Marriage Defined

In week 1 we talked about you never marry the right person. There is a strangeness to marriage in that the person you marry is undergoing constant transformation. The transformation is on two fronts. We focused upon Paul’s quote of Genesis, “...and the two will become one flesh.” First there is the transformation of the individual and second there is the transformation of the collective whole. Over time there is this mingling of souls that results in a mysteriously beautiful and powerful reflection of the Gospel. A Gospel that proclaims that you are more dreadful than you ever dared believe and more loved than you ever dared hope.

Last week we talked about Public Enemy #1. And who did we discover was the #1 enemy to a healthy marriage? That’s right, you are. So, everyone just repeat after me. I am the biggest enemy to a healthy marriage. Marriage used to be about us, but now it has become about me. So, the culture says that the perfect spouse is someone who will meet all of my needs while at the same time making no demands of me. And this is totally anti-Biblical. The Bible not only demands that you die to yourself, pick up your cross, and leave your former way of life and this not only applies to two married people but of everyone who wants to follow Jesus. If you are unwilling to deny your desires for the sake of Christ, the sake of your spouse, or the sake of your friend then you cannot follow Jesus and you will not remain married.

This week we are actually going to define marriage, and you may think the definition is obvious, but in reality there are some things with which the culture has burdened marriage that marriage was never really supposed to carry. Before we get there let’s read again the passage we are focusing upon for this series. reads

21submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

22Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

This week we are actually going to define marriage, and you may think the definition is obvious, but in reality there are some things with which the culture has burdened marriage that marriage was never really supposed to carry. Before we get there let’s read again the passage we are focusing upon for this series. reads

25Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30because we are members of his body. 31"Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." 32This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

Tim Keller gives us a great definition for what marriage is and clarifies what it isn’t. He says that, “Marriage is a public, permanent, exclusive, legal commitment to share your life completely with someone else.”

Let’s be honest, that’s not a very romantic definition. That seems to be very different than our enlightened fairy tale view of marriage which reads, “And they lived happily ever after.” Notice that there is also something missing from the definition that you may not recognize right off the bat, but I would argue that the culture holds it as the exponentially most important component of marriage.

21submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

L O V E

It seems a little strange to say right, “There is no love in marriage.” In this day and age that seems almost scandalous to infer that love is not in marriage. If I ask a young couple why they want to marry the first words out of their mouth is typically, “Because I love...”

So, the first thing I want to ask is how does that make you feel? I want this to feel a little controversial because I really want you to remember where we are going next. Everyone feeling a little conflicted?

22Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

The cultural idea that love trumps everything is based in the feeling of love. In fact, it is likely very difficult for you to define your love for someone without describing how you feel about that person. So, since this feeling of love has become our supreme guide into intimate relationships when the feeling of love subsides or changes we are able to justify dissolving the relationship. It also helps us to justify entering into an intimate relationship with anyone for which we have feelings. It’s the argument that has fueled the same-sex marriage movement. Modernity was defined by Descartes’ “I think, therefore I am,” but Post-Modernity, where we find ourselves culturally today, has devolved into something the philosopher Epicurus might have said, “I feel, therefore I am.”

But that kind of love is barely eluded to in Scripture. And apart from the ’m not sure that the feeling of love is explored.

The biblical view of love is not a feeling, but a choice.

25Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30because we are members of his body. 31"Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." 32This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

25Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

The Biblical view of love is that it is a commitment to serve.

It involves an action that leads to a feeling, and not a feeling that leads to an action.

Tim Keller gives us a great definition for what marriage is and clarifies what it isn’t. He says that, “Marriage is a public, permanent, exclusive, legal commitment to share your life completely with someone else.”

31"Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh."

This deep oneness that marriage promises to promote comes from a joining together of two people who are looking to the same horizon.

Eros, a Greek word for love from which we get the word erotic, is the feeling kind of love. It doesn’t appear once in the Bible. The gaze of two people experiencing eros is toward one another. The horizon is different for each of them.

Phileo is another Greek word for love that is described as brotherly love. It is love for the common good. When two people are experiencing phileo they are standing shoulder to shoulder, side by side, looking at the same object, and each of them is there to help the other reach the horizon. And each one is hoping the other reaches it first.

Agape, another Greek word for love, is a decision. This is the word Paul uses in verses 25-32. This is a love that is willing to sacrifice reaching the horizon if it means to help the other reach it.

The common horizon in Christian marriage is Christ on His throne. And you hope in the potential you see in your mate to become all that God made them to be so that you can present your husband or your wife “to Christ in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that he or she might be holy and without blemish.”

Let’s be honest, that’s not a very romantic definition. That seems to be very different than our enlightened fairy tale view of marriage which reads, “And they lived happily ever after.” Notice that there is also something missing from the definition that you may not recognize right off the bat, but I would argue that the culture holds it as the exponentially most important component of marriage.

Your goal in your marriage is that in a billion years as you stand next to your spouse before the throne you know that you were a vehicle for their redemption.

Understanding marriage in terms of the horizon also helps us understand why we should refrain from entering into marriage with a non-Christian. They are unable to look at the same horizon. And two non-Christians who are married are like someone who has a Ferrari but doesn’t know how to drive a stick. It looks good, but they are unable to unlock its power...its true potential.

Now this is going to seem quite backwards from how we approach marriage today in our swipe right culture. In marriage Eros should grow out of Phileo and Agape.

L O V E

Typically, how you approach the dating scene is that you rule people out based upon attraction. And I’m not saying that attraction isn’t a part of the equation, but what I am saying is that it should not be primary thing we use to weed out candidates. Attraction easily leads to affection, and we have been taught that Eros is the goal.

So, we have Eros for someone and then we try to develop Phileo or Agape. We try to turn the attractive person into a friend, instead of allowing our attraction to grow out of our friendship. If the goal of marriage is to refine you into the perfect gift presented at the throne of God, then you need a friend far more than you need an attraction. You need someone with whom you can share hopes and dreams, fears and doubt, hopes and beliefs that will in turn affirm and challenge them. I promise you this if friendship isn’t developed prior to a marriage or rather quickly after a marriage it is doomed to fail. In fact, no matter how attractive they are your marriage will fail.

What is exposed about humans in the Bible is that our greatest fear is to be known and not loved which means our greatest need is to be fully known and fully loved and this is what God promises us. When two people enter into the promise of marriage they are committing to fully know and fully love the other.

It seems a little strange to say right, “There is no love in marriage.” In this day and age that seems almost scandalous to infer that love is not in marriage. If I ask a young couple why they want to marry the first words out of their mouth is typically, “Because I love...”

“Marriage is a public, permanent, exclusive, legal commitment to share your life completely with someone else.”

It is quite easy to be attracted to someone without any knowledge of them. It is even easy to commit to someone to whom you are attracted. However, the commitment to becoming fully known while at the same time committing the time and effort and energy to get to know the other is far from easy. In fact, it is the most difficult thing to do, and yet this is what marriage calls you to do.

So, if you are married I just want to simply ask you this question, “How’s your friend doing?” “Are they moving toward that throne on the horizon?” “Are you hindering or helping them?” “What sacrifices do you need to make to help them?”

In fact, a loveless marriage would seemingly be a

So, the first thing I want to ask is how does that make you feel? I want this to feel a little controversial because I really want you to remember where we are going next. Everyone feeling a little conflicted?

For the single and unmarried, let me ask you, “What friends might you be overlooking that could make a great spouse?” Just try it for a few months. Who knows what might happen.

The cultural idea that love trumps everything is based in the feeling of love. In fact, it is likely very difficult for you to define your love for someone without describing how you feel about that person. So, since this feeling of love has become our supreme guide into intimate relationships when the feeling of love subsides or changes we are able to justify dissolving the relationship. It also helps us to justify entering into an intimate relationship with anyone for which we have feelings. It’s the argument that has fueled the same-sex marriage movement. Modernity was defined by Descartes’ “I think, therefore I am,” but Post-Modernity, where we find ourselves culturally today, has devolved into something the philosopher Epicurus might have said, “I feel, therefore I am.”

But that kind of love is barely eluded to in Scripture. And apart from the ’m not sure that the feeling of love is explored.

The biblical view of love is not a feeling, but a choice.

25Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

The Biblical view of love is that it is a commitment to serve.

It involves an action that leads to a feeling, and not a feeling that leads to an action.

For the unsingle and unmarried, let me ask you, “How’s your friendship?” “Are you both looking toward the same horizon?” “If not, then what should your expectations be of that relationship?”