Husbands, love your wives, and be not bitter against them.
Colossians 3 tells believers to put on compassion, kindness and forgiveness. Then it takes that new life into the home, speaking to wives, husbands, children, fathers and servants. Verse 19 gives the husband a duty to love and a fault to avoid. Why does love need a warning attached to it?
The setting: everyday ties still matter
One writer notes that a share in the new creation does not cancel these earthly ties.
This is another section of Colossians. It deals with particular relationships that connect not with the new creation, but with the first creation. All believers have a vital part in the new creation. But that does not free them from the responsibilities of earthly relationships, no matter how much we enjoy the new creation. In fact, such enjoyment should make us all the more diligent and faithful in these temporary relationships.
Each side gets its own word
Verse 18 speaks to wives, verse 19 to husbands. Each gets a different command, and one writer sees a design in that.
God's arrangements are never lop-sided. If there is a word of instruction and guidance for those who have the subject place, there is equally a word for those who take the lead. In each case the Spirit of God puts His finger on the weak spot. The husband is urged to love. Mere natural love can easily turn to bitterness, but this can never happen when his love is a reflection of the divine. If the husband is marked by love the wife has no difficulty in being subject.
Notice also what the husband is not told to do.
They are to love their wives. Let them make no excuse for not doing so! They are not told to enforce their wives' submission, but real love for the wife would encourage her submission... His bitterness will certainly not encourage either her love or her submission to him.
What "bitter" means here
One writer looks at what the word targets: a husband taken up with anxiety, and a temper left unguarded.
The wife needs no urging to love her husband. It is assumed that her affections are all right there. But a husband might well let anxiety and the outward pressure of life so occupy him that he takes too little care of his wife, or too little interest in her worries... The wife necessarily depends on her husband. She leaves father, mother and all, and leans on him in a special way. If he is not watchful, he may fail in thoughtful love and in the attention of every day. He may not guard his temper enough, which seems to be what is meant by being "bitter."
Why love alone is not enough
Does a husband who truly loves still need the second half of the verse? One writer answers from experience.
You might think that if the love were secured, there would be no room left for the bitterness. But is it so in the actual experience of life? Many a husband truly loves his wife, and still drops hasty words in moments when he is off guard, out of the presence of God. Such words are as bitter as gall to a tender heart. The aim of the warning seems to be constant self-judgment, so that the husband may avoid anything that might fret or irritate the spirit of his wife.
Where the bitterness usually comes from
Bitterness at home is often imported from elsewhere. One writer traces its route, then names the motive Scripture uses instead.
The husband comes home after a day of contact with this evil world. Others may have handled him roughly, or disappointed him, or deceived him. He arrives with a ruffled and soured temper (if he has not kept his Christian balance through grace), and he is prone to forget the divine instruction... The Spirit of God does not tell him, "You ought to love your wife, and if you don't, you are the most inconsistent Christian." Instead, He puts Christ and His love before the husband as the motive power: "as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her."
Two patterns: Adam or Christ
The command has an old opposite. Under pressure, Adam blamed his wife instead of shielding her.
Husbands are told to love their wives, and not to be bitter against them. This last point stands in contrast to Adam. Love would shelter a wife and take the blame for her, rather than let a bitter spirit lay the blame on her. "She gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate," said Adam. This is the deed of the old man. The new man is renewed after the image of Christ, and He loved the church and gave Himself for it.
Summary
- Weak spot. Each partner gets the word aimed at their own failing; the husband's is love, and love turning sour.
- Bitterness defined. Not hatred, but an unguarded temper, fading attention, and hasty words that cut a tender heart.
- Imported. The sourness often starts outside the home, and lands on the person closest.
- Self-judgment. Real love still needs the warning. The damage happens in unwatched moments, away from God's presence.
- Pattern. Adam blamed his wife; Christ gave Himself for the church. The husband's love has one model, and it is the second.