A deeper analysis of marriage today

by Josh McClellan | Jan 16, 2014

With all the attention and discussion that has occurred recently over the topic of same-sex marriage, another article on the issue might provoke nothing more than a reluctant sigh.  Some of us may very well be growing weary of what seems like an endless bombardment of arguments and opinions on the matter. Hasn’t everything that needs to be said already been said?  Maybe.  And yet, for all that has been said, it is amazing how little clarity has been offered to some of the fundamental issues that undergird the whole debate.

There are two particular questions that I have seen remain relatively unaddressed amidst all of the discussion.  Two issues that are at the heart of the whole matter.  First is the question of how to define what marriage is (and thus is not).  Second is the question of whether marriage and its regulation (or lack of it) is a matter of law.  If Christians are to sustain any legitimate argument against a revisionist definition of marriage, they will have to be able to answer these two questions well.

A modern revisionist definition of marriage would contend that marriage is simply an emotional union that exists between two people who love each other and desire to share their lives with one another.  This understanding would view marriage as thus being for any two individuals (or more than two for that matter).  This definition also, interestingly enough, offers no real distinction between marriage and friendship.

However, cultures throughout human history have believed marriage to be about more than an emotional union, or maybe better said, about more than just love and companionship. Sherif Girgis, Ryan Anderson, and Robert George, in their book What is Marriage? offer a definition of marriage that reflects how it has been exclusively understood up until this particular moment in history.  They contend that marriage is first, a comprehensive union between two people, one that joins both body and mind (mind referring to purpose).  Marriage is about more than an emotional union, but is one that joins physically/biologically as well as for a common purpose, specifically procreation.

Second, if marriage is a comprehensive union of body and mind to the end of procreation, then marriage is inherently linked to children and family life.  The new life that comprehensive union creates must be protected and provided for.  Marriage thus, in both its intent and in its fruit, is connected to the creation of and care for children.

Third, the responsibility placed on parents to provide for and care for children necessitates permanence and exclusivity in marriage.  If marriage is linked to family life and the rearing of children, permanence and exclusivity provide the order and structure needed within the family unit for children to grow and mature properly.

These three components, comprehensive union of body and mind, connection to both the creation of and provision for children, and the need for permanence and exclusivity, comprise the traditional or historic understanding of marriage.  One can see the vast difference between this definition and the revisionist definition.  One can also see why redefining marriage is necessary for those in, for instance, the same-sex marriage camp.  Same-sex partnerships are incapable of comprehensive union as defined in the traditional understanding.  Furthermore, because they cannot produce children they are not inherently, or naturally, designed for family life. And finally, while there is no logical reason why same-sex partnerships cannot be permanent or exclusive (or that many very well are), the evidence reveals that same-sex partnerships, generally speaking, are far less permanent than heterosexual partnerships.

It needs to be acknowledged that as Christians, we would see marriage as being more than this in several regards. Marriage is a covenant made before God. Marriage is a picture of the Gospel and the relationship of Jesus and His bride, the church. Marriage is ultimately defined and understood based on the authority of God’s Word.  So there is more to marriage biblically than one will find in this definition.  But marriage according to the Bible is certainly not less than this understanding of it.  Each of these three components is consistent with what the Bible presents regarding marriage and family.  A definition such as this provides apologetic weight with those who reject any biblical or revelational authority.

Now to the second question: should marriage be a matter of law, regulated by the state?  To be brief, if one holds to the traditional definition of marriage then the answer is yes, and for one simple reason. Children and the production of new life is an inherently social and thus public issue. If one thinks that it is not, they need look no further than present day Europe. The birthrate has continued to drop in Europe for decades, even reaching an astounding 1.1 household birthrate in nations such as Italy. However, this lack of children has left Europe without a sufficient population base to support their economies.  Thus, European nations have had to loosen immigration laws to draw in people from other countries.  This phenomenon has led to massive shifts in the socio-economic climate in Europe.  So children certainly have an impact on public issues.  To take it even a step further, children may very well be the most precious resource a given society has at its disposal, and their development is often the most important factor in a given society’s future.

Girgis, Anderson and George are again helpful in addressing this question as well.  The role of the state is to serve its citizens by protecting the common good not only of individuals but also the society as a whole.  And since children and their development play a significant role in the common good of a society, marriage must be a matter of concern for the state, regulated by laws that protect and preserve the common good.  The revisionist definition seeks to relegate marriage to an understanding that eliminates those elements that impact the public sphere of life and confine marriage to what is personal, namely the emotional connection between two individuals.  As such, it is argued, the state should not infringe on what does or does not constitute a marriage (ironically, their desire is still the regulation of marriage by the state. T hey just want the state to enforce their own definition rather than their opponent’s.  It’s much like the relativist who argues there is no absolute truth, all the while making an absolute statement in doing so.  Their definition of marriage is a definition they want enforced by the state as well).  However, if one holds to the traditional definition of marriage then state regulation is both acceptable and good.

There is no question that the revisionist view has gained substantial momentum in recent years.  Still, Christians should take heart.  The traditional view of marriage, one that Christians can honestly and boldly stand on, makes a compelling case that is difficult to refute.  May the church continue to labor for what is both right and good, for the glory of God and the good of all peoples.

Don’t Stop Berean

by Jason Lee | Jan 13, 2014

One of the great things about the Internet (and the rest of modern media) is that it allows anyone to share his views with a wide and diverse audience. One of the bad things, though, about the Internet (and the rest of modern media) is that it allows anyone to share his views with a wide and diverse audience. Jokes aside, there’s a lot of good out there, but there’s a whole lot of bad. How is a discerning Christian to tell the difference?

In the book of Acts, chapter 17, we read the story of Paul at Thessalonica. A group of Jews and “wicked men” rejected Paul’s preaching and drove them from the city. Paul and Silas then ended up in Berea, where they found people who “were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so.” When Paul preached, the Bereans didn’t just accept it because some preacher said it. They examined the Scriptures to see if what Paul said was true.

This is the pattern that we as Christians should follow. Whenever we hear a preacher or teacher speak, or read a book, we should carefully compare those teachings with what the Bible tells us. For some teachings, the errors are obvious. For others, though, it might be more subtle. For example:

* Is Bruce Wilkinson’s “The Prayer of Jabez” a good model for prayer?
* Do charismatics have a “strange fire” as John MacArthur has stated?
* Is Rick Warren’s “Daniel Plan” a Biblically sound approach to faith and fitness?
* Does God want us to have our best life now, as Joel Osteen asserts?
* Should we pray in circles like Mark Batterson tells us to?
* Is Rachel Held Evans teaching what “Biblical womanhood” truly is?
* Is it true that “Love Wins” as Rob Bell teaches?

And on and on. As followers of Jesus, one of our goals is to know the God of Heaven as fully and completely as a finite creature can. We must be careful, then, about what we take in and accept. We must be critical (in the positive sense) of any teaching we hear, with the Word of God, clarified by the work of the Holy Spirit, as our guide. As you listen to sermons and read books, carefully compare what you read and hear with what the Holy Spirit tells you through Scripture. There are a lot of great resources for Believers out there, but there are also many wolves in sheep’s clothing.

Perhaps trust, definitely verify, but whatever you do (with apologies to Journey), my advice is this: Don’t stop Berean!

Ours is to Love: Thoughts on Homosexuality

by Angela Sanders | Jan 1, 2014

Homosexuality, like heterosexuality, is an orientation, a tendency, and, as long as it is acted out in accordance with the provisions for its practice given in God’s Word, it is acceptable.  The problem is that it can’t be.  There are no provisions given for the practice of homosexuality in the Bible.  In fact, the Bible calls the practice of homosexuality unnatural (Romans 1), not in the sense that it doesn’t come naturally to some people (all sin comes naturally, a by-product of our sin nature), but in the sense that it is not what God intended when he created mankind.

The practice of homosexuality is sin (Romans 1), as are pre and extramarital acts of heterosexuality, as are drunkenness, theft, and lying, for that matter.  Sin is sin is sin.  One brand is as “bad” as another in God’s sight (James 2:10), as all sin has the same effect on our relationship with Him.  Initially, before we accept God’s free gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, sin separates us from Him (Romans 6:23).  When committed after the point of salvation, sin causes relational static (Psalm 66:18), making it difficult for children of God to hear the Holy Spirit and experience the peace and joy that is rightfully theirs.

We don’t tend to see it that way.  That’s understandable, considering the fact that most of us have either witnessed or experienced for ourselves the deep and devastating effects of sexual sin, it being the one sin that a person commits against his/her own body (1 Corinthians 6:18).  To us, it just feels like a “big” or “bad” sin, one that would make the top five were we to make a list.  Again, it isn’t, but maybe that’s why we, like the guys in the Bible with the stones, tend to overreact when we come face to face with it, unintentionally wounding the captives that we’ve been sent to help free.

Ten or twelve years ago, my family attended a Christmas program at church.  It was a packed house.  We’d arrived early, so I had plenty of time to people watch, one of my favorite past times.  I smiled as family after family wearing some form of Christmas plaid filed in and took their seats, parents locking arms on the pew behind their children like bookends.  Smiles were shared.  Hugs were given.  Shoes were tied, and bows were straightened.  It was like a scene from Little House on the Prairie, only there were a lot more pews and the use of candle light, thank Edison, was elective.

Just before the program started, a young family took its place in the pew in front of us, two women and a little boy.  I assumed that the ladies were sisters.  A few tender looks and light caresses later, I realized that they were not sisters at all, but partners.

I have to admit that I didn’t quite know what to make of it.  It was the first time that I’d really ever been confronted with the idea of two people of the same gender building a family together as committed, life-long partners.   I wasn’t put off by it. I have homosexual friends.  I was just sad.  As I watched these ladies share a special holiday moment and love on their son, I realized that the practice of homosexuality and the adoption of it as a lifestyle, although no more sinful than my own transgressions, is much more serious, carrying with it complications that I will never have to wade through and difficult decisions that I will never have to face.

The Bible says that those who knowingly continue to live in sin do not belong to Him (1 John 3:6).  To surrender fully to God’s will for their lives, partners in a committed homosexual relationship would have to abandon and repent of the intimacy they have shared, dismantle, essentially, the family that they have built, and learn to love and respect platonically one whom they once considered to be the other half of themselves.  I wish that weren’t the case.  I really do, especially when I see couples like the one I just described.

What agony!  I simply cannot imagine it.

Could you make that choice?  You might be able to if you were given time to understand how much God loves you (John 3:16), how willing He is to forgive (1 John 1:9), and how eager He is to heal and make new (2 Corinthians 5:17).  You might be able to if you were taught with patience that this life is just a breath (James 4:14), that eternity with the Father is worth any cost to be paid here on earth (Romans 6:23), and that all things are possible with God (Mark 10:27).  You might be able to if you were loved and accepted by His family, but you probably wouldn’t if you thought it was the very choice that those who avoided, ridiculed, and judged you at every turn wanted you to make.

My brothers and sisters, consider.

It is not ours to condemn.  That’s sin’s job.

It is not ours to convict.  That’s the Holy Spirit’s job.

It is not ours to judge.  That’s God’s job.

Ours is to love freely and unconditionally, to speak the truth in love, and to extend to others the same measure of grace and mercy that we ourselves require on a daily basis.  If your daily quota is as high as mine, that should be more than enough to keep us busy and reason enough to leave the stones be.

Modern-Day Pharisees

by James Hunt | Nov 8, 2013

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean.” (Matt. 23:25–26, ESV)

The religious leaders of Jesus’ day were perfectly satisfied with proper appearances – regardless of inner reality. By the time of Jesus’ incarnation there was a very strong oral tradition of how to apply God’s Law into the minutiae of everyday Jewish life.

There was God’s perfect Law, of course; however, that was not enough, or so thought the Pharisees. Starting in the post-exilic period and growing through the 400 or so years prior to Jesus’ birth was the development of ideas on how to interpret God’s Law and apply its commands down to the finest details of everyday experience.

The oral traditions became the cushion surrounding the Law. If a person overlooked one of the traditions that was an infraction … but at least the actual Law hadn’t been transgressed. Over time, these oral traditions took on greater importance until, in effect, if you broke them; then it was essentially as taboo as breaking the actual Mosaic Law.

There were oral traditions that regulated how one must properly wash their hands, regulated how long a Sabbath Day’s journey was, and many, many more fine points of extra-biblical instruction imposed upon the masses.  Whose job was it to make sure Jewish society followed these oral traditions?  It was the self-imposed responsibility of the Pharisees – and their highly respected scholars, the scribes.

The Pharisees, as a whole, were respected members of Jewish society. They were many times the business owners and influencers of the day. Certainly the majority of Jewish society viewed the Pharisees with great respect and treated the scribes with tremendous honor. After all, they were the experts in the Law and how to apply it to real life.

The only big fly in the ointment for the scribes and Pharisees was a Jewish Rabbi named Jesus.  While Jesus could be heard softly speaking words of forgiveness and grace to repentant harlots and tax collectors, He reserved His greatest and harshest chastisements for the scribes and Pharisees.

These are the guys who loved to publically display their religious zeal and service – their ceremonial cleanness; yet, it was they whom Jesus denounced as zealous for the wrong things, their service unacceptable and their ceremony offensive.  Jesus says to them in the passage above that their cup is really nice and clean on the outside, that is, “You look good and clean to all who see you.”  But Jesus says to them that they are really corrupt on the inside.

I am quick to toss my head in disdain at these guys as I read through Matthew’s gospel.  After all, I feel as if they are pretty spiritually ridiculous … That is, until I go back and evaluate myself along the same lines of Jesus’ rebuke.  Jesus condemns them for being filled with “greed and self-indulgence.”  In verse 23 of the same chapter, Jesus tells these same leaders that they should pay special attention to “the weightier matters of the law.”  He defines those weightier matters as follows: “justice and mercy and faithfulness.”

Earlier in Matt. 9:13, Jesus tells these same religious leaders that they should “Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.’”

What does this all mean to me personally?  How am I to apply these texts to my own life?  Way too often I see in me the same value system of the scribes and Pharisees.  I see that I highly prize looking spiritually fit on the outside, yet, many times in my heart of hearts I have greed and an insatiable desire to gain more of this world’s goods and services (self-indulgence).

I find myself evaluating whether or not an opportunity to serve God will benefit me financially or in the area of personal or family advancement. Is this not the same sin-sickness of the scribes and Pharisees?  How many folks, myself included, have heard about adoption or fostering and have justified inaction based, in reality, on the above two vices at work in their heart?  That certainly used to be my attitude.

I wonder sometimes if I really am interested in seeing justice happen for the powerless. I find myself feeling an emotion of sympathy for the pain of others and equate that with mercy when, in reality, mercy is as mercy DOES.  Yet many times I do nothing and feel justified, after all, I am ceremonially clean (Modern Day Church Version: Attend worship, give of my time and resources, life devoted to vocational ministry, etc.). I wonder if sometimes Jesus sighs and shakes His head at my positive self-evaluations.

And then there is Jesus’ allusion to Hosea 6 as recorded in Matt. 9:13, “Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.’”  OUCH!

Conclusion: When our future plans do not include how we may be used maximally for the display of God’s glory in the advancement of His Kingdom and the display of His mercy then perhaps we are modern-day Pharisees.

Kick the ‘koozie’

by Angela Sanders | Nov 6, 2013

When I was a freshman in high school, I asked an older youth group member how he resisted peer pressure to drink alcohol — which is illegal for anyone under 21, no matter your stance on drinking as an adult.  Happy to offer a non-confrontational solution to the age-old question “To drink or not to drink?” he smiled proudly and shared his secret “koozie technique.”

Apparently, my poor friend had been dragged against his will to more than a few drinking parties and had seen people holding koozies, or insulated drink holders, there. Tired of saying “no” to one alcoholic drink after another — I mean, didn’t they know he was a Christian? — he noticed that it was difficult to tell what the people holding koozies were drinking.  All that showed above the rim was a little bit of can.

So, my friend went to the store and bought soft drinks with tops that matched the tops of popular brands of beer. The next time he was dragged to a drinking party against his will, he was ready.

No longer known as the kid who said “no,” he was able to blend in and be a part of what was going on without making anyone feel uncomfortable—He was planning to share Jesus with them as soon as God gave him the opportunity, you know, and didn’t want to scare people off before he got a chance.

I remember thinking that the “koozie technique” was a clever idea for about three seconds.   It seemed, for a moment, that my friend had actually found a way to please God and man at the same time, a middle ground, so to speak.

But something didn’t ring true. Didn’t the Bible say that it was impossible to please God and man at the same time? Didn’t it say to flee the appearance of evil? I felt pretty sure it did.

And wasn’t the “koozie technique” just an elaborate lie?  Yes, and it still is, but seems to be gaining popularity.

More and more, it’s difficult to tell what people are drinking, the Living Water of Jesus Christ or the dehydrating, life-sucking doctrine of the Enemy. Christians aren’t speaking up. They aren’t taking a stand.

Why? Is it really because we don’t want to scare non-believers who might be interested in trusting Christ away–something I doubt is even possible, as it is the Holy Spirit that both draws non-believers and compels us to obey– by doing the right thing or speaking the Truth in front of them?  Probably not.

Let’s be honest.  I think it is because we are simply tired of saying “no” to things that tempt and intrigue us, things that might fall within the boundaries of the permissible if we squint just a little, and/or things that we just flat-out want to do.

Of course, I’m speaking figuratively at this point.  Understand that this is not a post about drinking.  However, if drinking is your personal stumbling block, I don’t want to dull the Spirit’s sword in saying so.   That’s a matter for you to sort out with God on your own. 

Is it possible that we, a holy priesthood, have become so desensitized to the Truth of God’s Word that we actually believe we can please God and man at the same time?

Oh, I hope not! But, I’ve got to tell you, the obvious mixing and mingling that’s happening between God’s children and the World right now reminds me of a dimly-lit high school dance just picking up speed, boys and girls meeting and embracing at center court with the whole evening ahead, and I don’t believe that the Father is going to stand by much longer.

God is holy.  He expects His children to be holy, and that’s the plain truth. It’s time to take two giant steps back from whatever you’ve been flirting with and take a stand firmly and openly in the beneficial.

It’s time to kick the koozie.