Humanity of Marriage

What we can learn from the biblical principles laid out for us also applies to relationships so we will discuss relationships and marriage but only in the framework of Christ’s marriage to us.

So we will start like we have at the beginning of each message in the series and go back to Genesis 1:27

Genesis 1:27 (ESV)

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

God designed us to be together and compliment each other right from the beginning.

This is a big part of God’s plan for creation that we would compliment each other through community and relationships and that we would compliment each other through marriage.

We are even supposed to compliment God through bearing His image.

In Genesis 1 there are several things listed that are different but yet complimentary to each other

The land and the sea, the plants and the animals, the Heavens and the earth, and finally male and female. Different but complimentary.

God has a plan and a design for marriage and it starts right at the beginning of time.

We only have to get to Genesis 2 to see it unfold.

Genesis 2:24 (ESV)

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

If you aren’t married, I know you are thinking that this really is only about marriage but in a moment, we will see what this really means for every single person of faith

One thing we should remember in discussing this is that just as male and female come together as one, so also is the plan for Heaven and earth. There is a marriage of those two realities as well.

The very beginning of the Bible begins with this picture of marriage and then the New Testament describes us as the bride of Christ and the Bible ends describing this picture of Christ and we are his bride

Revelation 21:1 (ESV)

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.

Revelation 21:2 (ESV)

And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

Heaven and earth were meant for each other from the beginning of time and here we see the ultimate marriage of the two!

Humanity and God were made for one another and here we see the ultimate marriage of the two!

These are symbols of course and part of the function of marriage is that we would mirror that symbol to the world.

Notice as well that it said that there will be a new heaven and new earth!

In the end there is a new heaven and a new earth. So just as they were separated at the fall so began the fall of marriage as well. So, when God gives us a new heaven and a new earth it makes sense that this is the image that scripture uses for our reunification with Christ. We are the bride, and he is the groom, and we are married once again meaning in perfect unity once again

We are to bear the image of God and one of the ways we do that is through marriage.

On the topic of the new heavens and the new earth, some people think or feel that God has a list of rules for us and that the earth is bad and evil and if we keep the rules then we get to go to heaven. Others think that if we believe then we get to leave the earth and go to heaven and since we believe then we should still keep the rules. None of these truly capture what God is doing and that’s why marriage is such a great representation of our relationship with God. Being married is not about a list of rules and neither is being in a relationship with God. It is about connection and intimacy.

We are called to be symbols of the heaven and earth relationship to all those around us and to ourselves and our spouses.

Romans 8 near the end talks about birthing a new creation. Birth is used as a signpost for what God is doing. God speaks of Israel as the bride in the OT and that is to say that he chose them to be his bride and through them, there will be the birth of a new and restored creation.

Ephesians 5 is the passage where Paul speaks of Marriage and he speaks about it through the language of Christ and the church. It isn’t simply instructions

for marriage. It’s the ideal way that marriage can reflect the story of Christ and the church.

Ephesians 5:21 (ESV)

submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Ephesians 5:22 (ESV)

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord.

Ephesians 5:23 (ESV)

For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior.

Ephesians 5:24 (ESV)

Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

Ephesians 5:25 (ESV)

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,

Ephesians 5:26 (ESV)

that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,

Ephesians 5:27 (ESV)

so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

Ephesians 5:28 (ESV)

In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.

Ephesians 5:29 (ESV)

For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church,

Ephesians 5:30 (ESV)

because we are members of his body.

Ephesians 5:31 (ESV)

“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”

Ephesians 5:32 (ESV)

This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.

Ephesians 5:33 (ESV)

However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

What he says about husbands and wives in chapter 5 therefore comes within a larger context where in and through Jesus Christ the whole world is brought into a new unity.

Husbands and wives submit to each other as it said there in verse 21

When Paul speaks of the wife submitting to the husband he has already illustrated that husband and wife submit to each other but he emphasizes it through what he calls a mystery and obviously we as the bride of Christ are to submit to him as his bride.

What he is saying here is deep and what he is asking of us is that we do the best we can to make our marriage be an image of Christ’s marriage to us.

Matthew 19:3 (ESV)

And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?”

Matthew 19:4 (ESV)

He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female,

Matthew 19:5 (ESV)

and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?

Matthew 19:6 (ESV)

So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”

Matthew 19:7 (ESV)

They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?”

Matthew 19:8 (ESV)

He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.

Matthew 19:9 (ESV)

And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”

Matthew 19:10 (ESV)

The disciples said to him, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry.”

Matthew 19:11 (ESV)

But he said to them, “Not everyone can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given.

Matthew 19:12 (ESV)

For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this receive it.”

Marriage is intimate.

Christ is close to us. He came to the earth as a man to be present with us. He is called Emmanuel which means God with us. Marriage involves an intimacy where you share everything, where you become one.

Never hold anything back from God and mirror that in your marriage as well.

We have tried our best to learn to use attunement with each other. To be present.

Marriage is sacrificial.

Christ sacrifices all for us, Paul teaches us to lay down our life for our spouse just as Christ has laid down his life for us.

This means die to selfish desires in your marriage as well as in your relationship with Christ.

Marriage is a covenant.

Christ has made a covenant with us.

He honors it even when we don’t.

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