One of the areas where God’s people most ignore biblical teaching is marriage, and this takes many forms. Any experienced pastor can tell you that many of the counsels you should give are related to the problems of marriage: infidelity, insubordination, lack of forgiveness of spouses, children and choices, husbands who do not run their families, etc.
But of course there are problems with what happens before marriage, one of which is the choice of the spouse. God’s people are woefully misinformed as to what to look for in a spouse. In my still small experience, I have seen that women are often satisfied with the simple combination of happy marriage: “He doesn’t hit me, he doesn’t stop me from going to church, and he doesn’t have the way he’s going to cheat on me. ” It is being satisfied with very little. The biblical ideal for a man is someone who is on the way to becoming more and more like Christ by loving his wife as Christ loves the Church. It involves leading, serving with love, striving for sanctification, loving sacrificially, providing and spending deeply for it. Be Christ at home. Not betraying is within the reach of any idiot in the area. An unbeliever, because he has not been redeemed by Christ, can never be like Christ in the care of his wife. At best, you can be a good husband by the standards of this fallen world. And, unfortunately, it is increasingly common to see believers choosing to marry unbelievers. This is the main point of this article. Will the incredulous marriage end on pizza?
- Why do more and more men and women seek to become one flesh with someone who still exists in the old flesh? Make a covenant for life with someone who rejects the covenant with Christ? Trade your heart with someone with a heart of stone? Obviously there are legions of reasons.
- Let’s focus on one.
- I think one of the reasons is that many.
- Due to the secularization of our time.
- Consider religion as one of the various areas of life.
- One of many options.
- But something that does not influence life as a whole.
- Such as slices of pizza.
- That make up a person’s life.
I explain: we tend to see the different compartments of life as if they were a little separate, as if they were the different portions that make up my pizza, and each one has its own individualized pizza: I have my musical preferences, my financial choices, my health skills, my sexual preferences, my ideas to raise children, my favorite hobbies, etc. , and the decision to follow Christ is often treated as if it were a portion of pizza. , see if there are enough portions in common, but not all.
What if he’s not a believer? We think the same way to raise children, we like the same programs, we don’t fight, does it treat my family well?And besides, where we’re different, he respects it, and it even helps me. go to church, and even show up once in a while!?It’s the same litany I hear from girl to girl that you’re wrong to rebel against God. And several fellow shepherds report the same problem. Of course, there are variations. And yes, there are men who are also interested, but it seems to me that boys deceive themselves less, they go after non-believer girls precisely for things in which they are different, it is more of a deception.
But is it a proper view? If we want to follow the pizzaiola vision of life, it would be more appropriate to say that the situation of the person before God, believer or not, is the pizza dough itself, on which all the other elements are built. This is what Jesus teaches us when He says, for example, that he who is not with him is against him (Matthew 12:30). There is no neutrality, there is no possibility of having areas of life where rebellion against Christ. harmless The poison of evil spreads throughout life.
In the slice of the use of money, for example. The Christian must bow to the profound biblical truth that all our money belongs to God, not just what is separated in tithing, and that every penny must be spent in God’s honor, whether to buy food, clothes, pay rent or take his wife. to take a walk through Gramado, but the disbeliever doesn’t see it that way, he sees money as his prerogative. And sooner or later, there will be conflicts over the use of money. Support this church family who lost their jobs?A special offering of love to missionaries this Christmas?Tithing? But it goes further: how does the disbeliever see the question of the financial unity of the house?And does the common idolatry of doing things and the economic situation define our value?Does the gospel have antidotes for all these things? But the disbeliever woman does not submit to the gospel.
What about the parent’s slice of pizza? What will it be like to guide the child in the way of the Lord when there is a parent in the home who actively refuses to follow Jesus? How can we model the Christian life if there is someone who models the daily life away from the Lord at home? The Bible has a lot to say about the task of raising children and it goes far beyond the formation of honest and productive citizens. The goal is to teach them to live as nothing less than human beings in a new world living like salt and light in this one. How can an unbeliever help with this? While it doesn’t get in the way or in the way, which I think is nearly impossible. But even if it was? The task is too difficult and we need all the help we can get. Boys need men to set an example to be a Christian man just as much as girls need a female role model. In fact, girls need to see their parents as a role model for Christ to care for the church, directing their affections to Christ and the eventual future husband.
But, of course, the delicious share of sexuality will remain unscathed regardless of what the mass makes up, won’t it?Isn’t it fair, shall we say, do it? Ni. La sexuality is a gift of God’s creation, designed to be experienced in the sanctity of the covenant of marriage. And it’s not just the carnal conjunction of different parts; it’s something bigger and deeper. It is the physical expression of the deep unity of the soul. Once again, he who died in his faults and sins has in his soul the mark of a fierce rebellion against Christ, sustaining the truth by injustice (Romans 1:18). Someone who has a heart of flesh given by the action of the Holy Ghost learns to interpret his whole life through the prism of scripture, including what he does or does not do in bed. In all this, the biblical dynamic of seeking each other’s interest?Including sexuality? It will be different when the yoke is uneven And I ask you: do you really want to have sex with an enemy of your savior?
The pizza serving of the use of free time is also affected by the basic arrangement of the heart. It’s not just the decision to spend time on the beautiful Sunday mornings with God’s people in church rather than at the AABB or in the city park. goes beyond looking to meet other young couples on Saturday night instead of a group of disbelievers. These things are important, but it goes further. It’s about making every act of your free time a moment of gratitude and pleasure in God’s goodness, whether it’s movies, a dinner for two, a kayak ride or a vacation trip, it’s about doing everything for God’s glory with someone who does the same. , not with someone who refuses to glorify and thank God (Romans 1:21).
There are several portions of pizza that make up someone’s life, and none of them are insensitive to dough, no matter how appetizing the cheese or anything.
But it is not worth it?After all, your Mass can be converted and it will be a mass of believers!Isn’t it precisely being with me that he will hear and see the gospel, and then he will come to convert?It is undeniable that many conversions have taken place in this situation, but I think the number is overestimated. We cannot assume that God will be merciful. It’s like justifying the irresponsibility of wearing a seat belt by the fact that there are people who don’t wear it and who still suffer accidents without dying, and I see and know many cases where it ends in divorce or just decades of frustration.
But the problem is more fundamental than that. In the end, look at the scope of rebellion and madness: the person says that his hope is that, by his sin, the other will become, who knows, disobeying God, the other will obey God, perhaps rejecting the clear. Christ’s teaching, the other will become a disciple of Christ. Perhaps my idolatry will make the other love the true God. It’s stupid.
It is neither wise nor good to follow this path. Yes, I know there is a shortage of good men to marry in church (I certainly work in my church to change that, and I know many others who do the same). Dear sheep of Christ, stop contenting yourself with the little. Stop wanting old pizzas at the bar when God calls you for a gourmet meal with his son. Isn’t God trying to keep you from being happy? He wants you to have an image of Christ’s own relationship with the Church in his home.