Contemplations

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Location: Bridgewater, Virginia, United States

Wednesday, July 02, 2008

Unlikely passage about marriage

Since marriage has become all the rage this summer with my sister getting married, and me getting married, my mind has been in a very sensitive, highly associative marriage-mode. Just about everything i look at reminds me of marriage somehow. Yeah, even food reminds me of marriage; how else can a guy get good food everyday unless he's married (especially to a chef like Charisma)?
I was contemplating again about marriage just now, and a reminder came (i believe placed the Holy Spirit) of what i read yesterday from Matthew 18:
v18 - Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven:
and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

At the altar in front of God and man, and on the marriage bed in front of God and each other, there is a binding covenant made which speaks of everlasting care and closeness between a married couple. A marriage license is written on earth; the same is written in Heaven. All of heaven and earth permits and demands that a married couple protect, provide for and pleasure each other in the same manner that God through Christ relates to us.

This is not the end of the lessons we can draw from this passage in Matthew 18:
v19 - Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask,
it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.

Consider, then, the power of praying and soul-knit couples. Married people should aspire to grow together and humbler spiritually because God calls upon two people to ask (call for, beg, crave, desire) conjunctively before he will make a move for them. In marriage, we have perpetual, interested attention from God whilst we are in agreement together.

The remainder of the chapter also summoned me to consider what else comes with marriage: compassion and forgiveness. All the books say, and i've learned by experience, that marriage is the proving and growing grounds of one's compassion and forgiveness toward another human being. God is very attune to spouses' sensitivity towards each other, and especially a husband's sensitivity towards his wife (see 1 Peter 3:7). This is a very serious point. Our salvation is based on God's forgiveness through the sacrifice of His own innocent Son, Jesus. So if we fail and refuse to blanket this forgiveness to others, we are mocking the sacrifice of Christ, saying that more compassion and forgiveness is required of us than what was required for ourselves. We're playing the part of the holier-than-thou hypocrite, and nobody --nobody -- is holier or more innocent than anyone else. What differentiates us is our attitude towards God of "Thy will be done" or "My will be done."
The Matthew 18:21-35 passage is the whole parable, but here is the crux:

v. 22 - Shouldest not thou also have had compassion on thy fellowservant,
even as I had pity on thee?

That's not what i want to hear when I see my Father in Heaven! Yet I confess that, more every day, I merit a herem over my head rather than a halo on this point alone.
Marriage is a grand opportunity to realize who we are in God's perspective: we are the pure, lovely bride of Christ untainted by our sin because those are all washed away. He has infinite compassion on us because He is the infinite and eternal YHWH. He bathes us in His righteousness, and marriage is a chance to show another human being what it looks and feels like to be bathed in righteousness. It also tests our humility and servitude (Philippians 2:4-8) because by no other means can we have compassion on others as God has had compassion on us.
Thank God for marriage, which calls for us to live victoriously, or to fail miserably, in our appreciation of God's love, care, compassion and forgiveness toward us.


post-script:
My prayer is that Philippians 2:4 and Matthew 18:22 will be real for me in my future days.

Tuesday, July 01, 2008

A thought about Charisma.

Every now and then i have an especially good thought about Charisma that i want to keep locked up somewhere before the 'little love-distracting foxes' come and invade.
This thought came while reading a book:
"I should take each day as a chance to win Charisma's heart again."
This is what women want... Women want to be wanted, cherished and understood. They also want to wrap up their beloved in their love to warm, nurture and care for him.
Sometimes cherishing a woman and trying to understand her is a forced exercise, but God tells us to do it (probably because that is not in a guy's nature; we are not told to sin and that's what we do best). For the man who is willing and disciplined are earned many rewards. Seeing Charisma happy delights my heart, and I feel her happiness and interesting-ness. I need to selflessly give of myself to her - which is what she wants, and what God tells me to do - and through that giving comes a happy long-term relationship (i suppose so; i'm not there yet!).
I have only one life to live, and this life i now live I do live by the grace of God because that life could have ended several times over by now! What a noble honor to live so someone else can have a better journey through life...