I Do, but Do I? - Part 3 [Notes]

The institution of marriage seems to be falling out of favor in our culture today. With the high divorce rate and the prevalence of unhappy marriages, many wonder, “Why bother?” No marriage will be perfect, but understanding God’s design for marriage and the Biblical keys needed to make it work can make all the difference.  

Join us for “I Do, but Do I?,” a series about marriage that of us can benefit from because the qualities needed to make a strong marriage are  the same ones needed to develop good relationships in general.

Selfish: concerned excessively or exclusively with oneself; seeking or concentrating on one's own advantage, pleasure, or well-being without regard for others.
– Merriam-Webster Dictionary

Marriage matters.

The goal of marriage is intimacy–physical, emotional, and spiritual oneness.

But from the beginning of creation God made them male and female. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, man must not separate.
– Mark 10:6-9 (HCSB)

Now the works of the flesh are obvious: a sexual immorality, moral impurity, promiscuity, idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and anything similar.
– Galatians 5:19-20a (HCSB)

For where envy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder and every kind of evil.
– James 3:16 (HCSB)

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves. Everyone should look not to his own interests, but rather to the interests of others. Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus, who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited. Instead He emptied Himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when He had come as a man, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death—even to death on a cross.
– Philippians 2:3-8 (CSB)

 “Christ is the supreme example of humility and selfless concern for others … No better example of humiliation and a selfless attitude for believers to follow could possibly be given than that of Christ.”
– Robert Lightner

Growing in Selflessness 

• Share generously 

I have not coveted anyone’s silver or gold or clothing. You yourselves know that these hands have provided for my needs and for those who were with me. In every way I’ve shown you that by laboring like this, it is necessary to help the weak and to keep in mind the words of the Lord Jesus, for He said, "It is more blessed to give than to receive."
– Acts 20:33-35 (HCSB)

It is more blessed to give than to receive.
– Acts 20:35b (HCSB)

Growing in Selflessness 

• Share generously 
• Serve humbly 

So He got up from supper, laid aside His robe, took a towel, and tied it around Himself. Next, He poured water into a basin and began to wash His disciples’ feet and to dry them with the towel tied around Him.

When Jesus had washed their feet and put on His robe, He reclined again and said to them, “Do you know what I have done for you? You call Me Teacher and Lord. This is well said, for I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example  that you also should do just as I have done for you.
– John 13:4-5, 12-15 (HCSB)

For I have given you an example that you also should do just as I have done for you.
– John 13:15 (HCSB) 

What Jesus did in the upper room that night before his crucifixion was not just a kind gesture; it was meant to catalyze a movement. This was a seismic paradigm shift. Jesus’ message is simple: It’s now our turn to serve the way Jesus served. It’s your turn to set aside your crown for an apron. We live in a world that believes the higher you rise and the more power and wealth you accumulate, the more leverage you have to get others to serve you. But Jesus takes the idea and says, “Here’s what it really looks like to bless the world: you serve!”  
– BLESS: 5 Everyday Ways To Love Your Neighbor and Change The World, Dave and Jon Ferguson

Growing in Selflessness 

• Share generously 
• Serve humbly 
• Submit willingly

Submission: voluntary placement of oneself under the authority and leadership of another (Greek, hupotasso). Submission is taught in the context of various relationships. In divinely ordained relationships, submission enables a unique Christian harmony based on God‘s good design.
– Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary

Submitting to one another in the fear of Christ.
– Ephesians 5:21 (HCSB)

Wives, submit  to your own husbands  as to the Lord, for the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church. He is the Savior of the body. Now as the church submits to Christ, so wives are to submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself for her to make her holy, cleansing her with the washing of water by the word. He did this to present the church to Himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or anything like that, but holy and blameless. In the same way, husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hates his own flesh but provides and cares for it, just as Christ does for the church, since we are members of His body. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This mystery is profound, but I am talking about Christ and the church. To sum up, each one of you is to love his wife as himself, and the wife is to respect her husband.
– Ephesians 5:22-33 (HCSB)

Growing in Selflessness 

• Share generously 
• Serve humbly 
• Submit willingly

Praise You Anywhere // Homecoming // All Hail King Jesus // You Think I'd Learn

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