I Take You

the following message by Alistair beg is made available by truth for life for more information visit us online at truthfortheworld.org I invite you to turn this morning to the 10th chapter of Mark and verse 1 and he that is Jesus left there and went to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan and crowds gathered to him again and again as was his custom he taught them and Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife he answered them what did Moses command you they said Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away and Jesus said to them because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment but from the beginning of creation God made them male and female therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife and the two shall become one flesh so they're no longer two but one flesh what therefore God has joined together let not man separate and in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter and he said to them whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her and if she divorces her husband and marries another she commits adultery amen father help us now as we turn to the Bible may our minds be enabled to think may our hearts be open to receive may our wills be quicken to obey for we ask it in Jesus name Amen now not everybody here is married this morning some are young some are widowed and some are in other states of affairs I suppose but it is important for us to recognize that marriage is important to everybody marriage is important to everybody whether they realize it or not single people may be tempted to think that an address on marriage pertains only to the married but no as we will see it pertains to the very essence of our humanity and TS Mooney who my father quoted to you in the past is one of my favorite bachelors in his 80s he died I asked him why have you never married he was in his 70s at this point he said well he said because in my case the desirable has always been unattainable and the attainable has been undesirable and in a very sort of feminine endearing way he followed that up beats by saying I'd rather go through life wanting what I don't have then having what I don't want and some of you are very settled in your singleness and happy about it and you can concur with with old TS but no the Bible actually says marriage is a foundational issue and therefore a matter of concern to everyone let me start as if we're on the fringes in fact let me approach the subject in this way let's take a moment to say something concerning the confusion in the culture and then the clarity of the scripture and then thirdly just a call to keep our promises so confusion clarity and call I didn't have that in the first service but that's the benefit of having a second service so we started with the confusion of the coach so let let's start in 1970 I was at that point what 18 some of you were not even born Joni Mitchell was really emblematic of much of the underlying philosophy of the 60s she is the one who's saying my old man is a singer in the park he's a walker in the rain he's a dancer in the dark we don't need no piece of paper from the City Hall keeping us tied and true my old man he keeps away my blues it's quite fascinating to realize and this is for another day that the homosexual community is very concerned about a piece of paper from the City Hall quickly our world spins but in the late 60s and early 70s the underlying notion was as long as you have the right kind of feelings as long as you've got the right kind of romance one of those marriage licenses is unnecessary and will probably prove to be unhelpful because that's all about duty and framework and we're all about freedom and delight that's 70 fast-forward 14 years and Tina Turner has her first number-one hit in America taking it up a notch song written by two English fellows and she's saying remember you must understand though the touch of your hand makes my post react that it's only the thrill of boy meeting girl opposites attract how old-fashioned is that idea and then she's saying is physical it's only logical you must try to ignore that it means more than that what's love got to do with it got to do with it got to do with it what's love but a secondhand emotion so seventy we don't need the legality of it 84 we don't even need the love where was that leading to well go forward 24 years we're now in 2008 and the movie hooking up or as you say hook hooking up was just giving a visual representation of the hook-up culture a culture that quotes accepts and encourages casual sexual encounters which focus on physical pleasure without necessarily including emotional bonding or long time commitment so 70 we don't want a long time commitment that is represented in the marriage license 84 we don't really care if if you love me and by 2008 you get a text message on your phone that simply says do you want a hookup no strings attached no emotion involved it reminds me of the poets from the sixties or does does it is it is it is it coming through you're asking yeah it's coming through yeah the act of love lies somewhere between the belly and the mind this is Roger McGough I lost the love some time ago I've only the act to grind high on bedroom darkness we endure the pantomime ships that go bang in the night run aground on the sands of time oh the act of love life somewhere between the belly and the mind and I lost the love some time ago now I've only the act to grind the culture in which we live this morning is essentially and the Bible has made this clear from the beginning endemically selfish and a sort of underlying cultural narrative between an approach that is taken to interpersonal relationships and as it is revealed primarily in the subject of marriage is one that simply reiterates the kinds of things that we hear on a daily basis and God forbid that we are the ones saying this only I can determine what's right and wrong for me I have to be free to be myself I have to live how I choose to live and any environment that challenges that or violates that is inevitably an unsafe environment for me now your sensible people and you read the newspapers and you listen to the news you can judge whether this is rhetoric on my part whether I am overstating it whether I am simply observing what is out there there is arguably I suggest to you no place in in contemporary Western culture where the contrast between a Christian worldview and the culture itself is more clearly seen than in the rina of marriage marriage now think how this comes across into our world today this is the fourth verse of of Hebrews 13 it reads as follows marriage is to be held in honor among all and let the marriage bed be undefiled for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous that doesn't sound very politically correct does it that you're not going to get away with that as a large page advertisement in the New York Times I can pretty well guarantee but that is what God's Word says and before we set ourselves a little higher in our seats remember that it was written not to an alien culture but to the church that was written in Hebrews 13 to the church make sure you're engaged in charity make sure you're engaged in good deeds make sure you're living out the gospel life and make sure that you don't go foul out on this area because marriage is to be held and honored by all not least of all by those who are actually married now when when you think about this you realize how vitally important is that we do not step back from the absolute clarity and the uncompromising nature of what the Bible has to say about human sexuality and particularly about the covenant of marriage we read from mark 10 we could have read from elsewhere but I wanted to read so that we would hear how Jesus responded to those who were challenging him in relationship to the nature of marriage and its longevity and what Jesus did in response was to quote the Bible he actually said to them now what was it that Moses commanded you how did Moses command them because the Word of God came to Moses and Moses to all the people and he said now when Moses said that to you that was because of the hardness of your hearts but if you think about a beat behind that he said if you go back to the very beginning let me remind you what he said from the beginning start about creation starting about the Garden of Eden starting about Adam and Eve from the beginning God made them male and female therefore a man shall leave his father and mother hold fast to his wife and the two will become one flesh so they're no longer two but one flesh what therefore God has joined together let not man separate now let's just notice two things God's instruction to Adam is very clear first of all as it relates to gender to gender from the beginning God made them male and female that's their gender male and female he didn't make them transgender or any other kind of gender he made them male and female and he showed them however thing is supposed to work and they figured it out really well and it's clear not only concerning the gender but also concerning the number he didn't make a number of Eve's for Adam a selection for him to choose from he just made one and he didn't make another Adam as an alternative for Eve he just made one pointing to the fact that at the very beginning of creation you have the roots of heterosexual monogamy heterosexual monogamy that marriage is about one man and one woman and it isn't about anything other than one man and one woman and the redefining of that in terms of a confused culture does nothing does nothing to alter the facts there's nothing to alter the reality of what God has done and therefore that is why the marriage ceremony is so very very important Christians of all people should be big on marriage we shouldn't be minimalist when it comes to marriage I'm not a fan of going away with six of your friends to get married you say I don't care whether you are or not and that's justifiable I'm just pointing it out I think that the community should know that you're getting married they should know that you are single that you don't live together and that on a certain day when a certain thing happens everything changes they will then know that when the car goes back up the road and goes in the driveway the couple that get out are now going into the house together into the bedroom together because of what just happened down the street not because of how they feeling about one another or because they wanted to engage in sexual experimentation but because they got married and something happened then that's why premarital sex is not marriage incidentally it can't be it's an aberration marriage involves that piece of paper if you like it involves that structured statement within the community and within society and that is why the marriage ceremony really matters some of you have come up with your own marriage ceremonies and I hope you enjoy them because I will not preside at them I'll tell you that right now just before you ask me and some of you have written your own vows and who you want to have a great evening but the the fact is the marriage matters know at the risk of the risk let me just walk us through the marriage service here for a moment so that we understand what we're talking about for 40 years it's been my privilege to have a ringside seat at marriages to look out on a congregation and to say we're gathered here in the presence of God and before this congregation to join together this man and the women in marriage before God and before each other in other words it's a public thing is not a minimalist thing we're not in a back room somewhere conducting something and so you're not supposed to go in a back room and baptize people in a bath either for the very same reason but that's a different story we're not there doing that now we've now we've identified what what it's about we're to do and then the presiding minister says marriage is a special and unique relationship appointed by God and set apart in Scripture as honorable in all it is therefore not to be entered upon lightly or carelessly but thoughtfully with reverence for God with due consideration of the purposes for which it was established by God so what are the purposes for which it was established number 1 for the companionship companionship help and encouragement that husband and wife ought to give to each other friends for life 2 it was established for the continuance of family life as children who are gifts from the Lord should be carefully brought up and trained to love and obey God and thirdly it was a it was a ordained or established for the well-being of human society which can be strong and happy only when the marriage bond is held in honor the welfare of human society can be strong and happy only where the marriage bond is held in honor so when the marriage bond is redefined is disintegrated and is shelved the society will collapse along with it it is inevitable and history testifies to it and our present confused culture gives evidence of it you see why it is so imperative that the Christian population who understand who God is who understands that God's way is perfect are absolutely rock solid committed to what God has said and when we deviate from that we not only affect ourselves but we affect the culture now if you can if you can remember their being married and I can and or if you're anticipating it let me tell you how it goes let me speak to the young people now let me let me show you how scary this is let me show you how solemn this is first of all you're not supposed to look at each other I don't really like the bride and groom touching each other at the beginning I'm a bit of a weirdo leave leave them alone you're not married yet leave them alone it's right you didn't hold your dad leave him alone okay so I say to them do you take this woman to be your lawful wedded wife to have and to hold from this day forward for better for worse for richer for poorer in sickness and in health to love and to cherish till death do part you the person says I do the other one says I do that okay here we go now at this point they're not looking at each other they shouldn't be there looking at me why they're looking at me because I'm asking them to tell before God and everybody who's in there that they're actually covenant in the for God that they will do what they're about to say they will do in the vows that they are now about to make this way so the promises actually have to do with this way and the vows then have to do with this way and it is because of the significance of the vertical access plane that the horizontal plane takes on such an important dimension you see the Bible is very clear about this it doesn't talk in terms of contract this is not like you know buying a car and keep it for as long as the warranty is there or until you find one that you like better it's not really working the way you like to therefore they're just traded in and get another one no this is actually a contractual obligation that is set within the framework of time and eternity that's why in Malachi the the man is told the that the woman in in his home is quote your partner the wife of your marriage covenant and in proverbs two the wayward wife is described as having left the partner of her youth and ignored the covenant she made before God the Covenant she made before God there's now that she I just slipped out the back jack but she has actually ignored the covenant that she made before God now what I find most striking and I hope you do too is that neither the questions nor the vows have anything to do with how you're feeling there's never a question about how do you feel never once now that's very very important not only for the day you're married but for every day you're married and some days more important than other days that you realize this is a covenant we're in this thing for keeps because you see once these vows have been made you can't get out of it I do take you Susan to be my wife to have and to hold from this day forward for better for worse richer for poorer sickness and in health to love and to cherish till death us do part according to God's holy law in the presence of God I make this vow stuck stuck signed sealed delivered you go back down that aisle you don't go back the way you came up everything has changed you are stuck gloriously stuck wonderfully stuck durably stuck enthusiastically stuck legally stuck affectionately stuck but stuck you see I don't think stuck is the right word you're wrong stuck is the word it's the word in the King James Version that is translated cleave and it means stuck it means glued that's what it means now you just got yourself glued and no one including yourself is allowed to unglue it that's the point that's what makes marriage as revealed in Scripture so radically countercultural because and i flew by last night the stewardess and the seat next to me was flying in to go somewhere else was it just reading they were passing magazines to one another and then and the magazines were just basically the story of serial adultery all the pictures on the front just you're just people coming and going into marriage out of marriage onto another marriage whatever it might be and I said and I looked at it and I thought golly how different is the straightforward teaching of the Bible and what a lie it is that the devil says you know if you're gonna commit yourself to that stuff boy you're really putting yourself in a cage 1976 deals Tweety a writer in The Guardian she wrote an article called when marriage is just a cage and I've never forgotten one of our lines she she said in the article hopefully one day outside the bonds of Christian marriage we will discover what true love is all about for the first time in other words if we can just get out of this caged mentality the stock idea this God covenant notion then we'll really be on track for all that can be enjoyed oh you know you got asked whether the culture bear testimony to that or not know so let me say that in this god-given covenant arrangement there is security there is security there is the security of realizing that when we got married were just too clumsy bumbling sinners and their safety not in the depth of our feelings which may AB and flow flicker and fade wane not in the depth of our feelings but in the promises that we've made to God and in the promises we made to each other you know I mean when I think that I can be biographical I suppose autobiographical who and I think about when we took that Russian boat to London and to Edinburgh and Sue and I in 75 ended up in that little tiny apartment and comely bank in Edinburgh with both of us suddenly realised we're stuck we are stuck I mean we used to have an ocean between us and you know you could you could you can separate you know at that distance but this department is about the size of this platform area here and you know you could close a bathroom door but you know the person was right there I mean this is so you have so but there was security in that security and the safety of our vows because we made promises because we actually believe that somewhere on this long journey that was before us God's Way was actually best that his way was good pleasing and perfect so that these things would be the securing factors when we would be tempted to buy into the cultural narrative a narrative the values spontaneity over stability and a cultural narrative that that values fears over faithfulness or whatever you like now you don't have to look hard to find this kind of thing I hate to pull Barry Manilow but I'm going to just now remember this dreadful song probably one of the worst songs of all time it's called trying to get the feeling those of you who were born later you're you're delighted because you have no clue what this means you didn't have to you didn't have to live through this I dr. my woman is coming back home late today could you maybe give me something because the feeling is gone and I must get it back right away because she sees that I've been up down trying to get the feeling again all around trying to get the feeling again the one that made me shiver made my knees start to quiver every time she walked in and I've looked high low everywhere I possibly can but there's no trying to get the feeling again it seemed to disappear there all goodness gracious but that's exactly what's happening on a routine basis in bedrooms all around Cleveland the feelings gone I I've got to find somebody that will put it back cuz you sure can't put it back you're not who I thought you were this is not what I thought it was so if there's no physician who can give me a back again then I'm gonna have to find somebody who can reintroduce it to me now what will keep you in that situation now your feelings your feelings that take you anywhere only your promises only the vows only the security of the Covenant of God and the course of years I have listened you know to two husbands and wives telling me well you don't understand this and she's that and he's this and his mother interferes and he's much untidy ER than I ever thought he was and I can write it all out I mean it's I don't mean to be dismissive of it but I can tell your speech before you even show up and I almost inevitably say so what you're telling me is this marriage thing is worse the go exactly yeah and then I say well that's good because you signed up for worse and said what do you mean I said hey let's go back to the deal for better for worse now we're in the worst part okay now that is not to be dismissive of the things that have crept into a marriage I'm not playing fast and loose with that but I am being dead serious in part of course it's worse how can you live with somebody for all this time and not of times when it is worse than other times it's it's inevitable there are things that will invade your life above sadness is that creep in there will be disappointments you will discover all kinds of things about one another these things are realities but the fact of the matter is that if we buy the confused culture were finished if we bow to the clarity of Scripture then even though it may cost us we're gonna keep the promises in Ephesians when Paul is driving this home he says in Ephesians you know this is by the wife and then he says and husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church that's verse 25 but in verse 28 he comes back to it and he actually says husband's ought to love their wives ought to love their wives now that is a very important word because that that that demands obligation it's an obligation what does it mean to love what does it mean to love does it mean to have a feeling no it means to do what God says you're supposed to do and in doing what God says you're supposed to do you will often discover that the feelings that have begun to dissipate will catch up with you but how many failures on the part of a man and let's just stick with a man this morning reveal themselves then in a form of narcissism and unbelievable selfishness in one of my favorite authors a Scottish novelist I came across a quote some time ago I put it in my book and I kept it I said there'll be a day when this quote will be important and I think today's the day the the character in the novel and she's reflecting on the fact that her husband is is certainly not up to the mark and this is her soliloquy a real relationships based on trust and understanding the sharing of little things moments of happiness and laughter realizing you're both that you've both just had the same thought or about to say the same thing James and I shared nothing except the same space and even that less and less often I grew to realize that his emotions were without substance his obsession was with himself not me he'd be telling me about some big contract he'd sign some export deal to the United States and I'd realize he was watching his own reflection in the window as he told me playing to his own imagined gallery posing for photographs that weren't being taken he was in love with the idea of me but I was just another trophy in a life that was all about him now what's the problem there he's not doing what he said he would see the security is found in the boundaries God does not put these boundaries around the marriage covenant in order to jeopardize us or to thwart us and see the ultimately the issue and everything is are we gonna take God at His Word or are we not are we going to trust God that within the framework of covenant love and I got to draw this to a course but within the framework of covenant love that's where sexual intimacy and romantic creativity has the time and the framework to flourish it's within the it's within the security of that that you have the time but if but if if you if you're on again a short-term deal here where the contract is running out and then you know there'll be no time and there'll be no purpose but given that you've promised for then you get time to figure out how to do this how to enjoy this how to care how to be creative how to be all those things it seems perfectly sensible to me somebody said after the first service said I've been married for 50 years somebody else came said I've been married for 55 I said thank you for your example I'm chasing behind you I think this is wonderful it seems to me that it's relatively easy to just play the field what what seems quite immense to me is to meet couples that have been married for it you know five decades and for five decades they have loved each other that takes a heck of a lot of creativity I would think that takes a lot of developed affection that takes a lot of vomiting and within the framework you're covered in love as well you know we get the opportunity to be humble and to be honest with one another and and to anticipate that loged longevity is not only possible but desirable you know the old Paul overstreet song Randy Travis sang it you know forever and ever amen as long as old men sit and talk about the weather as long as old women sit and talk about old men honey if you ask me how long I'll be faithful I'll tell you again and again because I'm gonna love you forever forever and ever amen and when the challenges come when the waves hit when the difficulties that are there when the temptations abound what's going to keep you now your feelings your feelings will kill you your promises ultimately you know our lifes are the sum of promises promises kept and promises broken you did pretty well chart your course and mine too and we would be horribly despondent whether or not for the fight that all the promises of God find there yes and there are men and Jesus that ultimately are fractured and broken lifes and our mistakes and our and our stumblings along the way are subsumed in the wonder of Christ's redeeming love so that we needn't go back and rummage in the garbage cans of sins that have been forgiven but we better heed heed carefully the warning of God's Word and the call that he gives to be a Promise Keeper I've been singing a song to myself for a bit now that begins at a bar down in Dallas at a bar down in Dallas an old man chimed in and I thought he was out of his head because being a young guy I just laughed him off when I heard what the old man had said he said never again will I turn young ladies heads or run and chase out in the wind because I'm 3/4 done from the start to the end and I wish I was 18 again I wish I was 18 again to go where I've never been because I'm 3/4 done from the start to the end and I wish I was 18 again I don't know that's nostalgia and none of his regret I don't know what it is but this I think I have a responsibility to say to my children and in turn to my grandchildren and so do you if you are secure in your marriage I love your mom I love your grandmother I love her more today than I loved her before and I'm not gonna leave her and she isn't gonna leave me and it's not because we're the dearest sweetest people all the time because sometimes grandpa can be a little funky you know but but he promised and you know how important it is to you when I tell you I promise I'll pick you up that I keep my word well in the same way and I actually rewrote the thing for myself I wish I was 18 again to relive that Saturday when I said I take you to a young girl called Sue now I wish I was 18 again and as it turns out 47 years ago today in suburban London I met a 13 year old girl and here we and not because I'm trying to find the feelings again but because God promised and because we promised and you must promise to I promise you that grace will enable you to keep them so keep them father thank you thank you for the Bible thank you for the truth and clarity of it thank you for the call to an uncompromised obedience to your word look upon us in your mercy Lord talk like this unsettled some and discourages others and the evil one jumps on it to stir up old notions and bad ideas we resist him firm in the faith we take our place at the very cross of Christ in whom all of your promises find there yes and there are men the promise of forgiveness the assurance of Hope and the enabling reality of your grace help us Lord we pray for Jesus sake amen this message was brought to you from truth for life where the learning is for living to learn more about truth for life with Alistair beg visit us online at truth for

Channel: Alistair Begg

Views: 15,446

Rating: 4.9413919 out of 5

Keywords: Alistair Begg, Marriage, Sexuality, Christian Living, Grace of God

Id: slgYxTseo-s

Length: 38min 47sec (2327 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 21 2015