Kingdom Relationships: Married

While Connie was growing up, concentrating on music, her brothers were playing baseball and basketball. In high school and college I played soccer. Neither of us paid much attention to football until we moved to Oklahoma. There we quickly learned that football was a prime topic in Oklahoma conversations. To relate, we began to follow OU and OSU football teams.

By the time we moved to Pennsylvania, we enjoyed watching football. As a substitute for Oklahoma teams, we ended up with the Pittsburgh Steelers. At first we only watched the games. After awhile we began to listen to post-game interviews. The current coach, Mike Tomlin, has turned this into an art form.

Among his colorful, recurring comments, Coach Tomlin’s best-known phrase is: “The standard is the standard.” By this, he means that every Steeler is always expected to play football consistently at the same, high level.

When we look to the bible for truth, God's high and unchanging standard for marriage is a committed, lifelong relationship between a man and a woman.

This is not the prevailing view in our culture. Many are pessimistic about marriage and look for alternatives. Others think that marriage is outdated and unnecessary. After all, when two people are in love, who needs a piece of paper? With so many variations of “family,” how can anyone say that there is only one way to marry? There are biblical answers to these prevalent questions.

God built the standard of lifelong marriage between a man and a woman into the design of creation.

In Matthew 19:3-6, Jesus’ adversaries tested him with a question about divorce. In response, Jesus quoted Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 2:24. As the culmination of his work in creation, God created a man and a woman and united them in marriage as the pattern for humankind.

This pattern is revealed in the Bible before Abraham and before Moses—that is, before a community of faith with laws to govern faith and life. This template for marriage is not only for Jews and Christians; it is God’s design for humankind in all cultures and places and times.

The word that Jesus used in citing Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 is translated “hold fast” in the English Standard Version. It is a good representation of the word “cleave” used in the King James Version. The word in Hebrew means, literally, to be glued together.

In the Bible, marriage is established by a binding, covenant promise (Proverbs 2:17; Ezekiel 16:8; Malachi 2:14). This does not allow for a consumer relationship, based on the satisfaction of needs and desires. Covenant requires a lifelong commitment to nurture, strengthen, and sustain the marriage through good times and hard times. The Bible recognizes that real love instinctively desires permanence.

That is why cohabitation is a pale shadow, a weak imitation, of real love. Only the binding promises of a marriage covenant, made to your spouse and to God, provide the “super glue” that enables love to endure and thrive.

It takes an ongoing investment of mutual, sacrificial service to attain the high standard of a committed, livelong marriage.

The apostle Paul embedded the verse that Jesus quoted, Genesis 2:24, in his most profound teaching about marriage, Ephesians 5:10-20. By citing this verse, Paul upheld and reinforced the standard that marriage is to be a lifelong bond between a man and a woman, based on covenant vows.

On this foundation, the apostle gave inspired instructions for a good and lasting marriage. In a word, wives are to “submit” to their husbands “as to the Lord.”

The Greek word “submit” had its origin in the military. It refers to the way an individual soldier relinquishes his individual freedom for the good of the regiment—and does this by obeying the orders of a commanding officer.

As soon as this word is linked to Jesus, however, it takes on a deeper, richer, and kinder meaning. Yes, the wife sets aside her individual wants (as does the husband, verse 21) for the sake of the marriage and family, but this is done out of reverence for Christ.

Paul instructs husbands to “love” their wives “as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so 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.”

This leaves no room for domination or self-indulgence. The husband is to care for his wife with agape love, like Jesus did for us on the cross, with resolute commitment and full sacrifice. He must strive to bring out the best in his wife so that she grows into her full potential.

By this comparison of husband and wife to Christ and the Church, the apostle Paul draws on a recurring theme in Scripture. The Song of Solomon, interpreted as an allegory, anticipates Christ and the Church. Old Testament prophets present God as a faithful husband and Israel as an unfaithful wife. The Gospels, Epistles, and Revelation reveal Jesus as the ultimate bridegroom and the Church as his bride. Reading this, we assume that human marriage came first and these comparisons are metaphorical. In fact, just the opposite is true. God’s love for his people, always described as male with female, is both the original and eternal template for marriage.

Setting aside our interests to look out for the interests of the other, as Christ has done for his bride, is the secret of a good and lasting marriage. To do this, day after day, for a lifetime is, frankly, beyond our capacity. Only with the Holy Spirit of God, working within us, can we manage a lifetime of mutual love and sacrificial service, suffused with thanksgiving and joy (Ephesians 5:18-20).

A committed, lifelong marriage is a daunting challenge, prone to recurring times of adversity,

Over the centuries this adversity has led people to attempt many variations to God’s design. Abraham had two wives. Jacob had four wives. David committed adultery with someone else’s wife. Solomon had 700 wives and 300 consorts—999 too many. In all of these variations, there were disastrous consequences.

Amid all this human frailty, and ours today, the standard is still the standard: one man and one woman, united for life. Jesus does not waver from this truth, and yet, in him, we find grace (John 1:17; Hebrews 4:16).

A vivid instance of this grace is Jesus’ response to the woman caught in adultery in John 8:3-11. Jesus—the only one present without sin—could have condemned the woman, but he didn’t. He forgave her sin. Yet in his final words he did not depart from the standard: “Go, and from now on sin no more.”

Jesus’ interaction with the woman at the well in John 4 is another striking instance of the blend of grace and truth in Jesus. Against all social taboos at the time, he talked with the woman. He accepted a cup of water from her hands. He challenged her understanding of God. He revealed himself as the One who could offer Living Water. He confronted her with the truth about her multiple marriages. The conversation is a wonderful meld of kindness and gentleness and honesty.

At a deeper level, Jesus' interaction with this woman of five successive marriage meltdowns reveals another dimension of Jesus grace: no matter far or often we’ve fallen short of God’s standard, we are not beyond the reach of the grace and truth of Jesus. In the words of hymn-writer, Charles Wesley, nearly 300 years ago,

He breaks the power of cancelled sin, he sets the prisoner free;

his blood can make the foulest clean; his blood availed for me.”

When we turn to Jesus in repentance after failures in marriage or in any human relationship, he will say, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.”

When the Steelers are losing games or playing poorly, Coach Tomlin pulls the team back to the mindset and core skills needed to win games. Similarly, amid the questions that swirl around marriage in our current culture, we can return to the foundations in the Bible. The biblical standard for marriage is a committed, lifelong marriage between a man and a woman. Without question, this is a daunting challenge. Yet in the grace and strength of Jesus, we can practice and encourage mutual, sacrificial service as the best path toward good, lasting, and joy-filled marriages.

This is the second of three posts on kingdom relationships: single, married, and chaste.

The image is taken from an article in Focus on the Family magazine, September 6, 2024.