Pt 2 Pt 5 Dec 2,2012 Lets begin with Category Number One, a few basic marriage principles to get us started. Well call them marriage preliminaries, and well do these in point order. Point Number One: Marriage was instituted by God…therefore Marriage is a Divine Institution. What is it? A divine institution is something that God has established in order to carry out His work on the earth and to demonstrate His authority over His creation. Scholars have come up with at least six divine earthly institutions. Perhaps you can come up with some additional ones on your own, but here are the six that are most commonly mentioned. Divine Institution Number One: Volition. God instituted volition! In order to put His own rightful authority and recognition of His authority on display God instituted volition. What is volition? Volition is simply choice. In His sovereignty, God designed choice. Think back, even before the creation of man to the angelic host. What member of the angelic host could it be said fits the Biblical description as being the crowning achievement of God’s angelic realm? Full of wisdom and perfect in beauty, the Ezekiel describes him! Perfect in all his ways until iniquity was found in him, according to Ezekiel chapter 28, verse 15. Why, thats a description of Lucifer, is it not? Tell me, did God give Lucifer choice? Did God permit Lucifer to exercise his own will? Certainly, He did! Five times Lucifer said, “I will.” Youll find them in Isaiah, Chapter 14. It was those 5 “I wills” that resulted in Lucifers name being changed to Satan, the traducer, the adversary, the God opposer. So, certainly God gave the angelic host volition. And not only Lucifer, but God gave all of His angelic creation volition, choice. Scripture reveals that a third of the angelic realm followed Satan in his rebellion. So, the angels had choice! Volition...simply means choice, and its very clear in Scripture that the angels had choice. Where all living beings are concerned volition was the very first divine institution established by the Most High God. It was part of God’s sovereign plan. When God created man (when he created Adam and Eve) did He give them choice? Certainly, He did! He gave them choice with the establishment of a dietary restriction there in the garden! Of these trees you can eat…of this tree you cannot. It’s your choice Adam. You must make the decision for yourself! That’s volition. God gave Adam the power of choosing or deciding! Adam chose, as we all well know. Did God cause Adam to eat the apple? Or, did Adam eat it of his own accord? We know that answer, as well. They did, volition! We see volition from the first created beings (the angelic realm) right on through to the creation called Man. God instituted volition! Volition was a divine institution from the get go! As Gods created beings, we should choose to believe God and those who do were putting Gods authority on display! Not only TO God Himself are we putting that on display, but to those who choose not to accept the authority of God! Volition is a divine institution. In fact, volition is the first divine institution we see in the Word of God. Can anyone tell me the second divine institution established in the Word of God? If youve guessed marriage, youre right! Marriage...is also a divinely designed authority structure requiring choice. In fact, every one of the divine institutions well mention here allow for choice. God instituted marriage! We have some choices to make when it comes to our marriages, do we not, some choices we are called upon to make in the marriage relationship. We have choices to make, not only when it comes to the selection of a marriage partner, but we also have choices to make when it comes to how were to conduct ourselves IN our marriage relationship. Can you think of another divine institution? How about Family? Did God institute an authority structure called family? Listen to Paul in Eph. 6:1: “Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right.” Col. 3:20: “Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord.” Family is another divine institution requiring choice. If children want to conduct themselves in a well-pleasing manner before the Lord as Colossians 3:20 says, if they want to do the right thing (Eph 6:1) what will they do? Theyll obey their parents. But, its up to them. Its their choice. Some do…some dont! It all comes back to volition. And there are a few other divine institutions found in the Word of God. You probably have a few in your mind by now. How about Government? Is government a divine institution? Sure it is! Its an authority structure and once again, it requires choice. God tells us what to do, but its our choice whether or not to obey what God would have us do. There is also the church as a functioning assembly. Thats a divine institution established by God…where choice is involved! There is an authority structure in place according to Scripture even within the local assembly. Finally, we could mention…Employment. All of these are divine institutions established by God Himself! The next question is why? What is the purpose of a divine institution? Simply this. Each divine institution has been established in order to illustrate the channel of Gods authority over man. In other words, God is the authority over all things! And in order to illustrate this…He has established divine institutions so that man can (by his own choice) demonstrate Gods authority over him. By being accountable to God in each of God’s divine institutions we are putting Gods authority over us on display! God tells us that we are accountable in each of the areas that Ive just mentioned. Lets run through a few and Ill show you what I mean. What is the purpose of a divine institution? Simply this. Each divine institution has been established in order to illustrate the channel of Gods authority over man. In other words, God is the authority over all things! And in order to illustrate this…He has established divine institutions so that man can (by his own choice) demonstrate Gods authority over him. By being accountable to God in each of God’s divine institutions we are putting Gods authority over us on display! Take government, for example. Notice what Paul writes, in Rom. 13:1-2: “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God.” Put simply, God designed there to be structures of headship in place in the world because God is the supreme head of the universe. We might call these structures of headship levels of governmental authority. Paul is telling us here in Romans 13…that it was God who designed the institution of human government. God’s plan for man called for positions of headship authority, or orderly leadership. Did God know ahead of time that there would be those who would be given control, or those who would take control, and in turn, govern unwisely, even ruthlessly? Of course, He did! God knew about Hitler, and He knew about Stalin, just as God knew about King Nebuchadnezzar before it was time for Nebuchadnezzar to reign over Babylon. Yet, God allowed it to be so because of the divine institution called volition. God knew about the rule of Tiberius Caesar, and He knew before Pontius Pilate ever drew breath that Pilate would be made governor over Judaea. But tell me, did King Nebuchadnezzar and Pontius Pilate not play right into the hand of the supreme ruler of the universe when it came to God accomplishing His purpose through those rulers He knew about long before they ever came into positions of governmental authority? Why, of course! Paul went on to say there, in Rom. 12:2: “Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.” What in the world is this talking about? The damnation, or condemnation spoken of here comes in the form of reaping what weve sown! God would never want any believer to operate in opposition to the clear teachings of His Word, rightly divided. We’re to be subject to the higher powers ONLY when those higher powers are not asking us to go against the highest power there is and that is God Himself, the Most High God. God is the Supreme authority in all matters of life. Let me give you a couple of other examples when disobedience was actually a good thing rather than a wrong thing. Do you remember the order passed down by the King of Egypt to the midwives of Moses day? Here it is, in Ex. 1:15-16: “And the king of Egypt spake to the Hebrew midwives, of which the name of the one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah: And he (the King, obviously the power, or authority of that day) said, When ye do the office of a midwife to the Hebrew women, and see them upon the stools; if it be a son, then ye shall kill him: but if it be a daughter, then she shall live.” Tell me, did these Hebrew midwives obey the King of Egypt, or did they do as they knew God would have them do? Here it is, in Ex. 1:17 “But the midwives feared God, and did not as the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the men children alive.” Another example in the Bible of disobedience to a higher power took place with Peter and John. Some of you already know what I have in mind. The Jewish council was the ruling authority in that day and you’ll recall that the council did not want Peter and John to teach anything in the name of Jesus. The council rejected any notion of Christ being Israel’s Messiah. Now, watch Peter and John resist the authority structure in place in their day when those in authority went contrary to the expressed will of God. Here it is, in Acts 4:17 where the context is a miracle that took place at that time. Acts 4:17 “But that it spread no further among the people (the Jewish council decreed), let us straitly threaten them (Peter and John), that they speak henceforth to no man in this name.” Now, who was the ruling power in place at that time? It was the Council as far as Israel was concerned and the Council was saying, “Don’t teach in the name of this one who claims to be the Messiah” and threatening Peter and John if they did so. But did Peter and John obey the authority at that time? The answer is No. Why? because they would be usurping the authority of God to do so. Acts 4:18: “And they called them, and commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus.” Now here is where a power of authority was actually telling some people to do some things and where subjection would not have been proper because what they were being told to do was to usurp what God had wanted them to do. How did Peter and John respond to that higher authority in their day? Here it is, in Acts 4:19-20: “But Peter and John answered and said unto them, Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye. For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.” In Acts5:21…it says that the high priest, along with the council and all the senate of the children of Israel sent for the apostles. Listen to the apostle’s response, in Acts 5:29 “Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to obey God rather than men.” Understand that obeying God rather than those in authority might very well lead to unpleasant earthly repercussions, men have been burned at the stake in time past, but it’s still a matter of volition. Being subject to the higher powers is God’s idea UNLESS those higher powers are asking us to go contrary to what God would have us do as expressed in His Word. So, we can’t think that being subject to a higher power, especially in governmental positions is always the right thing to do. We have a choice to make and that may call for some repercussions when we are disobedient to those higher powers, but we must be obedient not to a Constitution, that’s not what it’s talking about here, we must be obedient to the Word of God itself. That’s the believer’s Constitution. According to Gods Word…if we believe that God is the supreme authority in the universe and that He is the supreme head above all, then we are to place ourselves under the authority of the higher powers in ALL situations where they are in agreement with the Word of God. In situations apart from those where God’s Word tells us to do otherwise, we are to obey the higher powers. The idea being that as we obey the laws of the land we are demonstrating Gods authority over us. That’s why He put all these volition institutions into place so that we could demonstrate His authority over us as we demonstrate our volition, our choices in the divine institutions God established because God is the One who has told us to obey the higher powers! We may not like all the laws of the land. But we can obey or not obey the higher powers because the divine institution called volition is in place. The choice is ours. Some are law-keepers. Some are law- breakers. Some for very good reason, and some simply out of rebellion to authority. But, I think you can see volition sits at the core of every divine institution that God has established. The same holds true in the divine institution called family. The same holds true in the divine institution called church or the local assembly. The same hold true in every divine institution. Is it the role of husband to boss his wife? NO! There is very clear Scripture on that! Then what in the world does headship mean? If the husband doesn’t become the supreme order-giver, if he doesn’t deal with his wife according to law, then what does headship mean? For that, you’ll have to stay tuned as we continue our study of The Designer’s Guide On Marriage; marriage from the pen of the Apostle Paul. We’ll pick it up in our next session, right here where we left off today…with some additional preliminary marriage principles that will lead us to the differing roles in the marriage relationship and how YOUR marriage can be a marriage made in heaven. Remember that God gave us marriage for the purpose of demonstrating through our marriage relationships our union with Him and He allows nothing to come between our union with His Son. So we should allow nothing to cause that sundering, that space that comes between husbands and wives in far too many instances in our day and time. The answer—the key is right here in the book of Ephesians.chapter 5. youtu.be/e8bS5EPAVak
Posted on: Sat, 06 Dec 2014 23:33:06 +0000
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