Marriage is Golden

God is smart. Let’s start with that thought and never lose it. The words that follow have a single goal in them. They want to convince that your marriage and the home that grows out from it can be wonderful. More than that, they desire to convince you that you should expect your home to be as amazing as have ever dreamed it could be. But already there is a problem: Life. Likely your home has already felt many of the pains that life brings to us. You have already hurt your spouse in ways that will not soon be forgotten. He or she has already repaid that favor. Your children have been injured under their perception of your disappointment in their failures. You have felt isolated from them by the resentful expression of their anger toward you. So universal is this persistent conflict in so many homes, our society has crafted a label to describe it: Dysfunctional families.

The Myth of Dysfunction

Our society has grown in its doubts, suspicions, and even distain about traditional families to the point that the assumption is that no home is truly functional. Almost none of the academics and enlightened among us view marriage as a necessary thing. Biologists study marriage as the consequence of evolutionary pressures on our species. Anthropologists study marriage as a cultural oddity and a vestige of historical circumstance. Modern feminists see marriage through the filter of chauvinistic abuses. Statist politicians see in marriage a hindrance to their central planning of a society. Our counselors and schools preach the conclusions of those jaundiced views of marriage. Popular media rarely portrays marriage and parenting in a positive light. We replaced the Cleavers with the Bunkers and then with . . . well, the biblical family is now just gone pop culture. Somewhere along the way we bought into the myth that only a few lucky ones could truly find happiness in their homes.

Too often our experiences mimicked the vision of the home painted by our leaders and that we saw in our entertainment choices. We accepted mediocrity. We adapted and lowered our expectations to shield our hearts from disappointment. We bought into the myth that home was prone to being dysfunctional. At best we suffered quietly. At worst we gave up and let our homes fall apart.

Our children have paid the price. They have become disillusioned about the hope of family. They are delaying marriage until later in life. More and more they are avoiding marriage altogether. A generation of a young people is being raised that is more comfortable living together without marriage than they are in risking the dysfunction and hurt that they have seen in their own homes and have been taught is almost inherent within the permanent bonds of marriage.

So, the goal of this article is staggering in its aim. To reach its goal it must convince you that your experiences are not reality. It must lift your hopes and make you believe that the idyllic expectations that led you to commit yourself to one beloved person are still within your reach. It must teach your uncertain lips how to sing the greatest love song God ever wrote even after a lifetime of failings and criticism. There is only one way that goal can be achieved. This article must make sure that you are convicted of our one unchanging truth: God is smart.

Intelligent Design

You are reading an article about having a golden marriage. Let’s assume then that you are a theist. As such you have probably defended your belief in God at some point in your life. In so doing, you probably made the argument from design or the teleological argument as it is also known. More recently, the phrase “intelligent design” has been used in more secular environments to express the same idea. Whether you know the labels or not, you almost certainly know the argument. For hundreds of years, theists have argued that the delicate balance and intricacy of nature demands that an Intelligence must be behind the order found in the universe. One of the earliest uses of the spirit this argument is found in the Bible. The Hebrews’ writer said “For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God” (Hebrews 3:4). One knows just by the existence of the house there was a builder behind it. Over 200 years ago, William Paley crafted this argument with such eloquence and power that his formulation of it is still used in apologetics circles to this day:

In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were asked how the stone came to be there; I might possibly answer, that, for any thing I knew to the contrary, it had lain there for ever: nor would it perhaps be very easy to show the absurdity of this answer. But suppose I had found a watch on the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch happened to be in that place; I should hardly think of the answer which I had before given, that for any thing I knew, the watch might have always been there. Yet why should not this answer serve for the watch as well as for the stone? Why is it not admissible in the second case, as in the first? For this reason, and for no other, viz. that, when we come to inspect the watch, we perceive (what we could not discover in the stone) that its several parts are framed and put together for a purpose, e. g. that they are so formed and adjusted as to produce motion, and that motion so regulated as to point out the hour of the day: that if the different parts had been differently shaped from what they are, of a different size from what they are, or placed after any other manner, or in any other order, than that in which they are placed, either no motion at all would have been carried on in the machine, or none which would have answer the use that is now served by it. . . the inference, we think, is in evitable, that the watch must have had a maker: that there must have existed, at some time, and at some place or other, an artificer or artificers, who formed it for the purpose which we find it actually to answer; who comprehended its construction, and designed it use. (Paley, Natural Theology, 9-11)

Everything in God’s creation is perfectly designed to accomplish the purpose for which it was created. He created humans to inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide and made plant life to reverse the process. He knew plants needed help in distributing their pollen and bees needed a reliable food source. His whole creation works with that same complex and complimentary balance. It is more finely crafted than any watch ever made:

[E]very contrivance, every manifestation of design, which existed in the watch, exists in works of nature; with the difference, on the side of nature, of being greater and more, and that in a degree which exceeds all computation. I mean, that the contrivances of nature surpass the contrivances of art, in the complexity, subtilty, and curiosity of the mechanism; and still more, if possible, do they go beyond them in number and variety: yet, in a multitude of cases, are not less evidently mechanical, not less evidently contrivances, nor less evidently accommodated to their end, or suited to their office, than are the most perfect productions of human ingenuity. (Paley, p 22).

What Mr. Paley is saying is, “God sure is smart.”

Marriage: Intelligently Designed by God

I know, “What does a 19th century presentation of the teleological argument have to do with my marriage?” In a word: expectations. Do you expect the sun to rise tomorrow? Will it rise above the eastern horizon or some other direction? Will the light of the stars dotting the night sky be visible to you tonight just like last night? Will Winter be colder than Summer? You are a theist. You know the answer to each of those questions. More importantly, you know why you have such confidence in everyone of those things: You trust the God who made them. Because of that trust, you expect each of these things to work and to work every day of your life. That trust has empowered us to frame our entire existence around the constant and predicable passage of time and the seasons. Our lives are measured by the steady passage of the years. Our food is sown and reaped by the guaranteed regularity of the seasons (Genesis 8:22). 

Our testimony is the same as was William Paley’s. We truly believe that God is smart. We trust without question that His design of the universe was perfect. We stake the certainty of our faith on the wisdom evident in His creation. We point the skeptic and the doubter to the evidence of His knowledge and power proclaimed all around us in the things that He made. When arguing on His behalf in the area of apologetics, we speak with the clarity and confidence that comes from our conviction in his wisdom. We know that no scientist can ever outsmart God. Our God is bigger and wiser than their doubts and criticisms. We know that if God made something, it will work. Our confidence is based on something we never doubt: Our God is smart.

A question must be asked and answered then: “Who made marriage?” You are still a theist, right? You have only one answer: God made marriage. In fact, the creation account not only states that God made it, but also lingers over its creation longer than any other aspect of that week. The creation of the heavens is told in two verses. Sun’s existence is described in 5 verses. Yet the creation of man and his bride take up 19 verses of the first two chapters of the Bible. God’s greatest and most cherished creation of the universe is not found in the unimaginable and immeasurable expanse of space. It does not soar in the freedom of the sky or wander in the protected passages deep in the seas. It is proclaimed and glorified in the love of home and family. Its power is experienced in the most intricately crafted piece of God’s creation: Marriage.

If God is Smart, Marriage Should Work

Do you think that God expected bees and flowers to get together? Was there any doubt in his mind as He made one and then the other that each could and would fulfill their part in His plan? Of course not. There was no negotiation process needed. Bees were made for flowers and flowers for bees. Because God perfectly designed them to complement each other they did so from the creation week and have done so without interruption since.

We need to make sure that we have the same understanding about our homes. They are the end result of a system designed by God. Every part of that system: man, woman, and child was specially crafted by God to fulfill a particular and special place in that system. Successful marriages are the product of God’s wisdom, not the fruit of the ingenuity and special chemistry of two lucky people who happen to find each other.

The creation account makes clear the work of God in creating successful relationships. The early verses of Genesis 2 highlight for us the creation of Adam:

When no bush of the field was yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up–for the LORD God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground, and a mist was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground– then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. (Genesis 2:5-7)

At least for a short time man lived on the earth alone. In that time he was placed in the Garden of Eden and told both what work with which God wanted him to busy himself and what limitations were placed on his actions:

The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (Genesis 2:15-17)

However, God’s realized His work was not finished at that point. His statement about Adam’s condition was that “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him” (Genesis 2:18). It was God’s determination that Adam needed a companion suitable to stand with him throughout his life. Adam needed someone to share in the experiences that the life that God had given him would bring. God had one more creative work to finish. Yet, something needed to be done first.

The verses that follow in Genesis 2 are intriguing. God has already determined a course of action: “I will make him a helper . . .” God knew that He would have to make Adam’s companion. God said He would “make” a companion for Adam, not “find” one for him. But what does God cause to happen in the next moment?

Now out of the ground the LORD God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him. (Genesis 2:19-20)

He caused Adam to look across the entire creation. At the end of that endeavor “there was not found a helper fit” for Adam. Well of course there was not. God had already stated that He would have to “make” one for Adam. God knew before Adam ever called the first of the animals by name that no being like Adam existed in the creation. There was only one person who needed to understand that distinction: Adam. God was about to create a being that was unique and uniquely qualified to stand alongside Adam. She would complement and challenge him in ways that no other creature under heaven could have possibly done. Her connection to Adam would be perfectly suited to his needs and hers.

So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. (Genesis 2:21-24)

What do you think was God’s expectation for the marriage He created between Adam and Eve? Do you think He had any less hope that Adam and Eve would work together than He had for bees and flower He had created? Surely, God would make two people designed to complement each other suitable to accomplish the task for which they were made.

His confidence in the bond He had created is highlighted in what is missing from the creation account. In no place in the passage does God regulate the ending of a marriage. He makes no provision for divorce. There was no in need. In a world with no sin and populated by two people designed by the hand of God to be mates, there was no reason to think about divorce. While Adam and Eve lived in the Garden, there was no possibility that they would ever divorce. God had placed them together. He had joined them in a perfect union in a perfect world. God had created their home and so their home was going to be happy. Do you know why? Because God is smart.

Finding Mr(s). Right

Fate, luck, destiny, good karma – call it whatever you would like, but it is one of the biggest existing hindrances to building a happy marriage. There is likely no greater myth than the idea that the world must bring the right two people together at the right time in the right place to find true happiness. We are a people who have come to age looking to put the glass slipper on just the right foot. Even Christians fall prey to this line of thinking. Perhaps we have taken the creation account’s imagery of God’s bringing one man and one specially made woman together and applied directly to ourselves. We have created an expectation in our minds that, not the word fate, but God has one special person in mind for us. Our mission in life becomes to find just that one person that God’s plan will bring into our lives. Our prayers while dating plead with God to give us some inspired moment of wisdom, some glimpse of foresight; any sign at all about whether or not the person we hope is meant for us is truly for us. For so many dating becomes a search for a soul-mate. We believe, at least on some sub-conscious level, that the secret to happiness in marriage is found at that start. The secret is finding the right person. We are convinced that there must be an Adam to our Eve or an Eve to our Adam. But is that really what God intended?

Our attention must turn again to the creation account. When Adam is brought to Eve this is the commentary that is given:

Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. (Genesis 2:23-24)

The lesson God wanted us to learn from His uniting of Adam and Eve is generic and prophetic. It is generic in the sense that it was not just about Adam and Eve. Back in Genesis 2:18 God referred to man as “the man”: “It is not good that the man should be alone. . .” Yet in verse 24 the statement is “Therefore shall a man . . .” The scope of this statement went beyond just Adam and what his actions toward Eve would be. The lesson is also prophetic. The man of Genesis 2:24 is to “leave his father and his mother.” It should be self-evident to the attentive reader of the creation account that Adam as the first man had no father or mother. Adam and Eve would not only be the first married couple and they would also be the first parents. The proclamation about marriage contained in the creation was not about Adam and Eve. It was about the generations of marriage that would follow theirs – including yours.

Jesus echoed this same ideal during His earthly ministry. A group of Jewish religious leaders known as the Pharisees were questioning Him about the lawfulness of divorce. His response turned their attention back to the Garden:

He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” (Matthew 19:4-6)

His answer was that divorce should not be needed. Marriage between a man and a woman was God’s plan from the creation. In the beginning God designed man for the woman and woman for the man. Their union should be happy, not because they are individually soul-mates, but because God created them male and female. Male and female are meant to be together. Their coupling works because of God’s wisdom in creation, not our ability of selection.

However the Pharisees were unhappy with the answer and pressed Jesus to explain why then God ever allowed people to divorce as their law indicated in Deuteronomy 24:

They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?” He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. (Matthew 19:7-8)

Notice what Jesus said was the reason for the provision allowing divorce under the Law of Moses: “Because of your hardness of heart . . .” God knew that marriages were failing. He knew that even among His people, Abraham’s descendants, marriages were failing. But He also knew the cause. It was not that the wrong two people were getting married. They had not somehow missed the signs that He had placed in their lives so that they found just the right person and made the perfect connection with them. He knew the real reason. Their marriages were failing because their hearts were hard. Their hearts had turned against each other. Their hearts were rebelling against God and His laws. Their marriages were failing for the same reason ours do. They were unhappy in their homes over the same cause: Sin.

Remember where we started: God is smart. His design for the home is perfect. He designed it with marriage in mind. He has also told us what our roles are in that marriage and how we should treat one another in that relationship. When our hearts are tender and humble we follow that plan. When they get hard, we rebel and turn away from His design. That neglect and/or rebellion from His plan the Bible calls “sin” (1 John 3:4). The moment that we do that, we are beginning to harm each other. Our relationships become strained and eventually break. The truth really is this simple. God’s plan works every time it is tried. God’s plan will work for any person and any couple who are willing to try it. God is smart and is smart enough to design the bond of marriage to hold even you and your spouse together.

The truth you need to know is that sin is behind every divorce. If it were possible for two people to commit to each other in marriage and then have neither sin against the other, why would that marriage ever be unhappy? What would ever cause it to end? Unhappiness in marriage and its home is not a dysfunction inherent to it. It is not the misfortune of Mrs. Right marrying Mr. Wrong (or vice-versa). It is always the product of the home’s Designer’s plan being ignored. It is always the fruit of sin.

Mr(s). Right’s Golden Life

The simple answers are usually the best ones. I attended two Bible camps in my childhood. One was in Alabama. The other was in Florida. I remember one feature the shared in common. The first day of camp there was a meeting at which the director covered the rules for the camp. At Maywood Christian camp in Alabama, the director made my young heart excited for a moment as he announced, “We only have one rule here.” My excitement ended quickly once he revealed the rule: “Do good.” I have never forgotten that lesson. At the Florida camp, the director spent long minutes rehearsing the necessary provisions of our time together. Even though I was a few years older by the time I made it to Florida, I cannot remember a single word he said that day.

The Old Testament can have that same impact on some Bible students. The Law of Moses has hundreds of laws within it. In fact the Jews count some 600 laws for them in God’s word. Knowing and remembering all of those laws must have been a daunting task. However, the reality is that those laws had one aim in mind. They were trying to train God’s people to conduct their lives in manner that was pleasing to Him. Jesus expressed that desire with this statement: “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 7:12).

We know those words as the Golden Rule. We quote the first half of the verse often, almost to the point of its becoming a trite expression with an underappreciated power. Yet, the second half of the verse states that the Golden Rule is “the Law and the Prophets.” It is, in fact, a summary of all that God was attempting to teach His people. Hundreds of the provisions of the Old Testament commanded the Israelites to treat their countrymen with honor and respect. They are told not to steal from one another. There was to be no lying, cheating, or mistreatment of any kind. The poor were to be relieved from their suffering. Widows and orphans were to be care for in their loneliness. Jesus’ statement ties a seemingly endless maze of regulations together so concisely that no one could miss the point. All that God wanted is for each member of the nation to take on the personal responsibility of treating everyone else with the same honor and grace they wanted for themselves.

What was true of the Old Law is equally true of your marriage. The secret to happiness within it is not found in some great complex profundity that only a few can manage to grasp. It is not in the crafting of intricate system of checks and balances that will keep each person protected within its layers of fairness. Success in your family is found in simplicity. You just need to make a choice to apply one simple truth to your life every day that you live: “I will treat my spouse the way that I want him/her to treat me.” You can learn hundreds of other skills and routines to apply in your home. However, none of them will ever go deeper and be surer than that rule of gold. Your marriage can and should always be golden.

None of us ever wants someone else to sin against us. We never want someone to disrespect us or cheat us or steal from us or lie to us. When we have done wrong, none of us wants to be treated harshly or to be taken advantage of because of our mistakes. Even on our worst days, perhaps especially then, we want to feel the gracious touch of someone who loves us. A second sin is never the right response to a first sin. That is why the Golden Rule works every time it is tried. Its use stops conflict before it ever gets started.

Mr. or Mrs. Right is not a product of chemistry or circumstance. No fate or destiny had any impact on creating that elusive person. Even God has left the creation of the “Rights” within their own hands. Mr. Right becomes Mr. Right through the choices that he makes. He either chooses to honor His role in the home as God designed or he does not. He chooses to live by the Golden Rule with His wife no matter how hard it may be or he does not. Mr. Right is not found by looking at what man appears to be or what he professes. No man who fails to live by the Golden Rule will ever be right for you – no matter what fate says.

Gold is Always Golden

Anyone can live by the golden rule when in good times. When other people are kind and considerate toward us reciprocating that graciousness comes naturally. The real test of our commitment to the principles contained in the Golden Rule comes when others have mistreated us. That test is hard enough to pass on a one time offense. Even being considerate to the stranger with whom we have had a disagreement in traffic pushes our endurance. However, move the offense from a single moment to a daily encounter and it becomes almost unbearable. Imagine having the same person cut you off at the same place on your commute every day. How long would it take before you began plotting a way in which to stop him from imposing himself on your rights? It is the repeated application of the Golden Rule that is hard and wherein its greatest power is seen.

The wonderful statement of Jesus before us has no conditions placed upon it. It is personal. I cannot make you live by it. Only you can and so Jesus addresses it to the individual. The Golden Rule is yours to own. The obligation resides upon you no matter what the circumstance is. The action of another does not remove your duty to its call. When men treat you badly, God calls you to do unto them as you would have done unto you. When you are ignored and treated with neglect He beckons you to do unto them as you would have done unto you. Under the touch of the harsh and angered abuse of an enemy, God calls you to do unto them as you would have done unto you. No matter the circumstance, the Golden Rule remains golden.

Jesus’ command to us is also timeless. There is no limit placed on the number of times we are called to apply it. The first time you are treated poorly the Golden Rule is the guiding principle of your life. The same is true at the second offence. Even enduring through the long passage of years of criticism and challenges, the Golden Rule is no less yours to own than at the first encounter with it. Gold never loses its luster. It can be buried, lost, and forgotten for long centuries and it will still be golden.

There is no better treasure to keep in your marriage than this rule. No marriage will ever linger in unhappiness if both husband and wife live by it. However, even if one spouse stumbles in its application or fails to acknowledge his/her obligation to it, the Golden Rule only takes one person to make it work. Even if you are alone in trying to do what is right in your marriage this rule is still golden. It is still the right way to treat an emotionally detached spouse. Keeping your commitment keeps God’s presence in your home and His presence means there is hope.

God is in Gold

Do not ever give up. If your spouse will not return your gift of gold that does not mean it is time for despair or withdrawal. You see, the Golden Rule was never actually about your spouse. Your use of it with your husband or wife was never a statement about how you felt about them – even if you thought it was.

Look at the full statement made by Jesus once more: “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 7:12). The statement is that the Golden Rule is “the Law and the Prophets.” Do you recall Jesus ever making that statement elsewhere? Being the astute Bible student that you are you do, of course, you remember His words in Matthew 22:36-40. In that context a teacher of the Law of Moses asked Jesus “Which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied:

And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:37-40)

He returned with two commandments that rose above the rest: 1) You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind; 2) You shall love your neighbor as yourself. It is His summary of these two laws that ought to attract our attention: “On these commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” That is the same basic affirmation He made in the giving of the Golden Rule. These three great laws are linked together

Taken as a whole as a whole they form a foundation that can withstand even the greatest challenge to any relationship.

1. You shall love the Lord your God – My identity as a person begins with my attachment to God. His presence is the defining characteristic of my life. As long as I am committed to walking with Him, I will be a person of holiness and goodness because that is who He is.
2. You shall love your neighbor as yourself – This is the natural outgrowth of the first one. God is love and that love demonstrated itself in His seeking to redeem man from sin through the sacrifice of His Son (John 3:16; 1 John 3:16). How then can I have any different or lesser attitude toward my fellow man? His life, his soul was valued by God without condition. Since my heart is given to God by that first and greatest commandment to love Him, I must possess and reflect that sense of worth He has for every man.
3. Whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them – That love has a practical expression. At the least, I will treat every person I encounter with the same dignity I feel that God has viewed me as being worthy of.

These three rules give the Christian an unwavering commitment to do what is right even in the presence of wrong-doing. The progression of thought ties our treatment of others directly to our love of God. Rule #3, the Golden Rule, is in my life because of Rule #1. It is there because I love God with all my heart, soul, and mind. No person’s actions, no matter how evil or long continued can impact the love I have for God. I can endure treating an evil-doer long after my patience with him has been exhausted because my eyes were never focused on him. I am treating him well because God has treated me well. His evil or insensitive actions will never eliminate God’s goodness in my life. God keeps His Golden Rule golden. No weight of neglect or abuse can tarnish pure gold.

Conclusion

This is the grand secret of marriage. It is not chemistry or fate. There your treasures of gold in your home. God has placed them there to be found. Keep God in your home by keeping the Golden Rule active in your life. God’s touch and power are in that grand rule of life. Serve your spouse in her weakness, in his harshness, in her insensitivity, and in his neglect not because of them, not even for their benefit. Serve them because of your love for God and to help your spouse see His grace and glory.

No marriage will ever fail that has within it two people committed to that grand calling. Happiness in the home is not a product of fate. Dysfunction has a guaranteed cure. Your home is designed to work. It is designed to bring glory to God. You need to stop hearing the voices of secular cynicism and hear the call of God that promises happiness in your home: whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them. It works every time it is tried.

Never forget God is smart.