I think I’m going to change it up just a little bit and call you beloved this morning instead of dear ones. That’s a pretty good one, too, isn’t it? Beloved. I appreciate you. Appreciate you being here. On the drive over this morning, we saw a number of folks riding motorcycles. We saw some people riding or walking to work. We saw some folks as we passed over the water just coming down. Uh one we saw some folks going out fishing today in their boat. And so, there’s all sorts of things you could be doing today, but you’re here, and I appreciate that.

I believe the Lord appreciates that, too. Brother Steve has copies of the bulletin. If you didn’t get one, raise your hand. He’d be glad to give you one for a very small fee. And uh it helps you stay awake. Uh interesting article, I hope, on the front cover marking the passing of a dear man, Gene Tope, died in his 90s after serving the Lord as a preacher for 73 years. And it’s a an interest interesting article, I think, I’d draw your attention to there.

Um when I was hired on, part of the contractual agreement that we had maybe not written, but spoken was that I was going to intend to speak on the idea of marriage at least once a year. And uh this is something I’ve been doing for a number of years, marking its importance. And I hope, by God’s good grace, to be able to continue to do this for for many, many years. And so, today I want to speak to you about seven scriptures that have to do with marriage.

That kind of establish a baseline according to the scriptures. And hopefully this is not new information to you, but it often is new information to people who get their information about the rules for marriage from the law of the land instead of from the law of the Lord. We’re going to track as we go on today some divergence that has happened through the years between the laws of the Lord and the laws of the land. And if you look at what’s happened in our country in the past 100 years, you’ll see that there’s been divergence that the plan that the Lord set out for the family is not much respected today.

As a matter of fact, it seems to be under attack. And it seems to me also that we, as the Lord’s people, comprise the spiritual army who are to uphold and defend marriage in this world. And it is a big job that we have. The The nature of the conflict is described pretty well here in 2 Corinthians chapter 10 verses 3 through 6. For though we walk in the flesh, we’re not waging war according to the flesh. We’re not going to be issuing guns on this one or any kind of anti-aircraft weapons or or a naval vessel or anything like that.

That’s not the kind of war that we’re fighting. The weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God and take every thought captive. Our prisoners of war, if you will, are thoughts, and they become captive to obey Christ. And I’m not exactly sure how this next part goes. I don’t know if we’re involved with punishing the disobedient, but being ready to punish every disobedience when your obedience is complete.

And so, about the punishment, I’m not sure, but I am sure about the warfare. We’re tearing down false ideas. And that’s that’s our work. So, I want to give you a seven passages on marriage today. And these are arranged pretty much in Bible order, not completely in Bible order. And there is a bit of a grouping to them. And the grouping has to do with, first of all, the creation of marriage. I think when we start to think that marriage is something that men came up with, we get free with it.

When we see that marriage is a created relationship by our creator, perhaps we have a little more respect for it. After the fact that it’s created, we go on to its intended duration or the term of the marriage and what that should be. We speak also, these seven do, to the exclusivity of marriage. How it is for two people and we’ll talk about that. Then we’ll talk about the alternatives to marriage, which would either be remaining single or the dissolution of a marriage.

And then finally, we’ll talk about the honor that is to be given to marriage. As we go through this, I’m going to incorporate some references to the times when marriage in the land has diverged from marriage or the rules in the land have diverged from the rules of God. And it’s going to mark some anniversaries. And I think it appropriate to mark two good anniversaries that will happen before we’re together again. Before we’re together again on the Lord’s Day, we’ll mark the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

And I’m not going to start to be about Christian nationalism, but I think as a citizen of this country, we have to realize God has blessed America. We pray that God blesses it today and God continues to bless this country. And I look back and see how many blessings have come to me through being a citizen of this country and I’m just overwhelmed. I think above all people and all times we are most richly blessed. And there’s a time to mention that.

Also, before we are together again on the Lord’s Day, I and Jean and I will celebrate uh 45 years of marriage. And she really has made sure that I don’t ever speak about here her from up here, but I will today and say that most of my blessings in this life have come through her and I was so richly blessed when 45 years ago she said I do. And um it’s just a wonderful thing and I love her deeply. And you need to know that at least once. All right, so I said that and I didn’t cry, so that’s pretty good.

So, let’s talk first about creation and we’ll go back to the book of Genesis and we’ll see this foundational um scripture from which in the notes you’ll see we’re going to get five different observations. In each of these passages I’m going to draw some of the observations, perhaps not all that could be found from each, but the first reference Genesis 2:21-25. And today I’m using the New American Standard Bible, not the few Bible. So, the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man and he slept.

And he took one of the ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. The Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib which he had taken from the man and brought her to the man. The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

Genesis 2:21-25. The first comment from this is that marriage is ordained by God. This is a relationship established by he him who established us. This is a relationship that he conceived and set forth to be the way that his children would relate and procreate and the species would be carried on to bear much fruit for him in this world, and that is the purpose of it. But and when we recognize that marriage is ordained by God, we don’t I I hope we don’t get to the point where we think we can change it and start to come up with a better idea for marriage.

Remember, it’s his creation. The second point is marriage is for one man and one woman. We get that from this inception of it in Genesis chapter 2. Another anniversary we just passed. I don’t know if you marked it. I I don’t celebrate it, but I marked it. It was June 24th, 2011, 15 years ago. And I was living in New York when New York State legalized same-sex marriages. It was 15 years ago that Governor Andrew Cuomo signed that into law in New York State.

A huge change. For all the history of our country, marriage, especially in New York State and other places, had been for one man and one woman. But, it was legalized in June 24 on June 24th, 2011 in New York State. I I heard surprisingly little fallout from that. It just kind of life went on in most places, but not in Barker, New York. In Barker, New York, there was a town clerk named Laura Fatuski. And she said she could not in good conscience issue a marriage license [snorts] to a same-sex couple.

And she came to the point of actually getting ready to resign, and they kind of waited for a little while to see what the governor would say about that. If the governor would listen to a a protest and, you know, someone who took exception with a plan, and maybe he would roll back what he said. But his position on that was, “If when you enforce the laws of the state, you do not get to pick and choose the laws.” And so, since New York State had approved this, she was she resigned. There were other instances in the state, and I say New York because that’s where I was living at the time.

That’s where I was marking the change. There were other instances in the state where town clerks whose conscience opposed the change had a deputy issue the licenses for same-sex couples cuz they couldn’t do it, but they kept their job. It was a workaround for them, but they objected to it morally. But it was interesting. The folks who objected to that on religious grounds were basically dismissed from public service. So, the ones who feel fine about uh you know, granting licenses to same-sex couples could have those positions.

And I think that’s often the way. If you have an objection to what the state is doing, you’re excused and we’ll get someone who’s unprincipled or less principled in to fill the position. And so, the the folks with a scruple, a godly scruple, are marginalized. Um this uh change in New York state in 2011 was followed by June 26, 2015 when the US Supreme Court ruled in Obergefell v. Hodges that the Constitution guarantees the right to same-sex marriage nationwide.

And so, it was just um 11 years ago that in on June 26, by the way, very another uh anniversary that we mark, but it’s notorious, not one we celebrate, that for 11 years same-sex marriages have been ruled legal, can be legal in this country. So, an instance in the past 15 years of divergence with a very fundamental definition of marriage in this country. It’s just happened in the past two decades. From the beginning, marriage is for one man and for one woman.

The third item we can pull out of this first pericope is the two man and woman united in marriage become a new family. And they are a complete family, a new family. They leave father and mother and they are on their own. They are a family. They leave physically, they leave emotionally, they are their own set. And they’re a complete family whether they’re blessed with children or not. Children are welcome guests if they if they come, if not, these two are a family.

And and that’s where family uh a new family begins. The two then unite physically, they become one flesh, and that’s an amazing gift to marriage. It’s an amazing thing to be exercised. It is to be exercised the union of man and woman but in a marriage of a godly lawful marriage alone. That is the place that is to be exercised. And when that is happening, when two a husband and wife are together intimately, there’s no shame in marriage marital intimacy.

The man and the wife were both naked, they were not ashamed. It’s all right for that that take place. So, five observations from the first, the creation of marriage, we move on to both the duration and the exclusivity as we look at Romans chapter 7 and verse 2. The married woman is bound by law to her husband while he is living, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law concerning her husband. So then, if while her husband is living, she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress.

But if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she’s not an adulteress though she is joined to another man. The first observation from this is marriage is intended to be till death do us apart. There is one dissolution of marriage that is honorable for both the husband husband and the wife, and that is the death of one of the people in the marriage. That’s honorable for both. That’s what God said, till death do us part. And what Paul affirmed here in Romans chapter 7 verses 2 and 3.

What what the the logical consequence of that is, if you are faithful till death do us part and you are left as a widow or a widower, this tells us to be joined in marriage to someone else is not adultery. That is fine cuz the term of the marriage was for the life of the two. And when one dies, that marriage is dissolved. And so a widower may remarry. It also speaks, I think, to the exclusivity, the same verse. So then, if while her husband is living, she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress.

And this is with or without the consent of the husband. Some folks get so liberal, they they think they can invite other people into a marriage relationship. There’s no place in scripture for that. You you cannot be joined to anyone outside the marriage sexually and not be an adulterer or an adulteress. It is an exclusive relationship. It is a man and a woman. And that is that is all. Marriage is exclusive. Let’s look at the some of the alternatives to marriage, the the third scripture I want to consider.

First Corinthians chapter 7, verses 1 and 2. This is an awful lot in this chapter about marriage. First Corinthians chapter 7. I’m just going to take a couple of the key points. But by the way, let me say here and maybe also at the end that since the laws of the land and the laws of the Lord have diverged so widely, when we if you’ve been listening to the laws of the land, and that’s where you get your ideas of marriage. When you hear these fundamental rules about marriage in the word of the Lord, it may alarm you.

It may catch you. It may trouble you. It may it may uncover some things that you were taking to be true from the law of the land, which are not supported in the law of the Lord. We do not bring these things up to trouble you. We do not bring these things up to to convict or condemn. But sometimes troubles arise and if they do arise, my door is open and I know everyone else’s door is open to discuss these things. If you’re found in a situation that doesn’t work or doesn’t fit with what we’re learning learning today, let’s talk about that.

Let’s find the way forward. Let’s find the path forward. Don’t don’t run away discouraged, okay? 1 Corinthians 7:1 and 2. Now concerning the things about which you wrote, “It’s good for a man not to touch a woman, but because of immoralities each man is to have his own wife and each woman is to have her own husband.” What we learn from this twofold, not all need to marry. All need not marry. Marry is not a required relationship. It is an elective, not a requirement.

And folks can live certain folks can live Actually, as 1 as 1 Corinthians 7 goes on to say, maybe even more devoted to God as a single person than as a married person cuz the normal thing for a married person is to think about their spouse and to put their spouse pretty up pretty high up on the list of priorities. And if you’re not married, you keep just absolutely God up there and and everybody else a far second to that. But not everyone can do that.

But not all need marry. All need not marry. We’ll have trouble with the syntax on this trying to get this right so it’s not awkward, but I think you know what I’m saying. Uh Paul was saying it’s good for a man not to touch a woman. You can live as a single person and be very pleasing to God. But not everybody can. In verse 2, because of immoralities, the the draw sexually to folks to other people, if if if there’s a strong desire, then you ought to get married.

There man is to have his own wife and each woman is to have her own husband. That marriage relationship is the normal expression of those desires. And if you have those desires ought to be in a marriage relationship. Marriage not immorality. Don’t just start sleeping around or being free or hooking up, whatever you call it. The the terms change but the idea is always the same and it is not a scriptural idea. The fourth passage we want to consider is from Matthew chapter 19. And I don’t know if you’ve read this but this is a very powerful section as Matthew chapter 19 begins.

And um they’re they’re they’re challenging Jesus. They’re trying to trip him up. They’re playing stump the chump really. Let’s see if we can get him to come up with such a uh absurd ruling that everybody will dismiss what he’s doing. And in the midst of that towards the end of that in verses 8 and 9 in Matthew 19, he said to them about divorce, because of the hardness of your heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives but from the beginning it has not been this way.

And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife except for immorality and marries another woman commits adultery. And that was Jesus’ teachings. Two gleanings from this one. First of all, divorce was not God’s plan. From the beginning it has not been this way. He set this up till death do us part. He did not mean provide for dissolution of the marriage in a way other than death. Divorce was not his plan. Again back to New York State history cuz that’s where I’m from and that’s what I’ve been tracking and I heard an interview years ago by a former mayor of New York City called named Ed Koch.

I don’t know if you remember Ed Koch, but he served for many years as the mayor. He was talking about before he was mayor, as a lawyer, he was instrumental in changing the divorce laws in New York State. And I looked it up and prior to 1966, adultery was the only grounds for divorce in New York State. But, and on April 27th, 1966, so we’re marking the 60th anniversary of this ruling, added to adultery as grounds for divorce were cruel treatment, abandonment of 2 years or more, imprisonment of 3 years or more, or legal separation.

And I think when you go back historically and you look at the divorces in New York, those first three added grounds were not the most popular. The one that’s used most is legal separation. If I separate for long enough, then I am legally allowed to get a divorce. That was that it was ruled uh enacted, if if you will, in April of 1966 to go into effect September 1st of 1967, and it did, in New York State. And that was the law, all of those, I think, five different grounds for divorce in New York State until 2010.

And you know what happened in 2010? That was when no-fault divorce became the law in New York State, which basically means you do not have to have any grounds. One person can just say, “I think this marriage is broken.” And then, the marriage, after a suitable period of time, is broken. And all that’s left is to sort out the property and and and the children, if there are any, and figure out who’s got custody of what. But, one person can say the marriage is broken, and I think after a period of 6 months, it will go head to a divorce, no fault, and the other person cannot contest it and say that the marriage is not broken.

One person can just say the marriage is broken, no fault divorce. Divorce has become very easy is what I’m saying in the past 16 years. And so it’s very easy for a person to get a divorce legally that doesn’t fit with or they may not ever realize that divorce was something that was not part of God’s plan from the beginning. And that Jesus said divorce for just any old reason incompatibility or the the classic one because she burned the toast. Did you ever hear that one? is not divorce at all in his eyes.

Divorce for just any reason, Jesus says, it any reason except immorality, sexual immorality causes adultery. From the fifth passage in Malachi we learn something more about divorce as an alternative to marriage. Malachi 2:15 and 16. But not one has done so who has remnant of the spirit. And what did that one do while he was seeking a godly offspring? Take heed then to your spirits and let no one deal treacherously against the wife of your youth.

For I hate divorce, says the Lord, the God of Israel, and him who covers his with wrong, says the Lord of hosts. So, take heed to your spirit that you do not deal treacherously. Right in the middle of this God says, I hate divorce. And if we love our heavenly Father and respect his wishes, we ought to hate it too. There are times when it’s called for. But even when it’s called for, scripturally called for, we ought to hate it. That’s what God does, and so that’s what I do, too.

I try to be holy, for he is holy. I try to hate divorce, because my father hates divorce. The sixth reference we’re going to go to from the book of Hebrews talks about the honor that should be in marriage, and brother Paul read from the section. I appreciate it. Hebrews 13:1-8 was our reading. Verse 4, “Marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed to be undefiled.” All should honor marriage. Got a kinsman back in New York, who has since passed away.

He was a a pilot in uh the last part of the Korean War, I believe, and then came home and became a dairy farmer and just milked cows, about 45 head for the rest of his life. But, he told of a time when he was a young man and they working on a construction uh job, and it was just kind of an ad hoc group. I mean, they were together working on something, and as they were working, a fellow came up and said, “I’m looking for work.” And they said, “Well, we just we’ve got our crew.” He says, “But, I’ve got a I’ve got a wife and family.”

And a fellow there in the crew who was single said, “Okay, then. You go ahead You go ahead and take it.” He bowed out to find something else. That was honor for marriage. You know, you’re in a marriage relationship, you’ve got a responsibility. I’m a single man, I don’t have that responsibility. You take this job. That kind of honor of marriage, I don’t know that I see that much anymore. I don’t know that I see everybody respecting, “Oh, you’re in a marriage, we’re going to respect that relationship.

We’re going to help that relationship. We’re going to lift up your hands and encourage you in that relationship. And if it if it needs some help, we hope hope we can be the helpers. All should honor marriage. And another way to honor that marriage is to keep it defined the way the Lord defined it and to keep it exclusive the way the Lord made it exclusive. You do not invite other people into the relationship. Marriage is a marriage one man, one woman and everyone should honor that.

And it says also in that passage, fornicators and adulterers, God will judge. If we become active sexually outside of marriage or in marriage become active sexually with someone outside of the marriage, God’s ready to judge that and God will judge that. And we should make we shouldn’t be confused about that. He said very clearly, if we do not respect his laws for this fundamental relationship, we should prepare for the consequences. And there will be consequences. God will judge those who dishonor marriage.

This last thing about honoring marriage, you might think I’m pulling it out of context. I don’t think I am. And it’s an interesting situation, I think. This is going way back to different times. Abraham was so sure as a soldier or going into a new community that people are going to see how beautiful his wife was and they’re going to kill him and take her. And what did he do? He said, “Well, dear, I need you to tell a little lie for me.” And it wasn’t like Who is it?

No, I’m not here. Did you ever do that on the phone? Back when the phone used to be in the house and people would call that phone for everybody, you could do that. Now, it’s just your phone, right? And they know exactly where to find you. But but this he says, “I need you to I need you to tell a little white lie for me, honey. I need you to say, when they ask, you’re my sister.” And you know, you kind of are because we had the same father but not the same mother, right?

So we’re we’re kind of brother and sister. And that reminds me that a lie, remember in in court cases, what do they say? You have to tell the truth and the whole truth and nothing but the truth. So, did he tell the truth? Yeah. Did he tell the whole truth? No. So, yeah, he he lied by not revealing all of it. And towards the end of this exchange between Abraham and Abimelech you see the consequences for what had happened here. Now, Abimelech had seemingly done his due diligence to check out that she was available. He’d asked, “Is this your wife?”

No, it’s my sister. So, he he took her into the harem, they evidently in in in waiting. They hadn’t been together sexually, but God came to Abimelech in a dream in the night and said to him, “Behold, you’re a dead man because of the woman whom you’ve taken. She is married.” God was upset that a marriage was threatened. It wasn’t even yet violated. But it was threatened and he said, “You’re a dead man for what you’ve done.” And we go on in verse 18 and see that was at the beginning of the exchange.

And towards the end in verse 18, the Lord had closed fast all the wombs of the household of Abimelech because of Sarah, Abraham’s wife, and it hadn’t even his marriage or his violation of the marriage hadn’t even been consummated. So, what this means is to threaten a marriage upsets God. And there are consequences for that. I’ve had some people say, “Well, that’s just because Abraham and Sarah were where the promise was going to be fulfilled and that’s why their marriage was special.”

I don’t think you can just say it was only their marriage that was special and that God was upset when it was threatened. To even threaten a marriage brings severe penalties. There were once seven passages on marriage. Have we discussed all the different aspects of marriage? No. Can we in one sermon? No, I don’t think so. But, I’ve laid some fundamental principles here that I think are significant and that help us understand the the importance of marriage.

We talked about its creation, duration, exclusivity, the alternatives to it, and the honor that it should have in the eyes of all. You’ve listened well and as I said before, if we’ve touched on anything this morning that has upset you, that has flagged something in a relationship of yours, let’s talk about that. But, as God’s children, it is for us to uphold and defend the plan for God’s plan for the family that has diverged so from the na- nation’s plan for the family.

And have to do what we the best we can to live in this world, this this fallen and broken world as God’s children. And it’s no small thing. We always have an invitation song and good singing today, by the way, brother Josh. We’re going to sing, “We have heard the joyful sound, Jesus truly does save.” And if something this morning has pricked your heart and you’ve decided to respond to the gospel, this is the time to do it. And we invite you to come forward while we stand and while we sing.

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