Faith And Family Series

Well how do you go about destroy marriage in a culture?

You teach that marriage isn’t all that important.

And that is what is being taught in our movies/ TV shows/ popular books.

Hollywood’s biggest and grandest stars swap partners like trading cards.

Some of our nation’s “heroes” engage in repeated affairs, such as Tiger Wood.

Recently I heard about the once great astronaut Buzz Aldrin. Apparently he’s on his 3rd marriage… and he’s cheating on her.

Then, of course there is the push in Washington D.C. and various state governments to embrace homosexual unions/marriages – things that God clearly tells us are immoral.

ILLUS: Back in 2007, Zogby International and AOL surveyed more than 7,000 Americans and found 44% said didn’t need a marriage certificate to prove love or commitment. These people felt marriage was not necessary in order to have a committed, fulfilling, life-long relationship.

(Jeff Johnson OneNewsNow.com January 7, 2008)

What that means is that our culture has succeeded in tearing marriages down. And part of the reason they’ve been successful is that we’ve been told certain lies over the years.

For example, we’ve been told the lie that 50% of all marriages fail.

Have you ever heard that?

It’s not true.

That statistic was stated by someone who didn’t know how to read.

ILLUS: Pollster Louis Harris stated, "The idea that half of American marriages are doomed is one of the most specious pieces of statistical nonsense ever perpetuated in modern times.

• Only one out of 8 marriages will end in divorce

• and in any single year only about 2% of existing marriages will break up."

(Homemade by Dr. J. Allan Petersen)

We’ve also been told the lie that living together before marriage will help us avoid divorce. You’ll see that idea played out in many of today’s popular TV shows/sitcoms. With romantic music being played in the background the hero will woe the heroine to his bed. And many will find themselves thinking how natural that is.

How Nice.

How Wonderful.

But it isn’t wonderful.

Set aside for a moment the sexual diseases people who live like that can be afflicted with, these Hollywood scripts still don’t tell us the truth.

ILLUS: A study done by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops’ dealing with Cohabitation (Marriage Preparation and Cohabiting Couples). Found that

• Though 76% of cohabiters plan to marry their partner, only about half do,

• And for cohabiters who do marry, the divorce rate is 50% higher than couples who have never live together.

LIVING TOGETHER DOESN’T WORK!

And it never has.

That’s one of the major reasons God condemned this kind of lifestyle in His Word.

So, we’ve been told the lie that 50% of marriages fail.

And we’ve been told the lie that living together is good.

BUT we’ve also been told the lie that religion CAN’T help prevent a divorce.

Well… YES it can.

Glenn T. Stanton, Director of Global Family Formation Studies at Focus on the Family,

"The divorce rates of Christian believers are not identical to the general population — not even close. Being a committed, faithful believer makes a measurable difference in marriage.”