In a two-part series, we will see:

• God commands husbands to love their wives at the highest standard of love fathomable: “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her” (Eph. 5:25). Notice, husbands, that the command does not say, “Husbands, if you’re tired or if you don’t feel like it or if she hasn’t treated you like you want, then go ahead and lower the bar of love for her.” Husbands are commanded by God to love their wives even if she is a tyrant. This isn’t about the wife’s loveliness, so much as it is about the standard of Christ’s love.

• Husbands, in God’s sovereignty, some of you are in situations where your wife might unapologetically commit many things on the list below. If so, Christ, who suffered the greatest injustice ever, is your rest and comfort to persevere in your trial. He loves you. He notices. And he has entrusted you with this trial to glorify him.

• Husbands, we may not use this list as a weapon against our wives. By God’s grace, let us not stoop so low.

• Wives, many of you strive for godliness in these areas, and, yet, tragically, your husband refuses to turn to Christ and grow in godliness. Few stations of life are more difficult than this. Christ is your immediate tangible source of comfort and motivation to persevere in this unique form of suffering. Additionally, however, there is joy in knowing that God has sovereignly ordained this situation for you. So, you can embrace the struggle by being a quiet, but powerful, example of salt and light. As you strive to do so, your reward will be great in heaven. And, whether acknowledged or not, your following after Christ is not unnoticed.

• Resentment is sin against God and others. Husbands, resentment is never justified. And, in extreme sin, that can be very difficult. Even so, we look to the One who unhesitatingly lowered his shoulder and went to the cross to be sentenced for every single one of our sins (1 Pet. 2:24). Resentment would have kept him from going. But his love for you and the Father did not even permit a hint of resentment against us (Rom. 5:8).

Click here to read How Husbands can get their wives to resent them

Click here to read How Wives can get their husbands to resent them