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The Rev. Dr. Dennis E. Morey, Pastor
Scripture: Mark 10:2-16
Husbands, Wives, and Children
Today’s sermon is about husbands, wives and children. I know you already have your mind made up about the subject of marriage and divorce and how to raise children. There may not be much that is going to change your mind.
Each of us somehow learns to cope with the brokenness of relationships. These days we have come to expect brokenness as part of life. We see the human heart as incapable of doing anything but making a mess out of relationships. We lament with the prophet Jeremiah, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jeremiah 17:9, King James Version)
We fear the days when our children begin to date, because we know there is trouble and heartache and that it will most likely end badly. We know that half the marriages fail. That means it doesn’t matter who walks down the aisle and what words they repeat, the marriage has as good a chance at failing as it has at succeeding.
Several denominations, including the Presbyterians, have argued about homosexuality over the past thirty years and pretty much ignored the issue of divorce.
Jesus said nothing about homosexuality, but clearly addressed divorce and we ignore his teachings altogether.
We say marriage is more than a legal agreement; it is serious business. We tell young people that marriage is joining your life to the life of another person, making vows of commitment in the presence of God. Yet when it comes to dissolving the marriage it is strictly the business of the couple, their lawyers, and finally a judge issuing an order. The church and what God says has nothing to say about it. Half of those who walk down the aisle with a heart full of love and big plans for the future will end in court. And 85 percent of those who live together before getting married will end up apart.
We continue to fail to understand the nature of relationships.
Set aside for a moment what you think about marriage and divorce and what you allow or don’t allow on that subject. Let’s look at the practice of marriage and divorce that Jesus is addressing. These religious men, Pharisees, those who practiced keeping the letter of the law, had a question for Jesus.
“What do you say? Can a man divorce his wife?”
Jesus said, “Well, let’s start with Moses’ teachings, since the law is your point of reference. What did Moses say?”
“Moses gave a man permission to divorce his wife.”
Jesus replied, “Let’s examine the reason for that permission. The reason for that permission was to deal with the problem of your hardheartedness. Hardhearted husbands were simply leaving their wives without giving a reason, and women were left not knowing what went wrong.
“The bill of divorce was to state clearly what reason the man saw for leaving his commitment. Then the woman knew she was free to marry another. Divorce happened because you could not or would not get it. This whole idea of marriage is about what your creator intended in the beginning when you were made male and female.
“For the cause of marriage a man rearranges his whole relationship base, leaving his father and mother, and reorganizes his life to cleave, or to become glued in purpose to the person God has made as his mate. Together the two of them become one in purpose.”
We hear that idea today at the end of the marriage ceremony when the pastor says, “I now pronounce you husband and wife.” That means that in this relationship the primary aim of this man is to be this woman’s husband, and the primary aim of this woman is to be this man’s wife. The two of them are called by God to build a life together.
That is what God intended. When that happens, divorce is not a possibility. Jesus is defending Moses, not divorce. Moses had to deal with the determined brokenness of relationships. Moses had to deal with men who wanted someone else to be their wife. Moses had to deal with women who were being deserted not knowing what they did to offend their husband. Moses’ law made the men say what it was that caused the breakdown of the relationship God intended.
Today we have all kinds of reasons Christians say they divorce their mate.
“We just look at life differently.”
“We have grown apart.”
“I’m just not in love anymore”
“I am just too hurt to go on.”
“We don’t share the same life-goals.”
“She just doesn’t like being married.”
“He has changed.”
“The Lord is calling us in different directions. Staying together is really just holding us back from what God wants us to be.”
We forget that the scriptures teach us God’s idea is that the marriage, the relationship between the husband and wife, is to take precedence over what either of them, independent of what the other, may “want.”
The marriage relationship was more important than the personal happiness of either party. Personal happiness is just that, personal happiness. If personal happiness is the life goal, then that person should stay single.
Joining your life to the life of another person will include many times you will have to set aside your personal happiness for the good of the marriage.
The marriage relationship must take precedence over all other human relationships. It must take precedence over our relationship with our parents.
In Jesus’ culture a man was born a son and would remain primarily a son until his parents were dead. By that time he was a father and his children were seen as his most important human relationship.
A man was never “married” to a woman; that is, he never saw himself as primarily a husband. A woman was born a daughter and would remain a daughter until she married. Then she became a wife with her husband as the central focus of her life.
The culture had men who considered themselves a son, married to women who considered themselves a wife.
That was not what God intended. Was it any wonder there would be trouble in that relationship?
Jesus quoted not only Moses, but the story of Adam and Eve with the words of Adam, “For this reason, shall a man leave his father and mother and shall cleave unto his wife and the two shall be one.” Cultivating and enjoying the marriage relationship is life’s highest goal, there was no higher calling, or greater joy.
I think it is interesting that Mark, the Gospel writer, puts this about children right after Jesus’ treatise on divorce.
People were bringing their children to Jesus and the disciples tried to shoo them away.
When
Jesus noticed this, he was angry and said to his disciples, “Let the
children come to me, and do not stop them, because the Kingdom of God
belongs to such as these. I assure you that whoever does not
receive the Kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.”
Then he took the children in his arms, placed his hands on each of
them, and blessed them. (Mark
10:14-16, Good News Translation)
Jesus believed children were important. Jesus wanted his followers to consider children, and went so far as to say that, unless we trust God with childlike faith, we can’t be a part of God’s Kingdom.
We know how much we depend on God. Can we see that children depend on us much the same way and trust us to do what is good for them, like arranging for them to meet Jesus?
Instead of turning the children away, the disciples should have been encouraging parents to bring their children so they could meet Jesus.
Do we understand as parents it is our privilege to make arrangements for our children to meet Jesus and get to know him?
Do we have any idea the scope of our responsibility as parents and grandparents? Do we understand that part of the purpose for which God has arranged us to have a relationship with these family members is so that we can all grow closer to God because of those relationships?
What is wrong with our world today? I would be so brave as to state that it has been the breakdown of what God intended the family to be that is at the root of every problem we face as a nation and a planet.
If you want to build fewer prisons, you have to build stronger marriages and stronger children. We somehow think that we can just let relationships happen and then we will work on mending the broken people.
If you want to build better schools, you have to build stronger marriages and stronger children.
If you want to get rid of gangs, and I understand there are two now in Ottumwa and they are edging our way, if they aren’t already here. If you don’t want gangs to happen, you have to build stronger marriages and stronger children.
If you want to reduce teenage pregnancies, keep kids away from drugs of which alcohol is the biggest offender and easiest to get, you have to build stronger marriages and stronger children.
If you want to reduce corruption in the government, we have to build stronger marriages and stronger children.
If you want a stronger work force and more capable professionals, we have to build stronger marriages and stronger children.
Regardless of what the problem we face, it could either be greatly reduced or stamped out entirely if we built stronger marriages and stronger children.
That will happen only if we turn to God’s word and learn what God had in mind when God designed us.
We are designed to live in a primary relationship with the husband or wife God has designed for us, and from that relationship all other relationships are to blossom and finally produce the fruit of other good relationships.
We won’t get that unless we are busy studying God’s word and learning what God is trying to teach us. That is why I am calling for every person in this congregation, every member, to be a part of some kind of Bible Study. There are now seven opportunities offered and the possibility of others if none of those suit your schedule.
We are not going to make it. This world is going to collapse before our children and grandchildren are adults. We are handing them a mess, because we have neglected to study God’s Word.
Today is World Communion Sunday. Next week we will be walking on the CROP walk for hunger both in our world and in this community. Take a look around. There are so many needs and so few of us.
We are losing ground. There was a time forty years ago when the Presbyterians numbered four million; now we are two million. There are more Muslims in this country and their numbers are growing and the radical wings of that religion are calling for the collapse of our nation.
In the Muslim rally last week in Washington, D.C., one of the radical Muslim speakers said the White House will soon become Muhammad’s House.
What is happening? Christians today don’t study the Bible. It is seen as a dry book with obscure teachings. We don’t know what God’s Word says. We can’t argue for our faith. We don’t stand up for it because we are afraid we will be seen as intolerant, while there are those whose plan is to force their religion or their non-religion on us, and we will take it or we will be called intolerant.
In a few days someone will be calling on you, asking to meet with you to discuss the coming year’s church budget. I am sorry we have reduced the ministry of the church to how much money we will need, and I am sorry the Session has to take so much time in meetings trying to figure out how we can stretch the dollars to not exceed that budget.
These are days that we must not hold back. These are days we area called to give the church all the support we can possibly muster. These are the days that count, not only for this generation but for generations to come.
Unless we seriously commit ourselves to making time to study God’s Word, and seriously commit ourselves to being here to do ministry, and seriously commit ourselves to supporting the church with serious money, there is no hope.
These days we hear a lot about hope. I tell you this: the greatest hope lies in your making a decision to be serious about being a Christ-follower. The times aren’t going to get easier. The world our children and grandchildren grow up in will need every faithful decision we can produce today.
Some of you are thinking, “Husbands, wives and children? That part of my life is already past. My kids are grown. My grandkids are grown. I’m just waiting to die in my sleep. My work is done. I have no influence. Those days are gone.”
I tell you today, if you are alive, God has a job for you to do. Find out what it is and get busy.
There is a terrible urgency. Each one of us must realize the greatest hope husbands, wives, and children have today is sitting there in your clothes in your spot in the pew at this moment.
Amen.
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Mark 10:2-16 Then in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.” People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them. But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.” And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them. (From the
New Revised Standard Version of the
Bible) |
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