Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - Marriage Supper of the Lamb

Episode Date: September 22, 2023

We look now at the peak verse of the most famous biblical passage on marriage. It’s Ephesians 5:32, where Paul says, “This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.” He says everything he’s said about marriage has also been about Christ and the church.  This verse teaches there are some things we would never know about marriage if we didn’t know about how we relate to Christ by faith. Conversely, there are things we would never know about our relationship with Christ if we didn’t know about marriage. You can’t completely understand one without understanding the other.  I’d like to look at this under these two headings: 1) what does marriage teach us about our relationship with Jesus? and 2) what does our relationship with Jesus teach us about marriage? This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on October 13, 1991. Series: Marriage. Scripture: Ephesians 5:22-33. Today's podcast episode is brought to you by Gospel in Life, the site for all sermons, books, study guides and resources from Timothy Keller and Redeemer Presbyterian Church. If you've enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to support the ongoing efforts of this ministry, you can do so by visiting https://gospelinlife.com/give and making a one-time or recurring donation.

Welcome to Gospel in Life. When it comes to marriage, we often use words like soulmate or the one. These words can reveal an underlying belief that to have a good marriage, you just have to find the perfect person. But the biblical vision for marriage is starkly different. It's a way for two imperfect people to help each other become who God intended them to be. Listen as Tim Keller explores the meaning of marriage. This passage in Ephesians 5 on marriage, for the last time, there's a slight mistake.

This is not the 10th sermon on marriage. This is the 9th sermon on marriage. And this is the last one. And I want to start off right now by saying, unfortunately, there's a lot of people that I've talked to over these nine weeks who said, are you going to say this? Are you going to say this? Are you going to get to this? And I said, yes, yes, yes. I don't know if I'm going to do it. I got to be done tonight. We're done. I'm tired. You're tired of marriage. And I've just got to finish tonight. From here, I've said, well, I'll say to this, or I'll address this person. I'm not sure I'm going to get to it all tonight, and I want to

apologize ahead of time. Don't be too mad. If you're somebody that I talked to somewhere in the last few days or a few weeks and said, yes, I will definitely address that, I'm just not going to get to it all. Tonight, I would just like to talk about, in some ways, the peak verse of this entire passage. I won't even read the whole thing again, but it's Ephesians 5, and I just want to read chapter 5 of Ephesians, verse 32. We've been going in these evening services through the book of Ephesians. We've come to this passage on marriage, and we're going to look for the last time at it. The whole passage runs from chapter 5, verse 21 to verse 33, but I would like to just read you one verse and expound it and try to pull the meaning out of it. And it's verse 32, where Paul says, this is a great mystery, but I am talking about Christ and the church.

He's able to say all this stuff I've been talking to you about, husbands and wives, and love and submission and relationships, it's all been about Christ and the church as well. If I was going to name this sermon, I would call it, maybe I should someday name this sermon something besides marriage number nine, I'd call it the marriage supper of the lamb. What Paul is saying is everything I've said in these verses, you can say about the marriage state and about the gospel state, about your relationship between you and Christ. Put it this way. This verse is teaching us that there are some things we would never know about

marriage if we don't know about how you relate to Christ by faith. And conversely, there are things we would never know about our relationship with Christ if we didn't know about marriage. When you look at marriage, you see things you would never know about a relationship with Christ if we didn't know about marriage. When you look at marriage you see things you would never know about a relationship with Christ otherwise, and when you look at Christ and our relationship with Him, we learn things about marriage you wouldn't know otherwise. Did you catch that? That's two sides. And in some ways what Paul is saying is if you don't know both marriage and a relationship with Christ, you don't really know either. In a sense, one teaches you about the other and you can't completely understand one without understanding the other.

And all I would like to do is lay out, though you could go on infinitely thinking and reflecting about this, I would like to take those two headings. What does marriage teach us about our relationship with Jesus? And what does our relationship with Jesus teach us about marriage? And I would just like to take those two headings, and I would just like to say there are two things that I'd like to mention under each heading.

Two things that we learn. First of all, what does marriage tell us about our relationship with Jesus? What do we learn from marriage? What do we learn from being married? What do we learn from what the Bible teaches about marriage that teaches us what it means to be a Christian? And here are the two things, and let's look at them.

First of all, I believe marriage teaches you about repentance and grace in a way nothing else on earth can. It teaches you why your relationship with Christ has to be based on repentance and grace, not on works, not on good deeds, not on performance, because your marriage relationship could never be based on your good deeds and your performance. So first of all, what marriage tells us about our relationship with Christ, it teaches us about grace. And secondly, marriage teaches us about the relationship of intimacy to fruitfulness. I'll go back over both of these. Secondly, marriage teaches us about the relationship of intimacy to fruitfulness. I'll go back over both of these. Secondly, marriage teaches us about the relationship of intimacy to fruitfulness. I'll try to be loud. I know,

I've been in the balcony. I know it's hard to hear me from back there. First of all, marriage teaches us about grace and repentance. A lot of us think we know about it. We think we know what it means to repent and believe until you get married and you realize you don't know much about it. It was pretty interesting, for example, yesterday. For me, just to hear briefly a place where Orrin Hatch at the hearing said, sexual harassment is unforgivable.

Does he really mean that? I do know. Does he know what he's saying? But what's interesting to me is he does know what he's saying because in the public realm, from what I can tell, generally speaking, people don't believe in forgiveness. They believe if you forgive people for things that they have done, you'll be crushed. You can't forgive people. When Lee Atwater, conservative Republican official who recently died of cancer. Now, maybe some of you saw this. It just didn't get the press I thought it probably deserved. But Lee Atwater was a dirty politician, a backstabber, somebody who went and dug up dirt and used it against opponents in campaigns.

He got cancer. Before he died, he was converted. From what I can tell, he became a born-again Christian. And what he began to do is he began to confess and ask for forgiveness. He began to confess his sins to people. He said, I was a dirty politician. I was a dirty dog. It was interesting to see how people responded. It was

interesting to see what the writers and the pundits and the columnists said. Basically, they had to be a little bit careful because the man was dying. The man was dying. And they liked the fact that he was admitting he was a dirty dog. But basically, you could tell what they were saying is, what do you mean forgive? How do you forgive somebody for something like that? What do you mean wipe the slate clean and everything's okay? Come on. Nobody believes in that. Really. You don't forgive groups of people for sins against other groups of people. You don't do that. All you do is you remind them about it forever. You never, ever, ever, ever forgive. Somebody decides to ask forgiveness, good.

I'm glad he's admitted the kind of person he really is. But forgive him? Come on. Chuck Colson, who worked in the Nixon administration, who's a very famous born-again Christian type, the way in which he's regarded, from what I can tell, basically by the media, is with absolute scorn. The idea that somebody who did the things that he did, now he gets converted and he says, God has forgiven me, and he expects us to forgive and forget, to wipe the past clean.

Come on! See, that's the attitude. The attitude is, to forgive means you put yourself in a place of weakness and you will be absolutely crushed. And when you get married, you find it's actually the opposite. If you don't forgive, if you don't put the past behind you, if you don't start clean, you will be crushed. It's exactly the opposite.

You see, out in the world, people say, hey, you achieve or you don't. If you fail, if you blow it, don't ask us to forgive. Don't ask us to wipe out the past. If you sin, it'll be on your blot forever. See, we always consider you that way. Give me a break. Wipe out the past forgiveness. Come on. You'll be crushed if you forgive people. In marriage, you'll be crushed if you don't. And what you see in marriage for the first time is you can't be saved by your works. You can't be saved by your performance. You've got to be saved by sheer grace, by constant forgiveness, by constant repentance. In fact, in a good marriage, what you have is you have the drama of salvation continually and constantly played out.

The drama of, in fact, sometimes it goes through the cycle. I call it the gospel cycle. And the gospel cycle, it happens actually several times a day in a very, very, very small way, and then sometimes a couple times a month in a large way, and actually a couple times in a lifetime in a very, very large way. And the drama basically is you have peace, you see, and you have harmony until somebody decides to live for their own glory.

Somebody decides to put his or her own glory and happiness above the other one. And because that person sins, that person decides to go his or her own way, decides to live for his or her own glory, there's estrangement and alienation. So here's a peace and harmony, and then there's sin, and then there's estrangement and alienation. So here's a peace and harmony, and then there's sin, and then there's estrangement and alienation and hostility. And then somebody reaches out, and there's redemption, and there's reconciliation,

and there's peace and harmony, and that's the cycle. And in every good marriage, that sort of thing is happening constantly in various, as I said, in various degrees of seriousness. Now, let me give you an example of what I mean. What do I mean? That redemption part is really critical. In the Bible, we're told, the redemption happens

because two things are happening. On God's side, there's electing love. That means God, who has every right to be angry at us because he's been offended, he is the one whose glory has been impugned, he's the one who's been trampled upon, that God puts away his wrath, covers the sin, reaches out and puts his love on people and says, I want you. I know what you've done, but I put that behind me. I've dealt with that. I want you. Open your heart to me. That's God's part, electing love. And the human part is repentance. You see, now, let's talk about it. You see, these two sides, the offender repents. The offended elects in love.

Both of those things have to happen. But actually, though we know biblically that they happen in this order, that God is the one who comes after us and we repent. In marriage, the fact is it can happen either way. But it both has to happen. You see, what happens if your spouse has wronged you? Well, if you're the offended one, what can you do? You can say, I'm going to put away my wrath. I'm going to lay it aside. I'm going to deal with the sin. I'm

going to cover it. And I open myself to you and I want you. Now, how do you do that? Generally speaking, of course, you're not very verbal. In fact, if you sit down and say, I'm the offended one, but I lay aside my wrath, I put away the sin, and I am open to you coming back any time you want to grubble. You'll see what you've actually done is that's not electing love. You're punishing the person. Let me tell you what it means to truly elect somebody, to truly choose somebody freely. What you basically say is, I know you're under a lot of pressure. See, as soon as you say that, as soon as you don't revile even though you've been reviled, as soon as you don't pay back even though you've been hit, as soon as you just say,

like Jesus says in the garden, the Spirit is willing. I know you meant well. I know you've been under a lot of pressure. What that does is it gives the other person the open door. It's a way of saying to the other person, I'm not going to pay back. I really want you. And ordinarily, just that kind of thing, just to have the other person know that you've just slammed, but you're not getting slammed back. And the offended says, I know you're under a lot of pressure or something like that. That convicts you of sin. It convicts the offender of sin. And the offender says, well, yeah, but it's no excuse for what I just did. And there's the cycle. There's the gospel cycle, election and repentance. It happens. You see, that's the one side. The other side is the offender has to actually repent.

Now, repentance is the thing you learn in marriage. And repentance, if you want to understand repentance biblically, and it's so important, I'll just spend a moment or two on it, you don't really understand it until you get, I think, into marriage, until you learn all this in marriage. Repentance, you can see in the parable of the prodigal son. There, the prodigal son comes to his senses, and he says, I'm not going to make any excuses.

I come back to my father, and I say, Father, I've sinned against you and in heaven's sight. And I make no excuses. Not only that, I don't make any demands from you. If you want to take me back, you can. If you don't want to take me back, you don't have to. You want to take me back, partially fine. Your schedule is fine. I deserve what I get.

I'll do anything to make it right, and I'll take whatever you give me. That's repentance. See, it's not penitence, where you're trying to sort of pay for your sins by groveling deep enough and flagellating yourself. Nor is it explanation. See, a lot of people think they're saying, I'm sorry, but they're explaining. They're making excuses. They're saying, Father, sorry, but they're explaining. They're making excuses.

They're saying, Father, you know, but hey, I was rebelling. You know, I was 18 years old, Father. That's why I was in the pigsty. But I mean, I've been reading books about this. All kids need to separate, you see, to come to maturity. So hey, you know, I would like my place back. Maybe not the room I had before, but that's not what he does. In repentance, what you say is,

no excuses, no defenses. I will take whatever you can give me in your time at your discretion. You know, that is what re... That's what reinstitutes the relationship and nothing else. It's one of my favorite illustrations of when I saw this movie that... I don't remember much else about the movie. It's one of my favorite illustrations. And when I saw this movie,

I don't remember much else about the movie. It wasn't a terribly remarkable movie, but it was the movie with Ted Danson and Jack Lemmon and some younger kid. It was called Dads. It wasn't a big splash. It was probably last year. But there's this one place where the son, the grown son, talks to his father and says, Dad, why did you leave us? He divorced the family and he left. And he left the mother with the kids. And the kid looks at the father, and they've always been estranged, and he says, Dad, why did you leave us?

And Ted Danson is the dad who sits there and says, Well, we had irreconcilable differences. We had two different views of life. We were both really young. Neither of us really knew what we wanted to do. And the son is looking at him. And finally, Ted, he puts his head down and he says, let me tell you why I left. Because I loved the powerful feeling I had when I made money. And I couldn't make money and have the job that I wanted to have and still have that family because your mother was always making me

feel guilty. I loved the power. I wanted that more than I wanted to raise you. And that's why I left. And when he did that, he moved from explanation to repentance. And instantly, instantly he could sense. I mean, the director knew the way human beings work. The relationship was resurrected instantly. The gospel was happening. There was resurrected instantly. The gospel was happening. There was real repentance, and so there was real reconciliation.

And you see, what was so funny was as soon as he was willing to admit just how bad the past was, you could see that the son was sitting there ready to say, I'm ready to forget the past if you'll just admit it. You see, what's come between me and you is your pride, Dad. Repentance is something you learn. Everybody thinks repentance and forgiveness and admitting you're wrong and confession will crush you out there, but in marriage it'll crush you if you don't do it. In fact, let me go this far.

If you don't understand the importance of repentance, you don't understand the gospel. When you're depressed, the best thing you can do for yourself is repent. When you're bitter, the best thing you can do for yourself is repent. When you're bitter, the best thing you can do is repent. When you're being accused falsely and persecuted, the best thing you can do is repent. Now, if you say, what? Look, I admit that when you're trying to help somebody who's depressed or who's bitter or who's been falsely accused, you shouldn't call them to repent because they're going to say, I feel bad enough as it is. How can you put a guilt trip on me? But if you have any kind of maturity and any understanding of the gospel,

you will know the best thing you can do when you're depressed or bitter or persecuted is repent. Find something to repent of. Why? Because you say, look, when you get depressed, you put yourself back in control. Here you are depressed, and you're saying, oh, what's all this happening to me for? Well, find something to repent of. Oh, the thing that's happening, don't say,

well, maybe the reason I lost my job, or maybe the reason that this sickness has happened is because I'm a bad person. That's not what I mean. What I mean is you can start to say, wait a minute, wait a minute. Why don't I trust God to be working in this? What's the matter with me? Wait a minute. Why have I stopped praying just because it doesn't seem like I'm getting answers to my prayers? Wait a minute. You start repenting for what you can repent of, and you find yourself getting back in control. You begin to realize what's making you depressed is not your circumstances, but your responses to your circumstances, and you've got control over that. When you start to repent, you start to wake up. What's going on here? And you stop being a victim. your circumstances, but your responses to your circumstances, and you've got control over that.

When you start to repent, you start to wake up. What's going on here? And you stop being a victim. It doesn't get rid of the circumstances that are so bad, but it puts you back in control. Or, for example, what if you're bitter? The best thing you can do for yourself is repent of anything, of anything. Because, you see, what makes you bitter is the fact you don't think you're a sinner. What makes you so miserable the fact you don't think you're a sinner. What makes you so miserable is you can't forgive. You're so angry. You're so angry because you've forgotten you're a sinner. We were mentioning this at the four o'clock service. The Bible clearly says that the way you know that you are a forgiven sinner is that you can forgive. Why do you think so many men are willing to forgive sexual harassment? And why so many women are not?

Because an awful lot of men know they've done it. That's why they're saying, well, come on, you've got to forgive a person for something like that. And the reason the women aren't doing it is because they say, well, I've never done such a thing. I think that's awful. I've been abused in that way. I think it's terrible. Now, away, if you can, for a moment, from the sexual harassment thing to the principle.

The principle is, the way you know you are a forgiven sinner is that you can forgive. And if you can't forgive, it's because you've forgotten that you're a forgiven sinner. And if you're bitter and you're under the thumb of bitterness, it's because you've forgotten about all the other areas where you have sinned and where God has forgiven you and where other people forgive you or needed to forgive you. You want to get back in control of your life? Repent! If somebody says, but won't that just make you more upset and terrible?

Only if you forget the gospel. The gospel is that if Jesus Christ has died for you, if you've received him as your savior, then you are completely accepted by God. You're never going to ever be cast away. He loves you in Christ. And one old Puritan once put it this way, the way you can tell the difference between a Christian and a Pharisee

is when a Christian sees his sin and begins to repent, he feels closer to God. And when a Pharisee sees his sin and begins to repent, he feels further from God. Because the Pharisee has based his acceptance with God on his works. And when he sees that he's a sinner, he feels like, how could God

possibly accept me? Which reveals the fact that he is a self-righteous, moralistic Pharisee. But a Christian is somebody who, every time you repent, you get back in touch, again, with the fact that it's all of grace. It's all of grace. The best thing that can possibly happen to you is to repent. And in marriage, it's absolutely critical. Real repentance and real electing love. You see how that works? You're replaying, you're just continually replaying the gospel again and again and again. I don't want to trivialize it, but what I'm saying is it happens in the large, of course, for the big ones, the places where one person in the marriage has really betrayed the other one. And that happens every few years. And there's a major conflict. And you go from peace and harmony to estrangement and alienation and to repentance

and election and reconciliation. And it's hard. And there's a lot of tears and everybody falls apart. And then it's joy in heaven, you know, when it's all done. But it happens in the little. Marriage is one of the most significant human relationships there is, but is also one of the most difficult and misunderstood. In The Meaning of Marriage, Tim and Kathy Keller offer biblical wisdom and insight that will help you understand God's vision for marriage. Whether you're single, considering marriage,

or someone who's been married a long time, The Meaning of Marriage will help you face the complexities of commitment with the wisdom of God. The Meaning of Marriage is our thank you for your gift to help Gospel and Life share the love of Christ with people all over the world. So request your copy today at gospelandlife.com slash give. That's gospelandlife.com slash give. That's gospelandlife.com slash give. I remember years ago, we had a little one of these cycles,

and I refused because I didn't understand what repentance meant in the little things. But they're not little in the end because they add up. I used to sit on my bed in Virginia at night, and I would take my shoes off, and I would throw them into the closet. And my wife certainly found out pretty soon that by throwing my shoes in the closet I was making all these scuff marks all over the inside of the closet and the door lintel into the closet and all that. And so a couple nights after I was doing that she said,

Don't do that, you're just scuffing up everything. And I said, oh, I'm sorry, I won't do it anymore. But I hardly thought about it, you see, and what would happen is I forgot, it was a habit. So the next night I threw them in again, and she said, you said you weren't going to do that. Oh yes, I'm sorry. The third night I did it again, what does she start to think?

She says, obviously my concerns are really important to him. And so she just stuffs it. I'm not going to keep humiliating myself and nagging him. He's not going to turn me into a nag. I'm just going to sit here and that's okay. But what happens is every time, every night, she would hear a clump. There'd be this little teeny bit of anger stored up, you know, and 40 clumps later, maybe

we're having a bad night or maybe something else is wrong or something, and I throw my shoe in, and she goes, there you go again. You know, she's 40 clumps angry, but I'm not even thinking about the 40 clumps. I'm just thinking about this one. I'm saying, this is inappropriate anger. I just threw my shoes in. You're right, I admitted it. I shouldn't have done it, but come on. And so instead of repenting, I defend myself because I said, this is inappropriate anger. And what does she do? She says, oh, great. Now you see, look it. One day, what actually happened was I began to realize what was wrong. And I said, what can I do? See, that was a big idea of repentance. And she says, I don't know, something to remind yourself.

So what I did was right at the place on the door where I'd throw the shoes in, I took a sign and I made myself a sign and I wrote down, I said, stupid, stop throwing your shoes and hurting your wife. Signed, God. I put it there. And did that mean that sometimes I forgot and I threw my shoes? Of course sometimes I forgot, but see, that sheet represented in my wife's eyes repentance, because I was saying,

what will it take? What do I have to do? You see, I will it take? What do I have to do? You see? I will take the steps. If you think, as funny as that is, and it is hilarious, lousy marriages are made of, you know, well, as they say, what is a seashore?

It's made up of little tiny grains of sand. Those are the grains of sand. They come there. Marriage will teach you about grace. Now, secondly, and I will be brief on this because, like because I said I've got to finish this thing, didn't I? Secondly, that's what marriage teaches us about Christianity. Marriage tells us about a relationship with Christ. Marriage says it's all of grace. Here's a perfect example of it. Secondly, marriage, the idea that my relationship with my wife is a picture of Christ's relationship with the church,

also tells me about the relationship of intimacy to friendship. The fact is that the Bible says that when you become a Christian, the first thing that happens is your relationship with God has changed. You become the child of God. The Bible also says right here that when you become a Christian, your relationship with Christ changes. You become the bride of Christ. All of us, male and female, we're all brides of Christ. We're all his spouse. And there's some places in the scripture that talk in some of the most fairly incredible and

risque ways about that. So, for example, in Romans chapter 7, it says, don't you know, brothers, for example, in Romans chapter 7, it says, don't you know, brothers, that the law has authority over a man only as long as he lives. For example, by law, a married woman is bound to her husband as long as he is alive, but if her husband dies, she is released from the laws of marriage. So then, my brothers, you die to the law that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit to God. That is saying that all human beings, in a sense, now listen carefully, are like a woman, that if you're married to this particular man

and you put yourself in his arms, so let's say you're Miss C and you marry Mr. A, you put yourself in his arms and you bear fruit into the world through your body. Children. And those children, if you're in the arms of Mr. A, are AC children. But if you put yourself in the arms of Mr. B, then the fruit of that union is born into the world, and those aren't A.C. children, those are B.C. children. What the point is, and this is amazing,

it says the difference in your life when you become a Christian is before you had yourself in the arms of another. You were trying to earn your salvation in a different way. There was something else that drove you. You had a different God, and the fruit of that was coming into the world through your body. But now you have put yourself, and you must put yourself into the arms of Jesus Christ, and he will bear his fruit into the world through your body. Well, what is the fruit? Well, you see, for example, Galatians 5, listen, we can be pretty honest about this. Galatians 5 says, the works of the flesh are adultery, uncleanness, idolatry, hatred, bitterness, strife, envy, drunkenness, and party spirit. And the works of the spirit, the fruit of

the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, meekness, gentleness, you know, faithfulness, and self-control. Here's the point. Once you're married, that doesn't mean you'll have any children. Being married is nice, but you've got to continually have the kind of relationship so that you're in each other's arms, so that you will bear children. And not only that, it's possible to be married to Mr. A and be sleeping with Mr. B. What this is telling you is take a look at your life. What is being born out into the world through your life? Huh? Hatred? Envy? Bitterness? Drunkenness? Party spirit? Then you're not in the arms of Christ.

You're in the arms of someone else. Something else that's driving your life, something else that you're worshiping, something else that's more important to you, something else which is your Lord, something else which is your husband. That's what the imagery is saying. On the other hand,

do you see yourself actually growing in grace, growing in love? Are you more loving than you were last year? Are you more self-controlled than you were last year? Are you more peaceful than you were last year? Are you a happier person than you were last year? If not, if that fruit isn't being born out into the world through your body, you see, if that isn't happening in your life, if that fruit isn't being born, then you are not putting yourself, moment by by moment into the arms of your true husband. It's one thing to be married to Christ. It's one thing to become a Christian. It's one thing to be baptized. It's one thing to make your commitment to him, just like it's

one thing to be wedded. It's another thing to actually have an intimate relationship that bears fruit. Are you day in and day out putting yourself back into your husband's arms? Now, I'm going to show you why, as risque and as daring as this imagery is, this is the imagery that God uses, for good reasons. I'm coming to that in a moment. But the point is, you are not going to have a very good marriage if all you ever do is talk to one another on the way to something else. There's got to be times in which you sit down and actually concentrate on each other. That's what sex is. You can't always be saying, how do I look on the way to something? You can't always be saying, I need something on the way to something. I need some money on the way to something.

I need you to go pick up the kids on the way to something. You'll never have any children that way. And the fact is that a lot of you are living in a relationship with Christ just like that. All you're ever doing is calling up when you're in trouble. All you're ever doing is asking for help when you're in need. But are you setting aside time to look at him and to rejoice in him and to listen to him and pay attention to his word and to commune with him and to pray with him? Do you see what we're saying?

The relationship of intimacy to fruitfulness is so obvious in the illustration and so convicting when you think about it. Marriage teaches us about grace. Marriage teaches us about the relationship of intimacy to fruitfulness. But then, let's switch things around. Our relationship with Christ

teaches us two things about marriage that we've got to look at, and they're both very, very important and have lots of practical ramifications. The first thing is the relationship with Christ as our husband, as our bridegroom, sheds a lot of light on a relationship in marriage in this way. First of all, it relativizes marriage. It shows us that marriage is only an image. Marriage is penultimate. It's only an image of the relationship with Christ. You see, the relationship with Christ shows us that that's the true relationship that completes us. We've talked about this for eight weeks. We've been

saying that human beings were built with a sense of deficiency. The reason we seek out someone else to love and to get into their lives, the reason we seek out someone to couple with and someone to commit to us and commit to, is because we sense that we're incomplete. We sense that there's a deficiency in us. We sense that we need relationship in order to find ourselves. As a quick recap, we said that that in marriage there's this marvelous ability to reprogram the self-image do you remember this from about three weeks ago in a nutshell it goes this

way marriage gives the institution of marriage the invention of the divine institution of marriage gives your spouse the ability to overturn everything that you have ever believed about yourself and everything that anyone else has ever said to you about yourself. Your self-image comes from all these different things that people have been saying about you for years. But now, to put it in a nutshell, if your spouse says you're beautiful and everybody else says you're ugly, you'll feel beautiful. If your spouse says that you're ugly, though, and everybody else says you're beautiful, you'll still feel ugly. and everybody else says you're beautiful, you'll still feel ugly. You have that power in a marriage to reprogram the self-image.

Here's the danger. That is only an image of the divine marriage that you have with Christ. Ultimately, your self-image, your understanding of yourself has got to come, your completion has got to come from his love for you and your life. And therefore, unless you see your relationship with Christ is the real marriage, you're going to make an idol out of marriage. And there's two ways you can do it. The first way you can do it is by being married. And the second way, in the marriage, you can make an idol out of marriage. I found this out by reading my old friend John Newton, the guy who wrote all the great hymns. He was a tremendous pastor. He wrote lots of letters. And whenever he wrote letters to people on the basis of about

marriage, he always said the biggest problem in marriage is idolatry. That is, you make the other person your salvation. Instead of Jesus being the one that really is your strength, the other person is the one who's your strength. Instead of saying, I know I'm okay because Jesus says I'm okay. Instead, we look at, we put tremendous pressure on our spouse to love us perfectly and to not be bad and not fall apart and not be too weak. We need someone in our marriage to love us perfectly and so we put tremendous burdens on that marriage to make us completely

happy. John Newton says, unless you understand the fact that the real bridegroom is Christ, and that the real marriages are relationship with Christ, unless you see that even the best possible marriages can never satisfy, you'll always be demanding more out of your spouse than that person can ever possibly give. That person is a sinner,

and that person is just as upset with you. And you see, if you don't see that marriage is penultimate, it's relative, you'll make an idol out of marriage. Well, that's what happens when you're inside marriage. But how do you make an idol of marriage when you're outside of marriage? That's easy. Most of you are single and you know. A lot of you know exactly how that works. Because you say, I've got to be married or I'm going to jump off a bridge. Now you see, the same attitude, if you were married today,

you'd be wanting to jump off a bridge anyway. It's not funny. Because the attitude that makes you feel like life isn't worth living unless I'm married is the same attitude that will wreck the marriage because isn't worth living unless I'm married is the same attitude that will wreck the marriage because you will be sure that that person, that spouse, that marriage has got to be the source of all of your happiness. And you say, oh, I wouldn't make that mistake, but you're making it now. You see, listen, you can easily conclude by reading Genesis 1 and 2, and I think I've pretty much concluded,

that if there was no sin in the world, that marriage would be the ideal and that all human beings would be married. But you see, the Bible tells us that something happened after Genesis 2, something called sin, something called the fall. And it's very clear from 1 Corinthians 7 and Matthew 19 that now marriage is only the ideal if you're called to it and when you're called to it. Marriage and singleness are trade-offs. There's advantages and terrible disadvantages to marriage, and there's advantages and terrible

disadvantages to singleness. They're both full of glories and they're both full of burdens, and they trade off. I remember talking when I was a younger minister, I had a friend who was in the ministry and he was single and I was married. And we used to argue with each other because we used to, when we got under the gun and when we were under tremendous pressure to produce and we had all these ministry opportunities, we used to envy the other because he would say, I am so tired. I am so stressed out. I wish I was married. When I'm overworked, I wish I was married because when I'm overworked, all I am is lonely and I have no comfort. And I say, yeah, when you're overworked and you're married, all you get is guilt. Because you know that you're shortchanging your marriage. You're shortchanging your family.

You see, it's true there's a consolation, but there's tremendous guilt as to it. We began to realize that there were trade-offs here. So, is it better? If you go to Ephesians 5, is Paul saying it's better to be married or single? If you go to 1 Corinthians 7, does Paul say it looks like it's better to be single than to be married? The fact is, if you put them together, what Paul is saying is, it depends on your calling. And a Christian is somebody who says, if I'm single today, and I don't want to be single, and I don't want to stay single, that's fine. I'm going to pray to God for a spouse. But meanwhile, today, I'm going to offer up my singleness to him. I'm going to ask him to help me with the burdens, and I'm going to ask him

to help me to capitalize on the opportunities. You know, E.B. White, who wrote that very famous essay some years ago on New York, he says this. He says, on any person who desires such queer prizes, New York will bestow the gift of loneliness and the gift of privacy. That gift can destroy an individual or it can fulfill him, depending a good deal on luck. Now, he's right except about the luck part. What he's trying to say is, you as a Christian, your singleness means that you can do things, you have a flexibility, you've got an ability to make changes, you've got certain things that you can do, ministries that you can do, and people you can serve that a married person cannot. It's also true that you could take this gift of privacy and singleness and strangle

yourself with it because as a single person you can do things, you can indulge in things, and get away with things that you could never get away with if you're married. There's an accountability, there's an authority that you're under when you're married. Much harder in some ways to lose self-control when you're married. Oh, it's possible, but you see there's a certain accountability. You see, it can either destroy you or it can fulfill you, depending a good deal on commitment, not luck. And by the way, some of you are saying, well, this is pretty interesting. Marriage is penultimate to the divine marriage. I want you to see that also applies to those of you who are divorced. A lot of people

who are out there who are divorced have been sitting there saying, you know, here I'm hearing eight, nine weeks of sermons on marriage and all it does is make me feel kind of bad. What has all this got to say to me? Here's what it's got to say to you. The Bible teaches, number one, that marriage is an amputation. It's not like taking a shirt off, it's like taking an arm off. All this stuff that we've been reading about the fact that two people become one flesh, you know, the head, the body, all this sort of thing, proves why you have felt as maimed as you have. If we ever get to the place where our society and our laws

try to treat divorce as if it's a light thing, as if it's a casual or routine thing, we will know that they're lies, because everybody who goes through it knows it's like an amputation. But the Bible also teaches, just like doctors know, that sometimes amputation is necessary to live. You know, nobody wants to take a leg off. Sometimes they take the leg off or lose everything. That's the reason the Bible allows for divorce and prescribes it, and here's why. You see, marriage is a high-risk, high-gain thing in the world of sin. When you get married, you're going to be either a lot better off than you were when you were single or a lot worse off,

but you won't be where you were. Because in marriage, you are so vulnerable that if a villain gets in there and starts to tear things up, you can be destroyed unless there's a divorce. And that's why God allows for divorce on two grounds, adultery and willful desertion that cannot be remedied. But then somebody says, but what if I was the villain? What if, looking back, I'm the one who blew it? Don't you forget that Jesus Christ is married to you. The real marriage is intact if you belong to him. You see, you're his bride, and he sees you through the rags,

and he says, I'm going to make you pure and spotless. I am devoted to you. I love you. David and Bathsheba, huh? Remember them? David has an affair with Bathsheba, gets Uriah killed so he can marry Bathsheba. Now, how do you like an unbiblical divorce? That's a pretty bad one. What does God do?

Does God say, okay, I'll forgive you, but your life is on plan B? No. He not only forgives David and Bathsheba from that incredibly unbiblical divorce, but he also brings them into a relationship with them so that the Messiah is descended out of their children. You know, David had a couple of other wives that God could have said, hey, why should I bring the Messiah out of this terrible relationship? God believes in grace. God believes in repentance. God believes in wiping the slate clean. God says,

you are my spouse, even if you have no other one. I will complete you. I will love you. I will give you the things that you need. I will meet the deficiencies, you see? But now lastly, we've said our relationship with Christ proves that marriage is penultimate. Secondly, it's our relationship with Christ as the bridegroom that shows us why the Bible teaches that sex belongs in marriage only. Unless you understand that you are married to Jesus, you will never understand why Christians, why the Bible has the sex ethic that it does. I want you to know I'm just mildly irked at the fact that I hear people say, I like the Redeemer,

even though they take a hard line on this chastity thing. Hey, you want to know something? What the Bible says is sex belongs in marriage only. Do you know that all three branches of Christianity have always taught that for centuries, Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant? Do you know that Judaism has taught that? Do you know that all three branches of Christianity have always taught that for centuries, Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestants? Do you know that Judaism has taught that? Do you know that Islam has taught that? Can you think of many things that all those religions have all agreed on?

If you are an inherent, if you are a believer in any one of those religions, and you don't believe that you have to keep sexual intercourse inside marriage, look it, I probably might not be able to convince you tonight, but I want you to know, don't you think of me or us as weird. You're the novelty. You're the blip. There's been complete consensus on this thing.

If you don't understand about the marriage supper of the Lamb, you will never understand why the Bible says keep sex inside marriage. You'll say, well, that's just a rigid thing. No, listen to this. Can you imagine going to Jesus and saying, Lord, I want you to complete me. I want intimacy with you.

I want you to love me. I want you inside me. I want you to come into my life and I want you to complete me. I want you to support me. I want you to help me. I want you to love me. I want you inside me. I want you to come into my life and I want you to complete me. I want you to support me. I want you to help me. I want you to lead me. I want intimacy with you. I want the beatific vision. I want your love in my life. But I do not want a covenant with you.

I don't want to get up publicly and be baptized. I don't want to be publicly identified with you. I don't want to make you the number one thing in my life. I don't want to forsake publicly and be baptized. I don't want to be publicly identified with you. I don't want to make you the number one thing in my life. I don't want to forsake all others and follow you alone. I want to be able to make my own decisions sometimes. I don't want to be that vulnerable or committed to you. I want your love, I want your intimacy, but I don't want a covenant. How would Jesus Christ react to that?

He would say, come on. And everybody here realizes how silly that is. But when you decide to say, I want sexual intimacy with you, but I don't want a covenant with you, you're doing the same thing. You want intimacy without commitment. Oh, somebody says, look, I don't sleep around. I only sleep with people that I'm committed to. No, you don't. Listen, physical nakedness and vulnerability has to go with spiritual and personal nakedness and vulnerability. We've said all along that the way a man fits into a woman physically

is supposed to be a picture of the way they complete each other personally. When you tell me I want to have, I'm committed to that person, but not enough to be married, what you mean is I want to still be able to make my own decisions. If I want to move here, if I want to go over here, if I want to change jobs, I want to do it on my own. I don't want to be accountable to somebody else. I don't want to have to work through consensus with somebody else. I don't want to be that vulnerable. So you want physical nakedness and you want intimacy, but you don't want personal nakedness or vulnerability, do you? Boy, I tell you something.

There's a huge difference between two people who are having sex and two people who are having sex in the context of a covenant to complete each other over the years. You see, if you're really completing each other, the completing comes through hard work, it comes through confrontation, it comes through a commitment where you get up and make a binding, permanent, exclusive covenant to say, you're mine, I'm yours forever. That gives you the right to come into me and to talk to me about my sins.

And not only that, I am no longer independent. I'm on the authority of the relationship. I can't decide where to go. I can't decide what to do unless I work it out with this person. I can't decide where to go. I can't decide what to do unless I work it out with this person. I'm vulnerable now. I'm committed now. Intimacy always goes with commitment. It goes that way with your commitment with God. Why would it be different in a commitment between a man and a woman?

Don't you see how dangerous this is? Because the Christian understanding of sex is not a dirty one. It's not like sex is kind of dirty, so let's keep it inside marriage. The Christian understanding of sex is so glorious, the Bible goes this far. We've been hinting at it all along. The greatest, most rapturous sex between a man and a woman is just a dim hint of the incredible joy of your marriage and union with Christ.

It's actually a foretaste of the great day in which we see him face to face, and we're in complete union and knowledge with him. And there's almost no way in the whole world that you're ever going to therefore understand the greatness of marriage unless you understand what it points to. It points all the way, all the way to the ceiling. It points all the way to God. And therefore you cannot conduct your relationship

between a man and a woman differently than you conduct your relationship between God and yourself. It just doesn't go any other way. Sexual completion and personal completion are supposed to set each other off. The reason sex is wonderful between two people who are committed to each other and working day and night to complete each other off. The reason sex is wonderful between two people who are committed to each other and working day and night to complete each other and to confront each other and to elect and repent with each other, let me tell you, sex in that condition is laughter and it's tears.

And the sexual completion enhances the personal completion process, and the personal completion process enhances the sexual completion process. You know it to be true. Remember the first time you had sex and you weren't married? You were totally uncovered. You were totally vulnerable. You were totally unified. And don't you remember how incongruous it was to get up and to walk away and realize that that unity did not flow out into the rest of your life, that that person could go off and make any decision he or she wanted to make without consulting with you, to be vulnerable, to be unified physically and not in any other way is a monstrosity. It's not natural. It's not the way it was supposed to be.

That great union with Christ that we're going to have on the last day, is that going to be fun? Sure, if you can use the word fun for it. Then don't you think it's earthly analogy? Sex should be fun? Well, of course. But it points to that, and you've got to follow the sign. You don't camp underneath the sign. You take the sign, you follow it to the place that it's telling you to go. Thank you for joining us today. If you were encouraged by today's podcast, please rate and review it so more people can discover this resource. And thanks again for listening.

This month's sermons were recorded in 1991. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel and Life podcast were preached from 1989 to 2017 while Dr. Keller was Senior Pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.