MARRIAGE, GOD’S DIVINE DESIGN-II

Genesis 2:18-25
Bob Bonner
February 22, 2004

A German proverb states, “If you want a good year, marry; if you want two, refrain!” When we look at the success rate of marriages in this State of Oregon, we can easily understand such cynicism about marriage. When more than half of all marriages begun in Josephine County alone end in divorce, we know that we have a serious problem on our hands. Yet, even in the midst of so many marriage disasters, there are still those few who seem to have a very happy, mutually satisfying and growing relationship in marriage. But they are the minority.

Why have so many who had dreams of a fulfilling marriage found their dreams shattered and transformed into horrible nightmares? Why did that which began as “stars” in a young couple’s eyes later turn into sand? Answer: They either didn’t know the Divine Designer of Marriage and His instructions for a healthy marriage, or they ignored Him and His instructions.

This morning we want to pick up where we left off in our study of Genesis 2:18-25. We are going to continue our study of God’s divine design for marriage, His instructions for what He intended marriage to be.

First, I would like to take you back to Genesis 1:27 to make an important point. In this verse, God says something very interesting about His creation of us. We read, “And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” It’s very clear from this verse, that if one wants to begin to grasp the mystery of understanding who God is, one must study and understand both man and woman. Both man and woman are created by God, and together they reveal the mystery of who God is. If you fail to understand the roles of man and woman together, if you devalue or ignore either role, you will not correctly see or reflect to this world Who God is.

In Genesis 2:18-23, we begin to see God giving the unique role assignments for man and woman. These role assignments are clarified for us in the rest of Scripture. In 2:18-20, man or the male’s primary role is to “rule” or oversee the entire operations, so to speak. This is illustrated in his being created first and being given the responsibility to name the animals. This role of man reflects God’s attribute of sovereignty or right to rule.

In 2:18, 20, God describes for Adam that woman’s primary role in relationship to man is that she is to be a “helper suitable to him.” This term “helper” literally refers to one who “provides what is lacking for another.” As we learned last time, this term “helper” in no way expresses or is meant to point to wife’s role as being one of a second class citizen. Woman is not to be treated by man as his “errand girl” or private slave. She is not the only one to change diapers, wash clothes, cook or clean up after a meal. Those are both man and woman’s responsibilities.

When God brings woman to man, he describes her as a “helper suitable for him”. God uses the same Hebrew term to describe Himself as “helper” God.

Of the twenty times this term “helper” is used in the Old Testament, 17 times God uses it to refer to Himself. As it refers to God Himself, it points to God’s role in assisting us to do things we cannot do for ourselves.

Just as man’s role as a “ruler” illustrated God’s attribute of sovereignty, woman’s role as “helper” illustrates God’s attribute of mercy. “Mercy” is voluntarily helping or coming to the aid of one who is unable to help himself. Mercy is not coming to the aid of one who refuses to help himself, or is lazy, or unwilling to learn how to perform a chore. That is not mercy. “Mercy” is voluntarily helping or coming to the aid of one who is unable to help himself.

We were unable to save ourselves. It had nothing to do with us not trying hard enough to earn God’s favor. We can never earn God’s favor or make our own sin go away. That’s why God, out of His mercy, His “helper” role, provided us with a Savior.

When woman fulfills her God-ordained role as a “helper” to her husband, she is fulfilling God’s assigned role in the man’s life. It is the role God would play in a man’s life if God were human. Woman is God’s tailor-made representative in that relationship to complete the man. Women, your role is God-ordained, distinct from a man’s by God’s design, uniquely important. Don’t let anyone ever tell you it isn’t. God thought so much of what a woman’s role is, he called his Church his Bride.

There are many today who want to confuse these roles and say that men and women are the same and not uniquely different. Yes, women have many similarities to men, but they are distinctly different mentally, emotionally and physically. Dr. James Dobson has explained this well documented fact that men and women are more uniquely different than just the physical roles they play in producing children. He writes, “An effort has been underway for the past few years to prove that men and women are identical, except for the ability to bear children. Radical feminists have vigorously (and foolishly) asserted that the only distinction between the sexes is culturally and environmentally produced. Nothing could be farther from the truth; males and females differ biochemically, anatomically, and emotionally. In truth, they are unique in every cell of their bodies, for men carry a different chromosomal pattern than women. There is considerable evidence to indicate that the hypothalamic region, located just above the pituitary gland in the midbrain, is "wired" very uniquely for each of the sexes. Thus, the hypothalamus (known as the seat of the emotions) provides women with a different psychological frame of reference than that of men. Further, female sexual desire tends to be somewhat cyclical, correlated with the menstrual calendar, whereas males are acyclical. These and other features account for the undeniable fact that masculine and feminine expressions of sexuality are far from identical. Failure to understand this uniqueness can produce a continual source of marital frustration and guilt.¹

Another authority, Dr. Joyce Brothers, in her book “What Every Woman Should Know About Men”, confesses that she was astounded to find the differences between men and women to be so vast. She devotes an entire chapter to the differences between men's and women's brains. She cites repeated evidence to prove that, although male and female brains are made up of two basic parts, a left and a right hemisphere, the function for each sex is quite different.

Simply put, a man's brain operates specifically, while a woman's operates wholistically. The right hemisphere of a man's brain can and does operate without the left being involved, and vice versa. A woman's brain, however, uses and integrates both hemispheres simultaneously. Thus, a man can give more focused attention to his work or project, while his wife can be tuned in to everything around her. This makes her more perceptive of people and their feelings than her husband is, and it enables her, especially if she is a mother, to know what is going on in every part of the house at once.²

As a pastor, I am extremely thankful that I am married. My wife is tuned into things that I am oblivious to. She has the ability to read between the lines when someone else is speaking. She hears intent when I only hear words. She has had a sixth sense that something was wrong in another room, when I am not aware that there is even another room! In a very real sense, my ministry is not just my ministry. It is our ministry. And she would tell you the same about her ministry. She would tell you that I can pick up details or organize a train of thought in a way that better communicates her objectives. We are tailor-made for each other, ruler and helper.

Why God chose to create us this way and to assign the roles He has to men and women, only He knows. But together, they are a team that together portrays the mystery of Who God is. How arrogant of us to become exasperated with our roles and our mates when we ask the question, “Why can’t you be more like me?” when it has been God’s intent all along to design us uniquely different from one another. To demean or ignore or devalue either the role of a husband or the role of a wife, or to raise up one role as more important than the other is to give a distorted picture of Who God is.

A second observation about marriage that is held true throughout the Scriptures is that it was God’s divine design for marriage to be made up of one man to one woman. Nowhere in the Bible do you ever see God speak positively or encourage polygamy. Or to put it another way, God always speaks of polygamy as being evil.

The only place that God encouraged a married man to have sex with another person besides the man’s wife, was in the Old Testament when a brother died leaving his widow childless. And then, the sole purpose for those two to get together was to help her have a son who when grown could take care of his mother. If that second woman, the sister-in-law, never bore a son, then it was the brother-in-law’s responsibility to provide for and look after her. But that second woman, the sister-in-law, was never deemed to be that man’s wife. And furthermore, after she gave birth to a son, or if someone else came along to marry her that was the end of their intimacy.

In addition, it is obvious from reading Genesis 2 that Adam knew that none of the animals were fit or suitable to be his counterpart. Elsewhere in Scripture, God clearly condemns bestiality.

Neither did God create man’s “suitable helper” to be a male. He did not create “Adam and Steve” but Adam and Eve. Hence, homosexuality is not a part of God’s divine design for marriage. God’s divine design for marriage never included two men or two women making up a marriage couple. The world can call them a homosexual couple, but never in God’s view, the One who authored and designed marriage, did He ever consider the joining together of the two same sex people a legitimate marriage.

In the New Testament, there is one term that was used not only in the Bible but elsewhere in Greek literature for sexual perversions. When this term is used, it is used inclusively to refer to the sexual evil practices of premarital sex, adultery, homosexuality, bestiality, and pedophilia. The term in Greek is “pornea” the word from which we get our word, pornography. Clearly, when Jesus is talking about marriage, three times in the Gospel of Matthew alone He speaks of things such as homosexuality, bestiality, premarital sex, adultery and pedophilia as being evil. They were never part of God’s Divine Design for marriage. In 23 other places, this same word, “pornea” is used to speak of these perversions as evil actions, standing in stark contrast to a proper sexual union between a man and woman in marriage.

And I am not even including the other forms of this word, translated as “whoremonger”, “fornicator”, “harlot” or the various verb forms, that all refer to the same thing and God’s displeasure with them. If you want to add those other verb forms and nouns that come from the same root word, “pornea” in as statements whereby God clearly sees homosexuality, bestiality, adultery and pedophilia as evil and never to be a part of marriage or lifestyle, you would have to throw in an additional 30 occurrences in the New Testament alone. I didn’t have the time to count all the Old Testament references.

What’s the point? In this day and age, don’t ever let someone buffalo you into accepting adultery, homosexuality, bestiality or pedophilia as an alternative lifestyle, as something God ordained or as something good and healthy for the individual or society. Don’t ever accept their twisting of Scripture to say things like, “God is love and tolerant of all people therefore we should all be tolerant of different people’s tastes.” It is true that God is love and tolerant of people. But He is not tolerant of what He clearly defines as sin and perversion. In the Old Testament, sexual perverts were condemned to death, not glamorized or given their own TV shows. God’s Word clearly shows that those lifestyles are a perversion and harmful to the individual and society. As far as God is concerned, all sex outside of marriage is forbidden, wrong and sin.

Turn with me to Genesis 2:24. Let’s read these verses and make a few more observations about marriage. We read, “For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.”

First of all, what is “this cause” that v. 24 points to? The context here, as in the four contexts where this verse or part of it is repeated in the New Testament, is marriage. It can refer to nothing but a marriage. God’s cause for creating man and woman is that they would make a team, that a man and woman would be married. And that together, they would in their marriage enjoy and glorify God together as they served together with God.

Second, from Whom do these instructions ultimately come? God. Now this may be real obvious to some of you, but I will guarantee you that to the majority of your non-Christian friends, this is not obvious. The fact that God created man and woman, and gives them these instructions for bringing them together reveals that from the beginning God is the author of marriage. Marriage is not some sociological institution created by human beings to selfishly protect their lovers from being stolen by someone else! Marriage is a divine and purposeful creation of God. And because marriage was created by God, He, more than anyone, knows best as to how it should function.

Therefore since the context of Genesis 2 is God’s instructions about His purpose for creating man and woman and His institution of marriage, we can make these further deductions: First, marriage is sacred. What do we mean by “sacred”? Sacred simply means that marriage, the joining together of man and woman, is something special, holy, or set apart from every other relationship between people, and thus it is to be protected, not to be taken lightly or discarded as something culturally out of date.

Keep in mind, the creation of marriage took place before there ever was a culture. Furthermore throughout Israel’s Old Testament history, that nation observed many cultures come and go, but God’s institution and guidelines for marriage never changed. When we get to the New Testament, Jesus underscores at that time and forevermore, that God’s guidelines for marriage are not to change. Marriage is not some cultural, ancient non-relevant fossil of ages past to be ignored. Marriage is a divine institution, with specific instructions as to how it is to function. It is sacred and not open to discussion as to how we may want to change it.

Probably the most important observation that can be made about marriage from this passage has to do with the make up of those involved in marriage. Most people believe that marriage is made up of a two party team, a husband and wife. But it is not. When you look at God’s creation of the earth and placing man and woman in the garden to work with the Lord on the earth, you realize that God intended Himself to be an integral and important part of the team. God was not just working with them as individuals, but as a couple as well. Hence, if a marriage is ever going to be fulfilling to each individual, one must recognize that it takes three to have a successful marriage. Marriage has always been designed to be a three party team , with the third person, God, the Creator of marriage, being the coach of that team.

Suppose we have a couple who meet and fall in love. Usually there is something that initially draws them together, like a common interest in school, a hobby, a career or sport. Let’s say they are students and they meet in medical school, and both are passionate about the field of medicine. In the beginning of their courtship they study together, compare notes and maybe get assigned to work on the same project or patient. Over time, this common interest in medicine and the curiosity of learning about the other’s past history are enough to keep them enjoying and attracted to one another. So, one thing leads to another and they get married.

After a year or two of being married, the mundaneness of life sets in. The monthly paying of the bills, balancing of the checkbook, the grocery shopping, the late work schedules, the interruptions of one’s plans due to surprise car and house repairs, and the other normal irritabilities of life. Throw in a child or two and suddenly the emotional, financial and relational stress of raising a family, keeping careers going and caring for one’s possessions begins to eat away at the freedom and romance of the earlier years.

It is at this point that the inevitable question arises in every relationship once the honeymoon is over: Are those original common interests that drew them together in the first place enough to keep them together when the normal stresses of life attack their marriage? Is there any of that passion left that they felt toward one another in the beginning? That passion that drew them together and forbade others from keeping them apart? Or has that emotional bond been killed by the friction, lack of communication and grudges people commonly hold against one another in their relationship when it hits the normal bumps in the road?

Typically, the passion evaporates and the common interests are no longer enough to keep them together. And this is one of the major reasons why we are seeing so much disinterest with one's spouse, say 5-10 years into their marriage. In the end, unless a miracle takes place, that marriage will eventually lead to divorce, in these easy-to-divorce days.

But why are not the common interests, whether they be work, children, favorite activities not enough to keep a marriage together during tough times? The answer should be obvious. We logically reason that a person can enjoy an interest or hobby he or she had before they got married just as easily as they can after a divorce. Therefore if the pressures and stress of married life become too uncomfortable, people typically bail on their marriages and seek after that which brings them more ease, pleasure and comfort.

The only thing that can keep a marriage growing and together is the will or powerful influence of a third very interested party, that is stronger than either the husband’s or wife’s will. This third party must win the confidence of both the husband and wife, and prove that this third party is wiser and genuinely concerned about their best interests. And that third party is God. When a husband and wife know and love Jesus Christ, His love for them will protect their marriage and grant them the supernatural glue that can hold them together when they feel like they are falling apart.

Allow me to demonstrate how the love for God and the love of God is the only ingredient that can keep a marriage growing together even in the most difficult of times.

Let's say that we have two people who have independently discovered that God really does loves them----that He sent Jesus Christ to be their savior and Lord. As a result, they individually submit their lives to His leadership and commit to obeying Jesus as the coach over their individual lives.

Then let's assume that The Coach drafts these two individuals to play on the same team called marriage. In this marriage team each player wants more than anything else in this world to please the coach first and to get to know Him better. As each player draws closer to the Coach in his or her own personal relationship with the Coach, as they learn to follow His instructions for their lives as individuals, what happens to their marriage? They draw closer together. His will, His influencing and enabling power, and His love for them, and their commitment to Him keeps them together and draws them closer even in the midst of difficult times.

For instance, I remember those times in the earlier years of our marriage, when we first had children. I felt that I had lost my wife, or worse, I had been replaced by the children, as being number one in my wife’s life. I remember the jealousy I felt of her care for these babies and never having a wide awake energetic person to share my life with. I felt I was always handed the leftovers. My wife was doing nothing wrong, by the way. That was just a season of marriage and family most couples experience, and you work through it. But I didn’t know that at the time. I was feeling sorry for myself, and found myself becoming more grouchy and bitter.

At those times, I don’t know what husbands and wives do who don’t know Jesus. I know what we did. Individually and sometimes together we prayed and asked the Lord to show us what He would have us to do. We also expressed to Him, that if it was going to be a hard assignment, something that we were not naturally capable of doing, something that went against our personality, then He had better supernaturally empower us to fulfill that assignment as a husband or wife, or we would be in trouble trying to do it on our own.

As I daily continued to seek the Lord during that time, He not only supernaturally enabled me to love my wife and kids, but He kept that jealousy, selfishness and grouchiness under control. Furthermore, He taught me lessons about what real true love is; lessons that I had yet to learn or put into practice. The good news is that the normal stresses and pressures of life didn’t send me or Becky to the brink of divorce. Instead as we continued to seek the Lord and obey Him fully in what he told us to do, He drew us closer together as well.

The Lord designed marriage so that He would not just be involved, but He is to be the center of each marriage. He is the glue that keeps the marriage together. He is like the third strand in a braided string. Did you know that it is impossible to make a braided rope or to braid hair and only have two strands? When only two strands are used, they quickly unravel. The third strand, though not immediately evident, keeps the strands tightly woven together. So it is with God's presence in a marriage. Marriage was never intended by God to involve just two people. He created marriage to be a three party team with Him as the coach. His welcomed involvement is what keeps a marriage growing intimately through the years.

¹ Dr. James Dobson, What Wives With Their Husbands Knew About Women, p. 114

² Dr. Joyce Brothers, What Every Woman Should Know About Men, New York Ballantine books, 1981, pp. 293

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