PENTECOST 19 – Oct. 3, 2021 – Mark 10:2-16
“GOD’S GIFT OF MARRIAGE”
Introduction: Grace be to you and peace, from God our Father, and from our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ. Our text is the Gospel Lesson just read, from Mark 10. We begin with prayer.
Dear fellow disciples of our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ:
- I would like you to join me in contemplating the utter ingratitude and wastefulness of mankind when it comes to the gifts and blessings of God. First, the gift of creation is taken for granted, as if this world just is and has nothing to do with God. Second, the gift of redemption, that God loved the world, all people, so much that He sent Jesus to take away all sins, the sins of the world. But as you are aware so many people go through life with no care about this, as utter unbelievers.
- The same is true about the main topic of the OT Lesson and our text, the Gospel Lesson. I’m talking about marriage. Now it used to be that folks understood the value of marriage and desired it. And once married they did their utmost to grow in cherishing their spouse. They were still sinful human beings, but they honored God’s gift of marriage.
- Shift forward to today and our attitude is quite different. Marriage is considered optional by many, and a nuisance and hindrance to many. So among those who contemplate marriage, in the back of their minds is the thought, well if it doesn’t work out I’ll just bag it. This thought can also enter the minds of Christians, as we are inundated with worldly thinking.
- And there are many times in our married lives when we do not exactly cherish our spouse, and when we are a far cry away from the kind of gratitude and respect that we owe God for this precious gift.
- So this morning, let us spend a brief time looking at “GOD’S GIFT OF MARRIAGE.” And hopefully we will grow in our gratitude to God for this gift. In our text we see that:
I. The Pharisees Came To Jesus With The Wrong Question – Is It Lawful [Permissible, Right, Moral] To Divorce [And In Matthew’s Account They Added “for any cause”]
A. Jesus Taught Them That To Contemplate Divorce Is To Demonstrate A Severe Hardness Of Heart
Text: “He answered them, ‘What did Moses command you?’ They said, ‘Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away.’ Jesus said to them, ‘Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment.’”
B. But Jesus Makes Clear That Divorce Was Never Part Of The Plan Of God To Bless Us In Marriage
Text: “Jesus said, ‘But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together let not man separate.’”
C. Marriage Then Is The Creation Of God And Is Holy – Just Like Human Life, So That Murder And Divorce Are Similar Sins, The Violent Destruction Of God’s Creation
Mal. 2:16 “For the man who does not love his wife but divorces her, says the Lord, the God of Israel, covers his garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and do not be faithless.”
Statement: You see the cavalier attitude of the Pharisees toward marriage in their question to Jesus. We can identify with them. In fact, Jesus disciples, once they heard Jesus’ teaching on marriage commented to Him: “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry.” Even they were cynical. But Jesus encouraged them, just as He encourages us: “Not everyone can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given.” Pray therefore, that it be given to you – for to have a faithless spirit that is willing to be covered with the violence of divorce is a tragic thing.
Application: So all of us have much to confess, when we recognize our own ingratitude to God for our spouse and for marriage! And if we have experienced divorce, let us consider carefully the destructive nature of it. If we have a marriage that is troubled and in danger, let us see where we are at fault, and let us repent and change, and if we were at fault in the demise of a previous marriage, let us repent and live in God’s gracious forgiveness and mercy.
God wants you to be given His wisdom in regard to marriage. He wants all to have it! Sadly, the world and our sinful nature oppose this good and gracious will of God and seek to destroy the blessedness of “GOD’S GIFT OF MARRIAGE.”
Transition: But there is more, for:
II. Creation Itself Predicts God’s Gift Of Marriage
Gen. 1:27,28 “So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’”
A. Man And Woman Are Both Created In The Image Of God, But With Differences
B. So, Each Is Fully Human, Yet Each Lacks Some Of The Humanity That The Other Sex Possesses
Text: “But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh.
C. Once God Makes Them One Flesh In Marriage They Possess Together – Within Marriage – The Fullness Of Humanity [Heterosexual marriage, the only real marriage, only], Able Also To Procreate As God Commands
Gen. 1:28 “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it.”
D. And Children Are A Tremendous Blessing From God – And They Benefit Greatly From Marital Faithfulness
1. Children benefit economically when parents remain together in one home
2. Children raised within a faithful heterosexual marriage of love experience the wholeness of humanity
3. Children raised within a faithful Christian marriage also benefit from being raised in the fear and encouragement of the Lord, knowing true and genuine love, and likely are imbued with a proper respect for God’s gift of marriage
Deut. 11:18,19 “You shall therefore lay up these Words of Mine in your heart and in you soul, and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach then to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in you house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.”
Statement: These also are great blessings that will be returned upon us when we are old! But it can only happen within the context of faithful, monogamous, heterosexual marriage. And this brings us totally – as one fulfillment of humanity – into harmony with God’s creative intent! And this is an additional blessing.
In an observation regarding marriage, and Christian marriage that includes God as a partner, the wise preacher of the Proverbs wrote: “Though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him – and a threefold cord is not quickly broken.” [Ecc. 4:12]
Application: These are all blessings that God intends for all human beings to enjoy, and especially His dear children of faith! So let us pray that God would enable us to understand, and to fully imbibe in these blessings and protect them against everything that would destroy them. If not for ourselves, then for our children.
Where we see that we have failed in this, and have degraded “GOD’S GIFT OF MARRIAGE,” let us repent, and receive God’s gracious forgiveness and mercy! And in the warmth of His great love, let us devote ourselves to receiving and enjoying to the fullest this gift of His love, marriage.
Conclusion: So, let us be proactive and change our thinking right away, so that we never come at this question by asking: “If it permissible for a man to divorce his wife?” This question, in itself, betrays the hardness of heart and delusion of the one asking.
But if we come around the corner on this topic and come to appreciate and love the blessing God gives us in marriage, then we will come to Jesus asking Him to enable us to remain always faithful and growing in love for our spouse.
It is sad, how the vast majority of humanity around us simply wastes and squanders the gifts of love God has prepared for us, in stubborn and ignorant rebellion. What they miss out on!
But it needn’t be so with us. We don’t need to conform to the ignorance around us! God grant us forgiveness, for our own sinful weaknesses, and grant us also the glorious wisdom of love! Amen.
Votum: And the peace of God, which surpasses all human understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds in the true faith, which is in Christ Jesus, even unto life everlasting, Amen.