On the Subject of Marriage
I always tell my folks that we
preach and teach God’s ideal. We don’t always
measure up to the ideal, because we are conceived in sin and our heart deceives
us in many ways, but we should strive to meet the ideal.
God’s ideal for marriage is one man and one woman for one
lifetime.
Sometimes, due to sin and our hardened hearts, we fail to meet the
ideal, but we should at least be willing to admit that God’s plan does not
change just because we would like to do something different. So with that in mind, let us begin.
Marriage is the joining of two people together as “one flesh” (Eph 5:31, Gen 2:24, Matt 19:6). Scripture does not seem to require a
ceremony for this to take place, but in almost all cultures there is some kind
of ritualistic behavior associated with the marriage. In the old testament, it seemed to be a rather simplistic ritual
of taking a wife, accompanied by a party:
Gen 29: 22-23 And Laban gathered together all
the men of the place, and made a feast. And it came to pass in the evening,
that he took Leah his daughter, and brought her to him; and he went in unto
her.
So there is not necessarily a
lot of formality involved. However, in
the day in which we live, if we wish the government to recognize our marriage,
we must conform to the government’s laws in order to do that. That brings many problems, definitions, and
arguments that were not necessary in biblical times – and a lot of those take
place even before the ceremony! Today,
we as a nation are wrestling with same-sex marriage. That is not an issue with those that believe the Word of God,
because the Word plainly states that marriage is between a man and a woman:
Gen 2:24 Therefore
shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife:
and they shall be one flesh.
The word “man” is a masculine
noun and the word “wife” is a feminine noun.
There is nothing in the Word of God to condone same-sex marriage, nor
are there any examples of same-sex marriage in the Word. The issue is strictly a legal one. If this ammorality persists, we may one day
have to struggle with the definition again if, let’s say, a woman wants to
marry her dog, or if a woman wants to be married to a man and another woman at
the same time. It’s a legal issue –
not a Bible issue. The Word of God is
perfectly clear. God provided Adam a
woman as his wife.
A marriage then, in the sight of
God, is between a man and a woman, and the two become, in the eyes of God, one
flesh. They operate as a unit.
Is it God’s will for the unit to
break apart?
Matt 5: 31-32 It hath been said, Whosoever shall put away
his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement: But I say unto you, That
whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth
her to commit adultery: and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced
committeth adultery.
I Cor 7:2 [to
avoid] fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have
her own husband.
I Cor 7:10-11 And
unto the married I command, [yet] not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart
from [her] husband: But and if she depart, let her remain unmarried, or be
reconciled to [her] husband: and let not the husband put away [his] wife.
Therefore, God’s ideal is one
man for one woman until death separates them.
How is the marriage to be
conducted?
Eph 5:33 Nevertheless
let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself; and the
wife [see] that she reverence [her] husband.
Eph 5:25 Husbands, love
your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;
Col 3:18 Wives,
submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord.
The pattern seems pretty clear,
doesn’t it? If the pattern was
followed, would there ever be a need for divorce, separation, or harm? I fail to see how.
Is divorce in the bible? Yes it is.
Matt 19:8 He saith
unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put
away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.
God allowed divorce because of
the hardness of hearts. If hearts were
hard in Moses’ day, hearts are probably hard today. Divorce is not God’s ideal, but because we are sinners, we
sometimes find ourselves in that situation. Does that mean we cannot serve
God? No, it does not. God desires that all his children serve
him. Are there certain things that
divorced people should not do in the service of God? Yes, there are. Because
the Lord desires that his servants set a certain kind of example to the flock,
He has ordained that the primary leadership in His churches should not be
divorced.
I Tim 3:2 A
bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of
good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach;
Titus 1:6 If any
be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children not accused of
riot or unruly.
I Tim 3:12 Let the deacons be the husbands
of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well.
The word “bishop” is the Greek
word “episkopos,” and means overseer.
It is today what most people call a pastor or ordained elder. Such an officer in the church of the Lord is
to be the husband of one wife – and not just one at a time. If he had other living wives, he would be
described by the Lord as an adulterer (Matt 5:31-32), which would not exactly
make him blameless. The deacons are to
meet those same standards.
If you have been saved by the grace of God, and you have a
believing wife, there is no problem that God cannot solve in order to preserve
your marriage. It is God’s ideal for
one woman to marry one man and that the marriage continue until God dissolves
it by the death of one of the partners.
Nowadays, it seems to be common practice to simply live together
outside the bonds of matrimony. That is
known in the Bible as fornication, and as quoted above in I Corinthians 7:2, we
are to avoid that by being married.
There is no escape from the ideal that God has established, whether it be of marriage, holiness, obedience, or any other subject in the Word. But God also offers salvation to sinners, no matter what our condition at present. A new creature in Christ will recognize the ideal.
God Bless,
Doc Trin