May 2, 2024

GOD’S WORD FOR TODAY:

“Find out what pleases the Lord. Each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.” (Ephesians 5.10; 33)

REFLECTION ON GOD’S WORD:

Only in fairness to Paul’s teaching should we remember that in husbands giving a reason for wives to respect them, wives should exhibit foster and encourage such respect as a mutual reality. We cannot ignore the emphasis of wives preparing themselves to be wives and desiring the love and respect of their husbands. Is there a demonstration of submission, the willingness to submit, to a husband who is godly? We can say with certainty that this can only be understood as that “profound mystery” to which Paul alludes. The benchmark of these relationships is Christ and the Church with Christ as the husband and the Church as the wife. We hear it more in terms of groom and bride. These terms indicate the impending event of marriage; betrothed but not yet officially married. Yet, it is without question that the marriage is going to happen. I can only infer that Paul saw this truth revealed in the relationship of Jesus’ parents, Joseph and Mary. While Paul never truly speaks of the birth story of Jesus, the pattern of resolve between a man and a woman and God is clear. We read in Luke, a travelling companion of Paul in his ministry, that Joseph took Mary to whom he was pledged to be married and was already with child according to the Holy Spirit, to Bethlehem to complete the census obligation. Since they were not married formally in the synagogue, they did not have sexual relations. Mary, a virgin, was blessed with carrying and delivering the Son of God into the world. This did not make Joseph insignificant in the relationship. We know from Matthew that when Joseph discovered that Mary was with child already, he, being a man of the Law and compassionate, he decided to divorce her quietly. The divorcement was the nullification of the betrothal to be married. The betrothal had the authority of a marriage relationship already. It indicated the intentions of both man and woman to be husband and wife. The joy of such union was in the season of preparation. When that union actually took place is not known. For the rest of the world, it already had. Even in Nazareth they were known upon their return from Bethlehem via a sojourn in Egypt, as husband and wife; Jesus was called the son of Joseph. This, too, is significant as the people of Nazareth would have called Him Yeshua bar Joseph. They did not call Him Yeshua bar Elohim. This was evident in their response to Jesus’ teaching following His baptism by His cousin John and the forty-day sojourn in the wilderness as He took on the ministry of reconciliation. He returned to Nazareth, most likely to see His mother and confirm with her that His time had come. It was His thirtieth birthday and for all practical purposes, the indication was that He was a rabbi (longer story made short.) Back to the original point is this- before Jesus was born, Joseph treated Mary with the respect due to her in his submission to the Word and will of God. Even though she was not formally recognized by sacred ceremony before the people as his wife, he gave her the full blessing and benefit of his favor until that time came to pass. [It does lead one to consider that Mary had relatives in Nazareth. This is a story found in later Church writings but not the subject of this reflection.) When Joseph, Mary and Jesus return to Nazareth after the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem (whether a matter of weeks- in Luke, or years- in Matthew), it was assumed that such a ceremony had happened.

In all of this, Mary, according to tradition, was in a season of preparation “to be married” and true only to her betrothed. Her betrothed, according to tradition, was also in a season of preparation “to be married” and preparing a place for them to dwell in love forever. In this “season of preparation,” or waiting, we see the nature, character and resolve of those pledged to be husband and wife as groom and bride. They model the proper behaviors and expectations which declare they are to be “as husband and wife.” The wife maintains herself in dignity for that moment when her husband-to-be comes to claim her as his wife. By tradition, it is a season of the unknown known. His coming will happen. When it will happen is dependent upon the will of the father. Strange that we do not hear of the parents of Mary or Joseph. For the purpose of the gospel, it is safer to read that both Mary and Joseph had aligned themselves already with God in heaven as “their Father.” Little wonder, that being the case, that Jesus would be able to say to his earthly parents after they found Him in the temple following His bar-mitzvah in Jerusalem, “Where else would you expect to find Me but in My Father’s House?” There was no disrespect intended by Jesus to either Mary and especially not to Joseph, for they both understood the meaning of such commitment and intentionality directed from “man to God.” So, as Mary prepared herself as a “lady-in-waiting” for Joseph being faithful to him and to God, so wives (accordingly to Paul) should show themselves to be worthy of their husbands, too. Such worthiness was bound to their relationship to both God and “man.” In Mary we find the appropriate relationship of woman to man as it was from the beginning in the creation story. Eve was called Issah, woman, by Adam because she was drawn from man. Her being and existence was drawn from Adam’s right relationship with God. It was not for his own purpose alone that Eve existed but for the “two to be as one” before God. Of course, we know what happened after that moment when the tables were turned into a sinful understanding of their relationship when Adam allowed himself to be drawn away from God and into the will of Eve. This Mary did not do to Joseph and so the pattern of right relationship, for Paul, should not be the course of wives to their husbands.

As the husband should show himself worthy of being respected in His faithfulness to God and to his wife, so should the wife show herself in similar fashion thus honoring God, her husband and herself. Little wonder that Paul would tell the woman in Timothy’s congregation, “A woman is saved through child-bearing.” The model of behavior was presented as being more like Mary than Eve; not that having babies makes her a “saved” woman. (1 Timothy 2.15). We know our salvation is from the Lord, maker of Heaven and earth. It is His joy that we be saved and are born again as children of the Most High, joint heirs to the kingdom with Christ and through Him alone.

TODAY’S PRAYER IN RESPONSE TO GOD’S WORD:

Father, before we were conceived in the womb, You had already formed us in Your love and by Your Spirit brought us into being. Each one of us is blessed with the opportunity of doing right, being good and producing the fruit of the Spirit so that others may be fed the truth of that same love so that the two will become one. It is our soul’s sincere desire to embrace the oneness You have in mind that we would know that we are Your people and that You are our God. Lead us in that discovery of the truth and the manifestation of that love for us all. In Jesus’ name, we pray. AMEN.