A Marriage Versus Being Married

Scripture Text: Romans 3:1-20

Paul is helping the followers in Rome wrestle with an aspect of theology that people have wrestled with ever since the life, death and resurrection of Christ, the relationship between The Law and grace. Before the time of Christ the Jewish people followed the law as their path to being in relationship with God. These prescribed ways of living showed the way to have a faithful and full relationship with God. The big problem was that no one seemed to be able to keep the totality of the law.

Enter Christ. Jesus became the fulfillment of the law, not by keeping all the rules and regulations, rather by providing the pathway by which people could have a faithful and full relationship with God. Once the grace of God was made available through Jesus the law then served to highlight our need for Jesus if we are to have a faithful and full relationship with God. Notice, the law does not disappear or become negated.

If we are to have a faithful and full relationship with our spouse there is a lot to learn from Paul's teaching here in Romans 3. We can navigate life together keeping all the pieces of being married on track. Every effort can be made to make sure we do all the right things, remember all the important dates and always have just the right balance of problem solving and presence. We could do all the things married people are "supposed" to do and still not have a marriage.

The goal of a marriage is not to be married, rather it is to have a faithful and full relationship with our spouse build on love, grace and forgiveness. To experience a marriage means we move beyond using the lists to measure our relationship because in all reality no marriage will pass that test. We must allow the grace of God to move through our relationship, and then we will find the fullness and faithfulness.