True Freedom

We are returning this morning to our series on the book of Proverbs. Let us remember that the book of Proverbs is all about human flourishing, genuine humanness lived within the covenant family of God. This morning we are looking at Proverbs 5, where a father is addressing his sons on the topic of sexuality. The Bible speaks very realistically in the way it handles topics like human sexuality, along with every other topic for that matter. And the Bible gives us a wonderful view of sex that is quite counter-cultural from how our society views sex. Sex as a created gift from God, beautiful in and of itself, corrupted only by our rebellion, our using it for our own purposes. Our text this morning where the father is addressing his sons give us two things to consider. First, some protective parameters. God sets parameters, gives us boundaries, not to be mean or arbitrary but to protect and love us. And second, God gives us a positive purpose. Here we will look at both the purposes of marriage, as well as what the Bible says is our ultimate marriage, our marriage as believers to Christ.

One of the most amazing metaphors to describe our relationship to Christ is that of the church as His bride and Christ as the bridegroom. Martin Luther says, “Faith unites the soul with Christ, as a bride is united with her bridegroom. From such a marriage, it follows that Christ and the soul hold all things in common, whether for better or worse. This means that what Christ possesses belongs to the believing soul, and what the soul possesses belongs to Christ. Thus Christ possesses all good things and holiness; these now belong to the soul. The soul possesses lots of vices and sin; these now belong to Christ. Christ, the rich, noble and holy bridegroom, takes in marriage this poor, contemptible and sinful little prostitute, takes away all her evil and bestows all his goodness upon her. It is no longer possible for sin to overwhelm her; for she is now found in Christ” (Martin Luther, quoted in Raymond C. Ortlund Jr., Proverbs: Wisdom That Works, p.95). The question is will we surrender to this Christ?