- The Building Blocks of Marriage
Marriage doesn't come without it's challenges, but God also does not set us up for failure. If husband and wife truly believe that God is a part of themselves and they delight in His presence, then a marriage united with Him will make it possible to delight in one another even among the challenges in life.
Genesis 2:22-24 Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.” That verse in Genesis is often quoted in wedding ceremonies, and explains why a man must leave his father and mother, to then be united with his wife. They become one flesh in a new sense, just how God intended for marriage between man and woman to be.
Genesis shows us that God created man and woman to live together in His holy presence, to be united with Him as one unit. This may be old testament but even in today’s society we acknowledge that God made marriage by calling it “Holy Matrimony.” Ed Stetzer outlines that a biblical marriage made by God is one man, one woman, one marriage, and one lifetime.
Marriage is created for a lifetime, and as a married believer we are called to delight in our relationship by relating to our spouses, prioritizing each other’s needs, and remaining united in intimacy.
We can see in the new testament, as Jesus Christ began to build the church, it was another marriage designed by God. The bible gives us specific directions on how husbands and wives can function in a healthy marriage.
Ephesians 5:22-33 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church—for we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
The building blocks of marriage isn’t a twelve step program to live a happy life with your spouse. There isn’t an amount of chocolates a husband can buy nor an amount of sports memorabilia a wife could purchase to reconcile a conflict. The key to a successful marriage is Jesus Christ. He gave himself up as payment for our sins and if we believe that is true, we can live a life of peace in God. The husband and wife must both love the Lord and accept the Holy Spirit in themselves, if that is true then a marriage of delight and unity in Christ will live on for a lifetime.
