Recently in Love and Marriage Category

Wow, did you see this piece in CT? It's by Mark Regnerus.

Indeed, over 90 percent of American adults experience sexual intercourse before marrying. The percentage of evangelicals who do so is not much lower. In a nationally representative study of young adults, just under 80 percent of unmarried, church- going, conservative Protestants who are currently dating someone are having sex of some sort. I'm certainly not suggesting that they cannot abstain. I'm suggesting that in the domain of sex, most of them don't and won't.

What to do? Intensify the abstinence message even more? No. It won't work. The message must change, because our preoccupation with sex has unwittingly turned our attention away from the damage that Americans--including evangelicals--are doing to the institution of marriage by discouraging it and delaying it.

Late Have I Loved You

If you think it's difficult to be pro-life in a pro-choice world, or to be a disciple of Jesus in a sea of skeptics, try advocating for young marriage. Almost no one empathizes, even among the faithful. The nearly universal hostile reaction to my April 23, 2009, op-ed on early marriage in The Washington Post suggests that to esteem marriage in the public sphere today is to speak a foreign language: you invoke annoyance, confusion, or both.

In our last post in this series, John Piper has a chapter on singleness, and I didn't know what to expect. I say this for two reasons: some leaders in recent years have made some incredibly insensitive remarks about singleness and because I'm aware of the struggles so many have who don't want to be single. On top of this, culture has not made it a primary focus of our youth to pursue love and marriage. (More of that someday.)

So, what does Piper say in his recent book, This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence?

Of course, I'm keen on hearing what singles have to say about this chp and how singles are experiencing the church today. And even having any image of "singles" can at times "define" some people in ways that are prejudicial ... but I risk that in order to get a conversation going here about singleness.

Here's the theme: "God promises those of you who remain single in Christ blessings that are better than the blessings of marriage and children" (113).

There are two major arguments in this chapter:

First, Piper makes much of Isaiah 56:4-5, a majestic text where the prophet extols the inclusive grace of God, a grace that shows special promise to eunuchs, and takes this as a cipher for singleness (are eunuchs and "singles" the same?):

Let no foreigner who has bound himself to the LORD say,
       "The LORD will surely exclude me from his people."
       And let not any eunuch complain,
       "I am only a dry tree.
For this is what the LORD says:

       "To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths,
       who choose what pleases me
       and hold fast to my covenant- to them I will give within my temple and its walls
       a memorial and a name
       better than sons and daughters;
       I will give them an everlasting name
       that will not be cut off

We are discussing marriage by examining the recent book of John Piper's called This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence.

What then about this "submissiveness" that is so emphatic in Piper's complementarian approach to reading the roles of husbands and wives?

Piper begins with 1 Peter 3 and finds four characteristics of biblical women: they hope in God, they are fearless about the future, they have an inner adornment, and they are submissive.

What submission is not according to Piper:

1. It does not mean agreeing with everything yoru husband says.
2. It does not mean leaving your brain or your will at the wedding altar.
3. It does not mean avoiding every effort to change a husband.
4. It does not mean putting the will of a husband before the will of Christ. "Submission to Jesus relativizes submission to husbands" (100).
5. It does not mean that a wife gets her personal, spiritual strength through her husband.
6. It does not mean she is to act out of fear.

What is it?

We are discussing marriage by examining the recent book of John Piper's called This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence.

If you know the debates today among (mostly) evangelicals -- I don't know this debate outside that circle, you know there is a debate between complementarians and egalitarians, though I think the word "egalitarian" is slippery and derivative more from modernist theories of equality and justice than from either biblical teaching or theological perceptions. As I state in my book, The Blue Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible , I prefer the term "mutuality."

Piper doesn't. He's perhaps the leading voice in the complementarian group, and he has two chps in this book on male headship and another chapter on the wife's submission. Some of you are snarling now. Some of you are suspicious of what I might say. I hope both you, and others, keep reading.

Once again, here is the passage: Ephesians 5:21ff

Laura Sessions Stepp, a well-known journalist at The Washington Post, has a book about the nature of life for women in the hook-up culture, and the book is nothing less than a bold revelation of things you might not want to know. The book is called Unhooked: How Young Women Pursue Sex, Delay Love and Lose at Both .

The hook-up culture is hardly representative of all college students, but numbers show that there's more involved in this culture than want to be because of peer pressure. Questions: What changes have you seen in women in the past generation? What do you think of Stepp's analysis? What do you think is going on in the hook-up culture?

I want to drop in this post today a few lines of hers that describe the big shift that has occurred in the last generation when it come to sexual aggression:

Young women today "want to decide who, when and, above all, what happens between them and their partners, sexually and otherwise" (65).

"The prize from high school on is the feeling of power they get from setting their sights on a boy, seducing him and walking away at will, the better to avoid commitment, distractions and being hurt."

"This traditionally male social scheme as been reconstructed by girls who took a good look around and decided that it was better to be predator than prey, better do unto others before they do to you" (66).

We are discussing marriage by examining the recent book of John Piper's called This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence. Piper is a well-known advocate for what most call "complementarianism," and I don't know how to define this in...

We are discussing marriage by examining the recent book of John Piper's called This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence. Piper connects marriage to justification and to forgiveness. For marriage to "display God" the husband and the wife are...

We are discussing marriage by examining the recent book of John Piper's called This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence. "Marriage," Piper says, "is more wonderful than anyone on earth knows" (29). And he argues that we need God's...

We are discussing marriage by examining the recent book of John Piper's called This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence.  In the first chp Piper examines marriage in two respects:* It is from God.* It is for God's glory.Anyone...

What, in your view, are the top five mistakes made in marriage by couples? I got this question from Gretchen Rubin here. Her top five are:1. Wanting the gold stars of appreciation.2. Using a snappish tone.3. Getting angry about a...

We started yesterday, with a post of our own, a series on marriage by examining the recent book of John Piper's called This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence. Question added at 9:25am CT (find at bottom of post).John...

I begin a series today on John Piper's new book about marriage (This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence ) but I do so by posting a recent essay of mine from Out of Ur: it was called there "The...

In a recent post we discussed the hooked up culture and the neuroscience connected to hooking up -- the brain, so those authors argue, is the most influential sexual organ. That book discussed the facts and interpretation of neuorscience. Laura...

There are four major reasons given to teenagers at the time of their sexual awakening, for not engaging in sex.1. It's wrong -- and some just say "Because it's wrong!" while others reach into their sacred texts, like the Bible,...

David Blankenhorn, in a column in 1997 (and anthologized in a book my class is reading --  Wing to Wing, Oar to Oar: Readings on Courting and Marrying (The Ethics of Everyday Life) ), discusses the potential symbolic value of marriage...

The Song of Solomon is a love song between lovers and for lovers. Perhaps it was a play or designed to be dramatically played before others. Perhaps it was designed for the king's courtiers as entertainment. Perhaps it is a...

Here is a letter sent to us. Any comment of mine is worthless. Scot: Thank you for this post and for this website. I was turned on to this site by a friend and am currently reading "Jesus Creed." I...

Protestants today may be thoroughly surprised to learn that things weren't always so permissive and open when it comes to sexuality -- that is, between husbands and wives. Gilbert Meilaender, in The Way That Leads Home (chp. 4), puts Augustine...

We are all for churches and Christians extending mercy to the divorced, but we are also all for advocating the permanency and richness of marriage and I sometimes think an emphasis on this is too often assumed and not taught...

We finish the Song of Solomon today. The Song ends with the woman summoning her man to the bed: Make haste, my beloved, and be like a gazelle or a young stag upon the mountains of spices! (8:14) The "mountains...

And now her shepherd lover responds back: 11 Solomon had a vineyard at Baal-hamon; he entrusted the vineyard to keepers; each one was to bring for its fruit a thousand pieces of silver. 12 My vineyard, my very own, is...

Suddenly the woman turns to her ("their") sister, who is young. She describes her sister's body and then compares herself to her sister (vv. 8-10). He does the same -- compares himself to another -- in vv. 11-12. Here are...

The woman, after declaring where it was that their love was first aroused, now suddenly teaches what love is all about. Here are her words: 8:6 Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm;...

The woman speaks in 8:5b through 8:10, and then her shepherd love speaks in 8:11-13 and the woman closes off this potent and totally delightful exploration of love in 8:14. Here is how she begins the finale: 8:5b speaks of...

As at 3:1-5, the woman wants to take her lover to her mother's home, and not only to her home but into her mother's bedroom -- to her "chamber" (8:2). And, once again, not clear when it comes to fantasy...

Chp 8 of the Song of Songs is a dialogue about love and this chp closes it off. As I have worked through this text I think the three-character interpretation does have merit -- but it is not entirely clear....

The shepherd lover, whom I am not convinced is Solomon but who is insteadn the woman's husband/lover, has spoken -- he has extolled the woman's physically rapturous beauty. She now responds: "I am my beloved’s, and his desire is for...

This week the following verses (6:4-5), from the beginning of the week, struck me: You are beautiful, my darling, as Tirzah, lovely as Jerusalem, majestic as troops with banners. Turn your eyes from me; they overwhelm me. The shepherd lover...

The man, with his love back with him, extols her physical beauty once again. Her feet: 7:1 How graceful are your feet in sandals, O queenly maiden! Her thighs: Your rounded thighs are like jewels, the work of a master...

The following lines are a puzzle for interpreters. Who is saying these words? 6:11 I went down to the nut orchard, to look at the blossoms of the valley, to see whether the vines had budded, whether the pomegranates were...

The man, having extolled the beauty of his lover as that of a royal city decked out with heavenly splendor and creating awe -- like encountering God -- now extols her beauty: He begins at the top and moves down....

The Song of Songs is a pastiche of songs and episodes. After the Shulamite woman sought and seemingly found her lover, he now echoes back to her a song that extols her physical beauty: He compares her to the glory...

The narrative of Song of Songs 5:2--6:3 surprises. The woman is in bed, her lover knocks at the door, she delays, he departs, she searches, she enlists the women of Jerusalem to tell him if they find him that she...

The narrative that gives rise to the extolling by the woman of her lover's physical attributes was that she was on the hunt for him after he seemingly departed from her bedroom door. So, the women of Jerusalem ask: 6:1...

An assignment for you. The woman has just described her lover's physical attributes; he described her earlier. I'll post both of these descriptions and ask you what you see in their differing descriptions: She about him: 5:10 My beloved is...

The women of Jerusalem ask the young yearning lover-woman what's so special about her lover, and she answers with a listing of his attributes: Here's what she likes -- and these might not be what women today like most about...

Here's a question the women of Jerusalem ask the woman who is seeking to find her absent lover: 5:9 What is your beloved more than another beloved, O fairest among women? What is your beloved more than another beloved, that...

Song of Songs 5:2-8 tells a story of invitation, delay, disappointment and search -- the woman is asleep, her lover knocks on the door, she delays in responding, he disappears and she searches for him. Love sometimes issues an urgent...

Whether in her dream or in the reality of being awakened from a dream, the woman has teasingly said to her shepherd lover at the door that she is not attired to come to the door. But something happens that...

The shepherd's lover now will give a second long speech; the first one was in 2:8--3:11 which was followed by his speech (4:1--5:1). Now she speaks in 5:2--6:3: She is asleep but her heart of love was awake: 2 I...

The young shepherd lover continues his delight in his lover by cmparing her to his own garden of delights, a garden locked so that only he and she will enjoy that garden: 12 A garden locked is my sister, my...

A word for men ... the Song of Songs brings into poetic imagery the delight of love. The delight in love that both a woman and man enjoy -- only rarely, however, do both bring into poetic expression to one...

The shepherd-lover announces his intent in 4:6 in words that are charged with emotion that is masked for all but the two lovers themselves -- we watch only by entering into the imagery: Until the day breathes and the shadows...

You can't read the following verses (Song 4:1-5) without both knowing just exactly what the young man delights in in his lovely lover and also all he's leaving unsaid. Just read it and see what it images for you: 4:1...

We enter into a difficulty at Song of Solomon 3:6-11: are there two major characters (Shulamite woman and Solomon, her lover) or three (Shulamite, her shepherd lover, and Solomon)? I have for a long time fallen prey to the view...

When I look over the woman's speech that we have looked at this week, I am reminded again of her utter delight in her lover. There are characteristics of this woman's love that are worth our reminding ourselves of: 1....

Moving from chp 2 to chp 3 in Song of Songs moves us from a scene where the young woman has invited her lover into her home for the night ... and suddenly she declares to the women of Jerusalem...

The next verse is from the woman -- and she speaks to the maidens of Jerusalem. Oh so nice. Again, live in their delightful language with one another: She speaks to the women and, using the "vineyard" for her sexuality,...

The woman, either in conjuring up her lover in her mind or reporting of a previous encounter, now recalls what her lover said through the lattice. His words are basically these: "Let's escape into the flowery areas or let's find...

Our next section in the Song of Songs, 2:8--3:5, describes the woman's rendition of her lover's visit to her home -- either in reality or in her mind -- and then her nocturnal search and finding of her lover. Here...

As on last Friday, so today: I'll sum up some ideas about love and marriage from our reading this week of Song of Solomon 1:12--2:7. I suggest you ask yourself these questions: Does your love for your loved one evoke...

This dialogue of admiration continues. He glows about how beautiful she is and how she leaves the rest in her wake... and she glows right back: 2:3 As an apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my...

The young woman, enthralled with her lover's presence and delighting their Edenic space, now declares who she is: I am a rose [asphodel?] of Sharon, a lily of the valleys (2:1). His words of delight in her beauty lead her...

Now the young man speaks back: 1:15 Ah, you are beautiful, my love; ah, you are beautiful; your eyes are doves. They are in a dialogue now of mutual admiration, an admiration time that evokes delight in their love for...

The young man has just extolled the beauty of his lover, comparing or imagining her ornamentation to that of Pharaoh's royalty. It is now her turn to answer back: 12 While the king was on his couch, my nard gave...

The Song of Solomon is a love song between lovers and for lovers. Perhaps it was a play or designed to be dramatically played before others. Perhaps it was designed for the king's courtiers as entertainment. Perhaps it is a...

The young woman wants to know where her young lover will be during the siesta time of midday. His response? Read this: 8 If you do not know, most beautiful of women, follow the tracks of the sheep and graze...

The young woman, intoxicated with the delightful love of her young lover, describes herself in the presence of the other women of Jerusalem -- who watch her love like a chorus surrounding the scene -- with these words: 5 Dark...

Song of Songs 1:2-4, the words of the young woman, reads: 2 Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth— for your love is more delightful than wine. 3 Pleasing is the fragrance of your perfumes; your name...

Church kids, in the middle of a boring sermon, sometimes wander around in the Bible to keep themselves occupied. Those who wander accidentally into the Song of Songs not only wander but begin to wonder just what it is they...