Back to Basics - Marriage and Children (Mark 10:1-16)

Well, I'm not a big baseball fan.

I love sports.

I don't mind going to a baseball game on occasion, but it's it's not really the thing that I like to watch, except, like many of you, you can watch a highlight from a game, an exciting moment, and say, that's it that's fun to watch.

And my my family, we spent five years in Pennsylvania, and I remember for a while my algorithm, even after I had moved down to South Carolina, I would still catch like Phillies and Pirates highlights because I did RUF at Penn State and I had a number of friends and students from both camps.

And I remember this one clip that went around for a while.

Five years ago at a Pirates game, Ke Brian Hayes hits a home run to kick off a game, first score.

And the thing that's amazing to me about home runs is just the excitement instantly, the crack of the ball, the crowd goes insane.

You know it's a home game.

He's rounding the bases, he's fast, he's looking at the ball, the announcers are going crazy, the crowd's going crazy, he's got a grin on his face, and everybody watching him is thinking that has to be the best feeling in the world.

Rounds the bases, celebration in the dugout, and then there's this weird sort of awkward pause, and then the umpire says, You're out.

And I remember watching this clip.

I didn't watch it live, but I remember watching this clip, and then the commentators are like, are they calling it foul?

Because he'd hit it just inside the right pole.

What's happening right now?

And it wasn't until the producers started to show what happened that it dawns on everybody.

As he was rounding first base, watching the ball go out, he never actually hits first base.

That he misses the bag by about an inch, rounds and comes home.

And I don't even know that I knew this was possible.

You can hit it out of the park, and your run around the bases is not a token thing to do.

You actually have to hit first base.

And if you don't, you're out.

Even if you hit a home run.

Even if you've celebrated, if you have been celebrated by announcers and crowds, as Nick Saban would say, you cannot forget the fundamentals.

This morning, Jesus is talking fundamentals with us.

And he's getting back to basics.

He's talking about marriage and children.

And right off the bat, I just want to say this passage isn't just for the married.

And it's not just for the parents or the children, that this passage is for all of God's people.

I mean, Jesus himself, we realize, and we shouldn't forget, Jesus never married.

Jesus never had children.

And yet he teaches us how to think about both marriage and children.

And he uses these topics to highlight for us that we don't know naturally how to think about either.

That is, it is not self-evident how we ought to think about marriage.

It is not self-evident how we ought to think about how to think about children.

And yet Jesus uses both to highlight for us how we ought to approach life, that he returns us to creation, that he made this world to function in a certain way, and he also is the giver of grace.

And so he wants us to know how he made us, but he also wants us to know that we forget so easily how desperately we need grace.

And we see something of both in this passage.

Grace restores God's intentions.

So let me read this passage and ask for God to help us.

Mark chapter 10, verses 1 through 16.

Mark 10:1–16

And Jesus left there and went to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan.

And the crowds gathered to him again, and again, as was his custom, he taught them.

And the Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?

And he answered them, What did Moses command you?

And they said, Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away.

And Jesus said to them, Because of your hardness of heart, he wrote you this commandment.

But from the beginning of creation God made them male and female.

Therefore, what am therefore man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.

So they are no longer two, but one flesh.

What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.

And in the house the disciples asked him again about his about this matter, and he said to them, Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her, and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.

And they were bringing children to him, that he might touch them, and the disciples rebuked them.

But when Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, Let the children come to me.

Don't hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.

Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.

And he took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands on them.

The word of the Lord.

Lord, there's a lot in this passage that we've just read, and there's no way that we can cover all of it in a mere 30 minutes.

But we ask that you would give us yourself and these words, that you would show us your grace and your mercy, that you would heal us, and we ask that you would dig out for us ears to hear, that you would give us eyes to see Jesus.

And we pray that by his Holy Spirit He would give us the grace to follow him.

We pray these things in his name.

Amen.

Alright, so right off the bat, we see in verse 1, Jesus left there and he went to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan.

And if you've if you haven't been with us for a little bit, what we've seen over the last several weeks is that Mark is split into two.

We've got the first eight chapters and the second eight chapters.

And the first eight chapters is answering the question, who is Jesus?

Who is he?

And the answer, of course, is he is the king, he is the Messiah, he is the Christ.

And this comes to a head in chapter eight, when Jesus asks Peter and the disciples, who do people say that I am?

And Peter finally says, But we know who you are, you are the Christ.

And Jesus says, Yes, and the Christ must suffer, be rejected, be crucified, and be raised again.

And Peter says, No, never.

And Jesus says, Get behind me, Satan.

And so what we see in the first eight chapters, Jesus is the king.

And the second eight chapters is, well, what kind of king is he, and what does it look like to follow him?

And what kind of king is he?

Well, he's a servant king.

He's the kind that lays his life down for others.

And if we would follow him, we too must learn to pick up our crosses in self-denial and follow him through self-denial to glory.

That Jesus shows us the way and he paves the way for us.

And so here it is, Jesus is making his way back to Judea.

We saw in chapter 9 that he's transfigured on the Mount of Transfiguration right after he tells them what kind of Christ that he is.

And from that glorious moment on, he has his face set to Jerusalem.

He is intentionally going to the cross.

That is his plan.

And so we have a tension between him and the Pharisees that's building and building and bubbling.

They hate him, they want to destroy him, and yet no one will take his life.

He lays it down.

He's moving intentionally to the cross.

And so geographically, we see here, even if it doesn't leap off the page to us, he's getting closer and closer to Jerusalem.

Alright.

So, in context, Jesus is going to now underscore marriage to highlight something of self-denial.

Isn't that, doesn't that make you all want to get married?

If you want to get married, this is the way we learn self-denial.

And here's my outline this morning.

The test, the answer, and the children's lesson.

The test, the answer, and the children's lesson.

All right.

Here's the test.

Jesus is making his way down to Jerusalem, and he makes his way down to Judea across the river Jordan.

What where does your mind go when you think of the River Jordan?

Where did your mind go?

John the Baptist.

Jesus has returned to the place where he himself was baptized by John the Baptist.

Okay.

So we have a test, but it's a test within a test.

What's the test within the test?

Jesus returns to John the Baptist territory and he's asked immediately, is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?

Why is that a hidden test?

What happened to John the Baptist?

John the Baptist was arrested by Herod and he was beheaded.

Why?

Because he kept saying, It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife.

John the Baptist preached repentance to the regional governor, and he said, You do not understand marriage.

And the Pharisees say, One out of two is not bad.

Can we get two out of two?

Jesus, what are your thoughts on marriage and who may divorce whom?

That's the test within the test.

They don't say that.

They don't say that.

Okay.

Pharisees come up to him in verse 2 in order to test him.

Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?

Well, what's the other test?

The other test has to do with interpreting Deuteronomy 24.

And part of the problem of the whole setup is that their theology of marriage stems from a passage that talks about divorce.

That when they talk about marriage, they always start with Deuteronomy 24.

So that's a problem in and of itself.

So Jesus says, Well, what did Moses command you?

And they say, Well, Moses allowed for a man to write a certificate of divorce.

And they're quoting from Deuteronomy 24 in verse 4.

So let me just read from the source material.

Deuteronomy 24 says this.

So this is what they're asking him.

How do you define some indecency?

May a man divorce his wife?

And the reason they're asking, this is this sounds so foreign to us, this was like the this was the lightning rod argument back in the day.

There were parties who were on two sides.

Do you follow this rabbi school or do you follow this rabbi?

Shemae says this, Hillel says this.

What are you, Shemaean or Hillelian?

This was the debate, and they're trying to get Jesus to say, I pick this side.

What are the sides?

Well, Shemay says, some indecency, that's got to be something morally major.

Probably adultery.

And so he says, if someone commits adultery, you're allowed to divorce.

But Hillel says, some indecency.

Come on, guys.

Who hasn't received a burned dinner and felt that was indecent?

You can divorce your wife if she displeases you in any reason.

And we hear that today, and we rightfully say, that feels icky.

Before we accept these two options as the main event, it's important to see that Jesus is going to reframe the question entirely.

He rejects the premise.

Who here has seen the princess bride?

Anybody?

A bunch of us.

That's good.

You remember Vizini?

Inconceivable.

Okay, this is a man who thinks that he's brilliant.

Aristotle, Socrates, Plato, morons.

And he challenges Wesley, who is he's pursuing Buttercup, who's been kidnapped, remember?

He challenges Wesley to a duel of wits because he's not strong enough to fight him.

And so there's this bizarre scene in which Wesley accepts a duel of wits, and they have two goblets of wine, and he says, I'm going to poison one.

Iacane powder.

And he puts the powder in.

And so Vizzini has to decide which is the safe cup to drink.

And they go round and round and round, and he goes, aha! I figured it out.

And he drinks it and he falls over dead.

Buttercup looks at Wesley, she still doesn't know who he is, and she says, You could have died from the poison.

Your cup could have been poisoned.

He says, They were both poisoned.

They were both poisoned.

And these Pharisees are treating Jesus like there's one cup that's poisonous and one that's not.

And he rejects the whole paradigm and says they're both poisoned.

Not because one isn't closer to the truth than the other, but because the whole motivation is on the, it starts off on the wrong foot.

First of all, they're using something like marriage to test somebody else.

It's a matter of being right and wrong.

Not just with Jesus, but in marriage.

Who is right in their marriage, in their divorce, who can tick the boxes and say, I've done everything according to the law, instead of being motivated by what honors God and my neighbor, even the neighbor that I might be married to?

So they approach Jesus with two poisoned cups, and he says, No, I reject the premise.

So that's the test.

But what's the answer?

First of all, let me say both Old and New Testaments have a realistic picture of divorce.

That the Bible has a category for this, rightly, because there are some marriages that are so toxic and so dangerous that the healthiest path forward, as tragic as it is, the healthiest path forward sometimes is divorce.

And I I was thinking about this this week.

When I was in college, I haven't talked about this with Melissa, but we were dating and we were hanging out in her driveway, and this young woman came up to me, uh, and she'd clearly been roughed up, and she was clearly afraid.

I had never met her before, and she said, I need you to help me move out of my apartment right now.

He's gone, but I'm terrified for what happens when he comes back.

And now I'm scared.

I was like, let's go! And so we ran over there and I helped her move out in about 20 minutes and we left.

And there's a reminder that there are some situations it is just not healthy or right to stay in, and we have to acknowledge that, not just because we feel that, the Bible acknowledges that.

I once read a passage, not in Scripture, but somebody writing about marriage, and they they describe marriage as a beautiful vase, and it ought to be protected and treasured and put in a place of honor.

And a right divorce, a necessary, tragically necessary divorce, isn't taking that vase and putting it in the trash.

It's acknowledging that that vase is already shattered on the floor, and it's sweeping it up in a dustpan and putting it in the trash.

And so we have to acknowledge that Scripture has a category for that in this fallen world, sometimes that is an appropriate path forward.

But Jesus isn't talking about that right now.

He's talking about, he's talking to guys who are too eager to say, can I get there the right way?

Can I say I'm righteous by pursuing this?

He says, let's reframe the question altogether.

Let's not start with Deuteronomy 24.

Let's not get away from Deuteronomy 24, but that's not the fountainhead.

The fountainhead is creation, and everything else is downstream from what God created in the garden.

Marriage is not merely a social construct.

It is not an invention of humanity that God invented marriage.

And that when we participate in that, we participate in something profoundly mystical and powerful.

Jesus says, But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female.

Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.

So they're no longer two, but one flesh.

What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.

And so it's interesting that Jesus reiterates that creation ordinance that marriage is between one man and one woman.

That this command to be fruitful and multiply, it runs right down the center of the covenant of marriage and in Jesus' creation design.

But he talks about this not as ammunition for a fight on who can be right in an argument.

He's showing something.

What is the beautiful mystery and majesty of marriage?

It starts from the fact that God puts two very different kinds of people together and makes them one.

One.

And it's not just a saying like, this is my better half or this is my better half, that there's something to reality that we struggle to put into words that happens in marriage.

I mean, think about it this way: throughout the Gospels, you see instances where there are demons and we don't know what to do with that.

And yet we're not to say, they're probably not real.

I think the scriptures intend for us to say these are real forces.

There are things that we cannot see or explain that are invisible to us, but we ought to acknowledge that reality.

So it is that when God makes two people one, there is something there that speaks to reality that we're going to struggle to put into words.

And yet the scriptures say we would do well to pay attention and acknowledge that reality.

So he's not giving ammunition for an argument.

Who's right about marriage?

He's saying, do you, if you really want to talk about marriage, can we talk about the wonder of it?

Can we talk about how beautiful it is?

Can we talk about the mystery that two people can actually, in some metaphysical way, become one?

And this is why if couples become one, this is why couples share names.

As hard as that is.

I mean, Laura's going through changing all of her.

It's hard.

Why do we do this?

The two become one.

And this is why couples ought to share their names on a bank account and on a mortgage and share conversations about the vision for their future as a family, that no person in the family is just along for the ride.

The two become one.

Later on in the New Testament, Paul follows Jesus.

He doesn't start with Deuteronomy 24.

He too starts with creation.

He says, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies.

He who loves his wife loves himself.

For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church.

Because we are members of his body.

Hold on to that thought.

There's more metaphysical union language that's a part of reality.

And so the scriptures teach that God joined God, the maker of heaven and earth, actually joins men and women together in marriage.

Sam Van Aken is a tree artist.

And you might think, what is a tree artist?

Does he paint trees?

No.

Does he draw trees?

No.

Does he pretend to be?

No.

He actually grafts different kinds of trees together.

You can find him on YouTube.

He has successfully grafted 40 different fruit-bearing kinds of trees into one tree.

Which means that when spring happens, this tree has all different colors and shapes of leaves.

That in the summer you have these different kinds of fruit hanging on the same tree right next to each other.

That every autumn, as the leaves fall, those different colors and shapes fall together.

And what this means is if you go to this tree with a chainsaw and say you cut down this half or this branch, that you would never simply sever one type of tree.

You cannot destroy one branch without destroying several kinds.

So it is that Jesus wants his questioners to know there can be no casual conversation about divorce.

This is not a casual conversation any more than you can have a casual conversation with your doctor about amputating your legs from the waist down.

That to disrupt a marriage is to sever something that is now one.

At one point it was not, and now it is.

Paul says in Philippians, so in this union you ought to consider others more significant than ourselves.

And you might say, Ah, Joe, technically that is not about marriage, that's about life in the church together, and so it is, but isn't your spouse in that church together with you?

Hold on to that corporate thought, though.

The New Testament teaches us that the kind of union experienced in marriage points to and is also something like the union that the church has as the bride of Christ with Jesus.

That this union isn't just something experienced in marriage, though it is, it is also experienced in some way analogous to marriage, with everyone brought into the bride of Christ, joined together with Jesus.

This is a world in which there is more than meets the eye.

And so a husband and wife are one with one another as a reflection of Christ and the church.

So what do we what do we do with this?

What are we supposed to do with this?

If you're married, if you would one day be married, you have to believe that a marriage is a union that is more than two signatures on a piece of paper.

And it's more than an act that happens in a bedroom.

That there's something in marriage that is a union and you and you ought to believe that and lean into that.

That if you're married, you are to believe that you are one with the person who can get under your skin faster than others.

That if you are married, you are to believe that the one who can wound you deeper than others.

That if you are married, you are to believe that the one who can encourage you more profoundly than anyone else and make you laugh more heartily than anyone else, that you are one with this person.

And you must listen to them in a way that isn't altogether foreign from the way that you listen to your own body.

I don't know how many of you have, you've we've all had parts of our bodies that hurt.

My leg hurts when I run, and you don't say, Well, I will cut it off.

It hurts when I run, I will cut it off.

And again, there are scenarios where that might be necessary, but more times than not, we listen to our bodies.

And we take care of our bodies.

And sometimes we go to the doctor and we say, What's going on with my body?

You take care of it.

And so this wonderful and mystical but temporary union ought to be treasured and leaned into.

One in which the bride of Christ, which is all those who profess faith in Jesus, experience union with Christ.

And we ought to remind ourselves that that union is real.

It's not just a word picture.

It's not just a helpful way of thinking about a relationship.

It is a reflection of a metaphysical reality that we would do well to remind ourselves and each other is true.

And we too must learn to take care of our body together.

Which leads to my last point, my shortest point, the children's lesson.

Okay.

So Jesus, he's back on the scene, and we read, they're taking their children to him that he might bless them.

Okay?

And the disciples bow up like bouncers and say, They got ID?

Like, what's going on here?

There's more important people to deal with Jesus.

And the disciples are often shown in a negative light, but perhaps nowhere else more so than here.

They really do look the most like the Pharisees in this passage.

They're gatekeeping.

And there's this, there's, they're, they're made to gatekeep.

There's a way to gatekeep, but Jesus says, you're leaving out children who are being brought to me for blessing.

And we read that he's indignant, that he's offended on their behalf.

He doesn't roll his eyes and smile, they're missing it again.

I think sometimes he's kind of like that.

He's offended on their behalf.

So there's a literal way, and then there's a sort of metaphorical way that we're supposed to read this.

And the literal way is if Jesus has a category for having children brought to him that he might bless them, right?

Now he's not saying bless you.

He's not speaking a word of blessing, he's not saying the word blessing.

If Jesus has a category for children that can be brought to him that he might bless them, then so should we.

Then so should we.

And what that also means is if that still happens in the body of Christ, that whether you have literal children or not, you have a part to play in bringing children to Jesus, which is a powerful and magical, not magical, but you know what I mean, a powerful and wonderful thought.

There's a literal way to take that, and I think that we ought to.

But here's the other thing.

Jesus says, unless you're like a child.

Why does he say that?

Because these children are so sweet and innocent?

No.

There's no honest reading of Scripture, there's no honest reading of the New Testament that can really lead anyone to say, these sweet, cuddly children are just sweet and innocent, and Jesus just wants to highlight how innocent they are.

The Bible doesn't talk like that, but it does say that Jesus blesses those who do not come with something to offer of themselves, who do not come with a resume.

And so the reason I included this passage right on the heels of the marriage passage is because I think it keeps us from flexing our pharisaical muscles.

Because some of us, when we think about marriage, we're filled with anxiety and guilt and we really sort of tremble in ourselves, and others of us are like, maybe feel a little overconfident.

And Jesus would really have neither reality, and hopefully we're more of a mixed bag of emotions than that.

That's what he would have us do is not take a play out of the Pharisee playbook and say, Jesus, I've done this and this and this in my relationship, will you accept that?

He says, You don't come offering your marriage.

You come as children with nothing to offer.

And insofar as you have nothing to offer, to such belongs the kingdom of God.

Which sounds an awful lot like what Jesus opens the Beatitudes with.

Blessed are the poor in spirit.

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for to them belong the kingdom of God.

And so as we come to Jesus, we never come saying, look at my obedience, even though we're called to it.

And we never look come and say, Look at what I have to offer, except weakness and poverty of spirit.

I have all I really have to offer you is my sin, and what I would ask is for blessing and cleansing.

And we see how this takes place in our assurance of pardon.

I'll just read this again.

Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, his bride, his wife, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

If we would be cleansed, if we would be blessed, if we would be washed, if we would be put on a path to follow Jesus that looks like holiness, it starts and it is continued always and only by a posture that says, I need blessing as one who has nothing to offer.

And by faith, I believe that you will give that to those who cry out for mercy.

And if you would do that, you have everything you need, not just in this life, but in the life to come.

Let's pray.

Father, we thank you for your word.

And we thank you for sending your son Jesus that he might gather a people to himself that he calls his wife.

And what a privilege it is to be a part of that people, Lord.

And we ask that you would remind us of the grace and the grace alone that is required for that to be true.

And so we ask that you would help us to see each other in light of that union with you.

We're united to one another, and the marriages are united as well.

And we need all the help in the world, the vision, the patience, the self-control, the other-centeredness.

That is really a picture of the character that you embodied, Jesus, when you came.

You didn't take all the boxes and say, now I can hold all of these grudges against you.

You continue to welcome those who are poor in spirit.

And so we ask that you would that you would pay for our sins again and again.

Not that that needs to be redone, but that you would help us to see that that is the reality of life.

We pray these things in Christ's name.

Amen.