Ephesians 5:26 Commentary and Bible Study

In this passage on marriage, everything that Paul says about what Christ has done for his church is relevant to husbands. Christ loved the church and gave himself for it, ‘that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word’. These are beautiful things. Christ greatly values his church and he is willing to give unlimited attention in making her into the perfect bride that he wants her to be. The illustration could be a reference to baptism, but more likely it is the washing of regeneration, as referred to in Titus 3.5. A similar picture is also used in Ezekiel 16:9 where the Lord takes the nation of Israel as a wife for himself and washes her from her pollution in preparation for her becoming his bride. This washing is with the word. It is by the word of God that the church as a whole and the individual members make advance, as it is preached and applied to them. The are given a bath at the start of the Christian life, and they continue to be washed by the word and its sanctifying influence throughout life.But what bearing does this have on the duty of husbands? Paul is leading up to the application of this expression of Christ’s love for his church. That will come in verse 28: ‘So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies.’ Husbands have been told that they are to love their wives as Christ loved the church, and here Paul gives details of how that love is expressed towards the church. This gives something for husbands to imitate. Of course, there are differences between these two relationships, and there are unique aspects to Christ’s love for his bride which cannot be imitated by any man. The marriage supper of the Lamb is in the future, and that marriage will not take place in its fulness until Christ returns. The Lord is now preparing his bride for the future, while the husband on earth has already taken his wife and is now living with her and it is in this state that the instruction of this passage comes to him. In addition, Christ is able to do infinitely more for the church than any human husband can do for his wife, and some of the things mentioned here seem to fall into this category. Christ makes the church holy by purging away her sins with his blood and offering up a perfect sacrifice for her; that, no husband can do for he also needs to come to the same Saviour for his own sin. But in general terms the husband is to imitate the love of Christ for the church and the sacrifices that Christ was willing to make. He is to cherish his wife and regard her as having great value. He too is to give himself for her in many different ways, and he is to seek to have a sanctifying effect on her, just as she does on him. They are both sinners in need of grace, and they are heirs together of the grace of life.