The quote explained why many single people fear marriage and many married people struggle with their relationship: “Single? No, I am just in a relationship with freedom!” For many, commitment in a relationship means feeling trapped and miserable.
Others don’t see the connection between commitment and freedom at all. As one person said, “I am free to do anything I want. My life has not changed a bit after marriage.” Is that kind of limitless freedom the goal? Should marriage bring with it changes in the relationship?
Part of the challenge of navigating freedom, commitment, and teamwork in marriage can be a lack of healthy models. If you’ve been exposed to a toxic version of commitment or a freedomless version of marriage, it’s hard to know what a healthy relationship looks like. The Bible provides a unique solution. And God Himself models what it looks like.
Unity in Diversity
When God creates humanity, the Bible says, “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27). It’s the first mention of gender in the Bible and it comes in an explanation of our creation in God’s image. The point is that although men and women may be unique in various ways, they share a common purpose (Genesis 1:26) the same way that the members of the Trinity do. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit each have distinct roles, but they have a common vision. A couple should try to come to a shared understanding of what God has created them to do and work to see how they can best partner together in that. The work of marriage like the work of parenting needs to be owned by both partners.
Two Become One
When the Bible first describes marriage, it talks of the man and the woman becoming “one flesh.” As Jesus later says, “they are no longer two but one” (Matthew 19:6). The fact that God is three persons and yet one being prepares us for a vision of marriage marked by profound unity without a loss of individuality. But a marriage that functions like two single people just sharing a bed isn’t a biblical marriage. Biblical oneness involves sharing your hopes and fears, but it also involves sharing your decisions, your time, and your responsibilities. If you understand that you’ve become one, you look for ways to grow closer to one another and avoid the things that would drive you apart.
Submission and Sacrifice
While God spells out the fact that marriage requires submission (Ephesians 5:21-22) and sacrifice (Ephesians 5:25), I love the way that Jesus models both. When Jesus said of the Father, “He has not left me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to him” (John 8:29), nobody thought He was trapped in a loveless relationship. In fact, it was so attractive that the next verse says that “many believed in him.” When He said, “not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22:42), He was modeling the kind of sacrifice that partners make out of love for one another. Jesus shows that love is giving oneself to another but does so in a way that preserves dignity, individuality, and self-worth. In marriage, couples make these kinds of sacrifices for one another as an expression of their love and the new unity that they have entered into.
May God help us to imitate the unity that God Himself models for us.
In awe of Him,
Paul
