I reached down in to my briefcase and brought out a carving of two heads the one of a man and other of a woman, the heads were connected by a chain with wooden links, I held the carving up. "This is Marriage symbol which the church in Liberia gives to the young couple as a reminder of their marriage vows, if you came close and inspected it carefully you would see that this chain had no joint, The whole piece of art is carved out of one piece of wood and conveys the massage: "Where God joins, there is no joint." "I never found the innermost mystery of marriage more convincingly demonstrated than here, the two became completely one, "flesh", made out of one piece of wood, and still they remind two individuals person, it is not two halves which makes one whole but two whole persons from an entirely new whole, this is to "become one flesh". I stepped down from the pulpit and gave the marriage symbol to the people in the front row, they passed it on admiringly from hand to hand, I walked over to a big blackboard which Daniel had put up on the opposite side of the pulpit and took a piece of chalk in my hand. "Now come the most important message of our Bible verse. We have studied the three parts: to leave, and to become one flesh, the massage is that these three parts are inseparable from each other, if one of the parts is lacking the marriage is not complete, only those who have "left" regardless of the consequences and only those who "cleave " exclusively to each other, can become "one flesh". "These three elements of leaving, cleaving and becoming one flesh belong together like the three angles of a triangle. I turned to the blackboard and drew a large triangle in this way: "We could also write at the upper angle, "public and legal act" or simply "wedding" or "wedlock".At the left angle we could also write "love" or "faithfulness", at the right angle we could not write "physical union" or simply the word "sex", if it is understood that much more is meant by this word than just the sexual fellowship of the couple." It was the first time that I dared to use the word 'sex', but the spirit in the audience was so open by now that I had no need to be afraid of unnecessarily hurting feeling, I said pointing to the triangle: "If you want to have a real marriage, these three things have to be in the picture, for young people who are not yet married, this is the goal they have to reach, just as a triangle is no triangle if one of the angle is lacking, just so marriage is no marriage if the three elements is not there. "But not I have to call your attention to another very important facts about our Bible verse, how does it end? What is the last thing in this verse of General 2:24?" They opened their bible again and hands went up quickly. "It's the word "flesh", an elderly man answered. "No,' I said, "what comes after flesh?" There was a long silence, finally a young man said: "A full stop." There was laughter, but I accepted the answer. "Yes, I said, "this full stop is of the utmost importance." I went back into the pulpit and I read the bible verse again: "Therefore a man leave his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh." Striking my fist on the lectern, I added: Full stop." After a brief pause I continued: "In this key verse about marriage, quoted four times in the bible, there is not one word about children." The effects of these words on my audience was tremendous, it was as if I had thrown a bomb into the church, they became restless, shook their heads started to talk to each other, and some made a certain sound with their lips, indicating disapproved. "Let me explain!" I called out into the uproar, I glanced at Daniel face, I was not sure what he was thinking, but he had a very pleased expression, evidently he was happy about the active participation of his congregation. Full Stop I began again: "Don't misunderstand me, Children are a blessing of God, the Bible emphasize this over and over again, I have five children my self and am thankful for every one of them, we have received them as a sign of God goodness, as a very real blessing in our marriage, children are a blessing to marriage, but they are an additional blessing to marriage, when God created Adam and Eve, he blessed them and then he said to them: "Be fruitful and multiply" (Genesis 1:28). from the Hebrew text it is clear that this commandments was an additional action to the action of blessing. "Therefore when the Bible describes the indispensable element of marriage, it is significant that children are not expressly mentioned, leaving, cleaving and becoming one flesh are sufficient, Full stop, even if there are no children the one flesh union does not become meaningless, the full stop means that the child does not make marriage a marriage. A children marriage is also a marriage in the full sense of the word, the full stop means that barrenness is no reason for divorce, No man can say: "This woman has not given me a child, therefore I am not really to married her," and then send her away, if a marriage reminds childless, this doesn't Justify tearing the cleaving element apart, nor does it question the legality of the marriage." Daniel had translated these last statement with a special emphasis and with a certain warm concern in his voice, indicating that divorce motivated by childless was rather frequent in his county. And so although time was running short, I wanted to develop the subject further, I asked Daniel whether I could still go on for ten minutes, he said: You have caught their ears, you can go on as long as you want. so I continued:
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assome
22/09
0so very beautiful book
26/08
0nice story
30/07
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