The Divine Origin of Marriage - J.V. McGee
Marriage is more than just a legal contract. It’s more than an economical arrangement. It’s more than just a union of those with mutual love. It’s an act of God, and it rests upon His fiat command. There are many young people today who think that all you need to get married is a license and a preacher [or a justice of the peace], and then you’ve got it made. My beloved, if you’re going to have a successful marriage, you have to have God. God will have to make it. Otherwise that marriage must go on the rocks.
God has given a drive to the race to reproduce in the framework of marriage. He said "they shall be one flesh" (Gen. 2.24), and before man walked out of the garden of Eden God gave him this institution. Besides the skins that Adam and Eve had on, the only other thing they had was a marriage certificate from God. That’s the only institution that came out of the garden of Eden.
Marriage is a sacred relationship, a holy union. The apostle Paul said, “he sinneth not: let them marry” (1 Co. 7.36). The New Testament sums up the mind of God on this when it says, “Marriage is honorable in all” (Heb. 13.4).1 Therefore my beloved, marriage cannot be broken by just some little legal act. It cannot be broken by a fit of temper, or by self will. The Old Testament assigns the harshest penalty of all to the sin of adultery – death by stoning. Notice Leviticus 20.10, and the importance that God placed upon it. “And the man that committeth adultery with another man's wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbor's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.” And then in Deuteronomy 22.21-22 we read, “Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: because she hath wrought folly in Israel, to play the whore in her father's house: so shalt thou put evil away from among you. If a man be found lying with a woman married to an husband, then they shall both of them die, both the man that lay with the woman, and the woman: so shalt thou put away evil from Israel.”
If that were enforced in southern California today, you couldn’t have any freeways, because you couldn’t get around the rock piles! You see, the guilty parties in the Old Testament were stoned to death, so there was no living one left. Today we don’t do that, because there’s another arrangement.2
J. V. McGee, from a radio message preached on the book of Hosea
1 Editor’s note: "Marriage is honorable". Living together is not. Until recently it was known as "living in sin," which is correct, but today's society tolerates and accepts what God does not.
2 Editor’s note: Christian churches don’t torture or execute anyone. However, they should judge sin and exercise biblical discipline. See 1 Corinthians 5.11; 6.9-10. Unfortunately today many churches, in the interest of maintaining membership and not offending anyone, tolerate sin instead of judging it as God requires. They call it "love", but those who love God obey His Word (Jn. 14.15)
