Have you ever stopped to think of the purpose of Marriage? Or better yet do you know what the most powerful analogy/picture of marriage is? Or in other words do you know what your marriage was designed to reflect and look like? It’s generally agreed among Christians today that marriage is designed for three purposes.
1.Procreation: In Genesis 1:28 the Lord tells Adam and Eve to fill the earth. This is a common theme and command to populate the earth, producing a Godly offspring throughout the scriptures.(Gn 9:1, Lv 26:9, Ps 127:5)
2.Pleasure: Although this more uncommon in ancient literature with exception of Songs of Songs, it is evident in the New Testament that marriage is designed to bring pleasure and comfort to one another both emotionally and spiritually. (I Cor 7:5).
3.Picture: We find a consistent analogy of marriage between a husband and wife in the Old Testament to reflect God’s relationship to Israel. In the New Testament we see that Marriages are to mirror, Christ’s love for the church. (Eph 5:25)
What’s amazing here is that our marriages are picture of God’s covenant love for his people! Just as God has love for the church (His Bride), So we husbands are to love our wives (our brides). Our marriages are then, powerful pictures to the world around us of God’s love and covenant commitment.
This is a life changing truth that should motivate us then
1.Avoid divorce at all costs, seeing that it would hinder and hurt the picture of God’s covenant love and damage our witness.
2.Embrace our duty in our marital relationship. Understanding that in marriage we are to reflect his image and represent a picture of God's faithful love to his church.
3.View marriage as a sacred pathway in growing closer to God. As married couples love each other they grow in their relationship with God and gain more influence in the world, serving God together and growing together.
Lean into your marriage! Cultivate it. It's a gift that is to be treasured and cherished. It's very design was to reflect God's love to a hurting world. It's your duty to strive towards reflecting a picture of God's love.
Recommended Resource: Sacred Marriage
Enjoyed this very much but was just wondering why in your concluding "3 motivations" would you leave out your stated earlier point on marriage, which was #1, of Procreation? Not to be to critical of your writing because Im sure you would have more to say on this topic, but I see this a great deal in the modern evangelical church...a skimming over of Gods plan of procreation within the family of God. And how this (His) plan of having and discipling children is the most effective way to reach a lost world. Do you find this glossing over as well or am I just hyper-sensitive to this?
ReplyDeleteJust thinkinbg out loud, blessings man,
Ryan Ellison
No I did. Not to ignore it but to highlight the point on Marriage serving as a picture for God's love for the church. I do agree that procreation is excellent means for advancing God's kingdom. I suppose you have a growing family and take your ministry to your fam seriously. I applaud you. Maybe you will write on this?
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