Week 01 · God's design for marriage
Two Made One
Read together: Genesis 2:18-25
Also read: Matthew 19:4-6 · Ecclesiastes 4:9-12
Marriage was God's idea before it was ever ours. He made one out of two on purpose, and He is the one who holds it together.
The heart of it
Before sin entered the world, before there was a law or a temple or a nation, there was a marriage. God looked at a good creation and named one thing that was not good: the man was alone. The woman was not an afterthought or a helper in the sense of a servant. The word means one who comes alongside with strength that the other does not have.
Then comes the line Jesus Himself quoted: they shall be one flesh. One is not the same as identical. God did not blend two people into a blur. He joined two whole people into one life, one purpose, one direction. That joining is His work, which means He is invested in your marriage more deeply than you are.
Notice the last verse. They were naked and not ashamed. Before sin, there was nothing hidden. Much of what a marriage needs is simply the recovery of that: honesty without fear, being fully known and still fully loved.
What to notice
- God diagnosed the loneliness before Adam complained about it. He sees what your marriage needs before you can name it.
- Adam had meaningful work and a perfect environment and it was still not enough. Being busy for God is not a substitute for being present with your spouse.
- Leaving comes before cleaving. A marriage cannot be first if something else, a parent, a job, a hobby, still holds first place.
- One flesh is stated as a fact, not a goal. God made you one. The work is learning to live like it.
Talk together
- 1Tell each other the moment you first knew you wanted to spend your life with the other. Say it out loud, even if you have told it before.
- 2God said it was not good for the man to be alone. Where in your life right now do you feel most alone, even inside this marriage?
- 3What is one strength your spouse brings that you honestly do not have?
- 4Adam and Eve had nothing hidden. What is one small thing you have been hiding, not a secret sin, just something you have not bothered to say?
- 5Is there anything, family, work, phone, ministry, hobby, that still gets the first and best of you? Answer for yourself, not for each other.
- 6If a friend watched your marriage for a month, would they say God was at the center of it? What would they point to?
Your own journal
Answer these on your own during the week. They are yours; you are never required to read them out loud.
1. Write out what you believe God was giving you when He gave you your spouse. Be specific.
2. Where have I been living like a single person who happens to share a house?
3. What have I been hiding, and what am I afraid would happen if I said it out loud?
4. Name one thing my spouse does that I have quietly stopped thanking them for.
5. Ask God plainly: what one thing do You want to change in me for the sake of this marriage?
This week's practice
Sometime this week, tell your spouse one specific thing you are grateful for that they have never heard you say.
"Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh."
Genesis 2:24
Pray together
Thank God that He designed this marriage and that He is not finished with it. Ask Him to show each of you one thing you have been holding back.
Next week: Christ at the Center