HUSBAND AND WIFE | AdventAI

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jul 28, 1868

HUSBAND AND WIFE.

Of all human institutions, marriage is the oldest and most important. It dates back beyond the fall, to the days of the Garden of Eden. It was instituted by God himself, in the time of man's innocency, before sin had entered our world. Marriage, then, is consistent not only with Christian, but with Adamic, perfection.—Our Saviour recognized it, and honored it with the first miracle he worked among men. Saint Paul declares it to be honorable.

The duty of the husband and wife to each other, is clearly laid down in the Bible. And first of all, it is their duty to love each other. This is indispensable. For the want of this, there can be no compensation. A husband may provide for his wife a costly mansion, fine furniture, gorgeous apparel, and every delicacy that money can purchase; but if he fails to love her, he totally fails in the most important duty he owes to any of his fellow-beings. The wife may see that her house is well kept, and her husband cared for; but if she does not love him, she wrongs him, and sins against God and her own soul. A man and woman married to each other, have no right to live together merely as provider and housekeeper. They are to be more to each other than their nearest and dearest natural relations. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. Saint Paul gives the love which Christ had for the church, as the measure of the love which the husband should have for his wife. His language is, Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it.—Eph. v, 25.

This, of course, is the greatest degree of human love of which one is capable. God must be loved supremely, and neither husband nor wife must be allowed to come in between the soul and God. But God never contradicts himself. He never, by his Spirit, requires a person to act contrary to the plain teachings of his word. Says Dr. Adam Clarke, “What miserable work has been made in the peace of families, by a wife or a husband pretending to be wiser than the apostle, and too holy and spiritual to keep the commandments of God!”—Com. on 1 Cor. vii, 8. We have met with a number of cases, where the husband or wife got too spiritual for conjugal affection. If they did not get cured of what Dr. Clarke calls “a fancied sanctity, unsupported by Scripture or common sense,” they almost invariably turned out badly. We are getting to distrust, very strongly, the professions, no matter how high, of that husband or wife who is plainly wanting in affection for his or her wedded companion. There is generally unsoundness, either of the head or of the heart, or of both. “If a man love not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?” But he is to love his wife much more than his brother; therefore, if he does not love her, it is folly to pretend that he loves God, and especially that he loves God so much that he cannot love his wife as God so plainly commands. This is equally true of the wife. It is perfect folly for her to imagine that she has attained to such a degree of sanctity that she cannot keep one of the plainest commands of God. Enoch was one of the purest characters of whom mention is made in the Bible. He walked with God; and God took him up bodily in a chariot of fire to Heaven. But, that he might stand as a constant reproof to transcendental pietists of all ages, it is recorded of him, that he lived in holy wedlock, and “begat sons and daughters.”

The difficulty, with some, is in the domestic circle. They do not grow in grace, nor retain the blessings they get, because they do not have the affection which they should for those whom they are solemnly bound to love and cherish. A strict observance of their marriage vows, would help them more than a protracted meeting. Yet no one has a right to violate plain commands of the Bible, to please a companion. But let the general course of conduct be such, that it may be evident that the refusal is for Christ’s sake, and does not proceed from a lack of affection. Let every one in particular so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband.