Sinai was a further means of sanctifying His people, to be a priestly nation: You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians and how I bore you on eagles wings, and brought you to Myself. For they will turn your sons away from following Me to serve other gods; then the anger of the. We must distinguish between truth and error, between good and evil, between holiness and unrighteousness. We must begin by taking the Bible literally, and thus we acknowledge that any act of adultery must be avoided. Can you guess what that was? John did not hesitate, even for a moment. Because of its significance and the power behind it, we use it gingerly. In chapter 35, Ruben lay with one of his fathers concubines (35:22). They made their lives miserable with hard labor (Exodus 1). 8-10). Our culture is adamantly opposed to the sanctity of sex. Bob is a pastor/teacher and elder at Community Bible Chapel in Richardson, Texas, and has contributed many of his Bible study series for use by the Foundation. Exodus 2:10 And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. Since marriage matters to God, it should matter to believers too. (3) While David enjoyed sexual intimacy with Bathsheba, even though forbidden, Uriah refused such pleasure, even when legitimate and encouraged by the king. All rights reserved. Sanctification, therefore, was the first test which God gave mankind, and it was this test which man failed. The dictionary highlights this when it points out the Biblical origin of the word (Merriam-Websters.com, 2022). If one were so serious as to be willing to pluck out an eye or cut off a hand then that persons attitude is what it should be with regard to adultery. Thus, one should be careful not to think or say that since adultery is a sin against a marriage, it has also, de facto, terminated the marriage. The Law pertaining to adultery also confirms the sanctity of marriage. And the man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him. I do, however, believe that the first sin is similar to that of adultery, and thus very instructive. In Ephesians chapter 5 Paul focuses on the relationship between the Christian husband and wife, and the way it portrays an important spiritual truth to the world: So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. My people consult their wooden idol, and the diviners wand informs them; For a spirit of harlotry has led them astray, And they have played the harlot, departing from their God (Hos. Thus, whatever one does, he does in union with Christ. You may wonder what wood chisels have to do with the Seventh Commandment. We must remember that those who teach and lead are held to higher accountability (James 3:1). There is no one greater in this house than I, and he has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. It can dull the mind, like wine, making one insensitive to reality (Hos. Hence I have said to you, You are to possess their land, and I Myself will give it to you to possess it, a land flowing with milk and honey. I am the LORD your God, who has separated you from the peoples. Published by at February 16, 2022. For why should you, my son, be exhilarated with an adulteress, And embrace the bosom of a foreigner? Yes, Marriage Matters to God. Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a harlot is one body with her? And she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I drew him out of the water. The word fornication comes from the Greek term porneia (from which we . The sexual immorality of Israel has defiled the people and the land, and necessitates their expulsion from the land. Satan made great promises about the benefits of partaking of the fruit of that tree, but he failed to tell all. 29:20. 11. Marriage is sanctified in the degree to which a man and his wife have fellowship with one another. For they will turn your sons away from following Me to serve other gods; then the anger of the Lord will be kindled against you and He will quickly destroy you. May it never be! It is about friendship first and foremost. Any books with similarly powerful stories that you can suggest. Nevertheless, the rest of the Pentateuch (the Pentateuch is the five books of the Old Testament, written by Moses) provides us with a great deal of detail concerning sexual sins, and the various forms of punishment required by each. Sexual sin is also related to religious apostasy (cf. He had promised Abraham that his descendants would become a great nation (Genesis 17). Judaism condemned adultery and sexual immorality, as can be seen from John chapter 8. There are many things and situations where people make an exodus. The opposite is true. "If a man who has married a slave wife takes another wife for himself, he must not neglect the rights of the first wife to food, clothing, and sexual intimacy. Furthermore, there must be a distinction drawn between what is personally permissible and what is detrimental to others (cf. He joined the first man and the first woman together in marriage. Dr. Sandra Hamer Smith is a Christian and wife to Sylvester Smith. Satan, to save his skin, would begin to understand that he must begin to wage war on the seed of the woman. 4:3-8). Fellowship. 1 The reproduction of life is that function which is carried out within the marriage union, according to Gods design and decree. May God grant that we hold sex and marriage to be sacred, and may God enable each of us, by His grace and through His Spirit, to move ahead in the process of sanctification, to the praise of the glory of His grace. When some have read Deuteronomy 7:2-5, they conclude that God is opposed to intermarriage among the races. Sanctification involves purity, the absence of what is unclean. And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for immorality, and marries another commits adultery (Matt. Ex). From what we have already learned in Genesis, it is apparent that the Israelites understood what adultery was and that it was sin. michigan state coaching staff; The first is that the sanctity of marriage not only demands that we not defile the union in any way, including adultery, but that we actively seek to enhance the marriage. We sanctify sex because we value it highly, as a good gift from the hand of a gracious God. The consequences of either guilt or innocence are spelled out (vss. Why should I pardon you? Who knows better how to hurt his mate than the one who has the most intimate knowledge of her? Your sons have forsaken Me And sworn by those who are not gods. Deuteronomy 22When a man accuses his wife of not being a virgin at the time they were married, the parents can show her (blood-stained) garment as proof of her purity. After Joseph and his generation died, a new king arose over Egypt who was not familiar with Joseph (Exodus 1:6-8). Finally, we shall attempt to distill the biblical teaching into a few guiding and governing principles. God has here joined a man and a woman so that they have become a unity. "You shall have no other gods before me. When we thus honor marriage, we will see to it that the marriage bed, the blessing of sexual union, remains undefiled by sexual union outside of that marriage, which profanes. 4:4), and holding the marriage bed in honor, keeping the marriage bed undefiled (Heb. (1) Jesus had come to bear the penalty for sinners, and thus He did not come to condemn anyone, but to offer salvation to all (cf. 13:4) implies that not every sexual practice of the pagan world is permissible or beneficial for the Christian. . Flee immorality. Just as God placed the forbidden fruit in sight and within the reach of Adam and Eve, so the forbidden fruit of sexual immorality is visible and available. (2) Jesus was speaking to a Jewish audience, while most of the apostles addressed Gentiles. v. 24). Numbers 12:1 And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married: for he had married an Ethiopian woman. Sexual intercourse with a harlot, contrary to popular thought, is no casual matter, it is a union as well. 34:7). For a while, Shaun was dating Dr. Carly Lever (Jasika Nicole), a pathologist. His brothers gave him an unplanned exodus simply because his father adored him (Genesis 37:3-4). Our culture believes that the obtaining of a certificate of divorce legitimizes adultery. Our sanctification cannot be expressed or realized apart from a radical change in our sexual conductthat is, a radical change in the way we conduct ourselves sexually, as contrasted with our former conduct and that of the pagan world around us. Intimacy. The second layer of application relates to the church. The forbidden fruit was forbidden, not because of any evil characteristic of the fruit itself, but because God sanctified or set it apart. him--perhaps to share his tent. If you look at Exodus 1:5, you will see that seventy souls had come out of Jacob and arrived in Egypt with Joseph. That is a topic for another article. Deuteronomy 7:4. There are several reasons for the difference in the emphasis of our Lord from that of the Old Testament, which condemned adultery and demanded the death penalty. I honestly don't think I'll ever be the same. Smith lives and resides in Memphis, Tennessee. The Bible is full of Israelite men marrying foreign women. So, too, the pleasures of sexual sin are prominently proclaimed, but the price for immorality is exceedingly high (cf. It's been a long road, but on . (NIV) Exodus 22:16-17, which seems to be a restating of the same law, sheds some light on this passage: If a man seduces a virgin who is not betrothed and lies with her, he shall give the bride-price for her and make her his wife. Some died on the spot for murmuring and complaining about Moses (Numbers 16:33). Marriage is defined in Scripture as a covenant before God, joining a man and a woman together for their lives ( Genesis 2:24 ). While the seduction of a virgin entails either marriage to the virgin or the payment of her dowry price to the father, sexual union with a married woman is punishable by death. Jesus did not have nearly as much to say about adultery and sexual immorality as did the apostles. 12:13; Ps. Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? God is God, and He can manage timelines as well. He responded, Ill bet youve been using that Stanley wood chisel to scrape gaskets off of automobile engines again.. Exodos means leave, and the book of Exodus tells how the nation of Israel left Egypt. The Mohar.The funds, called mohar, are so important that this clause is called ikkar ketubahthe basic part of the ketubah, or simply the ketubah. We will discover in our lesson that marriage and sex were also sanctified by God. We must even distinguish between what is personally permissible and what is personally beneficial (1 Cor. Her restoration is described as a marriage between God and His bride. Anytime you hear the word exodus, it causes you to notice. For God has not called us for the purpose of impurity, but in sanctification (1 Thess. 13:27). Physical intimacy is the most obvious, but there is also a spiritual and emotional intimacy. He joined the first man and the first woman together in marriage. According to Matthew 19:9, if one divorces and marries another (except for the divorce based on the immorality of the other partner) that person commits adultery. Why Did Pharaoh Tell Joseph to Enjoy the 'Fat of the Land'? Article Images Copyright 2023 Getty Images unless otherwise indicated. 6:15-20). This is not one of the high points in Abrams life. Adultery mocks the union of a man and his wife, and the God who joined them together. We sanctify those things to which we attach great value. We can learn from the book Exodus that the Israelites continued to cry out to God until He delivered them. In both the New and Old Testaments we are urged to let the pleasure and enjoyment of sex within marriage serve as a godly defense against sexual immorality:44. and I will make you swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I live. Remember that God made it, and that all He made was good. Robert L. (Bob)Deffinbaugh graduated from Dallas Theological Seminary with his Th.M. Smith is also a playwrightand poet. The main focus of Exodus is to describe Gods deliverance of Israel and how He made them a great nation (The KJV Study Bible, Barbour Publishing, 2011). And the LORD GOD fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. I think there is little evidence for this conclusion. Moreover, you shall not follow the customs of the nation which I shall drive out before you, for they did all these things, and therefore I have abhorred them. He is a purist in that regardI am not. I also believe that humans will not stop the plan of God. When our Lord commented on this text He said, Consequently they are no more two, but one flesh. The husband and wife become one. Then the LORD GOD said, It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him. And out of the ground the LORD GOD formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. So David sent and inquired about the woman. Away from his family, perhaps never again to return to his own people, how easy it would have been for him to succumb to the advances of his masters wife: And it came about after these events that his masters wife looked with desire at Joseph, and she said, Lie with me. But he refused and said to his masters wife, Behold, with me around, my master does not concern himself with anything in the house, and he has put all that he owns in my charge. Q. Sexual purity begins with highly esteeming that which God has givenmarriage, and the one whom God has givenour mate. The sexually immoral, such as the woman caught in the act of adultery, honestly acknowledged their sin, but the scribes and Pharisees were hypocritical, refusing to acknowledge their own self-righteousness. 4:11-12). If we have accepted the principle of sanctification in general, we must then see it in the particulars of our Christian experience. Now, he tells Abram that the blessings He will give him and all the nations will come through his seed. You are therefore to keep all My statutes and all My ordinances and do them, so that the land to which I am bringing you to live will not spew you out. I would suggest that the categories of unity, intimacy, reproduction, and fellowship are four specific benchmarks of the quality of our marriages, and thus four specific areas for concentrated effort. Therefore, if a man cleanses himself from these things, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified, useful to the Master, prepared for every good work. The epidemic of sexual immorality is, I believe, the result of a failure to understand or appreciate the sanctity of sex and of marriage. While illicit sexual union is a sin, those unions which violate a marriage are taken more seriously. One of these particulars is that of marriage. I believe that there are several ways in which marriage is sanctified: Unity. In a divine vision, God said to Peter, What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy (Acts 10:15). in 1971. Shall I then go to my house to eat and to drink and to lie with my wife? Christianity.com is a member of the Salem Web Network of sites including: Copyright 2023, Christianity.com. Every daughter who comes into possession of an inheritance of any tribe of the sons of Israel shall be wife to one of the family of the tribe of her father, so that the sons of Israel each may possess the inheritance of his fathers. If you owned a Mercedes Benz, would you loan it to a neighbor to go hunting in, or to haul firewood? The reason seems to be solely because God has sanctified the marriage and the sexual sin has profaned it. Bible Answer: Marriage between people of different races occurs every day in spite of the conflicts that occur between nations and different interest groups. He does not necessarily teach that attitudinal sins are as bad as action sins. If the Seventh Commandment teaches the sanctity of marriage, it also teaches the sanctity of sex, for it is only in marriage that the pleasure and product (children) are to be experienced. But it is also referred to regularly in later Bible books. Ed, Issue 46, Winter 2023. 7:3-5). So Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan displeased his father Isaac;read more.and Esau went to Ishmael, and married, besides the wives that he had, Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael, Abrahams son, the sister of Nebaioth. Throughout the Scriptures, both Old Testament (cf. Moses is born, and placed in a basket in the reeds of Nile. Genesis 31:38-40 This twenty years have I been with thee; thy ewes and thy she goats have not cast their young, and the rams of thy flock have I not eaten, Philippians 4:11,12 Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content, Exodus 4:20-25 And Moses took his wife and his sons, and set them upon an ass, and he returned to the land of Egypt: and Moses took the rod of God in his hand, Exodus 18:2-6 Then Jethro, Moses' father in law, took Zipporah, Moses' wife, after he had sent her back, . Israel remained in the wilderness for forty years. It is little wonder, then, that God has so much to teach man about sanctification in the Bible. Moses -- a great Israelite leader, prophet and lawgiver, Conjunctive waw | Verb - Hifil - Consecutive imperfect - third person masculine singular, To show willingness, be pleased, determine, undertake (to do anything), Preposition-l | Verb - Qal - Infinitive construct, To sit down, to dwell, to remain, to settle, to marry, Conjunctive waw | Verb - Qal - Consecutive imperfect - third person masculine singular, Noun - feminine singular construct | third person masculine singular, Preposition-l | Noun - proper - masculine singular. If these Jewish leaders condemned sins which were overtly wrong actions, Jesus chose to focus on those hidden sins which were attitudes. (It is better for society that a man only think of murder than it is for him to take a life.) 5:7-9). Lev. The old dependent and submissive relationship of child to parent had to be set aside so that this unity of husband and wife could be established (v. 24). Now Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him away to Paddan-aram to take to himself a wife from there, and that when he blessed him he charged him, saying, You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan, and that Jacob had obeyed his father and his mother and had gone to Paddan-aram. The Tennessee native is a member of Temple of Deliverance COGIC, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc, Omicron Delta Kappa, The Golden Key International Honour Society, and Kappa Delta Pi. and that we will not give our daughters to the peoples of the land or take their daughters for our sons. I have heard it cruelly stated or implied that had a mate satisfied his or her partner in marriage, adultery would have been prevented. Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers, OT Law: Exodus 2:21 Moses was content to dwell (Exo. The higher the vote, the further up an answer is. The text says: Then the LORD God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.". When God brought man and woman together as husband and wife, He commanded them to be fruitful and multiply (Gen. 1:27-28). Later, God commanded Moses to take a census of all the Israelite men over 20 years old, which amounted to six hundred thousand and three thousand and five hundred and fifty. (Numbers 1:46). Joseph ended up in Egypt away from his family and did not understand until decades later when his brothers came to Egypt why all these events occurred (Genesis 50:20). When we sanctify sex, it is because we value it highly, not because we disdain it as something of little worth. but the scene where Cecilia says goodbye to Sean in Exodus literally broke me. Neither man nor beast was allowed to draw too near to it (Exod. First, I believe that a Christian has the right to divorce a spouse for adultery, but that this is never ones duty, and seldom ones highest calling. To me, my Stanley wood chisel is a very fine instrument for scraping old gasket material off an automobile engine. Marriage, by Gods decree, is sanctified, it is a relationship that is set apart and restricted. Leviticus 18 and 20 emphasize the defiling nature of adultery, and warn that the practice of such sins will defile the land and will result in expulsion from the land, just as the Canaanites were expelled (cf. Furthermore, He may even appear to be lenient on those guilty of immorality. At times we are tempted to think that what God has called clean is really unclean (as was the case with Peter; cf. It is against the backdrop of Israels history as described in Genesis that the Seventh Commandment is given to the Israelites: You shall not commit adultery (Exod. The Real Housewives of Atlanta The Bachelor Sister Wives 90 Day Fiance Wife Swap The Amazing Race Australia Married at First Sight The Real Housewives of Dallas My 600-lb Life Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. But do not let immorality or any impurity or greed even be named among you, as is proper among saints; and there must be no filthiness and silly talk, or coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks. For if you ever go back and cling to the rest of these nations, these which remain among you, and intermarry with them, so that you associate with them and they with you. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage shall he not diminish, Lo!, whether?, if, although, Oh that!, when, not, Verb - Qal - Imperfect - third person masculine singular, To scrape off, to shave, remove, lessen, withhold, Noun - masculine singular construct | third person feminine singular, Flesh, as living, for, food, food of any kind, kindred by blood, Noun - feminine singular construct | third person feminine singular, Conjunctive waw | Noun - feminine singular construct | third person feminine singular, Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers, OT Law: Exodus 21:10 If he takes another wife to himself (Exo. My master made me swear, saying, You shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I live; So Isaac called Jacob and blessed him and charged him, and said to him, You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan. The Israelites themselves were set apart from the Egyptians and from all other nations. John 3:16-17). Thus, it was not necessary for our Lord to dwell on the sinfulness of sexual immorality, since the Jews of His day agreed with Him on this point. This intimacy can be both constructive and destructive. 2. Second, in order to avoid the evils of sex, we need to minimize our exposure to those things which only stimulate lustful thoughts and sexual temptations. Our culture protests that Christians disdain and demean sex, that we have little appreciation for it. The same could be asked about your best china, or that very special dress (maybe even your wedding dress). 19:4-6a). (4) While Uriah was willing to lay down his life for the king and the nation, David was willing to take Uriahs life to save his own reputation and to satisfy his own sexual desires. First, we move from a Jewish to a Gentile culture. What is it that makes sexual purity so important to the New Testament saint, who is not an Israelite, but a member of the church, the body of Christ? To understand Johns response, you have to understand John. When the first sin was committed by partaking of the forbidden fruit God pronounced punishments which were appropriate to each party involved, as well as the consequences for all mankind.