recognizing wives as fellow heirs of grace emphasizes the spiritual equality and value assigned to them by God, changing how husbands should treat them. The importance of recognizing wives as fellow heirs of the grace of life is rooted in the biblical understanding of redemption. In 1 Peter 3:7, the apostle Peter reminds husbands that their wives share an equal standing before God, as they both are recipients of God’s salvific grace. This recognition transforms the husband's attitude from potential domineering to genuine respect and love. By affirming their wives' spiritual status as joint heirs, husbands honor the intrinsic worth and dignity that God has bestowed upon their wives. It calls them to actively support their wives’ growth in faith and to regard their contributions as significant within the marriage, fostering a partnership that reflects the unity of believers in Christ.

Q: What happens to a husband's prayers if he does not honor his wife?

If husbands do not honor their wives, their prayers may be hindered, as indicated in 1 Peter 3:7. 1 Peter 3:7 serves as a sobering reminder that neglecting to fulfill the divine directive toward their wives can have spiritual consequences for husbands. The verse states that if husbands do not dwell with their wives according to knowledge and honor them, their prayers will be hindered. This suggests that a disobedient posture in the marital relationship impacts not just horizontal relationships but also vertical communion with God. When a husband carries unaddressed conflict or neglect toward his wife into prayer, it can create a barrier to effective communication with God. Therefore, honoring wives and maintaining a right relationship is crucial not only for the marriage but also for the husband's spiritual life and prayer life.

Now before we turn to the scriptures,
I do want to just mention that I am not so antiquated and out
of touch with reality that in truth I do not know the difference
between Michael Jordan and Michael Jackson. If I were put under oath as to
what I said this morning, I even saw in my mind's eye when I was
making that point that no amount of impressiveness in monetary
matters or athletic ability should be the great concern for any
woman contemplating a potential marriage partner. I even envisioned
Michael Jordan's face and I would have sworn I said Michael Jordan,
but the witnesses who will affirm that I said Michael Jackson have
won the day. And I mention that seriously.
I wrestled and prayerfully considered whether I should, but I have
no confidence that the devil will not take the slightest thing
to try to erode the credibility of a preacher. And if the devil
was trying to take that in the minds particularly of any of
you young jocks, I do know the difference between the two very
well. Now let us turn in our Bibles
to 1 Peter chapter 3. 1 Peter chapter 3. and I read in your hearing verse
7. You husbands, in like manner,
dwell with your wives according to knowledge, giving honour unto
the woman as unto the weaker vessel, as being also joint heirs
of the grace of life, to the end that your prayers be not
hindered. Now those of you who frequent
this place of worship with any understanding of our normal patterns
will know that generally when we come to our Lord's Supper
of Remembrance, The ministry of the Word is often, most frequently,
what we would call a communion meditation. That is, we consider
a portion or a theme from the Word of God that in a very focused
way draws our attention to the death of our Lord Jesus or some
aspect of the benefits or the implications of his redemptive
love to us. However, due to a preaching schedule
that will find me out of the pulpit next Lord's Day, my son-in-law
will be here on vacation and the elders conscripted him to
preach, it would have meant that two weeks would pass between
the exposition of 1 Peter 3.7a and 1 Peter 3.7b. And so I judge that it would
be good to complete this morning's message and to bring at the end
of that message what I trust will be not an unnatural but
a very natural application in preparation for coming to the
Lord's table. And so I'm going to try to condense
into five to seven minutes an hour's worth of exposition from
this morning and then we will pick up where we left off in
our study. We took up this text in the course
of our regular expositions of the book of 1 Peter under the
subject of the divine directive to married men. And we noted
this morning, first of all, the objects of this divine directive. Peter is writing to husbands,
to married men. But he's not writing to all married
men, but to married men who are Christians. those described in
the first two chapters of this letter who possess all of those
realities of salvation in Christ which Peter has so powerfully
described by the guidance of the Holy Spirit. He can therefore
assume that these husbands have grace-implanted motives inclining
them to obey this directive, and grace-imparted power enabling
them to obey this directive. And then we began to consider,
secondly, having looked at the objects of the divine directive,
the substance of this divine directive. And I sought to demonstrate
that the translation given in the New American Standard version
far more accurately reflects the structure and the emphasis
of the original. And this is the translation of
the New American Standard. Live with your wives in an understanding
way as with a weaker vessel, since she is a woman. and grant
her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life that your prayers
not be hindered. And we learn then as we look
at the passage seeking to grasp the substance of this divine
directive to married men that there are two strands of gospel
duty. We looked this morning at the
first one, the duty to dwell with one's wife. The nature of
that duty is bound up in the word dwelling together with,
and it points to the entire spectrum of the experience of married
life, of two people living together in the multi-leveled commitments
of the marital bond. And then we consider the measure
or the standard of this duty. Peter says that husbands are
to dwell together, the words with their wives understood,
they are to dwell together according to knowledge. They are to dwell
together and in that dwelling the husbands have a peculiar
responsibility to possess knowledge. accurate knowledge as to the
nature of the marital bond, what God has to say about the responsibilities
as well as the privileges of the marital relationship. Their
feelings, inherited patterns, current notions and theories
about marriage are not to regulate the husband's relationship to
his wife, He is to dwell together with her according to knowledge
and then we noted thirdly the primary focus of this particular
part of the duty. Peter says husbands dwell together
with your wives according to knowledge as unto the weaker
vessel the wifely or the feminine one. In other words, that knowledge
is to have a peculiar focus upon the fact that she is constituted
by God's creative design and wisdom, the weaker vessel. And I sought to demonstrate that
that weaker vessel is to be understood in terms of the wife being weaker
physically and positionally. And perhaps in concluding that
summary, I can do no better than quote the Lutheran commentator
Lenski, who writes, the wife is the weaker vessel. Paganism
always tends to abuse her on this account. Her rights are
reduced, often greatly. Her status is lowered, often
shamefully. Heavy loads are put upon her.
She is made man's plaything or man's slave. The fact that she
is weaker is always exploited. That is why Peter inserts the
phrase regarding knowledge. Christian knowledge will accord
the wife all the consideration and all the thoughtfulness which
God intends for her as a weaker vessel in her wifely relation. Peter himself had a wife. Whether
she was still alive at this time and was with Peter at this writing,
we do not know. And surely that summarizes the
heart of the concerns as I sought to amplify and apply them, that
the husband is never to look upon the wife as the weaker vessel
and use that reality as an occasion to exploit her. but he is to
dwell with her according to knowledge in the light of that identity
given to her in the creative wisdom and purpose of God. Now that's the review. Now we
come to the second strand of duty as found in the words, giving
honor as being also joint heirs of the grace of life. Here is
the duty to give honor to one's wife. And in trying to unpack
it, I'll do so under two simple headings. Let's look at the nature
of this duty, giving, honor, and then the primary focus of
this duty as also fellow heirs of the grace of life. The word
that Peter here uses for giving is, like so many of Peter's words,
found only here in the New Testament. It is a word that means to assign. to show or to pay. And so Peter,
writing to husbands, says, husbands, you are not only to dwell with
your wives according to knowledge, particularly focusing your understanding
upon her identity as the weaker vessel, but you are to continually
be assigning, showing, or paying out honor to her. You are to assign, to show, to
demonstrate honor. Now this word honor is a word
that is one of Peter's favorite words. He used it in chapter
1 in verse 7, that the proof of your faith being more precious
than gold that perishes, though it is proved with fire, may be
found under praise and glory and honor at the revelation of
Jesus Christ. Honor has in this context as
its companion praise and glory. Husbands, you are to give, you
are to pay, you are to assign, to show honor to your wives. In 2 Peter 1 17, it is honor
which the father showed to the son when the voice spoke out
of heaven saying, this is my beloved son in whom I am well
pleased. in those breathtaking scenes
of heaven's praise in Revelation 4 and chapter 5, and we find
creatures in the presence of God ascribing glory and honor
to God, and then in chapter 5, to the Lamb. You get a feeling
of what this honor is. It means to regard someone or
something as of great value and worth, and to treat it accordingly. to think of it in terms of its
intrinsic worth, to think of him in terms of his intrinsic
worth, and to give verbal expression to that recognition. And so the
second strand of duty has to do with the husband being under
solemn obligation to constantly assign, to show honor to his
wife. then notice the primary focus
of this duty. Constantly showing honor as being
also joint heirs of the grace of life. In other words, the
wife is to be held in honor because of what she is by the saving
grace of God. She, with her husband, is an
heir of all of that which God has purchased for his people. Peter says to these husbands,
the honor you give to your wife is to have as its reference point
that which God has assigned to your wife as an heir of the grace
of life. The root of this word, fellow
heir, is the word Peter used for inheritance in chapter 1
in verse 4. All of God's people have been
begotten again unto a living hope and unto an inheritance. and our wives are fellow inheritors
with us of that which Peter calls the grace of life, the free unmerited
favor of God that has conferred spiritual and eternal life upon
the wife equally with the husband, eternal life in its present reality,
eternal life in all of its future glory, in all of the pledged
commitments of God that constitute the inheritance. And Peter says
to these husbands, now you husbands, not only must you dwell with
your wife according to knowledge, a knowledge that peculiarly recognizes
who and what she is in virtue of creation, the weaker vessel,
weaker physically, weaker positionally. But you must also constantly
give her honor in the light of what God has made her in His
grace. And he turns from the focus upon
creation as weaker vessel to the privileges of grace as fellow
heir. And he says you must think of
her in terms of who and what she is by the grace of God. In the wisdom and purpose of
God in creation, she is the weaker vessel in the marital bond. In terms of what she is in virtue
of redemption, she is fellow heir with you of the grace of
life. And all that the grace of God
has purposed in the conferral of spiritual life and blessing
is hers equally with you. And therefore you husbands constantly
assign to her, show to her, pay honor to her as joint heir of
the grace of life. In your internal attitudes toward
her, in your actions with respect to her, in what you demand of
your children in the way they relate to her, You husbands constantly
show honor to your wife as joint heir of the grace of life. Now to try to illustrate how
critical this is in the way we relate to our wives, try to imagine
with me that someone has moved into a home that was lived in
before they moved into it. They are not the first dwellers.
The previous owners cleaned out just about everything, but once
the new family comes in, they find in the basement an old bowl
covered with dirt and grime. Who knows how long it's been
stuck there on a shelf in the basement. So when they are settling
in, they have a bunch of odds and ends of nuts and bolts and brackets to hang shades, etc. Most of us have such a thing
in the basement where we put all of the odds and ends and
the bits and the pieces. And so they figured this old
grimy bowl will make a lovely receptacle for all of the bits
and pieces of household hardware. And so it begins to serve that
purpose well. And then, as some of you may
do with such old bowls, when you need to have a bowl in which
to clean out a paintbrush, you'll temporarily dump out the nuts
and bolts and curtain fixtures and the rest and slop in whatever
you're going to use, the paint thinner or the brush cleaner,
and you use it and throw it out and back go in the nuts and bolts.
And that's the way it's been used for five years. Then one
day, you have a friend over, and he happens to come down into
the basement with you, and his eye catches that bowl. And he
says to you, where'd that bowl come from? You say, oh, it was
here when we came here. Just an old, grimy, dirty, old
bowl. We used it for this. And he says, let me take a closer
look at that. And this person, who happens to be a little bit
knowledgeable in antique bowls, says, you know, you may have
something here of some worth. I understand that Antique Roadshow
is coming to town in two months. You all know what the Antique
Roadshow is. Most of you are laughing. That's a traveling
troupe that gives free appraisals of people's junk. And sometimes
they discover that the junk is expensive junk and really worth
something. So Antique Roadshow comes to town, and so you go
clean up your bowl, and you wait in line, and finally you're there.
And lo and behold, the television crew comes and focuses on you.
And you say, hmm, maybe something's going here. Well, to make a long
story short, Someone who really knows that type of bowl said,
do you know what you have here? You have a very rare 18th century
bowl, and then they give you all the history of it and the
rest, and then the moment of truth comes. Do you have any
idea what this is worth? And you look at them very still
and say, I don't have a clue. And he says, this is now going
on the auction markets for $30,000 to $35,000. And whatever you do, I hope you
don't express an expletive that takes the name of God like so
many do. But you show your surprise and
your wonder. Now, I want to ask you something.
Does that bull go back in the basement to hold odd nuts and
bolts and curtain fixtures? No, no. You take it home very
gingerly. you make sure that it goes into
a prominent place, safe, secure, well-sheltered, in your finest
china closet. Now what's happened? Between
the time it was down in your basement and it ends up as a
centerpiece in your china closet, has anything happened to its
own intrinsic worth as an antique bull? No. All the difference is in your
recognition of that bowl, which changes your whole disposition
and treatment of that bowl. You follow me? The bowl was worth
$30,000 down in your basement. The problem was you didn't recognize
it for its intrinsic worth. And after the appraiser was done,
you recognized its worth, now you treat it accordingly. You
say, what in the world does that have to do with 1 Peter 3.7?
Well, you look at the text. Husbands, not only are you to
dwell with your wives according to knowledge, a knowledge that
focuses upon what they are as weaker vessel in creation, but
recognize their tremendous worth in redemption. Don't treat them
like an old jumble when God has made a precious antico. See their true worth. What is
God's estimation of them? He has conferred upon them all
the blessings of his salvation in Christ. He has made them heirs
of that inheritance, incorruptible, undefiled, and that fades not
away. You husbands, give them the honor
that is their due in the light of what God has made them in
His grace. That's what Peter is saying.
You continually give them honor as joint heirs of the grace of
life. That's our privilege and our
responsibility as husbands. And for some of you, it doesn't
mean that your wife gains more worth than she has sitting right
next to you tonight. But if you begin to think of
her in terms of what she is, as joint heir of the grace of
life, it cannot help but radically alter. the way you think of her,
the way you speak of her and to her and about her, the way
you will demand any within your household relate to her as joint
heir of the grace of life. Now, do you see what Peter has
done? I've already alluded to it, but I want to focus upon
it. He has highlighted the duty of husbands towards their wives
in the light of the great Biblical realities of both creation and
redemption. In creation they were constituted
the weaker vessel, weaker physically, weaker in their position of subordination
to the husband. Rather than being the occasion
of exploitation, of abuse, Peter says, for the Christian husband,
this becomes the occasion of dwelling with her according to
a knowledge that constantly is reminding itself of her position
as weaker vessel, and then he joins to that the responsibility
of constantly giving honor to her in the light of the redemptive
grace of God. You are joint heirs of the grace
of life. Now with an onlooking world,
and remember this is Peter's constant burden in this epistle,
how these Christians in Asia Minor will impact their pagan
neighbors. And we find that emphasis coming
through again and again. We've already found it, as we've
noted again and again in chapter 2, verses 11 and 12. Peter, in
calling these believers to a radically different Christian lifestyle,
is conscious that the Gentiles, the unconverted, will look at
the life of the people of God. and will see that pattern of
life. Later on in this chapter, he
will speak of that lifestyle being so different from those
in the world that they will eventually ask, what is it that makes you
tick? And Peter says, sanctify Christ as Lord, ready always
to give an answer to everyone who asks you concerning the hope
that is within you. And surely, my brothers, I speak
to my fellow Christian husbands In a day when on the one hand
machoism and the abuse of women abounds, in which they are looked
upon as playthings, in which they are looked upon as something
to be exploited, or on the other hand, where we have this cursed,
wimpy out of all responsibility and of all aggressive masculinity,
men who've been neutered by aggressive feminism, What an opportunity
to bear witness to the transforming grace of God, to see husbands
that are graciously assertive, protectively assertive, honorably
assertive, knowledgeably assertive, sensitively assertive, so that
in a sense the way we relate to our wives ought to cause the
worldling to scratch his head. And when they see godly wives
embracing their place under the protective strength of their
husbands, under the government of their husbands, it ought to
cause them to be amazed and say, you actually seem to be comfortable
in a relationship in which it's clear who wears the pants in
your family. And for you to say with a smiling
face, yes, I'm a liberated woman. I'm free to be joyfully what
God made me to be, the weaker vessel. That's what it means to be a
radical Christian woman in this age. for you as a husband to
make it evident that you bear the burden of leadership in the
home and leadership with your wife, that you are conscious
that this is not an egalitarian relationship where we divide
the leadership 50-50. No, God's made me the head and
the leader. He calls my wife to be in submission
to me, to follow in the steps of her spiritual mother, Sarah,
who obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord, and yet, and yet, While
seeing that role assumed and the burden of it discharged nobly,
they sense that we do not speak of women in a demeaning way.
For as a man thinks in his heart, so is he, and out of the abundance
of the heart the mouth speaks. It's often in semi-jesting little
words that we show what's really in there. We will have no sympathy
for language that in any way is dishonorable to women. We will not engage in activities
that in any way would cast any shadow over the nobility and
honorableness of those who are our wives. This is what Peter
calls us to as Christian husbands. You are to dwell with them according
to knowledge. and you are to show honor to
them as joint heirs of the grace of life. Now having looked at
the subjects of this divine directive, Christian husbands, the substance
of this divine directive, two strands of gospel duty, each
one buttressed with a peculiar reason, now we come thirdly and
finally to the crowning incentive to obey this divine directive. the crowning incentive to obey
this divine directive. And what is it? Peter says, to
the end, that your prayers be not hindered. And the peculiar
structure in the original points to a negative purpose which refers
back to both strands of duty. The NIV, though it's a bit paraphrastic,
captures the sense of what Peter wrote. Do this so that nothing
will interfere with your prayers. Now let me take a moment to explain
the words. The words that your prayers be not hindered, again
is one of these words rarely used in the New Testament, but
it is used in other places. In the secular Greek of that
day, it would be the word you would use to describe what an
army might do in blowing up a bridge in order to hinder an approaching
army or a retreating army. to impede the progress of an
enemy by breaking up his road, by radically interfering. It's the word that Paul used
in Romans 15-22 when he speaks of being hindered in his purposes
of coming to Rome. Galatians 5-7, you were running
well, who hindered you? Who stepped in the racetrack
and stopped you, turned you aside out of the way? That's the word
that he uses. And he says to these men as the
crowning incentive to obey the divine directive, if you are
indifferent to this, if you do not in gospel strength render
obedience to this directive, your prayers will be impeded,
your prayers will be cut off, your prayers will be hindered. Now how? Whose prayers? How are they hindered? When he
said that your prayers be not hindered. Is he speaking of the
prayers of the husband and wife? Some commentators believe he
is. And then they draw many very practical applications of the
text that are very good, that are very true. However, remember,
Peter is speaking to the husbands. Verse 7, you husbands. And unless
there is compelling contextual reason, we must believe that
when he says that your prayers, he is referring primarily to
the husbands. Now, let me ask you as you sit
here. Does the hearing of the words that a given course of
action will do something to your prayer life, does that strike
any deep interest in you? Or do you breathe easy and say,
well, if the only consequence of blowing this off and treating
it like I do a lot of other sermons is something will happen to my
prayer life, no big deal. My friend, if that's your disposition,
I seriously question you whether you're a child of God. For the
true child of God, few things touch a more sensitive core than
those things that pertain to whether or not that child of
God can enjoy the peculiar intimacy and communion with God that are
found in the place of prayer. And Peter is assuming that when
he says to these Christian husbands, look, any of you tempted to treat
these directives lightly, any of you tempted to think, well,
if I feel like it, yes, if I don't, it's a matter of indifference.
He says, look, this is a matter of whether or not your prayers
cut a straight course through into the year of God or whether
they are cut off in their progress, whether they are hindered, whether
they are impeded. Now how would refusal to comply
with these directives hinder their prayers? Well, think of
what the Word of God teaches, of what happens from God's perspective
when one of his children who would come into his presence
to pray is not dealing honestly with his duty or with his failure
to perform duty. Psalm 66, 18, If I had regarded
iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not hear. If you countenance
iniquity, if you deliberately treat any form of iniquity with
indifference, the psalmist said, the Lord would not hear. Isaiah
59, 1 and 2, the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot
save, neither is ear heavy that it cannot hear, but your sins
have separated between you and your God so that he will not
hear. From God's perspective, when
his children are deliberately countenancing iniquity, God says,
I will not hear you. Yes, he will hear the prayer
of penitence and brokenness, but we cannot treat our sins
with carelessness and think we can crash into the presence of
God and have an intimate hearing. And then from our perspective,
our prayers will be hindered. Because once the light of God's
truth has come to our minds and puts its pressure upon our consciences,
and we do not yield to the pressure of truth and independence upon
the grace of God, walk in the way of truth, we now have a bloodied
and guilty conscience. And that is a horrible hocking
of your spiritual feet when you try to go into the presence of
God. If you go into the presence of God to have a guilty conscience
cleansed by repentance and confession and fresh, boring to the fountain
open for sin and uncleanness, that's one thing. But you try
to deal with God on other matters when your conscience is bloodied
because of sin that you're not dealing with. Your prayers are
hindered. Furthermore, such a state grieves
the spirit who is the spirit of grace and supplication. And
there is no fresh, imminent enablement of the Spirit of God drawing
us out in prayer. So he says to these men, of all
the motives he could have laid before them, By the guidance
of the Spirit of God, Peter picks out this one and says, Now you
husbands, I've given you this directive as an apostle of Jesus
Christ. The will of God for you is this. Dwell with your wives according
to knowledge in the light of what they are as the weaker vessel. Continually give them honor in
the light of what they are as joint heirs of the grace of life
and never forget that the fulfillment, the pursuit of this duty is a
matter of whether or not you're going to be heard when you go
into the presence of God. And surely among the many things
that this underscores, it underscores a vital biblical principle found
in many places of scripture, that your horizontal relationships
have a great impact I'm sorry that your horizontal relationships
have a great impact upon your vertical relationship to God. You can't be all wrong at this
level and be all right at this level. Remember how Jesus emphasized
this in the model prayer he gave to us? We're to pray Matthew
chapter 6, one of those petitions is this, forgive us our debts
as we forgive our debtors, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive
those who trespass against us. And what's the one petition Jesus
amplifies in Matthew 6 verses 14 and 15? The one petition that
he amplifies in that entire model prayer Verses 14 and 15, For
if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also
forgive you. But if you forgive not men their
trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
Your horizontal spiritual experiences have a tremendous impact upon
your vertical spiritual relationships. In Mark chapter 11 and verse
25, Jesus said, when you stand praying, forgive. If you do not
forgive, you will not be forgiven. In other words, I would have
dealings with God at the vertical dimension. I must be certain
that the horizontal dimensions of relations to others are what
they ought to be. Now while I don't agree with
the commentators who say that your prayers be not hindered
as referring to the prayers of a husband and wife, I do agree
that few things are more telling as to whether or not you're dealing
as you ought with God in terms of your husbandly duties than
your ability to pray with your wife. I have found over the years
that a ritual we established years ago where I kneel to pray
with my wife and take her hand, and there's anything unresolved
between us, anything wherein I have not expressed dwelling
with her according to knowledge, respecting what she is as weaker
vessel, giving honor to her as joint heir, I would either have
to cross the line into a form of gross hypocrisy that in my
judgment could be the first big steps to apostasy, to hold her
hand as a symbol of marital intimacy and be the mouthpiece at the
throne of grace if things aren't right between us. I find the
pressure of that discipline to be a great means of grace. And
we've had some of our most intense, here publicly I call them, in-depth
marital discussions with more or less heat when attempting
to pray together. because there were issues that
needed to be thrashed out and dealt with. And I think that's
why a number of the commentators almost invariably say, well,
it must mean that your prayers, that is, prayers as husband and
wife, because they had the same experience. And while I don't
believe that's the direct meaning of the text, surely, surely all
of us understand that that is one of the implications of whether
or not we are dwelling with our wives according to knowledge.
giving honor to them as unto weaker vessels. Now we're going
to come to the Lord's table in a few moments. And I say to you,
my brothers who are husbands, what better place to go to the
fountain open for sin and uncleanness than here at the table and say,
Lord Jesus, when the scripture says you died for our sins, you
died for my sins. of failing to dwell with my wife
according to knowledge. Lord Jesus, you died for my sins
of not giving honor to my wife as joint heir, fellow heir of
the grace of life. Lord Jesus, forgive me. What better place than here at
the table to plead the promise of 1 John 1 9. If we confess
our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins.
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. What better place to plead with
God for present and future supplies of grace, to do what the Word
of God tells us to do. What better place than here at
the table to plead the promise, he that spared not his own son. How shall he not with him also
freely give us all things? Lord Jesus, give me the things
I need to dwell with my wife according to a knowledge that
constantly remembers that you made her the weaker vessel. Lord Jesus, give me grace to
constantly honor her as one whom you've made joint heir of the
grace of life. For the death of Christ is not
only God's answer to the problem of our sin, it's God's pledge
of His commitment to give us all things needful that the purpose
for which Christ died might be realized in us. And so may we
here at this table tonight as Christian husbands go to the
Lord Jesus in the confession of sin and failure going to Him
in fresh appropriating acts of faith that He would give us what
we need, that we may, by His grace, be husbands who are living
commentaries on this text. So if someone were to come and
say to another, what does it mean? They would be able in some
measure to say, you look at that man in the way he relates to
his wife and there you will see at least a faint picture of what
it is to dwell with a wife according to knowledge in the light of
who she is as weaker vessel and to give her honor as joint heir
of the grace of life. Let's pray together. Our Father, we do thank you for
your word. We thank you that it is a lamp
to our feet and a light to our pathway. And we pray that you
would seal to all of our hearts this portion of your word that
we have studied today. And we do ask that as we come
to the table in a few moments, that many of us will have deep
heart dealings with you in the light of your truth. How we thank
you that there is a fountain open for sin and uncleanness. We thank you that having spared
not your son, you are committed and you have pledged with him
also freely to give us all things. In his name, therefore, we plead
for fresh supplies of grace that we who are husbands may be obedient
to this directive given to us by your Spirit through the pen
of your servant and your apostle Peter. Help the wives with fresh
commitment to your grace, joyfully to take their place as the weaker
vessels. joyfully embracing the mandate
of your word, that they be submissive to their husbands, that they
constantly strive for that true inner beauty of the meek and
of the quiet spirit which in your sight is of great price. O Lord, seal these things to
our hearts, Bring them constantly to our remembrance and give us
grace to live them out in the power of your grace and in the
strength of your spirit for Jesus' sake. Amen.

The Divine Directive to Married Men, Part 2

Key Quotes

What does the Bible say about husbands honoring their wives?

How do we know that husbands must live with their wives according to knowledge?

Why is it important for husbands to recognize their wives as fellow heirs of grace?

What happens to a husband's prayers if he does not honor his wife?

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About Albert N. Martin

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The Divine Directive to Married Men, Part 2

Key Quotes

What does the Bible say about husbands honoring their wives?

How do we know that husbands must live with their wives according to knowledge?

Why is it important for husbands to recognize their wives as fellow heirs of grace?

What happens to a husband's prayers if he does not honor his wife?

Sermon Transcript

About Albert N. Martin

Comments

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