Marriage
HOW NOT TO FIND A MARRIAGE PARTNER (PART 1)
And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him. And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed. Genesis 2:18-25
On many occasions I’ve heard a number of preachers teach that in the choice of who to marry as a single, the man has to do the ‘finding’. In support of this position, particular reference is often made to Proverbs 18:22 which says ‘Whosofindeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favour of the LORD’. In the opinion of these teachers and proponents of this concept, a man has the responsibility to ‘find’ his own wife. Some, jocularly do assert that a man or a lady must have his or her eyes widely open while ‘finding’ a marriage partner, while some have even gone to the extreme position of drawing conclusion that God necessarily needs not be involved in the business of finding a wife or a husband.
Everything has a beginning, and so is marriage. Marriage was authored by the Almighty God, and to comprehend the mind of the author, the proper thing is to go back to the beginning in order to understand the way the Creator designed it. From Genesis chapter 2, after God had reasoned within himself that it was not good for Adam to be alone, He (God) single-handedly initiated the process of providing him (Adam) a wife, who was to be a help meet. The process, according to the scriptures, began with God making Adam to sleep a deep sleep. Why was it necessary for God to make Adam sleep? Beyond the need to handle the complexities associated with the first surgical operation which was performed by the Almighty God Himself, it appears part of the considerations was also that of the need to prevent Adam from interfering with the process. Through the deep sleep, God disabled Adam’s faculties and consciousness, and this totally prevented him from interfering or interrupting the process from which Eve-his wife emerged. God single handedly anchored the process from end to end, and it’s not on record that Adam had any contribution whatsoever.
Just as God made Adam to sleep a deep sleep during the process of formation and presentation of his wife-Eve, I believe this approach is what the unchanging God will still adopt today for any of His children in finding the right marriage partner. Of course I’m sure no one is in doubt of the fact that God never changes, neither does He review nor improve on His ways or principles.
The above principles played out very well in the way and manner Isaac got his bride-Rebecca according to Genesis 24. It is not on record that Isaac participated in the process that produced Rebecca his bride, yet he was adjudged to have the best marriage relationship amongst all the Patriarchs. At the time Abraham initiated the process of finding a wife for Isaac, he (Isaac) was already forty (40) years old, and one cannot but wonder why a forty year old man would not go find a wife for himself.
Looking at the process and the circumstances which produced the bride for Isaac, no one should be in doubt that God the Father was the one actively working in divine ways to find Rebecca for Isaac. Beginning from the time Abraham commissioned his eldest servant for the critical assignment, to the time the servant sincerely prayed out his heart for divine guidance in the course of the journey, to the time Rebecca showed up at the well and passed the hidden test of fetching water for all the camels, to the time the servant was invited for dinner at Bethuel’s house, up to the point the family gave their consent for Rebecca -their daughter to go hook up in matrimony to a man none of them, including the bride, had ever seen, it is abundantly clear that the Almighty God was the one that played the role of finding a bride for Isaac.
Of course, this is not an attempt to suggest or promote the primitive concept and tradition of parents dictating or determining whom their children should or shouldn’t marry, however, for those who recognize the place of the Almighty God as a Father, it will not be difficult to absolutely surrender the whole process of finding a marriage partner to Him through genuine and heartfelt prayers backed up by submission to divine leading.
As a single, finding your God-ordained partner for marriage requires that you allow God to ‘disable’ your physical senses and faculties, so that these will not interfere with the process which is supposed to be under His absolute control and supervision. It is unfortunate that many people are living in regrets and pain today just because they got hooked up with wrong partners because of they relied on their sight and senses in choosing a marriage partner.
Looking at the above passage again, the scripture says ‘And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man’. Whao! I like the phrase ‘…brought her unto the man’. Are you aware that as a Father, part of God’s strict responsibilities to you His son, is to bring unto you your wife, and as His daughter, to take you to your husband! God didn’t send Eve to find her way to Adam, but personally took her to the right place she belonged-the same place He was taken from as a rib. The way God handled the solemnization of the marriage of Adam has established in clear terms, what God has committed to do for His children if they allow Him in absolute surrender. As a child of God, please I dare to emphatically say that nothing has discharged God from His strict responsibility as a Father, to ensure that He brings your wife to you, as His son, and His daughter to take you to your husband. Please, with this understanding, if you believe God for marriage partner, you’ve got to change the direction of your prayer to birth your long-awaited answer. When you have truly surrendered your will and ways to God as your Father, please you have the right to simply ask Him to bring your wife to you (as His son), and take you to your husband (as His daughter). God will never fail in His responsibilities; the reason you have stayed many years trying to find someone to marry, may be that you have been attempting to take over God’s responsibility, and that will never work!
Ezekiel Olukolajo
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Ezekiel Olukolajo
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