Final Exam Flashcards
What is a Christ-centered marriage?
1: God ordained union of two sinners
2: God ordained union of two sinners who admit their sins
3: || who find forgiveness for their sins in Jesus and seek to extend that forgiveness to each other
4: || who have been made new in Christ and who are making progress in overcoming their sins and in being and doing what God wants them to be and do, both in relationship to him and to each other
Ultimate cause of marriage problems:
Not past mistreatments, present mistreatment, situational pressures, sinful influences, diseases, or the devil.
It’s sin.
How to view as a single:
- 1: View God as saving, sovereign, wise, loving, having your best interest at heart; weeps over sin that leads to singleness; Jesus as sympathetic high priest; best friend and loving covenantal partner
- 2: view yourself as complete in Christ, can learn contentment, capable of achieving and making impact, among a multitude
- 3: view opposite gender as not potential spouses, possible spouses of other men and women, need to be led by God if ever to marry you,
- 4: view other marrieds: rejoice for them, they also have hardships, people you can minister to
Singleness Questions:
- Gen. 2:18=> not a remedy to loneliness, talking about Adam and Eve specifically
- Gift of singleness=> spiritual gift/charisma; or God-given providential view=God guides people to live and serve him as a single or married Christian
- Crisis in 1 Cor. 7:26-31=> a) local problem, 2) return of Christ coming, 3) new age inaugurated.
marriage is not the highest good, as it will not continue into the resurrection
Pre-engagement counseling approach and justification
Premarital TRAINING not COUNSELING
Why premarital training?
1. marriage is important to God, it makes sense to take time
2. positive correlation between premarital training and marital success
3. culture, families, and churches fail to provide proper instruction
4. couples are glad they did it
Christian Marriage Commitment Staircase
Step 1: am i saved and following Jesus
2: is the Bible my sole authority
3: what is meaning, purpose, and roles of marriage? Why desire it?
4: biblically problem solve, seek help, or give up? push spouse to pastoral help?
5: promise vows to God when time comes? Swear fidelity, even when things get hard?
Gen. 2:24 being most important for marriage:
It addresses four generations:
1. Written about Adam and Eve
2. Written to Israel about to enter promised land
3. Jesus cited it in Mt. 19 and MK 10 to emphasize permanence
4. 20+ years later Paul cited in 1 Cor. 6:16 and Eph. 5:31
- Before and after fall marriage
- paradise of Eden, desert of Sinai, ancient Palestine, urban Corinth and Ephesus
Lesson 5 Eve’s role in Gen. 2:18:
Suitable: fit for
Helper: not inferior, helps him accomplish mandate
Implications of marriage as a covenant and God’s purpose in marriage
- marriage established by Cov.
- marriage established by cov. within laws and customs of a culture
- est. by cov. not sexual union (though sex expresses it)
- marriage cov. permanent in life except by death or divorce
- marriage cov. can and should hold marriages together, even when nothing else seems to
- marriage cov. calls married people to cultivate marriage as prim. human. relationship
- mar. cov. means God sovereignly ordained and est. YOUR marriage, even if it was unbib. or unwise to enter
Marital Counseling Perspectives and Guidelines
A: Marital counseling is not wise when there’s serious one sided sins
B: Differences between individual and marriage counseling.
- 1. in goals
- 2. in length of sessions or case
- 3. in format
- 4. in counselee expectations
- 5. in how we assess the problem and progress
Twofold Marital Counseling Goal
C: Twofold Marital Counseling Goal
- 1. both grasp the Gospel, please God
- 2. love each other, oneness in marriage
– all problems stem from one or both failing to follow goal
– when one or both partners come in:
- they probably will have a different theory for the problem
- probably will have a fix my spouse justify me agenda
Marital Counseling Task
- expose wrong thinking
- present bib. hope
- secure active commitment to bib. agenda
- teach them bib agenda and help them follow
Husband and wife roles
2: Understand role issues under broader context of equality and mutuality of marriage cov.
3: It’s easier to perform our roles when they do theirs, but their disobedience can’t distract or hinder our obedience
4: it is not our duty to demand that they carry out their role, or hold them accountable
7: the role commands does not imply that they need to receive the blessings
Husband’s Roles
Love your wife with sacrificial love– love that lays down your life for your wife
Love your wife with sensitive love– love that cherishes her and seeks to meet her desires
Wife’s Roles and Mutual Submission
- Jesus calls you to submit to your husband
- from the heart with a submissive attitude
- whether he is obedient or disobedient to God
- in everything except sinful things
- to please Jesus
*mutual submission to one another:
v1: all submit to one another
v2: proper submission relationships
Conflict Step 1
Step 1: Determine to please God
- implications:
1) Failure by you and/or your spouse to please God is the ultimate cause of all marital conflicts
2) This goal keeps your focus on God, not on the conflict issues or on your spouse.
3) In Christ, this goal is always doable, no matter how your spouse behaves
4) This goal will pace your efforts (e.g., timing, energy, risk)
5) If you both please God, reconciliation is guaranteed and your marriage will grow.
6) Even if your spouse does not please God, you can experience God’s favor and comfort
7) You must continue your pleasing God commitment, even if your spouse does not seem to do so, and even if the marital relationship gets worse.
8) When this goal governs you, your spouse’s sins, bad habits, offenses, failures, etc. become opportunities not obstacles to pleasing God and growing as a Christian.
- 2 Cor. 5:9-10; 2 Cor. 5:14-15
Conflict Step 2
Step 2: Repent of your sins
- Heart sins and behavioral sins
- how to confess: Identify offenses, confess to God, confess to spouse
- James 4:1-3; Matt. 7:3-5
Conflict Step 3
Step 3: Love your spouse
- Eph. 4:1-3; Col. 3:12-14
- issue, position, interest– goal of understanding and fulfilling interests
—here’s the issue, tell me your position, i serve your interest
- Luke 6:27-36 game plan:
- - Love - - - - - - - Mercy
- Do good - bless - pray -
Because we’ve been recipients of good, blessed, cared for
Counseling people married to unbeliever
A. Start with compassion for difficult marriage
B. Consider with your counselee 2 passages that address the situation (1 Cor. 7:12-16; 1 Pet. 3:1-6
C. Give biblical counsel to them
- 1. find highest comfort, joy, and strength in Jesus not spouse
- 2. God sovereignly allowed for this, and He wants to use it to make you like Jesus
- 3. Do all that God calls you to do to minister, and remove any improper stumbling blocks for following Him
D. Caution them against spiritual dangers
- 1. daydreaming about life otherwise
- 2. envying others
- 3. letting good desire for salv. become demand
- 4. anger toward God
Problems come from the heart passages
Proverbs 4:23 -24; Matthew 12:33-37; Matthew 15:1-20
Lesson 10 pt. 2: point 2, 2 guidelines, structured listening assignment
Principle: God listens to us, His people
Guideline #1: listen actively and attentively
Guideline #2: caringly and compassionately
Structured listening assignment:
- person a talks uninterrupted for 5-10 minutes
- person b listens
- person b reflects what they heard
- person a says yes or no,
- if no, person a restates it, until they feel understood
Four qualities of godly speech?
Honest, beneficial, timely, and kind
Practical Guidelines for Marital Growth
- engage in spiritual disciplines together
- concentrate on things you appreciate about them
- understand how your spouse experiences life
- express love in “languages” that speak to them
- share relationship building experiences together
Godly sex in marriage
it’s marital, multi-purposed, ministerial; seeking to know and satisfy spouses desires