love your wife as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her

^{so i had this really cool realization about something so i'm going to try to share it}

Hosea 2

²"Plead with your mother, plead—

for she is not my wife,
and I am not her husband—
that she put away her whoring from her face,
and her adultery from between her breasts;
³lest I strip her naked
and make her as in the day she was born,
and make her like a wilderness,
and make her like a parched land,
and kill her with thirst.
⁴ Upon her children also I will have no mercy,
because they are children of whoredom.
⁵For their mother has played the whore;
she who conceived them has acted shamefully.
For she said, 'I will go after my lovers,
who give me my bread and my water,
my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.'
⁶Therefore I will hedge up her way with thorns,
and I will build a wall against her,
so that she cannot find her paths.
⁷She shall pursue her lovers
but not overtake them,
and she shall seek them
but shall not find them.
Then she shall say,
'I will go and return to my first husband,
for it was better for me then than now.'
⁸And she did not know
that it was I who gave her
the grain, the wine, and the oil,
and who lavished on her silver and gold,
which they used for Baal.
⁹Therefore I will take back
my grain in its time,
and my wine in its season,
and I will take away my wool and my flax,
which were to cover her nakedness.
¹⁰Now I will uncover her lewdness
in the sight of her lovers,
and no one shall rescue her out of my hand.
¹¹ And I will put an end to all her mirth,
her feasts, her new moons, her Sabbaths,
and all her appointed feasts.
¹²And I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees,
of which she said,
'These are my wages,
which my lovers have given me.'
I will make them a forest,
and the beasts of the field shall devour them.
¹³And I will punish her for the feast days of the Baals
when she burned offerings to them
and adorned herself with her ring and jewelry,
and went after her lovers
and forgot me, declares the LORD.

¹⁴"Therefore, behold, I will allure her,
and bring her into the wilderness,
and speak tenderly to her.
¹⁵And there I will give her her vineyards
and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope.
And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth,
as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt.

¹⁶"And in that day, declares the LORD, you will call me 'My Husband,' and no longer will you call me 'My Baal.' ¹⁷For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more. ¹⁸And I will make for them a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the creeping things of the ground. And I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land, and I will make you lie down in safety. ¹⁹And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy.²⁰ I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall know the LORD.
²¹"And in that day I will answer, declares the LORD,
I will answer the heavens,
and they shall answer the earth,
²²and the earth shall answer the grain, the wine, and the oil,
and they shall answer Jezreel,

²³and I will sow her for myself in the land.
And I will have mercy on No Mercy,
and I will say to Not My People, 'You are my people';
and he shall say, 'You are my God.'"

so it's important to note that Hosea is talking about Israel unfaithfulness and also about the bride of Christ. the bride of Christ isthe church , made up of all of God's elect who he choose before the foundation of the world and given to his son. marriage was ordain by God and really illuminates and shines some light on salvation and regeneration , but also should note i'm coming from a husband's point of view cause that's my role

^{ephesians 5:22 "}Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. ²³For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. ²⁴Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

²⁵Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her ²⁶to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, ²⁷and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. ²⁸In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. ²⁹After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church— ³⁰for we are members of his body. ³¹"For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." ³²This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.³³However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband."

so the big realization for me was that the bride of Christ was a whore, we were at one time unfaithful, haters of God and turned to many lovers ( idols/false gods)

^{titus 3:3"}At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another."

romans 5"⁶You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. ⁷Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die.

so in marriages back in that time the father would go out and pick out a wife for his son( God has done the same thing john 6:⁷All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. ³⁸For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. ³⁹And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all that he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. ⁴⁰For my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.") then the two would remain pure and set aside for each other then when the women was of age the bridegroom would go to the bride house and take her to his house and they would be married and have a big wedding party, now the bible also illustrates that stuff but don't have time to go into it now and not my main focus. my main focus is that we did not remain pure and faith full to our bridegroom, we are whores as God puts it, but God did something amazing

titus 3: ³At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. ⁴But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, ⁵he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, ⁶whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, ⁷so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.

ezekile 36:24 " 'For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. ²⁵ I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. ²⁶ I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. ²⁷ And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. ²⁸ You will live in the land I gave your forefathers; you will be my people, and I will be your God. ²⁹ I will save you from all your uncleanness. I will call for the grain and make it plentiful and will not bring famine upon you. ³⁰ I will increase the fruit of the trees and the crops of the field, so that you will no longer suffer disgrace among the nations because of famine. ³¹ Then you will remember your evil ways and wicked deeds, and you will loathe yourselves for your sins and detestable practices. ³² I want you to know that I am not doing this for your sake, declares the Sovereign LORD. Be ashamed and disgraced for your conduct, O house of Israel!" and

hosa 2:14"Therefore, behold, I will allure her,
and bring her into the wilderness,
andspeak tenderly to her.
¹⁵And there I will give her her vineyards
and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope.
And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth,
as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt.

¹⁶"And in that day, declares the LORD, you will call me 'My Husband,' and no longer will you call me 'My Baal.' ¹⁷For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more. ¹⁸And I will make for them a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the creeping things of the ground. And I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land, and I will make you lie down in safety. ¹⁹And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy.²⁰ I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall know the LORD.

is that not truly amazing GOOD NEWS that ^{romans 5:8}But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." isn't that truly amazing and all some and really what love is and now something that hit me even harder is that in that exact same way i am suppose to love my wife" ²⁵Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her ²⁶to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word," now incase you didn't know marriage and relationships are a Sanctification process , i believe there is a one, not the one who is perfect and will complete my life, but the one who is perfectly flawed in all the areas i am strong in and strong in all the areas i'm weak in and that God in his perfect plan wants us to be to together for his glory and that we may be held accountable and be make known each others sin and areas where we fall sort. but also it's the husband who is to love his wife, the wife has to be taught to love her husband (titus 2) something i've come to see is that for that one person person there is when you get down to it past all the miss leading feelings from the heart a true unconditional spirit lead love that cannot be explained for and that i don't think the woman could ever match or at least with out much time and help so i hope i made some sense and feel free to comment (i would love to hear from some of my sister's their view point of this)