The Christian Life of a Wife/ The Wise Wife: Sermon Notes

Once again I have been asked to publish my speaking notes from the Sunday sermon.  These notes differ from the actual message.  That message can be found at: http://www.holidayshoresbaptist.org/media/2012-10-14_Wes_Pinkley.mp3

Several Scriptures are pertinent to this topic, and this sermon is limited by time.

However there are three areas I desire to address today.

I. Your Husband is Your Ministry

II. Submission is Faith in God

III. Looking Good

 Remember, Paul uses these things as an illustration of the Church.  Thus we all need to heed and know our role.  For it is a grand blessing of God to be His bride. 

Ladies, your success is not based on your husband, but on your God.  Live accordingly.  For it is an honor to God to serve well, especially in difficult circumstances.

All these are done to the glory of God.

I.          Your Husband is your ministry

Genesis 2:24-25 One Flesh
1 Corinthians 11:3 The husband is the head of the wife
Ephesians 5:23
Proverbs 31:10-31 The priority is the household to aid the husband
2 Peter 1:3 Doing all with excellence
Ephesians 5:22 & 33 submit and respect, serving by building up your co-laborer

 

II. Submission

This idea has been perverted by the “women’s liberation movement”, and by unloving husbands who have manipulated it into a dirge of the covenant.

HUSBANDS- remove the plank in your own eye before going after her speck.  Remember the sermon on success?  The standard is from God, not the world.  Idolatry places us against God’s ways.  You yourself are in submission to God. Are you thus hypocritical or a man of character?

Ephesians 5:22 Submission is graceful acceptance of the husband’s care.

Your husband has a responsibility to God, how can he learn submissiveness if you do not have humble submission?  This of course is for those who desire for their husbands to take on a spiritual leader role and to honor God. 

The context is Ephesians 5:2, 15-17, 20-21

It is a submission to God issue.

Because your husband is your ministry, it is a key to success before God.

III.  Looking Good, Women’s Adornment

1 Peter 3:1-6

            Again submission comes up, it is working orderly with your husband.

Peter shows that it has a purpose in bringing others to Christ.

As I said weeks ago, we are to be peculiar people.  Your disposition to your husband will set you apart from other women.  It can give great glory to Christ.  Otherwise, claiming to be a Christian and yet grumbling, band mouthing, and showing disrespect puts you in the category of unchanged from the former ways.  The cross always changes us in sanctification.

  Beauty is not merely clothing, hair, and jewelry. Peter does not prohibit these things.

A pastor once said, if the barn needs paint, then pain it.

However, true godly beauty is the personality of the heart.  Really. 

Unfortunately, physical appearance is idolized today.  Magazines, TV shows, fitness programs, all turn appearance into an idol.

            Here is a point, the body is temporary, the eternal is the priority.  God has chosen to give us the bodies we have.  Yes we should care for them, but to the point that we are at our best for ministry.  That we live quality lives for the glory of God.  When you eat, eat sensibly.  Exercise too.  To fail to do these is to be slothful, and Proverbs says much about this character, it calls it sin.

But your character is key.  A ring of gold in a pigs snout is a disgraceful waste.  If you do not have the beauty of the heart they you may run the risk of being a bejeweled sow.  However, a woman of excellence is to be praised.

Do not look for praise for your shoes, hair, or figure; find it in “well done thou good and faithful servant.”

Thus, eat that chocolate to God’s glory.  Dine on pasta.  But also enjoy a salad and exercise regularly, all the while, renewing the mind- not conforming to the things of the world. For God wishes to bless you through sanctification. 

Husbands, help your wife to become the woman God intends for her to be.  She is your co-labored, your help-meet, your responsibility, together you both shall worship God in spirit and in truth.