BMH Books author and Grace Theological Seminary graduate, Larry McCall, has been interviewed on the Books at a Glance website about his 2009 book, Loving Your Wife as Christ Loves the Church. A portion of the interview is included below. Click here to read the complete article.
Long-time friend and pastor Larry McCall (Christ’s Covenant Church, Winona Lake, IN) loves to help Christians live out biblical commands and see them experience ever more deeply the transforming work promised to us in the gospel. In his Loving Your Wife as Christ Loves the Church he takes up the famous command of the apostle Paul to husbands found in Ephesians 5:25 and very practically explores what this kind of love looks like in the Christian home. Today he is here to talk to us about his book … and his subject.
Books At a Glance (Fred Zaspel):
First off, not to belabor the obvious, perhaps you can summarize for us what your book is about. Can you summarize your central thesis briefly?
McCall:
Loving Your Wife as Christ Loves the Church is an easy-to-read book for husbands that is Bible-based, Christ-centered, and grace-promoting. The starting point for the book is the Bible’s teaching in Ephesians 5:25, “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” This is not a “grit your teeth and try harder” book. I have sought to show in specific ways how Christ is the perfect model for us husbands in knowing how to love our wives and how the gospel empowers that love. The book is meant to be full of hope and help.
Books At a Glance:
What contribution are you hoping to make with this book? And perhaps you can tell us how your interest and attention to “flesh out” this subject in such practical detail came about.
McCall:
As a longtime pastor I had the growing realization that most men were never mentored by their dads in the ministry of “husbanding.” Having the privilege of speaking at quite a few men’s conferences and retreats, I often begin by asking, “How many of you guys had dads who taught you how to love your wife?” The highest percentage of hands I’ve ever seen go up in response is about 20%. Normally, about 10% of the guys raise their hands. So, you can see that the great majority of men feel a lack of training in the amazingly important ministry of loving their wives. And, to complicate matters, we men tend to avoid areas of felt incompetency. We don’t want others to see our incompetence. So, lots of married men devote themselves to things they do feel more competent in – their hobbies, their jobs and yes, even their “ministries” in the church rather than devoting themselves to the scary responsibility of loving their wives. In the meantime, there are lot of married women who are hurting, craving their husband’s love and attention while their husbands are spending their time and attention on other things.
Seeing this, I felt compelled to write a book that men would read that is practical and gospel-fueled. A humbling realization along the way was that I needed this book! Though we had been married for 35 years by the time I was writing this book, I found that this book was, in a sense, for me. By God’s amazing grace, thousands of other men have read the book and found help as well.
Click here to read the complete article.
