We worked through the last part of the section on the roles and responsibilities of husbands and wives. The picture the text paints is majestic in how it points us to the person and work of Jesus for the church, as the model for married couples to look to. Wives can think of their role as mirroring the role of the church in its relationship to Jesus. Men can think of their role as mirroring the role of Jesus in how He leads as a servant and lays down His life for the church. Paul even points us back to the creation of Eve for Adam as a foreshadowing or a picture of Jesus relationship to His bride. Paul goes so far as to say the mystery of marriage is it’s creation is a picture of Jesus and His bride. In other words the greater and better reality of marriage is found in Jesus and the church. One of the most beautiful pictures of this is found in how when Eve is created even her creation is a mirror of how the church will be created by God for Jesus through His work on the cross. God put Adam to sleep as if in death and took a piece of his side as if it was pierced and He fashioned from this a bride for Adam because God was thinking of the future death of Jesus and how His side would be pierced and from Jesus shed blood God planned to fashion a bride for His Son. So marriage is this amazing picture we have been entrusted with. It is important for us to see it in this light and value it as the foreshadowing it is. This just raises the bar on how important it is for husbands to love their wives like Jesus loves the church and gives Himself up for it. It also provides a clear reference for how submission and respect of the church to Jesus is a guide for the wife to submit to and respect her husband. The thing which is really clear from the passage is how both of the spousal roles are ones which they are called to take upon themselves. It is not the husbands job to force the wife to submit and it is not the wives job to demand the husbands love. Both of them are called to enter into this because of their relationship with Jesus. In fact if you look at the curse as we did two weeks ago you will see how the roles the Christian is called to in marriage are really commands to overcome as much as possible the curse against men and women in the garden after the fall.