Original Intentions or What is Marriage?

One evening some years ago I accompanied my then Pastor to drop off a guy who had wandered over to our church from his home a few suburbs away in search of food. Before we got there, this guy shared that he had been living with his girlfriend for over 10 years and had 2 or 3 children with her. My pastor made the comment on the way back that as far as he was concerned, if a couple have lived together for 10 years, and especially if they’ve had children, the Church should treat them as a married couple.

What?! I thought. No way!  There has to be a definite vow taken - a publicly recognised beginning to the marriage. The Biblically acknowledged differences between a wife and a concubine indicates that there needs to be a formal agreement entered into.

But I couldn’t deny the truth that there are many couples who live together without being married, so, I thought, sex cannot be essential to making a relationship become a marriage. Continue Reading »

In lieu of a Christmas post, I have just cut and pasted my Christmas Communion message here.  It has done strange things with the formats, and I’ll get on to putting links in later.  At the moment we’ve got guests, so this’ll have to do…

The Feast.

As I was doing a bit of surfing on the internet in preparation for tonight, I came across a blog entry written by an atheist declaring that Christmas doesn’t belong to Christians, it belongs to atheists.  He uses a number of “interesting” arguments, and one of them is that Christmas reflects moral values that are against the Christian ethic.  One of those, he thinks, is feasting.  This is what he says:

Nothing in the Bible encourages feasting.  There is a verse that encourages drinking, but only to dull your suffering (Proverbs 31:6-7).  In fact, the Catholic Church made gluttony a “deadly sin”.  Christianity is definitely against “worldly” pleasures, and feasting is one of those.  So this element [of Christmas] goes against the spirit of Christianity.

Now, there are good arguments, and there are bad arguments.  Good arguments actually show that the person knows what they are talking about.  Bad arguments show the person hasn’t got a clue.  This is a bad argument.

Why?  Because the Bible has God encouraging feasting so much He makes it mandatory - you had to feast according to the Law God gave His people, seven times a year!  And on top of that there were the voluntary feasts!  This is not a God who doesn’t like to party. Continue Reading »

Thanks to Glenn, who knows I talk alot but often don’t get around to doing it, for creating a new design for the blog here.

Thanks, mate.  This is still true.

The recent Mark Driscoll controversy began with a post that used the revelations about Ted Haggard’s tragic sins to give advice on pastors avoiding sexual sin. Despite his clarifications here and here, a protest was called for by another confessing Christian group in his city. Mark managed to stir the pot with another post on the Episcopalian Church voting a female as their presiding bishop, until recognising what was going on and managed to respond in what I thought was a very admirable way, averting the protest.

Reading the over-the-top descriptions of Marks view of women(exagerrated and interpreted in ways that completely misconstrue his actual position) I was shaking my head at their portrayal not only of his beliefs, but his person. I have listened to and read him quite a bit and I could not believe the reaction to his views on women and how he communicated them - until I remembered my own experience of disagreeing with something presented at Mars Hill and found myself wanting to write an angry email to let Mark know about it!

It was then that I realised how different we sound to those who disagree. For instance, I agree with most of Mars Hill’s theology regarding men and women and I enjoy the jokes and mocking Mark Driscoll employs in his preaching about that and viritually every other topic. But when I disagree, the jokes and mocking become aggravating and blind me to much of what he is saying. So, while I deplore the gross misrepresentation of Mark and his views, I can see how it happened - especially on a topic as volitile as gender.

I’ve used Mark Driscoll as an example, but there are other examples all over the place - the internet itself is full of this. The most current example I have found is in the comment section of Adrian Warnock’s serialised interview with Wayne Grudem (involving, yes, the issue of women again!). While I find Wayne Grudem quite irenic (as, incidentally, is Wayne Leman, a commenter who disagrees with some of Grudem’s work - perhaps being irenic is a “Wayne” thing) there are a flurry of comments from a couple of people incensed at Dr. Grudem’s views who write long diatribes often short on grace. I’m sure there are people who agree with their position who read these particular comments and say, “There’s nothing offensive there”, but for someone who agrees with Dr. Grudem in the main (though is interested in reading other opinions) it’s got to the point that I barely read the comments made by these people and skip to those made by those I know to be gracious or who I have not read before.

It makes me wonder how I sound to those who disagree with me! Just because people who agree with me tell me I’m not being offensive, that does not mean I am not being offensive. There will always be people who react badly to beliefs we hold, but let’s make sure that it is our beliefs and not our presentation that people react to.

And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will. 2 Timothy 2:24-26.

Divorce, but no remarriage…type 2.

2. No marriage after divorce for any reason except adultery and abandonment.

This is a position I have far more sympathy for. Those who hold to this view can only see remarriage being an option for those reasons explicitly stated - adultery and abandonment by a non-Christian. All other divorce among Christians can result only in remaining single (unless your ex-spouse dies) or reconciling with your spouse (1 Corinthians 7:10-11).

The reason I have a lot of sympathy for this view is because those who take that position desire to hold tightly to what the Bible says - a desire I share - and to permit only what the Bible explicitly permits - a desire I also share, but find difficult to adhere to in situations that are not explicitly discussed in the Bible. Continue Reading »

Went out to a restaraunt tonight with our Home Group and another one from our Church.  It was great.

I must confess I felt a little shame because, even though I had enough prior warning, I didn’t tell people in my group the details (and some of them that it was even happening) until Sunday…so it was a little rushed on my part.  But my wonderful group turned up and, even though I didn’t actually talk to most of them(!), I was so happy all that made it were there.

Thanks guys.  You mean a lot to me.  (Of course, hardly any of them read this blog, so Glenn, you can take that as me talking to you, even though it’s meant for everyone).

Divorce, but not remarriage.

There are going to be people who read what I have written in my previous post on divorce and who will agree up to a point. “Yes,” they will say, “it may be necessary at times for people in abusive relationships to divorce their spouse, but the Bible forbids them to remarry.” There are two groups who would say this: 1) those who believe a Christian who divorces for any reason should never remarry and 2) those who believe that only those who divorce for adultery or abandonment by a non-Christian can remarry ie. divorce for any other reason between Christians does not legitmate remarriage (based on 1 Corinthians 7:10-11).  I’ll deal with the first position in this post, and the second in the next.

1) No remarriage after divorce for any reason.

I think I should clarify that it was this position that made me wonder if I had sinned in marrying Paula. It’s a common thing for people to assume that a woman twice-divorced has in some way put themselves in a position where they can never be righteously married again (I assumed that at first). However, for those most who hold the “traditional position” of divorce and remarriage for adultery and abandonment only (and other related understandings), my marriage to Paula is no problem. It is a problem only to those who hold the belief that Christians cannot remarry while their original spouse is alive, no matter what. Continue Reading »