In this discussion of Chapter 25 of the Second London Baptist Confession, Scott Brown delves into the topic of marriage. If the devil can attack the foundation of marriage, he can affect the marriages of generations to come.

Accordingly, marriage is a critically important matter to study. Understanding what the Bible has to say about this important subject is beneficial for everyone today.

Okay, chapter 25 of marriage. Of marriage. Well, I want to give you an outline of this chapter first. Each paragraph has its own focus. First of all, the first paragraph is a definition of marriage.

The second paragraph explains the purposes of marriage. The third paragraph talks about marriage to people outside the family and then fourthly marriage to people inside the family. So there are all these distinctions that are made. Now when we think about marriage we just have to recognize how the devil has always waged war against marriage. It started day one in the garden with Adam and Eve when the devil desired to separate husband and wife to destroy the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace that God has designed for marriage.

And what we learn from the devil is that he always attacks foundations. And this confession here is focused on foundations of marriage. I read just today that the US Census Bureau estimates that there are 1, 300 step-families forming every day in America. I don't know how many divorces are taking place, but 1, 300 step-families a day are being formed in America. So there's trouble everywhere in the whole subject of marriage.

Now if we were writing this confession today, we would probably write more, because there are such significant and different attacks against marriage. And we understand by looking at this confession that confessions are written in a historical framework to speak to the times. One of the interesting things about this chapter in the confession is that it actually leaves out a number of really critical elements of what the Bible says about marriage. For example, divorce is never mentioned here. You would think in a confession about marriage that somehow the dissolution of marriage would be mentioned, but it doesn't mention it at all.

One of the most critical issues of our day centers around the question of roles in marriage, roles and responsibilities, manhood and womanhood, husbands and wives. But roles aren't really developed explicitly in this chapter. The whole matter of a covenant is kind of implied, but The fact that marriage is a covenant is so significant, and yet it doesn't seem to be developed here in the Confession. The Confession doesn't address some of the raging issues in our day like sodomy or polygamy, although these two are implied, I believe, in the first paragraph, but it's also surprising that the sexual nature of marriage and the privileges and responsibilities are not even addressed in this. So one of the striking things about this chapter is what's not there because there's a lot about marriage That could be said that isn't said in this confession, so let's begin here with the definition of marriage And marriage is to be between one man and one woman.

Now, this single sentence is regarded as hate speech today. It is such a massive contradiction to the whole spirit of the age. Not a man and a man, or a woman and a woman, but a man and a woman. That's a pretty revolutionary, culturally contradictory statement right out of the gate. I mean, you have to think clearly about this.

You can be sued or fined if you're providing services in the wedding industry by refusing to do a sodomite wedding. Did you know that? If you operate a charity that provides adoption services and you refuse to provide a sodomite couple, your tax exemption is most likely going to get revoked. If you are a physician or attorney, you can lose your license by refusing to serve sodomites. School children are told that holding this view is like supporting the American form of slavery.

So this idea that marriage is to be between one man and one woman is a gigantic cultural contradiction in our times. While on the contrary, we see what the Bible says. Genesis 2.24. Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh." The two shall become one. The man and the woman shall become one.

Again, it's Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve. It's a man and a woman. Malachi 2 15 says, but did he not make them one having a remnant of the Spirit? And why one? He seeks a godly offspring.

Therefore take heed to your spirit and let none deal treacherously with the wife of his youth." Genesis is quoted in this matter in the New Testament in Matthew 19 verses 5 and 6. And he said, for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh so then they are no longer two but one therefore what God has joined together let not man separate And so this principle of marriage that it is between one man and one woman is critical. And then the next statement is, neither is it lawful for any man to have more than one wife. So this condemns at least two things. One is experiencing a tremendous resurgence, and that is polygamy.

You think of polygamy as being relegated to ancient societies. Polygamy is really, really on the rise in America today. It was about probably five or six years ago Tom Hanks production company put on a sitcom called Big Love. It was about a Mormon polygamist and his wives and all the strange, you know, situations. They tried to make it look just so sweet.

Not only does it condemn polygamy, but it also condemns what you could call serial monogamy, where a man marries one woman after another and he experiences kind of a marital nomadism where it's legitimate just to marry one divorce, marry one divorce and just continue on until finally you've run out of money and run out of friends and then there you are at the end of your life with nothing and that's exactly what happens with serial monogamy. And then the next phrase, nor for any woman to have more than one husband at the same time. Now, this whole question of polygamy, you know, is raised here. In the Old Testament we observe a number of the patriarchs who had many wives. Let's just drive a stake in the ground about that.

We find the patriarchs not doing everything right, and they do things that contradict the commands of God. And they were sinners. They knew that the two shall become one. They knew that it was between one man and one woman. And to pretend somehow that this is a legitimate pattern really runs so cross grain with what's established didactically in Holy Scripture about marriage, that marriage is one man and one woman.

They departed from the path on a number of occasions, and one of the most common ways that men and women depart from the path is in matters of marriage, because it's so fundamental, it's so critical for everything in life. And so the devil is attacking marriage like few other things because he attacks foundations. If he can attack at that foundation, he affects all the generations after it, unless somehow the Spirit of God intervenes and breaks the cycle. In order to destroy one marriage, you've actually destroyed thousands of people down the line. So the devil is very efficient.

He's very time efficient in that sense by focusing on the things that have enormous leverage. That's a principle that we should all understand. Focus on the 20 percent of things that give you 80 percent of your leverage and that's exactly what marriage is. You destroy marriage, maybe you spend 20% of your effort, but you get 80% results out of it. So I believe it's a refutation of polygamy.

At the same time, God regulated polygamy. If you look at the polygamy regulations in Scripture, they seem really to be protective of the woman, to make sure that a woman is not left all by herself. For example, the law provides for the man who does not love his first wife. He's not able to withdraw his support from her. There are occasions, for example, in Ezra chapter 10, verses 1 through 5, where wives were put away.

Israel was commanded to put away their pagan wives. The issue there, though, in Ezra, it was a matter of syncretism. It was a time of devastating syncretism and so that's why we read in Ezra 10 verse 3, Now therefore let us make a covenant with our God to put all these wives and those who have borne to them according to the advice of my master and of those who tremble at the commandment of our God. Let it be done according to the law. Arise, for this matter is your responsibility." So this first part of the confession is focused in on the fundamental principle of oneness and this is really the premier and supreme principle of marriage.

Oneness is the central issue of marriage And if you think about the way that the devil is attacking your marriage, typically you can trace it back to this issue of oneness. The devil desires to destroy it. And so that means that as you're raising your children, you need to constantly teach them how to maintain oneness, how to make peace, how to be a blessing to one another so that the oneness of marriage can somehow be preserved in their lives later on. There's so many things that break up oneness in marriage. Falling victim to this fast-paced culture that we live in brings so many opportunities to couples that really require careful discernment or else that oneness will be broken up.

Groping for personal Satisfaction is often the destroyer of oneness. Pornography, neglecting time together. Even consider things like technology that do damage on this whole matter of oneness in marriage. Allowing technology to, by degrees, make you single again by getting absorbed in a world that is not your world, is so damaging. Technology, with its improper use, can destroy your marriage.

And it can make you single again as you pursue your own intensely personal, ever-expanding world while your spouse is off pursuing her ever-expanding, intensely personal world as well. So there are tremendous dangers here. But the first paragraph in this confession just speaks of the issue of one man and one woman. And the biblical support for this, that the framers of the confession use, are the texts that deal with oneness in marriage. The two shall become one flesh.

So let's move to paragraph two on the purpose of marriage. And what we learn here is that marriage was ordained. And marriage was ordained for certain things, and there are three things that the confession claims that marriage is ordained for. And so we're first confronted with this idea that marriage has a design, that there is a way that it ought to be engaged. Of course, that design is in heaven, and there is a design.

In other words, you don't just get married and go make it happen together, sort of a whatever approach to marriage. No, marriage is ordained for particular purposes. There are roles and responsibilities. There are things that husbands and wives need to do in order to fulfill the ordained pattern that God has established in marriage. And the first thing that marriage is ordained for, according to the confession, is that it's ordained for the mutual help of husband and wife.

So marriage is a two-way street. It's the mutual help of the husband and the wife. It's not just for the wife, and it's not just for the husband. So this whole matter of mutuality helps us to understand what God ordained marriage for. He ordained it for mutual help.

A man needs help. A woman also needs help. And so there's this mutual need that is fulfilled as the two become one flesh. Well of course, you know, what was the first thing that God said was not good in Scripture? In Genesis 2 18, It's not good that man should be alone.

There's a requirement of a mutual help. So he says, I will make him a helper comparable to him. And so the Lord has brought marriage into being for the mutual help of the husband and wife. Now it addresses a couple of things that are raging in our culture. First of all, it really does rage against feminism.

I remember when I was in college, and I would be walking up to the library door, and there'd be hundreds of students headed toward that door. And this was back in the early 1970s, when feminism was just really getting rolling here in America. Even at that time, if you as a man tried to hold a door open for a woman, you would get a snarl, you'd get a smirk. Every once in a while, you'd get a thank you, but almost never. Because I am woman, Hear me roar.

I am independent. I don't need men. Husbands are bad. Men are bad. And this item in the confession, it addresses the whole matter of the feminist design to eliminate men from life, when in fact Christianity says, no, a woman does need a man.

And that's what this confession is claiming. It also addresses what some might call hyper patriarchalism, where the wife is treated like a slave rather than a companion and a helpmeet. So you have this idea that many men have that their wives and their children are they just exist to serve them. I'm just going to call them couch potato patriarchs. And there they are.

He's lounging around and he just wants everyone to serve him. And he does nothing at all. He is there to be served. This is a danger of patriarchalism and it's an unbiblical monster that's created by misunderstanding what marriage is all about. The egalitarians would take the term mutual and try to prove that there's no headship in marriage, which they've been trying to prove for many, many years, that there's this idea of mutual submission in the sense that there is no head in the relationship.

Of course, husbands and wives submit to one another all the time, but that doesn't erase the fact of headship in a marriage. And a Galatarian might want to take this term mutual and turn it into something that it was never meant to do, in terms of erasing headship. Christ came as a bondservant. He gave his life for the church. He sacrificed for the church.

What is biblical patriarchy? Here it is in a nutshell. Are you ready for it? This is biblical patriarchy. If you want to have what I believe is the most critical and particularly indispensable definition of patriarchy, here it is.

It's the headship of the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at the way that Christ has treated his church. That's patriarchy. You can identify how the Lord Jesus Christ treats his bride, and there you have patriarchy. It gets no better than that.

It gets no clearer than that. If you want to understand how headship works, look at Jesus Christ. Look at the way Jesus Christ treats his bride And you'll have for yourself a beautiful definition of patriarchy. Here's a challenge for you unmarried young men. Do a study of Jesus Christ and ask the question, going through all the gospels, ask this question, What kind of headship does Jesus Christ provide for his church?

And there you will have the right definition of patriarchy. So here God makes us dependent, he creates us with a lack, with a blank spot that needs to be filled with help, this mutual help of a husband and wife. Now, you know, the Roman Catholic Church said that it was godly not to get married, and they tried to create a whole social environment where people didn't get married. Well, we might stagger at what's going on in our own culture, where people are getting married later and later and later. And in places like Sweden, people don't even get married anymore.

You have this environment of perpetual singleness. The legendary boy man who's 28, 29 years old, and he's still acting like a boy because that's exactly what he is. He hasn't grown up because he's just been single. He's not had the sanctifying effect of having a wife to knock off some of those hard edges that need to be knocked off. Do you have this condition in America today where people are just delaying marriage in perpetuity for many?

Well, at the time of the Reformation, 25% of the population of Europe had taken vows of celibacy. Can you imagine that? 25% of the people of the marriage age people were single and had taken a celibate vow. It's very much like our time, where marriage is despised, or something else is exalted. And the Roman Catholic Church said it's more godly not to be married, that singleness was a higher state.

So the first purpose of marriage, this first ordained function of marriage, is for the mutual help of husband and wife. And we could talk at length about how this mutuality works out in marriage, but this mutuality is a critical component that the Puritans believed should characterize marriage. And then the second purpose for which marriage is ordained is that it was ordained for the increase of mankind with a legitimate issue. So the second purpose is to have children to be to be fruitful and multiply to take Dominion over all the earth and this just brings us back to Genesis 128 where we read then God blessed them and God said to them be fruitful and multiply fill the earth and subdue it have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth. What a blessing, what an exciting thing it is, honestly, to get married and say, we are going to take dominion, we are going to go do stuff together as a husband and wife.

What a joy that is to mingle your gifts and your energies together and go out and do stuff together and be before God, praying about how God might use you. I hope you're doing that in your mind, even right now, thinking about what you might do. What dominion might you take with that woman or that man that God has given you? And how can you wives stimulate your husbands? And husbands, how can you help your wives even be more productive and more useful to the Lord Jesus Christ in the days that God gives them in the earth?

Nobody knows how long they'll live. So, husbands and wives ought to go after it to take dominion. And that's part of this purpose. For the increase of mankind, and of course the authors are quoting things like Genesis 1-28, they're quoting Psalm 127 verses 3 through 5, Behold children are a heritage from the Lord. The fruit of the womb is a reward, like arrows in the hand of a warrior.

So are the children of one's youth. Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them. They shall not be ashamed, but shall speak with their enemies at the gates." One of the great functions of having children is to teach them to speak with their enemies at the gates, to declare the glory of God in their generation, to uphold sound doctrine, to declare the supremacy and the beauty of Jesus Christ, and that salvation is of the Lord. This is a function of marriage for the increase of mankind with a legitimate issue. In other words, not just to simply have children, but for legitimate purposes, like what the scripture says.

The authors of the Confession cite Psalm 128 verses 3 and 4. Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine in the very heart of your house. Your children like olive plants all around your table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord. So the second function of marriage that God has ordained is for the increase of mankind with a legitimate issue.

Now you who are raising children right now are involved in this whole thing of being involved in a legitimate issue. In other words, spending your time in formative years to forge a people for God's own possession And to bring them up in the training and the admonition of the Lord to deprive them of evil to set nothing evil before Their eyes, but at the same time to bring the every beautiful thing of God before them and have them walk with you as you Teach them the way in which they should go as you bring them up in the training and the admonition of the Lord. You're involved in this whole matter of making a legitimate issue of it. So there are various offshoot issues that are really critical in our day, when you consider this function of marriage for the increase of mankind and legitimate issue, think of the economic collapse that's taking place all over the world because of low birth rates. To defy this is devastating to a nation.

If we had not allowed the abortion industry and the abortifacient industry to rage so freely in this world, we would have a completely different economy today. We would have well, well over a hundred million more people in this nation. And guess what they would be doing? They would be working, they would be eating, they would be buying, and the economy would be in a completely different position today than it is now. The industrialized nations of the world are languishing as a result of this.

My view is that while you see failing economies in Europe, particularly in other places, the dark underbelly of it goes right back to the defiance of this principle of marriage. Not only have they thrown off marriage, but at the same time have thrown off having children. So there is no one there even to take care of an aging population. The problems are just beginning here in America, where everybody's going to have gray hair, and they're not going to be able to do anything, and there's not going to be anybody around to take care of them, because they did practice serial monogamy, and they did offend one family after another, and they will die alone in the death camps of these old folks' homes. So there are devastating things that result from rejecting this principle that's so clearly stated in this confession that marriage is ordained for the increase of mankind with a legitimate issue.

And then the third purpose is for the preventing of uncleanness. So this has to do with sexual intimacy and the way that God uses marriage and sexual union in marriage to restrain evil in men and women as the sexual relationship is focused narrowly on one another. This was a problem in the church in Corinth. In 1 Corinthians 7 verse 2 we read, nevertheless, because of sexual immorality, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband. So the Apostle Paul says, because of sexual immorality, let them get married.

So it's important to be married because of sexual immorality. And in the ninth verse of that same chapter, in 1 Corinthians 7, he continues, But if they cannot exercise self-control, let them marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion. So the preventing of uncleanness is another function of marriage, although uncleanness doesn't disappear with marriage. It continues to be a struggle. It continues to be something that needs to be mortified in marriage.

It doesn't just go away, but it definitely is constrained by it and God has given marriage as a constraint of the things that will finally destroy a marriage and really would eventually destroy society. So the Confession lists these various functions of marriage, these three things, but it doesn't necessarily prioritize them. Here's some interesting historical coordinates about this. The authors of the confession speak of these three things, for the mutual help of husband and wife, for the increase of mankind, and for the preventing of uncleanness. And you know, how do you rank in importance the various functions of marriage?

Well, the Roman Catholic Church, during the time of the Reformation, they valued procreation over the companionship aspect of marriage. The Roman Catholics proposed a threefold order of importance. First was procreation, second was preservation from immorality, and third was companionship. However, the reformers and the Puritans after them, they really reversed that sequence of importance and they saw it differently that marriage was first for companionship, second for preservation from immorality, and third for procreation. And this radical change of emphasis unleashed in society a whole new place for love in relationship.

People say that the Puritans were stiff and Puritanical. We even have a word that describes this terrible condition of being so uptight. Actually, it's not true. The Puritans were saying things that were very disturbing to people because they were advocating sexual activity in marriage and they were advocating the joy and the emotional love aspects in marriage that were not being emphasized. They really brought in a new age of love and romance and joy and sexual intimacy in marriage.

That was really the legacy of the Puritan era. This whole idea of preventing of uncleanness while such a critical aspect of marriage in this confession really began to take on a life of its own as other Puritan writers began to speak about marriage and just the utter joy that marriage would afford. Now, then in paragraph three, we find the answer to the question, who can marry outside of the family? And then in the next paragraph, who can marry inside the family? And what the Confession says is that it is lawful for all sorts of people to marry who are able with judgment to give their consent.

And so all sorts of people means that marriage is for all mankind, it's not just for Christians. God created marriage for the human family and not just for Christianity. I don't know if you've ever run into people who think, well, they're not Christians, they shouldn't be married. Well, that's actually contrary to the confession and really contrary to the way that God has established the world. Marriage does constrain evil.

It does provide something of the glory of God in a culture. And so all sorts of people may marry and who are able with judgment to give their consent. Now, this means that interracial marriages are lawful. The Bible makes it very clear that mankind is of one blood. There really are only two races.

They're the sons of the devil, and they're the sons of God. Those are the only two races that really exist in the world today. The rest are artificial in nature. But this includes people who are able to enter into a covenant by giving their consent. That's really the whole idea behind who are able with judgment to give their consent.

There are some who are unable with judgment to make a proper covenant. They might have sexual abilities and things like that, but they're not able with judgment to give their consent. And so these are matters of discernment that families have to engage in if there's a child that's growing older and is in the age of marriage but is lacking particular faculties in order to have a biblically ordered marriage. You would have to ask yourself, what are the purposes of marriage? What are the commands surrounding marriage?

What are the functions of marriage? And then ask yourself, can this child be involved in these functions of marriage, not just the physical or sexual function. It's not enough to just say this person is physically mature. And so the language here indicates that there has to be some kind of discernment here. There are some people, because of particular frailties, that they should not be married.

And so there's a difference between liberty and wisdom in a matter like that. And then this next statement, yet it is the duty of Christians to marry in the Lord and therefore such as profess the true religion should not marry with infidels or idolaters, neither should, such as are godly, be unequally yoked by marrying with such as are wicked in their life, or maintain damnable heresy." This is the whole matter of marrying in the Lord as a requirement of marriage. Of course, the Apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthians 6, 14, Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers for what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness and What communion has light with darkness so? Marrying in the Lord is a critical factor in the formation of Christian marriage. And of course, this is defining who can marry outside the family.

The next paragraph is who can marry inside the family. There are a number of principles here that are brought up. One is that marriage is about fitness and compatibility. The whole concept of equal yoking brings up the matter of fitness and compatibility. Fitness meaning, is there a kind of match where their true is equal yoking together.

Does this couple seem to fit together? Does it make sense? Are there natural compatibilities involved in this? It also implies one of the most critical issues of marriage and that is marriage is about labor. Yoking is about labor and God calls husbands and wives to labor together.

Of course it's the labor of love so labor nonetheless. What do husbands and wives do together? They labor together. They have children. They live in a home.

They have projects. They live in a community. They're part of a church. All of these things have to do with labor. Everything in the life of a husband and wife includes some kind of labor.

And so when we think about marriage, we have to think about labor together. In our modern culture, this whole idea is completely ignored. Romance is everything. Labor is nothing. And we have to be very careful to train up our children to understand what kind of thinking they should have when they move toward marriage.

Are they thinking about who can they labor with? The most important thing is not who do I have romantic feelings for, who do I think is really good looking, but who could I labor with? Who would be a good match for taking on this dominion mandate that God has brought us to? So marriage is about labor. And then it is also about a profession.

And therefore, such as profess true religion. So Marriage is about a profession of faith. It's meant for the purpose of spreading the gospel, and therefore, such as profess true religion. So marriage is designed to be a picture of the gospel, that Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might present her to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish. That's the purpose of a marriage and so marriage is primarily about a profession of faith, and that means that everything that a husband and wife do together in all of their conversations in their public life centers around this matter of being a profession of faith.

And so the authors of the Confessions say that, and therefore such as profess the true religion. The true religion. This means that husbands and wives need to be unified in sound doctrine, because they're communicating the true religion. The marriage relationship is also a doctrinal endeavor as well, as husbands and wives grow together to understand the scriptures together, because this is about the profession of true religion, not their religion, but true religion. So husbands and wives need to be growing together in the Word of God.

They need to be studying it together. They need to be conversing about it, they need to be learning how to apply it better, they need to be reading scripture together. The husband and wife relationship is a doctrinally oriented kind of relationship. Well, it's governed by sound doctrine, and it's designed to profess true religion. And it's a critical issue that couples need to key in on.

It's interesting when you read the New Testament, you find that the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 14, 34, says if a wife has a question, let her ask her husband at home. Well, what's that all about? She can't ask an elder? She can't ask one of the other guys in the church? How come?

That is so tight sounding, isn't it? Well, I mean, why would you think something like that would be said? Here's one effect of that, and that is that it gets a husband and a wife talking. Instead of the wife going to every other doctrinal head in the church, she's turning to her head, her husband. And they're growing together.

Now quite likely she's going to ask her husband that question and he's going to have to go figure out what the right answer is because he's dumb enough not to know the answer. He also needs to grow. He needs to increase in the knowledge of God and of true religion so that he begins to sharpen his own understanding of the will of God. So on the one hand it sharpens the husband, on the other hand it unifies the husband and wife. God prioritizes the doctrinal unity of a husband and wife over that wife's doctrinal unity, even with an elder in a church.

It's critical that we understand this very important principle that's brought up here, that this is about a profession of the true religion. Again, the Puritans, they're not throwing any words away here, and every aspect of it is critical. And then it is also about breaking the bondage of infidelity and idolatry. They should not marry with infidels or idolaters, neither should such as are godly. So marriage is about breaking the bondage of infidelity and idolatry.

Marriage is about coming out of the world to set up a new kingdom, the kingdom of Jesus Christ. And again, this is just another one of the purposes of marriage. And so how marriages are formed, the principles that undergird the way that marriages are formed are really, really important. You know, The purpose of marriage is to display the glory of God by using every part of marriage to display the glory of the Gospel. Now there are many reasons that people marry.

Some people marry for beauty. Many men and women are suffering from this today because they married for beauty. They married because it was about image for them. They wanted to marry someone with a certain look and now they're suffering for because they defied some of God's principles regarding marriage. Some marry for desperation.

They just think, no one is ever going to marry me, I'll just take whatever comes around, both men and women. Or there's marrying for sexual gratification because there was just enough lust there to lure the two into marriage bonds. But here, the Confession identifies this critical issue that you should not marry with infidels or idolatry, neither should such as are godly. Which has to do that one of the functions of marriage is breaking the bonds of idolatry and disobedience in life and coming into a marital bond with someone who will equally yoke with you for the purposes of the gospel. And then the fourth paragraph, who can marry inside the family?

Now this is a really interesting section. This first statement, marriage ought not to be within the degrees of consanguineity or affinity forbidden in the word. Nor can such incestuous marriages ever be made lawful by any law of man or consent of parties, so as those persons may live together as man and wife." What does that mean? Well, we're going to go into the scriptures to detail this in just a moment. But here's the bottom line.

Inside the family, you can't marry anybody closer than your first cousin. That's basically what the passages deal with this say. Moses communicates this didactic instruction in Leviticus 18, verses 6 through 18. Now I'm just going to run through this passage so you can see how it's structured. Next of kin is defined, first of all, according to parents, none of you shall approach anyone who is near of kin to him to uncover his nakedness, I am the Lord.

The nakedness of your father or the nakedness of your mother you shall not uncover. She is your mother, you shall not uncover her nakedness. So again, we're talking about inside the family. And then stepmothers and stepfathers, beginning in verse 8, the nakedness of your father's wife you shall not uncover. It is your father's nakedness.

And so this covers stepmothers and stepfathers. And then grandchildren is addressed in verse 10. And then sisters are addressed in verse 11, and aunts and uncles are addressed in verses 12 through 14, and then daughters-in-law are addressed in the following verses, 15 to 18. So now, these laws may seem strange to our ears, they may seem antiquated, but if we think back through the Bible, we can find how these things have been actually confronted. Think of John the Baptist.

He was beheaded for upholding this law in his time. In Mark chapter 6 verse 18 we read, Because John had said to Herod, It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife. So upholding this doctrine can be very costly. John the Baptist upheld the doctrine. In his own community, he was thrown into prison, and he was finally beheaded in that prison that was known for its brutality.

We learn from John the Baptist and from this text that the law does apply to the state. The morality of the Bible should be legislated. Marriage laws should reflect these laws here. The prophets had to deal with this as well. Amos chapter 2 verse 7, We read, they pant after the dust of the earth, which is on the head of the poor.

And they pervert the way of the humble. And a man and his father go into the same girl to defile my holy name. Here's a chart that gives you, out of Leviticus 20, some of the unlawful marriages and the punishments. For example, in verse 7 in Leviticus 20, there's a mother and a son. The death penalty is given for that.

In verse 8, a stepmother and a son, the death penalty. In verse 9, a brother and a sister and a brother and a maternal half-sister, they are cut off from the children of Israel. Verse 10, a father and a granddaughter, they're burned. In verse 11, a brother and a paternal half-sister, they're cut off. Verse 12, a nephew and an aunt, there's barrenness.

Same thing in verse 13, a nephew and an aunt, barrenness. Same thing again in verse 14, a nephew and an aunt. A wife of the father's brother is given barrenness as a punishment. In verse 15, a father and a daughter-in-law is given death. And interestingly enough, if you go to verse 18, a husband and a sister-in-law, there's no punishments that are identified there.

So this passage of scripture tries to define who can and who cannot be married inside of a family circle and of course this is God's wisdom for us. And then let's talk about some applications here. I just want to end with a number of applications from the things that we've read. First of all, in this section we've learned what are really the foundational issues of marriage. All the issues of marriage are not spoken of, but some of absolutely the most critical that are incredibly, incredibly important and applicable today.

And first is the whole purpose of marriage. The whole purpose of marriage is for the glory of God. And if you want to somehow apply this confession, Make your marriage for the glory of God. Turn it to the biblical purposes that are identified here. And if you're not married yet, prepare yourself for a marriage like this.

Be the kind of person who is living for the glory of God now. That is your one and holy passion, to live for God's glory. And as you pray about your future husband or wife, consider the ways that you might glorify Him. The purpose of your marriage is not that you just find somebody and settle down and live happily ever after. No.

It's that you find someone and you labor happily ever after for the rest of your life for the glory of God. That's really the purpose of marriage. You really need to understand that on the front end. Many marriages suffer down the line because they didn't understand fundamental things on the front end. And so it's important that if you're not married yet that you really prepare yourself for a marriage for the glory of God.

Here's another one. It's important that we raise the voice of biblical morality in our day. We should continue to raise our voices just like John the Baptist did in his culture to preserve the moral categories. We should be raising our voices regarding sodomy, polygamy, and serial monogamy and the various other perversions of marriage. And it's right for us to do that.

It's just as right for us to do that as it was for John the Baptist to do it. And it is true that there are significant consequences, and you could lose all of your hair over it if the Lord would will. And then I think we should just recognize the dangers of sexual sin in marriage. The confession deals with one man and one woman and the focusing of that man and woman together. Elders need to be asking questions of their men, of how they're doing with pornography, or of their interests in other women.

Has someone shown up on the scene that has sort of piqued their interest? These things are massively devastating. When we should probe, we should poke, we should make our brothers bleed over this. Sometimes they don't tell us the truth the first time, and we need to keep poking. And we need to just understand that's one way that you protect the flock.

You know, elders protect the flock by being bold enough to ask really hard questions and not being so embarrassed and retiring about it and then watch their brothers fall off the cliff because it can happen and it will happen to people in your church And so it's important that we take those things very seriously. And then I think it's so important for us to raise a new generation that understands the purpose of marriage. I was so delighted to complete our conference, Gospel-Centered Marriages for a Glorious Church, we spent an enormous amount of time trying to define, really, for the rising generation, and for parents to train the rising generation about these matters. That was the whole purpose of the conference, really, is to try to define the issues that were really critical in our day for really the preparing of a generation to bring glory to God through their marriages. There are safety precautions that men need to take in their marriages.

When they ignore them, they ignore them to their own peril. Men should never be along with women that are not their wives. Never. Not in a car. They should always be.

If they're going to be with a woman that's not their wife, they should be in public. Absolutely. If you want to break that rule, you say that's a little bit tight, that's a little bit legalistic. I'll just give you a list of ten people who have fallen and you're next. That's my counsel to you.

The same thing, you know, with women. We have to be very careful how we govern our relationships in that sense. The damage is absolutely enormous. It's astounding. And we can't play games with this matter of marriage and sexual vulnerability in marriage.

Well, what about your marriage? This confession is dealing with your marriage and my marriage here at this moment. Here are a couple of realities. Churches are often weak because marriages are weak. Some of you are in weak churches and you can trace it right back to weak marriages.

If it's true, and it is true, that marriage is a picture of the gospel. It's a picture of Christ's love for the church. If you have a weak marriage, you have a weak church by definition. And if we ever hope to see our churches be mighty in the land, then we have to learn how to be married. We really do.

And then another matter that I'm sure this is clear to everyone but in this particularly for you men. Men are weaker employees when they have weak marriages. I've had companies before, and I've had many, many employees. Absolutely, men with weak marriages are worse employees, absolutely. And they make the company more vulnerable they cause a lot more problems and they have issues going on that can be really damaging to your company and men with weak marriages make way way worse employees and I'm frankly I'm scared of men with weak marriages when it comes to laboring with them, because I've seen the results of it.

It's just such a critical, critical issue. I know that if a man has a good marriage, he'll be more long-term effective. He'll be happier. He'll be more focused on the short term and the long term. He'll be less discouraged.

He'll have a supportive wife. He's got to typically it's because he has a wife at home that's laying a strong foundation. And she's loving him, and she is submitting to him, and he is nourishing and cherishing her and that builds for a strong foundation both of his work life of his family life and his church life and of the society in general that's what marriage does This foundation that we're talking about has so much weight resting upon it. And the devil wants to chip away at that foundation because he knows that when he does, a man's work life collapses, a man's church life collapses, a man's family collapses, and eventually the whole society comes down. And so here we have of marriage in this confession.

I'm glad they added this one into the confession to remind us of how important the foundation is. Would you pray with me? Lord, we thank you for showing us the fruits of the wisdom of men who long ago wrote about these things that are still so practical today. We thank you for them. For our spiritual fathers, we bless them, we pray that we would fulfill all their wisdom.

For more messages articles and videos on the subject of conforming the church and the family to the Word of God and for more information about the National Center for family integrated churches where you can search our online network to find family integrated churches in your area log on to our website ncfic.org.