WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.940 The epistle which was read this morning is a tough epistle in the sense that it goes 00:00:07.940 --> 00:00:14.200 against the grain of much of the types of things that would be said in our culture. 00:00:14.980 --> 00:00:22.160 Those of you who are our guests this morning, in this church we have the habit now of preaching 00:00:22.160 --> 00:00:23.879 through different books of the Bible. 00:00:23.879 --> 00:00:31.119 And some long books like John, which we're going to begin just after Easter, that'll 00:00:31.119 --> 00:00:38.039 probably take us four or five years to complete, unless Jesus comes back soon before that's 00:00:38.039 --> 00:00:43.019 over or through age or infirmity, or it wouldn't be age because I'm not that old, or infirmity, 00:00:43.079 --> 00:00:44.000 I can't finish it. 00:00:44.399 --> 00:00:49.340 It's one of the blessings of being a pastor in a church for a long time is you can undertake 00:00:49.340 --> 00:00:53.859 to say, let's preach the gospel of John and we'll take four or five years to do it. 00:00:54.560 --> 00:00:57.000 And 1 Corinthians is going to take us two or three years. 00:00:57.640 --> 00:01:03.620 And so we've already gone through the first six chapters and today and throughout Lent we'll 00:01:03.620 --> 00:01:11.340 be looking at chapter 7, 8, 9, and I think we get about halfway into chapter 10, but I can't 00:01:11.340 --> 00:01:12.740 quite remember where we get to. 00:01:13.480 --> 00:01:16.960 And so that's why we're looking at this text today. 00:01:18.260 --> 00:01:22.500 And we're going to really be looking at the first 16 verses in particular. 00:01:22.500 --> 00:01:27.019 And these are, this is an outline of sanity. 00:01:27.799 --> 00:01:32.900 It's an outline of sanity to those who are married or those who are widowed. 00:01:33.400 --> 00:01:35.480 It is an outline of sanity. 00:01:35.480 --> 00:01:41.700 But before we look at the text, I want us to look at two other passages in the Bible. 00:01:42.439 --> 00:01:46.400 And the first one is, please turn in your Bibles to page 991. 00:01:47.240 --> 00:01:53.960 Page 900, sorry, page 990, 990 in the Bible. 00:01:53.959 --> 00:02:03.379 This week, Paul's outline of sanity is towards those words of Christian wisdom to those who 00:02:03.379 --> 00:02:05.899 are married or those who are widowed. 00:02:05.900 --> 00:02:13.159 And next week, it's words of sanity to those who are single, primarily. 00:02:14.219 --> 00:02:18.740 And, but before we look, and I'm going to say the same passage next week as well as a bit of a 00:02:18.740 --> 00:02:20.040 context for this. 00:02:20.540 --> 00:02:23.620 Page 991, 1 Corinthians chapter 6. 00:02:24.159 --> 00:02:26.040 And I'm going to read verses 9 to 11. 00:02:26.039 --> 00:02:50.139 Here's the verse. 00:02:50.139 --> 00:02:50.919 Here's the thing. 00:02:51.659 --> 00:02:53.139 And such were some of you. 00:02:54.019 --> 00:02:59.839 But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord 00:02:59.839 --> 00:03:02.199 Jesus and by the Spirit of God. 00:03:03.879 --> 00:03:08.459 This is something which Paul wrote just very shortly before the passage that we're going 00:03:08.459 --> 00:03:09.319 to look at today. 00:03:09.819 --> 00:03:14.679 And it provides a really important word of caution as we look. 00:03:14.680 --> 00:03:18.260 Christianity is for sinners. 00:03:20.980 --> 00:03:25.840 If you don't think you're a sinner, like we welcome you here and we're really glad that 00:03:25.840 --> 00:03:29.240 you're, you want to be with us and you're our guest this morning. 00:03:29.420 --> 00:03:33.960 But if I was to ask all of the sinners in the room to stand up, you'll notice that I'm 00:03:33.960 --> 00:03:34.760 already standing. 00:03:36.180 --> 00:03:37.840 I'm standing before you are. 00:03:38.860 --> 00:03:41.860 And Christianity is not for those who are perfect. 00:03:41.860 --> 00:03:45.560 It's not for the smug or the self-righteous. 00:03:45.860 --> 00:03:52.880 It is a great error and a great tragedy that often Christians become smug and self-righteous. 00:03:53.460 --> 00:03:58.780 But Christianity is for those who have sinned and who continue to sin. 00:03:59.740 --> 00:04:06.020 And one of the things which is wonderful about this text is that I just read is that the text 00:04:06.020 --> 00:04:11.100 that we're going to read in a moment in 1 Corinthians 7 and next week when we read it on singleness, 00:04:11.099 --> 00:04:16.420 it's going to bring to our attention for many of us, not for all of us, but for many of us, 00:04:17.019 --> 00:04:21.860 things that we have done in the past and maybe things that we are even considering doing or 00:04:21.860 --> 00:04:24.639 have just done very, very recently that are wrong. 00:04:25.920 --> 00:04:32.399 And it's important for us to understand that, you know, we can't change our past. 00:04:33.139 --> 00:04:36.019 The things that we have done in the past, they have been done. 00:04:36.019 --> 00:04:42.779 But Christianity isn't for those who have never done anything wrong in their past and then 00:04:42.779 --> 00:04:45.199 can live completely and utterly blameless lives. 00:04:46.199 --> 00:04:50.199 Yet Christianity is for those who have done wrong things in their past, are doing wrong 00:04:50.199 --> 00:04:53.399 things today, and have understood that we need a Savior. 00:04:53.399 --> 00:05:04.179 And the wonderful promise of the gospel is that even though many of us maybe have very, very 00:05:04.179 --> 00:05:14.560 bad pasts, and maybe our lives have been characterized by great brokenness and great woundedness, the 00:05:14.560 --> 00:05:18.259 wonder of the gospel is that Jesus comes to us to be our Savior. 00:05:18.259 --> 00:05:24.599 And that the things in our past which are wrong, and even the things in our present that are 00:05:24.599 --> 00:05:28.019 wrong, are not going to be the final word about us. 00:05:28.399 --> 00:05:33.379 That the final word about George will not be failure in this area, failure in this area, 00:05:33.599 --> 00:05:36.000 failure in this area, and failure in this area. 00:05:36.620 --> 00:05:41.759 But the wonderful thing about the gospel is that when we come to Christ, acknowledging who 00:05:41.759 --> 00:05:47.459 we are and our true needs, and acknowledging that Jesus is the one that can meet our needs, 00:05:47.899 --> 00:05:54.079 then the final word about my life, and that means everything about my past as well, the 00:05:54.079 --> 00:05:59.300 final word about my life will be a word of welcome into the kingdom of God. 00:05:59.300 --> 00:06:09.780 So that when I die, and I wake on the other side of death, by having put my trust in Christ, 00:06:09.900 --> 00:06:16.920 by having come to him, my heavenly Father and your heavenly Father, he will smile at me, 00:06:17.080 --> 00:06:23.220 and he will say, George, I am so glad that you have come to be with me. 00:06:23.220 --> 00:06:31.220 So as we're looking at some things about how the married are to live with each other, 00:06:31.660 --> 00:06:37.400 it's just really important for us to understand this fundamental teaching of Christianity. 00:06:38.440 --> 00:06:44.140 So now, and that's why Paul says, all things work together for them that love God. 00:06:44.420 --> 00:06:48.220 Even those of us who've maybe had spectacularly sinful pasts, 00:06:48.220 --> 00:06:57.980 even those like that, we can have a new life and a new destiny and a new final word about our lives 00:06:57.980 --> 00:07:04.880 in the person of Jesus Christ. And the Christian community is a community of those who gather 00:07:04.880 --> 00:07:13.540 around Jesus, acknowledging their need and his power to save. So let's look now at this text 00:07:13.540 --> 00:07:21.180 called Principles for Marriage on page 991. And I'm going to be, we're going to be looking at 1 Corinthians 00:07:21.180 --> 00:07:27.640 7 verses 1 to 16. I'm going to be reading from the Bible, which I use as my personal devotions. 00:07:28.180 --> 00:07:33.520 And you folks can follow along in the Pew Bibles or your personal Bibles if you've brought them along. 00:07:34.500 --> 00:07:40.700 I'm going to read the first seven verses. And actually, as I read these first seven verses, 00:07:40.699 --> 00:07:47.120 there's a couple of things we have to sort of understand about this as I read these first seven 00:07:47.120 --> 00:07:53.399 verses. The first thing is, remember I'm saying that Paul here is giving us an outline of sanity. 00:07:54.219 --> 00:08:01.079 And some of his vice goes against the grain of the world. But he's giving us an outline of sanity. 00:08:01.079 --> 00:08:14.120 And Paul is, the church in Corinth is filled with problems. And it was probably, given that a lot of us 00:08:14.120 --> 00:08:21.979 would rather ride a bucking bronco than flog a dead horse. This first church in Corinth was a bucking 00:08:21.979 --> 00:08:30.439 bronco. It had the most spectacular charismatic gifts and spectacular evangelism and spectacular sin 00:08:30.439 --> 00:08:38.039 and spectacular problem. And they didn't have to deal with problems of no enthusiasm. They had to deal 00:08:38.039 --> 00:08:44.019 with spectacular, a porcupine type of enthusiasm that was shooting out in all sorts of different 00:08:44.019 --> 00:08:51.200 directions. And what's bringing about the writing of 1 Corinthians is that the different people have 00:08:51.200 --> 00:08:58.000 written to Paul. And some of them have been writing in sort of a grumpy fashion. And Paul is now 00:08:58.000 --> 00:09:05.580 responding. And Paul is going to respond to one of the slogans of a group within Corinth. And the 00:09:05.580 --> 00:09:12.480 slogan comes from what I would call the super spiritual. You know, maybe it's not a common 00:09:12.480 --> 00:09:20.480 Anglican problem right now in Canada. But there can be problems of what you'd call super spirituality. 00:09:21.240 --> 00:09:26.460 And that is, you get so caught up in what it means to be a Christian and so caught up with the fact that 00:09:26.460 --> 00:09:32.980 you've received the Holy Spirit, that you start to talk and almost believe that you're an angel and you 00:09:32.980 --> 00:09:40.780 don't have a body. You start to talk and try to urge everybody to act as if we're angels and we don't 00:09:40.780 --> 00:09:49.280 have bodies, that we're not fallen, embodied creatures who are in need of grace. And so there is a group of 00:09:49.279 --> 00:09:56.799 people within Corinth who are super, super, super spiritual and are giving advice to the congregation and some 00:09:56.799 --> 00:10:04.699 people are falling into it. The advice is to almost live as if they are angels. But here's the flip side of it. 00:10:05.159 --> 00:10:14.419 And this entire letter, both in the Greek and even more so in the English, Paul uses sideways language to talk about 00:10:14.419 --> 00:10:26.659 things. It's discreet language to talk about things. The super spiritual are saying, if you're really, 00:10:26.779 --> 00:10:31.819 really super spiritual, it doesn't matter whether you're married or not, you shouldn't sexually know 00:10:31.819 --> 00:10:40.199 another person. Just period. So if Louise and I had come into that church, they would tell us, 00:10:40.200 --> 00:10:45.220 it doesn't matter that you've been married for almost 25 years. There should be no sexual knowing 00:10:45.220 --> 00:10:51.780 in your marriage. Real, true, spiritual people know that. Real, true, spiritual people are only in love 00:10:51.780 --> 00:10:57.540 with Jesus, are completely and utterly caught up with that and are filled with spiritual ecstasies, 00:10:57.680 --> 00:11:03.920 and they need nothing else. And they've been very, very convincing. But here's the other side about this 00:11:03.920 --> 00:11:09.820 text, and this is something that Paul knows. That they're talking all this super spiritual talk, 00:11:10.200 --> 00:11:16.160 but the reality is that they talk super spiritual, talk super spiritual, talk super spiritual, 00:11:16.160 --> 00:11:21.280 and then things get out of control in their own lives, and they're visiting prostitutes. 00:11:22.640 --> 00:11:30.540 That's what's going on. So super spiritual talk, and maybe even for a while they sort of try to live 00:11:30.540 --> 00:11:36.300 it, but they're human beings, and what ends up happening is that some of them, some of the, 00:11:36.299 --> 00:11:42.000 that would have to be primarily men if it was in Corinth, they are going to visit some of the temple 00:11:42.000 --> 00:11:49.059 prostitutes. And that's what's at work here in this particular text. And so it begins 00:11:49.059 --> 00:11:51.679 with him quoting a letter. 00:11:53.079 --> 00:11:57.939 Now concerning the matters that which you wrote about, it is good for a man not to have sexual 00:11:57.940 --> 00:12:05.440 relations with a woman. But because of this temptation to sexual immoralities, each man 00:12:05.440 --> 00:12:13.720 should have his own wife, and each woman her own husband. And the word have here is an active word, 00:12:14.000 --> 00:12:24.440 and it's a sideways way of referring to this active sexual knowing and receiving of the other person. 00:12:24.440 --> 00:12:30.480 The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. 00:12:31.160 --> 00:12:35.540 For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. 00:12:36.360 --> 00:12:41.460 Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 00:12:42.140 --> 00:12:47.640 Do not deprive one another except by agreement for a limited time that you may devote yourselves to 00:12:47.640 --> 00:12:53.420 prayer, but then come together again so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of control. 00:12:53.419 --> 00:13:01.419 This is a concession, not a command. I wish that all were as I myself am, but each has his own gift 00:13:01.419 --> 00:13:10.459 from God, one of one kind and one of another. And we'll just pause. Here we see that Paul is saying 00:13:10.459 --> 00:13:16.379 that marriage, there are in a sense two particular gifts which Paul is talking about here. There'll be 00:13:16.379 --> 00:13:20.620 other gifts that he'll talk about later, but in this particular case there are two types of gifts. 00:13:20.620 --> 00:13:28.299 One is the gift of marriage and the other is the gift of celibacy. One is the gift of marriage and the 00:13:28.299 --> 00:13:37.620 other is the gift of celibacy. And Paul is here specifically denying that the gift of celibacy is 00:13:37.620 --> 00:13:46.019 somehow or another greater than the gift of marriage. For most people the gift that they will be granted is 00:13:46.019 --> 00:13:52.799 the gift of marriage, at least for part of the time of their life. Very few people will be granted the 00:13:52.799 --> 00:14:00.259 gift of lifelong celibacy. And so Paul is first of all here not, he's completely and utterly denying 00:14:00.259 --> 00:14:08.059 that if you are super, super spiritual, then whether or not you are married or anything, the highest state 00:14:08.059 --> 00:14:23.059 of affairs is to have this gift of celibacy is normal. And the marriage bed is important in marriage. The marriage bed 00:14:23.059 --> 00:14:34.179 creates unity between the couple and it is a daily reminder of the affirmation that they belong to each other. 00:14:35.379 --> 00:14:44.679 The marriage bed is important in marriage. It is a source of unity within the marriage or is to be a source of unity within the marriage. 00:14:44.679 --> 00:14:54.179 And it is to be a daily affirmation and reminder that the man belongs to the woman and the woman belongs to the man. 00:14:54.519 --> 00:15:04.599 In fact, this text is actually quite astounding in terms of its culture because you would have expected that Paul would have said 00:15:04.599 --> 00:15:12.819 something that put the man definitely higher than the woman. But Paul is very, very, you know, he's saying to me, he says, 00:15:12.820 --> 00:15:22.060 George, you belong to Louise. George, your body belongs to Louise. Everything about you, George, belongs to Louise. 00:15:22.780 --> 00:15:29.640 And he says to my wife the exact same thing, that she belongs to me. Her body belongs to me. 00:15:30.680 --> 00:15:37.640 And it, you know, if it had just been said to the man and not the woman, it would be a great tyranny and a great 00:15:37.640 --> 00:15:42.600 totalitarianism and a great evil. And if it was just said to the woman and not the man, 00:15:42.600 --> 00:15:48.639 it would be the exact same type of thing. And in complete and utter defiance of his culture, 00:15:49.279 --> 00:15:57.920 Paul points and calls to them understanding this complete and utter ownership of one to the other. 00:15:58.740 --> 00:16:06.660 And then Paul says something. He tries to teach them a value which is also very, very countercultural. 00:16:06.659 --> 00:16:13.779 You see, the easy thing would be for me to be able to say to my wife, you know, you owe me this, 00:16:13.879 --> 00:16:19.319 you owe me this, you owe me this. And my wife could say to me, you owe me this, you owe me this, 00:16:19.360 --> 00:16:26.639 you owe me this. And Paul tries to teach a different lesson. He said, he says to me, he says, George, 00:16:26.639 --> 00:16:34.000 you have to try to learn that the phrase that should go through your head, not all the time is, 00:16:34.080 --> 00:16:38.379 you owe me, you owe me, you owe me. But the phrase that should be going through your head, 00:16:38.559 --> 00:16:49.120 Sinclair, is, I owe you. I owe you. I owe you. In other words, rather than me looking at my wife and 00:16:49.120 --> 00:16:57.560 thinking what she owes me, the scripture text is calling me to say to myself, I owe my wife. I owe 00:16:57.560 --> 00:17:05.599 my wife. I owe my wife. You see, it's a complete and utter inversion of our natural habits. It's a 00:17:05.599 --> 00:17:12.819 complete and utter inversion of our natural tendencies. It's that the scripture is trying to 00:17:12.819 --> 00:17:21.460 teach the husband to go around with the attitude of debt that he owes his wife and all of the 00:17:21.460 --> 00:17:28.119 appropriate attitudes and behaviors and aspects of character. And the same text is calling the wife 00:17:28.119 --> 00:17:38.419 to have that attitude towards her husband. As I said, this text, which at first looks so hard, 00:17:38.420 --> 00:17:46.519 is actually the outline of sanity. It is the outline of what would lead to a happy marriage. 00:17:47.460 --> 00:17:57.039 Now, the next group of verses, Paul is trying to take this basic teaching and apply it to those in 00:17:57.039 --> 00:18:06.920 the context of people who are trying to dissolve marriage, either by encouraging an angelic belief that 00:18:06.920 --> 00:18:12.620 your angels or by, in a contradictory way, those who are trying to encourage divorce. 00:18:13.560 --> 00:18:21.980 And so in the face of people who are trying to weaken marriage and dissolve marriage, either from 00:18:21.980 --> 00:18:27.420 the point of view of an angelic super spirituality or just from those who just say, you know, divorce is 00:18:27.420 --> 00:18:32.920 just a natural thing and just go with the flow and move on to the next thing. In the face of an attempt 00:18:32.920 --> 00:18:41.120 to dissolve marriage, Paul applies what he's just said to three different situations. To those who are 00:18:41.120 --> 00:18:50.000 widowed in verses 8 and 9, to those who are Christians who are married in verses 10 and 11, and in verses 12 to 00:18:50.000 --> 00:18:59.180 16, he deals with the situation of a couple who are pagans and one of them becomes a Christian. 00:18:59.180 --> 00:19:08.100 And so let's listen to some of Paul's advice first to widows and widowers. 00:19:08.099 --> 00:19:16.299 Now, there's a bit of a technical argument as to why unmarried could also be translated as widowers. 00:19:17.199 --> 00:19:24.059 To the widowers and the widows, I say that it is good for them to remain single, as I am. But if they 00:19:24.059 --> 00:19:32.240 cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to be aflame with passion. 00:19:32.240 --> 00:19:44.220 Actually, the original Greek says it is better to marry than to burn. And passion is sort of added 00:19:44.220 --> 00:19:50.880 there and makes it look as if somehow or another Paul is concerned with just the mere fact that 00:19:50.880 --> 00:20:00.019 there's passion. He's really saying to those who, and Paul himself was probably a widower. 00:20:00.019 --> 00:20:07.519 We know that by the time that he was writing this letter, he's unmarried. In fact, throughout most of 00:20:07.519 --> 00:20:14.180 his apostleship, he was unmarried. But if, in fact, he was a rabbi before he became a Christian, 00:20:14.359 --> 00:20:20.059 he was probably married and he must have become widowed at some point in time. But Paul is silent 00:20:20.059 --> 00:20:26.619 about that part of his life from before. And so Paul is just saying, listen, for those of you 00:20:26.619 --> 00:20:35.459 who have been married and you are now bereft of your spouse through death, his advice is that we 00:20:35.459 --> 00:20:41.599 should consider being single, that we should consider that that would be the state of affairs 00:20:41.599 --> 00:20:46.059 that we might want to remain in for the rest of our lives. He doesn't go into it, but he just 00:20:46.059 --> 00:20:51.259 considers it. Rather than automatically thinking that marriage is the very next step, you should 00:20:51.259 --> 00:20:57.720 consider whether it's appropriate for you to continue on in singleness. And then in his next 00:20:57.720 --> 00:21:02.539 part here, he's not just referring to the fact that they don't appear to lack self-control. He's 00:21:02.539 --> 00:21:08.079 referring once again to the fact that what's happening is that, in probably the case of men, 00:21:08.180 --> 00:21:13.940 is the men are going to temple prostitutes. And he's saying, okay, listen, listen, dude. 00:21:13.940 --> 00:21:22.700 He's just being really blunt with them. He said, you know, if you've lost your wife, 00:21:23.400 --> 00:21:31.380 going to temple prostitutes isn't the way to go. Okay? If you can't be living a single life 00:21:31.380 --> 00:21:38.920 in some type of celibacy, you should really be pursuing marriage. He's not at all, he's not 00:21:38.920 --> 00:21:46.000 excusing or giving any type of permission for this type of sexual outlet. He's saying, I understand 00:21:46.000 --> 00:21:51.360 that you have sexual needs. I understand that you have things that you can't control. And listen, 00:21:51.840 --> 00:21:58.060 the way that you should be orienting your life is considering remarrying, not in pursuing this other 00:21:58.060 --> 00:22:07.640 type of path. Then in verses 10 and 11, to the married I give this charge, not I, but the Lord. 00:22:07.640 --> 00:22:13.280 Now, I just want to pause here before I read the next thing. This is a really interesting little 00:22:13.280 --> 00:22:18.640 thing. Sometimes Christians have wondered, does it mean that the next part isn't scripture? You know, 00:22:18.740 --> 00:22:26.460 that Paul is sort of just saying, you know, this is just my personal opinion. It's not like that at 00:22:26.460 --> 00:22:31.600 all. It actually sort of opens the door for a moment as to how the early Christians thought. 00:22:32.220 --> 00:22:37.500 And the early Christians, it appears from this text, wanted to keep the sharpest division between the 00:22:37.500 --> 00:22:44.480 remembered words of Jesus and their own words, and the remembered words of Jesus as being vastly 00:22:44.480 --> 00:22:50.420 precious and unchanging. And so Paul isn't saying here that the other things that he's going to say, 00:22:50.720 --> 00:22:54.619 I mean, he wouldn't have known at the time that would eventually become scripture. He wouldn't have 00:22:54.619 --> 00:23:00.519 known that. But he wants to make it very clear that, you know, some things he says are clear that he's 00:23:00.519 --> 00:23:06.400 heard the words of Jesus as told to him, maybe by the other apostles, the other witnesses of Jesus, 00:23:06.400 --> 00:23:11.279 maybe even some of the early written documents. I know the words of Jesus, and this thing which I'm 00:23:11.279 --> 00:23:17.900 about to say can go right back to something which Jesus himself has said. And let's listen to 00:23:17.900 --> 00:23:25.180 verses 10 and 11. To the married I give this charge, not I but the Lord, that the wife should not 00:23:25.180 --> 00:23:30.680 separate from her husband, but if she does, she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to 00:23:30.680 --> 00:23:39.940 her husband, and the husband should not divorce his wife. This text is saying that as the basic general 00:23:39.940 --> 00:23:48.440 principle, Christians shouldn't seek divorce, this is a very hard teaching today, but Christians 00:23:48.440 --> 00:23:54.660 shouldn't seek divorce, if at all possible. Paul here isn't dealing with all of the different things. 00:23:54.820 --> 00:23:59.140 He's not as, in fact, in an odd way, you're going to see that in a moment he's going to say that 00:23:59.140 --> 00:24:07.000 if in the case of a pagan husband, let's say, and a Christian wife, and if the pagan husband divorces 00:24:07.000 --> 00:24:12.740 his wife, he's going to, in effect, give the wife permission to remarry. And we know from the Gospels 00:24:12.740 --> 00:24:17.779 and from the Old Testament law that there's different conditions that allow people as a concession 00:24:17.779 --> 00:24:23.559 after the tragedy of divorce to remarry. Paul isn't giving a complete teaching here in just one verse 00:24:23.559 --> 00:24:31.700 about this, but he's sitting down a fundamental principle is that he's saying, George, when you marry 00:24:31.700 --> 00:24:38.380 Louise, what you are saying is that you will never be with another woman, and that is good. 00:24:40.980 --> 00:24:46.700 And when Louise married me, God, in a sense, the scriptures are saying, Louise, you will never be 00:24:46.700 --> 00:24:54.759 with another man other than George, and this is good. Work on it. This is the fundamental desire 00:24:54.759 --> 00:25:08.480 of my heart. Verses 12 to 16. To the rest I say, I, not the Lord. That's what I was referring 00:25:08.480 --> 00:25:14.079 to earlier, this little sort of a window into how precious the early Christians understood 00:25:14.079 --> 00:25:19.220 the words of the Lord. And the others here now are people who have been maybe both pagans. 00:25:19.220 --> 00:25:23.440 They would have been, in Corinth, they would have been both pagans, and one of the two of them 00:25:23.440 --> 00:25:30.420 have become Christians, but they're married. That if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, 00:25:30.779 --> 00:25:37.380 and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her. If a woman has a husband who is an 00:25:37.380 --> 00:25:44.039 unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him. For the unbelieving husband 00:25:44.039 --> 00:25:51.339 is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. 00:25:52.039 --> 00:25:58.500 Otherwise, your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy. But if the unbelieving partner 00:25:58.500 --> 00:26:07.379 separates, let it be so. In such cases, the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace. 00:26:07.380 --> 00:26:13.860 Wife, how do you know whether you will save your husband? Husband, how do you know whether you will 00:26:13.860 --> 00:26:21.840 save your wife? Now, the thing that is so wonderful about this text is that the text is saying, 00:26:22.760 --> 00:26:31.600 God claims your family. God claims your family. If I had become a Christian before my wife, 00:26:31.599 --> 00:26:39.359 and if we were to have children, the saying here is, God desires the wife and all of the children to be 00:26:39.359 --> 00:26:47.399 his. God has a claim, a passion, an interest in that entire family. And we also see here that the 00:26:47.399 --> 00:26:53.579 benefits for any one of us coming to know Jesus is not just some private little autonomous 00:26:53.579 --> 00:27:01.279 individualistic benefit that just flows to me in my private spirituality, but that to come to the 00:27:01.279 --> 00:27:06.639 living God through the person of Jesus Christ and to be filled with the Holy Spirit, to be drawn close 00:27:06.639 --> 00:27:15.980 to Christ, is to lead to benefits and to lead to changes that extend beyond the limits of my body 00:27:15.980 --> 00:27:24.019 and the limits of my mind. That in a sense, the Holy Spirit is to flow through me and to flow into my 00:27:24.019 --> 00:27:28.859 wife and into my children and into my neighbors, and it goes beyond that. You can just see the basic 00:27:28.859 --> 00:27:37.559 principle. But this very specific text is saying, you know, praise God that you have been granted a 00:27:37.559 --> 00:27:44.699 pagan husband, and you have wonderful children, and you have come to saving faith in Jesus Christ. 00:27:45.559 --> 00:27:55.179 And Christ now desires and claims your entire family, your children and your husband. And this is an 00:27:55.180 --> 00:28:02.860 invitation not to consider how you can now leave, either to become super spiritual like those angel 00:28:02.860 --> 00:28:09.019 spiritual types, or even just to try to imagine that you can somehow create some far better thing 00:28:09.019 --> 00:28:14.799 by being married to another person, maybe by being married to a believing husband. The text is saying, 00:28:15.380 --> 00:28:21.779 pray for your husband and pray for your children. Do all in your power to pray and to pray and to pray, 00:28:21.779 --> 00:28:27.259 and to surrender your life to Christ and surrender your life to his word and to be open to the Holy 00:28:27.259 --> 00:28:34.899 Spirit in such a way that your life will have a godly influence on your children and on your husband 00:28:34.899 --> 00:28:44.059 or on your wife, as the case might be. That you can grow and flourish where you are. That is the wonderful 00:28:44.059 --> 00:28:53.019 message of this passage of Scripture. I began by saying that Christianity is not for the sinless, 00:28:53.359 --> 00:28:58.339 but for sinners. It is not for those who have never done anything wrong in their lives, 00:28:58.599 --> 00:29:04.919 but for those of us who know that we have done many things wrong in our lives. But Jesus has come to save us. 00:29:04.920 --> 00:29:15.120 If there has been any type of touching of our conscience today as a result of this text, 00:29:15.380 --> 00:29:24.120 that is a good thing, not a bad thing. Because to touch our conscience is the touch of Jesus upon our 00:29:24.120 --> 00:29:31.240 souls, upon our bodies, our minds, and our hearts. And it's a touch not to push us away, 00:29:31.240 --> 00:29:39.240 but it's a touch that beckons us to come to him that we might know forgiveness and the new life 00:29:39.240 --> 00:29:42.859 which he is full of. Shall we bow our heads in prayer? 00:30:01.240 --> 00:30:07.359 Father, we give you thanks and praise that you do not weigh our merits, but pardon our offenses. 00:30:08.220 --> 00:30:13.700 We give you thanks and praise that your Son Jesus came to give us new life, new birth, 00:30:14.120 --> 00:30:20.900 a new hope, a new destiny, a new final word. We ask, Father, that your Holy Spirit would move and 00:30:20.900 --> 00:30:27.980 work in our lives to bring us to Jesus and through Jesus to yourself, that we might hear through Jesus 00:30:27.980 --> 00:30:35.420 that final and welcoming word that comes from you. And Father, for those of us who have been called to 00:30:35.420 --> 00:30:42.640 that state, holy estate of matrimony, we ask that your Holy Spirit would fall upon us and fall upon our 00:30:42.640 --> 00:30:49.480 marriage and fall upon our children, that our marriages might be characterized by the teaching of your word, 00:30:49.480 --> 00:30:58.920 that we might learn to love our spouse in a godly and full manner, and that we might learn to love our 00:30:58.920 --> 00:31:06.120 children in a godly and full manner. This we ask in the name of Jesus, your Son and our Savior. Amen.