Celebrating Covenant Love on St Valentine's Day Matthew 19.3-12

Matthew 19.3-12 p 986

Father God,
love and marriage means great happiness to many of us
but to others it brings pain, disappointment, anger.
May what I say bring out the good news,
the wise truth and the tender love of Jesus for every person,
married or unmarried
and through the ministry of your word may the Holy Spirit bring
thanksgiving, repentance, healing, as we each need.

Ryan Tubridy did an interesting take on St Valentine’s Day
on his radio show on Friday.
He highlighted the large amount of angst, of anger too,
the bitterness and sadness that surrounds unrequited love or broken love.
One of his guests said her request show
plays far more sad and angry songs about love
in the weeks following 14 February than at ay other time of year.

But the break up of relationships and disappointment in love is no new thing.
Parts of this reading from Matthew 19 is often used at weddings
but the whole reading is in the context of the reality of divorce
and what should people do who are never going to be married.

So if you didn‘t get a card today
or if the whole notion of a special day for ‘love‘ makes you sad or cross
listen carefully
or if you are ‘happy in love‘ listen anyway
for many people hurt on this issue and we need to help them in Jesus‘ name.

Jesus speaks here in Matthew 19 about marriage.
It is the commitment of a man and a woman in a lifelong bond
is the most important commitment anyone makes
second only to our commitment to Jesus Christ.

1 Marriage is hard wired into the way people are made.

Strange things happen at weddings.
I remember once in England we were kept awake in a bed and breakfast
by some Dutch men returning from a stag night celebration.
Only they had celebrated too well.
(I assure you that
drunk Dutch men are as annoying and sad as drunk Irish men.)
But as I lay awake and tried to love my neighbour
I had this thought about
the drunkenness and other follies of stag and hen parties:
doesn’t their very existence tell us something interesting about marriage?
Even in today’s materialistic, do as you please society
people still care about marriage - they sense it is important.
Something is changing about their friend who is going to be married
something irreversible, that can’t be altered, once gone into
and that change has to be marked, in however bizarre and stupid a way.
Marriage is hard wired into the way people are made
just as Jesus says in Matthew 19.4-6, quoting from Genesis 1:
‘Haven't you read that at the beginning
the Creator 'made them male and female', and said,
'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother
and be united to his wife,
and the two will become one flesh'?
So they are no longer two, but one.
Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate.’

Every human community has a basic concept of marriage.
The wedding customs may be different.
There may be things we frown on like polygamy, having more than one wife.
There may be things we find strange like arranged marriages
but it doesn’t matter about the religious background or lack of religion.
Even the stag and hen nights show that marriage is still important.

2 Marriage is about more than the couple.

Strange and unexpected things can happen when you are getting married.
It was at the photographing stage at our reception
when a voice from behind me said ‘John, do you know something?’
‘What Mary?’ ‘I am your mother in law.’
What answer can you make to that statement?
I think I meekly answered ‘Yes, Mary’ (which was a good answer).
Whatever else it is, marriage is a learning experience
and that conversation was part of my continuing learning experience,
that a marriage isn’t just about the bride and groom,
and their new commitment to each other
it’s about a whole set of relationships with family and friends
as a man leaves his father and mother and finds he has a mother in law.
It is also a public statement about the creation of a new family unit in society
which is why although many people nowadays live together before marriage
the Christian witness is that it is far far better to let sexual intimacy wait
until the public commitment of marriage is made
and the sexual expression of love is enjoyed
in the context and security of the covenant of marriage.

3 Jesus Values and Honours Marriage. And so should we.

It has been well said (John Piper) that
‘Staying married, is not about staying in love. It is about keeping covenant.’
Words in the marriage service
such as “Till death do us part,” or, “As long as we both shall live”
are covenant promises similar to the covenant promises God has made for us.
‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’
‘I will be your God and you will be my people.’

Notice how the Lord answers the question about divorce.
Rather than showing us ways out of marriage
he reminds us of the basic principle that it is a lifelong covenant,
a commitment sealed and guaranteed by God himself
and ‘what God has joined together, let no-one separate.’

4 Marriage is a Covenant not a Contract.

The word ‘covenant’ is not used in our reading
but it underlies what Jesus is saying.
A covenant is ‘an agreement made in trust.
The parties love each other and put no limits on their own responsibility.'
It is a sealed and binding agreement.
The relationship God has with us his people is a covenant relationship.
He set it up. He guarantees it. He will never break it.

A covenant is deeper and richer than a contract.
A contract is an agreement made in suspicion.
The parties do not trust each other,
and they set "limits" to their own responsibility.
This is understandable in business:
If I pay you money, you will give me goods.
If I don't pay the price, you have the right to take your goods back.
If the goods are not satisfactory I have the right to my money back. etc

But a covenant is an agreement made in trust
so that even if you do not keep your side of the agreement
I will still endeavour to fulfil my side.

How many marriages have become contractual more than covenantal?
They have been regarded as ‘deals’ which you can get out of
rather than binding commitments which you have pledged to stick to.
There is no doubt if we could ask the Lord Jesus
whether he saw marriage as a covenant or as a contract
what way he would reply.

In how many marriages is there contractual pointscoring:
‘you don’t listen to me’
‘You never lift a hand to help me.’
It’s your turn to tidy up.’
How soon we can degrade a marriage into a contractual dispute?
You didn’t do that. You never do this.
And do you notice how much we point out what the other person ought to do?
They need to change. We don’t, so we think.
The approach to marriage as covenant says:
‘I have promised and I will not give up.
I will fail in maybe many things,
but I will not give up on this relationship.’

What then about divorce?
It happens, sadly it even happens among believing Christians
and every time it happens we should be sad not just for the pain in that family
but for the loss or the obscuring of the God given pattern
for his human beings, male and female,
one flesh as long as they both shall live.
That we value and honour marriage as Jesus does
does not mean that people must always remain married
and endure abusive, oppressive behaviour
where love and faithfulness are abandoned.
In this church there is provision for remarriage in certain cases,
but always in this context that we value and honour covenant love.

The last thing we have time for today about marriage
is maybe the most important thing in our sex saturated society.

5 Jesus values and honours singleness. And so should we.

There is a myth about these days that to be completely human
you must have sexual experience and satisfaction.
That Jesus himself lived the single life without regret and without neurosis
should be answer enough to that modern way of thinking.
(The idea that he was married to Mary Magdalene has no historical foundation.)
Of course the physical intimacy of marriage is a great blessing
but the example of Jesus himself should challenge us
not to make an idol out of even marriage.

As he remarks at v 12 there are those
who ‘have renounced marriage because of the kingdom of heaven’.
as well as those who are never able to marry.

To be single without sexual experience is a state honoured by God.
God’s covenant love in Christ
may be known by every sort of person, married or unmarried.

Some may feel they are ‘on the shelf’ as regards human happiness
but God has no shelves for the people he loves.

Especially I want to say in the context of the issue of same-sex relationships
that God has no shelf for the homosexual people he loves.

While Jesus never explicitly addressed the question of same sex relationships
which were unthinkable in the culture of his day
everything he says here about marriage between a man and a woman
and what he says in v 12 about renouncing marriage
for the sake of the kingdom of heaven
points to what he would say in our day and place
and what he wants his people to say in this day and place.

Let me say this clearly and carefully
(because I have been caught in controversy about it recently)
that while homosexual practice is not pleasing to God
he still loves people with an homosexual orientation who remain single
as he loves people with an heterosexual orientation who remain single
as he loves people with an heterosexual orientation
who are privileged with the gift and responsibility of marriage.

Indeed people of whatever orientation
can do things that are not pleasing to him
and God still graciously loves us
not that for a moment he approves of what we do against his word
but he longs that we come back to him through Jesus for cleansing
and restoration to a way of life, difficult and demanding as it may be
in which we find his good pleasure.

So there is no way that Christians should ever treat gay people disrespectfully
with hysterical prejudice, name calling, dodgy jokes.

We are all sinners depending on God’s mercy
but we humbly maintain this conviction
that marriage is the covenant relationship between a man and a woman
which provides security for the relationship and for the community
and that there is dignity in the single state
and great compassion from God and hopefully from the people of God.

Let us pray for God’s practical blessing in whatever state we are
in marriage as he planned for most of humanity
in singleness as is given to some in order to advance his kingdom
and even as Christ meets people in broken situations and brings restoration

Thank you, loving Father
for making us, male and female,
that many should enjoy the wonder of marriage.
Thank you that many who do not know you
still hold on by instinct to the need for marriage.
May they come to see
that it is you joins a man and a woman together in life long union.

Help us Lord to see marriage as more than about the couple
but as also about the blessings it brings to families and to wider society.

Thank you that Jesus honours and values marriage.
Help us to see it as a covenant not a contract
and forgive us when we have down graded it to something
we may treat as pleases ourselves.

Thank you too that Jesus honours and values singleness.
We pray for those we know who are no longer married
through bereavement or marriage break down.

Healing Lord, deal gently with those in pain;
perhaps they are angry with you, or with another person.
Help them to deal with that anger; let it not turn to bitterness.

We pray for those we know who have never married
and have no prospect of marriage.
Help them in times of loneliness, of misunderstanding, of physical yearning
Give them, dear Father, a deep sense of your wholeness
and strong supporting friendships
that they and others shall see their lives as not blighted but blessed
in your covenanted promise of love that will not let them go.

(The background to this hymn is especially relevant:
George Matheson had become blind.
He was engaged to be married but just before his wedding
his fiancee sent word to say she could not face the prospect
of marrying him in that state.
It was out of that disappointment and rejection
that he wrote these words which have helped many
in their own path of difficult discipleship in many areas of life

Hymn 523

O Love that wilt not let me go

George Matheson, 1842-1906

O Love that wilt not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in thee:
I give thee back the life I owe
that in thine ocean depths its flow
may richer, fuller be.

O Light that followest all my way,
I yield my flickering torch to thee:
my heart restores its borrowed ray
that in thy sunshine's blaze its day
may brighter, fairer be.

O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
and feel the promise is not vain,
that morn shall tearless be.

O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from thee:
I lay in dust life's glory dead,
and from the ground there blossoms red
life that shall endless be.