Biblical View of Marriage (wedding sermon)

The point: Reject all forms of marriage experimentation (group, trial, no marriage) and embrace God's design for monogamous marriage.

Martin cites popular magazines and books like 'The Open Marriage' to illustrate contemporary societal questioning of traditional marriage, setting up the need for a biblical defense.

I'm sure you're aware that the rightness and the validity of this is being questioned on, many hands in our own day. There are articles in all the popular magazines, Family Circle, Woman's Day, McCall, Life, etc., on the experiments done in group marriages, or in trial marriages, or in no marriages at all. The book The Open Marriage has been a bestseller. And the whole idea of what has transpired this morning is being brought into serious suspicion in our own generation. And when it is, we must ask the question, well, is there any validity to what we are doing? Is this just a tradition establi...

3:00 - 3:58 Read in full sermon

The point: Reject all forms of marriage experimentation (group, trial, no marriage) and embrace God's design for monogamous marriage.

He uses the analogy of a magnifying glass to explain how Genesis 2 provides a detailed, enlarged view of the creation of man and woman, which is briefly mentioned in Genesis 1.

there is printed a block of Scripture. And this is taken from the second chapter of Genesis, which, as it were, becomes a magnifying glass on the two verses of Genesis 1. Genesis 1 gives a record of the entire creation process, from the inanimate creation to the highest creature of God, man. Chapter 2 of Genesis becomes a magnifying glass that is held over verses 26 and 27, and God enlarges in detail how he created the man and woman of God. And I read now from the front of your order of worship, And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of...

4:56 - 6:00 Read in full sermon

The point: Husbands are to be loving, tender, protective, and providing heads, not tyrannical, reflecting how Eve was taken from Adam's rib.

Martin quotes an 'old commentator' who quaintly explains that Eve was taken from Adam's rib, close to his heart to be loved, and under his arm to be protected, illustrating the husband's loving headship.

God didn't take Eve from one of Adam's foot bones that he should trample on her. Nor did he take her from one of his head bones that she should rule in. But as one old commentator says so quaintly, God took one of Adam's ribs, close to his heart, to be loved, under his arm to be protected. And from the very place that God took the rib. You say, you believe that God... Yes. Sure I do. Sure I do. Of course I do. You got it better? Were you there? I wasn't there. God was. And when God tells me he anesthetized Adam and took a rib and from the rib made a woman, that's not hard for me to believe. If...

11:08 - 12:16 Read in full sermon

The point: Husbands are to be loving, tender, protective, and providing heads, not tyrannical, reflecting how Eve was taken from Adam's rib.

He uses the analogy of God speaking worlds and galaxies into being to argue that if God can do that, creating a woman from a rib is not difficult for Him to accomplish, reinforcing the literal truth of Genesis.

God didn't take Eve from one of Adam's foot bones that he should trample on her. Nor did he take her from one of his head bones that she should rule in. But as one old commentator says so quaintly, God took one of Adam's ribs, close to his heart, to be loved, under his arm to be protected. And from the very place that God took the rib. You say, you believe that God... Yes. Sure I do. Sure I do. Of course I do. You got it better? Were you there? I wasn't there. God was. And when God tells me he anesthetized Adam and took a rib and from the rib made a woman, that's not hard for me to believe. If...

11:08 - 12:16 Read in full sermon

Driving home: When you put two selfish people into the close proximity of the marriage relationship, it's like trying to have two planets move in the same order. One's got to give. And that's why marriage becomes a living hell. Becaus…

Martin references a David Susskind discussion on group sex and open marriage to illustrate how society's 'sophisticated' views on sex are actually manifestations of sinful nature, not progress.

Man took things into his own hands. Man took things into his own hands. And as a result, he has turned inward and become a selfish creature, corrupt in his affections, rebellious against the law and the will of God, so that when you turn to the scriptures, you find descriptions like this. Now apply it to marriage. Listen. The works of the flesh, that is, man in rebellion against God, are manifest, which are these. Adultery, fornication, uncleanness. Lasciviousness. What's the root of all the infidelity that is being now given as sort of a sophisticated thing? David Susskind recently, some of y...

16:12 - 16:57 Read in full sermon

Driving home: When you put two selfish people into the close proximity of the marriage relationship, it's like trying to have two planets move in the same order. One's got to give. And that's why marriage becomes a living hell. Becaus…

He compares putting two selfish people in marriage to 'trying to have two planets move in the same order,' illustrating the inevitable clash of self-centered interests that leads to marital hell.

The Scripture says they are the natural outcropping of man in his sinful condition. That's what it is. Jesus said, for from within, out of the heart of man proceed pride, foolishness, anger, and all of these other sins. This is the problem. When you put two selfish people into the close proximity of the marriage relationship, it's like trying to have two planets move in the same order. One's got to give. And that's why marriage becomes a living hell. Because two people who've turned inward upon a position and a perspective that is selfish and self-centered find their selfish interests clashing...

18:24 - 19:17 Read in full sermon

The point: Husbands are to love their wives selflessly, as Christ loved the church, even putting up with idiosyncrasies and altering habits to please their wives.

Martin uses the metaphor of marriage becoming 'a little miniature of a bloody battle on the sands of Iwo Jima' to vividly describe the destructive conflict in unredeemed marriages, contrasting it with the ideal of Christ and the church.

that's so radical a change. You know what the Bible calls it? The prophet Ezekiel called it a new heart. Speaking metaphorically, of course. God says, I am going to bring him back to myself. I am going to take out that heart of stone and I'll give you a heart of flesh and I'll put my spirit within you and cause you to keep my commandments so that the marriage relationship between a husband and wife, instead of being a little miniature of a bloody battle on the sands of Iwo Jima in the Second World War, becomes a beautiful picture of Christ and his church. That's why I read from Ephesians 5 ear...

22:22 - 23:08 Read in full sermon

The point: Husbands are to love their wives selflessly, as Christ loved the church, even putting up with idiosyncrasies and altering habits to please their wives.

He uses the common marital irritation of a husband dropping socks in the same place to illustrate how Christ's redeeming power enables both spouses to overcome selfishness, compromise, and lovingly serve each other.

Realistic love. How can you love that way? You can't of yourself. But thank God in Jesus Christ we can. He gives us power to love that way. He gives a husband power to put up with a wife's idiosyncrasies and those things she does that irritate. And conversely, he gives a wife power. To put up. Dropping those socks in the same place day after day after day. And listen, he gives power to the husband to alter some of those patterns when he knows that the altering of them will please his wife. Instead of saying, I'm the head of the house, I'll drop my socks where I want. Christ gives a husband pow...

23:09 - 24:01 Read in full sermon

The point: Husbands are to love their wives selflessly, as Christ loved the church, even putting up with idiosyncrasies and altering habits to please their wives.

Martin shares a personal anecdote about his nearly 17 years of marriage, testifying that its joy and oneness are solely due to the redeeming power of Jesus Christ, serving as a living example of his sermon's third point.

order to make you happy. You see, it's just that practical. Just that practical. And I thank God I can bear witness after close to 17 years of married life that if it were not for the redeeming power of Jesus Christ, I don't know where my marriage would be. But I can say to God's praise that I could wish for any couple under heaven the joy, the oneness, the delight that we know in our marriage. And in our home. Why? Because the redeeming power of Jesus Christ has been operative in that marriage. Why do we meet with joy? Because God is the God of redemption. I can do all

24:01 - 24:53 Read in full sermon

The point: For those in 'living hell' marriages, recognize that a deep, nature-changing work of redemption through Jesus Christ is the only true answer.

He describes some attendees as having declared a 'four-hour truce' for the wedding and reception, implying that their marital problems will resume once they return home, highlighting the superficiality of temporary fixes without true heart change.

Being a God of redemption? Maybe that's the answer to your marriage problems. Some of you have come here today. You know what that living hell is. You're living it. Oh, you declared a four-hour truce so it wouldn't break out while you were here at the reception. But you know and I know that when you're home and the truce is over, you'll be right back to it again. Won't you? Why? Because you need a change that's as deep as your very nature.

26:05 - 26:33 Read in full sermon