A True marriage is seen in the Husband washing His wife’s feet!
Ooh do you like your feet washed? Have you considered washing your wife’s feet? Why or why not? And why are we talking about feet washing?
In the Bible we see it in Ephesians 5:22-28
“Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord.
For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which He is the Saviour.
Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.
In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself”.
Are you Selahing over this, it’s deep isn’t it? As I wrote it I too pondered and mediated on what marriage truly looks like from the Lord perspective.
With this resounding thought – Lord, what does Marriage look like to You?
The Lord showed me a remarkable picture ofhusband washing his wife’s feet. My eyes were suddenly opened to the above passage from the Bible that yes I had read and knew, Yet did not fully understand it’s Paul teaching the Church of Ephesus what a true marriage looks like!
Did you know that this teaching from Paul relates to a scripture in Genesis?
Let’s see it.
Genesis 3:16 (NKJV)
“To the woman He said: I will greatly multiply your sorrow and your conception; In pain you shall bring forth children; Your desire shall be for your husband,
And he shall rule over you.”
Yet if we look at only this verse or view we miss one really important difference! THE CROSS that restores us through Christ’s blood and paid the price for sin of all once and for all. So with the picture of husband washing his wife’s feet, let’s break down Ephesians 5:22-28 for revelation and keys to understand what God is saying.
V 22 “Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord.
V 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Saviour.
V 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
I’ve often looked at this verse and said to my wife “see you are meant to submit to me” and I am meant to love you!
However these two statements from Paul have aGREATER INSIGHT we need to pick up, conveyed in the following statement Paul says “As Christ loved the church!
The Lord said this as He showed me the picture of the husband washing his wife’s feet. Do you remember what Jesus did in John 13:13-15?
And what Jesus did before the Feast of Passover inJohn 13:1?
Yes! This was when Jesus knowing His hour had come of departing from this world to the Father, and having loved His own who were in the world, for He loved them to the end. He washed his disciples feet.Peter said (John 13:8)
Peter said to Him, “You shall never wash my feet!”
Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.”
This simple expression from Jesus of true Love shows how a husband should love His wife! Yet Peter couldn’t understand as to him it seemed upside down that he wash Jesus’ feet instead. Jesus was showing both him and us the way to enter into marriage is for the GROOM to come in the place of TRUE SURRENDERas a SERVANT!
We see this in verse 26 “to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word”,
By the act of being willing to bow and be the one who washes His wife’s feet, She will see true humility and Love, this provides a place of invitation out of love for the wife to surrender and submit freely from unconditional love.
This act of humility and Love is making her holy by cleansing her the Spirit (water) and the word (Jesus), this is an act of redemption. We see it in verse 27 “and to present her to Himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.
For as it was and is with Jesus who redeemed us, we husbands have been given the authority to redeem our wife through Christ. Why? “For two can become one” (Genesis 2:24,Mark 10:8, Ephesians 5:31)! The rib bone being stored in to bodies, as was removed in Genesis when God made woman from it (Genesis 2:22)
The Lord then said when a husband is willing to bow down and wash his wife’s feet, she will see his heart of Love for her through being a servant and will infreedom choose to submit to him out of unconditional Love. Also how we enter into our marriage with Christ, in Spirit and Truth.
I love how Paul ends this teaching and I think this is where the Husbands fall over and miss the key that is essential.
V 28”In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies.
He who loves his wife loves himself.”
Wow! Hitting hard and at the heart!
Reflection time:
Do you husbands actually love yourself?
Let’s start easier do you like yourself?
Do you see yourself as loveable and lovely?
Now Ask Jesus how much He loves you, to show you
Selah there, and what if you are like me who grew up as an orphan and being adopted?
My story is my mum while in University got pregnant, and because she grew up in a strict catholic house, then having a child out of wedlock was like an unpardonable sin.
So she did what any loving mum would do, she adopted me out! And I was adopted by a wonderful couple who I call mum and dad and love.
But put yourself in my shoes, you are orphaned, adopted out and then adopted in, how do you learn to Love yourself? Which by the way can be very hard and I believe if you are without Jesus, it’s impossible.
For if you are without, don’t know and have Jesus in you in relationship, who is Perfect Love and Love Himself, then you will never be able to truly Love another.
Deep aye? And so much more to unpack in that, let’s pause there, and if The Lord allows I hope to write a message on this very soon.
Let’s Pray:
Craig Patten
Itinerate Pastor/Prophet
Encounter Ministries
