[This post continues a series of posts entitled 'A Biblical Catechism on Sex and Marriage'. The intention is to provide basic material for further instruction by a trusted teacher of God's Word in a church that is committed to Biblical authority. The Church’s mission is to invite all people to live under God’s righteous rule.]
Question 6. What are the purposes of marriage?
Answer: The purposes of marriage are procreational, familial, relational, and to satisfy sexual appetite.
[Comments 1 and 2 are on marriage and procreation.]
Comment
3:
Marriage is secondly intended to provide a stable and caring family unit for
everyone associated with it.
Comment
3a:
The family is the smallest relational unit given to the tasks of being fruitful
and multiplying and meeting human needs for care. The household unit is based in a marital
union for producing children and can be extended to include other,
non-biological members. Households, with
kinship relationships, made up clans, and clans made up tribes, and tribes made
up a nation or people (cf. Joshua 7:14; Ruth 2:1).
Genesis
1:27-28 So
God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and
female he created them. 28
And God blessed them. And God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply and
fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and
over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the
earth."
1 Timothy 5:4 If a widow has children or grandchildren, they should
first learn their religious duty to their own family and make some repayment to
their parents; for this is pleasing in God's sight.
1 Timothy 5:8 And whoever does not provide for relatives, and
especially for family members, has denied the faith and is worse than an
unbeliever.
Titus
2:4 … train the young women to love their husbands and children….
Comment 3b: The
local church functions like a family in its close relationships, inclusion of
all persons, and meeting of one another’s needs. The church can make up for weaknesses in a
person’s family, such as the loss of parents, lack of children, and fellowship
for single persons (unmarried or widows/widowers). The church can be called ‘God’s family’ or a ‘household
of faith.’
1 Corinthians 8:12 But when you thus sin against members of your family, and
wound their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ.
1
Timothy 3:4-5 He [the
church’s overseer] must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping
his children submissive, 5
for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care
for God's church?
1 Timothy 5:9-10 Let a widow be put on the list if she is not less than
sixty years old and has been married only once;
10 she must be well attested for her good works, as one who
has brought up children, shown hospitality, washed the saints' feet, helped the
afflicted, and devoted herself to doing good in every way.
Galatians 1:2 …
all the members of God's family….
Galatians 6:10 So then, whenever we have an opportunity, let us work for
the good of all, and especially for those of the family of faith.
1 Peter 2:17 Love
the family of believers.
Comment 3c: Christ’s
relationship to the Church is like that between the oldest son of a large
family in its growing up to be like him and in its being cared for by him.
Romans 8:29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be
conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn
within a large family.
Comment
3d:
Young widows do well to remarry and fit into the role of marriage, child
bearing, and management of the household.
The alternative is possible sexual immorality.
1 Timothy 5:11-15 But refuse to put younger widows on the [church’s] list
[of widows—giving them access to support from the church]; for when their
sensual desires alienate them from Christ, they want to marry, 12 and so they incur condemnation
for having violated their first pledge. 13
Besides that, they learn to be idle, gadding about from house to house; and
they are not merely idle, but also gossips and busybodies, saying what they
should not say. 14 So I would
have younger widows marry, bear children, and manage their households, so as to
give the adversary no occasion to revile us.
15 For some have already turned away to follow Satan. [Cf. 1
Timothy 2:15; 2 Timothy 2:6.]
Comment
3e:
Parents are to instruct their children in the way to live Godly lives. The model Christian home is one in which the
believing parent establishes godly rules and which the children dutifully obey.
Proverbs 6:20 My
child, keep your father's commandment, and do not forsake your mother's
teaching.
Exodus
20:12 "Honor your father and your mother, that
your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you. [The
Fifth Commandment.]
Deuteronomy
4:8-10 And
what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all
this law that I set before you today? 9
"Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things
that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of
your life. Make them known to your children and your children's children - 10 how on the day that you stood
before the LORD your God at Horeb, the LORD said to me, 'Gather the people to
me, that I may let them hear my words, so that they may learn to fear me all
the days that they live on the earth, and that they may teach their children
so.'
Ephesians
6:1-3 Children,
obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 "Honor your father and
mother" (this is the first commandment with a promise), 3 "that it may go well with
you and that you may live long in the land."
Comment
3f: The
church not only affirms but also transforms the family. Belonging to the church transforms household
relationships for the better, removing the contention and power relationships that
create disunity because one rather seeks to meet the other person’s needs and
interests first.
Ephesians
5:22 - 6:9
Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of
the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its
Savior. 24 Now as the church
submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their
husbands. 25 Husbands, love
your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her,
having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the
church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that
she might be holy and without blemish. 28
In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who
loves his wife loves himself. 29
For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as
Christ does the church, 30
because we are members of his body. 31
"Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his
wife, and the two shall become one flesh."
32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers
to Christ and the church. 33
However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that
she respects her husband. 6:1
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 "Honor your father and
mother" (this is the first commandment with a promise), 3 "that it may go well with
you and that you may live long in the land." 4 Fathers, do not provoke your
children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the
Lord. 5 Slaves, obey
your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart,
as you would Christ, 6 not by
the way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but as servants1 of
Christ, doing the will of God from the heart,
7 rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not
to man, 8 knowing that
whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether he
is a slave or free. 9
Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is
both their Master1 and yours is in heaven, and that there is no
partiality with him. [Cf. Colossians 3:18-4:1.]
Titus
2:1-10 But
as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine. 2 Older men are to be
sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in
steadfastness. 3 Older women
likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine.
They are to teach what is good, 4
and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, 5 to be self-controlled, pure,
working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of
God may not be reviled. 6 Likewise,
urge the younger men to be self-controlled.
7 Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works,
and in your teaching show integrity, dignity,
8 and sound speech that cannot be condemned, so that an
opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say about us. 9 Slaves are to be
submissive to their own masters in everything; they are to be well-pleasing,
not argumentative, 10 not
pilfering, but showing all good faith, so that in everything they may adorn the
doctrine of God our Savior.
Philemon
1:16-17 … no
longer [receive the run-away slave, Onesimus, back] as a slave but
more than a slave, as a beloved brother - especially to me, but how much more
to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord.
17 So if you consider me your partner, receive him as you
would receive me.
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