Series: Chaos to Covenant
Title: “Where did marriage come from?"
Scripture: Genesis 2:18-25 NIV
Matthew 19:4-5; Ephesians 5:21-34
Bottom line: Marriage came from God. It was his idea. Marriage is a covenant (not contract) before God between a man and a woman for life.
INTRODUCTION
CONTEXT
SERMON OUTLINE
CONCLUSION
NOTES
QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER
OUTLINES
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
MAIN REFERENCES USED
INTRODUCTION
Men, we need help. But we're often the last to believe it. We'll resist help at every turn.
The recent commercial of a couple on their way to a fancy party illustrates my point. He's in a very expensive car, both are dressed to the nines, and he comes to a fork in the road. The GPS says continue on the paved road as the best route and gets them there on time. However, seeing the dirt road fork off to the right, the man says, "I know a short cut" and takes the dirt road.
We need help.
Guys, I'm not picking on you. We're guys! We've got this, right?! I mean it's just a bookcase. We can assemble this. Sure, it's from IKEA and there are instructions but we've got this!
We need help.
I could go on but you get what I'm slinging, right?
Men, let's be honest. There are times, maybe, possibly, ok, yes, there are times when we need help.
I'll go one step further (at great personal risk)...
Men, let's be honest. There are times, maybe, possibly, ok, yes, there are times when we need help...from our wife.
Let's look at Genesis and ask ourselves 2 questions as we do:
God, what are you saying to me today?
God, what do you want me to do about what you're saying to me today?
CONTEXT
We're in the second of two creation accounts: one from satellite view (ch. 1) and one from a closer, birds-eye view. (Ch. 2)
In this second (earlier?) view, we zoom in on day 6 where God created man and woman: Adam and Eve. Last week we focused on Adam. Today, we join Adam in seeing God create Eve.
Not only does God create Eve...he creates an amazing covenant relationship called marriage.
Basic Outline:
I. Primeval history (1-11)--God and the world
II. Patriarchal history (12-50)--God and Abraham's family
SERMON
I. "Not good". (Gen 2:18) "Warning, warning, Will Robinson." (-Robert, Lost in Space)
Narrator Moses says God said, "not good for the man to be alone."
"We're better together" and "We need each other" -both from Pastor Rick Warren.
This is true in your marriage.
This is true in your family and extended family.
This is true where you live, work, learn and play.
This is true in life.
God's take is community > isolation (even if you're an introvert, although you may prefer less community than an extrovert and that's ok)
God continues...
"I will make a suitable (equal, complementary, similar yet different) helper (needed partner for him to obey God's command in 2:15 and 1:26-28)."
I = God
This is God's decision, not Adam's request. Adam doesn't even see that he needs help yet! (Yes, that's where we get it, guys)
This is God's work. He doesn't make mistakes.
This is God's gift.
Of all the ways that God could have helped the man, woman is how God chose to do it. And she was perfect and exactly what he needed.
One more thing. Helper. To our modern ears, "Helper" sounds pathetically demeaning. I would simply point out this: In the Bible, the nation of Israel, God's chosen people, often need a helper. The Bible says that God is their helper. Think about that. God is called Israel's helper. Sounds like good company and rare air. Ladies, do not see Adam's helper as anything but a divine appointment that honors you and blesses him.
Paul digs into this in Ephesians 5:21-34.
II. Help needed? The man needs to know and believe he is unable to carry out God's command to rule, work, and take care of the garden alone.
So God asks the man to do a very vice-recently thing. To use his God-given authority to name all of the animals.
In the process, Adam realizes that
He's similar to animals but not an animal like they are.
There are male and female versions of these animals.
There's only one of him.
God summarizes what Adam comes to understand: "But for Adam no suitable helper was found." Now Adam knows and believes he needs help.
We hate to ask for help (because we are not convinced that we need it. Often just pride and ego). But Adam has (finally) come to his senses and sees he's in great need.
So like any good man with a need and epiphany, he takes a nap. And "deep sleep" means there's no better anesthesia than God putting you to sleep. (I think it's at least worth noting here that scripture never says that man ever came out of his sleep. But I digress)
III. God makes a helper. We're not just talking hamburger helper here...we're talking divinely inspired and divinely created help.
Over and over in scripture God is called Israel's helper. The helper of his chose people. So when God calls woman a helper, we're not talking hamburger helper kind of helper. We're talking this man needs God-sized help and only a woman can provide him what he needs.
Enter Eve.
God games some of Adam's stuff (side, rib, part) and builds Eve from him (instead of from dust). Similar to Adam, he crafts and builds her with great care, skill and then breathes life into her. We ay that because she is like Adam (mostly) (image of God), though there are some very obvious and amazing differences that do not displease Adam at all.
Adam exclaims with the first recorded words of a person. And both was he excited!
Whoa-man! This time (unlike with the animal naming) this is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh (strength and weakness). We are nearly the same. She shall be called isha (wo-man) because she was taken from ish (man).
IV. First wedding and marriage
The man leaves his father and mother (allegiance to the family switches) and cleaves (sticks, glues) himself to his wife giving her his earthly allegiance under God for as long as they both shall live. And they lived to over 900 so there's that.
They commit/surrender to one another, under God, and enter a biblical covenant relationship consummated intimately, fusing into "one flesh." That is one flesh that isn't dissolved without consequences. i.e. when divorce happens, by design, there are terrible consequences no matter who is at fault. Consequences...
In future relationships
In sex life
In kids lives
In extended family life
In church life
This is why marriage is taken so seriously by God. It's a covenant that shouldn't be broken until death.
Marriage's ultimate purpose is to illustrate to the worl dhow our relationship with God should look and work. (Eph 5:21-34)
Both naked. Neither ashamed. Why? Because they have no reason to be ashamed. No sin. They're married. Let's go!
CONCLUSION
Bottom line: Marriage came from God. It was his idea. Marriage is a covenant (not contract) before God between a man and a woman for life.
Applications to consider:
Community > Isolation
We are better together.
We need each other.
Do you believe this? Does your way of life indicate that?
Are you making a real effort to faithfully engage in healthy community with God's perspective in mind?
Do you need help?
Help in general? Reach out
Help from your spouse? Tell them
Help from God? Ask him
Marriage
Marriage is between a male and female, no matter what the culture is saying
Marriage is for life
Marriage was God's idea
Marriage is a covenant (100-100) not a contract (50-50)
Marriage is for God's mission and glory
Marriage is for our good
Divorce shreds the couple leaving scars that impact the rest of their lives their kids' lives
Do you need help with yours?
Invitation
““Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.” When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”” Acts 2:36-39 NIV
Bottom line:
What is God saying to me right now?
What am I going to do about it? Write this down on a sheet of paper.
What I hear you saying, Lord, is ___________________.
[my name] is going to believe/do __________________________________________________ as a result.
Finally, share this with your Home or Mission group this week when you gather as a testimony about what God is doing in your life. You don’t have to get too specific to give him praise.
Pray
NOTES
From David Helms, p. 59
"Who are we really? Genesis 2 replies:
We are divine dust.
We are to live under divine rule.
We are divinely created for relationship."
I share this due to the nature of the topic of women doing things men can do in light of the creation of Eve. Plus it's interesting.
Free to the world by Bill Murphy Jr.
We're going to commemorate two milestones from history this weekend, and they both seem a bit entwined even though they were mostly unrelated back when they actually happened:
September 8, 1916: Sisters Augusta and Adeline Van Buren arrive in Los Angeles, as they complete a 60-day motorcycle tour across the United States.
September 8, 1921: A 16-year-old named Margaret Gorman won the Inter-City Beauty Contest and the Atlantic City Bathing Beauty Contest, which was eventually retconned as the first Miss America.
Let's talk about the Van Buren sisters first. They were actually following in the footsteps of a mother-and-daughter team named Avis and Effie Hotchkiss who had ridden a motorcycle with a sidecar from New York to California the year before.
Still, I remain impressed. Challenges along the way:
Lack of roads and easily available gasoline,
Lack of navigation tools and maps, and
Angry local law enforcement kept arresting them for wearing pants. (Not kidding.)
To put the achievement in perspective, the Van Buren sisters were riding four years before women could vote in the U.S., and three years before a lieutenant colonel (and future president) named Dwight Eisenhower led a famed and epic 81-vehicle convoy from east to west, which took 62 days.
Unencumbered by men and military bureaucracy, I suppose, the Van Buren sisters did it two days faster. Their goal was to demonstrate that women could be counted on to do things like serve as military dispatch riders in the upcoming U.S. entry into World War I, and generally to act like badasses.
(Aside: I learned while reading up on all of this that I'm not the first Bill Murphy to write about the Van Burens' trip. That honor goes to a Michigan writer named William M. Murphy, who wrote a short book about them called Grace and Grit, back in 2021.)
Their adventure is striking to me because five years later—and no offense to anyone involved in pageants, but I've never liked the whole concept—the milestone of the first Miss America contest seems a little out of place.
Details: Gorman was a high school junior in Washington D.C., still only 15, who was apparently "scouted" months before the contest by a pair of Washington Herald reporters trying to find pretty girls to send to Atlantic City.
Come to think of it, assuming these reporters were grown men, the whole idea of “scouting” 15-year-olds sounds more than a little creepy. But, I guess things were different then? Anyway they met Gorman's family in Georgetown and convinced them all to head north so that Gorman could pose in a bathing suit for the contest.
This was an early 20th century bathing suit: "dark, knee-high stockings and a chiffon bathing costume with a tiered skirt that came almost to her knees."
I’m wearing a t-shirt and shorts as I write this, and probably showing more of the ol’ skin than Gorman’s getup did back then.
It's not clear to me what, if anything, Gorman got out of winning the contest besides a trophy.
These days the winner gets $100,000 in scholarships plus a salary for the year (which honestly, I don’t know; still doesn't seem all that much). Gorman said the pageant organizers were cheap and didn't even reimburse her for her expenses years later, when she agreed to attend contests as the winner number-1.
The obituaries that appeared around the time of Gorman's death in 1995 suggest that being crowned Miss America—and then carrying the crown like a burden for the next 70+ years—seemed to sum up her life story.
As for the Van Buren sisters, Adeline went on to law school at New York University, while Augusta became a pilot who was active with a flying group known as the 99s.
Here we are, a century later, and I doubt most readers will have known any of the three women’s names but for this article (or perhaps another one like it).
Of course, the Miss America pageant continues, and a few years ago about 200 women retraced the sisters' ride across the United States together on motorcycles to mark the one century anniversary.
So even if their names aren’t on the tip of everyone’s tongue, their legacies endure.
Frankly, its the juxtaposition of these two events, the trip and the pageant, five years apart but on the same day that stand out to me. I think it's worth it simply to point out their anniversaries in history.
I think I'll let Gorman have the quote of the day, quoting this line from a 1980 interview. I like it because reading it made me question my assumptions once again. Also, because while she was directing it to someone else, it sounds as if she were talking to me:
"Write this down, young man. Life has been extremely, I say extremely, kind."
From Wilmington's Bible Handbook:
It's primeval history (universal world history) of the world (universe) made up of 5 stories with the same structure. (1-11)
The Fall
Cain
Sons of God marrying daughters of man
The Flood
Tower of Babel
They all follow this 4-fold pattern:
Sin: the sin is described
Speech: There is a speech by God announcing the penalty for the sin
Grace: God brings grace to the situation to ease the misery due to sin
Punishment: God punishes the sin
Patriarchal history (12-50) or the history of Israel's founding fathers. It continues to reveal the many graces of God based on the gracious promise God made to and through Abraham in Genesis 12:3.
Who wrote Genesis? According the Old and New Testaments, Moses c. 15th century BC. Jesus confirms this, with the exception of Genesis. The religious leaders of Jesus' day credited Moses with writing it (Luke 20:28) and early Jewish writers viewed Moses as the author of all 5 books.
During his years in the Egyptian royal family, Moses could have become a skilled writer and historian as the Egyptians were quite advanced and he'd have had access to top tutors. He was, after all, a prince of Egypt.
Moses would have been an eye-witness and contemporary to all that happened and was recorded in Exodus-Deuteronomy. However, not so for Genesis. So how did he write this?
God gave it all to him.
Passed down orally.
Passed down in writing.
Any of these would make Moses an editor or compiler of ancient history from Adam to his day around after he led Israel out of Egypt in and through the wilderness enroute to the Promise Land.
Abraham c. 2,000 BC
End of Genesis c. 1,800 BC
Exodus c. 1,500 BC (1.440s) after 400 years in Egypt
Truths to note
God existed and exists eternally
God exists in plural unity as the Holy Trinity
God was in the beginning
God was before anything existed in our universe and the universe itself
God created everything that exists in the universe and the universe itself
God creates something from nothing Latin ex nihilo
An atheist scientist came to God and said, “We’ve figured out how to make a man without you.” God said, “OK, let me see you do it.” So the atheist bent down to the ground and scooped up a handful. But God stopped him and said, “Oh, no you don’t. Get your own dirt!”
God creates with words. He spoke creation into existence. His words still have power.
God creates purposefully for his glory and our good.
God starts with light to display his creation and provide an essential ingredient for life.
God only creates things that are good. Together it was all very good and will be again.
God is a God of order and moves from chaos to order.
Elohim (gods) intensifies God's divine majesty, when used as a noun. When used as a verb, it's singular for there is only one true God.
God created all things. "Heavens and earth"
God created an "open" universe, not a "closed" one where he never interacts
Notes from Bible Project Videos
1-11 God and the world
12:3 Hinge verse
12-50 God and Abraham's family
Disorder --> Order
Adam = human
Humanity created to:
Reflect God's character (image)
Represent God's rule (reign)
Harness creation's potential and create beauty and order
"Blessing" is a key word here
Choice: Tree of knowledge of good and evil
Trust God's definition of good and evil, or
Seize autonomy and define good and evil for themselves?
Serpent (against God) tells a different story. He lies when he tells them that if they eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that they will be like God. Because they already are like God (made in his image).
Heavens and earth aka skies and land
Formless and empty aka wild and waste
Deep abyss = dark, chaotic ocean
Days 1-3 God splits apart and forms this disordered waste into 3 ordered realms:
Realm: Time. God splits darkness and light on Day 1.
Realm: Sky & Seas. God splits the waters into water canopy or clouds (or both) and sea on Day 2.
Realm: Land. God brings land out of water and includes vegetation on it on Day 3.
Days 4-6 God
Day 4 brings lights--sun, moon and stars to reflect his light in space.
Day 5 brings creations to fill the sky and sea
Day 6 brings land animals and humanity to fill the land.
First poem in the Bible (1:27) celebrates God's creation where he completed the skies, land and inhabitants. God completes and rests and dwells in this sacred space he treats as a temple. The world or at least the garden of Eden is his temple.
"As America’s “loneliness epidemic” continues to impact Americans nationwide and foster increased social tension, there could be a simple cure: “Make a new friend,” our old friend David French argued in the New York Times. “There is a class divide in the percentage of Americans who can rely on someone to give them a ride to the doctor, lend them a small amount of money in an emergency or offer a place to stay. Another way of putting this is that the Americans who are most vulnerable to losing the informal social safety net of friends and relatives may be the people who need it the most. … The thought that so many millions of our fellow citizens feel as if they don’t belong, as if they can’t call anyone for help or simply lack the pure joy of fellowship with close friends should grieve us all. It should change the way we behave. It should make us be more intentional about reaching out to people. And it should call us to action in our own neighborhoods and communities.”" -morning dispatch
The Pattern
See D. J. A. Clines, Catholic Biblical Quarterly, No. 38 (1976), pp. 487, 488. Clines explains that Gerhard Von Rad initially observed a pattern of sin, mitigation, and punishment. Then Claus Westermann discerned another element, that of divine speech. Though he did not include it in the pattern, Clines does. Thus the following chart:
I.
II.
III.
IV.
SIN
SPEECH
GRACE
PUNISHMENT
FALL
3:6
3:14-19
3:21
3:22-24
CAIN
4:8
4:10-12
4:15
4:16
SONS OF GOD
6:2
6:3
6:8, 18ff
7:6-24
FLOOD
6:5, 11f
6:7, 13-21
6:8, 18ff
11:8
BABEL
11:4
11:6f
10:1-32
11:8
Preach the Word, Genesis, Kent Hughes, chapter 1, note 3, p. 625
QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER
Who is God?
What has he done/is he doing/is he going to do?
Who am I? (In light of 1 & 2)
What do I get to do? (In light of who I am)
How do I do it?
Let’s ask some summary sermon questions:
Q. What do I want them to know?
A.
Q. Why do I want them to know it?
A.
Q. What do I want them to do about it?
A.
Q. Why do I want them to do it?
A.
Q. How can they begin to do this?
A.
OUTLINES
Outline for Genesis (Willmington)
I. GOD'S WORKING SCHEDULE (1:1-2:19)
A. First day: creation of light (1:3-5): "Then God said, 'Let there be light.'" He then divides the light from the darkness.
B. Second day: creation of space and water (1:6-8): He separates the atmospheric, upper water from the earthly, lower water.
C. Third day: creation of plant life (1:9-13): First he separates the water from the land. The earth then brings forth green grass, plants, trees, and vegetation of every kind.
D. Fourth day: creation of sun, moon, and stars (1:14-19)
E. Fifth day: creation of fish and fowl (1:20-23)
F. Sixth day: creation of land animals and people (1:24-31; 2:7-20)
1. The brute creatures: livestock and all wild beasts (1:24-25)
2. The blessed creature, who is given two things:
a. The image of God (1:26-27)
b. The instructions from God (1:26-31; 2:15-19)
(1) People are to rule over all nature (1:26, 28),
(2) to fill the earth with their own kind (1:28),
(3) to cultivate and care for their beautiful home, the Garden of Eden (2:15),
(4) to eat from any tree except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (2:16-17),
(5) and to provide names for all the other creatures (2:19-20).
G. Seventh day: God rests (2:1-6): His creative work is complete and is pronounced good. God blesses and sets apart the seventh day.
II. GOD'S WEDDING SCHEDULE (2:20-25)
A. The making of Eve (2:20-22): Eve, the first woman, is formed from the flesh and bone of Adam's side.
B. The marriage of Eve (2:23-25): Eve is returned to Adam's side.
"This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is josted so his mare, and the two are united into one." This marks history's first marriage.
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Discovery Bible Study process: https://www.dbsguide.org/
Read the passage together.
Retell the story in your own words.
Discovery the story
What does this story tell me about God?
What does this story tell me about people?
If this is really true, what should I do?
What is God saying to you right now? (Write this down)
What are you going to do about it? (Write this down)
Who am I going to tell about this?
Find our sermons, podcasts, discussion questions and notes at https://www.gracetoday.net/podcast
Alternate Discussion Questions (by Jeff Vanderstelt): Based on this passage:
Who is God?
What has he done/is he doing/is he going to do?
Who am I? (In light of 1 & 2)
What do I do? (In light of who I am)
How do I do it?
Final Questions (Write this down)
What is God saying to you right now?
What are you going to do about it?
MAIN REFERENCES USED
“Genesis,” by R. Kent Hughes, Preaching the Word Commentary, Edited by Kent Hughes
Exalting Jesus in Genesis, by Bethancourt
The Genesis Record, by Henry Morris
The Genesis Factor, by David Helms & Jon Dennis
“Look at the Book” by John Piper (LATB)
“The Bible Knowledge Commentary” by Walvoord, Zuck (BKC)
“The Bible Exposition Commentary” by Warren Wiersbe (BEC)
Outline Bible, D Willmington (OB)
Willmington’s Bible Handbook, D Willmington (WBH)
NIV Study Bible (NIVSB) https://www.biblica.com/resources/scholar-notes/niv-study-bible/
Chronological Life Application Study Bible (NLT)
ESV Study Bible (ESVSB) https://www.esv.org
The Bible Project https://bibleproject.com
“The Bible in One Year 2023 with Nicky Gumbel” bible reading plan on YouVersion app (BIOY)
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