Hi, this is Pastor Ken thanks for joining me once again for the Monday Marriage Message where we search God’s instructions to discover how to experience a highly successful marriage. This is the fifth edition in our series 7 Biblical Principles of a Highly Successful Marriage.
In the past few weeks we have looked at four of seven biblical principles pertaining to a highly successful marriage. They have been; #1 Compatibility, #2 Understanding that your marriage is more about your relationship with God than it is about your relationship with your spouse, #3 Holiness and #4 Selfless service.
This week I want to introduce a 5th Biblical Principle of a highly successful marriage - faithfulness. One might think that faithfulness in marriage is a no brainer, an unnecessary focal point in a series such as this one. Even the world thinks for the most part that faithfulness in marriage is important right? Maybe, but why is faithfulness something that every highly successful marriage must possess? It may be for reasons greater than you think.
Admittedly as I have said almost ad nauseam, the primary purpose of marriage as stated by God, it’s originator, is to reflect Him and represent His many characteristics. (Genesis 1:26-27) As God looks into our marital mirrors He expects to see Himself, as the world looks at our marriages they too should see an awesome likeness of who God is. A rudimentary example of this that requires no further explanation is the secondary purpose of marriage as noted by God. Then God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it…” Genesis 1:28. God is the creator of life and when joined in marriage a husband and wife are also capable of creating life. That example illustrates the simple truth that marriage is in fact reflective of God, but we can also see the necessity of the requirement that a marriage be only comprised of a man and a woman. Two similar yet uniquely different beings joined as one for the purpose of glorifying God and His vast capabilities. In past episodes I have made note of other unique differences possessed by both men and women that when joined in marriage and made one, more accurately reflect the totality God’s characteristics. One I have noted is the differences in our thinking. Each man a compartmentalized thinker while His wife is relational in her thoughts. Why that difference? Because God thinks both ways as illustrated in my podcast series Differences that Divide. Another example from that series would be the differing relational needs of a man and a woman. A husband is always looking carefully at his wife’s responses to ensure that he is respected by her for what he says, does, thinks, and believes. Likewise, she is also scrutinizing his responses to see that she is loved for those very same things.
If marriage is intended to mirror God’s characteristics, and it most certainly is, then one of the qualities that must be found in every marriage for it to be highly successful at reflecting Him is faithfulness. God is faithful therefore there can be no question that faithfulness is key to a marriage living up to its intended purpose. How do we know that He is faithful? Certainly most of us would say we have more than enough anecdotal evidence to support that claim. However, His word also makes His faithfulness abundantly evident.
Deuteronomy 7:9 Therefore know that the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments. We can rest assured that the Lord God is faithful. As I said a moment ago, evidence of that from our own experience abounds, however so does proof from His word. Literally thousands of God’s promises recorded in the Bible have already been fulfilled, and there will never be scriptural promise that will go unfulfilled. In the 33 years that Jesus lived on the earth alone, He fulfilled not only the 48 specific messianic prophecies, but many scholars estimate that He fulfilled over 250 other prophesies, when you count the many that are not specific to, but are closely associated with the Messiah. I love that example because of the overwhelming conclusion it draws as to God’s faithfulness. Dr. Peter Stoner author of the book, Science Speaks, calculated that the probability of one man fulfilling just 8 of the 48 messianic prophecies found in the Old Testament to be 1 in a million to the 22nd power. For those not-so-good at math that is the number 1,000,000 with 22 more zeros added! For additional context, if you were to take enough silver dollars to cover the entire state of Texas 2 feet deep, and you marked a small x marked on the back of just one coin, the odds of a blindfolded person picking out the correct coin on the first try would be the same as Jesus fulfilling all 48 of the messianic prophecies, which He in fact did.
God is not simply faithful to keep His promises. Lamentations 3:22-23 tells us, The stea