Marry Well

Scripture: John 2.1-11; Proverbs 15.17-18; 21.9


Quick. Think of the most important days of your life.

High School Graduation. Your first kiss. Your first “real” job. The birth of your child. The death of a loved one.

I remember my important day.

I remember I went fly-fishing that morning. Didn’t catch anything. Then I got married that afternoon. I caught what I was after. You don’t forget your wedding day.

Why is it so important? Is it because you made a lot of money that day? No. Is it because of the great jokes told by the best man. Not the speeches I’ve heard. Is it because of the worship service? I can barely remember that.

No. It’s important because of the decision you make that day – the decision to bind yourself to another human being for the rest of your life. It’s not just a choice for that day, or for the foreseeable future, it’s for life.

Better make a good decision. It’s important. Who you marry affects so much about your life. Flunk a test – no biggie. Dent your car, so what. Get a bad haircut – it’ll grow back. But don’t mess up deciding whom to marry!

“Better a meal of vegetables where there is love than a beefsteak with bickering.” Proverbs 15.17

“Better to live on a corner of the roof than share a house with an ill-tempered wife.”
Proverbs 21.9

Does anyone care to disagree with the wisdom of Proverbs on the subject of marriage?
There is a lot more than beefsteak at stake when you decide whom to marry.
Yet, curiously, I never heard a sermon growing up about picking the right person to marry. And it’s not because the Bible is silent about it. But the Bible takes a decidedly different approach to marriage than our culture today.

For example, when Abraham was interested in finding a wife for his son, Isaac, Abe told his servant, “Just don’t get him a wife from the Cannaanites.” His concerns were two-fold, one cultural, the other spiritual. He wanted his future daughter-in-law to share the save values and culture as Isaac. And more importantly, he wanted Isaac to have, not a pagan Canaanite woman, but a God-fearing wife who loved the Lord. Apparently, Abraham didn’t care what the woman looked like, he cared how she lived and what she believed.
Can you imagine this arrangement today? I can’t either. I mean, look at the reality shows we watch today. Notice, we don’t have an equivalent of the old Dating Game. You remember the Dating Game. One contestant and three potential dates, all of whom are hidden behind a screen onstage. Do you know why we don’t have that show on today? Because no one wants to buy what they can’t immediately see. The girl doesn’t care what bachelor number three believes about anything, she just wants know if he’s hot or not.

Our culture teaches us to look at the packaging, while the Bible has different priorities, priorities like good character, sacrificial giving, a loving spirit. It’s not that the Bible is against dating or romance, it’s just that either they’re irrelevant or worse, they get in the way of seeing what’s really important.

What’s Jesus advice on marriage? Well, we know he attended a wedding. It was in the town of Cana, district of Galilee. We don’t know who was getting married. We just know Jesus and his disciples attended along with Mary, Jesus’ mother. Okay, so Jesus is there and he preaches a sermon on marriage. . . Wait, no, he didn’t. You would think he would. It’s a great opportunity to say at least a few words about the love of a man and woman. It’s a teachable moment, if you will. But, as far as we know, the Teacher says zilch, zippo, nothing on the occasion. Except, in one small exchange over the wine running out. And with that, he suggests he doesn’t want to be involved.

“Woman, why involve me?” as if to say, “I’m not the one getting married.”

But he turns water into wine so everyone can have enough to drink. This is, as you may know, his first public miracle. This has always struck me as odd for a first miracle. Why not do something more important, at least heal somebody?

But this miracle points to something that is very important. After the wedding host tastes this “new wine” he congratulates the groom on his choice of wine, “Most people serve the best wine first, but you have saved the best, this new wine, for last.”

Jesus is the New Wine. This “small” miracle of water to wine is meant to point to Himself. On the occasion when two human beings are declaring their love for each other, a miracle in itself, Jesus’ miracle speaks volumes: “My love is better.”

Jesus’s love is the agape love of God for all of us. Agape love is unconditional. Mark Buchanon writes,

“Conditional love, love predicated on desire and expectation, takes an if. . .then form. If you are good, if you please me, if you return love to me, if you are beautiful and remain so. . .then I will love you. With conditional love, decision follows emotion: I feel love; therefore, I will love.”

Agape works the opposite way. With agape, emotion follows decision; its emotion is the fruit of decision: I will love; therefore, I feel love. Agape love is given not because of love but in spite of love. It is not earned. It is unprovoked. “It seeks those who never so it coming.” Agape loves don’t sing, “I can’t help falling in love with you.” They can help it. That’s just the point: they choose it.

This is love of Jesus. And this is the meaning of marriage and marrying well. To the extent that your marriage helps you love one another and love God, then it is a good one. That is the goal of any and all human relationship, to love God and love one another and so become what He intends us to be.

To marry well is to make a good decision, based not exclusively on appearance but on character and spiritual affinity. And then even more importantly, the decision to continue to choose fidelity and love. You love not because you feel like it but you because choose it and then you feel it.

Jennifer and I have been married over twelve years. I can honestly say that I love her now more than the day we got married. And I can also say, with some confidence, she loves me more. We know what love costs. We know better what love is.

I want us to grow old together in love. I want us to look at each other through the old wrinkled eyes and say, “You are the one I have been waiting for my whole life.”

I want us to cross over to the Promised Land and say to the One who waits for us, “You are the One we have been waiting for all our married lives.”