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The Meaning of Christian Marriage
The Meaning of Christian Marriage
The Meaning of Christian Marriage
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The Meaning of Christian Marriage

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Why did God create the first humans as a man and a woman, in a marriage relationship? Why the differences between the genders, and does it really matter? Why was the man created first, and not the woman? How does the human spirit pass down from each generation to the next, and what implication is there in this for salvation, and for the Incarnation of Christ? What really is the “Image of God”? What does the particular nature of a Christian marriage have to do with all this? What does marriage, in particular Christian marriage, have to do with God’s eternal plan of salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ? Find out the answers to these and many other questions as they are clearly and simply explained in this book. Especially directed towards Bible-believing Christian women, this book is a must for all who, in today’s world, hold to the Christian Faith.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherHelen Haig
Release dateJun 24, 2012
ISBN9781476232485
The Meaning of Christian Marriage

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    Book preview

    The Meaning of Christian Marriage - Helen Haig

    THE MEANING OF CHRISTIAN MARRIAGE

    by

    Helen Haig

    ***

    PUBLISHED BY CHARGAN AT SMASHWORDS

    This book available in print from

    www.chargan.com

    The Meaning of Christian Marriage

    Copyright © 2012 Helen Haig

    ISBN: 978-1-476-23248-5

    All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

    Helen Haig asserted her right under the Copyright Act 1976 to be identified as the author of this work.

    Smashwords Edition License Notes

    This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

    ***

    Contents

    Introduction

    Chapter One: Marriage and Family Types and Problems.

    Chapter Two: Basic Foundational Doctrines Undergirding Christian Marriage.

    Chapter Three: Creation of Man in God’s Image; Implications for Christian Marriage.

    Chapter Four: Man: The Image of God Continued; Two Principles: The Principle of Representative Identity; The Naming Principle.

    Chapter Five: Fall of Lucifer; Fall of Man; Principle of the Tree and the Fruit; Implications for Christian Marriage.

    Chapter Six: The Two Marriage Patterns in the Church Today; Doctrinal Implications.

    Chapter Seven: The Spiritual Meaning Behind Christian Marriage; Centrality of the Role of Jesus as Bridegroom; The Dominion; Headship; Submission; Explanation.

    Chapter Eight: Conclusion

    About the Author

    ***

    Introduction

    Some time ago, in 2001, I completed the production of a set of video tapes dealing with Christian marriage. The tapes were directed to mature, Bible-believing Christian women who were born-again, and who were therefore desiring not only to live within their marriages in a way that honoured the Biblical pattern for Christian marriage, but to do so with an understanding of the eternal Biblical, spiritual reasons for which God had planned things in that particular way. In other words, not just how to live because God says so, but why He actually says it, so that in living out a truly Biblical Christian marriage before the eyes of the world, the nature of God Himself, and His eternal plan for mankind, would be clearly and openly manifested to all.

    The work had been begun some years before, in 1982, as the result of a research assignment project undertaken whilst studying at the then Newcastle College of Advanced Education, now a part of Newcastle University. The particular project concerned the political indoctrination of children in the schools, and I was thrown head-first into the hot-bed of debate surrounding the anti-discrimination legislation which was very much the focus of attention at that time. I was deeply shocked by the contents of that legislation with reference to the sexual roles and functions of men and women, and the forceful restructuring of educational objectives and methods in order to re-align the children’s perception to comply with the ungodly, unbiblical humanist morals and values expressed therein.

    The presentation of the data obtained in researching the project went through three stages. The first stage was to approach various churches in an endeavour to convince their pastors to permit me to address their congregations from the pulpit, in an effort to alert the rank and file of the church to the necessity of utilising their rights as citizens to voice their concerns and objections in as loud and concerted a way as possible. The response was pathetic, rather like the proverbial effort to beat a dead horse. Only two Pastors responded, one hesitantly and unwillingly, the other with a greater degree of interest. Response on the part of the laity was so lethargic as to be non-existent.

    Stage two consisted of the collation of the material that I had gathered for presentation as a book, in the hope that a written document might go further, and receive more attention from the church than my efforts to alert the church personally had done. During this period, I was overwhelmed by a series of illnesses that struck down various members of my family, and my duties and prior concerns as a wife and mother put all other concerns on a back-burner for several years. During this time I continued to do what I could to collect and collate data, but basically the work was of necessity set aside.

    Stage three occurred when the acquisition of a video camera provided the means to short-cut the more laborious book-style presentation. The use of charts, diagrams, and cartoon-style pictures which formed the focus of the points presented removed the necessity of the production of a lengthy manuscript. The clear pictorial presentation on film was also more likely to be viewed by busy people whose ability to make time to read a book, in our present visually-oriented age, was limited, and this also was a factor in the decision to make the videos. It was always going to be necessary to put the material into written form at some time, and this was in fact a request that was made by persons viewing the tapes. I was asked not only to put the material into book form, but to produce an accompanying study booklet that could be used in group work. The latter remains a project for a future date.

    The tapes were produced in a private home, with a small group of supporters who stood by me and encouraged me in the effort. They were circulated to qualified theological critics from five major Protestant denominations who were kind enough to check through the tapes to ensure their soundness and Biblical accuracy. Their feedback was positive and encouraging, with no negative responses to the doctrinal material presented. It was, in fact, from this group of people that the request for a book format originated. Copies of the tapes were also circulated to a number of older, married lay persons, whose commitment to Biblical principles was unquestionable, and to some other younger married couples in the churches.

    Responses to the tapes were eye-opening. At the ordained level, the response was unanimously one of praise, acclaim, and gratitude that a woman in the church had been willing to stand up and be counted on the issues discussed, and present the Biblical standard unequivocally. The response at the lay level, however, was varied.

    The predominant response from the older married couples was positive for the most part. Some even rang me especially to thank me for putting the case so clearly. One woman who had suffered badly as a result of her strong Christian witness to an immature son and daughter-in-law wept as she explained how her daughter-in-law excluded her from all normal family contact with her son and grandchildren, even to the point where she was referred to coldly, in her presence, as Graham’s mother, as though she were an outsider to the family.

    Responses from the younger couples to whom the tapes had been sent high-lighted the fact that a dichotomy of belief clearly exists in the church between young people raised on a diet of feminism and humanism in the secular school system, and unhappily, in both the Christian school system and the church as well; and older people whose doctrinal training occurred before the main thrust of the feminist and humanist onslaught struck and reshaped the church’s orientation to what actually constitutes a Christian marriage, and how it is intended by God to run. This does not mean that a hard and sharp line separated the two groups, there was a degree of overlap of each group into the other. There were, however, in the responses made, two clearly identifiable groups.

    While some of the younger couples concerned recognised and accepted the Biblical truth of the teachings on the tapes, their agreement was very ‘low-key’, with an obvious reluctance, verbally stated in one case, to not offend my friends (made by the female spouse). Others protested more directly, particularly at the suggestion that headship and submission in marriage were still the Christian pattern for today. That the male carries responsibility at a moral and spiritual level for the establishing of the marriage in the Christian pattern, with the bride making the promise to obey, thus recognising his headship and promising her support, was hotly rejected.

    The humanist/feminist pattern of equal partnership, indicated by the same vows and acceptance of exactly the same responsibilities towards each other without distinction of sex or roles and functions, was held up and defended as the proper pattern for today. The Biblical pattern was said to be out-of-touch, old-fashioned, archaic, culturally backward, offensive, and restricted to Old Testament times, without justification or relevance in the New Testament, or in today’s world. The protests were liberally sprinkled with terms such as "liberated; independent (as in under no-one’s rule but their own, including the Bible); autonomous (making up one’s own morals and values, a totally humanistic term, also meaning total self-rule); and a whole variety of uncomplimentary epithets directed towards the concept of headship, depicting this as sheer domination, and totally unnecessary for people whose relationship transcended this distasteful, cruel, and archaic pattern.

    For the most part these types of responses came from the younger married women, but in some cases they were supported by their anxious husbands, fearful of rocking the boat by offending either their wives, or their wives’ parents. In one case, the mother of one of the young wives came to the defence of her daughter, and roundly condemned headship in marriage for today for Christians, saying that God had introduced that originally because of domination! We don’t have that kind of thing in our relationship! The difference in the belief systems of the two families represented resulted, over time, in the alienation of the young man from his parents, and the once-united and Christian family of the young man became a family with a deep and distressing rift.

    Why is there such confusion and division over so central and basic an issue as what constitutes a Christian marriage, both at its initiation at the marriage ceremony, and in its ongoing lived-out expression, including extended family relationships?

    Obviously, the hard-line, forceful push via the educational system to promote feminist principles and concepts of sexuality and sexual roles has had a great deal to do with this. The removal of Bibles and prayers from schools, and their total secularisation, has also had a major effect. But is this the whole story?

    The church appears to have shot at breakneck speed down the same road, without so much as a glance backwards. The young Pastor involved in the marriage referred to above was in complete agreement with the bride and her parents, and fully supported their humanist, equal partnership concept of Christian marriage. Much has been said about paganism in the pews, but if it were not for paganism in the pulpits, paganism in the pews would surely have been dealt with before ever it reached its present plague proportions. When the desperate parents of the groom sought the help of their own Pastor in re-establishing a relationship with the son who now turned his back on them and scorned them, the result was a verbally violent attack on both parents, but especially the mother. He agreed totally with the young couple, and with the Pastor who had married them. His aggressive, finger-pointing (literally!) accusations against the elderly parents included accusations of mental unsoundness, and sheer trouble-making. They were required, without their Pastor making any reference to the Biblical record whatever, to change their Bible-based convictions regarding what actually constitutes a Christian marriage. They had, as faithful bible-believing people, refused to do this. This was apparently, according to their own Pastor, trouble-making!

    The anguish of these elderly people is not an isolated instance. It is being repeated across the church, but is being ignored and avoided by a leadership that appears to prefer to keep a smooth-running ship by turning a blind eye to the destruction of Christian families that is occurring in its midst. The circulation of my tapes, even in the limited numbers that were sent out, appeared to have taken the lid off a Pandora’s box of suffering, and my phone ran hot! I repeat, there may be a problem of paganism in the pews, but the real problem is the widespread and arrogant paganism that has become entrenched in many of our pulpits, and is being forced down the throats of the laity as the new, modern, real-life, in-touch, and with-it Christianity.

    The exception to this, thankfully, were the Pastoral representatives who were kind enough to examine the doctrinal content of my tapes, and who gave their full support and encouragement. Needless to say, the elderly couple referred to above were finally driven from their church, and at last contact, sat alone in their home nursing their grief together, with absolutely no Pastoral support whatever.

    Recently, two books came, by different means, into my hands. The first was called The Shack, and was authored by William P. Young, self-published by Wind Blown Media (2007). This book starts off with a tragic, gut-wrenching story of the loss of a small child in horrific circumstances. While one is still reeling with the impact of this and is emotionally vulnerable with all defenses down, the story moves to a meeting of the father of the child, in the shack where she was actually murdered, with no less a personage than God Himself. But – wait for it – God appears in His Trinitarian form as a plump, chuckling negro woman called Papa; a sweet unobtrusive woman who was presented as the Holy Spirit; and a lone male, a cheerful gardener and handyman, who was called Jesus. Oblivious to the gender confusion and blasphemy of such a completely anti-Biblical picture of God, the author then proceeds to record a series of conversations which overturn every basic orthodox Bible-based belief about the nature of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. One need hardly say that Biblical headship and submission, and God as male, with no female in the Godhead, were major targets. The most astonishing thing of all, however, was the number of rave notices printed in the book, listing well-known Pastors, politicians, and pop singers, all enthusiastically positive in their support of the book. I have to confess that I was so sickened by the contents of the book that I was unable to finish reading it, but did what I hope every other committed Christian will do – I tore it up, and threw it out in the garbage where such blasphemous trash belongs!

    How different was the second book that came to hand! This was The Gnostic Empire Strikes Back, by Dr. Peter Jones, published by P&R Publishing (1992). On my tapes I had stated clearly that equal partnership in marriage, as affirmed by leading feminists themselves, is a totally humanistic marriage pattern as opposed to the Christian pattern of headship and submission. I noted that Gloria Steinem, a leading feminist, stated in the magazine M.S., of March 1973 that for the sake of those who wish to live in equal partnership, we must abolish and reform the institution of marriage. The institution of marriage to which she refers is the Biblical Christian pattern incorporating headship and submission. I went on to show the destructive effect that equal partnership relationships in marriage have on Christian doctrine and living.

    What I did not realise at the time was the extent to which the feminist relationship structures that I opposed were traceable to the ancient pagan heresy

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