The Lord gave specific commandments to both the husband and the wife. The Lord, knowing that man’s foremost love was, by nature, himself, commanded the man to “love” his wife as Christ loved the church (Ephesians 5:25). Additionally, the Lord, knowing that a woman would not naturally desire to submit, commanded the wife to submit to her own husband, as unto the Lord. This does not suggest that she only goes along with her husband so long as she agrees with his decisions, neither does it mean that she can never offer input into the decision-making process. But, in the end, she follows her husband’s leading, trusting the Lord to bless her faithfulness.
Godly ladies are known for the love they express toward others. Isaiah 49:15 might be used to argue otherwise, but the Lord references a mother’s love to depict the peak of earthly love. This passage simply points out that the mother’s love only fails to reach the pinnacle when compared to God’s own love toward His creation. God made a woman’s heart tender, but sin can harden this tender heart. For this reason, the older women within the New Testament church are instructed to nurture this particular trait within the younger women by teaching them how to love their husbands and their children (Titus 2:4). When things are spiritually right, the godly woman makes it her priority to care for those whom God has given her, and she does so in love. Examples of this love permeate the pages of scripture.
A good wife and mother will exemplify a type of selflessness like no one else upon the earth. Proverbs offers a wonderful examination into her life and ways. Her life is one of sacrifice, often putting the needs and wants of her household ahead of her own. She labours to take care of her family (Proverbs 31:16-19). She looks well to the ways of her household while enjoying little to no idle time (Proverbs 31:27). Yet at day’s end, she rises up to give meat to her household (Proverbs 31:15). All the while, she can open her mouth with wisdom with the law of kindness in her tongue (Proverbs 31:26). The Bible points to her only reward as the praise of her husband and children (Proverbs 31:28). This reward may seem insignificant to the world, but to her the love of her family is both sufficient and worth the effort.
The Bible often speaks of sin as a thing of the past pertaining to the believer’s life prior to salvation. This is not because believers are without sin, but the goal of every believer should be to depart from and avoid the sins which once controlled his life prior to salvation. These past actions which helped us to see our lost condition should be viewed as the friend of our past and the enemy of our present and future. This is exactly how Paul spoke of envy in his epistle to Titus. According to Paul, “we . . . were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another.” Concerning the sins of the past, Paul further admonishes: “let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints” (Ephesians 5:3).
