The World’s View of Marriage (1)

In previous studies we have examined the foundation of the home by studying the meaning, manifestations, and means of being filled with the Holy Spirit. How vital it is that we, with Paul, start with that! If that is not accomplished first, the rest of Paul’s guidelines for the home will be impossible to implement. Spirit-filling, or as we also paralleled in Colossians, Word-filling, must be the very foundation of the Christian home (as well as everything else in Christian living). As noted before, when the Word of God permeates us, the Spirit of God controls us. This prepares us to examine the specifics Paul gives concerning the Christian home. In the verses that follow (5:22-6:4) Paul writes of the responsibilities of each family member. 

Just minutes before I stepped into the pulpit to deliver the first message on marriage, it occurred to me why I love to preach on marriage and the family. I quickly added three brief thoughts to my notes before stepping into the pulpit. One reason is that this is part of God’s Word, and that is my passion. My desire, based on Paul’s admonition to the Ephesians pastors in Acts 20:27, is to preach “all the [pas, “whole”] counsel of God.” Second, I have a wonderful wife and family that God has given, so I love to preach on a subject that is so dear to my heart. Third, is how important and foundational the marriage and home are not only to the Church but also to society itself. As we’ll see, there has been throughout history violent assault on marriage and family. I love to preach on this because if we don’t have godly homes, we won’t have a Church or even a country left in which to live.

Every family consists first of a husband and a wife, that is, a man and a woman. Is that a novel thought? Hardly. The whole notion of homosexual marriage is so ridiculous, so unimaginable that it barely deserves refutation. While it is more and more accepted in our day as various states legalize it (and some churches sanction it!), there can be no argument whatsoever that God does not even condone it, much less make it a standard for the family. 

We, therefore, ask the question, “What exactly is marriage?” While the answer might seem obvious, it actually grows more obscure by the day. It is vital that we know the answer to this before we can ever understand the home in general or the responsibilities God has given to each family member. Let us look, therefore, at the contrast between the world’s view of marriage and God’s view.

What is the world’s view of marriage? To say the least, many marriages are not happy, fulfilling, or rich. As the story goes, a certain little seven-year-old girl who had just seen the movie Cinderella was testing her neighbor lady’s knowledge of the story. The neighbor, anxious to impress the little girl, said, “I know what happens at the end.” “What?” asked the girl. “Cinderella and the prince live happily ever after.” To which the cynical seven-year-old answered, “Oh no, they didn’t. They got married!”

While that brings a smile to our faces, it is tragically true in many marriages. Why? Because they are not based upon the truth of Scripture. There truly is nothing on earth that has come under more direct assault, both today and historically, than has the institution of marriage. This fact is apparent in four ways.

First, the Jewish attitude concerning marriage. In Jewish culture a wife was quite literally considered to be, like cattle or household possessions, the property of her husband and was certainly not an equal. In his morning prayer, a Jewish man would often give thanks that God had not made him “a Gentile, a slave, or a woman.” Women never ate with the men in the home; the husband and sons would eat first and the wife and daughters would wait for what was left. Husband and wife never walked arm in arm, rather the wife walked behind the husband. Things such as pitching and striking tents, packing and unpacking household goods, and tending flocks were the duties of the women.

The provision God gave for divorce in Deuteronomy 24 had been so distorted by liberal rabbis that a man could divorce his wife for any offense he chose: adultery, spoiling his dinner by putting too much salt in his food, walking in public with her head uncovered, talking with men in the streets, speaking disrespectfully of her in-laws in her husband’s hearing, or if she was just quarrelsome.

There were, of course, exceptions to all that. We see deep affection between Jacob and Rachel (Gen. 29-30), and Abraham treated Sarah like a queen. But such examples were the exceptions, not the rule.

At this point some of us might be tempted to say, “What a terrible thing to be taught in the Bible!” But that is not taught in the Bible. The Bible only records these attitudes; It does not condone them. Such attitudes are certainly not God’s guidelines for marriage. Man perverted what God created and intended. We’ll continue next time.