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Day 5 –
Love for God and Others
DEPENDENT ON THE BRIDEGROOM
(Ephesians 5:24-25, 32)
24 But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the
wives ought to be to their husbands in everything 25 Husbands, love
your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her…
32 This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning
Christ and the church.
Yesterday’s devotional ended where we will pick up today. God’s love
must flow through us, first back to Him, then to our fellow members of the
church, and ultimately to the world, which God so loves that He gave His one
and only Son.
Christ Loves
the Church as a Bride
The Love of Christ. When we see this analogy of membership in the church
as the Bride of Christ, it is to remind us that we are the object of Christ’s
love.
In Ephesians 5:22-32, Revelation 21:2,
9; and 22:17, we see passages about the Bride of Christ which show how great His
love is for the church. In Mark 2:19, Matthew 9:15, and Luke 5:34, we see the
joy of the bridegroom, who will not fast or mourn but delightedly waits for His
union with His bride. The church membership is dependent on the love of Christ
and should operate in every function out of loving submission to Christ and His
teachings. Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments,” (John 14:15).
Godly Joy for the Bride and Groom. A lesson from the end of John 3 is often overlooked
because of the importance and familiarity of John 3:16, the story of Nicodemus,
and the teaching of being born again. Read John 3:25-30.
John the Baptist was not jealous when
people began following Christ, rather than him. “It is the bridegroom who marries the bride. The
best man is simply glad to stand with him and hear his vows. Therefore, I am
filled with joy at his success,” (John 3:29). Like John, we should be joyous, not
jealous, when we see Christ using others for ministry. Also, we should not
begrudge our ministry or wish we had another task if it is giving glory to God
and helping the body of Christ as a whole.
There is no limit on what the church can
accomplish when we remember that it is God, not us, who gets the glory. Just as
the individual members of a body work together for the good of the whole, true
church members rejoice when the church follows Christ, rather than certain individuals
or individual causes.
Godly Jealousy for the Bride and Groom. Can there be a godly
jealousy? Absolutely! The Bible says God is jealous for us, in the good sense
that He wants what is best for us. As the Bride of Christ, church members
should be interdependent on one another to see that none of us turn our
affections to anyone else but Christ.
Have you ever been anxious over a
lovers’ quarrel and desired to see things get “patched up”? As members of the
church, we also see that the church should stay true to her love for Christ. In
2 Corinthians 11:2, Paul writes to the church, “For I am jealous for you with the jealousy of
God himself. I promised you as a pure bride to one husband—Christ.” (NLT)
Just as the best man rejoices at the
marriage of his friend, the friend of the bride should be concerned if the
bride showed signs of being untrue to her fiancée. We should strive for purity
within our church membership. We should have a godly jealousy if a member of
the church or the entire church falls away from her first love, that being
toward Christ.
Jesus wrote a heart-broken letter to the
Ephesian church, and it is found in Revelation 2. “I know your works, your
labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil. ...
Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love.” Years earlier, Paul had written that same church. Read Ephesians 5:24-32 and apply it to a
member’s Christ-like love for others. We should give ourselves up for others
(v. 25), help others stay pure and clean, true to the Word (v. 26); be radiant,
not fault-finding; be holy and blameless (v. 27); love others as ourselves (v.
28); feed and care for others (v. 29); and leave all worldly ties (v. 30).
Let us as members of one another in the
church, strive for godly joy and godly jealousy that we do not leave our first
love, the Love of Christ.
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