Covenant Marriage

 Contract: We protect our rights and limit our responsibilities. 


 Covenant: We give up our rights and pick up our responsibilities. 



RIGHTS WE GIVE UP 


(Genesis 2:21-25) So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man's ribs and closed up the place with flesh.


Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. 


The man said, "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called 'woman,' for she was taken out of man." 



For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame. 


1. Priority. 


(Matthew 6:33) But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 


2. Ownership. 



(1 Corinthians 7:4) The wife's body does not belong to her alone but also to her husband. In the same way, the husband's body does not belong to him alone but also to his wife. 



3. Privacy. 


(John 15:15) I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 



RESPONSIBILITIES WE PICK UP


(Ephesians 5:22-33) Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. 


Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. 


Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 


In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 


After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church--for we are members of his body. 


"For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." This is a profound mystery--but I am talking about Christ and the church.



 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. 



1. Love unconditionally. 


(Romans 5:8) But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 


2. Honor respectfully. 



(1 Peter 3:5-6) For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful. They were submissive to their own husbands, like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her master. 


(1 Peter 3:7) Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers.



 3. Submit mutually. 


(Ephesians 5:21) Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.


Video
https://www.churchofthehighlands.com/media/message/covenant-marriage

Discussion Guide
https://www.churchofthehighlands.com/files/groups/guides/10-23-11.pdf


Chris Hodges, Church of the Highlands