Fear No Fear

“and the two shall be one flesh.’ So then they are no longer two, but one flesh” (Mark 10:8, MEV). Everyone hates the patriarchy. And more women are demanding the right to keep their name (I believe Japan is the only major developed nation that doesn’t easily allow it) in order not to lose their identity. But I think a lot of us miss the whole point. Marriage was given to us as a type and shadow of our relationship with the Lord. Adam was ONE individual that was separated into TWO. We were created in God’s image and given His breath. Adam was equal in both pieces and seen as the same in the eyes of God (God called them the same name, it was Adam the male who named Eve differently). We are co-heirs IN Christ – the same in the eyes of God as His children (1 John 3:2; Galatians 3:28). There was no submission or need of a chain of command – until we despised God and rebelled. When a man and a woman marry, they come together as one – even as we come together as one in Jesus. The woman takes the name of the man as we take the name of Jesus. The couple are a new unit. The male is the husband of the wife. The female is the wife of the husband. We are the bride of Christ. Christ is the bridegroom of those who believe in Him. The husband is the foundation of the marriage holding up and supporting the wife who holds up and supports the children. Jesus is the foundation who holds us up individually and as a unit. It’s all a picture of our relationship with God. The world and the devil fight to make it about submission and domination, instead of chain of command and accountability. They want to make it about patriarchy and identity theft. But it is about becoming MORE than you are alone. About having a NEW identity of support, love, and togetherness in our individuality. Just like we are new creations in Jesus, the same as Him, equal spiritually and at the same time separate and distinct, each of us in our own position within the unit – He God and we the Created. It is a picture of what He has done for us and will do for us and all of it in love. That’s why the male is to lead and love as Jesus loves the church. That’s why the female is to respect the chain of command even as she is the co-partner with fully equal rights, abilities, and responsibilities even as we look to Jesus in love. There is a unit founded in Jesus, following Jesus, speaking and loving and living as Jesus – a constant example to the couple of what individually we share with God. I think we lose sight of that too often. Don’t let the world’s ideas rob you of the symbology of the marriage. We take God’s name and become a new thing in Him – the world runs from that because they feel guilty for how they’re living. We don’t have that issue. Embrace the symbology for what it is: a love picture of our relationship with and through Jesus. It’s not dominance or patriarchy. It’s selfless love, each more concerned about the other than themselves. Let’s walk in that and stop fighting about nonsense. Let’s embrace our NEW identity, which includes the old identity, but leveled up and perfected in Jesus.