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SERMON SERIES Stay Married
SERMON TITLE Why Get Married?
SERMON DATE 03/30/2008
SPEAKER Jeff Paschall
TEXT Selected Scripture
If you ever want to know the real answer to tough questions… ask a kid. (Andrew, “Have you ever been to a funeral?” “…do weddings count?”) We have a lot of questions about marriage… and, thanks to kids, now we have all of the answers. Yeah! Like answer to questions like, , “How do you decide whom to marry?” Alan (10) “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 chip and dip coming.” Or Kristen (10) says, “No person really decides before they grow up who they’re going to marry. God decides it all way before, and you get to find out later who you’re stuck with.” “How can a stranger tell if two people are married?” Derrick (8) says, “You might have to guess, based on whether they seem to be yelling at the same kids.” “What do you think your mom and dad have in common?” Lori (8) says, ”Both don’t want any more kids.” Or this question… “What do most people do on a date?” Lynnette (8) says, ”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.” Martin (10) says, ”On the first date, they just tell each other lies and that usually gets them interested enough to go for a second date.” “When is it okay to kiss someone?” Curt (7) says, ” The law says you have to be eighteen, so I wouldn’t want to mess with that.” Pam (8) says, “When they’re rich.” How would you make a marriage work? Ricky (10) says, “Tell your wife that she looks pretty, even if she looks like a truck.” How would the world be different if no one got married? Calvin (8) said, “There sure would be a lot of kids to explain wouldn’t there?” Or Kenny, (7) said, “It gives me a headache to think about that stuff. I’m just a kid. I don’t need that kind of trouble.”
<Back to 01 title> I have a question about marriage. Actually, it’s a very good question… and maybe not as easily answered as one might think… “Why get married?” The standard answer… the one that I hear most often is simply this… “Because we are… (what?) …in love.” ……This is going to sound shocking to some… but actually… love is not one of the bases or foundational purposes for marriage. It’s a very good motivation… and if you intend to have a good marriage its indispensable, but, strictly, it’s not the reason why you get married. For some… I might have just lost you on this… but don’t tune out… all I ask is that you entertain the notion… that there are a number of purposes or reasons that we should get married… and love isn’t one of them… and if you don’t believe me… that’s okay… over the next 30 minutes… I’ll try to lay out what the Bible says… and, if you want to… you can still disagree with me later.
Our confusion about… and frustration over marriage… is really pretty evident. Because when we’re not certain… what marriage is FOR… when it doesn’t live up to our foggy expectations… when our basis FOR MARRIAGE has been grossly misplaced on the WRONG THINGS… we ditch! We get disillusioned… we want out!
But it’s interesting that when a person bails on a marriage… typical people… don’t abandon the IDEA of marriage as a whole… so much as THIS PARTICULAR MARRIAGE… We think the problem is the person we’re married to… not the institution of marriage itself. And we KNOW THAT because MOST PEOPLE… who get divorced… get re-married! Or at least WANT to be remarried. The problem, they think… is the chemistry… the two people… not marriage itself. (only very jaded people…)
This morning I don’t intend to fix all of our problems… I’m not even intending to dispense great advice on how to strengthen your marriage. This morning all I want to do is help us understand why God gave us marriage. It’s design… and it’s purpose… starting there will both help us what to look for in a mate… and how to improve the marriage that we’re in.
Now, a few quick disclaimers. You’d think that marriage is a safe topic, but it isn’t. First… I’m not saying that everybody should get married and that marriage will solve your problems. In fact, when you get married… you introduce all kinds of… other problems. RIGHT? Marriage… brings it’s own set… of unique… problems. And, so, if you’re TRYING to get married… in order to alleviate an uncomfortable set of circumstances… or to bring you HAPPINESS and fulfillment… so you won’t HAVE any more problems… it’s not going to work.
I’m ALSO not saying that if you have a FAILED MARRIAGE… if you have been divorced… I’m not saying you should feel singled out… that there’s something uniquely wrong with you. It’s RARE that the blame for divorce rests 100% on any one person’s shoulders. BUT LET’S ASSUME… that it does… Let’s ASSUME that it was 100% your fault… God’s mercy and grace washes you clean. God’s grace and mercy lifts the burden from your life… He can HEAL YOU… and make you NEW. So as we TALK ABOUT marriage… just know… if you SENSE a great guilt… for having a failed marriage in your past… just know a couple of things… #1) failure in life is not unique to you… None of us… want to ever experience… the ravaging devastation of divorce… either for the first time… or a repeated time… and #2) know… if you feel God’s conviction… remember that God’s uncomfortable prodding ALWAYS… ALWAYS… brings healing, not condemnation.
A number of years ago a middle aged couple asked me if I were willing to marry them and I told them what I require – 1 initial interview, 6 counseling visits and another meeting to help them write vows. And they replied, ”Oh, we don’t need all that counseling. Uh, we’re pretty experienced when it comes to marriage. This’ll be Tom’s 3rd and my 4th.” <yeesh!>
The first thing I say when I interview people for marriage is this, “The reason why you are getting married… can’t be to make you happy.” And normally they look at me like I just spoke Swahili. And I say, ”If you’re getting into marriage in order to make you happy… this whole thing is going to self-destruct… Because… people that MARRY… eventually… experience marital unhappiness… and if your getting into this… was to make you happy… when your basis for marriage… goes away… there’s no reason to stay married.” Now keep that in mind… and we’ll return to it in the end.
There are 5 purposes in scripture for marriage. The first one is companionship. I want to take you back in time to ancient days when the human race was in its infancy. The first few pages of the Bible describe God creating light, and dry land, and earth, and stars, and flora and fauna, and 6 different times God stands back looks down on creation and says, “It is good… it is good… it is good… it is good… it is good… it is good…” Six times he says that. And then he turns his attention to man and he says, “It is very good.” And then comes a startling statement. Genesis 2:18… He says,… “It is not good.”
When I look a those words I immediately wonder, “Well, what could possibly not be good? There’s no SIN yet. What isn’t good?” If you read verse 18 it says this. 18 The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. In other words… if you think about this… Adam has GOD… he has all the ANIMALS… he has a perfect ENVIRONMENT… he has meaningful THINGS TO DO… he has this ONE BIG VACATION! He doesn’t have TAXES… he doesn’t have CRIME… he doesn’t have PROBLEMS… it’s paradise with a capital “P!” It’s everything that you and I longingly wish for. And God looks in on that situation and says, “Not good!” Because the man is… what? (alone) NOW PLEASE THINK… ADAM HAS GOD! And God is saying, “Not enough.” REALLY? ADAM IS NOT SAYING, “I’m alooooone! I don’t know if I like this.” GOD IS LOOKING AT ADAM AND SAYING, “He’s alone… I don’t like that!”
And so…, in order to meet this need… God determines… I will make a helper suitable for him.” It’s not a secretary… it’s not an errand girl… it’s not a second-class citizen… not a maid… although the word “helper” seems to insinuate sub ordinance… we think it sounds demeaning… until… you read GOD, HIMSELF calls Himself, “a helper” (Ps. 33). A helper is simply somebody who supplies what the other person CAN’T!
Aaaand that helper would be “suitable” for him. Literally, “according to his opposite.” Enough LIKE him… so he’s no longer alone… but enough DIFFERENT… to fill the gaps and meet the needs. And that PERSON… that OTHER… was more than just IMPORTANT… she was… VITAL!
Look at verse 21. 21 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 [h] and closed up the place with flesh. 22 Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib [i] he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. So God met the need by taking and forming her out from part of the man… so that Adam’s opposite would be… of that same bolt of human cloth.
And notice… how Adam responds… verse 23. 23 The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman, [j]’ for she was taken out of man.” He says, in Hebrew, “AT LAST!” “AAAAH!” He’s overwhelmed! Full of wonder! He FEASTS his eyes on this woman… and RECOGNZES HER! As… like but different. And he’s DRAWN to her! She’s enough LIKE him to solve the aloneness… but enough DIFFERENT to fill his gaps. And Moses, writing this, thousands of years later… inserts a divinely inspired commentary and explains for us… this instinctive urge to marry… and he says, 24 For this reason (“not good for a man to be alone”) a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. I usually think of it in terms of “leaving” and “cleaving” (or sticking together) and “weaving”. They “leave” when they marry. Your loyalties and responsibilities are now first and foremost to your mate. And you “cleave” or you are “permanently united.” And the idea of that word is not just that, when you’re married you’re stuck together. It’s the idea that you unswervingly stick with that other person! It’s more than glue… it’s a bond!
You ever hear a wedding where the preacher says, “Do you promise to take this woman for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health…” And the groom says, “Yes. No. Yes. No. No Yes.” It’s not supposed to be multiple choice. Every time that I describe what marriage is… I feel it deep down. You know what a marriage is supposed to be? It’s a deep sense of companionship with another person where you and I… stick together… and stay with each other… through the trials and frustrations of life… and we HANG IN THERE with each other… even when we go through bitter bouts of anger… crushing pressure situations… failures… troubles… depression… even when we feel NOTHING AT ALL… and we STAY WITH each other… and we grow OLD TOGETHER… and as we grow old together… we begin to learn to TRUST each other… we learn to FORGIVE each other… and as the YEARS PASS… we find that we are married to our best friend… we find that our very identity… is woven into the other person… where people look at the two people from the outside… and can’t figure out… where one person ends and the other one begins… And SOMEDAY… one of us will die… and bury the other person… and we’ll grieve greatly…
When it says, “they will become one flesh” that’s not JUST sexual… that’s not JUST describing intercourse. The grammar of the sentence pictures not a single act, but this lifelong process… where two people slowly become united in every way… physically, emotionally, psychologically, intellectually, sexually. It’s the fulfillment of the aching need for another person! It’s the remedy for the loneliness that exists in the beginning! GOD WIRED US FOR INTIMACY. And marriage was instituted by God and one of its foundational purposes was to promote THIS KIND of intimacy.
I think that this is one of the best reasons why the Bible is absolutely clear about the requirement to only marry another person… who shares your faith. 1 Corinthians 7:39 says, A woman is bound to her husband as long as he lives. But if her husband dies, she is free to marry anyone she wishes, but he must belong to the Lord. The principle is… if you have any SAY in the process of choosing a lifelong mate… you must marry… in the LORD. Think of it this way. If the MOST IMPORTANT THING in your life… is your faith in CHRIST… if the most IMOPRTANT PERSON you’ve ever met… and the most IMPORTANT THING TO YOU is your relationship with Christ… AND… YOU… MARRY SOMEBODY… who’s most important things in their life are… ANYTHING BUT CHRIST… then what that means is that in your life… in this closest relationship… you are free to share together ANYTHING AT ALL with the other person… except what’s most important to you. THAT’S NOT GOOD!
<back to 01 title> Notice that Genesis 2 ends with an observation. 25 The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame. This ease and intimacy that commitment brings… there’s no SHAME in it at all… And it’s a relational intimacy that’s celebrated in marriage with sexual intimacy… In a very wonderful and powerful way… these two are seen celebrating their intimacy… by getting naked with each other! (we’ll talk more about this in a couple weeks)
The idea is to share sexual intimacy with ONE OTHER PERSON in your life! That’s what is supposed to happen. We give ourselves in marriage to another person in a way that we don’t give ourselves to anyone else. And the numerous negative prohibitions about sex in the Bible ISN’T downgrading sex as NASTY… or DIRTY… it’s trying to protect sex… from being degraded into something that’s just COMMON… just a biological instinct.
Sex… is supposed to be… anything but casual. It was designed as a celebration… of intimacy. And the reason we get so confused… is because it feels so good to do it… WE THINK… “Sex is GREAT… Let’s DO IT… to celebrate… IT!” People who do that… are like people who like partying for partying’s sake! You know people like this… they… PARTY! You ask them what they’re doing Friday night or over the weekend… and they say… “I’m partying this weekend!” “Well, where you going to party?” “I don’t know, It really doesn’t matter. All I know is… I’m gonna party!” “Well, who are you partying with?” “What are you bothering me with details for? I don’t know… partying… you know… partying… you just… party… with whoever!” “Well what are you partying for?” “Partying for? Dude! You don’t need a REASON to party! You just party… to party!” And people party… for partying’s sake. And they treat sex the same… They mistake sex… as a celebration… of itself… IT ISN’T ATTACHED TO ANYTHING!
God designed… sex… as a party for a reason… it’s the deepest expression… of the celebration… of the kind of intimacy… between a man and a woman… ONLY FOUND… in lifelong companionship… being woven together… in an exclusive, permanent commitment. THEY SHARE WITH EACH OTHER… a part of themselves… that is revealed and held sacred… for no other person. Sex has a REASON… it’s a celebration of the deepest kind of intimacy…
Marriage was made… for DEEP companionship… That’s only ONE of the purposes… There are 4 other reasons for marriage… And in fact… as awesome as companionship is… as much as it breeds fulfillment in my life… to strive for… and work hard… to foster companionship in our marriage… I’d go as far as to say… that companionship isn’t even the best purpose God made marriage. It’s ONE OF THE BEST… but God designed marriage to fulfill even greater purposes than our companionship. (And I hate to do this to you… but, see those other four… we’ll get to them… next week).
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Jeff, if there is any man qualified to speak on this topic…you would be he. Great post! How is Sharon by the way? LOL Amie
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Comment by Amie Charney — April 28, 2008 @ 4:17 pm
Hi,
I read the first part of “Why get married?”. HOw do I get to the other messages on “Why get married?” There were 5 reason and I only got 1.
Thanks
Sue
Comment by Sue Dickerson — August 10, 2008 @ 6:24 am
I did really like your post… Also can you suggest me any business hosting company for corporate website?
Comment by Web Hosting — April 23, 2009 @ 12:47 am
It sounds to me like the #1 focus in life is to be married which I absolutly disagree with, Your focus shoud totally be on christ not your spouse. Paul addresses clearly in 1 Corinth chp 7 that due to the fallible human race we should marry rather than burn with passion.(he is against marriage due to its interference with christs servents..US!!!!!!!) “If you are married then do not seek divorce, yet if you are single do not seek marriage.” People(you) seem to see marriage as a completion in their life. Yet NO ONE should ever come that close to your heart except for G-d, HE completes us, not some temporary feel-good, and warm fuzzy feeling wife or husband. Besides don’t you want intimacy with the creater and ruler of this world rather then some wife/husband who’s love will not even compare to christs and is only temporary????? It seems todays society demands marriage, yet if God completes our emotions and truly has controll of our lives and hearts then do we really need a spouse????? “Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman. But because of the TEMPTATION OF SEXUAL IMPORALITY, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.” That does not even sound like a wonderouse gift G-d has given to us, it seems like marriage is a cover up for those who cannot controll themselves. Besides numerous passages tell us to flee sexual imorality, yet is it not odd that when we marry we can just let all that sexuality go for that one person whom we have been ordered to flee from untill marriage…it appears that all the effort before marriage is worthless!!!! I say that we flee sexuality outside and inside a marriage and spend our lives fighting off this tempting sin and pursue christ and his holy rightouseness, instead of the opposite sex.
Comment by Jon — July 9, 2009 @ 8:33 pm