Being United - NCCG.ORG Ning Network Archive 2008-10

Being United

The other day, I had a discussion with a woman who insisted that marriage had to be sanctioned by the legal authorities before YHVH would recognize it. While the idea that she put forth is not new neither is it not a popular idea, the question then that pops into my mind - and I must warn you that my mind does not work the same way that most people’s minds work - is this: if it was YHVH that created the institution of marriage, then why is it that the governments and legal systems control it?

If you pick up the Scripture, and you open it, diligently searching it for references to marriage and instances of it, you will undoubtedly begin all the way back in the book of Genesis, even in the first chapter. It was YHVH who made a male and a female one flesh there. Stopping right there, and before some reading this get into a tizzy, if you look at the definitions of marriage that Yeshua and Paul gave to us, you will see that the definition of marriage is - surprise surprise - one flesh.

“Have ye not read, that He which made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?’ Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore YHVH hath joined together, let not man put asunder.” (Matthew 19:4-6) “Know ye not that your bodies are the members of the Messiah? Shall I then take the members of the Messiah, and make them the members of an harlot? By no means. What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? ‘For two,’ saith He, ‘shall be one flesh.’” (1 Corinthians 6:15-16) “For we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. ‘For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.’ This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning the Messiah and the assembly.” (Ephesians 5:30-32)

One flesh is the key to all of these passages. Now some of you may be pointing out - if not shouting out - that the passage “For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh” comes actually from Genesis chapter 2 and not chapter 1. Yes it does, but when we look back in chapter one, it says that YHVH made man - Hebrew word Adam - in the image and likeness of YHVH made He him, and male and female He made them. One flesh - which is exactly what YHVH said in chapter 2 when He separated the two of them, of which the whole definition of marriage stands. So the modern argument of the definition of marriage being one man and one woman, or two men, or two women, or one man with multiple wives are actually moot, because the creator of marriage said it is one flesh.

Now some of you might be more than shouting that I am missing the entire point of the modern argument here. But hold on for just a moment, because physical marriage is a picture of our relationship with Him. I could go, and argue with a stump out in a pasture somewhere that marriage is between a man and woman, but what good would that do? Did that stump create marriage, or even the definition of marriage? And further, does that stump have the authority to decide who is and who is not married? Well of course not, so it is the same arguing with the government and those running the government, because the government is in the exact same position as that stump, because neither created, nor defined what marriage is, so they do not have the authority or right to decide who is and who is not married. So if your point is about arguing with a stump, then go right ahead and waste your short life. “For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.” (James 4:14) When you are arguing with something or someone that has absolutely no control over what you are arguing about, then it really means you are wasting your time, breath, and energy. Find me where in Scripture does YHVH ever delegate His authority over marriage to man? Yeshua actually tells us that, “What therefore YHVH hath joined together, let not man put asunder.” (Matthew 19:6) That is a perfect statement telling us that marriage is still completely in YHVH’s authority and was, is, and never will be delegated to man. More on this in a moment.

One flesh means that two people, who were at once separated, are now one. It is the picture of our relationship with YHVH. Before we are formed in the womb, we are in heaven, with YHVH, one with Him. Then we come to this world, and the older we become, the farther away from Him we get, until we realize one day, that we need to reconnect with our Heavenly Father. And from that time forward - prayerfully - we spend the rest of our brief time on this earth maintaining that oneness that we had before we took on this physical fleshly body. And we are not talking solely about our spirit, which we can all safely agree is His, but we should “glorify YHVH in your body, and in your spirit, which are His.” (1 Corinthians 6:20b)

The marriage between a man and a woman imitates that of the marriage - or union - of Yeshua and each and every member of His assembly. Ephesians chapter 5 actually begins this way: “Be ye therefore followers of YHVH, as dear children; and walk in love, as the Messiah also hath loved us, and hath given Himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to YHVH for a sweet smelling savour.” (Ephesians 5:1-2) The word for follower there is the word where we get the English word mimic, and it means to imitate. So we are told to imitate YHVH, as well as we are to walk in love for everyone, which will cause us to have a sweet smelling savor to our spiritual husband.

How many of you ladies like to smell good for your husband? How many of you go to the effort of wearing a certain perfume that you know that he likes, so as to make him happy? When we walk in love, and give ourselves as an offering and sacrifice to Yeshua - our spiritual husband - we are wearing spiritual perfume, to use an analogy, that He loves to smell, making Him happy with us. For Paul also told us, which goes right along with this vein, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of YHVH, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto YHVH, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of YHVH.” (Romans 12:1-2)

Note how Paul interweaves the thread of this sweet smelling savor through out his writings, so as to exhort us on to being the bride that we need to be for Yeshua. “Now thanks be unto YHVH, which always causeth us to triumph in the Messiah, and maketh manifest the savour of His knowledge by us in every place. For we are unto YHVH a sweet savour of the Messiah, in them that are saved, and in them that perish: to the one we are the savour of death unto death; and to the other the savour of life unto life. And who is sufficient for these things? For we are not as many, which corrupt the word of YHVH: but as of sincerity, but as of YHVH, in the sight of YHVH speak we in the Messiah.” (2 Corinthians 2:14-17)

Just as ever since male and female were physically separated, the two have longed to be rejoined, so too do we long to be rejoined with YHVH our creator. He has throughout Scripture and ever since the fall beckoned for mankind to come back and unite with Him, as we were in eternity, before we took on this fleshly mortal body. But I wish to point out something to you right here, for simply because we are in the flesh does not mean that all flesh is bad. Before the fall of man and the expulsion of Adam and Chavah (Eve) from the Garden of Eden, they had flesh - and bones - but were still immortal. “All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds. There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: it is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, ‘The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.’ Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is Yeshua from heaven.” (1 Corinthians 15:39-47)

Paul here is telling us that there are different bodies that we would call flesh. Yeshua, after His resurrection, appeared how many times to His disciples? Did He not eat with them? Did He not let them physically touch Him, telling one in particular to place his fingers in His hands and his hand in His side? What the modern world considers spirits - ghosts - do not have a physical - or corporeal - body with which one can touch or with which the spirit can eat or handle physical items. When YHVH and the two angels came to Abraham, did they not physically eat? How about when the two angels reached Lot’s house, did they not physically lay hold of him? We need to see things not from the modern world’s perspective, but from the perspective of YHVH as recorded in His Word.

Genesis chapter 2 and Ephesians chapter 5 both tell us that about being flesh and bones. Adam and Chavah had bodies of flesh, but until they were cursed with death, they could not die, so they were immortal. “For the life of the flesh is in the blood” (Leviticus 17:11a) as YHVH has told us, and just as a penny has two sides, life has a second side which is death. Where there is no life, there is no death. If something is not alive, you can not kill it, but anything that lives must die; and all that die had lived. So the blood causes one to live, but it also brings about death. Adam was one before the curse of death. With no possibility to die, Adam did not live as we know living, for Adam was eternal. Therefore, Adam had incorruptible flesh that could not decay because there was no blood which is life.

“Behold, I shew you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.” (1 Corinthians 15:51-54)

This also points out how that being one with another person transcends life itself. Marriage is not something that automatically ends at death (“Til death do us part”), but in fact, it is eternal, for when both the male and the female were one in Adam, they were eternal for this was before the fall. When both were separated, they were still eternal before the fall. And this is where no human authority can indeed regulate and legislate, because they can not regulate nor legislate - no matter how hard they try - that which is eternal. Thus, when YHVH declares a man and a woman one, they are no longer two beings, but He has joined them in eternity, so they are now one flesh. And it is where we go so far astray when we seek the regulations and legislations, and try to appease human beings in an area where they have no legal right to intervene, for they can not and will not control the eternal incorruptible flesh that has been joined together by YHVH. For He is King of king’s and Ruler of ruler’s, and to Him alone belongs all glory and power.

This is also why we are told to not be unequally yoked. The reason is simple behind this teaching: a living person can not marry a dead person. If you are alive in the Messiah, then you are not able to marry someone who is not alive in the Messiah. If you are not alive, then you are the opposite of alive which is dead. Again here I speak of the spiritual, but with marriage being eternal, and with the King of king’s declaring who is married, then if He says the one is spiritually dead and therefore ineligible to marry, then they are just that.

Comment by Mike Wilson on April 16, 2010 at 8:23am: O.K. what about if you married some one and neither of you were called at the time and YHVH calls one of you!You are now unequally yoked!hostility in areas like discontinuing to keep pagan holidays of whitch you both enjoyed together as a family.now those same days burns deep in your core and the person called wants to know and enjoy the new discoveries of the meanings of the feast days and fellowship with the true body of messiah!but it is a constant strugle,one telling the children,YHVH's name and the other saying the whole world calls him GOD what makes you right and them wrong,they have ministries and college education and you dont.please someone help me with this.

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