Creating a vision for your marriage

Why are so few couples getting married today? The National statistics state that the number of couples getting married fell below 50% in 2021. Half of all teenagers don’t live with their natural parents. Why? Because their parents didn’t get married and drifted from the relationship. Basically, just living together isn’t good for children as well as the couple themselves.

Why was married established? Where did the idea come from? Well, it was God’s idea from the beginning ”it is not good for man to be alone. I will make a companion who will help him...” (Genesis 2:18-25) Now, you could say that another bloke could have helped Adam in the garden- Adam and Steve instead of Adam and Eve perhaps!! But scripture points out in Malachi 2:15 ...’ Didn’t the Lord make you one with your wife? In body and spirit you are his. And what does he want from your union? Godly children …’

The Marriage relationship was designed to show children and help them understand how to love one another in a loving relationship. This in turn should perpetuate the desire to get married and the godly understanding of it. Sadly, many parents fail to do this by not honouring one another, in their marriages and in front of the children and because they do not recognise the spiritual significance of this union. When the parents are married there is an unseen level of commitment- the glue- that God joined them with, on their wedding day, in front of so many witnesses. This in turn creates an unseen sense of security in any children that they have. ‘...this explains why a man must leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.’ (Genesis 2:24, Matthew 19:5 + Mark 10:6-9) When there has been no wedding, there has been no witness; no accountability; no decision; no promise; no lasting covenant; no real security.

When you are just living together it’s all rather ‘behind closed doors’ and deceptive. God hasn’t recognised your union. There is no ‘seal’ of approval. I mentioned the word covenant earlier - a word that is not universally recognised like vow and promise but is just as important. God made His promises by ‘sealing’ His covenant with blood. This is why marriage is supposed to take place between a virgin couple who then seal their union through intercourse on their wedding night.

‘Give honour to marriage and remain faithful to one another in marriage. God will surely judge people who are immoral and those who commit adultery.’ (Hebrews 13:4) Marriage is obviously a serious business in God’s eyes. It is because He does the joining and does not like anything or anyone to separate what He has joined!

Jesus repeats what His Father says about the leaving and joining of a man to his wife, as a reminder to the religious leaders of his day, who thought they could divorce at their whim. Someone we know got married recently after living with his partner and having children with her. But he decided to, as he put it ‘make it legal’. I thought he missed the point at first as marriage is more than a bit of legal jargon on paper but, actually he was right. If we look at the last part of that scripture from Hebrews it says that God will surely judge the immoral. It is God that makes it legal. It is not “just a piece of paper”!

Marriage is a status, a form of office really. There is a specialness to it that everyone in the world recognises. We can stand together to face the world. I believe, as a wife, it gives me a secure standing. We have symbols of our union and the vows we made in the form of our rings. I don’t feel ‘owned’ by a patriarchal system, as some feminist would call it. Far from it, I feel loved, wanted, blessed and cared for by my husband who was willing to stand in public and say he loves me and will commit himself to me for the rest of our lives. He was and is also willing to wear his ring to prove this.

The difference between actually being married verses living together as if married, is a bit like owning your house versus renting a house. Every year (unless you are immediate owners being able to buy outright) you are paying towards ownership. You are investing in something that is worth looking after. We care for a house we are buying. We place our own stamp on it. There is longevity in our decision making because we know we can live together here as long as we want.

When we rent, it’s not really ours so we don’t value it as much. We can’t treat it, do it up as we would like and there is no end in sight as far as it becoming ours. When we buy into something we put down roots. When we hire or rent, we have the attitude that we can stop and just give it back when we don’t want it anymore. There is statistical evidence that says couples are more likely to stay together when they are married but not so much when they are not.

The parable that Jesus spoke of in Luke 6:46-49, of the person who built their home on rock instead of sand comes to mind. We are being obedient and ‘buying’ into God’s word that speaks of marriage. Couples who live together have possibly formed a contractual relationship- creating rules for one another to ‘keep the peace’ and as a way of stating their claim on things they have accumulated should they part. Sadly, the contractual mindset can overspill with some couples who fancy the wedding aspect of marriage and create Pre-nuptials.

A Covenant relationship, on the other hand, is based on will and choosing. Choosing to love God’s way which is sure, reliable and permanent.

God created marriage to illustrate His love, through Jesus, to us as Christians. It’s a great mystery according to Paul in Ephesians 5:32-33. I have heard so many people say that the reason for not getting married is that they will get divorced! What a lie from the enemy! If we understand how God loves us, we will understand how we are to love one another in our marriages. If we know and understand how God intended marriage to be, then we need not fear the marriage commitment. In Ephesians 5:25 husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the church, submitting his life for her. He accepts her with all her spots, wrinkles and blemishes (paraphrasing verse27) and makes her beautiful. In so doing, a wife respects and submits to her husband.

In marriage we become one in mind, body and spirit. We are not walking a parallel path as two separate people under one roof. When we got married, we were ‘bound’ together symbolically by the Vicar when he placed a part of his stole over our hands and said...” what God has joined, let no one separate.”

This is our promised covenant that God has witnessed ‘You were united to your wife by the Lord....the two of you became one person in His sight.’ (Malachi 2:15)

How can anyone be fearful of what God delights in?