Got Sweat?

In a recent marriage enrichment retreat, the keynote speaker emphasized how much work it took to create a healthy and growing marriage. After nearly 35 years of marriage myself, I can identify. Or at least I can imagine how much work it took for my wife to tolerate me all this time and refrain from making herself a widow. As one minister said to a young couple in the midst of premarital counseling, "When you wake up each morning and look at your wife in curlers, you have to tell yourself again you love her. She'll have to say the same thing each day as your stomach expands and your hairline retreats!" Love comes out of the commitment, and commitment takes work. Got sweat?

Marriage isn't the only thing that takes work to keep the commitment strong. Keeping a church on track in fulfilling its purpose and mission takes work. It takes cooperation. It takes personal sacrifice. It takes humility. It takes honest acknowledgement that the body of Christ is not made up of one part, but rather many parts, and they are all important (Romans 12; I Corinthians 12). Every contribution made by a church member in the name of Christ for the sake of the Kingdom of God is valuable and is to be honored.

Giving honor to others when you'd like some is work. Working when others get the honor takes humility, patience, and perseverance. Making the effort to get the job done regardless of whose responsibility it might be takes work. Doing all things for the glory of God and as if you were doing it for Christ himself may be rewarding, but it is still work. Making sure you are effective (that's doing the right thing) instead of being dominated by doing things right (that's being efficient) takes hard work. Yet it is the only way a congregation will find itself obedient before God.

The one supreme purpose of the people of God is give him glory and honor. Everything else that might be named is a method by which we can do that. The first and greatest commandment is to love God (Matthew 22). No one shows love by sitting on their anatomy all day. Ask any wife who has to look at her couch-potato husband. He could show a lot more love by mowing the yard and painting the house, or better yet, vacuuming the carpet and washing the clothes. That's love! It's also work.

The church honors and glorifies God best when it in obedience goes into the fields of the world where souls are ready to be harvested and loves those souls as God loves them (John 4). In those fields the church will work up a sweat feeding the hungry and providing a roof for the homeless. The church will visit the sick, the elderly, and the imprisoned. The church will offer a hand to the weak and friendship to the lonely. The church will provide hope to the hopeless and the path of salvation to those who are dying while trying to make it on their own (Matthew 25). The church will do it all in the name of Jesus Christ. That may be joyful, but it can turn into hard work.

You cannot exempt associations and conventions. They have responsibilities before God as well. They too will be held accountable for putting feet and hands to the love they are supposed to be showing their God. As they support the local church in its efforts to fulfill the Great Commission, they are doing the work for which they were created. As they provide resources which can only be provided as churches work together, they are accomplishing their purpose. Associations and conventions cannot be successful holding meetings and talking about the terrible condition of the world. They must be at work and that will create sweat.

It is the rare thing of value we find in this world that can be gained without work and personal investment. Most often they require a great deal of effort. They require personal sacrifice. Marriages, friendships, freedom, these require work and effort and sweat whether physical, emotional, or mental. One thing that stands out from all these is the love of God and the grace for eternal life we find in it. No amount of work can earn it. No amount of personal sacrifice will make us good enough to have it. It's free (Romans 6:23). The sweat we save for the life of obedience that says thank you.

Prepared for Commitment

A contract says you are making a commitment whether it for buying houses and cars or service contracts for our computers and copiers. We sign contracts for our rental agreements and our utilities. Contracts, both written and oral, are a basic part of our lives.

Every contract is an understood agreement that there will be a system of give and take among the contract parties. Part of the understanding is that the participants in the contract are prepared to meet the terms. This is no mystery, but with this general understanding, it is still amazing how many contracts are broken because someone was not prepared.

Lack of preparation can exist because a party is not committed to the contract in the first place, or because some scenarios are not foreseen. This leaves parties in the contract unable to meet their obligations even though they had entered the agreement in full faith they could fulfill their commitment. External factors such as health or national economics can be beyond an individual's control.

What of those other situations where a break in the contract could have been avoided simply by making a choice? That involves the marriage contract. There may be some cultures where a party in a marriage has no choice, but that situation does not exist in America, at least not in a legal sense. A marriage exists here because two individuals willingly put their name on a document recognized by our government signifying a commitment to each other for some reason. We would like to think love had something to do with it.

A pastor friend of mine and I recently communicated on the North Carolina constitutional amendment relating to the definition of a married couple. In our discussion we brought up the definition of marriage that Jesus used in Matthew 19.

We both recognized that the question of gay marriages was not the subject of the controversy between Jesus and the religious rulers confronting him. Rather it was the question of the permissibility of divorce. My pastor friend's final comment was that it was odd that we would make such a big deal over homosexuality and its interpersonal manifestation but say so little from our pulpits about divorce, a subject on which Jesus spoke with much emotion.

Divorce nullifies a contract uniting two consenting adults. Rarely do the two people agree to the contract expecting it to end at some point short of death. Promises are numerous and dreams are big. The future is bright with the hope of a shared journey facing life together. Two together can succeed where one might fail. It is a beautiful vision.

Then along come the disagreements, the arguments, the unresolved tensions, the irreconcilable differences, and (I love this one) the decision that they are no longer compatible. A contract meant to last a lifetime is broken because situations arose for which the two individuals were not prepared to come to some form of acceptable agreement that would save the marriage.

If the divine intent was from the beginning for a man and a woman to join together in an intimate relationship designed to last a lifetime, why do nearly fifty percent of marriages in America end in divorce, even among professing Christians? Where is the voice of the Church in supporting God's plan for marriage? It spoke loud enough keep gay and polygamous marriages from being recognized as legal unions in our state. Where is the effort to hold together the marriages we say are right?

We should never enter into a contract for which we are not prepared. Marriage is a contract that should represent the self-sacrificing commitment by each of two individuals to live together in an intimate relationship that results in each one making the full effort to support the other, build up the other, honor the other above self, and work to assist the other in fulfilling their full potential in the eyes of God. Nothing can accomplish this better than making the commitment to love each other without reserve and without regret. We still hear those traditional phrases of "for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health" in wedding ceremonies. Marriages last when we are prepared to make such phrases a part of our commitment. Life brings changes, but the committed love between a man and a woman sealed in marriage should not be lessened by them.

A Minor Suggestion

In less than a week North Carolina voters will have determined if they want a state constitutional amendment saying the only legal union recognized by the state and defined as marriage will be between one man and one woman. Often called an anti-gay amendment, this amendment is far broader than that. Such unions as polygamy and communal marriages would also be declared unconstitutional, not to mention unions involving one partner with two legs and the other partner having four.

If the amendment does not pass, legal action is already pending in North Carolina that if found in favor of the plaintiffs would declare unconstitutional current state statutes defining marriage as between one man and one woman. This would open the door to court cases seeking state approval for a diversity of relationships such as polygamy. This scenario, combined with a broadening definition of hate crimes, would leave individuals in numerous difficult situations while trying to fulfill what they deem as their Christian responsibilities.

Will a minister be able to say that he will perform only a wedding ceremony in which the participants are one man and one woman? Will a congregation be able to say its facilities can be used only for services or ceremonies that are in line with its religious convictions? Will a minister be able to expound upon biblical texts in a way that says sexual behavior that deviates from the one man-one woman traditional relationship are antithetical to the will of God? This of course does not begin to address the issues of age restrictions and the definitions of adulthood which may also be seen by some as arbitrary and discriminatory.

I suggest for consideration a proposal that the twenty-first century Church return to an understanding of its role similar to that of the first and second century Church. Proclaim the gospel as the written word of God. Forget all those twenty-seven adjectives that some feel they have to attach to the phrase. It is the written word of God. Proclaim it as God-breathed (II Tim. 3). Take the lumps that come with preaching the truth. If you get fined or sent to jail, count yourself blessed (Matthew 5).

Agree to presiding in wedding ceremonies that God will recognize and bless according to the standards he has set (Matthew 19). To do this with integrity involves insisting on the participants themselves understand God’s expectations for a marriage he will bless. This will be made easier if ministers refuse to perform a wedding as a representative with state granted authority (“By the power invested in me by God and the state of…). If a couple wants secular recognition, let them go to a magistrate, get the marriage license signed, and say the proper “I do’s”. With the announcement by the magistrate, they will be recognized as married by the state. Then they can come to the church facilities and receive the blessings of God upon a marriage that should last until death ends it.

Is this an unforgiveable separation of church and state? I don't think so. Rather is this not the Church standing up and saying we are not the state? Is this not the Church standing up and saying we are different from the state, we operate under a different set of standards from the state, and we answer to no one but our God (Acts 4)? We fight compromise, yet demanding that the secular state recognize our divine commission may be the worst compromise of all.