Sunday Sermon: Bone of My Bones and Flesh of My Flesh (Genesis 2:18-23)

7 views

October 1, 2023

Pastor Gabriel Hughes teaches his Sunday school class out of Genesis 2:18-23, the creation of woman and of marriage, that also points to the way Christ loves His church. Visit wwutt.com for all of our videos!

00:18: You are listening to the teaching ministry of Gabriel Hughes.
00:23: Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday on this podcast we feature 20 minutes of Bible study through a New Testament book.
00:30: On Thursday is a study in the Old Testament and then we answer questions from the listeners on Friday.
00:36: Each Sunday we are pleased to share our sermon series.
00:39: Here's Pastor Gabe.
00:40: So the way that this is divided up, we began with part one we had creation revisited.
00:47: Well part one really we considered the day of rest where God had finished his creation and he rested.
00:54: That was in verses one through three.
00:57: Then part two was creation revisited.
01:00: So you had these are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens and then describing those things as they were made in the land as it was on day six.
01:13: Everything that we're looking at in chapter two was on day six.
01:17: We go from God rested on the seventh day which was verses one through three and then let's rewind a little bit and look at some of those things that were happening specifically on the day that God made man in his image.
01:31: And so then part three was in verses 10 through 14 where you have the description of Eden.
01:37: We had the mention of those rivers there that that watered the garden that God planted.
01:43: God is the one who planted this garden.
01:46: It was not made by man but he puts man in it to cultivate it and keep it.
01:50: And so then in part four you have that work that God has commissioned the man to do in verses 15 to 17 which included the command that you may eat of any tree that is in the garden but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you may not eat for the day that you eat of it you will surely die.
02:09: And then in part five is where we are today.
02:12: This was the section we didn't get to last week.
02:14: So in verses 18 to 25 you have the creation of woman and even the creation of marriage.
02:22: So let's read that passage again.
02:25: Genesis 2 verses 18 to 25 and then we'll pray.
02:30: Hear the word of the Lord.
02:32: Then the Lord God said it is not good that the man should be alone.
02:36: I will make a helper fit for him.
02:41: Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them.
02:49: And whatever the man called every living creature that was its name.
02:54: The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field.
02:59: But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him.
03:07: So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man and while he slept he took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh.
03:18: And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man.
03:27: Then the man said this at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.
03:35: She shall be called woman because she was taken out of man.
03:42: Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife and they shall become one flesh.
03:50: And the man and his wife were both naked and not ashamed.
03:56: Let's pray.
03:57: Heavenly Father we thank you for what we have read here.
04:01: Recalling once again a story that we've heard from for some people even before they became Christians.
04:08: A time that we had heard this story when we were even children growing up in church and yet we come back to this text here to hear about the creation of woman and the creation of marriage which you designed and gave to us as we read about in Ephesians 5 a picture of the way that Christ would love his church.
04:30: And so I pray that we see even in these things the work of Christ in our lives as we ponder and consider the creation of first things.
04:41: It's in Jesus name that we pray, amen.
04:44: So then once again the way that we start this really sets the tone for this particular passage.
04:50: With the Lord God saying it is not good that the man should be alone I will make a helper fit for him.
04:58: Now as we had considered last week the name Yahweh is first found in chapter 2.
05:08: It wasn't in chapter 1 but here in chapter 2 we have the name Yahweh wherever you would see the capital L-O-R-D in Hebrew it's the Tetragrammaton Y-H-W-H and we have pronounced that Yahweh.
05:22: Some have pronounced that Jehovah.
05:24: There have been various pronunciations of the Tetragrammaton over the centuries but that is the covenant name that God gave to his people.
05:34: He said to Moses I am who I am and that being the name Yahweh and so that is the way his people would know him and that is the way that his name is given even here in the book of Genesis.
05:48: Then Yahweh God or Yahweh Elohim is the way that that would be in Hebrew when we read that in verse 18.
05:55: So this is creator of all and we see in that name Yahweh that we get to know that name Yahweh is not just a declaration of well he's God and he has to have a name so this is the name that he gives himself.
06:08: There is personalness to this name.
06:10: There is the fact that God fellowships with his people that he gives them a name.
06:15: I am Yahweh.
06:17: You know somebody you fellowship with somebody that you're close to you have a good relationship with you know their name.
06:24: What's often the first thing that you learn about a person whenever you introduce themselves or you introduce yourself they introduce themselves to you.
06:32: What's the first thing you learn? You learn their name right? How many of you there are people in here that you have seen for years and you still don't know their name? Be honest.
06:43: Okay a few of you yes right.
06:48: What's that? Lois said if I know it I can't remember.
06:54: For some of you how many of you it's your age.
06:56: I knew it at one point but I don't remember it anymore.
06:59: Okay right.
07:00: So but that's the personal acquaintance that we have with one another.
07:05: You get to know their name and something every time you hear their name there's something else that's attached to that right? You know something about their character.
07:13: You know something about that person.
07:15: Maybe you can picture their face.
07:18: Maybe you know something about their background or some kind deed that they did for you at one point.
07:24: Their reputation whatever it might be.
07:26: There's always something connected with the name.
07:28: And so with the name God with the name Yahweh that's even given to us here in scripture before God has spoken of himself to Abraham which comes up later on in chapter 12.
07:43: Before God has introduced himself to Moses which comes up in Exodus chapter 3.
07:49: Yet we have the name Yahweh right here.
07:52: This was the name that Adam would have known God by.
07:55: This was the personal relationship that they had with one another.
08:00: Adam is named Adam.
08:02: It's simply man.
08:04: And here you have the creation of woman which is out of man.
08:08: It comes up toward the end of this particular section.
08:12: Eve is not really even given a name until the end of chapter 3.
08:15: We'll see that later possibly next week when we get to that particular chapter.
08:19: But here we have God's name.
08:21: So we know something personal about God.
08:23: Even we reading this text have a personal acquaintance with God because we get to know his name.
08:30: Yahweh said it is not good that man should be alone.
08:34: And so I will make a helper fit for him.
08:38: Now we've already seen that God is a community or a fellowship even unto himself.
08:47: Remember back to the creation of man where God said let us make man in our image.
08:54: This was Genesis 1.25.
08:57: After our likeness and let them mankind have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.
09:08: And so we read in Genesis 1.27 God created man in his own image.
09:13: There you have the singular pronoun his again.
09:17: In the image of God he created him.
09:19: Male and female he created them.
09:23: So there's a singularness to God because he's one God.
09:27: Deuteronomy 6.4 Hear O Israel the Lord our God the Lord is one.
09:33: He is one God.
09:34: Three persons.
09:36: And so this one God even has a fellowship unto himself Father Son and Holy Spirit.
09:41: And we read about in the high priestly prayer in John 17 Jesus praying to the father.
09:46: Father glorify me with the glory that I had with you before the ages began.
09:55: So Jesus had fellowship with the father before all of this was made.
10:00: What was God doing before creation came into being.
10:03: He was glorifying in himself.
10:07: God does not need anything.
10:09: And you will hear preachers say to this day you still hear preachers say God was lonely so he created us.
10:17: No God had God.
10:20: What did he need us for? And as we considered when we started this study in Genesis why did God create everything anyway? If he doesn't need us why did he create us? As a demonstration of his glory.
10:33: And even for us a demonstration of his love.
10:37: He had placed his affections on us before he made us.
10:42: We considered that in 2 Timothy 1 and in Titus 1 those declarations of God having predestined us or had foreknowledge of us.
10:53: That foreknowledge meaning that he had placed his affection on us before we were even made.
10:58: And so this creation being a demonstration of the glory of God that we would even behold and glorify God and we get to share in that glory that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit have been sharing with one another for all eternity.
11:15: When we are in Christ when you die and you go to be with the Lord and even that day when Christ returns and our dead bodies are raised to be imperishable and reunited with our souls we will glorify with God and get to behold that glory that he's had with himself before anything was ever made.
11:37: We get to be part of that.
11:39: And that is as I preached about last week as Tom preaches about today that is a demonstration of God's grace.
11:48: And so God showing himself here the personal nature of himself the fellowship that he even has with himself that he would create man in his image and he creates man to be a fellowshipping being.
12:06: God says it is not good that man should be alone.
12:13: Every once in a while you hear a story about somebody who decided to want to live as a hermit and they go live up in the hills and they live by themselves and just nobody around it's just him alone.
12:24: That's where we get that title or that name hermit to apply to a person that would live in such an environment probably heard of a hermit crab you know and it's just a crab lives in a shell by himself.
12:36: God did not make us for that.
12:40: He did not create us to isolate ourselves and live alone.
12:45: The very fact that we are a church is a called out assembly of people that we would fellowship with one another that we would grow with one another in our faith that you hold each other accountable admonishing where needed encouraging and building one another up in love.
13:06: And so God makes this declaration before he creates woman that it's not good for man to be alone and the creation of man by himself to even demonstrate that I created man but I didn't create him to just be like this.
13:20: Now remember everything that we're reading about here is on day six.
13:24: So Adam wasn't alone for very long.
13:27: It wasn't like God just kind of created him and left him there we'll see how long it takes him and then when he's really feeling it then I'll create someone for him.
13:36: It's that very day that he was created he felt incomplete.
13:41: And so in verse 19 we continue on so it's a verse 18 becomes again like a thesis statement of the narrative that we're reading here through verse 25.
13:51: And so then we kind of jump back into the description of everything.
13:55: Now out of the ground Yahweh God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would name them what would he call them and whatever the man called every living creature that would be its name.
14:15: So remember God has given this dominion mandate to the man to fill the earth and subdue it.
14:22: And the instruction even to the man and woman which we had read previously in chapter one was to be fruitful and multiply.
14:30: That's in verse 28.
14:32: God bless them and said to them be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it have dominion over the fish of the sea over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.
14:42: Now let me pause here for a moment before we continue.
14:45: Is that dominion mandate still in effect today.
14:51: Yes.
14:52: How do you know that.
14:55: Nine.
14:55: I think it's what you're thinking of.
14:56: So like at post flood.
14:58: Is that what you're thinking of.
14:59: Right.
14:59: So after after the flood after the ark landed at Mount Ararat after Noah and his family disembarked and they offer up a sacrifice unto God.
15:08: God once again tells them the same thing that he told Adam and Eve be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.
15:14: Now the interesting thing about the command as it's given there in Genesis 9 is man's a sinner in Genesis 9.
15:22: Here in Genesis 1 he's not.
15:25: So I've some I've heard some make this argument before.
15:29: I've usually read it in articles I know I've never talked with somebody face to face who's made this argument because I would push back on it.
15:35: But I've seen the argument made before that yeah the dominion mandate was made in the very beginning when man was sinless but now we're sinful and it doesn't apply anymore.
15:43: Well no because God gave it to Noah and his family after they came off of the ark.
15:48: So we do still have that mandate to fill the earth and subdue it.
15:52: Part of the reason for the Tower of Babel was because the people were not doing that.
15:56: They were not filling the earth and subduing it.
15:59: They had congregated in one spot.
16:01: They were trying to make a great name for themselves by building a tower to the heavens.
16:05: And so God says let's go down and confuse their languages.
16:08: And so now with their languages confused then they spread out throughout the world as God intended them to do.
16:13: But because they wouldn't obey it God gave this curse that would force the people to have to spread out that they couldn't be together anymore because they couldn't understand one another.
16:23: So there is still that mandate to fill the earth and subdue it.
16:27: Now of course the difference between when it's given in Genesis 1 and when it's given in Genesis 9 is indeed man is sinful.
16:34: So when we fill the earth and subdue it it's not righteously.
16:39: It's not done to the praise and glory and honor of God.
16:43: We are sinful.
16:44: We are corrupt.
16:44: And so the dominion that we try to extend in the earth is corrupt as well.
16:52: It's based on, say again? Doug says based on fear.
16:56: Explain that.
16:56: Animal spirits.
16:58: Oh that's right, yeah.
16:59: Here they were willful submission.
17:02: They came before him.
17:04: Yeah the animals coming before him.
17:05: That's right.
17:06: Yeah.
17:06: So here the animals come and almost kind of present themselves in a certain way to Adam.
17:12: What Doug is pointing out is that after the flood God says to man that the fear of man will be in the animals.
17:22: So they don't willingly come to man.
17:24: Which is why you've got to be really, really quiet when you're hunting wabbits.
17:29: Be really quiet.
17:32: Or whenever you're out hunting deer or whatever else.
17:35: The animals are fearful of man.
17:37: But here the Lord God had formed all of these animals and he brings them to the man and whatever the man calls every living creature that's his name.
17:46: So he's fulfilling that dominion mandate here.
17:49: He's naming animals.
17:51: He's subduing the earth, so to speak.
17:55: Verse 20.
17:55: The man gave names to all the livestock and to all the birds of the heavens to every beast of the field.
18:02: And by the way, livestock would be like domesticated animals and beasts of the field would be those that run wild.
18:09: So when we had talked earlier about Adam's assignment to keep the garden, there was a certain defense understanding there in the way that Adam would keep the garden, right? He's even defending it.
18:24: So there would be like outside animals that would not be domesticated that just probably have to be kept out of the garden.
18:32: It's not like a wolf or a lion that would come and devour somebody because there was no death in the earth.
18:39: But still animals that were not domesticated that shouldn't have been there in the garden.
18:43: Something to that effect.
18:44: I don't know how all of that would have worked, but you know.
18:47: That's the difference between when we read about livestock and beasts.
18:50: We're talking about the difference between a domesticated animal and a wild animal.
18:55: But it says there in verse 20, but for Adam, there was not found a helper fit for him.
19:01: So what's Adam seeing as all these animals are coming before him? He's seeing male and female.
19:08: He's seeing pairs.
19:10: There is a lion and a lioness.
19:12: There is a stag and a deer, a doe, yeah, doe, a deer, a female deer, remember my songs.
19:24: And so he's seeing male and female, but he knows he's male and there is no female.
19:28: There's no female for me.
19:30: And don't ever get the impression here that God is bringing animals in front of Adam and going, well here, pick one.
19:36: Find one for yourself.
19:37: That wasn't at all what this was for.
19:41: Hence the statement there, there was not found a helper fit for him.
19:45: He's not looking for a helper among these animals.
19:48: He's just recognizing there's male and female.
19:50: And I don't have, where's mine? You know, where's, where's my better half, perhaps his question.
19:57: And so Yahweh God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man.
20:02: And while he slept, he took one of his ribs and he closed up that place with flesh.
20:08: And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man, he made into a woman and brought her to the man.
20:16: Now I've heard when I was, when I was growing up, when I was a middle schooler and a high schooler and I would go to youth events and there would be something, some sort of presentation, these youth events about sexual purity and marriage would be talked about there, saving yourself for marriage and things like that.
20:32: I heard this illustration a lot.
20:34: I never knew where it came from until just a few years ago.
20:38: But I heard this illustration.
20:40: I'm going to give you the illustration.
20:41: I'm going to tell you who said it.
20:42: Maybe you know who said it.
20:44: But when God formed the woman, he took a rib from Adam's side.
20:50: He did not take a bone out of his head, lest Adam think that he's smarter than the woman.
20:58: He did not take a bone out of his arm, lest Adam think that I have strength over this woman, I can dominate this woman.
21:06: He didn't take a bone out of his leg, lest the man think that he can stand over this woman and triumph over this woman.
21:14: But he took a rib from his side and formed the woman from the rib so that it would be a demonstration to Adam.
21:23: As he says, this is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.
21:28: They would be side by side.
21:32: And that Eve even made a helper, a helpmeet for Adam is side by side in this work that they do together, that they would be a union with one another, not one higher than the other.
21:46: Yes, headship has been given to the man.
21:49: We'll look at a few passages regarding that, but that doesn't mean that the man is more important or more significant than the woman.
21:55: He would not be able to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it without her.
22:04: So she is just as important to the created order as the man is.
22:12: Even though God created patriarchy, which is kind of a curse word in our culture today.
22:17: They hate that term.
22:19: Hate the word, hate the structure.
22:21: But God did not create patriarchy for there to be a man who's lording himself over women.
22:28: It is so that a man would understand his responsibility to be the head of his household and that a woman would understand her responsibility to be his helper.
22:38: But both of them still instrumental in doing what God has commanded mankind to do.
22:44: Now that's the illustration, God taking the rib out of Adam's side instead of a bone from his head, bone from his arm, bone from his leg.
22:53: I've heard that many times.
22:54: I've heard that illustration used many, many times.
22:56: I never knew who it originated from until I was reading a particular commentary.
23:02: Does anybody know who it was that came up with this? If you've heard the illustration before? John MacArthur? No.
23:08: Older than that.
23:10: It's from Matthew Henry.
23:12: It's in Matthew Henry's commentary.
23:14: If you go to Genesis 2, it's Matthew Henry that lays out that illustration of God taking the rib from Adam's side, that he would know and be with this woman side by side, bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.
23:29: Now look at that in verse 23, then the man said, this is at last bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh and she shall be called woman because she was taken out of man.
23:44: What do you see there about verse 23 that looks different than everything else that we've read in chapter two? What looks different about it? Say it.
23:56: Say again.
23:57: It's quoting Adam.
23:58: Yeah.
23:59: But, but how is it, how's it phrased? Like how's it formatted in your text? Like a song.
24:05: It's like song lyrics.
24:07: Now this isn't the first poetry that we've seen because back up in chapter one, verse 27, the creation of man is written poetically, right? In that poetic sort of form.
24:19: God created man in his own image in the image of God, he created him male and female.
24:25: He created them.
24:26: That's written like almost like song lyrics.
24:28: And then you have the, uh, the, the stage or the statement of the summation of creation in chapter two, verse four.
24:35: These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created in the day that the Lord God made the heavens and the earth.
24:41: That also looks like kind of a poetic form.
24:44: But this here in chapter two, verse 23, this is the first song in scripture because it's not just written as narrative.
24:58: It's Adam's words.
25:01: When he sees the woman, he said this at last, that, that is, that is a declaration of awe of amazement of, of beauty.
25:12: This is like far before Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet.
25:17: This is Adam being poetic and awestruck at the beauty of this woman that is presented to him as his help me.
25:25: Now I say this, not, not to be crude, not to be crass about their nudity or anything to that effect, but he sees this woman and he sees that she's different than him.
25:39: Okay? Our culture is so confused about male and female.
25:44: They have been subjected to this futility.
25:48: In Romans 1, 18, they suppress the truth with their unrighteousness.
25:55: They are so darkened in their hearts because of the sexual depravity that has, that has become so widespread in our culture.
26:04: It's hard to even drive down the road and not see a billboard that's advertising sexual immorality.
26:10: It is so ingrained in our culture that their foolish hearts have been darkened.
26:16: And there are so many in this culture now that can't even tell the difference between male and female.
26:24: The Supreme Court justice can't even tell the difference.
26:26: That's right.
26:27: What was that bill? That's it.
26:30: Right.
26:31: They can tell.
26:32: Everybody knows, but they're suppressing the truth with unrighteousness, Romans 1, 18.
26:39: But you look at kindergarten kids, and they know there's a difference between a boy and a girl.
26:47: It is common sense.
26:50: They get it.
26:52: And it's why the LGBTQ movement in this culture is trying to push that reprogramming agenda even on kindergarten kids.
27:02: Because kindergarten kids can tell the difference.
27:05: So if we get them younger, we can program them to be thinking the way that we want them to think when they're older.
27:11: That's the agenda.
27:12: That's what's going on.
27:15: Adam sees it from the very beginning when his wife is brought to him.
27:20: She is not made like me.
27:24: There is a difference between us.
27:28: And yet a similarity.
27:31: Because he says, this at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.
27:41: And the very fact that woman was not made from the dirt as Adam was, but was made from his flesh, also demonstrates the fellowship that they're intended to have.
27:54: This wasn't this pile of dirt over here, this pile of dirt over here.
27:59: God made one man.
28:03: And from that man, woman.
28:06: And then from that man and woman would come all the rest of mankind.
28:12: There is an ingrained fellowship from the very beginning of our creation.
28:17: God doesn't create any other creature that way.
28:21: He doesn't create all the male beasts and then from them creates the female beasts.
28:26: He just simply made them male and female.
28:29: But with man, who is made in His image, demonstrating once again this call, this creation, this design of fellowship, you have the creation of man from him, woman, and from the two of them would come every other man and woman on earth.
28:47: We're not given any indication that there was only one male lion and one female lion.
28:52: And then from those lions, then there would be every other lion in the earth.
28:56: However, that does come about with the Ark, where you have the male and female, you know, two by two.
29:02: There was also seven by seven.
29:04: So we'll get to that when we get to Noah's Ark.
29:08: But anyway, so with 23, so the man saying this is, bone of my bones, flesh of my flesh, she shall be called woman because she's taken out of man.
29:18: So this isn't her name, but this is what she is.
29:21: All women will be women.
29:23: All men will be men.
29:26: Sorry, LGBTQ movement.
29:27: It's right there in the very beginning.
29:29: You cannot change sexes.
29:31: You don't go from man to woman.
29:32: You don't go from woman to man.
29:34: Men will always be men.
29:36: Male will always be male.
29:37: Female will always be female.
29:38: That's male and female.
29:39: That's man and woman.
29:40: Now, she's uniquely given the name Eve.
29:43: We don't see that until the end of chapter three, but we'll get to that.
29:47: So in verse 24, this statement, therefore, a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.
29:57: And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.
30:01: I want to jump to a passage in Matthew 19 here in a moment, but one more statement here first about this song.
30:09: When I did my marriage class in Song of Songs back during the spring, I had said in that class that I prefer the name Song of Songs instead of Song of Solomon for a couple of reasons because that's the very first phrase that's there.
30:28: It's the Song of Songs, which is Solomon's.
30:31: And so it was common for the Hebrews to title their books or title their psalms or anything else after the first line.
30:39: So it makes more sense to call it Song of Songs than it does to call it Song of Solomon.
30:43: That's the first reason.
30:43: Second reason is I'm not convinced that Solomon actually wrote it, that it was actually written in his honor, but not by his hand.
30:51: And nothing in Song of Songs indicates that Solomon is the author.
30:55: We just assume that he is.
30:56: So it was written in his court, so to speak, just like David had people who wrote psalms that we don't know exactly who wrote them.
31:04: So it is with Song of Songs, was written in Solomon's honor as part of his court, part of the wisdom that Solomon would preach in a sense, but not actually written by his hand.
31:18: So anyway, two arguments there regarding that.
31:21: And when we talked about that in the marriage class with this being called Song of Songs, why would the book be called that? A book about marriage, a book about coupling, this man and this woman who find each other, who get married, and even by the end of the book you see them being fruitful and multiplying.
31:37: So why would we call this book Song of Songs? And so I, or why would they call that a book about that? Why would it be called Song of Songs? So I took the class back to Genesis 2, 23 and showed them that the very first song that was ever sung by a human being was when Adam saw his wife and sang what was essentially the Song of Songs.
32:03: And anytime a man finds a woman to be his wife, Proverbs says that he finds a good thing.
32:11: And a man who is wowed and awed by that woman, every married man in here should know what this feels like.
32:20: When you find that woman and you are just awestruck by that.
32:23: I saw some wives turn to the husbands and be like, did you? Did you feel that way? I'll let you all resolve that later.
32:30: But every man who finds that good wife and knows that he is going to be united with this woman and wants to be for the rest of their lives has that song.
32:41: That Song of Songs.
32:43: It's the best song to ever be sung.
32:45: Kind of wonder why all of our pop songs are about all these love songs and all these broken relationships and whatnot.
32:52: Most of them are broken relationships.
32:53: Well, they're all sinners singing those songs.
32:55: But they, but you can tell they're, they really are attached to this concept of this feeling of love, right? That's in the song, even though the kind of love that they're singing about is not terribly biblical.
33:09: So let's look at a couple of verses that continue to expound on this concept for us in the few minutes that we have left.
33:17: Turn over to Matthew chapter 19.
33:21: In Matthew 19, beginning in verse 3, the Pharisees came to Jesus with this challenge and they said, is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause? And Jesus answered, have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female and said, therefore, a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife and the two shall become one flesh.
33:48: So they are no longer two, but one flesh.
33:51: What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.
33:57: So notice there, a man shall leave his father and his mother, hold fast to his wife.
34:01: The two shall become one flesh.
34:03: They're no longer two, but one flesh.
34:05: What God has joined together, God who created marriage and intended it to be one man and one woman for life, Jesus says, let not man separate.
34:20: Now a common argument that comes from our culture today is that Jesus never said anything about homosexuality, never said anything about transgenderism.
34:29: So why do you Christians make a big deal out of this? Jesus did not need to say any more than he said right there.
34:36: There's the definition of marriage.
34:38: There's the definition of male and female.
34:40: And again, we all know that.
34:42: It is naturally ingrained in us.
34:44: Those that love their sin will suppress the truth with unrighteousness.
34:49: But this is the way that God intended for marriage to be.
34:53: One man and one woman for life.
34:57: The two are one flesh.
34:59: And what God has joined together, let not man separate.
35:03: Once again, God is the one who created marriage.
35:05: I'm going to borrow something from Votie Bauckham that he just preached at G3 a little more than a week ago.
35:12: But he said, you know, the anti-patriarchalists or the feminists in this culture, they'll say that marriage is this oppressive system that was invented so that men could lord themselves over women.
35:32: And Votie said, just try to rationalize that to yourself for a little bit.
35:36: Bunch of men are gathered together.
35:39: And these are men who are probably clubbing women over the head, dragging them back to their cave.
35:44: Maybe they even have a harem of women, all these women that I'm stronger than and so I'm going to make them work for me and all this other kind of thing.
35:50: And just one of those guys speaks up and says, guys, I got this great idea.
35:56: Instead of having a bunch of women, let's limit ourselves to one.
36:03: And instead of acting like we're better than her, that we would actually be equals together in marriage.
36:10: What do you think? And oh, and get this, when we get tired of her, we can't go find another one.
36:17: We have to stick with that one.
36:20: What do you think? And Votie says, how could anybody rationally think in their minds that that's the way marriage came about? Mankind did not invent marriage.
36:34: Oppressive men did not come up with this system of lording over wives and children.
36:41: God made it.
36:43: And he made it so that it would be one man and one woman.
36:47: My friends, this goes against every sinful tendency that we feel in our flesh.
36:55: You don't want to be committed to this other person.
36:58: When they irritate you, you want to go find another one.
37:01: If you were left to your sinful self, that's exactly what you would do.
37:06: But it is because of the conviction of God that is on a person's heart.
37:12: That we would be committed to marriage to this one person who is every bit as much a sinner as I am.
37:20: I need as much graces as she does.
37:26: And it is only by God's grace that we stay committed in marriages.
37:34: Yeah, there are people out there who are not Christians who have long committed marriages that last decades as well.
37:42: That certainly does happen.
37:43: But that's an anomaly.
37:46: There was a statistic I read just recently that said among men and women who pray together and read their Bible every day, husband and wife, the divorce rate is less than 1%.
38:10: What's the divorce rate in our nation today? You know this.
38:13: It's over 50%.
38:17: A man and a woman committed to God who read the Bible and pray together, the divorce rate is actually less than 1%.
38:34: God made this.
38:37: And made it that it would be a picture of the way that Christ loves his church.
38:43: Is Christ going to leave his church? No.
38:50: And so if marriage is a picture of the way that Christ loves his church, may we be committed to our marriages.
38:56: Let's go to Ephesians chapter 5.
38:58: I'll close with this because we're coming down to the last minute here.
39:01: So Ephesians chapter 5, verse 22.
39:06: So I'm going to read through this whole section.
39:08: This is 22 to 33 and then we'll pray and be dismissed.
39:12: Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord.
39:15: For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior.
39:23: Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
39:31: Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor without spot or wrinkle or any such thing that she might be holy and without blemish.
39:53: In the same way, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies.
39:58: He who loves his wife loves himself.
40:01: For no one ever hated his own flesh but nourishes and cherishes it just as Christ does the church because we are members of his body.
40:12: Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife and the two shall become one flesh.
40:19: This mystery is profound and I am saying that it refers to Christ in the church.
40:25: However, let each one of you love his wife as himself and let the wife see that she respects her husband.
40:34: Let's pray.
40:35: Heavenly Father, as we come to a close on this lesson, I pray that we see from Christ exactly how he created marriage to be from the beginning.
40:46: This was Jesus himself, the Son of God, that designed marriage, even defines it there in Matthew chapter 19.
40:54: And we know that as man and woman were made differently, so we are created for different roles.
41:00: The man's responsibility is to be the head of his wife and his children and to lead his household with dignity and with grace and for the wife to respect her husband, to submit to him, to be his helper and to likewise care for and manage the home.
41:19: May we fulfill the roles that you have made for us to the glory of God and do all things unto Christ our King.
41:29: May we be a testimony to this culture of the gospel of Christ who gave himself for us, who died on the cross, who rose again from the grave, so that all who believe in him will not perish because of the sin and rebellion that we have committed against God, even corrupting your created order, but we will be forgiven our sins.
41:50: And may we continue to live in the righteousness of Christ from that day forth.
41:54: It's in Jesus name that we pray, Amen.
44:22: This is When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes.
44:25: There are lots of great Bible teaching programs on the web and we thank you for selecting ours.
44:30: But this is no replacement for regular fellowship with a church family.
44:34: Find a good, gospel-teaching, Christ-centered church to worship with this weekend and join us again Monday for more Bible study when we understand the text.