“The Covenant of Marriage”
Text
Genesis 15:9-18
Illustration
“A young minister was preparing for his first wedding ceremony that he had ever performed. The young minister was a nervous wreck and asked an older minister what to do if he messed up. The older minister said that if you forget what to say you can always quote scripture to fill in. So, as the young minister performed the wedding ceremony he said “I now pronounce you husband and wife” and then for some reason his mind went blank. So he remembered what the older minister said and he started to quote scripture saying “Lord forgive them for they know not what they do”.
Marriage Statistics
Hebrew 13:4 “Marriage is honorable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.”
1.) Households headed by unmarried people living together have quadrupled since 1970.
2.) According to recent polls, 73% of Americans, under the age of 45, believe that live spent with the same partner is both unusual and unnecessary.
3.) Six out of ten children live in a single parent household.
4.) One out of three marriages end in a divorce.
In America every 24 hours:
1.) 3,000 children see their parents divorced.
2.) 1,629 children are put in adult jail.
3.) 3,228 children run away from home
4.) 1,512 children drop out of school.
When commitment breaks down, so do families and marriages.
Marriages vs. Biblical Covenants
A.) We can read in the text God and Abraham entered into a covenant. We can also see that this biblical covenant is very similar to a marriage covenant between a man and a woman.
· God called Abraham to leave his land, his home country and to be willing to go wherever He wanted him to go.
· God changed Abram’s name to Abraham.
· There was an exchange made between God and Abraham to signify the covenant. God gave Abraham land and Abraham was circumcised.
· The children or descendents received the inheritance which was the land.
B.) We can clearly see that both covenants that where performed were done in the presence God. Even if we went back to ancient wedding ceremonies that did not believe in the one true God they still performed it before their pagan gods. Because in biblical times a very unique ceremony took place between a man and a women when they got married.
The fathers of the couples would take cows, sheep, birds, goats, and would cut them in half and put them ten feet apart. The couple would then walk bare foot through the bloody path saying with their actions, “May I pay with my life if this covenant is broken”. We can see that this and Abraham’s ceremony was almost identical. Therefore seeing that each ceremony was done with life long commitment and seen as a sanctified covenant unto God.
C.) Just as God entered into a covenant with Abraham, we need to also see and treat our marriage in that same regards, as a covenant. I hope that all of us including myself will always see marriage as a covenant that cannot be broken and that is sanctified by God Himself.
Deuteronomy 23:21-23
D.) In the beginning of our wedding the pastor started by saying, “Dearly beloved we are gathered together here in the sight of God, To join together here this man and woman in holy matrimony”. We made vows not only to each other but we made vows before God promising to fulfill the marital covenant every single day that live.
Not Only Conducted Before God…
A.) Not only did you make a covenant before God but also before witnesses. Just as the couple walked through the blood soaked soil, people watched. If two leaders that are against each other made a covenant there would be people there to watch. Why? This is so that the people that made the covenant could never deny that it never happened. Jesus stressed the importance of witnesses in Matthew 18:16.
Matthew 18:16 “But if he will not hear thee(or if he will not listen) then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.”
B.) Before you get married you have to sign a marriage certificate before your pastor and two witnesses. Then they sign the certificate as well. A
Pastor was challenged when a man came to him and said he was leaving his wife after six years of marriage. The pastor said, “Oh, no, your not. You made a vow to love your wife until death! I was there and I heard you make that vow the pastor said. Now you stay with her and work things out. He did and they are still married.
In Russia, the best man in a wedding must sign the marriage register guaranteeing that the union will last at least six months or he’ll pay a fine of 150 rubles.
Till Death Do Us Part
A.) Marriage vows can’t be broken. Till death do us part. It’s not like a car or different items that your able to trade in when you are tired of the one you have, it’s a covenant that is kept until you take your last breath.
Matthew 19:6 “Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder”.
Keeping Your Marriage Fresh
A.) Just as the old saying goes, “If you keep courting in your marriage, you will keep your marriage out of court.” Just as Abraham laid his sacrifices before the Lord, he still had to work hard to make sure the vultures didn’t destroy his covenant. We too have to work hard that we keep a fresh and lively marriage and if we see something that may influence a marriage in the wrong direction then we must work hard to take care of the problem right away.
B.) Panel of Women debated on what they thought was a perfect man, a guy who was ‘with it’. You would have thought they would have decided upon some actor or athlete even a wealthy tycoon. They decided that the perfect man was MR POTATO HEAD. 4 Reasons: ‘He’s tan, he’s cute, he knows the importance of accessorizing, and if he looks at another girl you can rearrange his face.
We need to make sure that we keep the lust and passion directed toward our spouse’s. We need to make sure that no matter how long we have been married that the fire will always be there for your spouse. I once heard a preacher say that lust is not when a guy is driving in a car and he passes a woman walking down the side walk but lust is when he drives around the block several times to get a better look at her.
C.) Make sure that there is always romance in your marriage. Don’t be ashamed to hold hand walking down the sidewalk or through the store. Let people see you open the door for your wife as she gets in the car. Let each other always be reminded by each action that you still mean the world to me.
Show Children What A Godly Marriage Consist Of
A.) A couple of kids were in their attic reading old letters their parents had written years ago. The boy said to the girl: "These aren’t the names they call each other now."
B.) We as parents need to make sure that we show are children what a Godly marriage consist of. They to some day will be bringing some gorilla home wanting the fathers blessings or some gal home that will annoy their father by the non-stop jabbering. They need to see that love is always there and felt as a family and that there is a unique but special love that they can always see in their mom and dad.
What’s A Argument?
A.) One Sunday a minister was finishing up a series on marriage. At the end of the service he was giving out small wooden crosses to each married couples. He said, "Place this cross in the room in which you fight the most and you will be reminded of God’s commands and you won’t argue as much." One woman came up after the service and said, "You’d better give me five."...
Ephesians 4:26 “Be angry and sin not: let not the sun go down on your wrath. (anger)”
B.) I can recall a couple times that Nicole and I had a disagreement and we went to bed still feeling hostile towards each other. It made us both feel so bad that we woke up in the middle of the night and said we were sorry. The cords of love may sometimes feel tension but they are never supposed to be broken.
Men’s Ignorance & A Wife’s Tolerance
THE MEN’S THESAURUS (men don’t always say what they mean) – excerpts:
When a man says "CAN I HELP WITH DINNER"
He means: "Why isn’t it already on the table?"
When a man says "UH HUH, SURE HONEY,” or “YES, DEAR"
He means: Absolutely nothing – It’s a conditioned response.
When a man says ’’IT WOULD TAKE TOO LONG TO EXPLAIN"
He means: "I have no idea how it works"
When a man says "TAKE A BREAK, HONEY. YOU ARE WORKING TOO HARD’’
He means: "I can’t hear the game over the vacuum cleaner"
When a man says ’THAT’S INTERESTING DEAR.’
He means: "Are you still talking?"
When a man says "YOU KNOW HOW BAD MY MEMORY IS."
He means: " I can remember the vehicle identification numbers of every car I ever owned – but I forgot your birthday"
When a man says “I HEARD YOU.”
He means: "I haven’t the foggiest clue what you just said and I am hoping desperately that I can fake it well enough so that you’ll not spend the next 3 days yelling at me."
When a man says "YOU KNOW I COULD NEVER LOVE ANYONE ELSE"
He means: "I am used to the way you yell at me and realize it could be worse."
When a man says "I’M NOT LOST. I KNOW EXACTLY WHERE WE ARE.’’
He means: : "No one will ever see us alive again."
B.) There are so many times when I come home that I just want to crash. I don’t want to eat, talk or listen, I just want to drop dead. But that is the very time that your wife wants to ask you a 1,000 questions and wants you to remodel the house. A wife can take all day to clean the house and us men can destroy it in less than 5 minutes.
C.) Women sometimes don’t realize how tired we men are at times, but we men neglect to appreciate the love they come home too. Wife’s care about how your day went. They want to show that they love you by keeping the house clean and by making sure dinner is made and sometimes that kind of love that is shown is over looked to often. We need to make sure that we love when we feel to tired to love. To smile and laugh when you feel like a volcano is about to erupt inside of you.
In Closing
Ephesians 5:22-25
Martin Luther, the famous Protestant Reformer once said, "Let the wife make her husband glad to come home, and let him make her sorry to see him leave."
