L esson 3 *April 12–18

Images From Marriage

Sabbath Afternoon
Read for This Week’s Study: Gen. 2:23–25, Eph. 5:29–32,
Ezek. 16:4–14, Rev. 18:1–4, Gen. 24:1–4, Rev. 19:1–9.

Memory Text: “Then he said to me, ‘Write: “Blessed are those who
are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb!” ’ And he said to me,
‘These are the true sayings of God’ ” (Revelation 19:9, NKJV).

T
he Bible is replete with love stories that powerfully reveal aspects
of salvation and of God’s love for His people. The most intimate
of relationships, marriage, proves to be a school in which, if we
allow ourselves to experience it the way that God had intended, we can
discover deep lessons about His love for us, about our relationship to
Him, and about the lengths to which He has gone to redeem us.
Modern conceptions of love and marriage have skewed our ability to
appreciate what God is trying to teach us through the marital covenant.
Though human sinfulness has greatly perverted marriage (and just
about everything else), marriage can still be a powerful way of reveal-
ing truth, even prophetic truth. More than just to make us happy, mar-
riage should be a school in which we learn deep lessons about ourselves
and our relationship to God.
This week we will explore different ways the Word of God talks
about marriages, good and bad. We can then draw lessons from these
examples to understand better how God relates to His people, even
when they fall short, and we can learn some truths about His love that
can help us better grasp last-day events.

* Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, April 19.

22
 S unday April 13

One Flesh
Few biblical metaphors underscore the intimacy that God desires
with the human race more than that of marriage. This metaphor is used
so frequently in the biblical narrative—and shows up so pointedly in
Revelation—that it is imperative for Bible students to grasp what God
is driving at when He uses it in the Word.

Read Genesis 2:23–25 and Ephesians 5:29–32. In what ways does a

human marriage mirror Christ’s bond to humanity?

_________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________

On an occasion when Jesus was speaking to the Pharisees, He quoted

the Genesis account of Adam and Eve’s marriage, to which the Pharisees
quickly raised the question, “ ‘Why then did Moses command to give a
certificate of divorce, and to put her away?’ ” (Matt. 19:7, NKJV).
Moses, of course, was deemed a founding prophet for the nation.
Imagine questioning the Author of the institution of marriage by pitting
Him against His own prophet. Their tact was typical of their approach
to Jesus; they often attempted to prove that His teachings contradicted
the Scriptures.
Lifetime, faithful marriage was the ideal established by God at the
foundation of the human race. Fallen humanity, unfortunately, damaged
this foundational gift from God.
Perhaps, given the importance that Scripture assigns to marriage, it is
not a coincidence that the institution has always been under relentless
attack. Along with the Sabbath, it is one of the two gifts bestowed on
us in Eden, and both were intended to demonstrate God’s desire for an
intimate relationship with His creation.
Marriage, the intimate pairing of two imperfect people, will always
give cause for tension. A marriage between the church and Christ is the
pairing of a perfect Savior with a very imperfect bride. Nevertheless,
we can learn about God’s love from what a good marriage offers.

Here are three principles for marriage. First, forgive your spouse,
however undeserving, just as Christ forgives us, however unde-
serving. Second, accept your spouse, faults and all, just as Christ
accepts us, faults and all. Third, just as Christ put us before
Himself, put your spouse before yourself. How could all three of
these gospel-based principles help us not only to understand how
God relates to us but also to help any marriage?

_______________________________________________________
23
 M onday April 14

The Beautiful Bride

Ezekiel 16 shows us an astonishing picture of God’s regard for His
people. He describes the nation of Israel as an abandoned baby, left in
a field to die. He takes her home, cleans her up, and when she is fully
grown, he marries her. It is a powerful picture of an unlikely marriage.

Read Ezekiel 16:4–14. What do the details about this bride’s exalta-
tion teach us about God’s intentions toward us?

_________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________

God told Israel that, under His care, she grew “ ‘exceedingly beauti-
ful’ ” (Ezek. 16:13, NKJV). When God first found her, nobody found
her beautiful; she was a reject among other children, cast aside in the
hopes that she would die. But as God showered His attention on her, she
became more and more beautiful, until she was the talk of the world. In
the earliest days of the Hebrew kings, under David and Solomon, this
was particularly true. The queen of Ethiopia even made a special trip in
order to see the splendor of Israel for herself!
Israel’s beauty, however, was entirely the gift of God. She was
beautiful—the talk of the nations—precisely because she was His
­
bride. God says that her beauty “ ‘was perfect through My splendor
which I had bestowed on you’ ” (Ezek. 16:14, NKJV).
This is a recurrent theme in the Bible: God’s bride is beautiful,
not because of anything she has done but because God has showered
His favor on her and made her that way. In a similar way, believers
appear beautiful in the estimate of heaven, not because of anything
we have done to earn it but because of the favor of God, the salva-
tion that He has showered on us. We are beautiful because we are
covered in His righteousness, the “righteousness of God” Himself
(2 Cor. 5:21).
All was good, however, until the next verse in Ezekiel: “ ‘But you
trusted in your own beauty, played the harlot because of your fame,
and poured out your harlotry on everyone passing by who would have
it’ ” (Ezek. 16:15).
We were created to reflect the goodness and glory of God. When
God’s creations assume that their beauty is their own, that beauty is
cheapened, and trouble awaits.

What are the dangers of us trusting in our “own beauty”? That

is, how might we think that there is anything in and of ourselves
that gives us merit with God or makes us deserving of His love?
How can we always guard against spiritual pride?

24
 T uesday April 15

Hosea’s Harlot Wife

God’s request of the prophet Hosea may be one of the strangest
assignments ever given to one of His servants: marry a harlot—on
purpose! But God was using Hosea to help us understand, from His
own perspective, the pain of human sin and rebellion. God had lovingly
chosen a wife, Israel, who repeatedly cheated on Him, and yet, aston-
ishingly enough, He took her back and restored her.

Compare Hosea 1:2; Hosea 3:1; Revelation 17:1, 2; and Revelation

18:1–4. What is the harlotry mentioned here? What lessons can the
Christian church learn from the story of Hosea? In what ways has
the church repeated the sins of the Old Testament?

_________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________

The Bible reveals that the errors of Israel in the Old Testament
would be largely repeated by Christ’s New Testament church. God’s
covenant people went wildly astray prior to their exile, bringing the
idolatrous practices of neighboring nations into God’s covenant nation.
In the early fourth century, the Christian church, sensing a potential
advantage, courted the emperor of Rome, Constantine, and invited him
to start settling the disputes of the church. In each case, God’s people
wandered outside of their relationship with Him in order to find “solu-
tions” for perceived problems.
God’s choice of words makes it seem obvious that He is not only
trying to show us what we’ve done wrong but also sharing how it
makes Him feel. Those who have been betrayed by a spouse can
begin to grasp the feelings of devastation that our infidelity to
Christ might stir in the courts of heaven. Perhaps the most amazing
part of Hosea’s story is the lengths to which the prophet went to
redeem his wayward wife.
When we see the final cry to humanity, calling God’s people to come
out of Babylon, it is noteworthy that He is calling His own people, and
not strangers. He knows them intimately. He loves them. And as the
world pitches toward its worst hour, He is still offering the redemption
price that He had paid in order to purchase us back with His own blood.
The cross of Christ, more than anything else, should show us just how
earnestly the Lord wants to save His wayward people.

What are the ways today that any church, even our own, can be
dallying with spiritual fornication?

_______________________________________________________
25
 W ednesday April 16

Isaac and Rebekah

When Abraham was old and no doubt thinking about the promises
made to him by God about his posterity (see Gen. 15:5), he gave his
oldest and most trusted servant a solemn task.

Read Genesis 24:1–4. Why was it so important to Abraham that his

son not marry “ ‘from the daughters of the Canaanites’ ” (Gen.
24:3, NKJV)?

_________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________

However exclusivist his admonition could seem, the issue for

Abraham was spiritual, not ethnic; it was theological, not national.
Abraham knew very well the moral degeneracy of Canaanite religious
practices, not to mention their worship of false gods, and he knew how
easy it would be for his son to fall into these practices were he to marry
from among them.
Indeed, the story of so much of ancient Israel, and even of the Christian
church through the centuries, has been one in which God’s people—who
should have been witnessing to the world—get caught up instead in the
world and in its false teachings and religious beliefs. Perhaps the greatest
example of this sad reality has been the introduction of Sunday, the pagan
day of the sun, in place of the biblical seventh-day Sabbath, a reality that
will play a prominent role in the last days.

Read Genesis 24:57–67. What lessons can we glean about Christ and
His church from some details we find in this story? What is there
to learn, for instance, about our fallen state from the fact that
Rebekah was a distant, separated relative to Isaac?

_________________________________________________________

We are undoubtedly related to our Creator, having originally been

made in His image. We have been separated from Him by sin, and yet,
we are still considered to be the right bride for Him though our choices
can make the marriage more turbulent than it needs to be.

Yes, God loves us, His bride, more than we love Him. What are
the choices we can make—and should make—every day that can
strengthen our love for God? At the same time, what choices will
only deaden our love?

_______________________________________________________
26
 T hursday April 17

The Harlot Is Judged

Read Revelation 19:1–9. Two things are celebrated simultaneously: the
end of the harlot and the marriage of Christ with His bride. How
is it possible that both events are actually demonstrations of God’s
righteous and loving character at the same time?

_________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________

Infidelity comes with a very painful price tag. The fallout spills over
into the lives of children and others. Even the most patient of wronged
spouses may eventually discover that there is a moment of no return, past
which the marriage can no longer be redeemed. When our world reaches
a point where hearts have hardened deeply enough that there will be no
more repentance, no point exists in continuing history and allowing the
unbridled suffering of sin to continue. Even though there is heartbreak over
the lost, those who have suffered under this world’s dispensation of sin can
celebrate that it is finally over—and that the world is being restored to the
way God originally designed it. This time there will not be a turning away
from God, because we have learned, the hard way, that God was correct
about the devastation that comes from separating ourselves from Him.

Read Revelation 21:1–4. What does the marriage imagery here mean,
and why is it full of hope and promise? What is our assurance of
the hope presented in these verses?

_________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________

“Marriage, a union for life, is a symbol of the union between Christ

and His church. The spirit that Christ manifests toward the church is the
spirit that husband and wife are to manifest toward each other.”—Ellen
G. White, Testimonies for the Church, vol. 7, p. 46.
Christ suffered unimaginable pain as the human race rejected Him
and gave the affection that belongs to Him to other gods. And yet, even
then, He gave Himself for us, paying in Himself for our infidelities and
adulteries so that, if we repent and turn away from them, we have the
promise of eternal life.

Read 1 Peter 1:18, 19. What are we told in these verses that gives
us the assurance of the end as depicted in Revelation 21:1–4?

_______________________________________________________
27
 F riday April 18

Further Thought: Read John 2:1–11, Matthew 22:1–14, 2 Corinthians

11:1–5, and Matthew 25:1–13.

Once you realize how much data is available in the rest of the Bible
to help you broaden your understanding of prophecy, it can be tempt-
ing to over-apply it. Throughout the centuries, some Christians have
emphasized the symbolism and imagery found in Bible stories to the
point where they virtually begin to treat the historical narrative as a
myth. While layers of meaning are to be found just about everywhere in
Scripture, we must always remember that God has a way of taking real
events that involve real people and using them to teach us things about
His future interactions with the church.
The wedding feast in Cana, for example, may offer insights into the
meta­phor of marriage used by prophecy, but the wedding was a literal
event. “The word of Christ supplied ample provision for the feast. So abun-
dant is the provision of His grace to blot out the iniquities of men, and to
renew and sustain the soul.”—Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, p. 149.
Or as she writes here: “ ‘The Lord God will do nothing, but He revealeth
His secret unto His servants the prophets.’ While ‘the secret things belong
unto the Lord our God,’ ‘those things which are revealed belong unto us
and to our children forever.’ Amos 3:7; Deuteronomy 29:29. God has given
these things to us, and His blessing will attend the reverent, prayerful study
of the prophetic scriptures.”—The Desire of Ages, p. 234.

Discussion Questions:
Ê Read John 2:1–11. There are many elements in John’s Gospel
that foreshadow Christ’s future work, and commentators have
noticed the deliberate way in which John moves his readers for-
ward to the Cross. Where do you see various aspects of Christ’s
character and future kingdom being demonstrated in this story?
What does it teach us about the plan of salvation or about the
ultimate marriage feast that has been promised to God’s Son?

Ë The parable of the ten virgins is widely known and much loved by
students of the Bible. What does this important story teach us about
last-day events? Is it significant that the groom is delayed? What les-
sons might this parable teach about our individual relationships to
Christ versus the way that Christ relates to the church corporately?

Ì Think about false practices that have entered into Christianity

from outside the faith. Besides the obvious one, Sunday, as opposed
to the biblical Sabbath, what other false beliefs have come in? How
have they come in, and what can we do not only to protect ourselves
from them but to help others see what they really are? In what ways
are the three angels’ messages an attempt to do just that, to help
people see the false beliefs that have entered the faith?
28