My first thought when I read “Don’t Marry” was basically shock. So I didn’t comment b/c I wanted to think about it plus Mondays are super busy here.

Today, I’m glad I read it. I like other POV It helps to see things from a guy’s perspective. What I did realize was that he didn’t have a biblical POV & you addressed that in your last paragraph. My first reaction was “How sad. I feel sorry for the men & women of whom he speaks of.” I Corinthians 13 came to my mind.

Marriage is a risk. Period. People are a risk. Period. Keep your focus on God. Period. Even then, there are no guarantees. What matters is your relationship and obedience to Christ & His word no matter what the other person is or does.

I had other thoughts as well but alas, I had to run errands two different times and me brain has moved on now lol

That article is better balanced than some others that I have come across. You are right that it was not written from a Christian worldview. On the other hand, I have known one or more (“Christian”) people who fit almost every scenario he gave. That is sad.

You make a good point that people are a risk, period. Our culture is risk-averse as can be easily demonstrated with the recent health care bill.

Could this be a major cause in breaking our society? I have been listening through a course on Alexis de Tocqueville and one of the points that was made was how much democracy relies on family stability.

I think it would be good to add a few more Biblical directions for the basis for marriage. The first is that it was instructed: be fruitful and multiply. That’s a marriage-man-and-woman thing (part of my issue with calling anything except man-and-woman a marriage).

The other is the way that the Bible compares the marriage relationship to Christ and the church.

Some of what you said does mirror encouragement in the Bible to remain unmarried if you can…but it actually merely defines that if you have the desire to be married then that negates not being married (basically a very easy metric…hey since you’re thinking/talking about it does that mean you qualify for the “needs to be married” category…this might be too soon of my return for me to pick on you).

Finally, overall, I think the Bible expresses an expectation that we are to build each other up, sharpen each other, and otherwise use the marriage relationship to grow into what God wants us to be and the ministry He wants us to have.

I’ll end with a couple personal, non-Biblical thoughts. My first is that I think we have to be a bit crazy to get married…and God designed us biologically to make that decision in a bit of insanity. It’s partially why I think its a problem to see the marriage age be delayed…and reduction in then people marrying it. We were designed to marry late teens and early 20’s. Lifespans of less than 50 years were the norm until the last century or so.

Yes, I agree that marriage and family used to be a major component of retirement and expanding your wealth/comfort (kids to help you run the farm). I think we do need to give more thought to what the pursuit of children needs to be based on in today’s society.

Seems like I’ve mentioned it here: they’ve projected that fundamentals will take over the world because most industrialized societies get to negative birthrates…except for fundamental religious persons. So hang out for another few decades and we might start to take over.

Finally, my own reconciliation with having a family (which is a component of being married—I know there are those that haven’t made a firm decision on the children thing, but I think you should plan to have a family as part of a God-designed marriage) was that I realized that children were a way that my time here on earth could escape the bounds of my lifespan. They were part of my nature, and I had the opportunity to nurture them. They would live on and have children after I was gone. Not the negative of living life through them, but looking on it as a worthy investment and ministry in my time on earth.

Okay, that was more than a couple things. Thanks for the forum.

Yeah. What he ^ said. :D

There is a lot that can be written about the Biblical foundations and reasons for marriage. Incidentally, most of them can be explained without using the Bible in a method that is similar to Solomon in his Proverbs. Even the secular Discovery Channel (linked in the original post) explains that divorce is a bad idea in its overall effects. The children of the marriage will deal with it for the rest of their lives, with the effects growing on into their mid-life years.

Jesus’ warning about the fall of Jerusalem is the only passage that I have found where having kids is discouraged. By contrast, Jeremiah 29 was written when the people were under the rule of another nation and Jeremiah was instructed to tell them to have kids anyway (and marry them off).

I would be more inclined to reverse the analogy and to say that the relationship between Christ and the church is compared to a marriage. You may have seen my last post on that since your wife posted in the thread (it was not on my blog). The short reason is that I find it strange that the marriage would be a type of Christ caring for the church when the fall occurred after marriage was created. There are a couple ways that it could be explained but this prohibits the most common usages of the analogy—at least to my mind. I know Paul does admonish husbands and wives based on the analogy.

What? Single people are not allowed to flesh out the details of marriage? And that after you have said Christ and the church is mirrored in it? Lol. Some of the best marriage advice I have heard on YouTube came from a Catholic priest. Go figure, right?

I do intend to marry eventually, and I know well enough what you mean about insanity forcing the decision. There is less need to marry in our culture than in others, where basic survival requires more than two hands (as you mentioned). I intend to live in one of those cultures and already my preparations have pushed my limits.

The growth of fundamentalists is more than just a projection. We are seeing it happen in Europe right now. Immigration is the primary reason that our society is still growing on this side of the puddle.

I biased the original post. ^_^

I’d recommend you study the MGTOW movement a bit more.

There are Christian Men in that movement who will vehemently disagree with you regarding men and divorce.

Thanks for your follow up comments; I was able to restrain myself because I did remember that you do a good job of “spinning” a topic for consideration without unacceptably endorsing it.

I’m going to look at the passages a little more…I’m a bit hesitant about your argument that it’s post-fall since there’s a pretty big emphasis on it not being good for man to be alone, and Eve was made for Adam….

I’m glad you caught my drift on fundamentalism not necessarily being a singularly Judeo Christian force. It will be very interesting because the effect is absolutely going to happen.

I dislike the slow speed of videos, but I will listen to it out of respect and comment separately.

All those perspectives can run through person x’s mind about person y (the pun is intentional…and I’ve tried to reverse the alignment). I feel the vast majority of them have to be dismissed as not thinking wholesome, helpful, affirming, beneficial, etc. thoughts. I think there’s a helpful comment at the end where it says (my phrasing), don’t be such a nilly about what people will say or think about if you do or don’t do…do what makes sense to you in order to forge a relationship that will be a true relationship.

...ug still disturbed by that one. Lots of assertion based on no or twisted data…obvisouly extremely one sided. No, I can affirm I don’t “think” that way…with God’s help.

I definitely don’t say Protestant Christianity has a lock on good solid logic. I may have blipped on why the son wasn’t allowed to tell his peers what his father told him…thought that was going to go somewhere but missed it.

Anyway, I learned in an ethics how long the Catholics have had to pursue a logic based ethic system that had roots in solid Biblical truth. Basically consider that at certain times in our world the learned people were concentrated in religion. That has put them in good stead on things like the sanctity of life.

Anyway, thanks for sharing the video. Just as I shared it is absolutely something to be reconciled to related to the vast majority of marriages.

Wonder if there’s a transcript of it out there…

I probably deserve to be beaten for that spin but the resulting conversation has been great.

Are you saying that it was not good for God to be alone? If not, then we aren’t on the same page. I would not argue that marriage did not begin until after the fall. There is no question that the first marriage came before. What I question is whether we should call marriage a “type” of Christ’s relationship with the church when marriage preceded the fall. Does that make sense?

I did not mean that you had to watch the video, though it is a good one. I had linked it only so that nobody would come along later and ask which video.

Those are interesting thoughts about logic. I’ve read a little bit of the early Christian fathers. Some of the logic is poor (like St. Jerome’s argument that Mary was perpetually a virgin) while others are fantastic. It reminds me a bit of interactions in the church world today except with more depth oftentimes.

<chuckle> I think the double double negatives are almost losing me. I am going to punt and say we agree on the start of marriage, and you’re drawing a fine line on the “type” that I generally don’t try to do with scripture. I believe in trying to be careful to find breaks in continuity to base something on because of two things:
1. We are finite, our language is limited, and its much more likely that our limits are creating the apparent division rather than otherwise (if its a fine distinction—not talking clear stuff here).
2. Our thoughts are not His thoughts. Our ways are not His ways. We’re not going to make it all fit in our logic. It was interesting to catch that post you mentioned…it definitely has some major logic holes that I don’t think can be solved.

I hope to circle back around on the comment you made about single people being denied something…or maybe I should just say the above applies here as well: maybe they are, maybe they aren’t, but my logic about it isn’t something the Bible has directed us to fret about. If you have the desire…get married. God does want us to learn from one another. He also makes people not have kids and there are verses about how kids are a blessing…give me the clear stuff, see if that gives you enough for living, and then tell me if you’re stuck…I can’t get stuck on the difference you’re making on this one.
P.S. At least one other comment indicates you spin in a way that easily lends itself to saying it’s your position.

No apology needed; it worked out great. I just get impatient with videos. I do understand the impact of adding much more of the process of communication to things…just like transcripts.

Totally with ya on the second paragraph—I was guilty of not mentioning that they reached some very poor logic conclusions as well.

There is a definite movement toward restoring masculinity. A friend pointed me toward a website called “The Art of Manliness” the other day. It isn’t exactly Christian in its orientation either but they do support learning about Christianity because of its historical influence on our society.

Being a man is not possible without reference points. Christianity still provides the best that I have seen, and of course I think I know why that is.

A non-double-negative version is that marriage began before the fall. I would not say otherwise.

You may be right that our limitations cause some things to not entirely make sense. The Calvinist perspective would make sense of marriage as a type before the fall, but I cannot agree with the reasons (to explain why would require a long post). Another possibility is that we were always intended as a bride for Christ, although the details of that escape me.

I had been trying to give you a hard time back over your comment about my consideration of marriage matters while being single. There is a very good passage in Isaiah (chapter 56) which explains that God’s name is better than children. Rachel’s words to Jacob about children, and his reply, are still interesting to me.