Sermon Tone Analysis

Today we are endeavoring to look at Marriage, what it is and what it Isn’t...

We need to assume one major component today that Pastor Chad will explain further next week.

How the Fall of man and sin has affected marriage.

So just to give some brief context, the story will develop from and show how a serpent came to eve the woman and caused her to question God and ultimately rebel against his commands.

Humanity will never be the same after that event and God will show Grace but yet will judge them.

Because of this Sin becomes the very nature that everyone born after them is born into.

So while I do not want to focus on that today, I do want to mention that and give you a basic understanding of that story.

Today as we look at what marriage is and isn’t, we need to start at the beginning.

And being that we spent the last few weeks in these passages, lets jump ahead to what was read today...

gen2.

So from these two parts of the main story what we can learn about Marriage and see what it is, or at least what it was intended to be.

God creates and defines Marriage

There is no other room from the Biblical text to believe anything other than the fact that God the Creator, created both male and female Genders.

There are no other genders, and there is no other form of marriage.

1 man and 1 woman.

Now I understand the debate and how sensitive it can be in this day and age, yet the Historical Biblical view has not changed for thousands of years and we feel no need to amend it now that our society has changed their view of it.

We will not use that as a reason to hate others, and we will not judge those outside the church as that is not our place.

Our role is to preach truth to them and let them receive it or not.

Yet our position is informed by scripture and we view our culture through the lens of scripture, not the other way around.

So what Am I saying marriage is based on our findings in scripture here...

Marriage is: God’s Idea & meant for Man and Woman

I think that it is clear here that was the original design, before anything sinful had happened tainting marriage, this is clear.

We are going to look at other aspects of marriage but we must have a baseline and this is it.

SO if we are going to plant a flag in the ground over marriage, this is where we land and the rest of this sermon will only reinforce that view.

And while the world and those outside the Christian Faith can understand that this is our view, it isn’t until we allow what marriage is inform our view of what it isn’t that we get non believers mad at us.

What do I mean by that??? Well if that what marriage is, then what isn’t it?

Marriage isn’t: Man’s Idea or Anything other than Man and Woman

Now I have your attention… Why?

Because after thousands of years that people have believed and practiced this, it has been challenged and championed as something other than this definition.

If this offends you, can I just stop you right now and say that everyone of us in this room are sinners in need of Gods grace to cover our sin.

We have all sinned and we all need to renew our minds, even when we feel it challenges our worldview.

But we either worship the God of the Bible or the God of our Imagination.

What else do we see from our main text in today?

gen2.

Not only do we see that God creates man and woman and gives them to each other in a mutually exclusive way called marriage, but we see why?!

Last week I alluded to that word for Helper, I said that it does not mean that man needed a servant that he could use and abuse because he was better than her.

That word Helper means to assist and serve another with what is needed to make complete.

So, woman from God to Man is meant to bring strength to their union in serving God and each other.

Marriage is: Meant for Help, Strength, and serving God and each other

Without this, God says it is not good for man to be alone.

Why?

Because he is incomplete.

Companionship brings strength.

But please notice how this helper will be fashioned...

FIT for HIM.

Woman was made and designed to be Fit for man.

I mean that even in the literal physical sense of their anatomy.

Nothing else in all creation is given to man as a helper fit for him.

Because of this look what else this marriage between man and woman is meant for.

To be fruitful and multiply can only mean one thing.

They could not create other humans out of the dust of the ground as God created them, could they?

No!

So then how are they going to multiply and fill the earth???

gen2.

This is a picture of marriage and it unashamedly shows that marriage is for Procreation and pleasure!

Thats what it means to be fruitful and multiply, and this is done by Man holding fast to his wife.

Other translations say cleave to his wife.

It is meant to give a picture of two becoming one, so it say that they then become one flesh.

This is because the are fit for each other, commanded to procreate b y holding fast and that is something that is fruitful in their life.

Marriage is: for Procreation and Pleasure

That is what Be fruitful and multiply means!

I would be quick to point out though, that this does not mean that martial rights of intimacy and having children is the only reason for marriage.

Rather we would say that it is a benefit of marriage that is prohibited outside of it.

SO if this is all the reasons we have found in just the beginning of the human races understanding of marriage, how do we get to a place where we are today?

SO if this is all the reasons we have found in just the beginning of the human races understanding of marriage, how do we get to a place where we are today?

Let’s be honest, in our culture marriage is not always looked at as an esteemed relationship between two people, and it is easily ended when it no longer mutually benefits those involved.

Is this right?

Well let’s get back to the place where we are reminding ourselves of who these instruction were written to before applying its wisdom to our lives today.

Moses wrote Genesis to a recently freed slave people.

They were under control of Egypt, and now are free to worship God in the desert.

Yet they are so messed up from years of slavery that their view of each other is tainted by their former slave masters.

They have no esteem for human life, and so they learn that they are Image bearers of God the Creator.

And while wandering in the dessert they receive a Law from God on how to live for him and worship him.

Now we are most familiar with the 10 commandments, but there are actually 613 laws that inform everything about their lives.

Some are moral laws that inform how they live with each other, some are ceremonial or levitical laws that inform their worship, and some are more civil in nature that inform how their society is to live in the land.

With all these laws there surely must be something about marriage… Right?!?!

There are actually two laws that inform how they handle brokenness in marriage.

Again please keep in mind that we are not looking so much at the effects of the fall on marriage but we are acknowledging that marriage like everything else was dramatically affected by the fall.

Marriage like humans made in the image of God are now broken and not functioning the way they were designed.

So the two laws we find that speak into marriage reflect the broken sin nature of humanity.

Why do I say that?

Because both these laws we will look at speak of divorce.

Lets look at them.

ex21.10

This is odd.

This law speaks about what to do if a man takes for himself another wife.

Before we can truly look at this and understand how it relates to everything we want to talk about with marriage today, I need to give you some background.

Marriage for the near eastern peoples, And the early Jewish society that this was written to, had dramatically changed the beauty we saw of completeness in .

They were using marriage as a means of procreation, posterity and prosperity.

When they would marry they decided that it was acceptable and even encouraged to marry in your extended family line, especially cousins from your fathers side of the family.

This way property and finances were kept in the family.

Now they didn’t always do this, and when they didn’t, marriage was treated as a business.

It was seen as a means of growing ones personal wealth.

So when a man would take a woman to marry he would asses what her family was good at and a Dowry was set up.

A dowry was specific finances and wealth that the bride would pay to get into the marriage.

In return her husband would provide Food, Clothing, and marital rights… meaning he would not with hold sexual intamacy from her in raising a family.

REAL ROMANTIC… No hallmark movies with that storyline...

but to further see how marriage is being handled by broken people, notice what this verse is saying… If a husband takes another wife???

Polygamy was so widespread because it was a means of growing ones personal wealth, and they had not been informed of the Imago Dei - being created in the image of God.

Remember that these former slaves were used to being bought and sold and treated as objects and so they apply this understand of their lives to their marriages.