When Two Become One

As with Adam and Eve, God delights in uniquely fitting a man and woman for lifelong unity. Today, Sinclair Ferguson considers the deep friendship in marriage that establishes a stable home in which families can flourish.

Welcome again to Things Unseen. Earlier on in the week, we were talking about Christian books on bringing up our children. And I was thinking about books written by gurus who have a very definite formula for how you do that and suggesting that we need to be discerning and, in some cases, very cautious about them because there’s no one-size-fits-all when it comes to either marriage or family life. Scripture is full of great principles, but what I’ve noticed is that sometimes gurus turn their own applications of those principles into the principles themselves, and that’s a very bad way to handle Scripture. And it can also lead to off-center guidelines for marriage and family life.

I’m actually inclined to say the same thing about books on courtship and marriage—there’s no one-size-fits-all. And certainly, in more recent decades, gurus’ ideas about courtship and married life often seem to have more to do with Hollywood than with Scripture. It’s often struck me, for example, that the courtship in the Song of Solomon wasn’t exactly plain sailing, and sometimes, that’s the case with us. So, we need to be cautious about prejudging the ways of God with individual Christians and learn to be confident in God’s faithfulness and His sovereign providences in our lives.

But what is marriage, after all? You remember how Genesis 2 describes the first courtship and marriage? Adam was on his own. He saw in Eve someone he recognized as, in a special way, belonging to him, someone who was like him, someone who would complete him, someone in whom he felt he could be fully himself. Actually, Genesis says, although I know it doesn’t sound exactly complimentary, that God built Eve for Adam. But if you think about it, it’s a beautiful way of thinking about God’s ways. Eve fitted Adam, and Adam fitted Eve. They locked together. I remember a friend who was struggling with the commitment involved in asking a lady that he loved if she would marry him. And then he said he eventually came to the realization that they could be more together than the sum total of what each of them would be without the other.

So, in a word, marriage is a friendship of a very special kind. So special that, as Scripture says, the two become one. There is the unity of the duality, a harmony of the differences, and it’s an amazing reality. And what makes it even more amazing to me is that it’s a gift that God has so freely given to us.

I sometimes laugh to myself at the thought of people who may not actually be very pleasant being married to each other, and it’s a gift of God’s general grace to them. I know it can be a smart thing to say, “They deserve each other,” but isn’t it remarkable to think of the generosity of God in this? Because on the big screen, it’s always the beautiful people who marry each other. But in God’s generosity, marriage is not just for the very beautiful people, but for the plain people, and also even for the somewhat ugly-looking people. And how is that possible? Because for all our fallen condition, God and His providence allows something to click. People find a friend with whom they want to live permanently, to be their very best friend in all the world.

I’m interested in people’s atmospheres, in the kind of life aroma that a person gives off. And, you know, in the home and family, in married life, and bringing up children—I suspect that’s what perhaps influences and shapes our children more than anything else, maybe even more than any words we speak. As I said the other day, they breathe in the atmosphere that mom and dad breathe out—I mean in their relationship with God, and in their relationship with one another, and in their mutual respect, and in their friendship with each other. And where that is present, where a couple really belong to each other in that way, well, there is the making of a stable home and family life in which the children can flourish.

I hope you’ve tasted some of this in one way or another, to one degree or another. And even if that has not been the case in your own family, remember what I said at the beginning of this week: the real family, the big family, the lasting family, the family into which Christians are to fold their own family, well, that’s the family of God to which we all belong if we’re Christ’s, because in Him, we’ve been adopted into the family of God.

Well, it’s the last day of the working week and the last podcast of the week. We’re going home, some of us, to our families. Let’s pray that in God’s grace and goodness, we’ll grow our families for the Lord Jesus Christ. And I hope you’ll join us again next week on Things Unseen.