Jun 29, 2015 Words of Grace – Be of Good Cheer
Today is a good day to be grateful for God’s good gift of marriage and to commit ourselves again to honor marriage as he has designed it and revealed it to be in the Bible.
In 2004, the elders of Grace Community Church presented a Statement on Marriage to our congregation. Here is an excerpt with four exhortations from that statement:
Marriage is an institution that has been created and established by God. It is the first and oldest institution. God has designed men and women to be physically and emotionally complimentary. He has given marriage to us so that we might enjoy the intimacy of a helpmate who has been specifically created for us. Marriage is the ultimate expression in human intimacy, it provides the basis and context for the birth and rearing of children, and it serves as the description of Christ’s relationship with the Church.
1. Value and affirm our own marriages and the institution of marriage by living in a way that honors God.
2. Pray that God would help us and our fellow citizens see the purpose and value of marriage.
3. Testify of God’s goodness to us in his creation of sexuality and reproduction and the proper expression of those in the institution of marriage.
4. As God leads us, pray for our local, state and national leaders, and respectfully ask them to protect the institution of marriage by taking actions necessary to see that marriage and the sanctity of marriage are not undermined by the legal recognition of same sex or other arrangements that are outside the bounds of what God has intended for marriage.
Though this fourth exhortation has been undermined by the Supreme Court’s decision today to make same sex marriage legal, we do not lose heart. We are of good cheer because God has once again given us the opportunity to give testimony to the goodness of marriage as he has defined it in Scripture and to show the grace and truth of the gospel.
Only by being faithful to God, his word, and the gospel of Jesus Christ in all aspects of our lives will we be able to give hope to people who are made ready by God to repent of their sin and believe on his Son.
– Scott