Why does Marriage Matter?
Let’s talk about why marriage matters.
But before we do, I want to hold space for the idea that we live in the real world. I realize that not every home has two parents living at home with a mom and dad who love each other and love Jesus.
And that can be for a lot of reasons.
Some people have lost a spouse. Some are divorced. Some have wanted to be married but that opportunity has never come your way. Some have gone through things I cannot even imagine.
Some marriages in the room right now are in triage and others are on life support. Some have survived infidelity and some have not.
Some have been through sickness and health, richer and poorer, and others are newly wed with big dreams and high hopes for the future.
Please know, wherever you are on that spectrum, you are loved and you are not alone.
I want us to hold space for what’s real.
And there’s a lot of pain when we start talking about family and marriage.
But I also want us to hold space to talk about what’s ideal… And God has gone to great lengths to teach us what family looks like, what marriage looks like, for followers of Jesus.
With all of that in mind, I want to start with this question…
Why does marriage matter?
A Wedding Story
A few months ago Alisha and I were blessed to travel to Atlanta for a wedding.
When our friends Ian and Savannah decided to get married they asked me to preside which was a tremendous honor and blessing.
Leading up to the wedding Alisha and I met with them several times for premarital counseling. When it came time for the wedding, I knew their love for God and their love for each other would sustain them and carry them. But I also wanted to tie this marriage knot tight.
I asked their permission to do this, I want to share with you a short part of the charge I gave them during their wedding ceremony. Here’s what I said:
“It’s because of your love for God and for each other that we celebrate what God is doing in your lives as you come together in marriage. Marriage is a gift of God. It is the most sacred of all relationships. Today we are gathered together in the presence of God to witness you exchange your vows and pledge your love and faithfulness to one another.
Savannah, God calls you to submit to your husband, to live your life for his joy and happiness. Once you say, “I do,” you have committed yourself to a lifetime of putting Ian’s needs above your own. Your relationship with God must always be first in your life. But your marriage must be your next highest priority. Honor your husband. Support him. Make him feel as if he is the most important man on earth. For in your eyes, he must be.
Ian, God calls you to submit your needs to Savannah’s. God calls you to love her the same way Christ loves the church; to be willing to give up everything for her. Though she must be willing to live for you, you must be willing to die for her. Once you say, “I do,” you have committed yourself to living your life to honor, cherish and bless Savannah. Your first question in every decision you make must not be, “What’s good for me?” but rather, “What will bless Savannah?” You are called to be the spiritual leader of your family. May your love for Savannah exemplify Christ’s love in every way.”
After the wedding ceremony, one of the older men who was there that day came up to me and said, “Man, you really laid it on thick! You tied that knot tight.”
I laughed it off, but inside I was thinking, “Yes sir, I did. Because Marriage matters.”
Is Marriage a Big Deal?
We live in a world that doesn’t take marriage seriously.
We take weddings seriously.
The wedding industry is one of the fastest growing sectors in America.
From wedding venues, to shows like, “Say Yes to the Dress,” to bachelor and bachelorette parties, to photographers and videographers, the cake, the flowers, to the dinners and dancing and everything in between, the average cost of a wedding in 2022 according to theknot.com was $30,000!!!
We take weddings seriously, but the marriage, not so much. Depending on where you look, the divorce rate in America is between 40-50%.
But even in those marriages that make it, how many of them are life giving and fulfilling?
No one goes into marriage hoping they’ll be mad and miserable and stuck in a marriage where there is little love, laughter, joy, and hope.
But so few of us ever think about what makes a marriage and even fewer consider, Why does marriage matter?
God Designed Marriage
Here’s the good news… God designed marriage. And God has a purpose for marriage.
God’s desire is for marriage to be full of hope, love, joy, peace… every fruit of the Spirit should be present in your marriage. No marriage is perfect. Every marriage has ups and downs. But God has a purpose for marriage and it’s so easy for us to forget and find ourself in the middle of a marriage without purpose.
And a marriage without purpose is often a marriage without faith, hope, and love.
Before I gave Ian and Savannah that charge at their wedding I shared this passage with them. Let’s take a look and see if we can discover together why Marriage Matters.
The Apostle Paul is about to give instructions about what life is supposed to be like and look like for followers of Jesus. But before he starts talking about husbands and wives and kids, he sets it all up with this…
So be careful how you live. Don’t live like fools, but like those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. Don’t act thoughtlessly, but understand what the Lord wants you to do. Don’t be drunk with wine, because that will ruin your life. Instead, be filled with the Holy Spirit, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, and making music to the Lord in your hearts. And give thanks for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. – Ephesians 5.15-20
In other words, your life and your life as a family and your married life should be FILLED WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT.
This is how we live differently. We are filled with the Holy Spirit.
But what does it look like to be filled with the Holy Spirit?
A Holy Spirit Filled Marriage
What does that look like in a marriage?
What does that look like for a husband? Or for a wife?
According to Paul, it looks like this…
And further, submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. – Ephesians 5.21
Almost everyone forgets about this verse. Almost everyone wants to jump to the next verse about wives submitting to their husbands and almost everyone wants to jump over about what Paul says husbands should do!
But don’t miss this… this is what marriage looks like for followers of Jesus. It’s Holy Spirit filled. And what does that mean? That means that both husband and wife constantly and consistently puts the needs of the other first!
The best marriages are those where both people are striving to out serve the other. And that will look different in different marriages, but the motivation is the same. When I’m putting your needs ahead of my own and your putting my needs ahead of your own and we’re both trying to out serve the other, something beautiful happens.
Why do this?
Why Do We Try To Out Serve Each Other?
Paul says the reason we live this way is out of reverence for Christ.
Reverence. That’s not a word we use much. We probably need to recover a little reverence in our lives. There’s not much we have reverence for these days, but what does life look like when have reverence for Christ. According to Paul it looks like this, we submit to one another. We put the needs of others ahead of our own.
Constantly. Consistently.
In the context of a marriage, it looks like this…
Wives
For wives, this means submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For a husband is the head of his wife as Christ is the head of the church. He is the Savior of his body, the church. As the church submits to Christ, so you wives should submit to your husbands in everything.– Ephesians 5.22-24
This passage comes with a lot of baggage because it’s been misused, misinterpreted, and misunderstood for so long.
Paul is not suggesting, not even for a moment, that wives should be submissive to an abusive husband looking to exert his power, his pride, his anger, his delusion, his desire, his might, or anything else over his wife. Let me be clear, that is not what Paul is teaching or what God desires.
What God wants, what Paul is trying to articulate here, is that in a God honoring marriage where both the husband and the wife are living in mutual submission, wives… you honor your husbands when you put him first, when you put his needs ahead of your own, when you cherish him, support him, defend him, encourage him, and help him.
It is a high and holy calling for a wife to love her husband and honor him in this way. It’s different, entirely different, than the way our world treats marriage. But wives, when you love and honor and submit to your husbands in this way, you demonstrate your reverence for Christ.
Husbands
Husbands, your calling is similar, but demands even more. Paul writes…
For husbands, this means love your wives, just as Christ loved the church. He gave up his life for her to make her holy and clean, washed by the cleansing of God’s word. He did this to present her to himself as a glorious church without a spot or wrinkle or any other blemish. Instead, she will be holy and without fault. In the same way, husbands ought to love their wives as they love their own bodies. For a man who loves his wife actually shows love for himself. No one hates his own body but feeds and cares for it, just as Christ cares for the church. And we are members of his body. – Ephesians 5.25-30
Husbands, your wives are called to live for you, you are called to die for her, just as Christ died for the church. You are called to serve her, care for her, cherish her, honor her, protect her, and be willing to sacrifice absolutely everything for her.
What God wants, what Paul is trying to articulate here, is that in a God honoring marriage where both the husband and the wife are living in mutual submission, husbands… you honor your wives when you put her first, when you put her needs ahead of your own, when you cherish her, support her, defend her, encourage her, help her, and when you are willing to lay down your life for her.
It is a high and holy calling for a husband to love his wife and honor her in this way. It’s different, entirely different, than the way our world treats marriage. But husbands, when you love and honor and submit to your wives in this way, you demonstrate your reverence for Christ.
Two Become One
As the Scriptures say, “A man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.” This is a great mystery, but it is an illustration of the way Christ and the church are one. So again I say, each man must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. – Ephesians 5.31-33
I would suggest that few things matter as much or more to God than marriage. Marriage is sacred, holy, spiritual, and special.
Why?
Because in your marriage you have the opportunity to show the other person what the manifest presence of the love of Jesus looks like.
God’s love for you is an unconditional, unending, unchanging kind of love. And in your marriage, you get to love another person with that kind of love.
We often say, there’s nothing you could ever do to make God love you less. And that is true. And in the context of your marriage, you have the opportunity to show another person what that kind of love looks like. The love of God, present in you, for another person.
What is the purpose of marriage?
The purpose of marriage is to be the manifest presence of the love of Jesus to another person. The purpose of marriage is to proclaim the goodness and the grace of God realized in relationship. The purpose of marriage is to live out the Christ life with and for someone else to the glory of God.
Marriage Matters Because…
Why does marriage matter? It matters for so many reasons… but today, in the context of this series on Family Matters, this is why your marriage matters.
Your marriage matters because it will be a significant part of your kid’s story.
My parents were married on September 5, 1974.
They didn’t know then that they would one day have a son and a daughter. They didn’t know then that their son and their daughter would be baptized on the same day. They didn’t know then their daughter would be married to a minister and that their son would become a minister.
They didn’t know then that their grandkids would one day be leading the church in worship, in communion, teaching in the kids classes, and serving in different ways. They didn’t know then that their grandchildren would be inviting people to church who didn’t have a church but would become a part of a church. They didn’t know then that those friendships would lead to baptisms and to people coming to know Jesus.
For better or for worse, your marriage will be a SIGNIFICANT part of your kids story, your grandkids story. The impact of your relationship will outlive your relationship. Just like your parents marriage and your grandparents marriage had a significant impact on your story, the same will be true for your kids, your grand kids, and your great grand kids.
The truth is, you never know what hangs in the balance of your marriage. But every marriage matters because…
Marriage gives you the chance to love another person the way God loves you.
What greater gift could you give your kids than loving your spouse?
Marriage matters for so many reasons but maybe most of all because of this…
If we want to raise the next generation to know God, love God, and serve God it begins with our children seeing this sacrificial love on display in their parents.
When mom and dad are always trying to out serve, encourage, help, support, pray for, lift up, speak well of, defend, and be kind to each other… it has an impact.
Want more from this Series… Click here.
