It's Day By Day

The most common misperception in all humanity today on the subject of marriage is that it is a religious invention. Nothing could be more wrong and unproven in a very literal sense. We can deliberately pretend that indelibles in purity of human courtship and marriage do not exist, and so behave like a pack of canines; we can Hollywood it like laughing Hyenas, but in the end the obvious always bites the blood from us.

Even evolutionists love the standard cartoon of a gruff, club-wielding caveman dragging a smiling female by the hair to his cave. But evolutionists seem oblivious to the natural order depicted in their own picture:  We never see a gruff cave WOMAN dragging a smiling caveman. Nor do we see her with a cave-harem of meek, subdued cavemen. Such a depiction would be seen as ridiculous and not even comical simply because everyone just naturally knows perfectly well that such nonsense does not even fit our inborn human nature. It isn’t who we are nor even what we physically look like.

Even the hippies made the startling (to them) discovery the hard way that communal living and mate swapping is a shortcut to the death of what they were supposed to be about to begin with—PEACE! When the hippies finally matured (at around 35 or 40 years old) they rejoined the rest of us, coupled off, got jobs, married, and raised children. Oddly, though, Hollywood missed that news and went about bathing the kids in the slop bucket. They grew up to vote that way.

Out of that bounded another generation who somehow got crossed up on how to identify the sexes, although even the obvious will knock you down! These all set their sights on Hollywood, the major networks, the halls of congress and, of course, the public schools. These also grew up to vote. With that it was only a short distance to arming women with hefty billyclubs and men with powderpuffs. All such fantasies blinded them to the real world where men who lose their dignity and honor shoot such confused victims, rape women by the multitudes, take them hostage and enslave them for life. Friends, there is a real difference between men and women and we’d better never forget it. That fact of life is not about to change while we have breath.

So why does a guy think his chosen gal is worth fighting for? Why will a woman fight like a tigress for her chosen guy? Where did we come up with such natures, anyhow? What, exactly, is in hormone juice that lights up eyes for the OPPOSITE sex?

Towering over these questions is a mountain of answer (one big answer). Here’s a question for all of us: Why is the Book of Genesis the ONLY ancient record of human beginnings that matches up perfectly with who we actually and literally are today? It is truly the only mirror of the past we can look into and see our spitting image! It is telling us, “Honey, THIS is who you are, can’t you see that?” The smart thing for us to do would be to simply accept it and get back to true nature.

So here’s what all of this means: Love, marriage, and family predates Judaism, Christianity, and all the rest by thousands of years! We are all in the image of Genesis no matter what we try to make ourselves believe to the contrary, and nature itself always drives us back to it. If that were not true the human race would have drowned long ago in a tsunami of utter confusion. When this current age comes to the end of our freakish notions, out of that cloud of collapse will emerge those few who held onto the notion that Genesis fits us exactly as plainly described.

An extension of that logic would also tell us that if Genesis is us, we might also consider the whole volume which Genesis only begins. It gets far more specific before the last chapter. Plenty, in fact, to provide the criteria for the choosing of a mate for life. Here are a few things it makes indelibly clear for all humanity:

1. One must completely disengage the mind from any notion that the proposed marriage will be on a trial basis. Such a position has a name: Cowardice. You cannot fly a combat aircraft successfully with one hand on the ejection handle. If you blow the canopy the first time a bullet tears through your wing, you’re better off on the ground where you belong. Marriage is not a trip to heaven, but a new arena of life where one continues to fight for victory.

2. Settle it in your mind now that nobody is perfect. Yes, one can think that guy or gal is perfect during courtship; in fact; a couple can date so long they think they know each other like a proverbial book, only to be convinced during that first week of marriage that they were reading the wrong book! Adjusting to the new life of “One flesh” (Gen.2:24) can be the biggest hurdle one has to leap since birth! Why? Because both persons MUST CHANGE to make the marriage work. It will be in deep water immediately if either party fails to change in order to become one with their mate. Change is an absolute requirement, and the quicker the change, the smoother the transition. By her created nature and purpose, the woman finds this easier than the man because the man’s nature is to LEAD his family. However, the man must deliberately by design make his chosen woman part of his flesh by providing for what she needs in him. That is, consolation, security, assurance, affection, and other things a man was not accustomed to giving in his former aggressive single lifestyle. Sadly, on this point most marriages enter a battle of the sexes. Here is where they will make or break their marriage. Stubbornness in changing is usually the backbreaker—and heartbreaker. Unfortunately, in the majority of cases of marriage breakup, it is the man who refuses to change, either altogether or not enough. Disenchanted, the woman is finally driven to seek elsewhere for her natural needs, realized only in becoming one flesh with a man. There is no shortage.

3. One should seek diligently to understand this person one thinks to mate with for life. Unfortunately, the nature of courtship is the art of storefront advertising—best behavior, best manners, best perfume/lotion, best clothes, best places for a date, best everything. What’s the shortcut to the real person? There is one surefire way to find out what it’s really like in the store: Stop looking at the display and just walk into the store. Look behind counters, in closets, back rooms, etc. That’s where the truth lies. What you see there is what you’re going to get. The big sign in big letters on the front of the store reads “FAMILY!” That’s right, simply observe carefully his or her family. THAT, friends, is who this person really is inside. Even if they are non-Christian but you are a Christian, you must remember: He or she was raised from the cradle by those parents. They are the ones who built the brain wrinkles in their gray matter to think and make value judgments. There before you is a glaring indication of lifestyle, values, philosophies, talents, spiritual fortitude, responsibilities, reliability, keeping confidence, eating habits, TV watching, courtesies, prayer habits, games they play, love or disdain for animals, education, and much more. Each trait is what is apt to be transferred into your new home unless they are dealt with by both of you. It pays to be very, very observant here. Look especially hard at the parents and their character traits. Be very mindful of what you are learning about this family, so when you do marry that guy or gal you will have your eyes open. Surprise is what you are trying to avoid.

There is much more to choosing a mate for life than these brief words if one is to invest an entire life with them, but I will include one last vital point:

4. The Genesis ORDER AND PRIORITIES must be embraced by both marriage partners simply because of the overwhelming physical evidence today of who we all really are. Choosing a mate in a lifetime commitment absolutely requires it. One can marry otherwise, but the odds are sky high that it will not be for life. Getting married for marriage sake just because youthful hormones are running at peak is saturated with the volatile ingredients of unhappiness for everyone, especially the offspring.

So here is what is meant by “Order and Priorities:” Friends, the Genesis record tells us with crystal clarity that the man was created first. He was made from the earth and then given the breath of life (Gen. 1:27,28: 2:19-24). So there stood the first man, fully equipped in every respect for the purposes before him, including the yet missing “Help meet,” or companion and assistant suitable to the purpose. The man was to “dress” and to “keep” the Garden of Eden, for which God gave him the design of physical and mental strength to subdue and dominate what God created. Today man’s design is still there unchanged from the Genesis model. As to the woman, we see that God did not create her from the dust, but from a piece of what He had already created—the man. So there she stood, designed in every respect to fit the man perfectly, including her beauty, her ability to conceive offspring, including the design to give them birth and suckle. So today there they both still stand exactly as described in the Genesis model in every way.

That design, with its order and priorities, is not obsolete. It is still who we are. It is still a requirement for lifelong marital happiness, regardless of our notions to the contrary. All of the balance of Scripture which treats on the subject of marriage is built on that one model. All the answers for marital happiness are there in detail, waiting for those who seek answers to what troubles their marriage. But most importantly to our subject, these are the most vital ingredients we must consider BEFORE marriage if we are going to find a mate for life. It all depends on just how serious we are about the subject of marital happiness. Hormones holding the reins of the brain, and not the opposite, is not being serious, but selfish.

We should make a final observation: Although many remain celibate for life, and although Scripture speaks of some who did, the Genesis model tells us plainly that we are literally DESIGNED for courting the opposite sex, marriage, and propagating children for future humanity. That being true, life without it will leave us unfulfilled before our Creator who made us thus. This is why the blossoming youth are driven inwardly to the opposite sex—to fulfill the mandate to “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it” (Gen. 1:28). It therefore behooves us while we are young to think on this vital ingredient to happiness and fulfillment, to diligently seek it, to make it a priority, and so fulfill our Divine purpose. It is a mistake to passively wait for it, for like all things in life, they come through our God-given design of WILLFUL PURSUIT. And God designs, yes, but as the Genesis model sharply mandates, WE must fulfill.

PART ONE

Many will see that title, shrug, and move on, assuming the subject is simplistic and burned over. But it isn’t simplistic at all, and it has endured the flames of assumption, yet  stands there before us an unfazed monolith. In that title, you see, hangs Heaven or Hell for every soul ever born. We owe it to our own destiny to GET interested on purpose. The Scriptures even say of themselves, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path” (Psalm 119:105 KJV). Without this Word, and properly understood, our path is dark and our feet aimless. We will most certainly stray from that path without its true light.

There is a philosophical science in our world so unimaginably complex that only minds of genius can deal with it in depth. It is so comprehensive that no other science can even be processed without it. Basic to who we are and all that we do, without it we would have never left Eden and attempted to make any sense of our fallen world. What is it? It is the science of logic. It is a part of our God-given nature, but, alas, neither did that part of us escape human depravity as a result of our sin against God. Reason though we may, our power of logic also fell to ruin at its base.

But we should give careful thought to each Scripture regarding the Divine Word of God, the light it gives, the direction it points us to. Why? Because the synonym for what we do with the Word of God is DOCTRINE, a product of our logic. We hear or see a thing, reason about it, and then decide what we believe about. That is called DOCTRINE. It’s what you personally have believed is the truth. Simple as that.

One day when Jesus preached to the multitudes, his words were so exclusive that many of his listeners walked away and ceased following him. He turned to his disciples and asked, “Will you also go away?” But Peter spoke powerfully: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:67,68). In Peter’s staggering words stands also the truth of Jesus shocking statement regarding the Kingdom of God: “Few there be that find it” (Matt.  7:14). The Greek word there for “few” means puny, little. It does not mean anything like a third of humanity, or even a fourth. It means only a pinch of it!

Now, this truth is startling. Jesus came, died, and was resurrected for the entirety of humanity, and yet he foresaw that only a smattering of us will escape the Hell prepared for those who reject their only source of redemption. That, friends, should sober us all! What we believe about the Word of God is lighted dynamite in our hands. We don’t play with a lighted stick of dynamite, and we’d better not play with Bible doctrine. DOCTRINE IS EVERYTHING when it comes to spiritual truth.

Ministers of God’s Word who fail to emphasize sound doctrine each time they mount the pulpit, and fail to carefully point out false doctrine, are failing at their task before God. The truth is that simple and uncomplicated in its logic. This is difficult if ministers are comfortable fellowshipping inter-denominationally with ministers who preach false doctrine from their pulpits under the compromising belief that God called them all to different purposes, so who are we to say they are wrong? This is erroneous Biblical logic. God’s church is not a cyclopes with 700 heads pulling in 700 different directions of so-called Biblical truth, all of them right. No, the lost human race desperately needs the pure truth once for all delivered to the saints, and anything else will lead to no good in the end. Oh, yes, we can have our civic responsibilities in common, but we’d do well to part company with doctrinal error, and keep a safe distance.

Nevertheless, the science and logic debate is ever with us. Thank God for it. Unfortunately, very early the church backslid away from the pure truth once delivered to it and failed, as she still is doing today, to repent and do her first works over again (Rev. 2:5). So, the natural human compensation for the loss gave rise to the need for the philosophical sciences to come forward in the defense of the Christian faith on the platform of debate. This sends a glitch into Christianity. You see, Ancient Greeks and Romans such as Plato, Aristotle, Socrates and others virtually cut their teeth on the science of logic and debate. With the cooling of the church’s original zeal for God, there emerged a gradual blending of Christianity with the culture of the ancient world. It never left us. Most early church fathers adopted it, including the great Saint Augustine. Perhaps the greatest champion of it was the famous John Calvin, who was meticulously schooled in it from his youth.

Today, church leaders, ministers, theologians, and professors pride themselves in their skill of logic and debate so as to prove Christianity and shut the mouths of scientific atheists and agnostics. But this emphasis overlooks an important fact: In accommodating such non-Christians, the church has entered an arena of scientific skill where both sides have equal intellectual footing in the science of debate. The best man at the skill wins, even if he is wrong. This points to a vital Scriptural truth often overlooked: It is found in Ephesians 6:10-17. Paul admonishes Christians to “Put on the whole armor of God.” Of that armor, he tells us which pieces of it are most vital to us: The Shield of Faith, the Helmet of Salvation, and the Sword of the Spirit (VV 16,17). Look very carefully at this. The shield of faith does not exist apart from our deliberate willingness to HAVE faith. That belongs to US. The helmet of salvation does not exist without, again, our deliberate willingness to have faith to receive it. That also belongs to US. But note most carefully that the Sword of the Spirit is NOT ours. The Greek is genitive. Put another way, the equivalent expression of “The sword of the Spirit” is “The Spirit’s sword”, not ours, but His! We take OUR shield, we take OUR helmet, but we take the SPIRIT’S sword. This is vital to see. We can hold the sword (The Word of God) in our hand, yes, but if we start wielding it in our own strength, genius, wisdom, and skill, we have seized the sword from the Spirit’s hand and lit out on our own prideful vanity. It is a good way to get butchered! We can never win, but the Spirit can never lose.

The Apostle Paul, in his zeal, dealt with the intellectuals on Mars Hill (Acts 17). One wonders if it was time well spent, considering the meager results. For every intellectual on Mars Hill, trained to doubt, the streets of Athens and other gentile cities were flooded with hungry, simple souls eager to believe some good news. Paul seemed to realize this later, for he refrained from such future engagements.

Indeed, logical geniuses have come to realize that logical debate finds it impossible to “study the genesis or the sequential order of time of man’s beliefs and cognitive activities.”* Why? Because “logic is not a positive factual science of nature…” because “its principles are rules for evaluating or criticizing the validity of arguments.”* That is, because both deductive and inductive reasoning merely ANALYZES the arguments, it does not itself argue, because it is only a tool in the hand of he who is believing something, right or wrong, and is engaged in arguing for it or against it. Do we see this truth? This is what Acts 17:21 means in saying these intellectuals spent their time in merely either telling or hearing something new. You see, only humans intellectually reason on evidence, and assume a posture based upon it. We have heard the saying regarding debate, “A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still.” All of us are fully aware of that fact, and act it out. How? Our depraved nature prompts us to shrink from correcting ourselves from something erroneous which we came to believe, only to discover we were in error. Instead, we stubbornly blunder on anyhow, refusing to change courses, knowing inside that we are blundering. Pride is the culprit.

A classic example of this truth is Bible Prophecy. You see, a study of it cannot be resolved with deductive nor inductive reasoning because of the universal fact of the God-given human free will’s ability to change direction in order to avoid the trouble prophecy predicts. Example? If an angry man is bearing down on you with an ice pick drawn, despite the fact that a policeman just told you that was impossible under his watch, would you calmly stand there trusting the policeman, or would your feet take over? I’d place my money on your feet. If you ran it would be perfectly natural. God made you that way. Logic, then, is not a “positive factual science” of Bible doctrine, because it is operating in man’s beliefs, not in the laws of nature.

This brings us to Part Two, the heart of our subject matter, interpreting Scripture.

*Dr. Ernest Nagel, former Professor of Philosophy, Columbia University.

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PART TWO

The Apostle Paul admonished Timothy to rightly divide the Word of Truth (II Tim. 2:15). We should see this not as a tool to debate, for we must remember that in any arena of combat one of the opponents is left bleeding in the sand, vowing to return and win another day. This is not what the Gospel is about. The idea is not to hack our way to victory and walk over the backs of our opponents, but to let the light within us awaken the hunger in the lost for restoration with their Creator. As Billy Graham so aptly put it, “Evangelism is simply one beggar telling another one where he can find bread.” There is no better definition.

The problem the church has fallen into is the lack of light within. How can we ever shine our light in a dark world when we have cloaked it in pride, selfishness, and a bent to be right in the face of detractors? So here is the heart and soul of this article: Friends, the correct perspective on the Word of God is to stop figuring out how to interpret Scripture, and see the cold truth SCRIPTURE MUST BE ALLOWED TO INTERPRET US! When we absorb ourselves in full attention on how to interpret it, we plug its own flow into our souls with its purpose to examine and change us instead. Never forget this rule: The Word of God will not flow through human pride and vanity, but only through a simple, elusive thing called humility.

This is the true spirit of Christianity and evangelism. The idea is not to run around cornering folks, prying open their ears and eyes so we can shine our prideful lights into them. Rather, it is to simply ALLOW our own lights to shine brightly for all to see. Jesus said a great deal about our lights in Matthew Chapters 5 and 6, as well as in Luke and John. He even mentioned a black light and how intense such a light can be. Read about it in Matt. 6:23.

Perhaps no Scripture speaks so eloquently of our relationship with God’s Word as Hebrews 4:12,13: “For the Word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in His sight: But all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do”(KJV). There is a Scriptural objective in this for us, and we are told what it is in verse 16: “…that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.” That’s the idea. We must not read this Scriptural reference with a mind that we use it on the other guy; rather, WE personally need mercy, and WE personally need God’s grace to help us. Such food is candlepower for our inner light.

So there is the key to Scriptural interpretation: We must cast OURSELVES purposely upon it like sprawling on an X-ray table so that IT may interpret US, not the other way around. Pride uses it for ammunition, whereas humility uses it for food to grow spiritually. If we dare lay the Word of God on a shelf for display; if we take it to church under our arm as though it’s truth will bleed into us without effort; if we only spot read it out of curiosity once in a while; if we think our mate’s dedication to it will sanctify our lack of it, well, such foolishness misses the entire purpose of God’s word—to change US, not the other person! That, friends, is the only way to the narrow way, instead of the broad way. Yes, we should fall on it, eat it daily with prayer, ask God to X-ray us with it, to expose our pride, our stubbornness, to humble us, to make us better by making us more like our Lord Jesus. That, friends, is the true definition of Scriptural interpretation. Any other is a waste of our time and God’s purpose in us. If the Word of God doesn’t interpret us, we do the opposite—we employ pride, foolishness, and plain stupidity in our interpretation of God’s Word of truth, and wind up hollow within.

This is not to say, however, that there is not a legitimate debate in life’s arena in such areas as politics, the sciences, and social/moral issues. Christians should engage in them enthusiastically. God’s people are desperately needed there. But when it comes to formally debating Bible doctrine, we start spinning our wheels. I would say, though, that the church should take note of who is winning the most souls to Christ whose walk exhibits all the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22,23), and come to the logical conclusion that where the fruit of the Spirit is, is where HE is and where His church SHOULD be!

Part of the process of examining Scripture is comparing Scripture with Scripture, “For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, and there a little:” (Isa. 28:10), until we understand its meaning, who said what and why, the Persons of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. To do this we may need the aids of Bible dictionaries, lexicons, concordances, maps, and references to the original languages of Scripture. God has inspired great men to just such purposes. These are the tools we normally use as ammunition to debate and inform others, even to direct their lives. But proper Scriptural interpretation comes with the PURPOSE in doing it: Our aim should be to do those vital things to direct, enlighten, change, transform, even CONSUME OURSELVES, and no one else! Only then can God use us to SHINE HIMSELF THROUGH US, and lighten the lives of others by His mighty Spirit. But remember, He only shines THROUGH a transparent substance called HUMILITY. The countenance of every child of God who does that always glows with God’s OWN presence. THAT is the only thing that will win the lost and light their way to their Savior.