back to index2021-10-10 Honor Marriage
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If you can turn your Bibles with me to Hebrews chapter 13. 00:00:19.840 |
There's things that I'm going to say this morning is going to offend some of you. 00:00:25.440 |
And so this is not going to be one of those lighthearted messages, but I wanted to take 00:00:31.280 |
this time to address certain things that are going on in our culture that is important. 00:00:36.480 |
And we wanted to make sure, and I'm sure it's not anything new to you, but I think it is 00:00:41.680 |
important for us to address this going forward. 00:00:44.680 |
And knowing that there is a fight for biblical marriage in our generation that we really 00:00:54.320 |
So let me read this text and then we'll jump in. 00:00:57.200 |
Verse four, marriage is to be held in honor among all and the marriage bed is to be undefiled 00:01:03.320 |
for fornicators and adulterers God will judge. 00:01:15.260 |
We pray, Father God, for your Holy Spirit to guide us. 00:01:18.860 |
And I know, Lord, that your word will cut us. 00:01:21.880 |
It will judge the thoughts and intentions of our heart. 00:01:25.800 |
But we pray, Father God, that as your word guides and leads us, that ultimately it would 00:01:34.120 |
Asking for your grace, asking that you would protect our church, this generation, Lord 00:01:39.280 |
God, that we may be the light that you've called us to be. 00:01:48.560 |
I think you will all agree that some of your best memories from your childhood will probably 00:02:00.880 |
be from your family interaction with your parents, with your siblings. 00:02:07.360 |
Families get together with uncles and aunts and grandparents. 00:02:10.680 |
And so you have a lot of great memories of that when you're young. 00:02:14.360 |
But also some of your most painful memories also come from your childhood because maybe 00:02:21.280 |
your parents didn't have the godliest marriage. 00:02:24.080 |
Or maybe, you know, a lot of you came from broken families. 00:02:27.880 |
And even if they didn't, weren't broken, they didn't have the healthiest, godliest of marriages. 00:02:36.120 |
And this is obviously, this is not unique to the church, people who are in the church. 00:02:40.800 |
We live in a generation where supposedly more than 60% of marriages end in divorce. 00:02:46.200 |
So there's a lot of pain that people are living through and baggages that they have. 00:02:51.120 |
And so part of the reason why there's the counseling, psychological counseling has kind 00:02:56.900 |
of taken off is because so many people are in pain and as a result of that. 00:03:05.320 |
They did a study and they said that 50% of people believe that marriage isn't that important 00:03:13.520 |
Two-thirds of people who are in the age of 19 to 29 believe it's not even necessary. 00:03:19.800 |
Since it causes so much pain, why do we even need to do that? 00:03:22.840 |
Only 36% of the people believe that marriage is even necessary. 00:03:30.200 |
So more and more people in our generation are coming to their own conclusion that if 00:03:34.680 |
it's going to cause this much pain, why have it? 00:03:37.460 |
And you see celebrities coming out and openly saying that it is a dead institution. 00:03:42.840 |
It is a construct of society that no longer works. 00:03:47.100 |
So equal habit, if it doesn't work, move on, find somebody else. 00:03:50.300 |
And that's kind of like the culture that has been readily accepted. 00:03:55.680 |
There is nothing to me that is as clearly, that causes the church to be separated and 00:04:04.760 |
defined and different than the biblical teaching of marriage and sexuality. 00:04:11.720 |
If there's any one thing that the world will look at and say, "Wow, those people are weird." 00:04:18.380 |
At least in our generation, it's this human sexuality and the biblical definition of what 00:04:30.860 |
If you haven't noticed it, I'm pretty sure it is coming. 00:04:34.240 |
That because if we are to remain faithful to what the Bible says, what marriage is and 00:04:40.040 |
what human sexuality ought to be, that persecution is already here and it's only going to intensify. 00:04:48.280 |
Because this one thing is going to separate us clearly in the eyes of the world. 00:04:54.800 |
And all the more why we need to make sure that what the scripture says, that we do not 00:05:01.680 |
compromise, no matter what consequences may come. 00:05:08.600 |
We're not here to make sure that the people in the world feel comfortable here. 00:05:13.560 |
And so we need to make sure that what Christ says is what is being taught in scripture, 00:05:19.380 |
So this morning, there's two parts of this sermon. 00:05:21.480 |
The first part is, it says in verse 4, it says, "Marriage is to be held in honor among 00:05:28.520 |
What does it mean to honor marriage and why is this so important? 00:05:31.460 |
And then secondly, it says, "Marriage bed is to be undefiled. 00:05:35.620 |
For fornicators and adulterers God will judge." 00:05:39.840 |
Practically, how do we honor marriage in a practical way? 00:05:44.760 |
So first of all, marriage is to be held in honor among all. 00:05:50.220 |
So let me start off by saying, among all, it's not just talking about those who are 00:05:59.520 |
That you and I need to understand that all human relationships stem from the marriage 00:06:07.860 |
So there is no relationship between father and son or daughter, brother, sister, grandparents, 00:06:13.480 |
All human relationship started by the relationship between Adam and Eve. 00:06:18.940 |
So if the relationship between Adam and Eve is not honored, everything else that comes 00:06:26.020 |
You cannot fix the human relationship until we fix the relationship between husband and 00:06:32.160 |
And so when it says to honor marriage by all, this is not just for those people who are 00:06:38.040 |
This is something that married or not, young and old, single or not, that we need to recognize 00:06:43.120 |
what the scripture teaches about this subject. 00:06:45.320 |
The word for honor is the same word it describes the precious stone in 1 Corinthians 3.12. 00:06:52.080 |
In 1 Peter 1.19, that word for honor is translated precious as the blood of Christ. 00:06:59.120 |
2 Peter 1.4, it says the promises of God is also precious and to be honored. 00:07:04.800 |
It means that we recognize the value of what this is. 00:07:11.840 |
Why is that word that describes the blood of Christ, the church of Christ, the promise 00:07:16.400 |
of God, and that we ought to honor the marriage in that light? 00:07:32.520 |
Marriage is not a social contract that we are to say, "It doesn't work because it's 00:07:37.040 |
broken that we're not going to do this anymore." 00:07:44.960 |
In Matthew 19, 3-6, there's some Pharisees came to Jesus testing him and asking, "Is 00:07:49.000 |
it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any reason at all?" 00:07:52.640 |
And he answered and said, "Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning 00:08:06.000 |
He said, "From the beginning when he created them male and female, he said, 'For this 00:08:09.800 |
reason man shall leave his father and mother to be joined to his wife, and the two shall 00:08:17.880 |
"What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate." 00:08:21.480 |
So in every wedding ceremony, you will hear at the declaration of your covenant union, 00:08:27.520 |
what God has put together, let no man separate. 00:08:31.560 |
The first reason why we honor marriage is God created this. 00:08:42.440 |
He didn't create Adam and Eve and then uncles and then children and all at once. 00:08:50.120 |
All of the relationships came from these two people, from this marriage. 00:08:55.480 |
Genesis 2, 18 says, "Then the Lord God said, 'It is not good for man to be alone. 00:09:02.680 |
So this text specifically is the purpose of why he created Adam and the purpose of why 00:09:10.200 |
He created all other creation and then he ends up by saying, "It is good." 00:09:15.000 |
And then he creates Adam and he said, "It is not good for him to be alone." 00:09:18.880 |
So we have to understand that when he says it is not good, he's not talking about morally 00:09:23.960 |
The word good here can also be understood not complete. 00:09:28.400 |
God created him and it was not good because what God had ordained him to be is not complete. 00:09:35.560 |
Because God's call for Adam was to remember twofold. 00:09:48.680 |
But in order to do that, he had to create Eve. 00:09:51.880 |
And so he says, "I will make him a helper suitable for him." 00:09:57.960 |
You know, it's interesting the word suitable means someone who is opposite or corresponding. 00:10:04.240 |
You know, it's interesting because just by observation, most people who end up being 00:10:11.000 |
attracted to one another are usually opposites. 00:10:16.240 |
You may be sitting next to your husband and wife and my guess is 90% of you, your wife 00:10:23.960 |
So if you happen to be very quiet, your wife may be extra. 00:10:28.680 |
Maybe you're the extra and then your wife is a quiet one. 00:10:31.800 |
And I'm not saying that that's true of every relationship. 00:10:35.080 |
I'm saying just for the most part, when we say opposites attract, that probably describes 00:10:45.000 |
What's interesting is the way he describes Eve is that she would be the corresponding 00:10:50.680 |
partner, a compliment, not a supplement, not the same person, but somebody who's going 00:10:56.440 |
And so he made Eve to be a compliment, even physically, so that they would physically 00:11:02.800 |
So that what he cannot do, that he needs her to be able to do that, both physically and 00:11:13.580 |
He created Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply, needed Eve to do that, and to subdue 00:11:20.200 |
And so it was, if you look, before the fall, they're laboring together, they're naming 00:11:27.760 |
Sin comes in, they rebel against God, and the first thing that happens is Genesis 3:7, 00:11:32.280 |
"Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked." 00:11:38.760 |
Now, even if you're naked, it doesn't bother you if you're by yourself, right? 00:11:46.480 |
"And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin covering." 00:11:49.760 |
So who were they covering themselves to hide their nakedness from? 00:12:01.840 |
They recognized their nakedness, and they hid from each other. 00:12:05.580 |
So from the get-go, there was shame, and so this husband and wife relationship, they hid 00:12:13.360 |
See, one of the most key things that we cover in marriage counseling is biblical communication, 00:12:24.080 |
And it shows in the way that we communicate, because before I say anything to you, I calculate 00:12:29.720 |
in my head, "If I say this, what are you going to think? 00:12:37.440 |
Or maybe you said something that hurt me, so now I'm going to say this to hurt you." 00:12:40.760 |
So everything that comes out of my mouth comes through some kind of filter. 00:12:45.080 |
So nobody is ever completely honest, and where this first comes in is a relationship between 00:12:54.380 |
So from the get-go, the marriage relationship was tainted. 00:13:02.460 |
He says, "Because of the sin, the curse on Eve was, 'I will greatly multiply your pain 00:13:11.380 |
Remember, this was the reason why Eve was created, so that she could be a suitable helper, 00:13:19.300 |
But here it says, "You will be fruitful and multiply, but it will be painful." 00:13:25.160 |
And pain and childbearing is not just referring to the actual birth itself. 00:13:29.400 |
It's talking about the whole process of giving birth, raising children. 00:13:33.660 |
And again, those of you who've raised children, you know, right, the hardest thing that you 00:13:40.760 |
And we pray for salvation because it's really for our own benefit. 00:13:53.260 |
In pain, you will bring forth children, and then yet your desire will be for your husband, 00:14:00.940 |
She was created to be a suitable helper, to be fruitful and multiply. 00:14:03.660 |
She was there to help him, but instead, there's contention in this relationship. 00:14:09.820 |
And the word "desire" here is a kind of word where she's trying to challenge him, and he 00:14:19.900 |
Instead of being a complement, they became the adversary because of sin. 00:14:26.620 |
So she's still carrying out the creation mandate, but as soon as sin comes in, the 00:14:32.540 |
very thing that they call them to do, it becomes contentious in the home. 00:14:37.540 |
Genesis 3, 17 to 19, "Cursed is the ground because of you," and this is the curse to 00:14:42.100 |
Adam, "in toil you will eat of it all the days of your life." 00:14:45.380 |
Remember, he was called, he was created to take care of the land. 00:14:48.420 |
He said, "You're going to take care of it, but you will eat of it in toil. 00:14:52.340 |
Both thorns and thistles, it shall grow for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. 00:14:56.140 |
By the sweat of your face, you will eat bread." 00:15:00.940 |
The curse of the fall is not our job, because God gave him a job before that sin came in. 00:15:06.820 |
What happened was, your job became painful, and it produced thorns and thistles, "Till 00:15:11.460 |
you return to the ground, because from it you are taken, for you are dust, and to dust 00:15:22.060 |
Sin came in and tainted everything, and it started with the relationship between husband 00:15:28.420 |
There's a reason why in our generation, in order to attack the work of God, the first 00:15:35.780 |
Because if the family falls apart, then the relationship with husband and wife, then the 00:15:39.820 |
children fall apart, and if that falls apart, then the relationship between siblings fall 00:15:44.180 |
apart, and if that falls apart, then all the other relationships that hinges on this relationship 00:15:53.080 |
But when he says to honor the marriage bed, and to honor marriage itself, it really is 00:15:59.940 |
at the core of the reversal of this curse, because curse first came in, in the marriage. 00:16:07.640 |
That's why in Ephesians chapter 5, 22-32, you know the passage where it says, "Wife, 00:16:12.280 |
be subject to your own husband as to the Lord. 00:16:14.800 |
For the husband is the head of the wife, and as Christ also is the head of the church, 00:16:19.520 |
And he says, "Submit to your husband as a church does to Christ." 00:16:22.800 |
And then in 25-28, it says to the husbands to love them sacrificially, as Christ gave 00:16:31.400 |
When he says gave himself, he's not simply saying he prioritized her, he's saying he 00:16:38.280 |
And so what he's calling the husband to do is to sacrifice who he is for the sake of 00:16:46.120 |
You'll hear this, sermons about this at weddings, you know, and anniversaries, because it's 00:16:51.200 |
a beautiful passage about the biblical mandate of marriage. 00:16:55.040 |
But here's how he sums it up in verse 31, "For this reason a man shall leave his father 00:16:59.080 |
and mother and shall be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. 00:17:03.440 |
But this mystery is great, but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church." 00:17:08.960 |
So he says that this illustration is that Christ and what he did for the church is not 00:17:14.720 |
to uphold the marriage, but the marriage is to uphold the gospel. 00:17:19.800 |
Because where the curse came in and the ramification of the curse came in between husband and wife, 00:17:26.320 |
the reversal of the curse is going to also begin at husband and wife. 00:17:31.640 |
And that's the reason why one of the qualifications of elders that's repeated in every list is 00:17:38.600 |
that he needs to be able to manage household well. 00:17:41.460 |
That this man needs to, there needs to be evidence that there is regeneration in his 00:17:46.120 |
life first at home between husband and wife and with their children. 00:17:51.660 |
So that once there is evidence of genuine salvation, reconciliation with God at home, 00:18:01.680 |
So the proving ground where regeneration, reconciliation happens first is at home. 00:18:14.000 |
Marriage is the epicenter of the enemy's attack. 00:18:23.300 |
Marriage is where the greatest sanctification takes place. 00:18:27.600 |
Now before you're married, you can kind of stiff-arm some people. 00:18:31.040 |
I mean, you shouldn't do that, but everybody practices that person. 00:18:41.440 |
And so there's a lot of sinfulness in us and selfishness in us that we kind of pick 00:18:48.580 |
When you get married, right, and you say, "Well, you know, we got to know our wife 00:18:55.080 |
But every, no matter how well you know your husband and wife, there are hidden sins in 00:19:00.480 |
everybody that you're not going to see until you get married. 00:19:09.380 |
You know, we come out, when we go date, I mean, if that guy comes out with, you know, 00:19:13.840 |
ripped jeans and he just doesn't care, like, right off the bat, don't give him a chance, 00:19:22.040 |
At first date, if he doesn't put out his best foot, he doesn't put his best shirt and best 00:19:27.480 |
pants and come out, already that tells you something. 00:19:33.920 |
But we do the same thing when we first get married because we want to give our best. 00:19:38.100 |
And so, you know, if you have a bad temper, you hold it. 00:19:40.960 |
If you're selfish, you know, you're very generous, right? 00:19:44.840 |
Sooner or later, our fallen nature is going to be exposed. 00:19:50.880 |
But when you're married, a married couple, man, you can't go anywhere, right? 00:19:54.520 |
When you're dating, like, you get mad and you go to your corner and you cool off after, 00:19:59.080 |
you know, maybe a few days and then now you're back to your, the person that you want to 00:20:03.760 |
present and you bring them back, but when you're married, you don't have that opportunity. 00:20:08.280 |
So God uses that to sanctify us because as they, as you see their sins, your sins are 00:20:22.960 |
So when you see their sins, you're going to respond in a sinful way. 00:20:26.160 |
And then when your sin gets exposed, like, we are to be sanctified. 00:20:30.660 |
And so marriage is a place because the most intimate relationship we have that we cannot 00:20:35.320 |
hide from one another, God uses that to sanctify us. 00:20:39.320 |
So it is the greatest place of sanctification. 00:20:42.240 |
Marriage is where the greatest practice of agape love is to be practiced. 00:20:47.620 |
There's a reason why he says to love your neighbor because neighbor is the person closest 00:20:52.360 |
And there's nobody closest to us than our husband and wives. 00:20:55.640 |
And so we are to practice that unconditional sacrificial love even when they don't deserve 00:21:03.440 |
We are to practice the love that he practiced in us. 00:21:07.400 |
So where the rubber meets the road in the practice of this love is in marriage. 00:21:13.860 |
It is the proving ground for leadership in the church, which I've already mentioned. 00:21:17.460 |
And then fourthly, it is where the future generation comes from. 00:21:21.680 |
So if you want to attack the church and you want to make sure that it ends in this generation, 00:21:27.480 |
And then the next generation, it would be it. 00:21:30.740 |
So there's a reason why our enemy who prowls around like a roaring lion, when he is wanting 00:21:38.400 |
to attack, where he's going to attack first is the home between husband and wife. 00:21:43.320 |
And so if you bring defilement into that, all the other relationships are going to unravel. 00:21:52.520 |
And this is why I'm taking this morning to cover this issue because we need to recognize 00:22:02.360 |
We need to make sure that our idea of what is right and wrong, what is good and bad, 00:22:10.520 |
That is coming from, it's not coming from what is popular in our generation. 00:22:18.220 |
He says by keeping the marriage bed undefiled. 00:22:25.780 |
You know, the term sex has become a dirty word, right? 00:22:31.060 |
So if I say sex, my guess is automatically there's a little bit of discomfort. 00:22:59.740 |
You know, first service, we had small children all over the place and parents were squirming. 00:23:08.420 |
But the term sex in and of itself is not a dirty word. 00:23:18.980 |
And so how were they going to obey this biblical mandate? 00:23:24.920 |
But the reason why the term makes us feel uncomfortable is because almost everyone in 00:23:29.100 |
this room, when we think of sex, we think of the perversion that is outside of what 00:23:53.620 |
And I got this from this plant underneath here. 00:23:59.820 |
In fact, you need, in order for this plant to survive, it needs the dirt that God created 00:24:16.820 |
And if I pour both of it into the pot, what does it do? 00:24:23.380 |
But the moment that I take it out of its ordained place and I pour it in here, I can't drink 00:24:40.820 |
Then it is practiced in the ordained manner that God has given as a gift to husband and 00:24:46.940 |
But when you take it out of the context, it is useless. 00:24:56.460 |
Because sex was for the purpose, again, and there's a reason why God made it enjoyable. 00:25:07.260 |
He made it so that you would enjoy it in obeying God's creation mandate. 00:25:15.140 |
But the problem is that we've all been introduced to the defiled idea of sex in this world. 00:25:23.660 |
And so what ends up happening is when we think of sex, we're not thinking about the biblical 00:25:29.380 |
We're thinking about the perversion that you and I all have been introduced to. 00:25:34.660 |
Francis Schaeffer says that people drift along from generation to generation and the morally 00:25:42.180 |
unthinkable becomes unthinkable as the years move on. 00:25:47.260 |
People drift along from generation to generation and the morally unthinkable becomes thinkable 00:25:52.900 |
Some of you who are younger may not have the benefit of knowing what it was like 30 years 00:25:59.700 |
But those of you who are a bit older, you know exactly what he means by that. 00:26:05.260 |
What was unthinkable, even in the non-Christian world, has become not only thinkable but openly 00:26:14.180 |
And sad to say it is starting to penetrate even inside the church. 00:26:19.260 |
What is unthinkable has become thinkable and actually is being practiced. 00:26:25.300 |
You know what's interesting is here the word fornicator, and then there's another word 00:26:31.420 |
And the specific nuance of this word fornicator is pornos, where we get the word pornography. 00:26:36.780 |
And that word basically means to sell, to sell cheaply. 00:26:40.860 |
And so that word was used specifically for male prostitutes. 00:26:45.480 |
But the idea of this word is to take something that is valuable and cheapen it. 00:26:50.540 |
That you see certain shows, you know, antique road show, and then you'll see somebody who 00:26:56.260 |
picked up this painting for $15 and then they go and get it, you know, assessed and they 00:27:01.700 |
say, "Oh, this was from Monet that they lost so many years ago and it's worth $15 million." 00:27:06.660 |
But he found it at a garage sale because owner had no idea of its value. 00:27:16.740 |
Is to take something that is so valuable and to cheapen it because we don't understand 00:27:23.060 |
the value of what it is that God has given us. 00:27:26.060 |
The word adultery basically means to live by your flesh, just to give into your impulse, 00:27:33.820 |
You know, we could think, humanly speaking, when we commit sexual offences, it doesn't 00:27:44.620 |
When we steal, when we, you know, when we do these things, we actually hurt people. 00:27:48.900 |
But you know, if we are impure and we're hooked on pornography, watch things that we shouldn't 00:27:53.900 |
watch, right, it doesn't hurt anybody because it's just me being, doing it privately. 00:28:02.380 |
In 1 Corinthians 6, 18 to 20, it says, "Flee immorality. 00:28:05.820 |
Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against 00:28:15.820 |
It is ridiculous that some people of prominence are saying that God screams social justice, 00:28:25.420 |
"All other sins commits outside of the body." 00:28:29.500 |
He is separating the sexual immorality with all other sins. 00:28:33.420 |
But the immoral man sins against his own body. 00:28:44.660 |
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you 00:28:48.360 |
have from God, and that you are not your own, for you have been bought with a price, therefore 00:28:57.260 |
What is the most precious thing in this building? 00:29:12.460 |
What's the most precious thing in this building? 00:29:18.420 |
Because the Bible says that we have been purchased by the blood of Christ. 00:29:26.940 |
Maybe ten, fifteen thousand dollars for the A/B system. 00:29:29.980 |
But every child of God was purchased by the precious blood of Jesus Christ. 00:29:34.780 |
The Son of God had to come and give himself to purchase us. 00:29:38.420 |
And the Bible says that we no longer belong to ourself. 00:29:44.100 |
So when we think that we're not hurting anybody, the greatest crime, the greatest sin, is to 00:29:56.580 |
He died on the cross and shed his blood, absorbed our sins to make us holy. 00:30:03.020 |
So to think that somehow the sexual sin only bothers us is because we don't understand 00:30:13.840 |
To keep this marriage bed undefiled begins before we get married. 00:30:28.180 |
You know what's interesting about this word marriage? 00:30:29.780 |
It's not just in reference to people who are married. 00:30:34.820 |
The specific nuance of this word is the marriage ceremony. 00:30:41.020 |
He's saying that do not defile the marriage ceremony. 00:30:45.660 |
Meaning, when you come together, that you come together prepared, undefiled. 00:30:51.140 |
The way that dating happens in our generation is completely pagan. 00:31:00.380 |
If you follow the pattern of this world, and you date like everybody else dates in our 00:31:10.740 |
We're Bereans because we want to examine the word of God that everything that we do, 00:31:15.100 |
that we're following what the scripture tells us to do. 00:31:19.060 |
When it comes to this, we have a tendency to have no intention to buy the car, but you're 00:31:27.340 |
in the car, you're decorating the car, you're cleaning the car, you're investing, change 00:31:30.300 |
the tires, and they say, "Are you going to buy the car?" 00:31:34.700 |
So you start the engine, you put it on drive, and then you put one foot on the brake, and 00:31:39.340 |
then the other foot revving it up as hard as you can. 00:31:49.980 |
We act like we're married, and then when we get physically intimate, it's like, "Oh, we 00:31:58.460 |
It says in Psalm 8, 4, "I want you to swear, O daughter of Jerusalem, do not arouse or 00:32:09.220 |
Don't do things to arouse this passion until it's time. 00:32:17.080 |
So that night, when the husband and wife comes together, it was meant for that. 00:32:24.020 |
Keep it holy, undefiled, until God ordains it." 00:32:26.500 |
So when two people come together for the purpose of marrying, we're not there to celebrate 00:32:32.540 |
the love of these two people, even though that's what brought them there. 00:32:36.380 |
Ultimately, we come to the Christian wedding, is coming to the altar and asking God to bless 00:32:44.940 |
That's why every once in a while, it's like, "I'll go to Vegas and let Elvis Presley ordain 00:32:51.540 |
It's like, you could do that legally and the world would acknowledge you, but that's not 00:32:57.300 |
You can go to a courtroom and then the courtroom, some clerk just signs the paper off and says, 00:33:07.980 |
Christian marriage is coming before the Lord and asking the Lord to bless this covenant. 00:33:13.020 |
And so when a pastor says, "Whatever God has put together, let no man separate." 00:33:18.580 |
So if we want God's ordination, we don't come with a paper that the world signs and say, 00:33:26.780 |
"Hey, the world says I'm married, so I need you to acknowledge this." 00:33:30.180 |
No, every time two Christians come together at the altar, that's where the wedding takes 00:33:37.140 |
And so he's saying, "Do not arouse or awaken my love until she pleases." 00:33:43.780 |
And I want to read this song from this great theologian, Beyonce, of our generation. 00:33:56.700 |
I didn't realize that this was a song for sacredness of marriage until I read the lyrics. 00:34:03.820 |
You guys all seen the dances on YouTube and stuff, but here are the lyrics. 00:34:13.260 |
I'm not going to ruin the whole message because of this. 00:34:16.340 |
All the single ladies, all the single ladies, all the single ladies, all the single ladies. 00:34:26.260 |
Decided to dip, and now you want to trip because another brother noticed me. 00:34:42.460 |
Because if you liked it, then you should have put a ring on it. 00:34:45.900 |
If you liked it, then you should have put a ring on it. 00:34:50.960 |
If you liked it, then you should have put a ring on it. 00:34:58.780 |
There's two parts, two deep theological truths in this song. 00:35:06.680 |
One is, if you wanted her, you should have put a ring on it. 00:35:17.440 |
If you want to possess her, if you want to have her, marry her, that's what he's saying. 00:35:28.920 |
The other side of it is, if you've already given yourself to him, why does he need to 00:35:36.540 |
If everything that was reserved for marriage was given to him outside of marriage, why 00:35:43.040 |
So this song really is about the sanctity of marriage. 00:35:48.480 |
Because that's what marriage was created for. 00:35:51.480 |
When it says, "Do not arouse until it is time," meaning that we ought to stay pure until we 00:36:01.960 |
Thirdly, we need to uphold the marriage, honor the marriage by upholding biblical marriage 00:36:13.720 |
You know, it's disturbing because 30-some years ago when I started preaching, I would 00:36:21.140 |
go to a church, and it doesn't matter what church I am, I could talk about homosexuality 00:36:25.840 |
being against the scripture, and I would almost get no response. 00:36:38.340 |
Now sometimes, even when I'm at a Bible church, I would say something like this, and somebody 00:36:42.780 |
would come up to me and say, "How can you possibly say this?" 00:36:51.380 |
The Bible is not ambiguous about the subject. 00:36:58.160 |
Genesis 127, it says, "God created man in His own image. 00:37:06.840 |
More and more people in our culture are saying, "Male doesn't mean male. 00:37:15.120 |
And so more and more people who are sympathetic, I understand. 00:37:18.920 |
And I know that you have people in this room, you could be struggling, maybe with same-sex 00:37:24.440 |
attraction, maybe you have brother or sister or cousin or somebody that you know, you're 00:37:29.680 |
really struggling with this, and because of your sympathetic heart, you want this not 00:37:40.360 |
You cannot compromise what the Word of God clearly says. 00:37:44.120 |
The Bible has not been written so that you need to go to school and you need to learn 00:37:50.520 |
deep theology and then to come out and say, "Male doesn't mean male." 00:38:00.200 |
The Bible was written so that a child who reads it comes out and says, "Male and female." 00:38:06.640 |
And more and more people are coming out and saying, "No, no, no. 00:38:16.320 |
Leviticus 18.22 says, "You should not lie with a male as one lies with a female. 00:38:22.080 |
It is an abomination because it challenges God's purpose in creation. 00:38:27.920 |
The very reason why you and I were created is to be fruitful and multiply. 00:38:31.680 |
So if Satan's going to attack, he attacks that. 00:38:35.400 |
Once you attack that, you cannot obey the biblical mandate. 00:38:41.880 |
Romans chapter 1, 26-27, "For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions. 00:38:46.520 |
For their woman exchanged a natural function for what is unnatural. 00:38:50.840 |
And in the same way also men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in 00:38:56.480 |
Men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty 00:39:02.120 |
This push to erase gender identity is not new. 00:39:12.000 |
From the beginning, when Satan decided to challenge God, he began to attack the marriage. 00:39:24.260 |
It just happens to be more prominent and because we have media, it's being spoken of and there's 00:39:28.740 |
pressure coming and for sure persecution is coming because of this. 00:39:35.600 |
1 Corinthians 6, 9-10, "Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom 00:39:44.260 |
Neither fornicators, adulterers, nor idolaters, adulterers, nor effeminate are homosexuals." 00:39:49.920 |
You know the word effeminate basically means a man who acts like a female. 00:39:58.200 |
Basically it's referring to male prostitutes. 00:40:01.840 |
But an individual who has feminized himself to act like a female. 00:40:06.360 |
That's what that specific understanding of that word means. 00:40:10.240 |
Nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkard, nor revilers, nor swindlers 00:40:19.720 |
So I ask you, and some of you may have been challenged by your friends and said, "That's 00:40:30.920 |
If what I say disturbs you, don't say, "I don't like that guy." 00:40:42.900 |
See if this is the prejudice of this guy or a few right-wing Christians or does the Bible 00:40:55.720 |
I'm telling you emphatically, there is no ambiguity in this issue. 00:41:03.560 |
Marriage, fourthly, must be between two believers. 00:41:10.060 |
In 2 Corinthians 6, 14-16, "Do not be bound together with an unbeliever, for what partnership 00:41:22.520 |
Or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? 00:41:25.740 |
What agreement has the temple of God with idols? 00:41:28.640 |
For we are the temple of the living God, just as God said, 'I will dwell in them and walk 00:41:32.640 |
among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.'" 00:41:36.360 |
Evangelism, mission marriage or mission dating is not biblical. 00:41:47.280 |
How can one person who believes that his whole hope rests upon Christ and his sacrifice and 00:41:53.720 |
an individual who doesn't even believe in God raise children together? 00:42:01.520 |
Either the person has completely compromised their faith or they probably don't believe 00:42:08.820 |
But the Bible is crystal clear on this subject. 00:42:12.160 |
A biblical marriage is between two believers. 00:42:16.720 |
Fifthly, marriage covenant is never to be broken outside of what God permits. 00:42:22.760 |
And again, at the end of the marriage, we say, "What God has put together, let no man 00:42:27.040 |
In Malachi 2.16, it says, "For I hate divorce," says the Lord, the God of Israel. 00:42:33.560 |
And him who covers his garments with wrongs, says the Lord of hosts, "So take heed to your 00:42:47.560 |
In Matthew 19.9, it says, "And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife except for immorality 00:42:56.700 |
Because God has ordained it, man does not stand before God and say, "No, I'm not going 00:43:02.280 |
So everyone who comes into the covenant relationship, it's meant to be permanent. 00:43:07.520 |
Now, the scripture does give guidance that if you have married an unbeliever, to not 00:43:16.880 |
They use it as an opportunity to share the gospel with them. 00:43:21.760 |
But if, again, when the two believers come together, that they are never to separate, 00:43:29.360 |
that we are to be sanctified, to grow and mature in that context. 00:43:33.360 |
And then, finally, marriage is to be honored by establishing biblical role of the husband 00:43:44.880 |
I would say in the church, I get the greatest pushback from this. 00:43:50.560 |
That men are to lead and the women are to follow. 00:44:00.720 |
I get greater pushback on this than probably any other subject because this is where the 00:44:10.880 |
We don't choose what's right and wrong based upon what is acceptable, what seems reasonable 00:44:16.600 |
We are, first and foremost, we have to be brilliant. 00:44:22.080 |
Bible clearly says that men were given the task to lead. 00:44:44.520 |
If you live your life like a child, you act like a child, you talk like a child, you behave 00:44:51.200 |
like a child, and then you ask your wife to submit to you. 00:45:01.000 |
If you have a commanding officer whose sole purpose is to glorify himself, and he's acting 00:45:09.600 |
selfishly, and he's asking you to submit so that he can have a better life, who's going 00:45:17.880 |
So when a man stands up and is a man, and this is, again, the challenge in our culture. 00:45:26.880 |
If you say you're a man, automatically it's toxic. 00:45:30.920 |
So the lines are being blurred where men have to act like women and women have to act like 00:45:42.720 |
Now I'm not telling you specifically what that means, but let me get to something that 00:45:47.640 |
I think is going to, if you haven't been bothered up to this point, it's going to be bothered 00:45:54.560 |
If you're a guy who has habits that is causing your wife to be frustrated because you're 00:46:03.040 |
playing games all day, and it's affecting your marriage, or maybe your spending habit, 00:46:08.920 |
or whatever it is you're doing, your living self-centered lives, you're not acting like 00:46:21.480 |
So when we tell or ask our wives to follow us and support us and submit to us, they need 00:46:28.600 |
to know that if they follow us, that we're going to lead them to Christ. 00:46:36.760 |
That they need to have confidence that if they submit to us, that we're looking out 00:46:44.200 |
That if they honor us, that they are following men who have committed themselves to pick 00:46:50.840 |
up their cross and lead them to the cross as well. 00:46:53.880 |
But if they are not confident that that's what you are doing, that's where you're headed, 00:47:05.040 |
If she's not certain that that's where you're headed, if she questions your selfishness, 00:47:12.840 |
then even though the Bible mandates this, you've shot yourself in the foot. 00:47:22.640 |
In order for marriage to be honored, men need to learn what it means to be men. 00:47:39.400 |
But if those things impede you being men in your home, before you shake the Bible and 00:47:47.720 |
tell them, "Oh, wives are supposed to do this. 00:47:51.320 |
Before that happens, we need to take a long, hard look at ourselves. 00:48:00.640 |
So until men are first men, we cannot establish honor in the marriage. 00:48:17.120 |
What an outdated thing to say in this generation. 00:48:33.920 |
I remember the very first wedding that I was officiating, and the future wife had a problem 00:48:45.280 |
"The non-Christian guests who are coming are not going to understand. 00:48:54.520 |
And I thought long and hard for four seconds. 00:49:02.200 |
Because I'm asking you to quote a Bible verse. 00:49:09.300 |
So if you cannot adhere to God's ordained mandate in scripture, you're not asking for 00:49:25.060 |
But a minister of God in the right conscious cannot do that. 00:49:34.340 |
He wants to appease you before he is obedient to God. 00:49:40.100 |
When a marriage is established where Christ is at the center, that's where true life is. 00:49:50.740 |
The reason why he told his disciples to pick up his cross and deny himself is because at 00:49:54.380 |
the other side of the cross was the resurrected life. 00:49:58.140 |
So all that he has commanded in creation, all that he has commanded in this new generation 00:50:03.820 |
God calls us to submit to the word of God because the word of God, when we practice 00:50:09.060 |
the way that God has given it to us, is the path of life. 00:50:15.420 |
Is where the children are raised, husband and wives are happy. 00:50:18.400 |
If you ask a husband and wife when something goes wrong, you know what they typically say? 00:50:23.380 |
The wife usually complains that they don't feel loved. 00:50:27.500 |
And you know what the typical complaint of a husband is? 00:50:34.540 |
It's not because they looked long and hard into the scripture and said, "Oh, they're 00:50:44.820 |
For ladies to be loved and men to be respected so you can lead. 00:50:51.700 |
So when we give ourselves an obedience to that, we experience what God intended in creation. 00:50:59.140 |
So we benefit, our children benefit, and our church benefits. 00:51:10.180 |
Having said everything I've said, I'm pretty sure I've said enough to offend all of you. 00:51:16.580 |
I'm pretty sure I've covered enough where there's not a single person, including myself, 00:51:25.220 |
First and foremost, we must never compromise what the scripture says to appease the culture 00:51:29.780 |
that we're in, no matter what the consequence. 00:51:40.020 |
It is not safe because the place where I find refuge is in Christ. 00:51:45.620 |
My refuge is not in the good reputation that I get from this world. 00:51:51.400 |
My reputation doesn't come from the size of this church. 00:51:57.140 |
So whatever storms may come as a result of running to Him is the safest place for any 00:52:04.500 |
So we must never compromise the biblical truth. 00:52:06.820 |
But number two, all of us are indicted by what I said. 00:52:14.300 |
If you go to a secular psychologist, they'll tell you, "Hey, you know what? 00:52:17.860 |
You're the way you are because your mom treated you this way or your dad treated you this 00:52:22.620 |
Because something happened to you when you were a little girl. 00:52:24.700 |
Something happened to you when you were a little boy." 00:52:26.380 |
And so they'll identify and then they'll say, "You're the way you are because somebody did 00:52:32.220 |
And so you can easily live your life and say, "I am the way I am because I've been sinned 00:52:39.020 |
And I sin against other people because I've been sinned against." 00:52:43.440 |
If you're not a Christian, that may be a good justification. 00:52:48.380 |
No Christian stands before God and says, "I am the way I am because of what they've done 00:52:55.740 |
Every single person who has become new by the blood of Christ stands in the presence 00:53:02.520 |
of His throne of grace and says, "I am what I am because of what Jesus did for me. 00:53:13.060 |
I am what I am despite all that happened in this fallen world. 00:53:17.940 |
I am what I am because of what He did to me." 00:53:23.380 |
All the filth and dirtiness and the pain that you experienced that came from your family, 00:53:29.940 |
from relationships, where the curse gets reversed is in Christ. 00:53:39.020 |
So I can stand here and tell you the pain that I've had, the things that I've been wronged. 00:53:45.200 |
And I'm sure every single one of you to different degrees can say the same thing. 00:53:49.380 |
But the reason why you and I are here is not to share with each other how painful our past 00:53:56.020 |
You and I are here together because Christ reversed this curse. 00:54:02.000 |
He reversed this curse so that we no longer live. 00:54:15.000 |
And that curse gets reversed in the home first. 00:54:20.300 |
That's why marriage must be honored among all. 00:54:37.420 |
As we ask our praise team to come, let's take some time to come before the Lord. 00:54:45.420 |
Whatever sins that we have committed, however deep we feel indicted because of the Word 00:55:00.020 |
You can't reverse what's been done by being good. 00:55:04.340 |
The only power that can save us from our own sins is the power of the cross. 00:55:12.260 |
So let's all come individually and collectively to refocus our attention on Christ, to be 00:55:17.760 |
anchored in Him so that all that we do, all that we think will be led by the blood of 00:55:24.980 |
Let's take some time to pray as our worship team leads us.