Marriage is an institution that accords with the dictates of nature and the laws of divine inspiration. It is an integral ingredient in the happiness of the couple and act as an integral part of any society.
Jesus threw a distinctive holiness and grandeur around this particular relationship of a man and a woman. It is manifested as a blessed state, and so Jesus clothed it with honor and sublimity. Jesus ratified the contract; he guarded the obligations; he expounded the laws; and he graced the celebration of it with his presence.
The first sign that Jesus' hands performed was at a bridal festival where he turned the water into wine for the joyous celebration of marriage to be continued. Jesus' apostles presented it as a type of the substantial, invisible and everlasting union existing between Christ and his bride, the church. It involves the most tender, close, and lasting ties that can unite human beings together, and it influences the destiny of many others. The triumph of Truth depends on the preservation of God's institution of marriage.
From the very beginning people have attempted to change God's institution of marriage to suit their own fleshy desires. The human race of today have embraced every form of profane activity within the marriage that the divine laws of God governing it are broken at every turn. Because of this treacherous behavior, the spiritual life and worship to the true God has fallen to the point of breaking His Covenant without even realizing how or when it happened.
We find no better description of this violation and its pain in the Scripture than in Malachi 2.
Each passage comes from a particular set of circumstances or a particular question. Malachi was dealing with a situation where a good number of men got rid of their Hebrew wives and married pagan woman. The prophet describes it as a treachery to God and His Covenant as well as to the wives. The prophet wants everyone to realize that the failure was sin, and that to go ahead in life with God they first had to acknowledged that, and if reconciliation was possible, it was to be pursued. If reconciliation was not possible, then the people had to accept the responsibility for their acts, find a way of forgiveness in order to heal and embrace the healing that God provided for them and get on with their lives.
What we find in the Scripture is a number of God's messages that are part of His divine revelation and timeless in their relevance, to an antagonistic audience, much like today in these matters. In the earlier days when people heard the Word of God they trembled and listened; but in Malachi's day when they heard the Word they challenged it; and in our day people changes the Word as they please.
Malachi alone focuses on the pain all this causes and on the fact that God hates it. He presents the wrong actions as a defilement of the holiness of God and His Laws.
Anyone who annul the distinction between God's chosen people and the heathen, by this very action he annihilates the distinction between the God of Israel and the idols of the heathen.
The sin is introduced as a treachery, which was paralleled with the word "abomination," before the sin is defined. The word "treachery" means a willful betrayal of confidence, trust or truth. One who is treacherous is a traitor, unreliable, and disloyal person. The term in Hebrew is "bah-gad," related to "garment."
The sin as an act, has greater implications over the spiritual background of the person committing the sin. It starts by becoming unfaithful to God, a traitor to His Covenant, and then followed by acts of violence, faithlessly reactions, and rebellion towards divine authority. The identity of guiltiness is mentioned in this order: Israel, Judah, and Jerusalem. Israel is the name of the covenant people; Judah and Jerusalem are the center of the kingdom, and Jerusalem itself is the core or religious center of the nation. It wasn't a marginal problem arising among people who had no Scriptural training; instead it was located in the very center of the religious and political community. They brought idolatry into the family of Israel.
The very reason that God loathed the sin was that it "defiled the holiness" of God. The words "defile" and "profane" and "holiness" are cleverly put together -they are antonyms. "Holiness" means "distinct, set apart, separate" to God. "Defile" means "common, profane, separated from sanctuary" or from God.
The treacherous people made common that which was to be distinct.
God loves Zion and prohibits idolatry from the sanctuary. He called Israel "a holy nation" and "His sanctuary. God made them one nation and He loves His nation Israel. God established the marriage laws for the people He loves in order that they might be distinct to Him and to the rest of the world.
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