Showing posts with label Family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Family. Show all posts

The Special Duties of Husbands to their Wives - Richard Baxter

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He that will expect duty or comfort from his wife, must be faithful in doing the duty of a husband. The failing of yourselves in your own duty, may cause the failing of another to you, or at least in some other way as much afflict you, and will be bitterer to you in the end, than if a hundred failed their duty to you. A good husband will either make a good wife, or easily and profitably endure a bad one. I shall therefore give you directions for your own part of duty, as that which your happiness is most concerned in.
Direct. I. The husband must undertake the principal part of the government of the whole family, even of the wife herself. And therefore, I. He must labor to be fit and able for that government which he undertakes. This ability consists, 1. In holiness and spiritual wisdom, that he may be acquainted with the end to which he is to conduct them, and the rule by which he is to guide them, and the principal works which they are to do. An ungodly, irreligious man is both a stranger and an enemy to the chief part of family government. 2. His ability consists in a due acquaintance with the works of his calling, and the labors in which his servants are to be employed. For he that is utterly unacquainted with their business, will be very unfit to govern them in it: unless he commit that part of their government to his wife, or a steward that is acquainted with it. 3. And he must be acquainted both with the common temper and infirmities of mankind, that he may know how much is to be borne with, and also with the particular
temper, and faults, and virtues of those whom he is to govern. 4. And he must have prudence, to direct himself in all his carriage to them; and justice, to deal with everyone as they deserve; and love, to do them all the good he can, for soul and body. II. And being thus able, he must make it his daily work, and especially be sure to govern himself well, that his example may be part of his government of others.
Direct. II. The husband must so unite authority and love, that neither of them be omitted or concealed, but both be exercised and maintained. Love must not be exercised so imprudently as to destroy the exercise of authority; and authority must not be exercised over a wife so magisterially and imperiously, as to destroy the exercise of love. As your love must be a governing love, so your commands must all be loving commands. Lose not your authority; for that will but disable you from doing the office of a husband to your wife, or of a master to your servants. Yet must it be maintained by no means inconsistent with conjugal love; and therefore not by fierceness or cruelty, by threats or stripes (unless by distraction or loss of reason, the cease to be capable of the carriage otherwise due to a wife). There are many cases of equality in which authority is not to be exercised; but there is no case of inequality or unworthiness so great, in which conjugal love is not to be exercised; and therefore nothing must exclude it.
Direct. III. It is the duty of husbands to preserve the authority of their wives, over the children and servants of the family. For they are joint governors with them over all the inferiors. And the infirmities of women are apt many times to expose them to contempt: so that servants and children will be apt to slight them, and disobey them, if the husband interpose not to preserve their honor and authority. Yet this must be done with cautions as these: 1. Justify not any error, vice, or weakness of your wives. They may be concealed or excused as far as may be, but never owned or defended. 2. Urge not obedience to any unlawful of theirs. No one hath authority to contradict the law of God, or disoblige any form of his government. You will but diminish your own authority with persons of any
understanding, if you justify any thing that is against God's authority. But if the thing commanded be lawful, though it may have some inconveniences, you must rebuke the disobedience of inferiors, and not
suffer them to slight the commands of your wives, nor to set their own reason and wills against them, and say, We will not do it. How can they help you in government, if you suffer them to be disobeyed?
Direct. IV. Also you must preserve the honor as well as the authority of your wives. If they have any dishonorable infirmities, they are not to be mentioned by children and servants. As in the natural body we cover most carefully the most dishonorable parts, (for our comely parts have no need.) 1 Cor. xii. 23, 24, so must it be here. Children or servants must not be suffered to carry themselves contemptuously or rudely towards them, nor to despise them, or speak unmannerly, proud, or disdainful words to them. The husband must vindicate them from all such injury and contempt.
Direct. V. The husband is to excel the wife in knowledge, and be her teacher in the matters that belong to salvation. He must instruct her in the word of God, and direct her in particular duties, and help her to subdue her own corruptions, and labor to confirm her against temptations; if she doubt of any thing that he can resolve her in, she is to ask his resolution, and he to open to her at home the things which she understood not in the congregation, 1 Cor. xiv. 35. But if the husband be indeed an ignorant sot, or have made himself unable to instruct his wife, she is not bound to ask him in vain, to teach her that which he understands not himself. Those husbands that despise the word of God, and live in willful ignorance, do not only despise their own souls, but their families also; and making themselves unable for their duties, they are usually themselves despised by their inferiors: for God hath told such in his message to Eli, 1 Sam. ii. 30, "Them that honor me, I will honor; and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed."
Direct. VI. The husband must be the principal teacher of the family. He must instruct them, and examine them, and rule them about matters of God, as well as his own service, and see that the Lord's day and worship be observed by all that are within his gates. And therefore he must labor for such understanding and ability as is necessary hereunto. And if he be unable or negligent, it is his sin and will be his shame. If the wife be wiser and abler, and it be cast upon her, it is his dishonor; but if neither of them do it, the sin, and shame, and suffering, will be common to them both.
Direct. VII. The husband is to be the mouth of the family, in their daily conjunct prayers unto God. Therefore he must be able to pray, and also have a praying heart. He must be as it were the priest of the household; and therefore should be the most holy, that he may be fit to stand between them and God, and to offer up their prayers to him. If this be cast on the wife, it will be his dishonor.
Direct. VIII. The husband is to be the chief provider for the family (ordinarily). It is supposed that he is most able for mind and body, and is the chief disposer of the estate. Therefore he must be specially careful, that wife and children want nothing that is fit for them, so far as he can procure it.
Direct. IX. The husband must be strongest in family patience; bearing with the weakness and passions of the wife; not so as to make light of any sin against God, but so as not to make a matter of any frailty as against himself, and so as to preserve the love and peace which is to be as the natural temper of their relation.
Direct. X. The manner of all these duties must also be carefully regarded. As, 1. That they be done in prudence, and not with folly, rashness, or inconsiderateness. 2. That all be done in conjugal love and tenderness, as over one that is tender, and the weaker vessel; and that he do not teach, or command, or reprove a wife, in the same imperious manner as a child or a servant. 3. That due familiarity be maintained, and that he keep not at a distance and strangeness from his wife. 4. That love be confident, without base suspicions, and causeless jealousies. 5. That all be done in gentleness and not is passion, roughness, and sourness. 6. That there be no unjust and causeless concealment of secrets, which should be common to them both. 7. That there be no foolish opening of such secrets to her as may become her snare, and she is not able to bear or keep. 8. That none of their own matters, which should be kept secret, be made known to others. His teaching and reproving of her, should be for the most part secret. 9. That he be constant, and not weary of his love or duty. This briefly of the matter.
Excerpted from Chapter VIII. of this English Puritan's manual on family life, "Christian Economics," found in his book A Christian Directory, which was first printed in 1673 and reprinted by Soli Deo Gloria in 1990 by Richard Baxter


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A Husband's Love - CH Spurgeon

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“Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church.” Ephesians 5:25

What a golden example Christ gives to his disciples! Few masters could venture to say, “If you would practise my teaching, imitate my life;” but as the life of Jesus is the exact transcript of perfect virtue, he can point to himself as the paragon of holiness, as well as the teacher of it. The Christian should take nothing short of Christ for his model. Under no circumstances ought we to be content unless we reflect the grace which was in him. As a husband, the Christian is to look upon the portrait of Christ Jesus, and he is to paint according to that copy. The true Christian is to be such a husband as Christ was to his church. The love of a husband is special. The Lord Jesus cherishes for the church a peculiar affection, which is set upon her above the rest of mankind: “I pray for them, I pray not for the world.” The elect church is the favourite of heaven, the treasure of Christ, the crown of his head, the bracelet of his arm, the breastplate of his heart, the very centre and core of his love. A husband should love his wife with a constant love, for thus Jesus loves his church. He does not vary in his affection. He may change in his display of affection, but the affection itself is still the same. A husband should love his wife with an enduring love, for nothing “shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” A true husband loves his wife with a hearty love, fervent and intense. It is not mere lip-service. Ah! beloved, what more could Christ have done in proof of his love than he has done? Jesus has a delighted love towards his spouse: He prizes her affection, and delights in her with sweet complacence. Believer, you wonder at Jesus’ love; you admire it-are you imitating it? In your domestic relationships is the rule and measure of your love-”even as Christ loved the church?”
Taken from CH Spurgeon's Morning and Evening, Evening, March 20



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The Defence of Family Worship

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Despite this evidence of the persistence and even thriving of family worship in the early decades of the 19th century, by the middle of the century there already were already signs of its decline. Perhaps the lack of provisions for discipline on this matter was taking its toll. However, even among families steeped in the traditions, signs of slippage were evident.
In 1847, J. W. Alexander, a Presbyterian minister and the son of Archibald Alexander of Princeton, testified to the importance of family worship in his life and the lives of other Presbyterians known to him.
"[The] richest inheritance which some of us have is the domestic rite, which has been in our houses as far back as record or tradition goes. A venerable parishoner of the author has enjoyed Family-Worship with no less than six generations, including a grandfather and great-grand children" (J. W. Alexander, Thoughts on Family Worship, p. 2).
He wrote Thoughts on Family Worship with the hope of addressing and halting the decline.
1. J. W. Alexander's Time
Alexander considered the decline of family worship to be an expression of the world making inroads into the church. While he rightly disparaged his time in comparison to the 17th century, his description of the extent of the emerging problem in his time should shame us. For example, he could scarcely believe the report that "some ruling elders and deacons... maintain no stated daily service of God in their dwellings."
"In a period when the world is every day making new inroads on the church, it has especially invaded the household. Our church cannot compare with that of the seventeenth century in this regard. Along with Sabbath observance, and the catechizing of children, Family-Worship has lost ground. There are many heads of families, communicants in our churches, and (according to a scarcely credible report) some ruling elders and deacons, who maintain no stated daily service of God in their dwellings. It is to awaken such to their duty that this volume has been prepared... " (Alexander, pp. 1-2).
2. The Beneficial Influences of Family Worship
Alexander was concerned that this inheritance of family worship might be lost. The decline of family worship was associated with times when "error and worldliness make inroads upon the church" (Alexander, p. 28). On the other hand, Alexander asserted that "the universal voice of the Church, in its best periods, has been in favor of family-worship" (Alexander, p. 29).
The primary reason for family worship is that it is "a service due to God, in regard to his bountiful and gracious relation to families" (Alexander, p. 29). God graciously brings people into families as He gathers the household of God and ordains the family as a setting for worship. However, as sinners, we also need family worship because of "the wants, temptations, dangers, and sins of the family state" (Alexander, p. 29).
In developing his defense of family worship Alexander focused on showing how family worship benefited the Christian home, church and the society at large. The following is a summary of Alexander’s list of benefits.
a. Family worship promotes the piety of the family head
In Alexander's view, "There is no member of a household whose individual piety is of such importance to all the rest, as the father or head; and there is no one whose soul is so directly influenced by the exercise of domestic worship" (Alexander, p. 28). The very exercise of the head’s leadership is a means of promoting his piety. Alexander understood this leadership to include the selection and reading of the word and "prayer, confession and praise."
b. Family worship is a daily practice
Alexander believed that half of the "defects and transgressions of our day arise from want of consideration" (Alexander, p. 35). He meant that for regenerate Christians, the simple bringing to mind of the Word of God would have an impact on practical piety. But in the business of life a whole day could pass without any external stimulus to consider God’s Word. "Hence the unspeakable value of an exercise, which twice every day calls each member of the household at least to think of God" (Alexander, p. 35).
Alexander referred to a "sacramental, sabbath, or periodical religion, a habit of mind to be put on and off, like the habit of a body. Family-worship has a direct and manifest tendency to make religion a matter of everyday interest" (Alexander, pp. 37-38). Today this phenomenon of "Sunday Christianity" is well known. However, its practitioners may well be genuine Christians whose sanctification is hindered by the absence of the daily practice of family worship in their lives.
c. Family worship activates the head's spiritual gifts
Family worship not only contributes to the sanctification of the head of the family, it also "furnishes a means of making increased graces in the head of the household available to the benefit of the members" (Alexander, p. 39). Each man brings with him various hindrances to acting as a spiritual leader.
Many men hesitate to lead in family worship because of a perception of their own shortcomings. However, the most effective means for the ordinary man to be educated in this practice is to do it. The pride which underlies this hesitancy blocks him from carrying out his God-given role and denies the consequent spiritual benefits to him and his family.
"...one of the chief means of promoting such individual graces in the head, is this his daily exercise of devotion with the members. It is more to him, than to others. It is he who presides and directs in it; who selects and delivers the precious word; and who leads the common supplication, confession, and praise" (Alexander, pp. 33-34).
d. Family worship educates the parents
Family worship educates both parents:
"In order to educate the children of a land, we must first educate the parents: and if an institution were demanded for this special purpose, it would be impossible to find one comparable to Family-Worship" (Alexander, p. 43).
The main means by which a head of the household will be able to teach is through the early instruction of his children in the Bible. Family worship also is an appropriate vehicle for the husband’s Biblically mandated spiritual nurture of his wife, "the washing of water by the word" (Eph 5:26). A man who is twice daily in worship with his family will come to know God’s Word intimately.
"The hindrances are various: lack of education; consciousness of small attainment; slowness of speech; natural diffidence; inexcusable pride or false shame; and a sense of inconsistency in life. These causes may operate to keep a father of a family in a state of inactive insulation. Nothing tends so directly to break a channel for right influences, in this respect, as the regular and faithful observance of domestic worship" (Alexander, p. 39).
In family worship the spiritual outworking for the husband’s headship is revealed in the manner most likely to encourage the wife in her Scriptural injunction to submit to her husband. Through the husband’s leadership of family worship a wife learns of its benefits for the entire family and the importance of neither usurping nor undermining him in his God-ordained role.
e. Family worship preserves the spiritual leadership of the head
In Alexander’s view the headship of the husband as inalienable. The husband and father can be a good or bad spiritual leader, but he is by divine mandate the leader.
"The maintenance of domestic religion in every house is primarily entrusted to the head of the family... "(Alexander, p. 43.).
His actions unfailingly leave their mark on his family. Indeed, his actions affect himself as well: "The father who, year after year, presides in the sacred domestic assembly, submits himself to an influence which is incalculably strong on his own parental character" (Alexander, pp. 45-46).
"No man can approach the duty of leading his household in an act of devotion, without solemn reflection on the place which he occupies in regard to them. He is their head. He is such by divine and unalterable constitution. These are duties and prerogatives which he cannot alienate. There is something more than mere precedence in age, knowledge, or substance. He is the father and master. No act of his, and nothing in his character, can fail to leave a mark on those around him "(Alexander, p. 44).
Alexander viewed the husband as the spiritual guardian of his wife and considered the reversal of that relationship to be "unnatural" (Alexander, p. 46). Family worship is a means for exercising this spiritual guardianship. No one else can exercise this role with his wife. Moreover, a head who does not act as a spiritual leader of his children cannot be replaced by his wife.
"Although both parents have recourse to Scripture in their daily relations with their children, formal instruction entails an exercise of spiritual authority which belongs to the head of the family. It is very unlikely that a man can truly be a spiritual leader in his family without some form of family worship.
f. Family worship makes the head able to teach
Alexander included instruction in the Bible as an element of family worship. The family is his flock, and he is its "teacher and undershepherd" (Alexander, p. 48). The natural standing of the father is enhanced when He reads the Word of God. Whatever his shortcomings as a teacher, the words he reads come from the One who teaches us all things.
"The hour of domestic prayer and praise is also the hour of scriptural instruction. The father has opened God’s word, in the presence of his little flock. He thus admits himself to be its teacher and undershepherd. Perhaps he is but a plain man, living by his labour, unused to schools or libraries, and like Moses, 'slow of speech, and of a slow tongue.' Nevertheless, he stands by the open well of wisdom, and like the same Moses, may draw water from it and water the flock" (Alexander, p. 48).
g. Family worship is a means of the head's sanctification
Leading in family worship will constantly bring to the mind of the head his inadequacy and sin before God. The Christian man will respond to this experience by seeking God’s grace to make him conform more to the image of His Son. In this way, family worship will be a daily means of the head’s spiritual growth.
Alexander believed that some men are deterred from this exercise of spiritual leadership of their families by "the consciousness of a discrepancy between their life and any acts of devotion."
"The Christian householder will feel himself constrained to say: I am leading my family in solemn addresses to God; what manner of man should I be! This undoubtedly has been, in cases innumerable, the direct operation of Family-Worship on the father. As we know that worldly men, and inconsistent professors, are deterred from performing this duty by the consciousness of a discrepance between their life and any acts of devotion, so humble Christians are led by the same comparison to be more circumspect, and to order their ways in such a manner as may edify their dependents" (Alexander, p. 49).
The very action of leading in family worship could reveal a sharp contrast between the head’s behavior at that time and in the rest of the day. The reading of God’s Word undoubtedly will become at times a spotlight on the one reading it.
This experience, so dreaded by "worldly men, and inconsistent professors [of faith]," actually is a vital means of the sanctification of the head of the household. It corrects him and makes him more fit to aid in the edification of his family.
h. Family worship makes the head a better father and husband
Family worship brings a sense of "parental responsibility... on the head of a household" (Alexander, p. 51). Alexander was well aware of how the pressure of work, "even in the pulpit," could cause a man to forget his responsibilities as a father and a husband. However, God's view of the head’s role as a father and husband is brought immediately and repeatedly before him in family worship.
i. Family worship counters worldliness and materialism
Family worship in this light is a vital means of resisting worldly pressures to provide economic security by devoting too much time to work. Men who are under these pressures above all need family worship. In the day when a man spent most of his day with his family on a farm or in a trade, family worship still was perceived as necessary. But from Alexander’s time, when industrialization was fully begun, to our day, with its fragmented family life, family worship is more vital than ever, especially for the head of the family, who may not otherwise even be recognized as the head:
"In the shop, the market, the field, the highway, the office, the exchange, and even in the pulpit, the father may forget that he is a father: he cannot forget it when the curtain has dropped, when the circle draws more closely around the hearth, when the wife of his youth welcomes him to prayer, and when the eyes of his little ones are fixed on him as the minister of God to their souls. I no longer marvel that Christianity becomes a dying, empty thing, in the houses of those professors (alas, that there should be such!) where there is no joint worship of God.
"In the rage for amassing wealth, which threatens the church among us, and especially in our great commercial cities, there is an estranging process going on which we fear is too little observed. Such is the insane precipitation with which the man of business rushes to his morning task, and such the length of his absence from home, often extending till the hours of darkness, that he gradually loses some of that parental tenderness which providence keeps alive by the presence of those whom we love. The long continuance of such habits cannot fail to affect the character. Of all persons in the world, he should be most willing to take time for family-devotion, who is by his very employment shut out from his home most of the day" (Alexander, pp. 53-5).
j. Family worship best teaches children the Bible
Alexander would agree with Richard Baxter that family instruction is the best setting for teaching the Bible to children. Family instruction is daily and can be reinforced throughout the day. It is much more difficult for a child to ignore a lesson taught in family worship, where distraction is easily noticed and can be acted against directly:
"The daily reading of God’s holy word, by a parent before his children, is one of the most powerful agencies of a Christian life. We are prone to under value this cause. It is a constant dropping, but it wears its mark into the rock. A family thus trained cannot be ignorant of the Word. The whole Scriptures come repeatedly before the mind... No part of juvenile education is more important" (Alexander, pp. 62-63).
Another strength of family instruction is that the natural affection of a child for the father reinforces the teaching. In turn, "filial affections are moulded by Family-Worship" (Alexander, p. 63).
k. Family worship promotes intellectual improvement
Alexander was intimately aware of a fact which too many Christian parents do not understand: the educational value of Bible reading. Children well imbued in Biblical knowledge are well prepared for less important fields of study.
l. Family worship strengthens the family
Family worship enhances all of the strengths of families in times of distress, as a bulwark against social pressures, as a witness to the community, in the maintenance of domestic harmony and in the expression of love.
Alexander wrote at a time when many advocates of social reform viewed the family as an obstacle to their objectives. Early exponents of socialism such as Godwin, Fourier, and Owen advocated changes which "tear the household elements asunder. Christianity compacts the structure, and strengthens every wall. It adds a new cement, and makes the father more a father -- the husband more a husband -- the son more a son; so that there is not a social tie which does not become more strong and endearing by means of grace" (Alexander, p. 103).
As opposed to these early socialists, Alexander recognized that strong families are the best means of correcting social problems:
"On every side... we hear the outcry against the domestic temple... Ignorant of the true sources of pauperism and oppression, our ruling pseudo-philanthropists are in perpetual agitation about the wrongs of labor, the rights of women, and the reconstruction of society. 'Association,' such as they propose, would pluck away the hearth-stone, and break the marriage-ring. ...cashier the natural guardians of infancy, and subject masses of youth, in phalanxes, to the regimental drill of a newly-invented education" (Alexander, pp. 164-165).
This observation is entirely confirmed today by an examination of the correlation between crime and poverty and single parent households, whether they be caused by divorce or childbearing outside of marriage.
A properly functioning family creates a respect for legitimate authority and self-discipline which is the very foundation for liberty in a fallen world:
"Every Christian household is a school of good citizenship. .. Family-Worship... promotes habits of order. It brings a stated regulation into the house, and gathers the inmates by a fixed law. It sets up a wholesome barrier against wanton irregularity, sloth, and night-wandering. It encourages early hours, thoughtfulness, and affection; and above all it adds strength to the principle of subordination and obedience; a point which we dare not pass lightly. Good citizens are such as abide by the law, and submit themselves to authority. The habit of so doing must be formed under the parental roof" (Alexander, pp. 165-166).
The maintenance of these standards by Christian households exerts considerable influence even on the households of non-Christians, although those who are not regenerated by the Holy Spirit can at best only imitate the external features of the Christian family.
m. Family worship promotes sound doctrine
Alexander was an "Old School" Presbyterian, committed to the sufficiency of Scripture in the worship, government and mission of the church. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that he firmly believed that:
"Where the Scriptures are fully and statedly read in a household day by day, there is the greatest possible safeguard against error. We desire no other orthodoxy than that which is contained in this Rule of Faith. We leave it to Rome, to be afraid of the volume. Our venerated formulas of faith were drawn up by men, who, though for the most part educated under other influences, derived their tenets from the naked word. By this we are ready to abide; and we maintain with earnestness, that the best of all methods for preventing latitudinarian declension, is a perpetual inculcation of the Scriptures, such as is continually taking place in Family-Worship" (Alexander, pp. 142-143).
The strength of the Westminster Standards is rooted in the fact that they were composed by men thoroughly immersed in Scripture due to the extensive practice of family worship in their generation. Alexander considered family worship as the best method for resisting doctrinal decline. Indeed, family worship and Biblical orthodoxy declined together in the century after Alexander wrote his book.
n. Family worship changes the world
"It is by the salvation of the children of the Church, more than from all other means, that we hope for the salvation of the world. It is by this very method, as we observe in history, the word of grace has been carried
abroad from land to land, and brought down to us. Amidst many seeming failures, the holy seed is kept up" (Alexander, pp. 180-181).
In Alexander's day Christians who had rejected the Biblical doctrine of election held that all people could be saved and thus create the foundation of a "Kingdom of God" on earth brought about through political and social action.
The duty of the Church is to proclaim the gospel and gather God’s elect and teach them to obey Christ’s commands (Mt 28:19-20). This action does confer benefits on the societies in which Christians live, but the limited number of the elect limits also the range of social change.
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The Mutual Duties Of Husbands And Wives Towards Each Other - Richard Baxter

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Selfish ungodly persons everywhere enter into all kinds of relationships with a desire of serving their ownselves, and gratifying their own flesh without knowing or caring what is required of them. Their desire is for the honour, profit, or pleasure their relationship will provide them but not for what God and man requires or expects from them. [Gen 2:18, Prov 18:22] Their mind is concerned only with what they shall have and not for what they shall be and do. (1)
They know what they want others to do for them, but do not care what their duty is to do for others. This is the way it is with too many husbands and wives.
We should be very concerned to know what the duties of our relationships are. And how we can please God in our relationships. Study and do your part, and God will certainly do his.
Direct. I. The first duty of husbands is to love their wives (and wives their husbands). Eph 5.25,28,29,33. "Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it.­­So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies; he that loveth his wife, loveth himself. For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church.­­Let every one of you in particular so love his wife, even as himself." See Gen 2.24.
Some directions for maintaining love are as follows:
1. Choose a good spouse in the first place. A spouse who is truly good and kind. Full of virtue and holiness to the Lord. (2)
2. Don't marry till you are sure that you can love entirely.
3. Be not too hasty, but know beforehand all the imperfections which may tempt you to despise your future mate. (3)
4. Remember that justice commands you to love one that has forsaken all the world for you. One who is contented to be the companion of your labours and sufferings, and be a sharer in all things with you, and that MUST be your companion until death. (4)
5. Remember that women are ordinarily affectionate, passionate creatures, and as they love much themselves, so they expect much love from you.
6. Remember that you are under God's command; and to deny marital love to your wives, is to deny a duty which God has urgently imposed on you. Obedience therefore should command your love.
7. Remember that you are "one flesh"; you have drawn her to forsake father and mother, and to cleave to you; (5)
8. Take more notice of the good, that is in your wives, than of her faults. Let not the observation of their faults make you forget or overlook their virtues. (6)
9. Don't magnify her imperfections until they drive you crazy.
Excuse them as far as is right in the Lord. Consider the frailty of the sex. Consider also your own infirmities, and how much your wives must bear with you. (7)
10. Don't stir up the evil of your spouse, but cause the best in them to belived out. (8)
11. Overcome them with love; and then they will be loving to you, and consequently lovely. Love will cause love, as fire kindleth fire. A good husband is the best means to make a good and loving wife. (9)
12. Live before them the life of a prudent, lowly, loving, meek, self­denying, patient, harmless, holy heavenly Christian. (10)
Direct. II. Husbands and wives must live together. 1 Cor 7:2­5
Direct III. Abhor not only adultery itself, but all that leads to unchasteness and the violation of your marriage­covenant. [Mat 5.31,32; 19:9; John 8,4­5, of adultery; Heb 13.4; Prov 22.14; Hos 4.2­3; Prov 2.17; 1 Cor 6.15,19; Mal. 2.15; Prov 6.32,35; Deu 23.2; Lev 21.9; 18:28; Num 25.9; Jer 5.7­9]
Direct. IV. Husband and wife must delight in the love and company, and lives of each other. When husband and wife take pleasure in each other, it unites them in duty, it helps them with ease to do their work, and bear
their burdens; and is a major part of the comfort of marriage. [Prov 5.18,19]
Direct. V. It is your solemn duty to live in quietness and peace. To avoid every occasion of fierce anger and discord.
[I. Directions showing the great necessity of avoiding dissension.]
1. The duty of your marriage­union requires unity. Can you not agree with your own flesh?
2. Division with your spouse will pain and upset your whole life ... Just as you do not wish to hurt your own self and are quick to care for your own wounds; so you should take notice of any break in the peace of your marriage and quickly seek to heal it.
3. Fighting chills love, fighting makes your spouse undesirable to you in your mind. Wounding is separating; to be tied together through marital bonds while your hearts are estranged is to be tormented. To be inwardly adversaries, while outwardly husband and wife turns your home and delight into a prison. (11)
4. Dissension between the husband and the wife disrupts the whole family life; they are like oxen unequally yoked, no work can be accomplished for all the striving with one another.
5. It greatly makes you unfit for the worship of God; you are not able to pray together nor to discuss heavenly things together, nor can you be mutual helpers to each other's souls. (12)
6. Dissension makes it impossible to manage your family properly.(13)
7. Your dissension will expose you to the malice of Satan, and give him advantage for many, many temptations. (14)

[II. Directions for avoiding dissensions.]
1. Keep alive your love for one another. Love your spouse dearly and fervently. Love will suppress wrath; you cannot be bitter over little things with someone you dearly love; much less will you descend to harsh words, aloofness, or any form abuse. (15)
2. Both husband and wife must mortify their pride and strong self­ centered feelings. (16 ) These are the feelings which cause intolerance and insensitivity. You must pray and labour for a humble, meek, and quiet spirit. A proud heart is troubled and provoked by every word that seems to assault your self­esteem.(17)
3.Do not forget that you are both diseased persons, full of infirmities; and therefore expect the fruit of those infirmities in each other; and do not act surprised about it, as if you had never known of it before. Decide to be patient with one another; remembering that you took one another as sinful, frail, imperfect persons, and not as angels, or as blameless and perfect. (18)
4. Remember still that your are one flesh; and therefore be no more offended with the words or failings of each other, than you would be if they were your own. Be angry with your wife for her faults no more than you are angry with yourself for your own. Have such an anger and displeasure against a fault, as will work to heal it; but not such as will cause festering and aggravation of the diseased part. This will turn anger into compassion, and will cause you to administer care for the cure. (19)
5. Agree together beforehand, that when one of you is sinfully angry and upset the other shall silently and gently bear it until you have come to your sanity. (20)
6. Have an eye to the future and remember that you must live together until death, and must be the companions of each other's lives, and the comforts of each other's lives, and then you will see how absurd it is for you to disagree and upset each other.(21)
7. As far as you are able, avoid all occasions of wrath and quarreling, about the matters of your families.(22)
8. If you are so angry that you cannot calm yourself at least control your tongue and do not speak hurtful and taunting words, talking it out hotly fans the fire, and increases the flame; (Do not ventilate your anger as you only feed your fleshly vengenance) Be silent, and you will much sooner return to your serenity and peace.(23)
9. Let the calm and rational spouse speak carefully and compellingly reason with the other (unless it be with a person so insolent as will make things worse). Usually a few sober, grave admonitions, will prove as water to the boiling pot. Say to your angry wife or husband, "You know this should not be between us; love must put it to rest, and it must be repented of. God does not approve of it, and we shall not approve of it when this heat is over. This frame of mind is contrary to a praying frame, and this language contrary to a praying language; we must pray together; let us do nothing contrary to prayer now: sweet water and bitter come not from one spring", etc. Some calm and condescending words of reason, may stop the torrent, and revive the reason which passion had overcome.(24)
10. When you have sinfully acted towards your spouse confess to one another; and ask for forgiveness of each other, and join in prayer to God for pardon; and this will act as a preventative in you the next time: you will surely be ashamed to do that which you have confessed and asked forgiveness for of God and man.(25)
Direct. VI. One of the most important duties of a husband to his wife and a wife to her husband is to carefully, skillfully, and diligently help each other in the knowledge and worship, and obedience of God that they might be saved and grow in their Christian Life.
1. This is not love, when you neglect each other's soul.(26 ) Do you believe that you have immortal souls, and an endless life of joy or misery to live? Then you MUST know that your great concern and business is, to care for those souls, and for the endless life. Therefore if your love does not help one another in this which is your main concern, it is of little worth, and of little use. Every thing in this world is as valuable as it is useful. A useless or unprofitable love, is a worthless love. It is a trifling, or a childish, or a beastly love, which helps you but in trifling, childish, or beastly things. Do you love your wife, and will leave her in the power of Satan, or will not help to save her soul? What! love her, and yet let her go to hell? and rather let her be damned than you will be at the pains to endeavor her salvation? Never say you love them, if you will not labour for their salvation.
What then shall we say of them that do not only deny their help, but are hinderers of the holiness and salvation of each other! [1Kings 11.4, Acts 5.2, Job 2.9] And yet (the Lord have mercy on the poor miserable world!) how common a thing is this among us! If the wife be ignorant and ungodly, she will do her worst to make or keep her husband in the same state as she is herself; and if God put any holy inclinations into his heart, she will be like water to the fire, to quench it or to keep it subdued; and if he will not be as sinful and miserable as herself, he shall have little rest. And if God open the eyes of the wife of a bad man, and show her the necessity of a holy life, and she resolves to obey the Lord, and save her soul, what an enemy and tyrant will her husband be to her ( if God does not restrain him); so that the devil himself will do no more to prevent the saving of their souls than ungodly husbands and wives do against each other.
2. Consider also that you are not living up to the design of marriage, if you are not helping each other's souls.(27)
3. Consider also, if you neglect each other's souls, what enemies you are to one another, and how you are preparing for your everlasting sorrows: when you should be preparing for your joyful meeting in heaven, you are laying up for yourselves everlasting horror.(28)
Therefore without a moment's hesitation determine to live together as heirs of heaven, and to be a helper to one other's souls. To assist you in this holy pursuit I will give you these following directions, which if you will faithfully practice, may make you to be special blessings to each other.
Direct. I. Before you can help to save each other's souls you must be sure of your own. You must have a deep and living understanding of the great eternal matters of which you are required to speak to others about. If you have no compassion for your own soul and will sell it for a moment of ease and pleasure, surely then you have no compassion for your spouse's soul.(29)
Direct. II. Take every opportunity which your nearness provides to be speaking seriously to each other about the matters of God, and your salvation.(30 ) Discussing those things of this world no more than required. And then talk together of the state and duty of your souls towards God, and of your hopes of heaven, as those that take these for their greatest business. And don't speak lightly, or unreverently, or in a rude and disputing manner; but with gravity and sobriety, as those that are discussing the most important things in the whole world. [Mark 8:36]
Direct. III. When either husband or wife is speaking seriously about holy things, let the other be careful to cherish, and not to extinguish the conversation.(31)
Direct IV. Watch over the hearts and lives of one another, judging the condition of each other's souls, and the strength or weakness of each others sins and graces, and the failings of each others lives, so that you may be able to apply to one another the most suitable help. (32)
Direct. V. Do not flatter one another from a foolish love.(33 ) Neither meanly critise one another. Do all in true, Godly love. Some are so blinded to the faults of husband, wife or child that they do not see the sin and wickedness in them. They are deluded concerning their eternal souls. This is the same as it is with self­ loving sinners and their own souls, willfully deceiving themselves to their damnation. This flattering of yourselves or others, is but the devil's charm to keep you from effectual repentance and salvation. On the other hand, some cannot speak to one another of their faults, without such bitterness, or contempt, which will cause them to refuse the medicine that could save them. If the everyday warnings you make to strangers must all be offered in love, much more between the husband and wife.
Direct. VI. Keep up your love to one another, do not grow distant. For if you do, you will despise each other's counsels and reproofs.
Direct. VII. Do not discourage your spouse from instructing you by refusing to receive and learn from their corrections.(34)
Direct. VIII. Help each other by reading together the most convicting, cutting, life­giving books. The ones most spiritual. Do not waste your time on light, weak, milk­toast ministries and books. Make friendships together with the holiest persons. This is not neglecting your duty to one another, but that all the helps working together may be the more effectual.(35)
Direct. IX. Don't Conceal the state of your souls, nor hide your faults from one another. You are as one flesh, and should have one heart: and as it is dangerous for a man to be ignorant of his own soul so it is very hurtful to husband or wife to be ignorant of one another, in those areas where they have need of help.(36)
Direct X. Avoid as much as possible different opinions in religion.
Direct. XI. If different religious understandings come between you, be sure that you manage it with holiness, humility, love, and peace, and not with carnality, pride, uncharitableness, or contention.
Direct. XII. Do not either blindly indulge each others faults nor be too critical of each other's state, allowing Satan to alienate your affections from one another.
Direct. XIII. If you are married to one that is an ungodly person, yet keep up all the love which is due for the relation's sake.(37)
Direct XIV. Join together in frequent and fervent prayer. Prayer forces the mind into sobriety, and moves the heart with the presence and majesty of God. Pray also for each other when you are in secret, that God may do that work which you most desire, upon each other's hearts.
Direct. XV. Lastly, Help each other by an exemplary life. Be yourself, what you desire your husband or wife should be; excel in meekness, and humility, and charity, and dutifulness, and diligence, and self­denial, and patience.(38 )
Direct. VII. Another important duty in marriage is, to help in the health and comfort of each other's bodies. Not to pamper each other's flesh, or cherish the vices of pride, or sloth, or gluttony, or the sensual pleasures in each other; but to increase the health and vigor of the body, making it fit for the service of the soul and God.
1. In health, you must be careful to provide for each other (not so much pleasing as) wholesome food, and to keep each other from that which is hurtful to your health; warning each other from the dangers of gluttony and idleness, the two great murderers of mankind.(39)
2. Also in sickness, you are to be caring of each other; and not to spare any costs or pains, by which the health of each other may be restored, or your souls confirmed, and your comforts cherished.(40)
Direct. VIII. Another duty of husbands and wives is, to be helpful to each other in their worldly business and estates. Not for worldly ends, nor with a worldly mind; but in obedience to God, who will have them labour, as well as pray, for their daily bread, and has determined that in the sweat of their brows they shall eat their bread; and that six days they shall labor and do all that they have to do; and that he that will not work must not eat.(41)
Direct IX. Also you must be careful to guard the honour of one another. You must not divulge, but conceal, the failings of each other; The reputation of each other must be as dear to you as your own. It is a sinful and unfaithful practice of many, both husbands and wives, who among their friends are discussing the faults of each other, which they are required in tenderness to cover up. MANY peevish persons will aggravate all the faults of their spouse behind their backs.(42 )
Direct X. IT is your marriage duty to assist one another in the education of your children.(43)
Direct XI. It is your marriage duty to assist each other in charity.(44)
Direct XII. LASTLY, it is a great DUTY of husbands and wives, to help and comfort one other in preparing for a safe and happy death.(45)
1. In the time of health, you must often and seriously remind each other of the time when death will make the separation; and live together daily as those that are still expecting the parting hour....Reprove everything in one another, which would be an unwelcome memory at death. If you see eachother dull and slow in heavenliness, or living in vanity, worldliness, or sloth, as if you had forgotten that you must shortly die, stir up one another to do all without delay which the approach of such a day requireth.
2. And when death is at hand, oh then what abundance of tenderness, and seriousness, and skill, and diligence, is needful for one, that hath the last office of love to perform, to the departing soul of so near a friend! Oh then what need will there be of your most wise, and faithful, and diligent help!....They that are utterly unprepared and unfit to die themselves, can do little to prepare or help another. But they that live together as the heirs of heaven, and converse on earth as fellow travellers to the land of promise, may help and encourage the souls of one another, and joyfully part at death, as expecting quickly to meet again in life eternal.
THE END

No doubt much of the original force and poetry has been lost in my feeble attempt to modernise. It was only my hope to make this treatise available and understandable to the reader who has not accustomed himself to reading and understanding the language of our King James Version Bible. This work was found in Volume I, Baxter's Practical Works, A Christian Directory, page 431­438. Also available upon request is a Bible study where the scriptures reflecting on each point in Baxter's above treatise are listed. (Contact Scott Andersen, email: gerkin@gerkin.com) It would be hoped that the hearing of God's word regarding the mutual duties of Husbands and Wives will further strengthen your conviction and provide help to your soul to live as Faith requires. Lastly I would like to relate what a very wise man once told me: "If you are having troubles with your spouse it is not because of what you think of him or her, it is not because of negative thought patterns, it is not because you haven't first loved self. But it is what you think of Jesus. Do you love Him FIRST? Do you live for Him FIRST? Is your life, his? If you are right with Jesus Christ the King of Glory, then it will be right with your husband or your wife. And this is what is right with God."
FOOTNOTES
Some of the following scripture references are found in Baxter's Work, others I have added in hopes of increasing your edification.
1 Luk 6:31­32; 1Cor 10:24; Gal 6:2; Phil 2:4; 2tim 3:2; Jam 2:15; 1Joh
3:17; Gen 4:9; 1 Sam 25:3­11; Esth 6:6; Isa 56:11; Joh 6:26
2 Pro 18:22; Pro 19:13­14
3 Pro 18:13
4 Mat 5:32; Mat 19:9; 1Cor 7:39; Col 3:19; Gen 2:24
5 Mat 19:5; Mar 10:7
6 1 Cor 13:7; Phil 2:3
7 Psa 103:14; 1Cor 13:7
8 Pro 10:12
9 Rom 12:21; 1Pet 3:9
10 Eph 4:1; Col 1:10; 1The 2:12; Pro 11:30; 1Tim 4:16; Jam 5:19­20; 1Pet
3:1­2
11 Pro 19:13
12 Mat 5:23; 1Sam 15:22
13 Mat 12:25; Mar 3:25; Luk 11:17
14 Jam 1:13; 1Cor 7:5; Job 2:9
15 Lev 19:8; Psa 133:1; Pro 15:17; Rom 12:10; Rom 14:19; Rom 15:1; 1Cor
13:4­7
16 Luk 9:23; Psa 101:5; Prov 16:5; Prov 21:4; Prov 28:25; Mat 23:12; 1Pet
5:6
17 Psa 10:4; Hos 7:10; Prov 13:10; Prov 28:25
18 Jer 17:9; Rom 7:24; 1Joh 1:8
19 Eph 4:26; Eph 4:32; Jam 1:19
20 Eph 4:2; 1Cor 13:4
21 Ecc 9:9; Rom 7:2
22 Gen 2:24
23 Gal 5:15; Jam 3:5,6,8
24 Pro 15:18; Mat 5:9; Psa 85:8
25 Eph 4:32; Jam 5:16
26 2Cor 2:4; 2Cor 12:15; 1The 2:8
27 Gen 2:18 1The 5:11; Eph 4:16; Heb 12:15; 1cor 7:5; Col 2:19; Gen 35:2;
Gen 35:4; Lev 19:17; Num 16:27; Num 16:32
29 Gen 2:18; 2Cor 13:5; Gal 6:3; Gen 25:29; Gen 25:34
30 Col 3:16; Heb 3:13; Heb 10:24
31 Pro 27:6; Pro 15:12; Pro 15:31; Pro 15:32
32 Heb 10:24
33 Eph 4:15; Eph 4:26­5:9
34 Pro 29:1
35 Eph 4:11­16
36 Jam 5:16; Eph 5:27­32
37 1Cor 7:13­14
38 1Pe 3:1; Joh 13:15; 1Tim 4:12; 1Cor 11:1; 1The 1:6; 2The 3:7­9;
Tit 2:6; Jam 3:17; 2Pe 1:5­8
39 1Cor 6:19; Deu 21:20; Pro 23:21; Pro 19:15; Pro 6:9; Pro 10:4;
2Th 3:10 Pro 19:24; Pro 20:13; Pro 23:21; Pro 24:33; Isa 56:10;
1Tim 5:13
40 Eph 5:29, Job 19:17
41 Pro 31; Tit 2:5; 1Ti 5:14; 1Ti 5:8; Ex 20:9,11; Ge 3:19; 1Th 3:10­12
42 Jam 4:11; Pro 17:9; 1Pet 4:8
43 Gen 18:19; Gen 35:2; Jos 24:14; 1Tim 5:14; Prov 31:1
44 Heb 13:2; Gen 18:6; Rom 12:13; 2Cor 9:6; Luk 16:9; 1Tim 3:2; 1Tim 5:10;
Pro 11:20; Pro 11:28; Neh 8:1; Pro 19:17; Job 29:13; Joh 31:20 Acts 20:35
45 Deu 32:29; Psa 39:4; Psa 90:12; Rom 14:8; Heb 13:14; 1Pe 1:17; Psa 3:5;
Psa 37:37; Psa 49:15; Psa 73:24; Psa 116:15; Pro 14:32; Ecc 7:1; Luk 16:22;
Luk 23:43; 1Cor 15:51­57; 2Cor 5:1; 2Cor 5:4; 2Cor 5:8; Phi 1:20­23; 1The
5:9; 2Pe 1:11; 2Pe 1:14; Rev 14:13; Psa 23:4
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