Responding with Godly Qualities

How husbands and wives

may display the fruit of the Spirit

Have you ever attempted to apply godly qualities to your marriage? Perhaps you wanted to be more like Christ in this important relationship. Or it may be that, in your efforts to bless others, you encouraged another to display the fruit of the Spirit. Whether it be your own efforts to allow the Spirit to work in your life or whether it be your determination to promote godliness in another’s life, the fruit have been the focus of these efforts.

Let’s discuss these “Fruit.” They might include such things as characteristics, attributes, traits, marks, or qualities. But here we choose to call them fruit.

These qualities are called “the fruit of the Spirit” for a reason. They are expressions of the Holy Spirit in your life. They show that the Spirit is living and active in your heart, mind, and actions so that you live a different life from what you formerly did. Instead of you working alone in this, it is the Spirit who is active to produce these character traits in your own life!

Thus, we read in Acts 13:52: “The disciples were continually filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.” The Spirit produced joy in these new disciples’ life! Paul calls these characteristics “the fruit of the light” since God’s light is found in your life and heart (Ephesians 5:9). Notice also that in Colossians 3:12-17 we also see godly fruit being produced in the life of believers.

When a married person wants to maintain a transformed character, these godly traits are especially important. We do this for God, of course, but one benefit is that we are able to display the fruit in a way that they will touch the heart of the beloved.

Notice now several scriptures that would encourage a husband and a wife to display the fruit in a way that would touch the heart of the marriage partner. First, notice Ephesians 5:25: “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her. . . . Each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself” 5:25, 33). Along with this, notice verses 22-24: “Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything.”

This shows that the husband must love his wife and the wife must submit to her husband. As we read in verse 33, the husband is to love his wife as himself and the wife is to respect her husband. This might show that instead of God—through the Holy Spirit—commanding married couples to obey, the Lord would rather urge the marriage partners to display those characteristics that show the Spirit’s work in their heart.

This might be similar to Colossians 3:18-19. There we read that the wife is to “be subject to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.” Then we read that the husband must “love your wives and do not be embittered against them.” We know that it is very common for the husband to treat his wife with disrespect, with harshness, with cruelty, and with even with hatred. Along with this, it is common for the wife to fail to (even refuse to) be subject to the husband—that which is “fitting in the Lord.” Let’s remember too that the wife is to love her own husband (Titus 2:4). Isn’t it so much better for the husband and wife to seek to display sweet and kind attitudes and behavior toward the marriage partner instead of manifesting a harsh attitude or a mean-tempered attitude!

Notice a few more characteristics that should be found in the life and attitude of marriage partners. The servants (deacons) are told to be good managers of “their own households.” With so many irresponsible husbands in the world, think of what it would be like if they were to be good managers of their families (over their children as well as wives).

Paul continues in Titus 2:4-5, and says that wives are to “love their husbands” (v. 4), and are to be “sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored” (v. 5). Look at those character traits! A wife is to be sensible—and pure (not impure). She is to be a “worker at home” and not one who works outside the home. She is to be “kind” in attitude and behavior, and she is to be subject to her husband. Does this sound like the attitude and behavior that you seek to have?

As for the husband, we find in verses 6-8 that young men (presumably some would be married men) are to be “sensible.” Are you a sensible person? He is to be an “example” of good deeds with purity in teaching, dignified, sound in speech. Does this sound like what you want to be? Does it describe your relationship to your own wife?

Further, in 1 Peter 3, we discover that the wife is to be “submissive” to their own husband. Apparently the wife is prone to either not want to be submissive, not know how to be submissive, or need some encouragement to be a submissive woman. How many women do we know like this? Perhaps ten percent? Or five percent? Or a lower number?

Peter goes on to say that the wife is to be chaste and respectful. How rare! How many women are chaste and want to show a chaste behavior? How many are consciously respectful toward their husband? Further, the wife must not focus on the external appearance but, instead, must focus on “the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God” (vv. 2-4).

Instead, the modern “liberated” and “feministic” woman does not aspire to chastity and respectful attitudes. She is not that interested in the “hidden person of the heart. (Many would even sneer or laugh at these words!) Instead of a “gentle” attitude, the modern woman prides herself in being outgoing, bossy, and a leader! Instead of being “gentle” she wants to be one who takes the lead; instead of being “quiet” in spirit, she often wants to display her knowledge and abilities outwardly. In other words, sadly, the modern feministic woman is the very opposite of what God would want!

The husband is told to “live with your wives in an understanding way” (1 Peter 3:7). Is this what a modern husband seeks to do? Does the husband grant his wife the honor that God would want? Does he intently want to be what God would want and does the husband want to pray earnestly for his wife? In other words, does the modern husband want to display the characteristic that would make him a man of God in the marriage relationship?

Let’s admit that most marriages are not characterized as godly ones. Husbands and wives are not at all what God would want and what He has revealed. We shouldn’t be surprised at this since the Holy Spirit is not working in these marriages. They are fleshly and ungodly! They are merely secular in nature. They may demonstrate much wisdom, much understanding, and much experience—but God is not active in their lives.

It is our intention to urge you to both be filled with the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 5:18) as well as be actively involved in producing godly fruit. We don’t want to be characterized with godly fruit for its own sake but to display the Spirit’s own power in our lives. With God’s own activity, we are “to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man” (Ephesians 3:16). With the Spirit’s power, we are able to be the kind of husband or wife that we should be.

Think of your own life. If you were a wife, would you want your husband to be cruel, uncaring, mean-tempered, irresponsible, dirty, unloving, or dishonest? If you were a husband, would you want your wife to be harsh, unkind, impatient, impure, unchaste, insubmissive, or loud and lacking in gentleness. In other words, would you want your spouse to be like other ungodly, unrighteous, impure, or unholy women? You know that this is not what you would want. And it is not what your husband or wife would want either.

We encourage you to read through the New Testament letters—perhaps from Romans to Jude—and let those words permeate your conscience and infill your attitudes. There are numerous instructions that will help us to be conformed to the image of Christ and fulfill the instructions of how to be godly in mind, in words, in attitudes, and in life. This is what you want to be, isn’t it? Determine to cast off the old way of living and begin to live anew with God’s own help.

You might find some of the following passages helpful in your determination to be the husband or wife that you need to be. Remember, we must be a godly spouse regardless of whether your partner chooses to follow the ways of God or not. Here are a few Biblical passages to read over slowly, carefully and prayerfully:

• Colossians 3:9-10
• Ephesians 4:22-24
• Romans 12:1-2
• Romans 12:9-21
• 1 Peter 4:8-12
• Colossians 3:14ff
• Galatians 5:22-24
• 2 Peter 1:3-11

(We are sorry that some of the photos above are of insubmissive and wrongful women. This is all that we found available.)