Marriage: The Real Thing

Pastor, teacher, and author Adrian Rogers has introduced people all over the world to the love of Jesus Christ and has impacted untold numbers of lives by presenting profound truth simply stated. Thanks for joining us for this message.

Here's Adrian Rogers. God made us as human beings because when you understand how God made us as human beings, then you understand what marriage is all about. Now, when God made us, he made us in his image, and God is a triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. And so there are three parts to the nature of God.

God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, three in one and one in three. And you're made in the image of God, you're made in the image of God, and there are three parts to your nature. You are body, soul, and spirit.

And the Bible says in 1 Thessalonians 5 and verse 23, and I pray God, your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless under the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. So sitting there is a spirit, soul, and a body, okay? Sitting there is a spirit, a soul, and a body.

Now, when you come together, your spirit, soul, and body is going to be united with his spirit, soul, and body. Now for a long time, I didn't know the difference between spirit, soul, and body. I knew the difference between body and spirit, but I didn't know the difference between spirit and soul.

I thought they were basically the same thing, just the invisible part of a man, maybe synonymous. Maybe one time you would say spirit and another time you would say soul, but the Bible teaches there's a difference between spirit and soul. Now this may seem very complicated, and you might be asking yourself right now, what on earth does this have to do with marriage, okay? But stay with me and you'll understand what it has to do with marriage because it'll help you understand what marriage is all about. The Bible says in Hebrews 4 verse 12 that the word of God is quick and powerful and that it divides between soul and spirit.

What is the difference? Well, let me explain it. With your body, you have physical life and physical relationships. We know the physical world, roughly speaking the world beneath us. With our soul, we have psychological life. The Greek word for soul is psyche.

It's a word we get psychiatry from, psychology from, psychic. And so with your soul, you have psychological life. The soul is the self, the ego, the I, the me, the soul. And so with our souls, we have psychological relationships, okay? But what about our spirit? Well, our spirit is that part of our nature that truly makes us in the image of God, for the Bible says God is a spirit. And with our spirit, we have spiritual relationships. We know God through the spirit.

The Bible says that when we get saved, God's spirit bears witness with our spirit that we're children of God. And the spirit of God dwells in Christians, the Holy Spirit in the human spirit, that's what makes us a Christian. Now, plants, they have a body, but they don't have a soul. Animals have a body and a soul, but they don't have a spirit. Only man has a spirit and woman, of course.

I'm using man in the larger sense. So, your body, soul and spirit. With your body, you know the world beneath you. With your soul, you know the world around you.

With your spirit, you know the world above you, okay? When your body is right, you're healthy. When your soul is right, you're happy. When your spirit is right, you're holy. God wants you to be healthy and happy and holy, but in reverse order.

First of all, holy, holy. All right, now, what does that have to do with marriage? Well, you need to understand who's getting married. A body, soul and spirit is marrying a body, soul and spirit, see? Now, here is what God says. There are no longer two, but you'll become one flesh.

God's arithmetic is one plus one equals one, okay? But how are you to be one? You're to be one physically, one psychologically and one spiritually, all right? There's to be the union of your bodies because you are a body. There's to be the union of your souls because you are a soul. And there's to be the union of your spirit because you are a spirit.

Now, let me tell you very frankly, the reason that some people's marriage don't last, they're just one-third married. There's just that union of their bodies. And while they call it love, really it's very little different than animals mating.

And there may be a lot of moonlight and roses and romance and all of that, but when you peel it back, it's just simply animal magnetism. Now, I want to say that when you get married, there will be the union of your bodies. And there's nothing impure about that. As a matter of fact, sex is a wonderful gift of God as you two will come together physically, intimately, sexually. That'll be one of God's sweetest gifts to you. And may I say that the sexual union is not merely or only, shall I say, for the procreation or the reproduction of the race that you might have children. You should have children.

I hope you will. I hope God will bless you with a nice, fine, large family. The sexual relationship is more than for procreation. You know, it's interesting in the Bible when husband and wife would come together in the marriage act that the Bible would say that thus and such a person knew his wife. You remember reading that in the Bible that so and so knew his wife? Well, why would the Bible call the marriage act knowing someone?

That's very interesting. You see, the marriage act is a form of communication. It's a way of knowing someone.

It's a way of saying, I love you. That cannot be put into words. It's very beautiful and very wonderful. Now, sometimes we've been taught of to think of sex as dirty or impure. Outside the bonds of matrimony, it is.

Inside the bonds of matrimony, it is very pure and very wonderful. And the Bible says marriage is honorable and the bed undefiled. But it also says adulterers and whoremongers, God will judge. So when the Bible says thou shalt not commit adultery or when the Bible says flee fornication, it's very important you understand this. God is not trying to keep sex from you.

God is keeping sex for you. Now, in my office back there, I have a picture on the wall. It's an ordinary picture.

I suppose it costs maybe 50 or $100. And if someone stole it, there'd be no great loss. Or if it got marred, no great problem. But if it were Rembrandt or Van Gogh or something like that, it would probably be in a vault because it would be so intrinsically valuable.

You wouldn't want it marred or misused or abused. Now, when God puts these high walls around this thing called sex, it's because it is so valuable, not because it's not valuable, but because it is. And God wants to cherish that for you too as his special gift just for you. Don't get the idea that in your physical relationship you'll just start in a crescendo of joy. This is something that if you will keep God's laws concerning the physical relationship, you'll find out that you will increase in joy.

As you try not simply to receive satisfaction but to give satisfaction and joy to the other person. Believe me when I tell you that people who keep God's laws concerning sex enjoy sex more and probably enjoy more sex than those who break God's laws. And every time God says thou shalt not, he's just saying don't hurt yourself. And every time God says thou shalt, he's saying help yourself to happiness. So there'll be the union of your bodies and that is what I want to call a healthy marriage.

I want that for you, okay? Secondly, there will be the union of your souls. Not only will you come together physically, but you will become one flesh psychologically. Now that's very important because not only should you love her, you ought to like her, okay? You know there are a lot of folks who think they're in love but they get along about like a cobra and a mongoose. Now, you see we've often heard that phrase, you know, can't live with them and can't live without them.

That ought not to be. There ought to be that oneness of soul where we enjoy one another. You ought not just to be sweethearts but you're friends. Everybody needs a friend and if it's the one you're married to it's a lot cheaper. You don't have to buy as, you know, if you can share the same things and do the same things together. And so you're going to need to cultivate your friendship because really let me tell you, you think you know each other, you really don't because you're not yet married. Now I know what dating is like and I know when you're dating there's so much romance and all of that and you know you want to play huggy bear and smacky mouth and all of that. I understand that.

But just be quiet now. But listen, after you get married you'll have plenty of time for that and then you'll have a lot of time left over. And that's when you're going to get to know one another. And you see, let me tell you, opposites attract. Not only physically are boys attracted to girls and girls attracted to boys but psychologically opposites attract. You've proven that.

Yeah, sure. You see, why do opposites attract? Well, we see in the other person that which is missing in us. For example, physically a man says woman was taken out of me.

I'm incomplete without her. That's the reason why she's called my better half or the other part of me. And psychologically many times an opposite will attract. Let me give you an illustration. Sometimes a person who's very fastidious or just, you know, just can't stand anything that's not in its place will marry a person who's kind of sloppy.

Now, why is that? Well, the sloppy person sees the fastidious person and says, boy, I like the way he or she's got it all together. And the very fastidious person may say, you know, I wish I weren't such a bother over trifles.

I like his free and easy or her free and easy way. So we see in the other person we think strengths where we have weaknesses. Now, we don't figure it out in our head.

It's very subliminal. Many times an extrovert will marry an introvert. It's incredible how many early risers will marry late sleepers and so forth. True. And it's incredible how many times a spin thrift will marry a penny pitcher.

It's incredible. But it's easy to understand why we do that, because in doing that, we're trying to supplement weaknesses that we see in ourselves or firm strengths that we see in our partner. But remember this. The same thing that caused attraction before marriage will cause friction after marriage. And if you understand that's why you got married, you can laugh at it and just accept it. And getting married is like buying a phonograph record.

You buy it because you want what's on one side and you just take what comes on the other side. OK, the same way it is in getting married. Don't marry one another if you think that you're going to marry this person to make them over.

Just accept the differences and remember that God put those differences in you to help both of you to grow in patience and to learn from the other and to encourage one another. But I'm going to tell you, you will have psychological problems adjusting. I don't want that to frighten you. I just want you to be forewarned.

It can happen. Did you know that I've been married for longer than you're old and my bride is sitting down there and I love her very much? When I married her, I married a sweet, beautiful young lady.

Now I'm married to a complicated, beautiful, mature lady. And she's still getting adjusted to me and I'm still getting adjusted to her because we're changing all the time. So adjustment goes on all the time. You will never, ever just say, OK, that's that's finished. We're adjusted one to another. You will adjust to one another as long as you live. And it's going to take a lot of prayer.

And sometimes in your marriage, you'll get so close to the wall, you won't even be able to tell what color it is. You will need some help. You'll need some help. And if you need some help, don't be too proud to come to someone as a counselor, as a friend. OK. Preferably a pastor or a trusted, dedicated Christian who is full of maturity. As much as your parents love you, it's probably not wise to take your problems to your parents. So sometimes now this is not to say that you won't share your problems with your parents.

And it certainly doesn't mean that you don't go to them for advice when it's needed and when you want it. But you're going to have to leave, father and mother, cleave unto your wife and you too will become one flesh. Well, the honeymoon things will be pretty good. But after a while, when you get down, there's so many things you've never thought of.

Vacations, telephone calls, in-laws, gifts at Christmas time, children. How many? What kind of automobile are we going to have? Where are we going to live? All of these things. It's going to take a lot of adjustment. All right.

Are you willing to do that? And remember that opposites attract. And so you're going to discover some things that attracted you that you wouldn't even dreamt of later. Now, thirdly, and I want you to listen to this, not only should you be one physically and not only should you be one psychologically, but the only way that you can do that is to be one spiritually. There's a union of your bodies, a union of your souls, but then you're still only two thirds married. There must be a union of your spirits. You see, the Bible says a threefold cord is not easily broken. Now, how can you have this union of your spirits?

Well, let me tell you how. You see, in everybody's life, there is a throne, the center of control, the control center. I'll just call it a throne. And by nature, we're full of self and self wants to be on that throne.

All right. Now, let's get a fictitious couple. Let's call him James and let's call her Mary. OK, now James is on the throne of his own life and Mary's on the throne of her life. So King James and Queen Mary decide that they're going to get married. Both of them still on the throne of their life. And so they get married.

A lot of moonlight and roses and candles and and all of this. And then they move into one apartment. Two kingdoms under one roof.

All right. What did Jesus say? A kingdom divided against itself cannot stand. And sooner or later, there's going to be war between those two kingdoms. Do you know what most of our arguments are? Ego against ego, self against self.

There are no problems too big to solve, just people too small to solve them. Before long, there's going to be a war between those two kingdoms. It may be a hot war throwing a frying pan.

It may be a cold war, just not speaking. And after a while, a tragedy comes along called a divorce. And how tragic that is. How tragic that is. Divorce is not an option, dear friend, in the Bible. All right. The Bible says God hates divorce, hates putting away.

Marriage is a lifetime contract, OK? Now, what would happen, though, if King James becomes a Christian? In order for him to become a Christian, King James has to step down from the throne of his life and enthrone King Jesus. Queen Mary, if she becomes a Christian, she steps down off the throne of her life and enthrones King Jesus. Now, how many kingdoms are there? Just one kingdom, because Jesus rules both thrones.

Here's a wonderful secret. The Jesus in James is not going to fight the Jesus in Mary. And the Jesus in Mary is not going to fight the Jesus in James. If Christ is on the throne of both lives, are going to be one spiritually, you're going to be able to pray together, worship together.

Watch what's going to happen. Because you're one spiritually, it's so much easier to be one psychologically, OK? Because where is the problem psychologically? Why can't we heal our arguments?

Because of rotten ego. But when we take self off the throne and enthrone Christ, then we can solve those problems. And when we're one spiritually, then we become one psychologically.

Now, watch this. When we're one psychologically, it's so much easier to be one physically, because you can't be arguing one moment and having romance the next, you see. It's all tied together.

And what a lot of people don't realize is their relationship to God in heaven is linked to their relationship to one another, even physically in the physical act of marriage. Now, listen, it's not going to be easy, but it's going to be worth it. You won't see a lot of other kids. They're doing things that you can't do.

But really, you wouldn't want to do it. They're going to be boozing around, sleeping around. They're not going to be in church. You're going to say, hey, everything's passing us by. Don't worry about them. Commit your life to Jesus, to one another, to his church. Be faithful, and I'll promise you, I'll promise you, when you get to be an old coot like me, you'll look back and you'll say it's worth it, truly worth it. .