Current Doctrinal Issues: EFCA Ordination (Part 11 of 11)
Marriage, divorce, and remarriage; abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia; role distinctions in the church of men and women; and several more.
In the fall, I began my longest blog series ever, a series sharing my ordination paper for the Evangelical Free Church of America (EFCA). If you’d like to read about what the process of ordination looks like in the EFCA, check out the first post in the series (here).
The ordination paper engages with our denomination’s 10-point statement of faith. I know these posts are dense. Please hang with me; this week’s post is the final in the series. It’s a miscellany on current doctrinal issues and issues related to lifestyle.
If you’ve found these posts helpful, please pick up the entire paper, which is now available on Amazon in both paperback and ebook formats under the title Once for all Delivered: A Reformed, Amillennial Ordination Paper for the Evangelical Free Church of America.
Thank you for the prayers and encouragement along the way,
Benjamin
PS: I posted a few pictures to Instagram from my ordination service last Sunday night.
{Previous posts in this series: God, The Bible, The Human Condition, Jesus, The Work of Christ, The Holy Spirit, The Church, Christian Living, The Return of Christ, Response and Eternal Destiny}
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Current Doctrinal Issues
Marriage, Divorce, and Remarriage
God desires that Christians marry only other Christians. This follows from the prudent extension of 2 Corinthians 6:14–18 to marriage (cf. 1 Cor 7:39 “only in the Lord” and 1 Cor. 9:5 “a believing wife”) and the OT passages about marrying those from other nations, which weren’t so much about differing ethnicities or nationalities but religions (Dt 7:3–4; 1 Kg 11:1–8). It’s a great evil to delegitimize interracial marriages, as some have done in the past and some continue to do in our own day. But based on these passages, I would not officiate the marriage of one person who professes faith and one who does not. Prudence also suggests that Christians enter the covenant of marriage only with Christians of similar conviction and maturity. The issues surrounding marriage of a previously divorced person are more complicated. The Bible presents two grounds for a divorce that could open up the possibility of a remarriage, namely, infidelity (Mt 5:32; 19:8–9) and desertion (1 Cor 7:10–11). The ideal is always repentance, forgiveness, and reconciliation, but these are not always possible. Thus pastors must take into consideration situational specificity while at the same time giving serious weight to what Scripture teaches, especially God’s hatred of divorce and the way the permanence of marriage portrays the permanence of God’s love (Mal 2:16; Eph 5:21).
Because questions often arise about the definition of sexual immorality and desertion, allow me to discuss each briefly. I take Jesus’s use of the word porneia (sexual immorality) in the exception clause in Matthew 5:32 and 19:9 to be a sort of “junk drawer” term incorporating many variations of sexual sin, especially when the specific word for adultery, moichatai, is used in close proximity (5:27 and 19:9). This is not to say I’d encourage a woman to divorce her husband because last year he infrequently and repentantly looked at pornography. In fact, I’d never lead with the encouragement to get divorced. But I am saying a spouse in habitual, intense, and unrepentant porneia might qualify. Through study of God’s word and devoted prayer, I could very well imagine the pastor-elders of our church coming to the conclusion that a man who spent a decade at strip clubs and consuming internet pornography, even if he had not consummated an affair in sexual intercourse, could be divorced under the exception clause. Related to this, the desertion clause in 1 Corinthians 7 doesn’t only mean a spouse has moved to Vegas without a forwarding address. There are probably multiple ways to desert your spouse. But saying, “He won’t go shopping with me” or “She won’t watch football with me,” certainly do not constitute desertion. However, I consider habitual, unrepentant violence inflicted on one’s spouse to be a form of desertion. We must hold strictly to God’s commands, feeling the weight of Scripture far more than cultural trends. And it’s wise for pastor-elders to have a clear understanding of how we define sexual immorality and desertion before cases of each arise. As a final comment, my discussion in this paragraph should not be understood as an attempt to create new categories for divorce but to give definition and application to what the two categories encompass.
Abortion, Infanticide, and Euthanasia
God values life (Gen 9:6) and takes no pleasure in death (Ez 18:32). Thus, so should his people. Because abortion and euthanasia are sins, our views of them transcend political party lines and our solutions for them will not merely be political ones. No individual Christian or local church can participate in every meaningful cause, but I do long and pray for more who labor to advance this biblical worldview so that it gives birth to life-affirming deeds.
Role Distinctions in the Church of Men and Women
God can, and does, give both men and women extraordinary gifts for ministry, but God has left the office of pastor-elder-overseer to men. Biblical support for this is seen in the following:
the responsibilities given by God to Adam before and after the fall (Gen 2–3; Rm 5:12ff);
the pattern of OT and NT spiritual leadership being placed mainly among men;
the parallels between male leadership in the church and the headship of men in the home as taught in places like Ephesians 5, Colossians 3, and Titus 2;
no explicit mention of women pastor-elders in the NT;
and, finally, specific passages like 1 Timothy 2:8–3:7 and Titus 1:5–9 which require male pastor-elders, something Paul even sees rooted in creation in the 1 Timothy passage.
At the same time, however, women can and should be encouraged to participate in significant Christian ministry.
Homosexual Belief and Conduct
Today, the church has a tremendous challenge but also opportunity when speaking about what the Bible teaches about sexuality. The challenge is to speak with humility and compassion and at the same time fidelity to the Word. Homosexual practice is against God’s good design. It is a sin (Lev 18:22, 20:13; Rm 1:24–27; 1 Cor 6:9–11; 1 Tim 1:8–11), and must be called such (Is 5:20). However, alongside this truth, the church must do a better job of explaining the positive sexual design that God has established for society to flourish and winsomely invite people to participate in it.
Theology of Worship
All of life ought to be lived as worship (1 Cor 10:31), that is, living in obedient, glad esteem of the worthiness of God. It is appropriate that Christians gather regularly in local churches to both display and deepen their worship.
Speaking of the corporate gathering for worship, we endeavor to sings songs, preach sermons, and pray prayers that exalt what is true about God, faithful to Scripture, and celebrates the riches that are ours in the gospel. We seek to do all of this in an orderly way to build up the body with words intelligible to our people. The responsibility of leading corporate worship is so weighty to us that a few of us make time each Tuesday to debrief the previous week’s sermon and worship service, always striving to improve our ability to rightly handle the word of truth, asking for forgiveness where we’ve failed to speak as well as we ought, and praying that our church would more and more fall in love with God and his word.
Issues Related to Lifestyle
Spiritual Disciplines
God is pleased to supply his grace day by day and moment by moment to his people through spiritual disciplines. Therefore I actively pursue practices like evangelism, fellowship, prayer, service, and listening to the preached Word. I have my devotions in the morning before my family wakes up, attempting to read through the Bible cover to cover each year. As for prayer, I typically spend some time in prayer during my devotions. In conjunction with prayer, fasting—in both short and long durations—has been important to me.
Stewardship, Personal Finances, and Debt
God owns everything, yet he has entrusted humans with the care of creation (Ps 8; Heb 2); therefore, we should strive to be good stewards. The only debt my wife and I have is the mortgage on our house. We also intend to continue contributing to retirement funds. The Lord has been very gracious to us in these regards, and we feel blessed to extend God’s money generously to our local church, as well as to other ministries and missionaries.
Sexual Purity
The Bible tells us, “Be holy, because I am holy” (1 Pet 1:16). There are certain temptations that tend to tempt men more acutely, and pastors and Christian leaders are not immune. As such, I will continue to seek God’s help in regard to all areas related to personal holiness and trust Christ to give me continued victory and progress as I lean into the means he has appointed for such victory and progress. This is the heart behind the book I authored to help men struggle against porn, not with it.
Marriage and Family Priorities
God made it the duty of men to provide, protect, lead, and serve our families (Eph 5:22ff). It is not a role of entitlement but of sacrificial leadership. Thus, practically, Christ-like spiritual leadership in my home involves me being the one to initiate conflict resolution (as opposed to being passive), doing the dirty house-work jobs, providing financially, and, as needed, being the first to take responsibility and repent. God calls all men to embody these impulses, though the outworking will vary depending upon one’s circumstances. May God supply the grace to do it with increasing success and joy. With respect to pastoring, my family is a priority above the church. This has many practical implications such as coming home around 4:30 every day, even if I go back out for an evening meeting, as well as cutting the occasional sermon illustration that might bless the church but not my children or wife.
Social Drinking of Alcohol
Alcohol was seen as a blessing by the Jewish people and a sign of covenant celebration of God’s goodness and provision (Dt 14:26; Ps 104:15; Prov 3:7–10; Jn 2:1–12; Lk 22:20), but the use of alcohol in excess is strongly warned against throughout the Bible in both propositional statements and through sinful examples (Noah’s drunkenness in Gen 9 and Lot’s in Gen 19; Prov 20:1; Is 5:11; Gal 5:21; Eph 5:28; and many others).
In light of all these passages, I occasionally drink alcohol but always in moderation.
Accountability in Life and Ministry
There are several structures in place for personal and ministry accountability, including an engaged pastor-elder board and bi-weekly meetings with my best friend who asks hard questions.
* Photo by Désirée Fawn on Unsplash
NOT YET MARRIED by Marshall Segal (FAN AND FLAME Book Reviews)
Dating can be a beautiful, mysterious thing, like a ship sailing across the sea (Prov. 30:18–19). Here’s my review of Not Yet Married, a great book to help you sail this sea.
On a cold January night in 2003, I was in Denver, Colorado, for a Campus Crusade winter conference. All the cool kids wore Abercrombie and had flip phones, and under the influence of Joshua Harris’s book about relationships, I had kissed dating goodbye.
After dinner that night, I spoke with a girl named Brooke about dating—I mean courting—and whether God had marriage in our future. He did, and we’ve been married for a dozen years.
A lot has changed in the last 15 years. Crusade is now Cru. Having a flip phone might be cool, but in a retro kind of way. Yet for all the changes, much stays the same. Whether you call it dating or courting or something else, the “way of a man with a young woman” (as Proverbs puts it) is still a beautiful, mysterious thing, like a ship sailing across the sea (Prov. 30:18–19).
But like the high seas, dating can be dangerous, leaving people with bitter and broken hearts.
Christian Living and Christian Dating
That’s why I’m thankful for Marshall Segal’s new book, Not Yet Married: The Pursuit of Joy in Singleness and Dating. Segal, staff writer and managing editor for desiringGod.org, is newly married, but he isn’t just another married guy telling singles what to do. “I wrote a lot of this book, and learned almost all of the lessons before I married my wife,” he explains, establishing his singleness credentials (16).
Not Yet Married has two parts. The first is “the not-yet-married life.” Here Segal channels many of Desiring God’s hallmark themes—passion and purpose, joy in mission, and the glory of God—and applies them to singleness. In the second part, “when the not-yet-married meet,” he deals with the particulars of Christian dating.
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[To read the rest of this post, visit The Gospel Coalition.]
Pinterest Perfect Wedding Pressure
An interview I recently did about the pressures on couples as they prepare for weddings.
The pressure on couples to have a beautiful wedding is enormous, far more than when Brooke and I were married 12 years ago. When we were married, Facebook had only been around for one year, which meant no one expected us to release breathtaking photos. All of that has changed.
Last year, a year in which I was a part of seven weddings, I wrote an article for Desiring God titled, "The Problem with the Pinterest Dream Wedding." In it, I encouraged Christian couples to keep what is the center of their marriage (the gospel) at the center of their wedding ceremony.
Heather Sells, a reporter for CBN, recently interviewed me about that article and the broader trends we pastors are seeing at wedding ceremonies. Sells notes, “That 10 years ago, couples spent $16,000 on a wedding with an average of 110 guests. Today, they’re spending an average of $28,000 with 124 guests.” That increase in cost is far more than mere inflation. Also, in the last decade, the average length of engagement has increased from 8 months to 13 months.
Why do you think this is? Why the increase in cost and length of engagement? Why do weddings need a clever hashtag on social media? Why do couples feel the need to have Pinterest-perfect centerpieces? And why do I, as a pastor, feel the need to preach the perfect wedding homily?
I’m not sure all of the reasons, but I do have a few guesses. In the interview I say,
Culturally I think right now we’re at a place where our identity is not so much looking upward to God and who He says we are in the Gospel—the good news that we’re His sons and daughters in Christ—but rather who we posture ourselves as in social media.
You can watch the video interview here, which includes my comments and those of a few others.
[Picture by Allef Vinicius / Unsplash]
MARRIAGE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE GOSPEL by Ray Ortlund (FAN AND FLAME Book Reviews)
A short (but stout) book on the divine romance between The Groom and The Bride, and how the ultimate marriage should shape all marriages.
Ray Ortlund, Marriage and the Mystery of the Gospel. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2016. 128 pp.
Besides following my wife on Facebook, of all the people I follow on social media—Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and, yes, even LinkedIn—my favorite person to follow on social media is Ray Ortlund on Instagram. Ortlund is the pastor of Immanuel Church in Nashville, Tennessee, and the author of several books, including The Gospel: How the Church Portrays the Beauty of Christ and Whoredom: God’s Unfaithful Wife in Biblical Theology. He has also written commentaries on the Old Testament books of Proverbs and Isaiah, as well as contributing to the ESV Study Bible.
But why is this guy, this Ortlund fella, my favorite person to follow on social media?
Well, I just like him. I really do. Perhaps because, according to Instagram, it seems . . .
He’s part goofball (here, here, here).
He’s part hunter-warrior (here, here, here).
He’s part pastor-author-scholar (here, here, here).
He’s part passionate pet owner of a black lab (here, here, here).
He’s part lover-of-his grandkids (here, here, here).
He’s part cultural- and spiritual-agitator, often posting on racial injustice (here, here, here).
Nevertheless, if Ortlund is these in part, it would seem he’s also completely in love with his wife. He’s always posting pictures of her on Instagram with captions that sing her praises (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and many more). It’s because of this love for his bride that, when I saw Ortlund had written a book about marriage, I was immediately ready to hit “Buy Now.” Unfortunately, it just took me a few months to hit “Read Now” and post my review.
Marriage and the Mystery of the Gospel is part of a series by Crossway called “Short Studies in Biblical Theology.” Biblical theology is the attempt to track the development of a theme in the same way the Bible develops the theme—from the beginning of the story to the end. Hence, Marriage and the Mystery of the Gospel has a progression from Genesis; to the books of law, wisdom, and prophets; to the New Testament; and then finally to the present day. And throughout the book, Ortlund writes with a sympathetic, yet firm awareness that the biblical view of marriage is not highly esteemed by all—sometimes by those in the church who find the biblical view of marriage too passionate, and sometimes by outsiders who find it too restrictive.
A major focus of his book is not, as you might have expected, the human romance between bride and groom, which is the chief subject of so many Christian books on marriage. Rather, Ortlund’s focus is on the divine romance between The Bride and The Groom, that is, the passionate love of Jesus Christ that compels him to woo and rescue the church. Ortlund writes,
I want to lead you on a brief journey of discovery from the beginning of the Bible to its end, because the Bible is a love story. It is not a hodgepodge of religious thoughts. The Bible unfolds as a complex but coherent narrative of God gathering a bride for his Son—and he found her on the wrong side of town, too. What a story! (13)
As I read Marriage and the Mystery of the Gospel, I found myself longing to be able to articulate the biblical view of marriage the way Ortlund does. It’s one of those books, that if I had let myself, I might have underlined more sentences than I didn’t. In my opinion, his writing achieved an ideal I strive for in my own writing, namely, “accessible yet riveting scholarship.” I’m not sure how often—if ever—I live up to that ideal, but it was wonderful to read an author who truly does.
But not only, or even mainly, do I long to articulate the biblical view of marriage as well as Ortlund does. More than this, the book made me long to live the biblical view of marriage. I want to live the beauty and passion and commitment and long-suffering and intimacy of biblical marriage. I want this for my own marriage and the marriages of those in my church.
The Gospel Coalition, as they sometimes do for new books, published a post of their favorite 20 quotes from the book (here). I won’t repeat this feat, but here are just four of my favorites to whet your appetite.
“It is not as though marriage is just one theme among others in the Bible. Instead, marriage is the wraparound concept for the entire Bible, within which the other themes find their places.” (16)
“The head-with-helper dance of complementarity sprang from deep within the intuitions of God himself. We men and women today do not automatically know the steps to this dance. We must learn. But if we will receive it by faith, trusting in the goodness and wisdom of God, we can then explore its potentialities for joyful human magnificence.” (23)
“The key to a lasting romance is not endless sex but believing hearts.” (54)
“So [Jesus] not only believed Genesis 2:24 to be valid and relevant, but he publically taught it to be so—and not because he was a man of his times, echoing what everyone believed back then. What got Jesus into trouble was that he was not a man of his times.” (80)
If you are looking for a short, but stout book about marriage, I couldn’t recommend this book more highly. And if you’re looking for someone new to follow on Instagram, ditto.
[Picture by Anne Edgar / Unsplash]
Husbands, Praise and Praise Again
Husbands, keep praising your wife. Do it again and again. It matters.
Rise and rise again
until lambs become lions.
That’s a line from the movie Robin Hood (2010) with Russell Crowe. It means you must do something over and over until change happens; in this case, you must repeatedly summon the courage for battle until the fearful become fighters.
Recently, while teaching through the book and video series, The Mingling of Souls: God's Design for Love, Marriage, Sex, and Redemption by Matthew Chandler and Jared Wilson, I came across something I wrote almost twelve years ago. It’s a reflection on the way King Solomon repeatedly praises his bride in the Old Testament book the Song of Solomon (also sometimes called, the Song of Songs).
I wrote it for my then fiancée, now wife, Brooke. But I also wrote it for myself. I hoped it would shape the type of husband I would become, even as it (hopefully and subsequently) would shape my wife. Perhaps I could summarize what I wrote in this way:
Praise and praise again
until brambles become lilies.
The point is that a husband is to praise his wife, so constantly, so faithfully, that it changes her.
I don’t think the poetry in my line is as strong as the original from Robin Hood; I’m missing the alliteration of “l” (lambs, lions). But my line does have an allusion to Song of Solomon and the way he praises his bride. In 2:2, he says, “As a lily among brambles, so is my love among the young women.”
All of this to say, I gave the below reflection on the Song of Solomon some fresh polish, as well as making it more generic so that I could share it with you. May God use it as a helpful reminder—for me and husbands everywhere.
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Right in the middle of the Old Testament, there is a Hebrew love poem written about King Solomon and his bride. In the book, she is not named, though she is referred to once as the “Shulammite” (6:13).
There are a number of different ways to interpret the book. One popular and, I believe, helpful approach is the “chronological” view. (This, by the way, is the view taken in The Mingling of Souls). In this approach, the eight chapters are understood to follow the couple’s relationship from their initial attraction, to their dating, to courting, to wedding, to honeymoon, and finally through married life.
But one thing is for sure: Solomon’s bride is not a rock of security and self-confidence, or at least not originally. In 1:5-6, she says to her friends,
I am very dark, but lovely,
O daughters of Jerusalem,
like the tents of Kedar,
like the curtains of Solomon.
Do not gaze at me because I am dark,
because the sun has looked upon me.
My mother's sons were angry with me;
they made me keeper of the vineyards,
but my own vineyard I have not kept!
Can you hear her insecurities? “Do not look at me.”
Apparently, she was not from a wealthy family; her brothers made her work all day outside in a hot vineyard while her “own vineyard,” that is her body and personal appearance, she didn’t “keep.”
If you only read the beginning of their love song, however, you would not expect the Shulammite woman ever to say, “Let my beloved come to his garden, and eat its choicest fruits” (4:16b). Yet this is precisely what she whispers to Solomon on her wedding night. She almost sounds like a different woman. And in many ways she is. Something changes, something massive changes.
Brooke and me after our wedding, May 29, 2005.
Throughout the book, Solomon devotes himself to praising and prizing “[his] sister and [his] bride” (4:9). In fact, of all the twenty-one verses that Solomon speaks before chapter five (the consummation of the marriage), not a single verse is missing a praise of her physical beauty, strength of character, or an expression of his desire for her to come away with him.
Solomon praises her eyes three times; her cheeks, fragrance, and lips twice; and her neck, teeth, lips, mouth, breasts, tongue, and her chastity are all admired once. And he pronounces her beautiful six times (1:8, 15 [twice]; 4:1 [twice], 7).
The amazing thing to ponder is that this practice doesn’t cease after the honeymoon. It doesn’t even appear to slow down. He’s like the Energizer Bunny of Praise. Four times, he calls her beautiful (6:4, 10, 7:1, 6). In fact, in the sixteen verses that Solomon speaks after 5:1, only his closing verse (8:13) does not contain overt praise of his wife. Yet even in this line, he expresses his desire to hear her voice.
And this, as I understand it, changes everything.
Husbands, praise and praise again until brambles become lilies.
[Picture by Rachael Crowe / Unsplash]
Consumer v. Covenant Relationships
Talking about the difference between “consumer” and “covenant” relationships is a helpful way to get at the deeper meaning of marriage, that is, the gospel.
There’s a lot of pressure on engaged couples to have the perfect wedding. I recently wrote about this in an article called, “The Problem with the Pinterest Dream Wedding.”
After the article was published, an author, Catherine Parks, reached out to me. Parks co-authored a book with her mother about this very topic. It’s called, A Christ-Centered Wedding: Rejoicing in the Gospel on Your Big Day. I just finished reading it last week.
If you’re engaged or if you have a friend or family member who is, this book would make a great gift. It’s full of sturdy, gospel-centered advice to counter the pressures to have the perfect wedding and keep the focus where it ought to be. Catherine Parks and her co-author, Linda Strode, write in the introduction,
Don’t get us wrong—we aren’t saying ... you shouldn’t ever look at Pinterest or magazines [to help create the perfect wedding]. We have just seen so many couples suffer through planning their weddings, weighed down by all the pressure to make them unique and perfect. (p. 2)
This has been my experience working with couples, too.
But this pressure to have a “dream wedding” sometimes spills over to the pastor who officiates the wedding, at least I know it does to me. In my article for Desiring God, I wrote,
There’s something in me, something ugly, that longs to preach Ephesians 5 better than it’s ever been preached: a sermon that engages the un-churched, dazzles the mature Christian, and rescues the estranged couple off the cliff of divorce.
Each time I share a message in a wedding, it’s a little different. That’s because every couple is different. Below is the most recent message I shared at a friend’s wedding. In it, I talk about the difference between “consumer” and “covenant” relationships. I find this distinction to be a helpful way to explain the greater meaning of marriage.
It’s possible that Timothy Keller has said something about this, perhaps in a message I heard him preach on Proverbs or maybe in his book The Meaning of Marriage; it all runs together for me. (If you know where he does this, let me know.)
Anyway, the below message takes me about 8-10 minutes to share. I’m not sure it’s a “Pinterest dream wedding sermon,” but it’s what I’ve got for now.
[Note, I changed the names of the bride and groom. Also, these reflections followed a reading of Ephesians 5:22-31 done by family members.]
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At this time, I’m going to share a few comments about marriage and about the gospel. These comments are for all of us, but I would especially like to share them with you, John and Jessica.
I will say, though, that if you are here and you are not a Christian—perhaps you haven’t been to a church in a long time, or ever—you may be thinking, “I knew it; here it comes.” If that’s you, that’s okay. If I were you, I might feel that same way.
However, I would encourage you to listen in because so often I find that what people think Christianity is all about, is really not what it’s about at all. And discussing for a few moments the deeper meaning of marriage might be a wonderful way for you to consider what it is that Christians actually believe, at least at the core of our faith.
Marriage is, according to the Bible, more than a lifelong commitment to each other; it’s at least this, but it’s also more. Marriage is a reflection of what the Bible calls “the gospel.” And what I’d like to explain, just briefly, is how your marriage—and all marriages—are to reflect the relationship that God has with his people and God’s people have with him.
A good way to do this is to talk about two types of relationships. I want to talk about “consumer” and “covenant” relationships.
Just so that I’m not misunderstood, both types of relationships—consumer and covenant—have a proper place. Both can be very appropriate and healthy. A problem occurs, however, when we mistake a covenant relationship for a consumer one. To be more specific, the problem is when we mistake the covenant of marriage for a consumer relationship.
But let me back up. When we talk about consumer relationships, what do we mean? They are one-sided relationships where, as long as the other person keeps doing his or her part, then we will do our part. We have these relationships all the time. For example, many times in the last two years, when John and I would meet to talk about life and pray for each other, we would go to either Starbucks or our favorite local coffee shop, Little Amps. These are different types of coffee shops, I know, but I like them both. But I’m in a consumer relationship with them both. If one of them stops “delivering the goods,” well, eventually, I’m going to stop going.
The hallmark of a consumer relationship is that as long as they—the other person—holds up their end of the bargain, then I’ll hold up mine. If they change their product quality or if something happens, well, I’m free to do what I want; it’s my money.
I was talking with my father last year, and he told me how recently, yet reluctantly, he changed his home and car insurance carrier after over thirty some years with the same company. There was an incident that made him change, which I won’t go into. But I bring this up because my father is the most brand-loyal guy I know. When he finds something he likes, he sticks with it. But even for him, even in his loyalty, his relationship with an insurance company is still a consumer relationship.
And there is nothing wrong with that. Again, the problem comes when we bring this consumer view of relationships into marriage, which is to be a covenant relationship.
A covenant relationship is not focused on whether or not the other person delivers the goods. No, a covenant relationship is one based on a solemn vow to hold up your own end of the agreement regardless of whether the other person does. This is the most beautiful of all relationships because it means that you can be truly known—known in all of your glory, but also known in all of your depravity and shame and failures and insecurities—and not only known, but still loved. This is the meaning of unconditional love: truly known and dearly loved.
It’s God’s intention that marriage would be this type of relationship—one not based on what the other person does, but rather, through “better and worse, sickness and health, richer and poorer,” the marriage holds.
Those statements, which are so often included in wedding ceremonies, wouldn’t make any sense in a consumer relationship. If the baristas at Starbucks start spitting in my coffee, well, they are not going to be getting my $2.23 for a grande dark roast, which, by the way, I get with no room for cream or sugar. (Just mentioning that in case anyone ever wants to get me one.)
So, what does this have to do with anything? Let me come back to where I started. John and Jessica, your relationship in marriage is a covenant relationship. It’s to be a place where you truly know each other and deeply love one another—unconditionally.
And the reason that God has designed marriage to work this way is because it displays to the world the way God loves people in the gospel. This is the heart of Christianity. Christians do not believe that God loves us because we have done good; that would be a consumer relationship. Rather, at the heart of Christianity is the covenant love of God.
The sad truth is that all of us, according to the Bible, are more like a faithless bride than a faithful one. Or to put it another way, we have spit in God’s coffee. And the gospel is the good news that, in Jesus, God has undertaken a rescue mission to win back his bride. It’s the good news that God sent his Son, Jesus, to do what we could not, would not, did not do.
The Bible teaches that Jesus lived a perfect life; he was utterly faithful to God the Father, and loved him supremely. And then out of love for God, Jesus went to a cross and died, suffering the ultimate punishment for sin.
Marriage is to display this. Specifically, you John, as a husband and based on the passage of Scripture just read (Ephesians 5:22-31), are to love Jessica as Jesus loves you: sacrificially and unconditionally. This is a high and honorable calling.
And Jessica, your beautiful part is to represent the Church—the part of a loving, responsive, committed Church. Jessica, as an equal in person and value, you are to be John’s best friend and his most devoted helper, that together, you may accomplish the purposes of God, and in doing this, you will display to the world the beauty and blessing that it is for us, the Church, to follow God. You also have a high and beautiful calling.
I want to end with this. Yes, you have your roles to play and yes, you ought to do them well, just as we all ought to do them, but you must remember something in the process: God loves you, both of you, John and Jessica. And though you will both inadequately display the gospel in your marriage, remember that you are not saved because you do right, but because God loved you even while you were at your worst, and he continues to love you. May this gospel of the covenant love of God be the centerpiece of your life together.
[Photo by Josh Felise / Unsplash]
Roses Are Red, A Tired Cliche
On Sunday, which was of course Valentine’s Day, I shared a short poem before my sermon. The poem—in both a goofy and I hope serious way—critiqued the sappy view of love we have in culture today. And I hope it encouraged us to look to God’s love as the model of true love, whether we are single or married.
On Sunday, which was of course Valentine’s Day, I shared a short poem before my sermon. The poem—in both a goofy and I hope serious way—critiqued the sappy view of love we have in culture today. And I hope it encouraged us to look to God’s love as the model of true love, whether we are single or married.
If you’d like to hear all of the introductory comments about the poem, which I think would be very helpful, you can listen to the first nine minutes of my sermon below.
* * *
Roses Are Red, A Tired Cliché
Benjamin Vrbicek
Roses are red. Violets are blue.
Sugar is sweet. And so are you.
Are these our poems? “Violets are blue.
Sugar is sweet”? I guess that’s true.
Our poems are lame, in culture today.
Romance is cheap, like pots of clay.
We need much more—old truth made new.
God sent his Son, a love rescue.
Think how better, our poems could be,
If from above, this love we’d see.
The flame of the Lord flashes,
Love neither quiet nor quaint.
Its heat dashes and smashes
The sappy portraits we paint.
Loves draws lines in wet cement.
In the furnace of trials,
Marriage vows harden and set.
And love, though strained, still smiles.
Now of singles: in culture today,
“Singles are weird,” so they say.
Not in Scripture. Paul wanted more,
Singles to serve, so love will soar.
Jesus is real. Single was he.
His church his bride, trust him and see.
Roses are red. Violets are blue.
Love more than sweet? God’s love for you.
Faithful God stays, with love like glue.
When Gospel meets, sinners like you.
* Special thanks to my wife, Brooke, for help with a few of the sticky lines.
OTHER POEMS
Reflections on The Bachelor
After nineteen seasons, I finally watched some of The Bachelor. And because I believe women should be held in honor, and because I believe sex is a gift from God, I won’t ever watch again.
Our kids were misbehaving last night, so they got sent to bed early. It probably was not the best use of our time but since my wife and I had extra, we decided to flip the on TV. Among a few other things, we watched twenty minutes of The Bachelor. I had heard about The Bachelor, but it wasn’t quite what I had imagined… it was far worse.
On last night’s episode, the protagonist and Iowa farmer Chris Soules, had already narrowed the women down from thirty to just three. Now he was to take each on a final date in the country of Bali. Pretty exotic, right? And with these last dates came the famous overnighters in the Fantasy Suites, of course fitted with votive candles, four-poster beds, and bathtubs filled with rose petals.
At first, for me, there was a humor to it all. I couldn’t take it seriously. As Whitney talked with Chris on a massive sailboat on the Indian Ocean, and the camera repeatedly offered close-ups of Chris as he listened to her drone on and on about her sister’s reservations about their potential marriage, I provided my own commentary for what Chris might have been thinking.
But the more I watched, the more painful it became. I kept thinking to myself, how is it that this show is tolerated by women? It’s so offensive to them!
I felt this all the more because just before The Bachelor, we caught a few minutes of an Oscar recap show, and several times we saw a clip of Patricia Arquette passionately appealing for wage equality for women, to which the crowd—especially a few prominent women—enthusiastically applauded. I understood Ms. Arquette to be making the point that women should be honored and treated fairly. I’m not a huge fan of the celebrity soapbox, but to me this sounded like a noble enough talking point, and apparently the audience thought so as well.
Why do I bring this up? Generally speaking there are healthy, although sometimes overdone, voices in culture rightly challenging all of us to treat women with dignity. Which is why, I say again, I can hardly believe a show like The Bachelor—a show that denigrates women and turns their beauty and sexuality into a competition—is tolerated.
But then I realized something: The Bachelor is not tolerated, it’s loved. Case in point: if you count all the various renditions, the show is in its nineteenth season.
As television shows do, before each commercial break, The Bachelor kept showing upcoming scenes hoping that viewers would keep watching. The particular teaser that was on repeat last night was a short clip of Becca, the third woman, explaining to Chris as they were about to enter the Fantasy Suite that she was a virgin.
I was done. I couldn’t take it.
It’s common to hear people speak as though we in the modern world have the moral high ground on those in the past, particularly those in what we might call “primitive” cultures. I’m thinking especially of our tendency to learn about strange, cultic sex practices in ancient cultures and think that we have improved morally. But when I watch The Bachelor and consider its popularity, I say no way. It would seem to me that we can be every bit as far from God’s design as those of the past. Our culture, like those of other eras, has a schizophrenic view of sex: we both over and under value it. We say sex has tremendous meaning, even an ultimate meaning for our lives. And at the same time we say it is meaningless—something cheap and casual.
But it’s not that I’m so upset with culture at large; that’s not where my confusion is mostly directed. What I cannot understand is the show’s popularity among Christian women.
Perhaps, however, some of my sisters in Christ will object: Benjamin, you can’t possibly tell the quality of a show by just watching twenty minutes.
Maybe. But what if you saw me in a public place, say a Starbucks, reading the latest edition of Sports Illustrated, which just so happens to be the swimsuit issue with its typically provocative and demeaning pictures. Would it be appropriate for someone to say to me, as a Christian man, that what I was doing was wrong? Or couldn’t I object and say, But you’re only judging by a quick glance and that’s not fair; there are some good articles in this.
Here’s the deal: sometimes you don’t need all the context. Sometimes it’s the whole context that lulls us to sleep. Sex is a gift from God. And as such, we ought not to overvalue it as though it were a god, but neither should we undervalue it either. After nineteen seasons, I’m glad I’ve only seen twenty minutes. And thankful they’ll be, God willing, my last.
[Image: Craig Sjodin/ABC, from The Washington Post]
The Woman I Love, Denver Christmas Conference, and a Letter from the Apostle Paul
You know how smells can bring back memories, well, for me, so does the Bible. Specific passages recall specific memories, and every time I read 2 Corinthians 1:12, I always think about this one time when…
In my morning devotions yesterday, I finished 1 Corinthians. So this morning, naturally, I started 2 Corinthians. As I read verse 12, an unexpected avalanche of memories swept me away. All of a sudden, I was in Denver, Colorado wearing a blue shirt in the upstairs of a restaurant talking to a beautiful woman. That was a dozen years ago, but it might as well have been this morning.
It was January and unusually warm for Denver. I was there for a conference with Campus Crusade for Christ called Denver Christmas Conference (DCC as we called it). Over the semester break, a bunch of us had made the 14-hour road trip from mid-Missouri.
I was wearing a light blue shirt that had a picture of a buzzard on it—weird, right? It was my college flag football team jersey. We were The Scavengers, a name in “honor” of our team leader. And my shirt had the following written on it: “2002 All-Campus Champions.” I wore the shirt with pride. (It’s funny, I competed for 5 years in Division 1 college sports, yet the highlight of my athletic career occurred playing competitive intermural flag.)
And I was in the upstairs of a restaurant. Downstairs was the noise; upstairs was the quiet—the place to talk, to listen.
And a beautiful young woman was with me. Her name was Brooke. She held my hand and I held hers.
We were about to begin dating, or courting, or something. I’m not sure what we were calling it. But it wasn’t an ordinary relationship we were going to start, at least I prayed it wasn’t going to be ordinary.
I remember telling Brooke that I had never been in a godly dating relationship before, but that I was committed to figuring it out. Not much of a sales pitch, I know.
Then I read 2 Corinthians 1:12 to her.
Now this is our boast: Our conscience testifies that we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially in our relations with you, in the holiness and sincerity that are from God. We have done so not according to worldly wisdom but according to God’s grace. (2 Corinthians 1:12, NIV)
Paul said that his relationship with this church was characterized by holiness and sincerity, and not “worldly wisdom,” and all this by “God’s grace.”
I told Brooke that I wanted this for us: Holiness. And sincerity. And love. And by the grace of God.
I didn’t know what a relationship like that was like, not firsthand anyway, but I wanted to strive for it. And I wanted for Brooke to do that with me.
And she said yes.
I don’t know if she knew all that she was saying yes to, but she said it. We said it. And I am so glad. My bride and my sweetie and my friend, said yes.
That night in Denver, in January, in the upstairs of a restaurant, wearing a shirt with a buzzard on it, we prayed together. Then we went downstairs, and then back to the conference center where we went to a concert; Bebo Norman played his acoustic guitar and wore a red t-shirt and a stocking cap. Brooke sat on my left.
That was almost a dozen years ago.
This is what I mean when I say an avalanche of emotions and memories swept over me this morning as I read 2 Corinthians.
God has been exceedingly good to me in giving me Brooke—my wife and my best friend.
Thank you for saying yes, Sweetie.
[Image]
A plea from a loving father to his son.