“MARRIAGE IS HONORABLE” Heb 5:4)April 20^th, 2003

Int.      For many in our day, marriage and family life have become painfully unfulfilling.

1.         Physchologists, Psychiatrists, counselors, and sociologists inside and outside the church offer a massave library of suggestions and solutions.

2.         They have persuaded a few couples to stay together, but they have for the most part missed the mark on the home.

3.         No one needs to tell us that our generation may be watching the death of marriage and an attempt to do away with the family as we know it.

4.         There are a number of contributing factors to this problem.

            A.        Immorality, adultery, fornication, homosexuality, abortion, sterilization, women’s liberation, juvenile deliquency, crime, sexual rebellion and DRUGS.

I.       THE DURATION OF A GOOD MARRIAGE. (Rom 7:2) 

          A.      BECAUSE MARRIAGE IS OF GOD. (GEN. 2:18-25)

                        1.         (Gen 2:18) “And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.

                                    a.         The only real, true marriage (Home) has to be a Christian home.

                        2.         Since God is the Author, inventor of marriage; HE WROTE THE BOOK ON HOW IT SHOULD BE RUN.

                                    Ill.       A local preacher said: “I am not an authority on marriage; I suggest you go and see a marriage counselor.” (Unsaved counselor? ? ?)

                        3.         (Rom 7:2) “For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband.”

                                    a.         Some apply the term law in this place to the Roman law, with which those addressed must have been acquainted; but it is well known that it was usual both for husbands and wives among the Romans to be married to other husbands and wives during the life of their former consorts, without being considered guilty of adultery.

            B.      PAUL GIVES THE PRESCRIPTION FOR A GOOD MARRIAGE: (Eph 5:25)

                    1.         The Christian husband should take nothing short of Christ for his model.

                        2.         A husband should love his wife with an enduring love, for nothing “shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

                        3.         A true husband loves his wife with a hearty love, fervent and intense. It is not mere lip-service.

                        4.         This agapao love will NEVER produce a chauvinist, dictator type husband. He will be a husband who will love his wife an unselfish, unconditional, sacrificial love .

                                    Note:  “Nobody is perfect until you fall in love with them.”

                        5.         1828 Noah Webster's American Dictionary: “Marriage—the act of uniting a man and woman for life... Marriage was instituted by God himself. . . . "Marriage is honorable in all. . . ."

II.      THE DANGERS FACING A GOOD MARRIAGE.

          A.       THE PROBLEM OF BREAKDOWNS IN THE HOME TODAY IS NOT A LACK OF INFORMATION (Actually, we know too much)

                        1.         We are drowning in a sea of marriage information.

                                    a.         Marriage seminars, marriage conferences, marriage encounters, marriage books, and marriage counselors.

                                    b.         We don’t need all these books. WE HAVE THE BOOK----”THE BIBLE.”

                                                Ill. ..    Man’s whose wife refuses to allow me to counsel them because she said: “I know what he’s going to say.”

                        2.         Barna Research: “Christians (professing) are more likely to divorce than non-Christians.”

            B.      TODAY’S MARRIAGES HAVE THREE THINGS WRONG WITH THEM.

                        1.         God is left out of our plans.

                                    a.         Love is spelled wrong.....”Lust”

                                    b.         In 1999, a record 1.3 million babies were born out of wedlock -- 30% of all births in that year.

                                    c.         (4-1-2001) Ellen Fein, co-author of "The Rules," a best-selling "how-to" book for women looking for a husband, announced she is getting a divorce -- on the eve of the release of her latest book, "The Rules III," subtitled, "Time-tested secrets for making your marriage work."

                        2.         Christ is left out of our plans. (No church attendance)

                                    a.         When Christ is not worshiped, the marriage will suffer.

                        3.         Financial Carelessness. (We have got to have the best of everything—we therefore have them at the expense of robbing God.

                        4.         The Federalists: "Unlike the families of the 1950s and '60s, new millennium families find themselves heading in a million different directions. Work schedules, after-school activities, television, computers, and church activities all compete for our time. Our homes sometimes feel like hotels with boarders waving to each other as they pass in the hallways."

                                    Ill.       The bride, upon getting engaged, went to her mother and said, "I've found a man just like daddy! " Her mother replied, "So what do you want from me, sympathy?"

                        5.         Baptist Press, 6/28/99 says: "That daily some 3,000 children see their parents' marriage end in divorce and that 40% of the children will go to bed in a home without a father." The Lord said: "What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.

                        6.         "Love has been described as a five-ring circus: First comes the telephone ring, then the engagement ring, then the wedding ring, then the teething ring, and after that the suffer-ring. "

                                    a.         When Adam's son asked why they didn't live in the Garden of Eden, he answered, "Your mother ate us out of house and home."

                        7.          On July 29, 1981 Britain's Prince Charles married his Lady Diana in a grand royal ceremony. The glamorous wedding was a fairy tale of present pomp and past glory, a last gold-leaf page from the tattered book of empire. London was a city dressed like a vast stage. Buses were painted with bows, and parks bloomed with Charles' royal crest outlined in precisely painted blossoms. Some 4,500 pots of flowers lined the wedding route.

Besides the happy couple, the audience included 26 prominent clerics, a congregation of 2,500 crowding each other for pew space under the great painted dome of St. Paul's Cathedral, more than 75 technicians manning 21 cameras, and an estimated worldwide television audience of 750 million.

Isn't it noteworthy that a glamorous wedding does not guarantee a great marriage?

III.    DESCRIPTION OF A GOOD MARRIAGE.

          A.      OUR EARTHLY HOME SHOULD BE MODELED AFTER OUR HEAVENLY HOME.

                    1.         In our heavenly home, righteousness dwells, holiness sanctifies, love reigns, perfect confidence and sympathy and harmony exist.

                                    a.         Epitaph: Here lies my darling husband, Walter. May he rest in peace until we meet again.

                        2.         Octavius Winslow said: “One unhappy temper, one unbending will, one unloving, unsympathizing heart may becloud and embitter the sunniest sweetest home on earth.”

                        3.         A beautiful blond senior shares: "When we date, we start giving gifts, like flowers or candy. When a couple becomes engaged, they give special things -- a diamond and very personal things. The most personal gift that I can ever give is myself. I have nothing more precious to give. When I marry, I want to give my husband the best that I have -- my whole self as completely as I can."  

            B.      CHRIST MAKES THE DIFFERENCE IN A MARRIAGE.

                        1.          In 1980 in the United States 1 out of 3 marriages ends in divorce. However, in a marriage where both people were married in a church, the divorce rate is 1 out of 50.

                        2.         In a marriage where the couple is married in a church, they attend church every Sunday, and they pray and read the Bible together, the divorce rate is 1 out of 1,105.

                        3.         Paul Harvey, 11/5/91 Sam Levison once said, "Love at first sight is nothing special. It's when two people have been looking at each other for years that it becomes a miracle."

            C.      A LOVING MARRIAGE WORKS BEST.

                        1.          BONN, Germany -- A German group of psychologists, physicians and insurance companies who cooperated on a research project, designed to find the secret to long life and success, made a surprising discovery. The secret? Kiss your wife each morning when you leave for work! The meticulous German researchers discovered that men who kiss their wives every morning have fewer automobile accidents on their way to work than men who omit the morning kiss. The good-morning kissers miss less work because of sickness and earn 20 to 30 percent more money than non-kissers. How do they explain their findings? According to West Germany's Dr. Arthur Szabo, "A husband who kisses his wife every morning begins the day with a positive attitude."

                        2.          Matthew Henry writes: "Eve was made by God not out of His head to rule over Him, nor out of His feet to be trampled upon by Him, but ou t of His side to be equal with Him, under His arm to be protected, and near His heart to be loved."

                        3.         Someone has said: “The key to a healthy marriage is to keep your eyes wide open before you wed -- and half closed thereafter."

                        4.         Adam and Eve had an ideal marriage. He didn't have to hear about all the men she could have married, and she didn't hear about how well his mother cooked.

IV.    THE DUTIES FOR A GOOD MARRIAGE.

          A.      THERE ARE SOME DUTIES FACING THOSE INTERESTED IN A GOOD MARRIAGE.

                        1.         Never be yoked to one who refuses to be yoked to Christ.

                        2.         A GOOD MARRIAGE , LIKE A GOOD GARDEN, REQUIRES A LOT OF ATTENTION.

                                    a.         There would be fewer divorces if the husband tried as hard to keep his wife as he did to get her.

                                    b.         A happy marriage is the union of two forgivers.

                                    c.         The world's greatest bargain is a happy marriage.

                                    d.         A young man prayed, "Lord give me a wife that loves Thee--for then I know she will love me."

                        3.         Someone has said: “Judging from some of the specimens they pick for husbands, no wonder brides blush.”

            B.      LOVE ONE ANOTHER FOR CHRIST SAKE.

                        Ill.       In counseling a couple:

                        1.         The pastor said: "The Bible says you're to love your wife as Jesus Christ loved the church."

                                    a.         He says, "Oh, I can't do that."

                        2.         The pastor says, "If you can't begin at that level, then begin on a lower level. You're supposed to love your neighbor as you love yourself. Can you at least love her as you would love a neighbor?"

                                    a.         The husband says, "No. That's still too high a level."

                        3.         The pastor says, "The Bible says, Love your enemies. Begin there."

Conclusion:   William Jay sums it up this way: "Let all who stand in the marriage relation be willing to know and practice duties which spring from it. Enter, my brethren and sisters, the temple of Revelation, and bow before the divine oracle. Say, Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do? Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth. Extract from the scripture the mind of God concerning yourselves individually. Take home the words I have been explaining. Do not, ye husbands, take away the duties of the wife, nor, ye wives, the duties of the husband, but both of you respectively your own, and say: "O that my feet were directed to keep thy statutes: I have chosen the way of truth; thy judgments have I laid before me: through thy precepts I get understanding, therefore I hate every false way: I have sworn, and I will perform it, that I will keep thy righteous judgments."