Simple Faith

Bill Henry: I have met people, "Oh, I hate the way I look. I hate this about me. I hate that." I understand what we're saying, but what we really are saying is, "I love myself so much it really makes me sad that I don't have the nose that I want or I'm this or I'm that." We love ourselves. Husbands, love your wives as you love yourself.

Don't love your car more, your retirement more, or your job more. No one takes precedence over your husband and wife. I tell our kids all the time, "I love you, but I will never love you like I love your mom. Period. Flat out, it isn't happening."

Guest (Male): Coming up today on Simple Faith with Pastor Bill Henry. I think we've all been around someone who's in a great amount of pain or is in the middle of a crisis. I think we'd all agree it is hard to know what to say. But as we're going to see through our study of Job today on Simple Faith, sometimes it's best not to say anything but just weep with those who weep.

Pastor Bill Henry is in Job chapter two today where Job's friends enter the scene. Through this valuable study, we'll learn what to and what not to say to people in a crisis. Here's Pastor Bill.

Bill Henry: Even if we've been through really hard times, it is just by the grace of God that we don't need to take that out on those around us, especially those that we love the most. Notice how we do that, by the way. We don't take it out on the people at work. We don't take it out on the people at church. We don't come here and grumble. No, we come here and we are all smiles. Then you get in the car and scream, "Back there, kids! I can't believe you just did that! He took the last chocolate donut!"

We are laughing, but I bet that happens a lot more even here at Simple Faith than some of us would care to admit. Are we seeking to build up when bad things do happen, or do we tear down? "I told you you shouldn't have bought this house. I told you you shouldn't have got this car. I told you you shouldn't have done this." It is easy to go back and forth instead of just saying, "Let's pray. Let's encourage."

Again, are you choosing to tear down your husband or your wife? Psalm 5:19 through 21 says, "Speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God." Matter of fact, let's turn in our Bibles there for just a moment over to Ephesians chapter five. Keep your finger back there in Job two.

We're going to look at a couple more things as we're talking about this with marriage and how we are to be treating each other. First, we see there in Ephesians 5:19 through 21 that we are to be speaking to one another. Yes, this is within the church. Yes, this is within Christianity. But first and foremost, our Christianity should be starting in the home.

It's not just like, "Hey, just come to church and let's speak to each other this way." We should be speaking to our husbands and wives this way. We should be speaking to our children this way. We should be speaking to our parents in this manner if we are Christians. Giving thanks for all things. And then wives, notice in chapter five verse 22, this is how the wives are to be towards their husbands.

"Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church. He is the savior of the body. Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be subject to their own husbands in everything." Look at verse 33, "Let the wife see that she respects her husband."

Out of the Amplified, I like that last part of verse 33. It says it this way, "And let the wife see that she respects and reverences her husband, that she notices him, regards him, honors him, prefers him, venerates and esteems him, and that she defers to him, praises him, and loves and admires him exceedingly." Sadly, thinking about the women's liberation movement, it teaches the exact opposite of what the Word of God says.

I remember when I first became a pastor, these kinds of scriptures scared me a little bit teaching from the pulpit. I always had some older woman come up and be all upset with me. Take it up with God because it has nothing to do with me. It's between you and the Lord. This is how a woman is supposed to be towards her husband. Not what we see here in Job.

Reverencing her husband, noticing him, regarding him, honoring him, preferring him above all of her friends, venerating and esteeming him. Puff him up a little bit. "Hey, I see you did this. That's so wonderful. Thank you so much for doing that. That was so great." I remember years ago, and Talia knows I share these things so I am not throwing her under the bus.

We had just been married a few weeks and came home from our honeymoon. I went to work and came home. We had a mobile home, and as we were coming in through the laundry room right into the kitchen, I walked in and there was this cupboard over the bar. There was this new thing that was there, and I thought, "What is this? Oh, honey-do list."

It had two columns full of stuff to do. I looked right at her and said, "Yeah, I'll never do any of those things. I love you, babe. I'll see you later." To be honest, I ended up doing them all. But it wasn't because she put them on a honey-do list as if I was her servant to do these things. It was because we talked through it and she took it down.

She learned that from her mother and her grandmother, that the man is the head of the house, but the woman is the neck and she turns the head whichever way she wants. I know that was in some movie, but this was from her thing. No, you need to notice your husband, regard him, honor him, prefer him.

In 1 Peter 3:1, it says this to wives, "In like manner, you married women be submissive to your own husbands. Subordinate yourselves as being secondary to and dependent on them and adapt yourselves to them." Remember that what he's talking about here is only positionally. In other words, it is the work that is happening within the home.

God has set up positions. We are all equal before God. Just because the husband is to be over the wife and the wife is to submit doesn't mean the husband is now the master of the house. It's just the order that God has set. Subordinate yourselves as being secondary to and dependent on them and adapt yourselves to them, so that even if they do not obey the Word of God, they may be won over not by discussion but by the godly lives of their wives.

Verse two, "When they observe the pure and modest way in which you conduct yourselves." Does this describe you wives tonight? Pure and modest. I have a feeling some of you are going to say no if we're truthful here. "Together with your reverence for your husband. You are to feel for him all that reverence includes, to respect, defer to, refer to him, to honor, esteem, appreciate, prize, and in the human sense to adore him. That is, admire, praise, be devoted to, deeply love and enjoy your husband."

That's how God created it to be. No matter what anybody in the world says or anybody within the church, or maybe even anybody within your own brain, this is how God said it's supposed to be. Verse three, he goes on, "Let not yours be the merely external adornment with elaborate interweaving and knotting of the hair, the wearing of jewelry or changing of clothes. But let it be inward adorning and beauty of the hidden person of the heart with the incorruptible and unfading charm of a gentle and peaceful spirit which is not anxious or wrought up, but is very precious in the sight of God."

Some of you might say, "Well, that's not my personality. I'm a strong woman. I'm a strong personality." That means you simply haven't submitted that part of your womanhood to the Lord and repented of it. Everybody is so quiet, this is crazy. Don't worry, I have the guys coming, ladies, before you start throwing chairs at me.

Proverbs 21:9 says it is better to dwell in the corner of a housetop or on the flat oriental roof exposed to all kinds of weather than in a house shared with a nagging, quarrelsome, and faultfinding woman. That's a biblical truth right there. I've met so many husbands sadly where their wives will not submit to them as unto the Lord. And so the husband just becomes beat down. The wife is definitely ruling even though they might say, "Oh no, my husband is over the family. He's given me the authority." There is no such animal.

Now, husbands, you guys ready for this? Wives are all excited. Ephesians 5:25, "Husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for her, that he might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word." And then in verse 33, "Nevertheless, let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself."

Guys, are you loving your wives as you love yourself? I know a lot of guys, especially a lot of the younger guys today in their 20s, 30s, and 40s, and they think, "Oh, I'm working. I've had a hard day at work. I'm going to come home and relax." The woman of the house, get me my food. I've been working all day. I'm the ruler of the house. Submit to me, woman.

Then they go and they play their video games, or they go and they watch their football, or they go and do all this other stuff. That poor wife has been watching and tending to the kids all day, working harder than he'll ever work a lot of times. And yet, where's the love? Love and care as Christ loved the church.

Christ gave his life for her. Christ laid his life down. You come home and you're tired. Welcome to the club. It's like when I tell people to come and serve at church. People say, "Oh, I'm so busy. I'm so tired." Go talk to everybody who's working. They're busy and they're tired too. When you come home, husbands, you need to come home to bless your wife.

What a blessed thing, wives, that they come home to this home where it is a sanctuary. Husbands, come home to love your wife, to build them up and to lift them up as Christ gave himself for the church, seeking to sanctify her and cleanse her by the washing of the water of the word. This doesn't just simply mean let's sit down and have a Bible study devotions every day.

This means that moment by moment, day by day, hour by hour, you are washing your wife and washing your children in the Word of God that you have taken in. You are saying it naturally because you studied this morning and you prayed about it. You are loving them, and this is how you do your best to live your life according to the Word of God by his Holy Spirit.

"Nevertheless, let each one of you in particular so love his own wife as himself." No one's ever hated himself. I have met people who say, "I hate the way I look. I hate this about me. I hate that." I understand what we're saying, but what we really are saying is, "I love myself so much it really makes me sad that I don't have the nose that I want or I'm this or I'm that."

We love ourselves. Husbands, love your wives as you love yourself. Don't love your car more, your retirement more, or your job more. No one takes precedence over your husband and wife. I tell our kids all the time, "Look, I love you, but I will never love you like I love your mom. Period. Flat out, it isn't happening."

She tells them the same thing about me. We need to remember this, men, especially right now. How about in 1 Peter 3:7 through 9? "In the same way, you married men should live considerately with your wives with an intelligent recognition of the marriage relation, honoring the woman as physically the weaker but realizing that you are joint heirs of the grace of life, in order that your prayers may not be hindered and cut off. Otherwise, you cannot pray effectively."

"Finally, all of you should be of one mind, the same mind, united in spirit, sympathizing with one another, loving each other as brethren of one household, compassionate and courteous, tender-hearted and humble." Peter there is going on to expand, but how about to the marriages first? Are you of the same mind, united in spirit? Do you sympathize with one another, loving each other as brethren of one household, compassionate, courteous?

Does that describe how you speak to one another and to your children? Are you courteous? "Hey, could you please do that? Thank you very much." They are not your slaves. Moms and dads, your kids are not your slaves. "Do this! Why? Because I said so! It's my house and my rules!" Be careful because we are not to be living according to the world.

He goes on in verse nine, "Never returning evil for evil or insult for insult, scolding, tongue-lashing, berating, but on the contrary blessing, praying for their welfare, happiness, and protection and truly pitying and loving them." Do you feel that way to your husband or your wife? Especially, again, that's who we're talking about. "For I know that to this you have been called, that you may yourselves inherit a blessing from God, that you may obtain a blessing as heirs, being welfare and happiness and protection."

I love the part where it says in verse nine, "Never return evil for evil." As we're here in Job two, we don't know exactly what happened between his wife and Job, but we weren't told that Job did anything to provoke this from his wife. He's already been going through all this stuff. But here's the thing. Do our marriages reflect Christ and his church? That's what a marriage is supposed to reflect.

If your marriage is not reflecting Christ and the church, not reflecting what we've just been reading, then here's the key. You need to repent. You need to turn away from that and turn to the biblical way with a godly sorrow that will lead to a true and lasting restoring change in your marriage. "Oh, that'll never happen. We've been married for so many years. Our marriage is dead."

I like what Chuck Missler used to say. "If God can resurrect Lazarus from the grave, he can resurrect your marriage." Right? In Joel we read this, "And I will restore or replace for you the years that the locusts have eaten." Again, this is to the nation of Israel, but it is also applicable to us today.

God does that. That's who our God is. Isaiah 61:3, "He will give a crown of beauty for ashes, a joyous blessing instead of mourning." That's what our God does. These are promises for Israel, but they also can apply to us. So as another part of marriage, again as we're coming back into Job chapter two verse 10, let me ask you this.

When your spouse does go off into sin like Job's wife did, how do you respond? Because this is what we're going to see next. How do we respond? Do we respond in like manner? Do we do evil for evil, or do we seek to respond how the Lord would have us respond? A lot of times it is, "Oh, you said this! Well, I'm saying this!" and voices get higher. No.

What does Job do? Look at verse 10. "But he said to her," remember she just said, "Curse God and die." He's got sores all over his body. They are hurting. They are oozing. They are just disgusting. But he said to her, "You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. Shall we receive good from God and shall we not receive evil?" In all this, Job did not sin with his lips.

Notice he points out her silliness and says, "You're speaking as one of the foolish women would speak." Who is the fool? The fool has said in his heart there is no God. She is speaking like a fool right now. So a few things. If your husband or wife is being that way, do not respond how they are responding.

I've had so many in counseling over the years and, "Well, they did this, so I did that." No. If your husband or wife sins against you, that's not an excuse to sin against them. Notice what he does, though. Notice he does point out, "You're speaking as one of the foolish women speak."

Husbands, can I just encourage you to lead in your homes? Be firm. Don't be a jerk about it. He isn't saying, "Boy, you sound like a wicked witch." He's saying, "You sound like one of the foolish women would speak." And then he corrects her, gives her the correct theology. "Shall we receive from God good and shall we not receive evil?" In all this, Job did not sin with his lips.

Beloved in Christ, even when we have our arguments, even when we have trials in our lives, we will sin against each other. That's because you're married to a sinner. But here's the thing. Don't remain in that sin. Be quick to repent. Be quick to apologize. Be quick to change. And don't just keep doing that same thing over again. "I said I'm sorry again."

Yes, we need to keep forgiving, but that trust is going further and further and further away because I don't know if you really mean it. You keep doing that same thing over and over again. Be careful. But again, husbands, don't be afraid to lead and rebuke them a little bit. "You're speaking as one of the foolish women speak."

And then correct them biblically. That's one of the things I always did with my wife and still do, and she'll do with me when we get in something. "This is what the Bible says." With our children, "This is why you're getting in trouble because this is what the Bible says and you did this." Sometimes it would be, "You're getting in trouble, you're going to get a little spanking or a timeout."

And then it would be, "But because of God's grace and mercy, it's not happening today." And they'll look at you and go, "What? Really?" Yeah, because I receive God's grace and mercy every day. It might not happen tomorrow. But again, I talk to all three of our girls and they'll say one of the main things that stands out is that.

Showing them that grace and mercy. So especially dads and fathers and husbands, correct and lead, but remember to do it biblically. Not according to, "Well, my dad was great. My dad raised me like this, and I turned out okay." No you didn't. If you're not biblical, no you didn't.

And it's okay to say that. And you can still love your parents. My dad abused us a bit. Not as bad as a lot of dads had done. I had to come to that reality, but I could still love him. But I also wouldn't want to follow in his footsteps. Why would I? That's the most lame thing in the world. Point them back to the Word of God.

Notice in all this, Job did not sin with his lips. Be careful what we say. Our words can cause wounds that are very deep and lasting in people's hearts and lives. Be careful of that. Sadly, some of us are so used to wounding others with our tongues that it is just second nature. That's not of God.

Remember that. Let us seek to not. Go read in James when he talks about how powerful the tongue is and how such a little thing can spark such a large fire. I still drive up the gorge and you see the fire for mile after mile. Some silly kid playing with a firework just threw it down in the cavern. Little dinky thing caused millions and millions in damage.

Our tongues can do the same thing. I love that he did not sin, again, not against his wife, not against God. God is always listening because he loves us so much. He's always paying attention. Just by the grace of God, may we be those seeking to walk as Job walked in all of this.

Guest (Male): This has been Simple Faith with Pastor Bill Henry from Simple Faith Calvary Chapel in Vancouver, Washington. Today we brought you a message from Pastor Bill from his series in the book of First Thessalonians. It's our sincere hope and prayer that you've been blessed by the words you heard from Pastor Bill today.

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Here at Simple Faith Calvary Chapel, we have two services on Sunday morning at 9:00 and 10:45, and a great time of studying in God's Word Wednesday night at 7:00 PM. We'd love to have you come visit us and make sure you say hi to Pastor Bill and let him know you listen to Simple Faith.

For more information and directions, go to simplefaith.org. You can also follow us on Facebook and Instagram. Thanks for joining us today and be sure to join us next time as our series in First Thessalonians continues here on Simple Faith with Pastor Bill Henry. And be sure to join us for the Sunday edition of Simple Faith and a series in the book of Job. This program is brought to you by Simple Faith Calvary Chapel in Vancouver, Washington.