The
true meaning of marriage,
according to God’s holy Word, is union with Jesus
Christ, whereby, "the two shall become one flesh (Eph 5:31:32)."
In Genesis we read that God took Eve out
of Adam and then gave her to Adam... "And Adam said,
This is now bone of my
bones and flesh of my flesh...(Gen
2:24)
." The Apostle
Paul wrote
to the Church regarding Jesus Christ, that: "...we are members
of His body, of His
flesh, and of His bones. For
this
cause shall
a man leave his father and mother, and shall
be joined unto his wife,
and
they two shall be one flesh. This
is a great
mystery: but
I speak concerning Christ and the
church (Eph
5:30-32)." Here we are given the true
meaning of
marriage - complete union with Jesus
Christ. The
Church is to be as Jesus Christ, or as 1st John
4:17 reads, "...as
He is, so are we in this world."
In
this marriage union the
husband is to represent Christ and the wife is to
represent the Church.
Both roles are impossible apart from the grace of
God through the power
of
His Holy Spirit. Our marriage to
Christ takes place during our baptism, for it is
there He gives us His
NAME:"Therefore go
and make disciples of all
nations, baptizing them in the name of the
Father and of the Son and of
the Holy Spirit."
(Matt 28:19) Notice
here that we are only given One NAME,
His glorious Name, for these Three are One in
NAME. In a
Christian marriage that wishes to show forth the
"Heavenly Pattern",
the wife will give up her family name and take on
the name of her
husband, because of Christ, Who calls us to do all
things in His
Name. Our marriage union has an eternal
purpose
associated
with it "that
now through the Church, the manifold wisdom of
God should be made known
to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly
realms, according to His
eternal purpose that He accomplished
in Christ Jesus our Lord (Eph
3:10-11)."
For God, in the beginning, put Adam to sleep and
took Eve from his side
just as He likewise did through Jesus at Calvary.
Then He brought Eve
to Adam and
commanded that they both were to be fruitful and
multiply (Gen
1:28), and because our marriage is both physical
and spiritual, this
command applies in both realms. Similarily,
Jesus taught us that "No one comes to me
unless the Father Who sent me draws them, and I
will raise them up at
the last day"
(John 6:44). In John's Gospel we read that "My Father is
glorified by
this, that you bear much fruit..."(John
15:8). Jesus goes
even
further in John 15:16, that He "appointed us" to
bear much
fruit and that our fruit should remain. Again, this is both
physical and
spiritual. When both husband and wife
physically love eachother,
children (fruit) multiply in a very natural
way. Similarly,
because of our love for Christ, we naturally share
His Gospel message
and the Church is enlarged. Billboards,
advertising and programs
will never succeed in enlarging His church if it
is trying to replace
His Heavenly Pattern - genuine Vine supplying
Love.
The
"Heavenly Pattern" shows forth The
Creator "For
since the creation of the world God's invisible
qualities - His eternal
power and Divine nature - have been clearly
seen, being understood from
what He has made, so that people are without
excuse (Rom
1:20)."
Unlike the sodomitic or contraceptive union which
is for pleasure only, our
male female (Christ and His Church) union is
designed and purposed by
God to
be fruitful.
Now it is this
eternal purpose of marriage that has come under
attack as of the 1930
and subsequent
Lambeth Council decisions. There,
the Anglican Church embraced new
doctrines (contraception and birth-control, most
all of which is abortifacient)
for the wife of Christ. From Abraham to
Calvary and right up
until
this time, no Christian denomination had accepted
these sorcerous
(pharmakia)
practices and all the refomers along with the
Catholic Church preached
admantly
against them.
Now
to understand the
purpose of
marriage we need to know why God took Eve
out from Adam, or to be
more
correct, the Church out from Christ. The
answer is: to enlarge or
increase
Adam, i.e., to glorify and magnify Jesus
Christ. Christ
admonished
His
disciples to "do all
things
in My Name" because of our
baptism marriage to Him. Therefore the wife is to
take
on the name of her husband and the offspring are
to be named after
him.
In Psalm 24:1 we read that "The
earth is The Lord’s, and the fullness
thereof;...". When God created the
earth, He created
it
with a definite purpose; to fill it with Jesus
Christ. Colossians
1:16
tells us that ..."all
things
were created by Him, and for Him." Notice again, it was
created for Him.
Psalm 72:19 says..."let
the whole
earth be filled with His glory "
and again back to Colossians, "...Christ
in you, the hope of glory (Col 1:27)".
So then, the true purpose of marriage
(complete
union with Christ) is for the propagation of Jesus
Christ, both by
evangelism
and raising Christ-like children, until He fills
the whole earth, "...until
He (Jesus Christ) is all and in
all (Col
3:11)."
The joy and the pleasure of the union may be ours
but the fruit of the
union is His for "the fruit of the womb is His
reward" (Psalm 127:3
ASV). He purchased every little one of them
at Calvary.
In
the Church there is no room
for patriotic nationalism, whether Greek, Jewish,
American, or
Barbarian, for His Gospel is to all nations and
therefore His present
Kingdom is withour borders or particular
nationality but in the hearts
of all who responded to His call. He rules as
a King on a throne in each of their hearts as they
hear His voice and
will not listen to anyone else. There is only
Christ "all
and in all" in the Church. "I
am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and
the end, the first and the last
(Rev 22:13)".
Here again we see
plainly
stated that only that which is Christ or joined in
matrimony to Christ
will survive eternity.
Today,
we are being told by
many church
leaders and family organizations that left wing
radicals and homosexual
groups
are out to destroy marriage. If we only look
on the surface of
things,
that might very likely be our conclusion.
But, the nuclear
bombardment of marriage was the 1930 Angelican and
subsequent Lambeth
Council decisions, and the propogation of those
new and contrary
doctrines by the NCCUSA (National Council of
Churches USA) here in the
USA. These new doctrines have since
spread like leaven causing multitudes to take the
Name of our Lord in
vain.
When the Church began to reject God's blessing of
new life, her purpose
was
also being rejected (aborted). "Then
understood they how that he bade
them not
beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the
Pharisees and of the Sadducees (Matt
16:11-12). "For I say unto you, That
except your
righteousness shall exceed the
righteousness of the scribes and
Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the
kingdom of heaven (Matt
5:20). Unlike the
Christ which these new doctrines portray, our
marriage union is to be
fruitful
because Love is fruitful (1Jn 4:16).
Regardless of how
potentially fertile a female is, she will not be
fruitful until her
husband comes into her. In the same way,
Jesus taught us that "As the
branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless
it abides in the vine,
neither can you, unless you abide in
me. I am the vine; you are
the branches. Whoever abides in me and
I in him, he it is that
bears much fruit, for apart from me you can
do nothing (John
15:4-5). Again, we can plainly see that God
created and instituted
marriage to show forth His Heavenly Pattern and
that the purpose of
marriage according to The Heavenly Pattern - Jesus
Christ, is
fruitfulness. We are told that Moses heard these
cherished words: "Well
done, good and
faithful servant!" because
he made everything
according to the Heavenly Pattern shown to him on
the mount (Exod.
25:8-9; Heb.
8:5). Similarily, we are called to be conformed to
Jesus Christ - God's
Heavenly Pattern shown to us on mount Calvary.
Now we come to something of
the
utmost importance regarding the Church, the wife
of Christ. About
600 B.C., the prophet Jeremiah
declared that God
was going
to create a new thing on the earth, "A
woman will surround (encompass) a man
(Jer
31:22)."
In
fulfillment of this
prophecy, we read in Ephesians 1:22 that God : "gave
him
(Christ) to be
the head over all things to the church, Which
is his body, the fullness
of
him that filleth all in all."
Here the Church is described as the
fullness of Him,
the bride (encompasses) is the fullness of
Christ. Therefore
each and every menber of the Church
is to be Christ-like, an expression of Him. The
Church alone
(made up of all the true Churches now and
throughout the ages), one
body, is stated here to be the
fullness of Him,
Who is to fill
all and be in all. For "..there
is no other name under heaven
given to men by which we must be saved
(Acts 4:12)".
The
true Church, then, is the wife (bride) of Christ
and she will be found
possessing, and honoring, and seeking to bring
fruitful
increase to the Name which is above all names -
His great NAME.
In loving union with Christ, the true
Church will always seek and cherish a full quiver,
both spiritual and
physical, until Jesus
Christ is all and in all and the whole
earth is filled with His
glory.
