Let's Stay Together
“Let’s Stay Together”
Matthew 5:31-32; 19:1-12
You’ve heard me talk over the years of my courtship with Korie. In January of 1998 we first met, and after a horrible first date, she got her act together, and relatively quickly I knew that this was the woman God wanted me to marry. A few months later we started talking marriage, and in December of 1998 I remember buying her engagement ring from a store in Los Angeles’ downtown diamond district. With the diamond burning a hole in my pocket I picked up the phone and called my father all excited to tell him that I had just made this purchase and was going to ask Korie to marry me. I’ll never forget his response: “Now son, you do know this is for life.” Are you kidding me? Like, no excitement. Like, no rejoicing with me right away. You’re not going to ask me what size or color it is, or how I’m going to propose? Seriously? Talk about a record scratching, party pooper moment.
It was right then and there that I felt all of the weight of what we were about to venture into come down on me. I wasn’t writing a letter to Korie asking her to be my girlfriend with those three boxes- yes, no or maybe. I wasn’t presenting the key to my apartment to Korie and asking her to move in with me. I was asking her to step into a covenant, a life long covenant, to be made in the presence of God and witnesses til death do we part.
Creating the Need
There’s a weight, a seriousness to marriage. Chances are you felt this as we read these passages. Yes marriage is fun, and no it shouldn’t be this obligatory thing. There should be joy and friendship to marriage. But marriage is also serious business with its moments of challenge and testing. And what is going to see us through those stormy seasons are not feelings but commitment.
But why is this? Why did God design marriage to be a covenant and not a contract? Marriage is gifted to us by God to model to the world God’s profound covenantal commitment to we his people. In other words your marriage is not about your marriage, but it is about showing the world the love of God. If you want an example of this read the book of Hosea. In Hosea God is going crazy because his bride Israel keeps cheating on them by worshipping other gods. And even though they are giving God reason for divorce, God in his holiness, grace and mercy refuses to divorce them. So to communicate his profound love for them he tells his prophet Hosea to marry a prostitute. And when after they marry she cheats on him, God tells Hosea to go again and get her, because that’s exactly what God does to us when we sin.
Marriage is God’s megaphone to the world announcing his unfailing love to his people. This is why Jesus has some really hard and heavy things to say about the subject of marriage and divorce. Some of you are particularly uncomfortable with Jesus’ teaching on divorce. You’ve gone down the road of divorce, and you feel particularly ashamed. Maybe it was your fault- you were the one who cheated and betrayed. Or maybe it wasn’t your fault. I want you to hear me this morning, God’s grace is sufficient for you. God’s grace is available to you. The Bible says if anyone is in Christ there is no condemnation. Still others of you are on the brink of divorce. Maybe you are the spouse who’s been cheated on or wronged. I want to give you something to consider. The gospel says we cheated on and wronged God, and yet God in his grace forgave us. If your spouse is repentant and is open to working on the marriage, would you be open to the possibility of forgiveness which could announce to the world the beauty of the gospel to heal? A restored marriage is a stunning picture of the gospel.
So here’s my hope this morning: I want to draw you into what Jesus says about marriage and divorce. If you’re single this is a perfect time for you to hear this teaching because I hope you leave with a sobering yet hopeful view of marriage. If you are married my hope for us is that we would leave with an entrenched resolve to honor our covenant, and to be people who display the beauties of the gospel.
Historical Context
As we come to our passage this morning Jesus is approached by the Pharisees, the religious leaders of his day, and he’s asked what appears to be a simple question, and that is, is it okay to divorce one’s wife for any cause. Now what we need to understand this morning is that the Pharisees ask this question because they wanted to pull Jesus into a debate about marriage that was raging in their day between two respected Jewish schools of thought- Shammai and Hillel.
The Shammai position on divorce and remarriage was very narrow. They taught that there was only one reason to divorce and that was for unfaithfulness, and specifically sexual unfaithfulness. The school of Hillel on the other hand, had a lot more of a liberal view of what constituted divorce. They said that a man could divorce his wife for any cause. For example, and I’m so not making this up, if a man’s wife burned his bread he could divorce her. If she talked disrespectfully to him, or about his parents he could divorce her. If his neighbors in the house next door could hear her talking he could divorce her. If she was seen out with her hair down, or talking to another man he could divorce her. And most devastating of all, if the husband found another woman that he liked better he was free to divorce his wife.
Sadly, in Jesus’ day, it was the school of Hillel that was driving the culture, creating an environment where men were divorcing their wives for any and all reasons, and the results were devastating. See, when a woman was divorced, typically no man would marry her, and now she has no financial security. Her only option of supporting herself was to become a prostitute. Divorce, was devastating.
Post It Note/Envelope Illustration
Likewise, you and I live in a culture of divorce, where people divorce their spouses for any and all reasons. But what people do not realize is the absolutely, and many times comprehensively, devastating effects that divorce has. It’s sort of like this post it note and envelope…see it as a post it note where I can just take it off and move on…but the bible speaks of marriage not as a post it note but as an envelope that is sealed…for me to get out of this is to tear it up, IT IS TO DEVASTATE THE ENVELOPE.
This is divorce- it is devastating. It’s devastating financially- number one cause of personal bankruptcies. It’s devastating on the children. I was talking some years ago to a child of divorce who was now in his forties, and he said that divorce is like going to a funeral that never ends. Divorce is devastating.
ONE FLESH
Now I love how Jesus answers their question of whether or not it is okay to divorce one’s wife for any cause. Notice, that he does not spend the bulk of his time giving well reasoned arguments for what constitutes divorce, and what does not, instead he pulls them away from the law, and back to Genesis chapter two when God creates marriage. In other words, Jesus in his answer is saying to them, you guys are asking the wrong question. You’re asking what’s allowable, or what’s permissible, when instead you should focus on what’s ideal. And what is God’s ideal for marriage? Look at verses 5-6. Here he states the ideal and repeats it: GOD’S IDEAL FOR MARRIAGE IS ONE FLESH. THAT TWO SHALL NOW BECOME ONE!
But what is this notion of one flesh? What does this mean? The idea of one flesh is not just the idea of a sharing of bodies in the physical act of sex, oh no! One flesh is not just a harmony of bodies, but it is an all encompassing intimacy that is shared between two people on every dimension. One flesh is not just a sharing of bills, or of space, but it is the intertwining of lives to the point where two distinct people now become one!
Friendship
Tim Keller in his book, The Meaning of Marriage, spends significant time talking about the issue of one flesh, which is God’s purpose for marriage, and what Tim Keller says is in view by the term “one flesh” is that of friendship, friendship. That my wife at the end of the day is not ultimately my business partner, maid, nanny or driver, but that she is my friend.
In David McCullough’s award winning book, John Adams, he explores the relationship between our second president and his wife Abigail, and one of the things that immediately jumps out at you is the fact that these two were one, that in the deepest most all encompassing way, these two were friends. I mean over the span of their marriage they wrote over one thousand letters to each other. In one letter Abigail wrote to her husband John, “My dearest friend, How much is comprised in that short sentence? How fondly can I call you mine, bound by every tie which consecrates the most inviolable friendship? Is it not natural to suppose that as our dependence is greater, our attachment is stronger? I find in my own breast a sympathetic power always operating upon the near approach of letters from my dearest friend.”
Can you say this about your spouse? Is your spouse your dearest friend? Well, how do I know this? Let me give you two practical ways that both reflect whether or not you’re friends, and how to strengthen your friendship: 1. Do you speak your spouses love language often and well? The Five Love Languages: Physical Touch. Acts of Service. Gifts. Words of Affirmation. Quality Time. 2. Do you hang out at levels 4-5 of the communication pyramid? (GET THE COMMUNICATION PYRAMID FROM DANIELLE).
VALUE/WORTH
What happens when my spouse becomes my deepest friend and we are experiencing oneness? Well quite naturally I am saying to my spouse that I value you, you mean something to me. Walking in one flesh bestows value and oneness on your spouse. This is important because when we come to our text you need to understand that in Jewish culture it was only the men who could divorce their wives. A woman could never divorce her husband without the husband giving permission. So what the Jews were essentially saying was that women had no value, that they had no status.
Now I bring up the issue of status, because for those of us who were here back when we began Matthew 18 we said that this whole section has to do with the issue of status, because the disciples ask the question who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? Jesus answers by saying worldly status has no place in the kingdom, that we are all equal. Paul would continue this theme in Galatians 3:28, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male or female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus”. Here Paul is reiterating what Jesus has been arguing in Matthew 18, that in the kingdom of heaven no one is intrinsically better or worse, we are all one in Christ. This is an astounding statement for Jesus and Paul to make in a sexist culture where women were seen as mere possessions. Both Jesus and Paul throw a flag and say not so in the kingdom of heaven- men and women are both equally esteemed by our God!
Because men and women are honored and esteemed equally by God, this is to be mirrored in the covenant of marriage. That when I walk in one flesh with my spouse, in true friendship at the deepest levels, what I am communicating is that you mean something to me. I value you! You’re honored!
Cups/Glass Visual
You know in I Peter 3 we as husbands are told to honor our wives because they are the weaker vessel. Sadly, this passage has been preached by idiots to promote sexism- it’s their way of going, see, see, women are inferior, but this is not what the text means. I have two vessels in my house- cups and glasses…explain. Men, do you honor your wives, treating her as equal?
WITNESS TO THE WORLD
What does one flesh mean? It means an intertwining of lives at the deepest levels, it is the idea of friendship. What happens when we walk in friendship, one flesh, with our spouses? Two things- one we bestow worth on our spouse, but secondly and finally, it is a strong witness to the world!
The Hebrew word for marriage is kiddushin which simply means consecration. To consecrate something means to set it aside, or to set it a part. When things were consecrated to God, for example, it was God’s way of saying this is different, this is unique, this is special, this is mine. Likewise, when the Jews spoke the very word marriage, it was a reminder that their relationship was both set a part to God and was to therefore be special, unique and different, but in the very act of it being set a part to God it was a witness to the world. That the world was to look at their marriage and say, Wow, I’ve never seen that before, it’s different!
Author Henri Nouwen tells of the time in which he was struggling with his faith and went to the Hermitage museum to view some works by Rembrandt. When he came to Rembrandts classic painting, The Return of the Prodigal Son, Nouwen’s breath was taken away, so much so that he sat and stared at the painting for the next several hours, he had quite frankly never seen anything like this- it was special and unique. Finally, the museum closed and Nouwen had to leave, but he left a changed man and inspired. He would soon after write a book based on Rembrandt’s painting baring the same title, The Return of the Prodigal Son. This book would go onto sell millions, changing lives in the process. All because he sat and caught a glimpse of a painting in a museum.
Likewise God has chosen to hang our marriages in the museum of this world! The name of our marriage portrait is One Flesh. In a world where people view marriage as a business merger, or sexual encounter, God wants to put your marriage on display in such a way where people sit down and go I’ve never seen anything like that before. He wants little boys and girls to see your marriage and get inspired. He wants singles who’ve come from a legacy of fatherlessness and divorced to see your marriage and get inspired. He wants those who’ve been wounded by the opposite sex to see your marriage and get inspired.
PRAYER FOR MARRIAGES
