Latest / Marriage Life and More and Bible Study / Origin of Marriage is God's Design, Not Man's Idea Pt 1 (Marriage as a Mission) - 309

Transcript

Origin of Marriage is God's Design, Not Man's Idea Pt 1 (Marriage as a Mission) - 309 · Marriage Life and More and Bible Study

• 0:07
  Daniel Moore: Let's be honest, if humans had invented marriage, it would probably come with a customizable app.
• 0:12
  Daniel Moore: Something like Build a Spouse, Swipe Left on Laziness, Upgrade Communication Skills, Add the Premium Actually Listen instead of just Nodding feature, and boom, perfect marriage achieved.
• 0:23
  Daniel Moore: But marriage didn't come out of a tech lab, a counseling seminar, or someone's Pinterest wedding board.
• 0:29
  Daniel Moore: It came from God.
• 0:30
  Daniel Moore: Long before date nights, registries, and debates about whose turn it is to load the dishwasher, God designed marriage with purpose, covenant, and unity in mind.
• 0:40
  Daniel Moore: The problem is that many people today treat marriage like a DIY project, rearranging the pieces, scribbling on the canvas, and then wondering why the masterpiece looks a little abstract.
• 0:51
  Daniel Moore: Genesis 2 takes us back to the beginning, where we see that marriage wasn't humanity's bright idea, it was God's design from the start.
• 0:59
  Daniel Moore: And when we understand marriage the way the designer intended, everything from companionship to covenant begins to make a lot more sense.
• 1:06
  Daniel Moore: Welcome to Marriage Life and More.
• 1:22
  Daniel Moore: This is a podcast about marriage Bible and book studies, and we interview people that have inspiring stories.
• 1:27
  Daniel Moore: I'm Daniel Moore, your host.
• 1:28
  Daniel Moore: Over next to me is my beautiful co-host, my wife Michelle.
• 1:31
  Michelle Moore: Hey hey!
• 1:32
  Daniel Moore: Thank you guys for joining us this week.
• 1:34
  Daniel Moore: If you're not here with our show, check out our website at marriagelifeandmore.com.
• 1:37
  Daniel Moore: Our YouTube and Rumble links are there also.
• 1:40
  Daniel Moore: And we're in the Christian podcasting app Edifi.
• 1:43
  Daniel Moore: We're also on your Alexa and Google Smart Devices.
• 1:46
  Daniel Moore: You can also visit us on social on Facebook, Instagram, and X at CTGAPOnline.
• 1:50
  Daniel Moore: If you're a fan of our show, please subscribe.
• 1:52
  Daniel Moore: Feel free to leave a comment on our platforms, give us a thumbs up or a five-star review on Apple Podcasts, and we'd be eternally grateful to you for doing that.
• 2:00
  Daniel Moore: Well, as I've mentioned in my last episode with my Isaiah study, if you've all listened to that one, we do have a new book available now.
• 2:10
  Daniel Moore: It's called The Marriage Communication Toolkit, How to Talk and Truly Be Heard.
• 2:15
  Daniel Moore: That was just released here in this last few weeks.
• 2:18
  Daniel Moore: And you can go pick that up anywhere on Amazon right at the moment.
• 2:22
  Daniel Moore: As far as paperback, hardback, and ebook, it's available in all three formats.
• 2:26
  Daniel Moore: And of course, here in the near future, it's going to be distributed to all the different places like Barnes and Noble, Books A Million, and all those places as well.
• 2:34
  Daniel Moore: So if you uh would like to have a book that just kind of has a lot of the communication stuff that marriages need all in one place, I've tried to take a lot of that stuff and put it all together in one book.
• 2:45
  Daniel Moore: And uh we hope that you'll be blessed with that or know somebody that has some communication issues or whatever it may be, it'd be a good gift, maybe.
• 2:53
  Michelle Moore: Yes.
• 2:54
  Daniel Moore: Uh to give to those people that might need it.
• 2:56
  Michelle Moore: I wish I had like I could play music and be like, pshh, you know, all that good stuff to, you know, announce it and everything.
• 3:02
  Michelle Moore: So super excited, so proud of my husband that he has written this book.
• 3:07
  Michelle Moore: And I think a lot of it probably comes from us and then just you know his knowledge.
• 3:12
  Michelle Moore: And so um super excited and super proud of him.
• 3:16
  Daniel Moore: Yep, so you can go check that out again.
• 3:18
  Daniel Moore: It's on Amazon right now, it will be out everywhere else here pretty soon.
• 3:21
  Daniel Moore: Uh, the publisher has got it being distributed at this point, it just takes a little bit to get it all out there.
• 3:27
  Daniel Moore: But of course, if you haven't picked up our other books, I've also got a couple others available.
• 3:31
  Daniel Moore: And this week we are starting off a brand new series, and the series we're going to be doing is my first book.
• 3:38
  Daniel Moore: Woohoo! It's Marriage as a Mission.
• 3:40
  Daniel Moore: And so we're going to be doing this over the next months to come here, and hope you guys will enjoy that.
• 3:46
  Daniel Moore: If you would like to pick up a copy of the book and go along with us, you can do that.
• 3:50
  Daniel Moore: And that book is available all over the place.
• 3:53
  Daniel Moore: Just Google Marriage as a Mission by me, um, Daniel Moore, and it should come up and get your copy.
• 3:58
  Daniel Moore: There's a study guide to go with it as well.
• 4:00
  Daniel Moore: But the podcast is gonna be a little bit different.
• 4:03
  Daniel Moore: I didn't take the book directly directly, and we're not necessarily using the study guide.
• 4:09
  Daniel Moore: So uh it's gonna be a little bit different, but you can use the book to go along with it, and uh hopefully you'll be blessed by that and we'll learn some things as we go through this series.
• 4:17
  Daniel Moore: So we're gonna go ahead and get started with this week's episode, and this week we're gonna be talking about the origin of marriage, God's design, not man's idea.
• 4:46
  Michelle Moore: So let's be real.
• 4:48
  Michelle Moore: If Magic were a human invention, it would probably look a lot different.
• 4:53
  Michelle Moore: For starters, you would likely have an app for that.
• 4:56
  Michelle Moore: You know, something like build a spouse, just pipe on uh left on laziness, upgrade communication skills, and maybe add a listen and don't just nod feature.
• 5:08
  Michelle Moore: Problem solved, right?
• 5:10
  Michelle Moore: But marriage didn't originate in a tech lab or an office boardroom.
• 5:16
  Michelle Moore: It was God's design from the beginning, before dinner reservations, dual income debates, or pick your honeymoon or my favorite Pinterest.
• 5:26
  Michelle Moore: Yet today many act as an if marriage is something we just made up, like a weekend hobby that comes with return policies.
• 5:35
  Michelle Moore: It's like someone buying a Picasso, hanging it sideways, scribbling on it with a marker, and then saying, Look at my masterpiece.
• 5:45
  Michelle Moore: That's often how we treat marriage, as if we own it and can rework it however we please.
• 5:52
  Michelle Moore: Just trying to redesign marriage without the designer is a bit like trying to rewrite Romeo and Juliet with a happy ending and no Shakespeare.
• 6:03
  Michelle Moore: It misses the point entirely.
• 6:06
  Michelle Moore: So the truth is, marriage was God's idea before anyone ever thought it needed a registry or a Pinterest board.
• 6:14
  Michelle Moore: Man just keeps trying to claim copyright on a masterpiece only heaven could create.
• 6:21
  Daniel Moore: So as we start out this episode this week, my goal when I wrote this book was I think sometimes we need a reminder that marriage isn't about me and you.
• 6:32
  Michelle Moore: Right.
• 6:33
  Daniel Moore: And so good.
• 6:34
  Daniel Moore: You know, me and you a long time ago, when we went through things, we focused on ourselves a lot.
• 6:39
  Daniel Moore: Absolutely.
• 6:39
  Daniel Moore: And we kept God out of it, and that got us in a not so great spot whenever that happened.
• 6:45
  Daniel Moore: And I think a lot of marriages fall into this trap where life starts happening and you have kids, you your bills start accumulating, and all this stuff starts taking place that life throws at us, and all of a sudden we kind of feel like we're on this little island out there by ourselves just fighting to exist with each other.
• 7:02
  Daniel Moore: And we forget that whenever we asked our spouse to marry us, this was already in God's divine plan.
• 7:10
  Michelle Moore: Yeah.
• 7:10
  Daniel Moore: You know, God had God created marriage, it wasn't us.
• 7:14
  Daniel Moore: Thank goodness.
• 7:15
  Daniel Moore: Because I don't think we'd probably be doing a very good job at that if we were the ones that created it.
• 7:19
  Michelle Moore: No, we would be on that uh weekend hobby that comes with return policy.
• 7:24
  Daniel Moore: We'd be rewriting the script constantly.
• 7:27
  Michelle Moore: Absolutely.
• 7:28
  Daniel Moore: But unfortunately, a lot of people do rewrite the script constantly.
• 7:31
  Daniel Moore: They just they they're constantly trying to fix their own problems, their own issues.
• 7:34
  Daniel Moore: We have as we've done before.
• 7:36
  Daniel Moore: And we just forget that this is a God-ordained institution and that marriage is right actually there to reflect Christ and that relationship we have with Christ.
• 7:46
  Daniel Moore: And that's what this series is going to take us through.
• 7:50
  Daniel Moore: We're going to go on a journey to understand that as much as Michelle might like to have an app to create the perfect Daniel, you know, I and she's I can see the wheels turning over there.
• 8:03
  Daniel Moore: I know she's probably going to be hitting the app store after we're done here.
• 8:06
  Daniel Moore: Uh, but it's just kind of a humorous way to put that because you know, if you talk to a lot of couples that have been together, especially ones that have been there together for a while, uh, they start making little jokes about each other.
• 8:18
  Daniel Moore: And I wish I could change him and do this and do this, you know, or whatever.
• 8:22
  Daniel Moore: And you know, the app would come in handy, you know, if you could just sit there and push a little button and switch that around.
• 8:28
  Daniel Moore: But that's not how it works.
• 8:30
  Daniel Moore: We don't have an app to do that with.
• 8:33
  Daniel Moore: So that means we have to learn how to live together.
• 8:35
  Michelle Moore: That's right.
• 8:36
  Daniel Moore: And we have to learn how to bring God into the middle of it.
• 8:38
  Michelle Moore: Yes.
• 8:39
  Daniel Moore: And so the first topic that we're gonna cover here as we get started this week, and these episodes probably will be a couple of episodes apiece, a couple of weeks apiece to get through them completely because there's a lot of material.
• 8:50
  Daniel Moore: But we're gonna start off talking about God's creation of marriage.
• 8:54
  Daniel Moore: And of course, it goes all the way back to Genesis.
• 8:57
  Daniel Moore: Yeah, the very beginning of the Bible.
• 8:58
  Daniel Moore: Yeah, particularly the verses in chapter two, verses 18 to 25, and we're gonna use the ESV version here as we go through this.
• 9:08
  Daniel Moore: We're given a window into God's original design and purpose for marriage.
• 9:11
  Daniel Moore: Now, this passage does not present marriage as a cultural invention or a social convenience.
• 9:17
  Daniel Moore: It's actually a divine institution established by God Himself before the fall of man.
• 9:23
  Daniel Moore: It begins with God making a huge observation about Adam's condition.
• 9:28
  Daniel Moore: He looked at Adam and he saw that Adam was alone.
• 9:31
  Daniel Moore: In Genesis chapter 2, verses 18, it says, Then the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone.
• 9:39
  Daniel Moore: I'm gonna make a helper for him.
• 9:41
  Daniel Moore: Well, this declaration in the scripture is striking because it's the first and only time in creation narrative that God declares something to be not good.
• 9:52
  Daniel Moore: If you remember, if you read the Genesis account, you know, every time a day passed, and the first day, the second day, and God created the animals, the atmosphere, the grass, the trees, what did God say every time that it was good?
• 10:06
  Daniel Moore: You know, everything that God created was within his perfection.
• 10:10
  Daniel Moore: It was in the design that he had had put out there, and he did this for seven days.
• 10:16
  Daniel Moore: Um, he kept creating things.
• 10:18
  Daniel Moore: And every time he was done, he looked at it and said that it was good.
• 10:23
  Daniel Moore: But this one time God looked at something and said, This is not good.
• 10:28
  Daniel Moore: Everything else in creation had been pronounced good for every for every very good.
• 10:33
  Daniel Moore: And you can read Genesis 131 to read a little bit about that.
• 10:37
  Daniel Moore: The absence of relational companionship for Adam stood in contrast to God's design for humanity.
• 10:43
  Daniel Moore: God's concern here is not merely Adam's loneliness, but the absence of a complementary relationship that would then allow Adam to fully live out God's purposes.
• 10:53
  Daniel Moore: The phrase helper fit for him does not imply inferiority.
• 10:58
  Daniel Moore: The Hebrew word ezer is often used to describe God Himself as our helper.
• 11:05
  Daniel Moore: And you can read Psalm 3320 and Psalm 75 for that concept.
• 11:10
  Daniel Moore: The idea is strength, partnership, and suitability, someone corresponding to Adam, equal in value, yet distinct and complementary in design.
• 11:21
  Daniel Moore: So what follows is more than the formation of a companionship, it is the establishment of the first marriage covenant.
• 11:28
  Daniel Moore: God brings every animal to Adam, allowing him to exercise dominion and discernment, yet for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him, as it says in Genesis 220.
• 11:41
  Daniel Moore: Creation itself testifies that nothing else can fulfill the role God designed marriage to fill.
• 11:47
  Daniel Moore: As we read verses 21 and 22, it says, So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon man, and while he slept, took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh.
• 11:59
  Daniel Moore: And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man, he made into a woman, and brought her to the man.
• 12:05
  Daniel Moore: So here we see God's intentional and intimate involvement.
• 12:09
  Daniel Moore: Eve is not formed from Adam's head to roll over him, nor from his feet to be beneath him, but it's from his side.
• 12:16
  Daniel Moore: And what does that what does that symbolize, the fact that it's that it's from his side?
• 12:22
  Michelle Moore: Equality, closeness, and partnership.
• 12:26
  Daniel Moore: So this kind of wrecks all of the uh insinuations that people have sometimes that the man is the boss of the woman.
• 12:34
  Michelle Moore: Yep.
• 12:34
  Daniel Moore: Because we see a lot of dominant relationships a lot of times.
• 12:39
  Michelle Moore: And I think they get the I think the image of the man over the household makes them think that they are dominant and that they can do what they want to the female.
• 12:52
  Michelle Moore: Or, you know, just boss her around is what I guess I'm trying to say, you know.
• 12:56
  Michelle Moore: But I think they forget that's not how it works.
• 12:59
  Michelle Moore: That's not how God made it work.
• 13:01
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 13:01
  Daniel Moore: And I don't think a lot of people have ever thought of the concept of what part of Adam he took to make Eve.
• 13:09
  Daniel Moore: And this really makes it very clear because yes, if you know, if he had taken a part of his head or his brain, you know, that might give the insinuation that I'm Adam's boss, you know.
• 13:20
  Daniel Moore: Or maybe he he took it from the lower like the feet, like we just said there, that would look like Adam could just trample over her.
• 13:27
  Daniel Moore: But when you look at a a couple that is healthy in a relationship and you see them, you know, maybe you're at the mall and you see a very happily married couple that's walking down through there, or maybe you're at church and you see a healthy couple and they're walking down through there, more often than not, you see them walking side by side.
• 13:48
  Michelle Moore: That's good.
• 13:49
  Daniel Moore: They might be holding hands, they might have their arms wrapped around each other.
• 13:52
  Daniel Moore: That is not one being in front of the other, and that's unity.
• 13:57
  Daniel Moore: That's a sign of unity that that that man and that woman, they love each other eat on an equal basis.
• 14:03
  Daniel Moore: And when you think about all of that, it kind of puts it into a whole different perspective.
• 14:09
  Michelle Moore: Yeah.
• 14:09
  Daniel Moore: Uh when you think of it that way, because you know, God's not simply creating another human being, he's actually crafting a sacred relationship.
• 14:18
  Daniel Moore: And notably, God brings the woman to the man, much like a father presenting a bride.
• 14:23
  Daniel Moore: This moment reflects divine initiative and blessing.
• 14:26
  Daniel Moore: You know, here God officiated the first wedding.
• 14:29
  Daniel Moore: I mean, could you imagine having God as your wedding officiator?
• 14:34
  Daniel Moore: I mean, you definitely wouldn't want to mess up.
• 14:37
  Daniel Moore: You know, that that'd be horrible.
• 14:40
  Daniel Moore: But that's exactly what happened here.
• 14:43
  Daniel Moore: You know, in essence, God walked Eve down the aisle and he gave her hand over to Adam in marriage, and they became one at that point.
• 14:53
  Daniel Moore: And Adam's response to all of this in verse 23 of chapter two is poetic and deeply revealing.
• 15:00
  Daniel Moore: What does Adam say?
• 15:01
  Daniel Moore: Why don't you read that to us?
• 15:03
  Michelle Moore: This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.
• 15:07
  Michelle Moore: She should be called woman because she was taken out of man.
• 15:13
  Daniel Moore: So when Adam's response comes out like this, this is a moment of recognition, joy, and unity.
• 15:20
  Daniel Moore: So here Adam sees Eve as both like him, but uniquely different, distinct, yet inseparable.
• 15:29
  Daniel Moore: There is a delight, identity, and connection wrapped into his words.
• 15:33
  Daniel Moore: Marriage begins not with obligation, but with wonder.
• 15:37
  Daniel Moore: As we move on to verse 24, it then lays the foundation for all biblical understanding of marriage.
• 15:44
  Daniel Moore: And what does it say there in that verse?
• 15:46
  Michelle Moore: Therefore, a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.
• 15:55
  Daniel Moore: So in this verse here, this establishes what?
• 16:00
  Michelle Moore: God's enduring pattern for marriage.
• 16:02
  Michelle Moore: Yes.
• 16:03
  Daniel Moore: He puts that roadmap out there.
• 16:05
  Daniel Moore: So there's three points here that we can bring out of that scripture.
• 16:08
  Daniel Moore: Number one, there's leaving.
• 16:10
  Daniel Moore: And share with us what that means.
• 16:12
  Michelle Moore: Marriage requires a reordering of priorities.
• 16:16
  Michelle Moore: Why honoring parents remain important?
• 16:18
  Michelle Moore: You can find that in Exodus 2012.
• 16:21
  Michelle Moore: The marital relationship becomes the primary human bond.
• 16:26
  Daniel Moore: And this is a spot where a lot of people trip up.
• 16:28
  Daniel Moore: And it's kind of interesting because you remember our series that we did on the four laws of love.
• 16:33
  Daniel Moore: Uh, we had one episode where we talked about leaving our parents.
• 16:37
  Daniel Moore: And the name of that episode was Ditch Your Parents, is what I called it.
• 16:42
  Daniel Moore: And you know, that's one of the most popular episodes out of that series.
• 16:47
  Michelle Moore: Wow.
• 16:47
  Daniel Moore: Um, believe it or not.
• 16:49
  Daniel Moore: But we see this issue a lot, though.
• 16:51
  Daniel Moore: We see where children are so wrapped up in their parents, or the parents are have such a tight grip on their kids that when they do get married, they just can't seem to cut those apron strings.
• 17:02
  Daniel Moore: And they end up keeping the parents involved right in the middle of all their issues in their marriages.
• 17:08
  Daniel Moore: And if the spouse did not grow up that way, it really irritates them that the other spouse's parents are right in the middle of their stuff, you know.
• 17:18
  Daniel Moore: And then we see here though, biblically, that God didn't intend it to be that way either.
• 17:23
  Daniel Moore: You know, he told us that we're to leave our parents, and secondly, we are to cleave or hold fast.
• 17:29
  Daniel Moore: So what is share that with us?
• 17:32
  Michelle Moore: This speaks of covenant faithfulness.
• 17:35
  Michelle Moore: The language implies permanence, loyalty, and intentional commitment, not a temporary or disposal arrangement, and that can be found in Malachi 2 14.
• 17:48
  Daniel Moore: So he's established in the scripture that we are to leave our parents and go to our spouse.
• 17:53
  Daniel Moore: Once we get to our spouse, we're to cleave or hold fast, that means we're not to let go.
• 17:57
  Daniel Moore: Right.
• 17:58
  Daniel Moore: We're supposed to hang on with dear life.
• 18:00
  Daniel Moore: And then when we do that, the third thing, we become one flesh.
• 18:06
  Daniel Moore: Share that with us.
• 18:07
  Michelle Moore: This encompasses far more than physical intimacy.
• 18:10
  Michelle Moore: It points to a comprehensive unity, spiritual, emotional, relational, and even financial.
• 18:17
  Michelle Moore: You can find that in Ecclesiastics 4, 9 through 12.
• 18:22
  Daniel Moore: So when we look at this concept of being one flesh, it does sometimes is taken from some people that they become one, you know, when they have sexual intimacy or that kind of thing, and it stops there.
• 18:34
  Daniel Moore: Uh they still have division, and their marriage is sometimes beyond that point, but this has nothing to do with that.
• 18:41
  Daniel Moore: What this is actually saying is again, because Eve was created out of Adam's rib, she's not below his feet, she's not above his head, and vice versa.
• 18:53
  Daniel Moore: They're on equal level planes, they become one flesh, they become like-minded, one mind, trying to uh attain the same goal in marriage, and this is exactly God's plan.
• 19:04
  Daniel Moore: God created this whole concept.
• 19:06
  Daniel Moore: So Jesus himself affirmed this design when questioned about marriage and divorce in Matthew 19, verses 4 and 4 through 6.
• 19:14
  Daniel Moore: He directly quotes actually Genesis 2.24 and declares that so they are no longer two, but one flesh.
• 19:22
  Daniel Moore: What therefore God is joined together, let not man separate.
• 19:26
  Daniel Moore: And this is where the concept of, you know, divorce and that kind of thing comes into play.
• 19:32
  Daniel Moore: Because this uh consummation of marriage that we have between each other, this is intended to be a permanent relationship in God's eyes.
• 19:41
  Michelle Moore: Yeah.
• 19:41
  Daniel Moore: You know, he this is a covenant, and we'll get into that later on.
• 19:45
  Daniel Moore: But this is definitely something that was not intended to be separated.
• 19:49
  Daniel Moore: So by appealing to the creation account, Jesus here reinforces that marriage is God's idea and God's work.
• 19:56
  Daniel Moore: It is meant to be a lifelong covenant marked by unity and faithfulness, not shaped by convenience or cultural pressure.
• 20:05
  Daniel Moore: And how often do we see people let their marriages be shaped by what's going on around them?
• 20:12
  Michelle Moore: It's easy to do that.
• 20:13
  Daniel Moore: You know, we've been in that same condition before.
• 20:16
  Michelle Moore: Especially by convenience.
• 20:18
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 20:18
  Daniel Moore: Uh if we have conflict, especially, you know, if certain things start coming up that might cause division in our marriage.
• 20:27
  Daniel Moore: Uh a lot of times we'll look out into friends, you know, people that are around us, we see how they've handled theirs, and we end up kind of conforming to the way society handles conflict and the way that society takes care of those issues.
• 20:42
  Daniel Moore: And more often than not, that's not really a good way to do that.
• 20:46
  Daniel Moore: Because we know that society's view of con, you know, take care of conflict sometimes includes just leaving the person out in the cold and you know, getting a divorce or whatever.
• 20:58
  Daniel Moore: They don't have any reason to believe they need to stay together and work through it.
• 21:02
  Daniel Moore: And so this is what Jesus was talking about here when he was sharing these scriptures.
• 21:07
  Daniel Moore: So the Apostle Paul he takes this even further.
• 21:11
  Daniel Moore: In Ephesians chapter 5, verses 31 through 32.
• 21:14
  Daniel Moore: He also quotes Genesis before stating that this mystery is profound.
• 21:19
  Daniel Moore: And I'm saying that it refers to Christ and the church.
• 21:22
  Daniel Moore: So this moves our marriage up to a different level.
• 21:26
  Daniel Moore: Here we learn that marriage is not only about companionship, it is symbolic.
• 21:31
  Daniel Moore: Yes, it is a living picture of the gospel itself.
• 21:35
  Daniel Moore: The covenant love between husband and wife is designed to reflect Christ's sacrificial, faithful, and redemptive love for his people.
• 21:44
  Daniel Moore: And you can read about that in Ephesians chapter five, verse twenty five.
• 21:48
  Daniel Moore: So in Genesis chapter two, it reveals that God created marriage, not man.
• 21:54
  Daniel Moore: It was designed for relationship, covenant, unity, and ultimately for God's glory.
• 21:59
  Daniel Moore: Marriage is not merely a solution to loneliness or societal structure.
• 22:04
  Daniel Moore: It is meant to mirror something eternal and divine.
• 22:07
  Daniel Moore: While modern culture may attempt to redefine marriage, scripture definitely takes us back to the beginning where God defined it with clarity, beauty, and purpose long before sin entered the world.
• 22:18
  Michelle Moore: So good.
• 22:19
  Daniel Moore: And, you know, a lot of times people get into marriage for the wrong reasons.
• 22:24
  Daniel Moore: They just don't really love each other.
• 22:28
  Daniel Moore: You know, they might be trying to get out of their parents' home.
• 22:32
  Daniel Moore: There may be issues within their own lives that they're trying to escape, and that's just an easy way out.
• 22:38
  Daniel Moore: They may just, you know, be looking forward to the sexual intimacy, or there's just a lot of different reasons that people may get married for the wrong reasons.
• 22:47
  Daniel Moore: And if that happens, it's probably not going to last because they don't have that foundation of Christ underneath them and have a reason to continue, you know, living for God like they should as a married couple.
• 23:01
  Daniel Moore: And so that brings it to the point where we see in 2 Corinthians 6.14 to not be unequally yoked with unbelievers, for what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness.
• 23:14
  Daniel Moore: You know, our marriage is to be a reflection of Christ in the church.
• 23:17
  Daniel Moore: And if we're a believer and are yoked or married to an unbeliever, it is impossible for our marriage to reflect that image.
• 23:24
  Daniel Moore: And we'll get into more on that later.
• 23:26
  Daniel Moore: As you've seen marriages happen where people have been, they probably shouldn't have been married, I guess the best way to put that.
• 23:34
  Daniel Moore: And I thought I could make it work.
• 23:53
  Daniel Moore: You know, I thought I could change everything and I thought it would be all fine.
• 23:57
  Daniel Moore: I was trying to get out of the house at the time, and there's just a lot of things that go into that.
• 24:02
  Daniel Moore: But I found out pretty soon after it was all said and done that you can't do that.
• 24:07
  Daniel Moore: You can't change somebody.
• 24:09
  Michelle Moore: No.
• 24:10
  Daniel Moore: And I think, you know, you've experienced that yourself.
• 24:13
  Daniel Moore: And, you know, that being an equally yoked thing is so important.
• 24:18
  Daniel Moore: Uh, because, you know, I've seen countless people that have been good Christians that have married people that weren't really necessarily church people, and they've really struggled.
• 24:29
  Michelle Moore: I've seen it work.
• 24:30
  Daniel Moore: Yeah, it has worked on some.
• 24:32
  Michelle Moore: I have seen it where God has left definitely, I mean, that person has a lot of grace and a lot of understanding, and they're led by the Lord.
• 24:40
  Michelle Moore: I mean, obviously, if they're in a situation where it was once that and they've kind of gone their different ways, but they've stayed married, um, talking about more religious part of their marriage, you know, if you truly love that person, you know, and they've not given you any reason to divorce or anything like that, I've seen those marriages work.
• 25:00
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 25:00
  Michelle Moore: I've also seen a lot of good, I wouldn't say good biblical marriages as an example, but I've seen a lot of marriages that didn't have that Christian foundation have good marriages.
• 25:12
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 25:12
  Daniel Moore: I think a lot of times if the if it's the Christian marries the non-Christian, and especially if the non-Christian, you know, has no desire to have a church life, and their moralistic values may not be quite where they need to be.
• 25:31
  Daniel Moore: Sometimes those Christian spouses will struggle a lot because by the grace of God is the only way they can stay there.
• 25:39
  Michelle Moore: Right, right.
• 25:40
  Daniel Moore: They put up with so much and so many people, those are those are the people that their friends and family will always come to them if they see the from the outside, they see all the stuff that's going on, they'll be like, Why are you staying with this person?
• 25:53
  Daniel Moore: You know, it's like they're always being asked that question, and you do, you have to give kudos to somebody that has the grace to follow God and his purpose for them and their marriage in a situation like that.
• 26:06
  Daniel Moore: Now, of course, we don't condone abuse or if it gets too bad, you have to make a choice.
• 26:13
  Daniel Moore: But we definitely, you and I both have seen people just stay through thick and thin because they were just determined that this was going to make the marriage work, regardless, because not only because they love that person they're married to, but because they had God's love inside of them, which gave them that capability.
• 26:30
  Michelle Moore: Absolutely.
• 26:40
  Daniel Moore: So to move on here, we're gonna go ahead and talk about marriage as a covenant and not a contract.
• 26:46
  Daniel Moore: So, Michelle, go ahead and start sharing with us on that one.
• 26:50
  Michelle Moore: Well, this is one of my favorites in your book.
• 26:52
  Michelle Moore: So I'm super excited to be talking about this.
• 26:55
  Daniel Moore: And honestly, this is something that's not talked about very often.
• 26:58
  Michelle Moore: And that's the reason why I love it.
• 27:00
  Michelle Moore: And so, marriage according to scripture is a covenant, not a contract.
• 27:05
  Michelle Moore: This distinction is not merely semantic, it is foundational for Christian couples to understand if they are to grasp God's design for marriage.
• 27:17
  Michelle Moore: A contract is a mutual agreement built on performance, expectations, and conditions.
• 27:25
  Michelle Moore: It is designed to protect personal interest and can be dissolved with when one party fails to meet the agreed upon terms.
• 27:34
  Michelle Moore: However, a covenant is sacred and binding promise rooted in faithfulness, love, and a lifelong commitment, not only to one another, but ultimately before God Himself.
• 27:49
  Michelle Moore: A contract essentially says if you fulfill your obligations, I will fulfill mine.
• 27:55
  Michelle Moore: It is a transactional, benefit driven, and conditional that when circumstances change or expectations are unmet, the contract becomes void.
• 28:07
  Michelle Moore: A covenant by contrast declares I will remain faithful even when it costs me.
• 28:15
  Michelle Moore: Covenant commitment is not dependent on feelings, seasons, or performance.
• 28:21
  Michelle Moore: It involves both a vertical commitment to God and a horizontal commitment to one's spouse, making marriage a three-stranded bond.
• 28:31
  Michelle Moore: You can find that in Ecclesiastics 412.
• 28:35
  Daniel Moore: I want to jump in here for just a second.
• 28:36
  Daniel Moore: This one here a lot of people get confused on because and and I don't know that it's it's probably not even a confusion.
• 28:46
  Daniel Moore: It's just a I'm gonna do what I want to type of attitude.
• 28:50
  Daniel Moore: And they don't understand how important it is that they don't have that kind of an attitude.
• 28:56
  Daniel Moore: Because, you know, contracts we sign one of those like when you roof your house.
• 29:03
  Michelle Moore: Or you sign a contract when you loan against something.
• 29:06
  Daniel Moore: Right, get a loan on something.
• 29:07
  Daniel Moore: It's you know, all of those things are based on somebody else's workmanship type of thing.
• 29:14
  Daniel Moore: You know, if you build your own home, you're gonna have a contract within your contractor.
• 29:18
  Daniel Moore: That contract is gonna say that you gave me your blueprints, I'm gonna build you this blueprint, it's gonna look just like that blueprint unless you change something, and I'm gonna do this till I get to the very end of it, and it's gonna cost you a certain amount of money, and then you're going to pay me the money, and then if there's a warranty, I will back that warranty up until that's over with, and then we go our separate ways.
• 29:39
  Daniel Moore: Well, at any moment, if that contractor pockets change and takes off with it and doesn't finish building your home, or you come home or you come to it one day and you see that he's building a completely different blueprint, the one you didn't approve of, or let's say he bought he paid your, you know, for a bunch of material and and built some of it, and then you decided not to give him the money.
• 30:01
  Daniel Moore: Well, that gives you every right to break that contract with that person between each other, and you can move your separate ways and you know go to court over it or whatever it may be at that point to try to get your losses uh retained back.
• 30:15
  Daniel Moore: That is a contract based on everything going like it's supposed to.
• 30:21
  Michelle Moore: Yeah.
• 30:22
  Daniel Moore: Well, when we come into marriage, we expect it to go a certain way and we hope that it will, but we don't have that same right to just up and run off.
• 30:33
  Daniel Moore: That's just not how that works.
• 30:35
  Daniel Moore: Right.
• 30:35
  Daniel Moore: And the best way to look at that is how many times do we mess up, but God still pursues us.
• 30:41
  Michelle Moore: Right.
• 30:41
  Michelle Moore: That's it.
• 30:42
  Michelle Moore: That's it.
• 30:43
  Daniel Moore: He's got that covenant between us that no matter what we do wrong, no matter how much we sin, in the back of our minds, we always know that someday if I get into a spot where I've um that conviction gets me, and I decide that, you know, I really need to get my life back with Christ.
• 31:04
  Daniel Moore: I need to get back right the way I am.
• 31:06
  Daniel Moore: We don't have to go look for God.
• 31:08
  Daniel Moore: He's right there waiting on us.
• 31:10
  Michelle Moore: Isn't that awesome?
• 31:10
  Daniel Moore: And that's the best kind of love we could ever have, and this is exactly what he's wanting us to mirror.
• 31:16
  Daniel Moore: Um, there should not be any reason in my mind that I'm scared to death that you're just gonna up and leave me.
• 31:21
  Daniel Moore: You know, even if we get into a conflict or a little disagreement or a small fight of some kind or whatever it may be, I know within my heart that you love me enough and I love you enough that we will fix it.
• 31:34
  Michelle Moore: Right.
• 31:35
  Daniel Moore: Because we have a covenant between us that we're not letting go.
• 31:38
  Michelle Moore: That's right.
• 31:38
  Daniel Moore: And I think so many people, I like how, you know, with what I put in there with vertical commitment to God and horizontal, that creates a cross.
• 31:48
  Michelle Moore: Yeah.
• 31:49
  Daniel Moore: When you have the vertical and the horizontal and they cross each other, that creates a cross, and that's the picture of what we were looking at and where that freedom comes from and where that relationship comes from is from Jesus' death on the cross and that relationship he has with us.
• 32:04
  Daniel Moore: That covenant between us is what sent him to that cross.
• 32:07
  Daniel Moore: He loved us that much, he would die for us, and that's what we need to be keeping in our mind as we look to that.
• 32:14
  Daniel Moore: So go ahead and continue there.
• 32:16
  Michelle Moore: Yeah, um, scripture consistently presents marriage through this covenant lens.
• 32:20
  Michelle Moore: In Malachi 214, God confronts Israel saying, Because the Lord was witness between you and the wife of your youth to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant.
• 32:37
  Michelle Moore: Here God explicitly names marriage as a covenant and identifies himself as a witness to it.
• 32:44
  Michelle Moore: This means marriage is not a private agreement or merely a legal arrangement, it is a sacred union entered before God.
• 32:53
  Michelle Moore: To break covenant faithfulness is not just to betray a spouse, but to disregard the presence and authority of God in the relationship.
• 33:03
  Michelle Moore: A similar truth appears in Proverbs 2, 16, 17, where the adulterous woman is described as one who forsakes the companion of her youth and forgets the covenant of her God.
• 33:17
  Michelle Moore: Once again, marriage is framed not simply as a personal bond, but as a covenant that includes God.
• 33:24
  Michelle Moore: To violate marriage is to forget that God Himself stands as a party to the promise.
• 33:30
  Daniel Moore: And that's a very important point right there, because that covenant is between you and I, but we forget the third person.
• 33:38
  Michelle Moore: Yeah, that yeah.
• 33:39
  Daniel Moore: God's also in the middle of that covenant.
• 33:40
  Daniel Moore: And so we always have to remember that not only am I breaking my covenant to you, or you breaking it to me if we decide to split the sheets and take off on each other, uh, we're also breaking that covenant between God because He's that seal and that bond that we both have in our marriage.
• 33:56
  Daniel Moore: So go ahead.
• 33:57
  Michelle Moore: Ezekiel 16 8 further illustrates the conventional nature of marriage by using marital imagery to describe God's relationship with his people.
• 34:08
  Michelle Moore: I made my vow to you and entered into a covenant with you, declares the Lord God, and you became mine.
• 34:16
  Michelle Moore: This passage reveals the covenant is deeply relational, intimate, and enduring.
• 34:23
  Michelle Moore: God's covenant love is marked by initiative, commitment, and faithfulness, even when his people fell.
• 34:29
  Michelle Moore: Marriage in this sense is meant to reflect the same steadfast devotion, not a transactional exchange.
• 34:38
  Michelle Moore: In the New Testament, Jesus reinforces this covenant understanding when he quotes Genesis in Matthew 19, 5-6.
• 34:47
  Michelle Moore: 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.
• 35:00
  Michelle Moore: What therefore God has joined together let no man separate.
• 35:05
  Michelle Moore: By empathizing that God is the one who joins husband and wife, Jesus elevates marriage beyond a social social or cultural institution.
• 35:16
  Michelle Moore: It is a divine joining, an act of God that carries spiritual weight and permanence.
• 35:23
  Michelle Moore: Human convenience or dissatisfaction does not override God's covenant work.
• 35:30
  Michelle Moore: The Apostle Paul continues this theme in Ephesians 5 25, calling husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.
• 35:41
  Michelle Moore: This is the clearest picture of covenant love.
• 35:45
  Michelle Moore: Christ did not love conditionally or temporarily.
• 35:48
  Michelle Moore: He did not wait for the church to be perfect before committing himself.
• 35:53
  Michelle Moore: He loved sacrificially, faithfully, and fully, even to the point of suffering and death.
• 36:01
  Michelle Moore: That is covenant love in action.
• 36:04
  Michelle Moore: When marriage is viewed as a contract, it becomes easy to exit when difficulties arise, expectations are unmet, or emotional returns diminish.
• 36:15
  Michelle Moore: When marriage is understood as a covenant made before God and modeled after Christ's love, it becomes something to protect, nurture, and honor even through hardship, conflict, and seasons of strain.
• 36:31
  Michelle Moore: Understanding marriage as a covenant anchors couples not in fluctuating feelings, but in internal truth.
• 36:41
  Michelle Moore: It calls husbands and wives to a higher standard of faithfulness, deeper expressions of love, and greater perseverance.
• 36:50
  Michelle Moore: And it reminds them that they are not sustaining their marriage alone.
• 36:54
  Michelle Moore: God Himself is present, active, and invested in the union.
• 36:59
  Michelle Moore: He has joined together.
• 37:01
  Michelle Moore: I just absolutely love that.
• 37:03
  Daniel Moore: Yeah, it's I like you know going back to it.
• 37:06
  Michelle Moore: It stands so well between the covenant and the contract.
• 37:10
  Michelle Moore: Yes.
• 37:24
  Daniel Moore: And I think one of the biggest points that was made here as we get ready to wrap up this episode for this week is if you go back there to Matthew chapter 19 where it says that God joined together, let not men separate.
• 37:38
  Daniel Moore: And that's said in almost every wedding ceremony.
• 37:41
  Daniel Moore: Um, almost every time they do that little uh commitment thing between them, you know, when they finish the the wedding, uh, here's the husband and bride, and they say their names or whatever, and then they'll they'll always make that statement.
• 37:54
  Daniel Moore: But it's said so often, people just forget about it, I think, and they just don't listen to that.
• 37:59
  Daniel Moore: And they think they're the ones that got married, they think they're the ones that chose each other, and so therefore, if it doesn't work out, they can make the choice to separate it and quit.
• 38:10
  Daniel Moore: But and it's not the way it works.
• 38:13
  Daniel Moore: God has marriage as a covenantal relationship reflecting the Godhead and everything that goes on up in heaven, that's reflecting down onto earth and our marital relationships.
• 38:27
  Daniel Moore: And it is God that has put us together and and joined us together.
• 38:32
  Daniel Moore: He knows our our path before we even trod on it.
• 38:36
  Daniel Moore: You know, God knows what plan he has for us in our life.
• 38:40
  Daniel Moore: And if you think about all of that and realize that God's the one, He's the He's the responsible party for why you and I are together.
• 38:48
  Michelle Moore: Yeah.
• 38:49
  Daniel Moore: And we feel pretty strongly that we were soulmates from the beginning.
• 38:52
  Daniel Moore: We talked about that before.
• 38:54
  Daniel Moore: But you and I made, you know, some not so great choices.
• 38:57
  Daniel Moore: And that happens sometimes because we have free will and we have that option to make those choices.
• 39:02
  Michelle Moore: But if you really think about it, you know, even when, you know, you think about a covenant and your covenant with God.
• 39:10
  Michelle Moore: And I think about, you know, my first love.
• 39:14
  Michelle Moore: God is my first love.
• 39:17
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 39:18
  Michelle Moore: You're my second.
• 39:19
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 39:20
  Michelle Moore: You know, and we're talking about a covenant in a marriage.
• 39:23
  Michelle Moore: There's a lot of times, the reason why I really enjoyed this part of the book was because, like you said, you just don't think about it often.
• 39:30
  Michelle Moore: I think about it more now than I have ever thought about it.
• 39:34
  Michelle Moore: You know, I have a covenant with God.
• 39:36
  Michelle Moore: There's things sometimes I don't want to do, but I know that it would displease him.
• 39:40
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 39:41
  Michelle Moore: Same as you.
• 39:42
  Michelle Moore: There are things, and and I'm not saying like bad stuff.
• 39:46
  Michelle Moore: I'm just saying in general, you know, just like I'm too lazy to do this, or I want a bowl of ice cream, you know, and or I don't want to get up and do something that you you would like for me to do.
• 39:57
  Michelle Moore: You know, I think about Michelle, this is you're you're married to your soulmate here, you know.
• 40:02
  Michelle Moore: I don't want to be let he let you down.
• 40:05
  Michelle Moore: I don't want to let God down.
• 40:07
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 40:08
  Michelle Moore: It's that covenant that keeps me thinking all the time.
• 40:11
  Michelle Moore: I have a covenant, but I am who I am, and this is who God made me to be.
• 40:16
  Michelle Moore: I'm not the perfect person.
• 40:19
  Michelle Moore: And I'm so thankful for that that he loves me with everything that he has, and just like you, you love me with everything you have, and I love you with everything I have.
• 40:29
  Michelle Moore: All of our mess ups and everything, I just it resembles his love.
• 40:35
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 40:35
  Daniel Moore: And we're so fortunate, honestly, that God did create marriage and it wasn't us because that can actually make that marriage more of a perfected thing that we get involved in between each other rather than a disaster.
• 40:50
  Daniel Moore: Because when we when we create our own marriage and we create our own relationship and we keep God out of the middle of it, uh, we see so many times how that does not go well.
• 41:00
  Daniel Moore: And you don't want to take that there, there's a small portion of people that can make it and they have good marriages, but you don't want to have to try to uh be one of those that chanz because there's no no guarantee that you're gonna have a good marriage if you don't keep God in the middle of that.
• 41:15
  Daniel Moore: And so uh so I think this is a good spot to stop on this week.
• 41:20
  Daniel Moore: Uh we just got started here on our new series, Marriage is a Mission.
• 41:24
  Daniel Moore: It's my first book that I wrote uh last year.
• 41:27
  Daniel Moore: We're gonna go through this all the way to the end.
• 41:30
  Daniel Moore: Next week, when we come back, we will start talking about why God designed it as a reflection of his image.
• 41:36
  Daniel Moore: Uh, not only did God create the marriage as a covenant, and not only was it his idea, and he gave Eve to Adam from the beginning by taking Adam's rib and making them together as one in unity, but this also reflects God and the Godhead, the Trinity.
• 41:54
  Daniel Moore: And we're going to look at that next week as we finish up this first episode here on the podcast.
• 42:01
  Daniel Moore: So as we wrap up this episode, the big takeaway is simple but powerful.
• 42:06
  Daniel Moore: Marriage was never meant to be something we reinvent, it's something we return to.
• 42:11
  Daniel Moore: From the very beginning in Genesis 2, God designed marriage with purpose, unity, and covenant at its core.
• 42:17
  Daniel Moore: It wasn't created as a temporary arrangement based on feelings or convenience, but as a lifelong relationship meant to reflect something far greater, the faithful love of Christ for his church.
• 42:28
  Daniel Moore: When we start viewing marriage through that lens, it changes how we approach everything: commitment, conflict, communication, and even sacrifice.
• 42:37
  Daniel Moore: Instead of asking how can this marriage serve me, we begin asking, how can our marriage honor God?
• 42:44
  Daniel Moore: That shift moves marriage from a fragile agreement to a sacred covenant.
• 42:49
  Daniel Moore: So wherever you are in your marriage journey today, remember this.
• 42:52
  Daniel Moore: The designer hasn't abandoned his design.
• 42:55
  Daniel Moore: When we return to God's blueprint, we rediscover the beauty, the strength, and the purpose that he intended all along.
• 43:02
  Daniel Moore: Well, did you have anything else to add to this week's episode?
• 43:05
  Michelle Moore: I did not.
• 43:07
  Daniel Moore: Okay, well, we'll come back next week and we'll finish up this episode as we get through the first chapter of the book here.
• 43:14
  Daniel Moore: That's all for this week, though.
• 43:16
  Daniel Moore: And if you want to get a hold of us, you can go to our website at marriage life and more.com.
• 43:20
  Daniel Moore: And there's a form there you can fill out.
• 43:23
  Daniel Moore: You can email us at Daniel ConnectingTheGap.net.
• 43:26
  Daniel Moore: If you'd like to reach out to us, we'd love to hear from you and hear some of your marriage stories.
• 43:31
  Daniel Moore: If you have any you'd like to share, you can do that by visiting our website.
• 43:35
  Daniel Moore: Also, please subscribe and share this episode to someone that may need to hear this, and we thank you for that.
• 43:41
  Daniel Moore: Well, as we go, we pray that your marriage is stronger and that your walk with God is closer after this episode.
• 43:47
  Daniel Moore: This is an extension of Connecting the Gap Ministries, and we pray that you have a blessed week.
• 44:00
  Michelle Moore: Mm.