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Old 07-21-2009, 10:59 AM
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PaulB PaulB is offline
 
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: The Northwest of England
Posts: 158
Default Greenbear

Hello again Greenbear,

Thank you for responding to my post I find your thoughts interesting.
The question still arises in my heart (in the fleshly sense!) if Jacob could marry a number of women and Muslims can then why am I disqualified? (Not that I would truly want another, as one can be hard enough to live with!)

1 Corinthians 7:24 “Brethren, let every man, wherein he is called, therein abide with God.”

Personally Greenbear I don’t see this as a way of authorising a number of wives to be joined together by God as “one flesh”. Yes, there are occasions in the OT were things happened that are contrary to the norm, but the historical recording of them isn’t the spiritual endorsement of them.

Mk.10: 5-9 “And Jesus answered and said unto them, For the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept. But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife;
And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.

There may have been acts recorded in the OT that tell us what happened throughout God’s plan of redemption up until Christ restored the direct connection between God & man. But when you say “where is my Scripture reference to prove that something stopped happening?” (as in more than one wife is being a genuine reflection of biblical marriage). The reverse can also be applied – Where is the scripture reference to prove that God has ordained more than one wife to be a genuine reflection of biblical marriage?

Th above passage is what I see as being joined together as one and the words of Jesus are spoken to restore the correct concept of marriage from all of its previous and present deviations. Because when you look at it – even the Pharisees were finding excuses to put away their wives in order to marry another – otherwise what would be the point, why not just add a new wife to existing ones?

Secondly, your reference concerning the provision of a man over his household:

1 Timothy 5:8 “But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel.”

This is not speaking about a man with many wives – but is addressing the basic responsibilities of those who name the name of Christ and were in danger of denying the faith by avoiding them. Now having said that, I do believe (regarding the man with 7 wives scenario) that he is responsible to feed, clothe and provide for those whom he has under his roof, but I don’t see any justification that he is to sleep with them all, as he did before. The future of those women is a difficult one but only one of them can truly be his wife in the intimate sense – in effect he will not be divorcing the others as they are not all truly married to him.

I have heard of a Muslim in the UK who has a few wives but tells everyone that they are his sisters because he knows that his lifestyle is not permitted by the law system over here. Now if the law has that power how much more authority does Christ’s words on marriage?

Well, lets put it this way, would you apply the same passage to a homosexual couple that claim to be validly married (i.e. 1 Corinthians 7:24 “Brethren, let every man, wherein he is called, therein abide with God.”). Not at all! (but what about their wedding album and all of those intimate memories, what if they have adopted children who have only known them as mom and dad?)
Does this mean that they must remain “one flesh” (as they were called?). somehow I don’t think so!

What about a western man who has two wives as an outright act of polygamy (and has children with both). Let’s say that neither wife knows of the existence of the other or of the children and then he gets saved! Does this man remain wherein he is called?

I once had a minister publicly rebuke me because I refused to baptise a woman who was living with an unsaved man as though they were a married couple. As I see it I would have been authorising something that Scripture gives me no grounds to do so and that is how I look at the scenarios above. Once leeway is granted then where do you draw the line before it gets ridiculous?
Was I unreasonable because I expected that woman to get married or move out before she got baptised or would it have been the Christian thing to do by just pleasing the crowd?

When I say all of this, please believe me that there s no malice in any of my words or thoughts towards you. All that I hold is a conviction to uphold the word with the motive of interacting with other believers on deep, sensitive and practical issues. Because these are scenarios that churches are now facing and pastors are seeking answers to them.

If things like these are raised it gives all of us the opportunity to think in depth about how we can address them.

God bless Greenbear

PaulB