Note: I'm single, but I still highly respect the concept of commitment and marriage as an honorable institution, especially as God intended it to be. I also would like to dedicate this post specifically to Jason Gress, co-founder of ChristCenteredGamer and someone I personally know to take their marriage vows as seriously as Jesus advised all men should.
Marriage is a concept that gets treated with shockingly callous indifference in this day and age, and while I have no plans to get married and am happy single, I respect anyone willing to do so and stick with it, because that requires some long-term commitment, and if you marry as Christians are supposed to, that takes SERIOUS commitment, because you just aren't bound by mortal laws on the topic, but spiritual ones.
Another reason marriage is important aside from the obvious commitment is that God made a direct comparison between marriage between a man and woman is the same as his commitment to us. Making a mockery of marriage is basically giving God the middle finger, and considering God admits to grieving in sorrow when we forsake Him, Marriage is SERIOUS BUSINESS.
If one reads the Bible, the above point is repeatedly stressed. Marriage is a small scale reflection of the larger promise God committed himself regarding humanity, but it's no less meaningful, and by remaining faithful to one another in a marriage, the married couple also remains faithful to God.
If you are Christian, then the following practices should be detestable to you, and while I don't believe they need elaboration, I'm going to provide it anyway because it should explain why God takes it so seriously:
Cuckoldry: This is basically no different than when Israel forsook God to practice idolatry despite him being willing to remain fully faithful to all the promises he made, and then to His horror had to watch the people he chose to forsake him for powerless statues and carved tree trunks.
God did not appreciate being cucked, and neither should anyone in a marriage want to feel the same because not only is it spitting in the face of your spouse, it's spitting in the face of God, who meant marriage to be a binding promise of love and devotion, and turning your spouse into a cuckold just degrades them, much like God felt degraded when his people forsook him.
"Open" marriages: This is another concept God finds contemptible because marriage is an exclusive promise between one party and another, it's not meant to be treated like a rope of sand to break into fragments when one feels like it.
Just like God was offended by the idea people might worship an idol and then worship Him just to hedge their bets, so should any Christian couple be repulsed by expanding the number of people in the marriage bed. The whole point is to remain faithful to who you married and them alone, it was never intended for more than that.
Homosexual marriages: This is spitting in God's face twice over. Not only did he never intend Adam and Steve, but marriage is also between a man and a woman only, he made no other provisions for alternative arrangements.
Just as he made a covenant where it was stipulated there are no other gods before him, a Christian should always remember marriage has immutable conditions that cannot be changed on a whim, they are set in stone, and homosexuality is off the table no matter if you are married or single.
I could go on, but if you are single, fine, so am I, but if you believe in God, you are part of the bride that is humanity that God pledged himself to, so by walking with God, you honor your vows as the humanity betrothed to God. If you are married and also believe in God, then you have honored his vows both in miniature and in an even greater sense, and you will be blessed for it.
In conclusion, I believe Ephesians 5:25-33 puts it best:
“Husbands, love your 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. In the same way, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church"
regarding the above condemnation of cuckoldry (traditionally interpreted as a wife cheating on her husband with another man behind his back) I am curious of what you think of the gender-inverted "cuckquean" fetishism and how it might relate to the practice of plural marriage (1 husband 2+wives) like we see among Mormons.
ReplyDeleteHaven't read enough of your blog yet to discern what type (ie Catholic, Prodestant, etc) of Christianity you promote, but am curious of what you think of the practice of a husband taking on more than 1 wife and how it may relate to bible passages about marriage.