God’s Best Plan or Ball and Chain? A Christian Theology of Marriage
January 23, 2005
Intro:
I believe that there is a lot of wisdom in children; allow me to share with you the responses of some children to some marriage questions…
How do you decide who to marry?
• "You got to find somebody who likes the same stuff. Like if you like sports, she should like it that you like sports, and she should keep the chips and dip coming." Alan, age 10
How can a stranger tell if two people are married?
• "Married people usually look happy to talk to other people." Eddie, age 6
• "You might have to guess, based on whether they seem to be yelling at the same kids." Derrick, age 8
What do you think your Mom and Dad have in common?
• "Both don’t want no more kids." Lori, age 8
What do most people do on a date?
• "Dates are for having fun, and people should use them to get to know each other. Even boys have something to say if you listen long enough." Lynnette, age 8
• "On the first date, they just tell each other lies, and that usually gets them interested enough to go for a second date." Martin, age 10
How would the world be different if people didn’t get married?
• "There sure would be a lot of kids to explain, wouldn’t there?" Kelvin, age 8
• "You can be sure of one thing - the boys would come chasing after us just the same as they do now." Roberta, age 7
How would you make a marriage work?
• "Tell your wife that she looks pretty even if she looks like a truck." Ricky, age 10
Context:
This January we have been talking about a Christian response to issues that our society faces, and asking that God would “transform (us) into new (people) by changing the way (we) think.” (Rom 12:2, NLT). One of the real biggies in Canadian society is the issue of marriage. What is marriage? How should it be defined? Who should be allowed to get married? Why does it matter to Christians? That is the issue I want to begin today.
A Word To Singles:
But first, let me acknowledge that not all of us here today are married. Some of you are single by choice, but most of you are not. In all that follows, as I talk about God’s design for marriage, I don’t want you to feel like second-class citizens, or like your situation is somehow less significant, because you are not. In fact, I believe that God has a very high regard for people who are single, as 1 Corinthians 7 makes clear: “It is good for a man not to marry.” (vs. 1). Also, vs. 8, “Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I am.” Even, in verse 28, “But those who marry will face many troubles in this life, and I want to spare you this.” Yes, that is actually in the Bible… Paul makes his reasons clear in vs. 32-35: “An unmarried man is concerned about the Lord’s affairs–how he can please the Lord. But a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world–how he can please his wife– and his interests are divided. An unmarried woman or virgin is concerned about the Lord’s affairs: Her aim is to be devoted to the Lord in both body and spirit. But a married woman is concerned about the affairs of this world–how she can please her husband. I am saying this for your own good, not to restrict you, but that you may live in a right way in undivided devotion to the Lord.”
So for Paul, being single was the best option because you could devote yourself single-mindedly to pleasing the Lord. Yet Paul recognizes that as the exception rather than the rule, stating so up front in vs 2: “But since there is so much immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman her own husband.” Which brings us to God’s plan for marriage.
God’s Design For Marriage
To see God’s design for marriage, we need to go all the way back to Genesis 2:15-25. “The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."
The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him."
Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field.
But for Adam no suitable helper was found. So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh. Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.
The man said,
"This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called ’woman,’ for she was taken out of man."
For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.
The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.”
Marriage: A Pre-Fall Institution
So here is where God creates marriage. Now, the very first thing I want to point out from Genesis 2 is actually not in the text, but rather an observation about when God instituted marriage. God created marriage before sin ever entered into the world. It isn’t until the next chapter, Genesis 3, that humanity chooses to reject God and as a result suffers all kinds of terrible difficulties. God created marriage as part of His perfect, un-corrupted, un-defiled, beautiful plan for humanity.
That has a number of very large implications.
1. God Designed Marriage
In the creation story I read, we saw how God looked at the man He had made, and made an observation. And no, it wasn’t “I think I can do way better than that!” He looked at Adam and said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”
Let me digress for a moment and comment on that word, “helper”. When we hear that word, many of us think hierarchically: Adam was to be the boss, Eve the assistant – Adam the journeyman, Eve the apprentice. So I looked up the other places in the Old Testament where that word is used, to see if that was the right understanding, and found out this: the word appears 21 times, twice here in Genesis 2, leaving 19 more. Of that 19, 15 of those usages describe God in His help for humanity. For example, Psalm 121:1-2, “1 I lift up my eyes to the hills- where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.” Same word there for “help” as in Gen 2, “helper”. Obviously, then, the original Hebrew word does not mean that the “helper” is underneath the one being helped – there are no hierarchical connotations.
So, God looked at Adam and said it was not good for him to be alone. God created him with a need for a companion, an equal, who would complete the perfect creation. And so God created Eve, introduced the two of them, and they were married.
God’s design for marriage was the perfect completion of creation. The coming together of a man and a woman in a sexual relationship was part of God’s design for the maximum experience of life.
2. Marriage Was Defined By God At The Very Beginning
The second substantial implication of the fact that marriage is a pre-fall institution is that as Christians, our definition of marriage as being between a man and a woman comes from the very beginning of God’s created order. It is pre-history, pre-society, pre-kingdoms and nations, pre-law, even pre-sin. The marriage relationship, and by extension the parent-child relationship, is rooted in our very understanding of how and who God created us. That is why Christians feel strongly about attempts to redefine marriage. And that is why, regardless of how Canada’s parliament may choose to act, I would never use the word “marriage” to describe relationships that didn’t fit with God’s description and God’s institution.
3. We Were Made For Relationship
On numerous occasions, I have had conversations with people who are single and would rather not be. Invariably, one of the things they express is that they feel guilty about wanting to be in a relationship – sometimes even saying, “but, shouldn’t God be enough? If my relationship with God was good enough and deep enough, shouldn’t I be content to be single?” My response is simple: “It wasn’t enough for Adam, and Adam had a perfect relationship with God.”
My point is simple: God made us to need a marriage partner. Again, I recognize that God has given some people the gift of being spared this need, and has called them to celibacy, and I have great respect for that. But for most of us, that is not the case. God created us with a need for a companion, a partner, a “helper” in the Biblical sense of the word. We were made for relationship, and that is part of God’s perfect plan.
Now, most of us, in our society, equate “need” with “weakness.” Our society preaches that we shouldn’t need anything, we should be our own person, we should be independent and self-actualizing and self-realizing. We should pursue our dreams, and we should be in complete control of ourselves and our environment. “I am a rock, I am an island” goes the famous Simon and Garfunkle song. And that is our society’s mantra – don’t depend on anyone else, they’ll let you down. Take what you need, take what you want, take as much as you can get, but make sure you don’t be vulnerable because then you will just get hurt. Is it any wonder, then, that our society is so incredibly lonely?
That is not how God made us. God made us to need a marriage partner, and I am convinced that our need for relationship is a reflection of the image and character of God. God Himself exists in relationship – it is clear even in our names for God: God the “Father”, God the “Son”. The whole idea of the Trinity is an idea of relationship, of “one God eternally existing in three persons,” of needing one another, being completely dependent on one another, of being equal with one another. Our very understanding of God is an understanding of relationship, and we reflect that in how we are created in God’s image.
You and I were made for relationship.
4. Your Marriage Is The Closest You Can Get To The Garden Of Eden
The final implication of marriage as a pre-fall institution that I want to mention today is this: your marriage is the closest you can get, in this life, to the garden of Eden. It is the closest you can get to paradise. I really believe that, and I believe it is Biblical.
You see, in God’s perfect plan for you and for your life, He wants your marriage to be an incredibly beautiful thing. God wants your existing marriage to reflect the perfection of relationship that we see between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God’s perfect plan is that your need for companionship, for a partner, for a helper, for a life-mate, for a place of absolute safety and absolute closeness and absolute unconditional acceptance and love, be met in your marriage, as you meet those same needs in your partner.
A few of you, as I say those words, smile, reach over and grab the hand of your spouse, and think and feel, “I praise God for you, because I have that in my marriage.” But many of us feel the opposite. We hear those words and we feel more lonely. We feel discouraged. We feel isolated and, in some cases, hopeless.
Well I believe that can change. Not only can change, but must change. Your feelings of loneliness and isolation in your marriage are killing you. They are draining you. They are, literally, destroying your life. And if you have children, they are harming them as well – now and for the patterns they are learning that will carry forward into their relationships.
I believe, with all my heart, that God can change that. And that God longs to change that. Now hear comes the big question: are you ready to fight for it? Something has to change, you know that and you feel that. What, you maybe aren’t sure of. How, I know you aren’t sure of. But all of that is, I believe, secondary, to the choice to fight for your marriage to be great. And that is all I want you to decide today – will you fight? Will you change yourself? Will you change the destructive habits you have brought into the relationship? Will you humble yourself before God and before your partner and ask for their forgiveness, and then change?
It will take work. It will, at times, feel desperate. But let me tell you this: it is worth fighting for. It is worth risking again. It is worth changing. If that sounds too tiring, get rid of something else that isn’t so important, so that you can recapture the love that God desires you to give and to receive.
It is worth fighting for.
