The Ultimate Husband - Part 1

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We find ourselves today back in Ephesians 5 and in the passage that you ladies have been waiting some weeks for us to arrive at. The husbands' roles. You know as I thought about this passage and the wonderful images it portrays, my mind went back to my childhood. My family had an absolute aversion to photography. You know there are only, I think, two baby pictures of me. I think part of that is, I was number 10. And you know by the time number 10 comes along you figured out well everybody knows what he looks like, let's just move on. But, whenever there was a group photograph of all 12 of us together, it seems like you almost could see several of my sisters darting for the doors. You get these sort of half images of the back of their head or the side as they walked out of the frame, because they didn't want to be caught, and whenever the picture came back, and you looked at the image their first response was, well, this is why I don't like to have pictures made of me. That looks absolutely nothing like me. Of course, exactly the opposite was true. That's why we look at photos and say that. Because if the camera is in focus, and if it's taken appropriately, then it looks exactly like us, and that's the problem. Sometimes it's not very flattering, what we see in the image that comes back.

When you look at this passage in Ephesians 5, we are told that there's an image that each of our marriages makes. It's as if someone takes a camera and sets out to take a picture of Christ and the church and their relationship, and when the print is processed, the image comes back, and it's a picture of you and your spouse, or of me and my spouse. It may be a very poor image of Christ and the church, but it's an image nonetheless. Listen to what Douglas Wilson writes in his book Reforming Marriage. He says,

In this passage in Ephesians, Paul tells us that husbands and their role as head provide a picture of Christ and the church. Every marriage, everywhere in the world is a picture of Christ and the church. Because of sin and rebellion, many of these pictures are slanderous lies concerning Christ, but a husband can never stop talking about Christ and the church. If he is obedient to God, he is preaching the truth. If he does not love his wife he is speaking apostasy and lies, but he is always talking. If he deserts his wife, he is saying, this is the way that Christ deserts His bride, a lie. If he is harsh with his wife, he is saying that Christ is harsh with the church, another lie. If he sleeps with another woman, he is an adulterer and a blasphemer as well. How could Christ love someone other than His own bride? It's astonishing how for a few moments of pleasure, faithless men can bring themselves to slander the faithfulness of Christ in such a way.

You see, our marriages, men, and specifically our relationship with our wives, is a picture. It is a picture whether we like it or not. And it's either a good picture, with the correct image or it is a terribly flawed out of focus picture, but it is always a picture. I'll tell you as I've come to this text, I've found myself deeply convicted. In fact, Evelyn my secretary, asked me this week, what the title of my message was, and I sort of winced, and I said well let me go look back at my computer. I think I have the title on there, and she said, "well, you know, if you don't have one, I have a couple of suggestions." Well that got my curiosity up so I said, okay, what exactly is it, so she pulled up her computer, and she had the mockup of the bulletin there on the program that she uses, and in the place of the title of the message, she had put, "Whamo to the Husbands."

I said alright, what's your second suggestion. She said, "Pardon the Sandals with the Suit, But My Toes Are Bruised." You know I resemble that remark. My wife also seemed to take some devilish delight in what I was studying this week. You know I'd come out of my study, and she'd say, "so, honey, how is it going?" You know I have to admit to you, as I have admitted to her, that as I have studied this passage, I realize I don't even come close to the standard that is laid out in this text. But as God knows my heart, by His grace ,it's my intention to continue to pursue it. And my challenge to you men this morning is to join me in that pursuit. I don't know the state of your current marriage, I don't know what kind of husband you are. I don't know what kind of image you're portraying of Jesus Christ. But I urge you, I plead with you on behalf of Christ, if you're a believer in Him, to understand the goal and to get on the path to pursuing it.

We've already discovered in this text, that husbands are the head of their wives. Notice verse 23, "the husband is the head of the wife". Notice it doesn't say the husband ought to be the head of the wife. It's a simple reality, like it or not, you are the head of your wife. This is the way God has built the universe. This is the way He has made marriage. You are the leader. You're leading, you may be a good leader; you may be a poor leader. You may be active in trying to lead your family, or you may have totally abdicated your responsibility to pursue your own selfish agenda. But in the sight of God, you bear the responsibility of that home. You are the leader. When there are problems in your marriage or in your home, you may not bear all the guilt for those problems, but in the sight of God you bear the complete responsibility. Let me tell you what I mean by that. We've all read in the paper about this terrible prison abuse scandal in Iraq. Was the commanding officer of that prison guilty of any of the acts of abuse? No, there is no evidence of that whatsoever. But she has now been censured by the military; she has been removed from her post because she was ultimately responsible. That's how it works with God, husbands and fathers are ultimately responsible for everything that happens in the sphere of their responsibility. We are leaders, like it or not. And God will hold us accountable for the kind of leaders we are.

In Ephesians 5 we learn exactly what that Godly leadership toward our wives should look like. Let me read it to you, beginning in verse 25. You are familiar with these words, but listen, if you can with a first timer's attitude as I read this, as if you'd never heard it before. Listen to what Paul writes, verse 25.

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are members of His body. FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER, AND SHALL BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH. This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church. Nevertheless, each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband.

Men, the bottom line in this important passage intended for us is this. Christian husbands are to pattern their love for their wives after Christ's love for His church. Now wives, you have to admit, submission to your husband's authority is pretty simple compared to this. You see you're required to respond to your husband as all of us as believers are required to respond to Christ, the human response of believers to Christ. But men, we are called upon to model Christ Himself, to be Christ to our wives, to play the role of Christ in loving our wives. Now the key question in Ephesians 5, the key question, I should say that's is answered in Ephesians 5 is this. In what ways is our love for our wives to be like Christ's love for His church? Obviously, Christ's love was perfect. John 13:1, it says that "[Jesus] loved … [His disciples] to the end." … literally, ultimately, completely, perfectly. You and I can never love our wives that way. But what we can do is we can demonstrate the same kind of love, if not the same intensity, to our wives that Christ demonstrated to His church. So, in this passage we are going to see five essential qualities of the kind of love that Christian men should have for their wives. And it's a reflection of Christ's love for His church: five essential qualities. This morning we are only going to look at the first, and it's a mouthful.

The first quality of a godly husband's love for his wife is that it is a sacrificial love. Notice verse 25, "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her." Alexander Strock writes,

Tragically some Christian men think that headship means dictatorship or lordship, being the boss. Thus, the Christian doctrine of headship has been misused to justify the physical and mental abuse of women, keeping women in their place, demeaning and controlling women, working wives to death, or simply neglecting them. Christian husbands who abuse or neglect their wives don't understand authentic Christian marriage. They don't understand loving, servant leadership, and they certainly don't understand Ephesians 5.

You see, you and I have been influenced in our role as husbands by our own upbringing. Perhaps we had fathers who were not the best model of what a Christian husband should be. We've been influenced by the culture in which we live, by our peers and how they respond to their wives. We've been influenced by everything except the Word of God. John Piper puts it this way. He says "the husband who plops himself in front of the TV and orders his wife around like a slave has abandoned Christ for Archie Bunker." That's exactly right. He bought into the culture. You bought into the lies of the culture as to what your role and responsibility to your wives should be. Listen to what Christ says. Husbands, love your wives as Christ Himself loved the church and gave Himself for her. You know that is an extraordinary command. It was every bit as much counter-culture in the first century as it is today. In fact, if anything, more so.

In the Greek and Roman world it was understood that women had obligations to their husbands, but not vice versa. In fact, Marcius Cato, a second century Roman politician (now remember this is in the hundreds A.D.) writes this, "If you catch you wife in an act of infidelity, you can kill her without a trial, but if she were to catch you, she would not venture to touch you with her finger, she has no rights." That was the mind set of the typical man in the first and second centuries A.D. And so, it's into that context that Paul comes and says, "Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church." It was an absolutely revolutionary command. Notice that Paul addresses it to the men, specifically the men who are currently married, husbands. But really it's applicable to all men. That is to all men, except those who believe they have what the Bible calls the gift of singleness, who intend to stay single for the service of the Kingdom.

By the way, let me just stop here a moment, and say that, say something to you young men who aren't married, but are sitting there thinking, there is no way I have the gift of singleness. I've discovered through the years, that there is an important first step in our culture to becoming a happily married man, and I want to share it with you today. And that is you have to get to know a woman. You have to ask a woman out. And now I understand, on good authority from some of the women who aren't married in our church, who would like to be getting to know some of you men, that you are seriously lacking in this first step in the process. So, I'm here to tell you to get with the program. You know God's not going to deliver her FedEx to your front door. I hate to tell you that. You've got to take some effort here.

But back to our command, in Ephesians 5. "Husbands, love your wives." Notice, first of all, that it is an imperative, that it's a command. There are several implications of the fact that this is a command issued to us. The first implication is that no husband is exempt from this directive for any reason. No one, husbands. He writes to all the husbands in Ephesus, everybody hearing the letter in the church. Husbands, love your wives. Nobody is exempt. You know, in counseling, I've heard lots of excuses from men as to why they can't carry this out or why they shouldn't carry this command out. These are a few of them.

Well, you don't know my wife. No, I may not, but God does, and God didn't leave you an out clause here. Husbands love your wives.

Another common one is: well, you know, she's just not the same woman I married. Really, who is she? You know I admit, I sometimes get this same feeling with Sheila, you know when, my wife's a clean freak, and I'll come in, and she'll say in the late evening occasionally, not very often, "You know I think I am just going to leave the dirty dishes in the sink overnight." You know my first thought is, who are you and what did you do with my wife? So, I understand this. Maybe your spouse has changed through the years. We all change. But that doesn't let you off the hook for this command.

You say, well, you know, I love my wife, but: she doesn't submit to me. She does whatever she wants. You mean Christ loves you because of the quality of your submission to Him?

Well, I just don't find her attractive anymore. Is that why Christ loves you, because you're attractive?

Here's the most common one: my wife doesn't love me. We just don't love each other. And so, I'm not under obligation anymore to love her. In 1 John 4:11, John writes, "Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another." Later in verse 19 of the same chapter he says, "We love, because He first loved us." Because Christ loved us we should love Him and others including our wives.

But there is another important point in this verse, and I want you to get it: if there is a lack of love in our homes, men, it's our problem. We are responsible. Because just as the church, as we respond to the first love of Christ, we are responsible in our homes to be Christ and to be the one loving. And our wives respond to our love. So, if she doesn't love you, it's first and foremost your failure. There are no acceptable excuses. God says, husbands love your wives. He issues this command. Nobody's exempt. There is another implication of the fact that this is a command, and that is that we have the capacity to do this thing. God is telling us, look, by the grace that is given to you in Christ, you can do this. You can be loving your wife as Christ loved the church.

There's a third implication, and it's this (and this is a very important one): the fact that God commands us to do this, to love, means that true biblical love begins and is sustained, not by feelings and emotion, but by a deliberate act of the will. Now don't misunderstand me, I don't believe that there is no emotion in true love. We're commanded to love God with all of our being, with every fiber of our being including our emotions, and we are to love other people in that way as well. But the fact that God commands us to love means that love begins with and is continually sustained by a deliberate act of our will, a choice to love. You and I can choose to love whomever we choose to love.

The most obvious example of this is a young couple that decides to adopt a child. They don't know that child, have never known that child before. They have no blood relationship to that little one and yet when they choose to take that child into their home, from the first day that child comes home, what choice do they make? They choose to set their love on that child, and to treat that child just as if he or she were their very own.

And you and I can do the same thing with our wives. We can choose to love. Every husband is commanded to constantly love his wife. By the way, this isn't a message just for husbands, because we're all commanded to love, aren't we? We are all commanded to love our neighbors, our brothers and sisters in Christ, even our enemies. So, what we learn about love from this passage is not only true of what we as husbands ought to be doing, but everybody in here can apply this truth. We are to love sacrificially. Now, notice the word love. Husbands love your wives. Of course, the Greek word for love is "agape".

Let me give you a brief warning here. You've heard some Bible teachers as I have. Be careful of drawing too great a distinction between the Greek words for love that are in the Scripture. Between the words specifically, "phileo" and "agape". You've heard those words. The truth is in Scripture they are often used interchangeably, even as synonyms. For example, in John 5:20, Christ says that the Father loves Him with a "phileo" love. On the other hand, the word "agape" isn't always used for high and holy divine love either. For example, in Luke 11:43 we're told that the Scribes and Pharisees loved "agape" the chief seats in the synagogues. That was the worst kind of selfish, self-centered expression. So agape and phileo are often used as synonyms to describe various kinds of love. Just like we use the English word.

We use the English word to describe loving a bowl of ice cream, loving our spouse, or loving God. Both in Greek and in English, it's the context that informs us as to the exact nature of the love. So, the key points here in this passage that are to be made about the husband's love for his wife, don't necessarily come from the Greek word, but from the context. And the context here is the example of the love of Jesus Christ.

Paul tells us back in Ephesians 5:25 that Christ loved the church. This is a constant theme of the New Testament. In fact, turn back just to verse 2 of the same chapter. We're told to be imitators of God as beloved children, and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you. You know I wish sometimes that you had never heard the Scripture. I wish you could really listen to it with a first time attitude and allow the words to sink into your heart. I think sometimes we come so acquainted with these expressions, that they don't mean anything to us. Listen to this. Paul says, Christ, If you're in Christ, Christ loved you, and He gave Himself up, and Paul can't help including himself, for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.

Turn back to John 15. In John 15 on the night before our Lord's crucifixion, He tells His disciples in verse 12, "This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you." And here's the expression of my love. Verse 13, "Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends." In Galatians 2:20 Paul says, "I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself up for me." Amazing expression of the love of God, the love of Christ. Turn to 1 John 3, 1 John 3:16. John writes, "We know love by this…." [In other words, here's how we come to really understand what love is.] "We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren."

Now look at that verse carefully again. There is a profound implication buried within that brief verse. Men, you and I will never learn to love the same way Christ loves until we really come to understand and grasp His love for us. That's how we come to know what love is. That's how we come to understand and grasp the whole principle of love, by seeing His amazing love for us. You remember, we won't turn there, but in Luke 7 Jesus has dinner with Simon, a Scribe and a Pharisee. And He is there in his home, and into his home (often outside observers could come in to a special dinner like this and; and so) this woman comes in who is simply called a sinner. We don't know anything about her. This is not the same account as Mary during the passion week. But she comes in. She is called a sinner. She is essentially (in that term in the New Testament this means she is) a woman of loose morals, possibly even a prostitute. And she takes, and she anoints the feet of Christ with two-years-wages worth of perfume, of oil.

And Simon immediately thinks, you know, if this man were really a prophet, he would know what kind of woman this is, and he would tell her to get away from him. He would want no association. And Jesus says, you know Simon, I want to ask you a question. And He says, look. Let's assume, for a moment, two people, two debtors, are forgiven a debt: one who owes a small debt and the other who owes a huge debt. Which of those do you think is going to love the one more who forgave the debt? Simon says well, I suppose it will be the one who was forgiven the great debt. And He said you are exactly right. This woman loves much, because she has been forgiven much.

Now don't miss the point of the story. The point of the story is not that this woman was a terrible sinner and Simon was not. The point is, she had come to grasp the depth and profundity of her sin; and therefore, she loved deeply. Listen men, when you and I come to understand the terrible depravity of our hearts, and we come to understand how we actually stand before God, and we understand the love of God given to us in Christ; then we come to understand love, and we come to express that love to others including our wives. The first step toward learning how to love our wives is getting a grasp on Christ's love for us.

And back in Ephesians 5, what was the ultimate expression of Christ's love for us? He loved us, speaking of the church here, and gave Himself for her, gave Himself up for her. If you and I are to follow Christ's example, we must be willing to love our wives so sacrificially that we would even be willing to die for them. Are you willing, if necessary, to die for you wife? Now many macho men immediately respond with a glib, well, of course, yes. That reminds of the two farmers that were talking, and they were sitting on the front porch, just enjoying the afternoon respite from the sun. One said to the other, He said, Fred, let me ask you a question. He said, "If you had a million dollars, would you give me half of it?"

And he said, "well of course, of course I'd give you half of it." He said, "you know as good a friends as you and I are, if I had a million dollars, I'd give you half of it."

He said, "alright," he said, "let me ask you another question Fred." He said "If you had ten thousand acres, would you give me half of it?"

And he said, "well, of course, as good a friends as you and I are, and the friendship we've developed, I'd give you half of it."

He said, "alright," well he said, "bear with me, let me ask you one more question." He said, "Fred, if you had two hogs, would you give me one of them?"

And Fred said, "Aw man, you know I have two hogs."

You see it's easy to sacrifice the hypothetical. So, let's not talk about dying for your wife, most of us won't be asked to do that. Let me ask you this question, are you willing to live for her?

John MacArthur in his commentary on this passage writes this,

If a loving husband is willing to sacrifice his life for his wife, he is certainly willing to make lesser sacrifices for her. He puts his own likes, his own desires, his own opinions and preferences and welfare aside, if that is required, in order to please her and to meet her needs. He dies to self in order to live for his wife, because that is what Christ's kind of love demands.

You are the leader, men, of your home, but your leadership isn't about asserting your rights and your authority. It's about service. It's about giving up your life. You see, love is not about getting, it's not about feeling, it's not about something you can't control just overwhelming you like a bad case of the stomach flu. At its heart, love is an unselfish, self-sacrificing act of the will to meet the needs of another person, motivated solely by concern for them. What did Christ say in Mark 10? I love this. Mark 10:45, He says, "I didn't come to be served, but to serve." There men, is our marching orders as husbands. You think of your wife as someone there to serve you. You have misunderstood the whole thing. You are in the place of Christ. You are there not to be served, but to serve her. John 3:16, God so loved, that He gave…. True love is about giving of yourself, sacrificing yourself. Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her. Men, let me ask you a soul-searching question, and it is for me as well. Does your wife think of you as someone who unselfishly, sacrificially, serves her?

That's the standard that is laid out in Ephesians 5. How can we get there? How can we learn to develop that kind of self-sacrificial love for our wives? What are some practical ways that we can express it? Let me give you just a couple of thoughts. These aren't inspired. They certainly aren't all inclusive. But here are a couple of practical ways.

Number one: determine to put her interests, desires, and needs before your own. We studied Philippians 2, and we learned there that the ultimate expression of humility is not to do anything from selfishness or empty conceit, but rather, in humility to look out for the other person's interests and put them ahead of your own. Wayne Mack in his book Strengthening Your Marriage, says that one of the greatest challenges for us men in when to do this, when to put our wives desires and needs ahead of our own is when we get home from work. You know, we're tired, we just really want to plop down and read the paper, look at a book, turn on the television. But, our wives want to talk, or maybe they want our help with dinner, with the kids. Or perhaps they want to go out to eat and then do some shopping, and they want us to go with them. What are you going to choose? Are you going to choose what you want to do? Or are you going to sacrifice yourself and your desires, for her? I wish I could tell you I always make the right sacrificial choice. I don't, but this is the model. This is what we are to be. This is how we are to live.

Let me give you a second one: put the paper down, turn off ESPN, and really listen to your wife. Several years ago, a man came to speak at Grace when I was out there, and he was from Birmingham, Alabama. And, he was preaching in the morning, and a man who used to be on staff at Grace was preaching in the evening, and he and his wife were there in that morning service listening as this gentleman from Alabama preached. And as he started preaching that morning, it was obvious immediately that he had a command of the language and the text and just a powerful message, and this wife wanting to be a great encouragement to her husband sitting out in the audience, wrote a little note that said, this guy is good, you know, and gave it to her husband, the man that was supposed to preach that night. And, he went along, and he went on to explain, the man who was preaching went along to explain that he had realized that he was really being utterly selfish in the morning with his time.

He had this ritual that he would go through. He would get up in the morning, and he would get the sport section, and he would sit out on the porch and drink his coffee and read his paper, and basically ignore his wife and family. And he just realized as he read and studied this passage, he was convicted of it, and he said, you know I've got to stop doing that, and so we've started something new in my household.

Now my wife comes out on the porch with me. This is what I know she would enjoy most and what would be a way to serve her. She comes out on the porch with me, and we have coffee together, and we talk about the day and our lives and our family. And this is just the way I serve her.

Well, at this point the wife and the husband sitting out in the audience: again the man that is supposed to preach that night, gets another note from his wife. And this one said, this guy is really good. So, he got up that night, and as he started to preach, he said I just want you to know, he said, it's hard to follow the man who preached this morning, and he told about these notes from his wife. And I just want you to know, I don't drink coffee, and I don't have a front porch. That's how we feel, isn't it? But that's right. Listen to your wife. Do what you have to do to sacrifice your own desires and what you want, to listen to your wife.

Thirdly: work to understand (and this is crucial), work to understand what makes her feel loved, and do that. You see, guys are different. For me, I'm content just to be together with my wife. You know, we can go to Home Depot, and I'm happy. But I've discovered that that's not as relationally satisfying for Sheila as it is for me. She appreciates gifts, but those aren't really important to her either. The way Sheila feels especially loved, is when we sit down together and have some serious quality time; talk deeply about goals and fears and desires and plans. So, I have a choice to make. I can choose just to do what I want, or I can make a conscious choice to show love to my wife by doing the thing that I know will cause her to know that I love her. Again, I wish I could tell you that I always choose unselfishly. I don't. But this is the model. This is the goal. Men, let's get on the path to pursue this.

Fourthly: another practical step you can take: decide to help her this week with some of her normal tasks, whatever those are. Whether it's kids or groceries or laundry or whatever. Remember Christ said, I didn't come to be served, but to serve. Figure out a way you can serve her this week.

And finally: find out what her most basic needs are and seek to meet them. Find out what really, in the depths of her heart, are important to her. You say, well how can I know that? Well, you could try asking her. Before we were married, Sheila and I got some very good advice, I'd like to tell you it was original with me. It wasn't, I don't think. We were talking about it. I think we probably read it somewhere or someone gave us this counsel. And that was to sit down and write out a list for each other, of what our real heartfelt needs were. What did we need from our spouse? So, we did that. And I can tell you, we were talking even last night, I think it was, that those lists have given us a wonderful target to show love to one another.

I asked Sheila if I could share just a little of the list she wrote me, just to illustrate what I mean by this list of needs. And she said it would be fine. Let me just share a few of them with you. She writes,

I need to know (now these were written a year before we were married). I need to know that I have your unconditional love. The more sure I am of your love the more willing and eager I'll be to change those areas in me that do not please you.

I need to know that in your eyes, I am the most attractive woman on earth, no matter how pale, bloated or shriveled I may become. (She is none of those things.) Others can be beautiful, glamorous, and cute, but I must know that they don't attract you more than I do.

I need your sympathy and understanding. No matter how foolishly or unreasonably I may be acting, please listen, comfort, and later, correct.

I need your gentle rebuke when I'm wrong, but I'll also need your understanding and forgiveness when I don't respond well.

I need your attention wherever we are, whatever we're doing, I need to know that you are aware of and concerned about me. Just a gentle squeeze of the hand, just a wink will usually do. Those are some targets, some goals for me to hit to meet her needs.

Guys, ask your wife what she needs from you. What is it that will best show your love to her? If we're going to love our wives as Christ loved the church, then our love for them must be sacrificial. In God's providence, today we have a chance to celebrate, commemorate the greatest sacrifice, the expression of the sacrifice of Christ for His bride was the ultimate giving of Himself in death for us. What a powerful reminder to us that our role as husbands is a picture of Christ's love. My question for you is, how good is the picture?

Let's pray together.

Father, we thank You for this wonderful reminder of Your death for us. And Lord, we pray today for someone who may be here who has seen the death of Christ portrayed in these elements and been reminded of the reason he died. Lord, I pray that if they have not yet embraced Him as Lord and Savior that they would be convicted today of their sin, even by seeing the gospel preached out, and they would repent and believe in Him and embrace Him whom to know is to have life eternal.

We pray it in Jesus name, Amen.