The Most Miserable Marriage Ever

“It is better to live in a corner of the housetop

than in a house shared with a quarrelsome wife.” [1]

Preachers often deliver sermons about marriage. When speaking of marriage, we preachers usually focus on speaking about what makes for a “happy” marriage. This is to be expected since the Bible speaks frequently of fulfilment in marriage. Elements ensuring fulfilment and contentment in marriage are emphasised repeatedly in the Word. That this is the case emphasises in a dramatic fashion how important marriage is in the eyes of the Lord God. As an aside of great significance, God instituted marriage between the man and the woman He created and placed in the Garden of Eden. God brought the woman to the man, and Adam was united to his wife. Marriage was designed to be between one man and one woman, united as one in service before the Living God.

Though many texts in the Word speak of a fulfilling marriage, the text before us this day speaks of a miserable marriage. In fact, this one brief verse may describe the most miserable marriage anyone could imagine. The text describes a marriage so miserable that it would be better for the man to live in a cramped corner that can be reached only with great difficulty than to share his house with a quarrelsome wife.

Often, the messages delivered from Christian pulpits address the responsibilities imposed on men by their relationship to the Lord Christ. That is not to imply that the Bible is silent concerning the responsibility women bear for making a happy marriage, but it is a frequent emphasis, especially in our modern world, to instruct men in how to be good husbands. The message before us this day steps aside from what is the more usual approach to speak of what a woman can do to make her husband miserable.

If I take my cue from commonly seen advertising, husbands are dolts and women are always wise. Candidly, any woman who marries a dolt who is incapable of thinking for himself reveals that she is not much of a judge of character. Appealing to the Word of God, we know that men are to be responsible to assume the burden of protecting their wives and their family. Men are responsible to provide for the necessities of their wives and the children whom God may send into the home. And sociological studies of this day reveal that women want to marry a man who is manly, accepting his responsibilities.

At the outset, it is appropriate that I make the rational observation that men are not women, and women are not men. We need one another in order to be complete. It is helpful to observe God’s statement when He created the woman, bringing her to the man whom He had created. Early in the first book of the Bible, we read, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make him a helper corresponding to him” [GENESIS 2:18 CSB]. The idea conveyed in the original text is that the woman whom the LORD made was not precisely like the man. She was his counterpart—strong where he was weaker and weak where he was stronger. Together, the man and the woman would constitute a strong whole, whereas neither would be as strong as possible when they were alone. I say, not to get a laugh, but to make a point, that God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.

That man and woman ideally correspond to one another in marriage, thus creating a new and stronger entity, becomes obvious when we witness the Preacher as he writes, “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up! Again, if two lie together, they keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone? And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken” [ECCLESIASTES 4:9-12].

God’s ideal of the union of a man and a woman united in marriage presents the divine conditions allowing for the strongest possible union. The union of the two is stronger than the component members can be alone. Marriage requires that a couple enters into the union of husband and wife with a biblical understanding if they ever hope to find the fulness God intended His people to have. I am not saying that singles can never have a full and satisfying life, but I am saying that the ideal presented in the Word of God is a man and a woman committed to one another in a union that excludes all other people. If that union is built on the foundation of Christ the Lord it will honour God and it will be sufficiently strong to weather the storms of life. And you may be assured that storms will come into every marriage! The two together will be stronger than either standing alone. To attempt to create something other than what God intended is to ensure sorrow and grief.