Summer is the time for lots of wedding services for Tim and me. I think between us we will perform more than twenty this year! That’s a lot of time dedicated to meeting with couples and trying to help them launch successful, growing, godly unions.
For me, this summer has been particularly focused on the essence of biblical marriage with our denomination’s penchant for living in the weeds and a brother-in-law who’s doggedly determined to know the mind of God when it comes to marriage and re-marriage. (He’s one of many who have an uncanny ability to ask a question while formulating his next one.)
So what’s the Bible say about marriage? The Pharisees asked Jesus about it. But their intention was not to get an answer. Moses, David, Solomon, and Paul all wrote about it, but there’s a wide divergence of opinion on what they really had to say. Nearly every couple I marry selects a Scripture or two from one of these authors, and yet so often I feel that it’s the flow of the words rather than the content of the message that strikes their fancy.
Today, throughout the Christian church there is a wide continuum of opinion on godly gender roles and marital duties. You listen to some Bible-believing evangelical Christians’ views of biblical marriage and they sound like members of a male chauvinist convention. You listen to other Christians and they sound like clones of Betty Friedan. So what is it? What’s the Bible really have to say about marriage?
That’s the topic this week. The text is Ephesians 5:22-33. In this text Paul gives an eleven verse excursus into the roles and duties of godly marriage. And yet when you examine these words you find that they have a particular context. In fact when you really dig into them you find that Paul has a much broader view of Christian marriage than most think. In fact Paul’s message to the Ephesians in Chapter 5 is contingent upon everything he’s said up to that point, as well as the words in Genesis 2.
So as you prepare for Sunday’s message, think about the following points and questions.
1. How many times do the words of Genesis 2:24 appear in the New Testament?
2. Why does Paul go back to this creation account to instruct the Ephesians in Christian marriage?
3. What is the predominant view of gender roles in the first century Asia Minor?
4. How do Paul’s words in verse 1 and 2 square with Aristotle’s code of household duties and the mores of orthodox Jewry of his day?
5. How does Paul redefine marriage based on the creation account of Genesis 2?
6. What significance is there to the fact that he places his instructions regarding marriage in the imperative section of his letter, rather than in the indicative section?
7. How does Paul treat “mystery”?
8. What is the mystery that is revealed in Christian marriage?
9. How does Paul understand God’s words in Genesis 2:18 as relevant to marriage?
10. How do Paul’s words in Galatians 3:28 relate?
11. How is the marital relationship a picture of divine redemption?
12. What is the chief purpose of Christian marriage as seen in Ephesians 5?
See you Sunday.
