To husbands, God says:
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her….So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are members of His body….Nevertheless let each individual among you also love his own wife even as himself; and let the wife see to it that she respect her husband (Eph. 5:25, 28-30, 33).
Husbands are commanded to love their wives as Christ loves the church. That is no small responsibility! Any wife will gladly submit to someone who loves her as much as Jesus does—who gave His own life in sacrificial love. Just as Christ loves his own body, the church, so also husbands ought to love the woman with whom they are “one flesh” (Eph. 5:31). If a Christian husband loves his wife as he should, he will provide for her, care for her, honor her, help her, encourage her, and spend time with her. If he fails in his responsibility to love his wife, the husband is in danger of hindering the answer to his own prayers:
You husbands likewise, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with a weaker vessel [body], since she is a woman; and grant her honor as a fellow-heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered (1 Pet. 3:7, emphasis added).
There has never been, of course, a marriage that is completely void of conflicts and disagreements. Through commitment and the development of the fruit of the spirit in our lives, however, husbands and wives can learn to live harmoniously and experience the ever-increasing blessedness of Christian marriage. Through the inevitable problems that arise in all marriages, each partner can learn to grow to greater maturity in Christ-likeness.
For further study on the duties of husbands and wives, see Gen. 2:15-25; Prov. 19:13; 21:9, 19; 27:15-16; 31:10-31; 1 Cor. 11:3; 13:1-8; Col. 3:18-19; 1 Tim. 3:4-5; Tit. 2:3-5; 1 Pet. 3:1-7.
