Life Series: Forgotten Picture of Marriage

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

Life Series: Two Kinds of Marriages

One night my wife and I were invited over to dinner by some friends. We had only been married a year or so. I will never forget the young married couple we met that night. They spoke all night long about how they never argued, never hurt each others feelings and always served each other above themselves.

They didn't have to say it, but they supposedly had the "Perfect Marriage!" "How could this be?" I thought to myself. "I am a Pastor and my wife and I fight like cats and dogs." I started getting sick to my stomach. It sounded like the Brady Bunch marriage on steroids! I wanted out!

What was going on? Leslie and were both committed to Christ but we had, what I thought a normal amount of conflict in our marriage. Didn't all marriages? We were and still are passionate people, with lots of opinions and both a decent amount of personal horse power!

We work hard to keep peace in our home, to love each other well and seek reconciliation when offenses are made. We did NOT and do NOT have the "Picture Perfect Marriage" to say the least. Our Marriage was and still is hard work. It is though, with out a shadow of doubt, the most rich and rewarding relationship I have on earth!

My father (A christian psychiatrist) always told me. "Son, there are only two kinds of marriages in this world. Hard marriages and bad marriages. The bad marriages are those that don't work at it. Anything of value takes hard work. The hard marriages are the good marriages! They work hard at loving God and each other and you can bank on it that these are the couples that will get a good reward in their relationship"

Wow, how true is that? Leslie and I have been married close to eight years. We do everything we can to work on our marriage, we are committed to each other, no matter what, in sickness and in health till death do we part. I meant what I said! Today, I am learning more and more to find joy in the hard work of marriage. I am seeing that the more I strive to love my wife, the more I grow in my relationship with God. He is for the permanency of marriage you know (Malachi 2:16)? He likes it when we obey and will reward us!(Hebrews 11:6).

I encourage any married couples to realize this simple truth, "Anything of value takes hard work." You don't find exceptional leaders that haven't paid the price for their excellence. Just ask anyone you know who is an exceptional leader, and you will discover they put in the hard work!

One day we all will stand before God and give account for our everything we did.(2 Cor 5:10) Yes, this includes your marriage! Did you work at it when things got tough? Or did you disobey God and quit? Let me encourage you friends, when it gets tough, dig in and remember anything of value take hard work!

oh yeah, the Brady Bunch couple later had to face their issues of denial, avoidance, and all other sorts of dysfunction in counseling. LoL.

Recommended Resource: Sacred Marriage