Marriage is not an invention of man though many people might think so. It is not something which gradually evolved in human history. It is an institution of God. He performed the first marriage. It was there in the Garden of Eden before sin entered and mankind fell from the state in which they were created. So marriage is good and can be, should be, a great blessing. God has ordained it for the good of men, women and children. True happiness is to be found in obedience to God’s will and Word. The marriage relationship is a loving bond which should grow stronger as the years pass.

Modern Attacks on Marriage⤒🔗

Marriage is under terrible attack in our Western world. The Bible clearly says sex before marriage is wrong – always wrong. But a recent survey in Britain showed that only 3% of young folk are virgins when they marry. Many people live together without marrying. Half the children in the United Kingdom are born outside of marriage. This is totally wrong. It is fornication and Scripture says ‘Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God’ (1 Cor 6:9-10). Fornicators head the list and it is made quite plain that they will not get into heaven – that is unless they repent and turn from their evil ways. Add to this immorality the fact that 7 million unborn children have been aborted (murdered) since abortion was legalised in the UK in 1967. What a wicked society we are and how ripe for God’s judgment.

These things are not distant from us. We see it going on all around us. Even young children are involved. Courting in our wicked society normally involves sex. A couple go out for a date and end the evening in bed together. People move on from one relationship to the next – like animals in a herd – like stray dogs in the street. Many people never marry yet live in sexual relationships with others. Among those who do marry, often after a ‘trial’ period of living together, half the marriages end in divorce. Lots of people are left with broken hearts, wishing their loved ones had died rather than just left them. Murders and violence are carried out in jealousy. Many people are lonely, living on their own, especially as they get older. Children often end up with only one parent. Fathers and sometimes mothers, because of an acrimonious separation, end up seldom if ever seeing their own children. What a huge grief and sorrow! AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases are affecting large numbers. If all people followed God’s law there would be no AIDS. ‘Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful’ (Ps 1:1).

Now there are plans afoot in Scotland to redefine marriage so that homosexual or lesbian couples can ‘marry’ – that is two men marrying one another or two women marrying one another. It changes marriage from what it has always been in every culture and of course in the Bible. This is trying to make acceptable what the Bible says is an abomination to the Lord (Lev 20:13). We need to study carefully the Bible’s teaching on marriage.

Need for a Wife←⤒🔗

Adam was created by God on the sixth day. He was placed in the beautiful garden of Eden and enjoyed God’s covenant. God comes into the garden to talk to him and he has fellowship with God. Man is perfectly happy and yet something is missing. God said, ‘It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him’ (Gen 2:18). He needed someone like himself with whom he could share his life. Marriage is the norm. Some people do not need to marry, for example the Apostle Paul was one such, but for most folk marriage is beneficial. We are told that God formed the animals and brought them to Adam who named them. He understood their nature. Man’s powers of understanding were so much better before the Fall. Yet no helpmeet for Adam was found among them. The animals have bodies similar to us but man also has an immortal soul which is in the image of God. It is rational, logical, self-conscious, able to reflect, to speak and to understand self and God and the world. There is a huge gap between man and animals.

The Creation of Adam’s Wife←⤒🔗

The creation of the first woman is a fascinating story. God caused a deep sleep to come over Adam and then performed an operation upon him. He took a rib out of his side and then closed up the flesh again. Around that rib He formed the woman. Matthew Henry comments that the woman was, ‘Not from Adam’s head to rule over him, not from his feet to be trampled upon but from his side to be his partner and companion, under his arm to be protected, near his heart to be loved’. When Adam sees her he understands her nature. He calls her woman which means taken from man – bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. She is of the same nature as Adam and equally intelligent. She is similarly created in the image of God and by grace is equally a child of God: ‘There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.’ (Gal 3:28). There is an essential equality between man and woman. Writing to the Corinthians Paul argues for the headship of the man over the woman even in the garden of Eden before the Fall: ‘For the man is not of the woman; but the woman of the man. Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man’ (1 Cor 11:8-9). The first woman was taken out of a man though ever after every man is born from the woman. Thus there is a mutual dependence. We need one another. Another reason he gives for the man’s headship is that the woman was created for the man. This headship is not because man is essentially superior to the woman. Many women are far more clever and gifted than their husbands. But God appoints the man to a headship in the relationship and we must submit to His will.

First Wedding←⤒🔗

God performed the first wedding. He created Eve and brought her to Adam. It was love at first sight. God joined them together in marriage, and Scripture says, ‘Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh’ (Gen 2:24). There is a leaving. It is not right for the family to remain under the father’s roof, either the husband’s father or the wife’s father. That is what the Bible says: ‘leave’ and ‘cleave’. A new social unit is formed and they are to live under God. Leave involves a break with the past. To cleave is to stick closely in love. It is a duty for those who marry to love one another and to be very close. The new couple, husband and wife, are to be faithful to one another. No one else should be allowed to come between them. Husbands are to please their wives and wives their husbands. Marriage as God designed it, and as it should be, is a wonderful, loving relationship. Notice that it was a woman whom God formed and brought to Adam, not another man. There is no room here for ‘Adam and Steve’, for any kind of homosexual or lesbian marriage. Neither is there room for ‘civil partnerships’ between a man and a man or between a woman and a woman. ‘Civil partnership’ is a kind of half-way house marriage between same-sex couples invented a few years ago (2004). The government legalized it in 2004. Homosexual couples were given the rights of marriage but not the name. Scripture makes plain that sexual activity is to be limited to marriage and marriage is defined as the union of one man and one woman for life.

Purpose of Marriage←⤒🔗

The purpose of marriage is threefold:

1. Companionship:←↰⤒🔗

This is first stressed by God in the words: ‘The Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him’ (Gen 2:18). It is wonderful to have someone with whom to share your life, someone whom you can trust and who will keep your closest secrets. You care for each other.

2. The Procreation of Children:←↰⤒🔗

God has given marriage for the purpose of producing children. He seeks a godly seed (Mal 2:15). It is the ideal unit in which children are to be born, to be reared and trained. Both father and mother have a role to play.

3. The Avoidance of Fornication:←↰⤒🔗

Paul speaks of this to the Corinthians: ‘Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband’ (1 Cor 7:2). Roman Catholic priests take a vow never to marry and because of this get into much trouble. Terrible scandals are at present affecting the RC Church with the disclosure of the sexual abuse of children. Remember what the Bible says: ‘Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge’ (Heb 13:4). A happy loving marriage is the answer to temptation to immorality.

Polygamy←⤒🔗

Polygamy was widely practised in Old Testament times. The first case recorded is that of wicked Lamech: ‘And Lamech took unto him two wives: the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other Zillah’ (Gen 4:19). Marriage was never meant to be so. For the hardness of hearts it was allowed but it brought many problems as we can see in the lives of Sarah and Hagar, of Rachel and Leah, and of Hanna and Peninnah. Jesus makes plain that a marriage should only be between one man and one woman: ‘And he (Jesus) answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder’ (Mt 19:4-6). Two are made one flesh but not three or four made one flesh. God made man male and female and there is no room for the abomination of so called ‘Gay marriage’.

Divorce←⤒🔗

Marriage is meant to be for life. Jesus’ words in the same passage just quoted make that plain: ‘What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder’ (Mt 19:6). This verse tells us the amazing truth that God is actively present at every marriage, not just the marriages of His people. He performs the marriage. He means that marriage to last. God hates divorce because it is an undoing of His work. ‘He hateth putting away’ (Mal 2:16).