#5 The Meaning of Marriage: Facing the Complexities of Commitment with the Wisdom of God, by Timothy Keller. This is one of the best and definitely the most comprehensive book I have ever read on marriage. One of God’s great purposes for marriage is to remind us of Christ’s relationship with His redeemed people forever! A greater understanding of the gospel creates a deeper union between spouses as time goes on. Keller suggests on page 47 that we start with this, “Do for your spouse what God did for you in Jesus, and the rest will follow.” It should be our goal to be a servant-lover to our spouse, meaning that we learn how to delay gratification or even deny self to serve each other. Christ gave himself up for us and we should follow His example in our marriage. Marriage simply cannot be properly understood or practiced without being rooted in the gospel. “If God had the gospel of Jesus’s salvation in mind when he established marriage, then marriage only ‘works’ to the degree that it approximates the pattern of God’s self-giving love in Christ.” However, sacrificial love is only made possible through a continual refilling of your soul’s tank with the glory and love of the Lord. Next to our relationship with God, there is no relationship more important than marriage, “and that is why coming to know and love your spouse is difficult and painful, yet rewarding and wondrous. The most painful, the most wonderful—this is the Biblical understanding of marriage. The Spirit’s work of making the gospel real to the heart weakens the self-centeredness of the soul. … The deep happiness that marriage can bring, then, lies on the far side of sacrificial service in the power of the Spirit.”
The Meaning of Marriage: Facing the Complexities with the Wisdom of God
