Ephesians 5:25

“Husbands love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.”

Paul now turns to the husband's responsibility in marriage relationships.

while husbands are to be subject to their wives as stated in verse 22, they have the additional requirement of loving their wives as Christ loved the church. As we read this and the subsequent verses, Paul switches rapidly between church, Christ, wives, and husbands so that it is at times difficult to tell which is the illustration and which is the subject. In Paul's mind the relationship between marriage and the church goes both ways, each illustrating the other.

the word for love that Paul uses here is the verb form of agape. We might have expected that he would use the word “eros” to describe marital love. This word refers to passionate. sexual love. He could have used phileo which means affection between family members or friends.

Paul uses the word which describes the love that God has for his people. Husbands are to love their wives in exactly the same way that Christ loves the church.

agape love is love that flows from the lover to the loved regardless of their response. It is love that is entirely selfless and interested only in the health, prosperity, and well-being of the person loved. Agape love never ends and never gives up.

the most poignant example of agape love, apart from Christ, is the Old Testament prophet Hosea. This man was directed by God to marry a prostitute named Gomer. After sometime, she returned to her old ways and ultimately became a slave. When Hosea saw this, he bought her back (literally redeemed her) so that she could be his wife again.

this is an illustration of God’s love for his people and the expectation of the love that husbands must have for their wives .

Because God’s love is unconditional, the love that a husband has for his wife must also be unconditional. Even if a wife refuses to submit to him or to God, a husband must love his wife.

Paul uses the specific example of Christ's giving of himself for the church. Christ sacrificed himself, handing himself over to be crucified in order for sinful people to be redeemed and reconciled to the Father.

husbands, then, must lay down their lives for their wives. This is not a physical act of suicide, but a metaphor that says every selfish ambition a man might have is put to death for the sake of loving his wife.

There is no lording it over a submissive wife in this relationship. A man who has died to self for the sake of his wife will have no need or desire to reign as a despot.

If the wife should be unfaithful, then both Christ and Hosea point to a love that keeps on seeking reconciliation regardless of the cost.

key points in this verse:

• the love of a husband for his wife is meant to be identical to the love of Christ for the church

• Hosea’s love is an example of God’s love for the church and therefore of a christian husband's love for his wife.

• husbands must never give up on their wives