…#$%^&$$*% Idea…When We Don’t Do It God’s Way!
S:
Ephesians 3:8-9
When it came to presenting the Message to people who had no background in God’s way, I was the least qualified of any of the available Christians. God saw to it that I was equipped, but you can be sure that it had nothing to do with my natural abilities.
And so here I am, preaching and writing about things that are way over my head, the inexhaustible riches and generosity of Christ. 9 My task is to bring out in the open and make plain what God, who created all this in the first place, has been doing in secret and behind the scenes all along.
(Message)
O:
If we stop and think about it, at the time of Christ’s death and for many years after, this idea of Christianity was an incredibly …strange (???) idea, especially to those who had taken great comfort in the knowledge that they were the “chosen ones”. How could God decide to change the rules like this? Paul is here assuring the all of his readers, those whom he refers to as insiders and outsiders (cf. Eph 3:6) that this was the original plan from before the foundations of the world. Paul also acknowledges that he was one of the least likely to be chosen for the spreading of this message. He was one of the most zealous Jews of his day, and to be educated to the point where he becomes the primary spokesperson for this new faith system, was beyond his ability to comprehend before his “experience”. How does marriage fit into all of this?
A:
Why on earth would God think that marriage was a good idea? How are we supposed to transition from a single life where we have been learning to stand on our own, think for ourselves, make our own decisions, with lesser and lesser input from our parents, all with the view of becoming an independent individual? Then we are to become connected with another individual who has been learning to be independent and make decisions on their own, and now we are supposed to learn to communicate with each other, talk about combined direction and goals, and make decisions that we are both in favour of pursuing.
In order to answer these questions, we have to do some background research. We need to start in the book of Genesis where we see God laying out the first steps. Adam and Eve are the first couple and we read pronouncing that it was not good for man (read mankind) to be alone…that companionship and communication was a important component to living life. Note: I am not saying that singles are not living life just because they are not married; please keep reading…
Trinitarian communication…God knew from experience inside the Godhead how much more rewarding existence could be when there is communication between equals who were committed to each other for the duration; not that union and communication make an individual better, or more complete, just that permanent union and communication with another human being add a depth of joy to every day life that is difficult to conceive when it is not experienced.
God’s omniscience…If we believe in the all-knowingness of God in one arena, are we not obligated to believe in it in another arena. Here’s the deal…if we trust that God knew what he was doing in creating Eve, and uniting her with Adam, and His statement about their union being good, then we also have to believe in and trust in God’s wisdom in helping us find a mate to begin with. However, too often, months or years into our marriage, we start to question our marriage based on a difficult day, or week, or decision, which leads us to question the whole marriage. We begin believing the lie that we married the wrong person, rather than believing the truth that no individual is our ‘perfect’ mate; that any individual is going to be difficult match and will require work, and effort and constant communication. We have to believe that God knew what he was doing when he introduced the two of us to each other in the first place. We have to believe that that decision was the correct one, and that trying to end a marriage is seldom the correct one.
P:
Lord, help us to commit to working on our current situation, rather than dreaming about and pursuing a new one. Amen.