Husbands Honor Your Wife

Scripture Reading

Will you please turn over in your Bibles with me to 1 Peter chapter 3, 1 Peter chapter 3. The reading this morning will come from 1 Peter chapter 3, verses 1 through 7, but the preaching will be especially on 1 Peter 3, 7. If you're using the provided New King James Pew Bibles, you'll find that on page 1077, 1 Peter chapter 3. You're now God's perfect word.

Wives, likewise, be submissive to your own husbands, that even if some do not obey the word, they, without a word, may be won over by the conduct of their wives, when they observe your chaste conduct accompanied by fear. Do not let your adornment be merely outward, arranging the hair, wearing gold, or putting on fine apparel. Rather, let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God. For in this manner in former times the holy women who trusted in God also adorned themselves, being submissive to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord, whose daughters you are, if you do good, and are not afraid with any terror. Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered.

Prayer for Illumination

Thus ends this portion of the reading of God's word. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word. We pray that your Holy Spirit might attend to the preaching of it as well. Lord, we pray that you would please help us. Lord, give us ears to hear, minds to understand, hearts to believe, and to live. Lord, please help me, a stumbling, failing man, to be able to proclaim your word in a way which would glorify you and be faithful to it. We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.

Sermon

And I gotta tell you, you know where our culture seems to land on this, because if you turn on almost any sitcom on TV today, what do you find about the man in the home? Well, he's a bumbling fool, an idiot who doesn't know how to actually care for his wife or raise his children. He's just helpless and stupid and can just be put in a corner to be laughed at. But yet on the other side, is a harm that many men have done in the past to their own reputation by wielding the authority that God has given them in society and in their homes for their own desires and sinful passions.

And so we might think that many of these things are an overcorrection, but I would like to pose to you this morning that in 1 Peter 3, verse 7, that we find very much both patriarchy as well as equality. A husband who is to lead his home truly is to be the head of his wife. And yet, women who also are worthy of dignity, honor, respect as equal heirs of the kingdom of life, of grace. And so we need to go through and what my goal is this morning is just to look at verse 7 phrase by phrase with you and see what God commands husbands specifically. Last week, you ladies got a heavy weight on your shoulders being told to be quiet and submissive, to be listening to your husbands. Husbands, now it's to make sure the Holy Spirit, I think here, makes sure that we don't then overstep our bounds. And so we'll do this by looking phrase by phrase through 1 Peter 3, 7. Notice first it is addressed to husbands, but the second word is likewise. Husbands likewise. Likewise what? Well, it's being compared to something or it's being tied to something.

If you look to chapter 3, verse 1, it said, women are wives likewise. And then in chapter 2, verse 18, it's the household servants who are to be submissive or obedient to their masters. But what is this tying to? If wives likewise, chapter 3, verse 1, as I argued last week, isn't tying them to being slaves, but tying to above that, what is this talking about? Well, look with me at verses 11 through 12.

Beloved, I beg you, as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul, having your conduct honorable among the Gentiles, that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by your good works which they observe, glorify God in the day of visitation. We, each one of us, every single one of us in this life, in this Christian life, are sojourners and pilgrims. The Gentiles, the nations, the pagans out there, they may slander you as evildoers, yet your good works are meant to speak for themselves, to speak of your faith. The good conduct in their lives was to be in the midst of nations is what verse 12 is getting at.

Why? So when they slander you, you Christians as evildoers, when the Lord returns on the day of visitation, They're not going to be able to say anything, because your conduct will have spoken for itself. So what does that look like played out in life? Well, we started that with verse 13. For everyone, it means being obedient to the ruling authorities.

You had freedom, but you weren't to let your freedom be a cloak for vice. You were to obey and to listen to those governing authorities, both the king and to the governors. In a similar way, likewise, verse 18, household slaves would be obedient and to listen to their masters, whether they were good and kind, gentle with them or cruel and crooked. They were free in Christ. And yet, they would not use their freedom to revile and or revolt their masters. No, their example would be a testimony. Likewise, wives, as they were submissive to their own husbands, even though they were non-Christians. Instead of putting on fine jewelry, and braided hair, and nice clothing, instead they would seek to be submissive, quiet, and gentle spirit, which is very precious to God.

There'd be models of this in society. And so likewise husbands behave in a way very different than the rest of the world as sojourners and pilgrims. See each one of us in our lives have a way in which God is saying you have a way to live differently than the rest of the world. Your conduct is to be filled with good works out of a love for Jesus Christ.

And so now this morning we come to these husbands Husbands are to live as sojourners and pilgrims, not going after the passionate desires of the flesh. There might be ways in which we as men naturally want to rule our families, govern over our wives. And the Lord's saying, you don't follow those natural lusts. You don't follow those natural desires.

But no, as sojourners and pilgrims, we follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ. So husbands, how do we do this? What does it mean to live as sojourners and pilgrims? Well, it's gonna look different than it did back then. And it's gonna look different than this culture around us wants it to look like today.

And so to step into the shoes of who Peter's talking to here in 1 Peter 3.1, we need to understand the Roman family system was very different than our family system today.

We even in Christian circles want to think of the husband as the head of the household. In some sense that's true in the Roman world, but not exactly. Because it was far more formal than that, with intergenerational family ties. See, in the Roman world, the paterfamilias was not just, you know, Brian, I live in my home, and so everybody in my house is part of my household, and so I'm in charge of all of them. No, that's not how it would be.

Because my dad's still alive, and he's a citizen. And so as my kids call him, Papa would get to call the shots. Grandpa Schneider would be the paterfamilias. And if Grandpa Schneider told me, hey, Brian, you need to go get a different job because you're not bringing in enough income for the whole household, meaning the whole family, guess what Brian would have to do if I was a Roman citizen in the first century? I'd have to go get a different job. I'd have to listen to my dad.

I think this is specifically the system that was talking about in chapter 3 verses 1 through 6 when it said that wives were to submit to their own husbands. Not to their husband's father or grandfather, but to their own husbands. Not to all men, but to their husbands. And so husbands here are being called out that they are to lead their own family in a particular way.

And the paterfamilias back then, I mean, this is a big deal. If you were the father of the family, the paterfamilias, Roman law had it that you were able to decide life and death for people in your household. Life and death. That there was a generational loyalty and a wife was to be treated, this is where it's very different. Many Roman authors wrote about how their households were arranged. The wife was just a little bit more than a slave.

Not so in the Christian household. In a male-dominated society, especially among citizens, this would have looked very different than how it does in our Western culture today. But Not everybody Peter's writing to were citizens. There's actually only about 30% of the Roman Empire were citizens, and especially because Peter isn't actually writing to the people in Rome, where the citizenship rate would be higher, but he's writing to the provinces of today, Turkey. There have been less Roman citizens in the church there.

And in the family back then, there was kind of It's like the Wild West of marriage laws. Because if you weren't a Roman citizen, you didn't have legal protection in your marriage. Roman law didn't apply to your marriage because you didn't have a lawful marriage because you weren't Roman citizens.

And so you kind of like let the plebeians do whatever the plebes do. There was divorce that would be rampant both by wives and by husbands. There would be kind of this regular fighting between the couples. There would be women who would leave their husbands and husbands who would desert their wives. There wasn't a legal protection over many marriages in the early church by the Roman authorities because they weren't Roman citizens. A number of them were slaves. It's a very different picture than what it looks like today. And so Peter is writing by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit here and ordering, what does it look like even for you non-citizens and for you citizens in the church? How is this going to restructure and solidify the family within the body of Christ?

And notice how he says it first. Peter takes aim first at dwelling with them with understanding. Dwell with them. Husbands, dwell with your wives. It's just a very basic level here. There's a command from the Holy Spirit that you're, you might think I'm crazy here, but this actually does apply. Husbands, you ought to live with your wives. Right then, then, hold on, what do you mean I gotta live with my wife? Yeah.

Yeah, right, you're not allowed to just go and live separately from your wife. Now I gotta say, many men will live in their home with their wife, but will live emotionally and socially and everything else divorced from their wife. They'll live in the same domicile, right, under the same roof, but they won't actually live, cohabitate with their wives. You must live with your wife. A husband ought to live with his wife. Now, on the flip side of that, if you ain't married, you ain't got no business living with a woman either.

It's husbands who ought to live, dwell with their wives. But notice, it's not just this dwelling with their wives, but notice how they're to dwell with their wives. Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding. The Greek there would be more along a literal translation of according to knowledge. Husbands, Christian husbands, you must be considerate of your wife. Do you think about your wife, husband?

Do you consider the things that she needs? Do you consider her weaknesses? Do you consider her strengths? Do you consider... Her, do you think about her kindly? Do you think about her with gentleness? Do you think well of her? How do you think about your wife in your heart? Do you consider her well? Is she like a Proverbs 31 woman to you or is she just that ball and chain? Is she just that nagging woman who holds you back? How do you think about your wife? Do you dwell with her according to knowledge?

Do you understand that she gets tired? Do you understand that, especially if you got a bunch of little kids at home, it's hard to raise these little tyrants who need to be civilized? Do you understand that there are times, and this is a real thing right there, do you understand that there are certain times of the month and year that you might need to be a little bit more patient with your wife? Do you understand? that there are times where she just wants you to listen and not to fix. You know what I'm talking about, right? Husbands, when your wife seems to have a problem, and we want to fix the problem and just get the conversation done quickly, and what she's really wanting to do is process verbally and pour out her heart, do we understand that that's what it means to dwell with her, to listen? Are you understanding, your wife, that it may take more time to do certain things?

Do you consider that your wife has different priorities, likes, and preferences, and do you give her space for that? And you might think, well, hold on, Brian, you're sounding an awful lot like, you know, just, just, you just gotta be so nice to your wife. This sounds like 21st century feminist gobbledygook. No, hold on.

Let me read to you what Calvin said on this passage in the 1500s. And this is Calvin writing on, what does it mean to live with them according to knowledge? He said, nothing destroys friendship of life more than contempt. Nor can we really love any but those whom we esteem, for love must be connected with respect. Do you see Calvin and viewed marriage, a Christian husband to a Christian wife as a well-functioning friendship in which people are considerate and respectful towards one another. And when consideration or understanding fails, do you know what comes into that vacuum? contempt, bitterness, annoyance, even hatred.

Many men, even Christian men in the home, fail the Lord because they're not considerate with their wives. And instead, they want to get together with their buddies. And it's just, you laugh at complaining about your spouse. Man, never be so. May your good conduct, how you think and speak about your wife, especially in public, be that people think so highly about your wife that they think, man, he really listens to her and he loves her and he must live with her in an understanding way. Because notice the next thing.

So the King James Version switches things up a little bit here just for the sake of English order, but I'm going to put it in the Greek. because she's the weaker vessel. Live with her, dwell with her with understanding as the weaker vessel, assigning her honor.

Your wife's weakness is not because she's less valuable. Your wife's weakness is not because she's less able. When it says here that we're giving honor to the wife as the weaker vessel, what does that mean, weaker? Because these two are tied together, right? Giving honor to the wife as the weaker vessel, it's actually opposite order in the Greek, because she's the weaker vessel, you ascribe to her honor. What does it mean, though, for the wife to be weaker?

Well, primarily, principally, this is talking about physical weakness. Not necessarily moral, spiritual, or mental weakness. If you know my wife, I can tell you the truth that she's probably stronger than I am spiritually, mentally, and in every other way. But, in today's society, I'm going to say some really countercultural things right now.

Men, God made you stronger for a reason. There's a death in our culture of a desire to see strong men who would actually protect their wives. Men who would rise up today and to want to honor their wives and protect them. We protect our wives, not looking down on them. as if to say we're lords over them, but because we honor them as weaker. Man, it is to our shame if we do not dwell with our wives, knowing that they're weaker vessels. God made it this way. This is why for two weeks we've been reading Genesis chapter two.

God made Adam, and how did Adam treat Eve? Did you notice that? It's beautiful. Adam sees Eve for the first time, and it's like his breath is taken away. This is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. For she was taken out of man, and she shall be called woman. There's no other helper like that in all creation. But he sees Eve, and he's immediately drawn to her. And he knows that this is someone he is to love and to cherish and to protect.

Men, God made you this way physically different. And I know that there's all sorts of people who are trying to just cast this out and whitewash it away. Oh, women are the exact same as men, but it's not true. It's just not true. There's a reason why.

In swimming, I was one of the worst swimmers on my college swim team. There was one event that I was somewhat decent at, but every other time we ordered all the lanes from fastest on the north side of the pool and to the slowest on the south side of the pool. Guess which lane I swam in? I was way far on the left-hand side of the pool. But guess how many female ladies were right of me at the pool. There weren't very many.

And I'm not saying that there aren't women stronger than me because I can tell you right now at the gym there are ladies who can deadlift more than me. That's not saying it's categorically that men you are stronger than every single woman, but by and large, when you look at, there's so many research studies about this, men have on average 61% more muscle mass than women. Men have significantly higher bone density on average. Men on average have larger hearts and cardiac volumes. Men on average are stronger than women. There's a reason why in every competitive sport there has for hundreds of years been a demarcation line between these two categories, male and female.

Because we're not built the same. But why did God do that? Men, God made you, designed you to protect the women in your life. The media doesn't want to hear this. Culture doesn't want you to believe this. But God has called you men to honor the weaker vessel. to protect them, to care for them, to lead them in a way which is good and right and just, filled with understanding and love, and it is counter-cultural at times. But why? Why do we do this? Because we ascribe honor to our wives.

Women were to be protected in Rome, generally, but not because they were necessarily honored. Actually, it was quite the known thing that in the Roman world, if you were to, if females were less honored than males, if a man was out at war and he received a letter from his wife and she said, I've had a daughter, there's plenty of letters that have remained alive today that says, expose her. She's a girl. And so just take her out to the field and leave her there and let her die.

Why? Because girls were not as valued as men. This happens all over the place, even in society today. In India, it is illegal, it is illegal in India to have an ultrasound and to find out whether it is a male or a female in the womb. Why? Because female infanticide is real there.

They had to pass this law about 15-20 years ago because many husbands were forcing their wives to go get an abortion because they didn't want to have a daughter. And so now it's illegal, thank God. Why do you think that there's a disproportionate amount of young girls who were adopted from China in the last 40 years? As China imposed their one-child policy, and families had a girl, guess what they would do often with the girl? Not always, but this did happen a lot. Give the girl to an orphanage, because then it doesn't count against your one child, and you can try for a boy. That's not to be the case in the Christian home.

Men, we ought to ascribe giving honor to the wife It's easy to be filled with thoughts of grandeur and of strength and protecting our wives, but do we actually see them as the weaker vessel and ascribe that weakness not as a problem, not as a hindrance, not as a reason for disdain, but actually to love them? They may be physically weaker, but that also makes them more vulnerable to intimidation and abuse.

This is exactly why the RP testimony, our church's testimony on marriage, says this. RP testimony 2415. While we abhor the sinful abuses of a husband's authority and the abdication of his responsibilities within marriage common since the fall, we deny that his headship is in and of itself a result of sin. We abhor both things. As a church, we testify against two things. Husbands, you abdicating your authority and saying, okay, I don't want to rule my home at all, as well as you then becoming the tyrant of your home.

We say both of those are sinful. Both of those are wrong. But I want you to notice a key part of verse 7. Actually, two letters that are extremely important. Look at me again at verse 7. Giving honor to the wife as to the weaker vessel. Weaker vessel. You're called a vessel too, guys. An instrument. A clay pot. The Lord could very easily just drop and break. When we understand that we are also weak, the only strength we have comes from the Lord, then we use whatever strength the Lord gives us to protect those that he has entrusted to us.

And so honor your wives, ascribe, think about them, give them honor. This is not a reversal of rules, This does not mean that somehow you husbands, because you give honor to your wife, that it means that you become a doormat. Doesn't mean that you give up any type of leadership in your home. That's not what this is speaking about, no. But it does mean, to honor your wife, does mean that you show her dignity. You show her respect. You show her consideration and understanding. and you provide for her needs as you're able to.

This is your job, husbands. This is the blessing of being a Christian husband. If you don't like this work, please don't get married. But if you burn with passion, it's better for you to marry than to stay single. By the way, we've been talking a lot about marriage because it's what's in the text. I'd encourage you, I'm going to hand out next week what I think is a good just two pages front and back of what the testimony and the confession say about marriage. But it starts off with being single isn't a horrible thing, right? If that's the place that God's called you to be, if that's the status in which God has placed you, use that as a time to bring God glory. But within the home, there is an order.

And I'm going to give you two big words here, ontological versus economic. Ontological versus economic. Husbands, you may be stronger. and entrusted by God to be the head of your wife. You might think of economic as functioning. In the home, you have a different function. You have a different role. You have a different job to do. That's where we get the word, if the word economy comes from the word ikos, ikos nomos, law of the house. Each person in the household has a function. Each person in the household has a job. Husbands, this is your job.

But just because you have a job to be the leader in your home, the protector in your home, living with your wife as a weaker vessel, does not mean that she is ontologically less than you. The study of ontology is the study of being. The thing in and of itself. Women, you are not in and of yourself somehow less than your husbands.

Notice what it said in verse 7. Look with me again at verse 7. As to the weaker vessel and as being heirs together of the grace of life, Husbands, we need to understand that our wives are fellow heirs, co-inheritors of the kingdom of God. They have every right to the covenant of grace that you do. God shows no partiality. Yeah, God made you a man, but that does not mean that God likes you more than your wife. No, He loves your wife. She is of equal value and has equal rights to the covenant of grace.

At this point, I'm going to say that I'm somewhat concerned, and I'm going to say this because I came out of this environment. When I first became a Christian man, I jumped into the Reformed world both feet. I wanted to read all the stuff and do all the things, and I was naturally driven to as far-right positions as I thought I could get without becoming an extremist.

And I thought, man, I really need to lead my home like a Christian husband. I really need to lead my wife as a Christian man. But then I started overstepping Olivia's boundaries and I'm confessing this sin to you and had to repent of it. When I realized that I was being told certain things by people that I had no right to hold over my wife. that I thought, you know what, somebody gave this idea, and they said, when we take the Lord's Supper, it really should be the husband who takes the Lord's Supper. And as he takes the Lord's Supper, then he distributes it to his wife and to his children, if they're of that age of understanding. And I thought, yeah, that sounds right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I realized, hold on.

There's only one mediator between God and Olivia, and it's the Lord Jesus Christ. See, I had taken a responsibility and a role that I did not deserve to take. I didn't lay down my life for Olivia. I didn't die for her. That was Jesus's covenant and meal for her, not mine to step in. I'd be like one of my kids at Thanksgiving saying, no, no, no, no, no. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Before you other kids are allowed to eat, I have to serve you. Oh, get out of here, you little brat. Right?

That's how I was treating my own wife. No, in the congregation, your wife has a certain amount of rights and privileges that you ought not to infringe upon. There's a movement, and I'm concerned about this, even in the Reformed world, that men who want to take things out of the egalitarian hands and out of the feminist hands will actually go so far in that they start groping at the things that are God's, that the Lord himself has given to their wives. If you think that somehow your wife isn't allowed to pray with you, or come to the sacraments without you, or attend church without you, or partake in the ordinary means of grace of the church somehow without you, or the benefits of redemption without you, you've stepped between your wife and God, and you've stepped in a place that puts yourself up as an idol. Husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way assigned to her honor. Give her dignity and recognize that she is a fellow heir of the grace of life. There's one mediator between your wife and God and it's not you, it's the Lord Jesus Christ.

Again, Calvin wrote on this, he said, the Lord is pleased to bestow in common on husbands and wives the same graces. He invites them to seek an equality in them. And we know that those graces are manifold in which wives are partakers with their husbands. Equality is not a swear word.

If Calvin can say it in the 1500s, that there is equality within the covenant of grace, go ahead and throw rocks at me if that sounds like feminism to you. No, it sounds like what Peter is telling us here is the economy, the working out of the household of God.

Husbands, you are the head of your wife, but Christ is the head of your home and Christ is the head of the church. So men, I have to ask you, as you try to think about this passage and wrestle with this passage in your homes, how do you give honor to your wife? How do you live with her in an understanding way as a weaker vessel? And how do you understand that she's a co-heir with you of the grace of life?

This looks like Jesus. This looks like Ephesians chapter 5. The sister passage to this is when Paul writes to the church in Ephesus, Husbands, love your wives as Christ loves the church. How do you think Jesus loves the church? He has compassion on her.

Or have you started to lord your authority, husbands, over them like the gentiles lord authority over those under them you remember that this is what jesus taught his disciples as they were trying to jockey for authority and jockey for a position and who gets to be first and who's going to sit at the right hand and who's going to sit at the left hand and jesus says guys knock it off that's how the pagans treat each other men have you Essentially, you've been trying to jockey for position in your home and have started to lord over your wife, your authority, like the Gentiles would. Has your reaction against feminism and the excesses of our day made the pendulum swing to a type of Roman headship that is out of place amongst God's people?

It's easy to say that you would die for your wife. I would like to ask you, are you living considerate with them now? Are you showing honor to them now? You know, people don't lay down their lives for something they don't value. Husbands, value your wife. Show your honor for them now. Because I want to end us here with a warning. And this is a harsh warning, but it's serious.

If you want to harm husbands, if you want to harm your relationship with God, the quickest way to do it is to have disdain for your wife. The very last words, last seven words of verse seven, that your prayers may not be hindered. If you close off your heart to your wife, make no doubt about it, God may shut his ears to you.

James tells us you ask and you receive not because you ask from ill motives. I don't think this is the Lord saying here that you're not going to be a Christian, but the Lord is not going to be favorably inclined to you. if you're not showing honor and love and respect and consideration towards your own wife. This is not about legalism here.

This is about the abiding in Jesus Christ. And as you understand the love that Jesus Christ has poured out on you, and as you abide in that love, then you will bear much good fruit. Do you think of the fruits of the spirit as how you should treat your own wife? Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control. Man, this is God's design for you in your marriage. Not to be a tyrant, not to lord over your wives, but to dwell with them in an understanding way as the weaker vessel ascribing unto them honor. that your prayers may not be hindered. Don't shut your ears to your wife, but be honoring and considerate to them. This is God's will for you. This is the Lord's design in his home.

This is what would shut the mouths of the pagans as they tried to slander the Christians. Why would I come to their Savior? You can imagine the pagans sitting there, why would I become a Christian? They say that their Savior, their Lord, is the one who acts like husbands treat their wives. And look how those slugs, look how these idiots treat their wives. Why would we want to follow a Savior like that? Why would we want to call him Lord?

Husbands, I pray. I pray that your testimony would be that. even on the day of visitation when the Lord Jesus Christ returns, though the pagans may have slandered you as evildoers because you were somehow the patriarch of your home, that you led your home in a way that brought Jesus Christ glory and that God would be glorified as you have loved your wives as Christ loves the church.

Closing Prayer

This is a blessing that you have to live out the gospel in front of your wives and your children. Something that you get to do by the power of the Holy Spirit is a blessing you have. So husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way. Ascribe to them honor as the weaker vessel, knowing that they are co-heirs of the grace of life. And don't let your prayers be hindered. God will be glorified in your marriages as you lead your families in this way. Let's pray.

Father, first and foremost, we thank you for Jesus Christ. Lord, we pray that you would please help us. Help us, Lord, as these directions that we've been getting over these last few weeks have been difficult, challenging, countercultural. Lord, even things that we don't want to do in our hearts. Father, we plead with you that your Holy Spirit would let us bear good fruit. Lord, where there is repentance needed, we pray that you would allow us to do it. We pray that we would turn away from the sinful desires of our own flesh and that we would walk in righteousness. that you might receive the glory. Lord, we love you. Please, Father, help us to fulfill our roles in your economy. In Jesus's name, amen.