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Genesis 2
[18] And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should
be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.
[21] 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;
[22] And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made
he a woman, and brought her unto the man.
[23] 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.
[24] Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and
shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. KJV
Genesis 2
[18] And the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to
be alone. I will make a companion who will help him."
[ 21] So the LORD God caused Adam to fall into a deep sleep. He
took one of Adam's ribs[1] and closed up the place from which
he had taken it.
[ 22] Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib and brought
her to Adam.
[23] "At last!" Adam exclaimed. "She is part of
my own flesh and bone! She will be called `woman,' because she
was taken out of a man."
[ 24] This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and
is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one. NLT
Genesis 2
[18] The LORD God said, "It isn't good for the man to live
alone. I need to make a suitable partner for him."
[ 21] So the LORD God made him fall into a deep sleep, and he
took out one of the man's ribs. Then after closing the man's side,
[ 22] the LORD made a woman out of the rib. The LORD God brought
her to the man,
[ 23] and the man exclaimed,
"Here is someone like me!
She is part of my body,
my own flesh and bones.
She came from me, a man.
So I will name her Woman!"
[ 24] That's why a man will leave his own father and mother. He
marries a woman, and the two of them become like one person. Contemporary
English Version
The message title sounds like today's new math but actually this
is old math from man's beginning and it was God's math in describing
the union of:
ONE MAN + ONE WOMAN = ONE UNION
God said these two, one man and one woman shall be one flesh!
ONE + ONE = ONE
| Four
Key Points: |
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1. |
Same-sex families always deny
children either their mother or father. |
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2. |
Same-sex family is a vast, untested social experiment
with children. |
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3. |
Where does it stop? How do we say "no"
to group marriage? |
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4. |
Schools will be forced to teach
that the homosexual family is normal. Churches will be legally
forced to perform same-sex ceremonies. |
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| Marriage
Is Always About the Next Generation... |
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A loving and compassionate society
always comes to the aid of motherless and fatherless
families. |
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A loving and compassionate society
never intentionally creates motherless or fatherless
families, which is exactly what every same-sex home does. |
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The same-sex family is not driven
by the needs of children, but rather by the radical wishes
of a small group of adults. |
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No child development theory says
children need two parents of the same gender, but rather that
children need their mothers and fathers. |
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| A
Vast Social Experiment Inflicted Upon Children... |
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No society, at any time, has ever
raised a generation of children in same-sex families. |
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Same-sex "marriage" will
subject generations of children to the status of lab rats
in a vast, untested social experiment. |
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| But
we know how the experiment will turn out
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America has raised millions of
children in fatherless families for three decades and that
experiment was a stunning failure by every measure! We know
how damaging it is to raise children in intentionally fatherless
families. Let's not create more child-suffering to satisfy
adult desire. |
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(Thousands of published social science, psychological and
medical studies show that children living in fatherless families,
on average, suffer dramatically in every important measure
of well-being. These children suffer from much higher levels
of physical and mental illness, educational failure, poverty,
substance abuse, criminal behavior, loneliness, as well as
physical and sexual abuse. Children living apart from both
biological parents are 8 times more likely to die of maltreatment
than children living with their mother and father. ) |
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| How
Your Same-sex Family Will Harm My Family... |
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If this were just about your
family, there would be no real danger. But same-sex "marriage"
advocates are not seeking marriage for you alone,
but rather demanding me -- and all of us -- to radically change
our understanding of family. And that will do great damage.
Your same-sex family will teach my little boys and girls that
husband/wife and mother/father are merely optional
for the family and therefore, meaningless. |
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And I will never allow my (grand)
children to be taught that their gender doesn't matter for
the family. Their masculinity and femininity matter far too
much, as does everyone's . |
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| Full
Acceptance Will Be Mandatory... |
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My civil rights to object to homosexuality
as an idea will be gone.
Same-sex relationships and homes are tolerated
in society today. Our nation has no existing problem where
same-sex couples are evicted from their neighborhoods because
of how they live. Americans tolerate such relationships. |
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But this is not about mere tolerance.
Instead it is about forcing everyone to fully accept
these unnatural families. |
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Only months after legalizing same-sex
"marriage" in Canada, activists there successfully
passed C-250, a bill criminalizing public statements against
homosexuality, punishable by up to two years in prison! Say
the wrong thing; go to jail. The same will happen here. |
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Every public school in the nation
would be forced to teach that same-sex "marriage"
and homosexuality are perfectly normal -- Heather has
Two Mommies in K-12. Pictures in text books will be
changed to show same-sex couples as normal. |
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Our church will be legally pressured
to perform same-sex weddings. When courts -- as happened in
Massachusetts -- find same-sex "marriage" to be
a constitutional and fundamental human right, the ACLU will
successfully argue that the government is underwriting discrimination
by offering tax exemptions to churches and synagogues that
only honor natural marriage. |
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Gay and lesbian people have a right
to form meaningful relationships. They don't have a right
to redefine marriage for all of us. |
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| The
Public Purpose of Marriage
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Marriage is a common good, not
a special interest.
Every society needs natural marriage -- as many men as possible
each finding a woman, caring for and committing himself exclusively
to her - working together to create and raise the next generation. |
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No society needs homosexual coupling.
In fact, too much of it would be harmful to society and that
is why natural marriage and same-sex coupling cannot be considered
socially equal. |
The concept of marriage has been around since the beginning.
God created it and He ordained it. The book of Genesis tells us
that "a man will leave his father
and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one
flesh."
His word is very clear - marriage involves one man and one woman.
But these days, many people in our society don't believe that
the Bible is God's Word. When we're talking to them about marriage,
we can't simply quote Scripture verses, because they may respond,
"Well, that's fine for you, but I don't believe the Bible
is true." When debating the issue of same-sex marriage, we
need to have persuasive arguments that are based on the truth
that God reveals to us in nature, His creation.
So what does the social science research tell us about marriage?
Some pretty amazing things.
| Married adults do better on virtually every
measure of well-being than unmarried adults: |
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They're more emotionally and physically healthy.
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They have lower rates of alcoholism, suicide
and mental health problems. |
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They're more likely to describe themselves as
"happy and contented with life." |
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And on average, married people live significantly
longer than unmarried people. |
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| Kids who live with their married, biological
parents also do better on every measure of well-being: |
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They do better in school and are less likely
to drop out. |
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Boys living with both parents are much less
likely to be convicted of a crime. |
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And they're 30 percent less likely to have health
problems and much less likely to be treated for emotional
and behavioral problems. |
The fact is that married men and women actually improve each
other. That's because the two genders each make a unique contribution
to the relationship, which is something that same-sex marriage
just can't provide.
Marriage, one of the
most fundamental human institutions, is dying in many nations
due to three developments.
In a cultural change without historical precedent, marriage is
increasingly seen as optional, disposable and re-definable.
1. Optional
Marriage is no longer an assumed requirement for setting up a
household or having children. Cohabitation and out-of-wedlock
childbearing are two of our fastest growing family configurations.
These trends indicate that marriage is increasingly seen as superfluous.
2. Disposable
For those who do marry, we have lost the ideal of marital permanence.
The skyrocketing divorce rate indicates we have lost the ideal
of "til death do us part." Instead, if marriage doesn't
work, we trade it in on a new one and hope for the best.
Interestingly, recent research indicates two things: most divorce
stems from low-conflict marriages and divorce doesn't lead to
a happier life, but hanging in there and making your marriage
work is much more likely to lead to happier life.(1)
3. Redefinable
We are entertaining a discussion in our culture that no other
age or civilization has undertaken: that is to redefine marriage
as a union between members of the same sex. We act as if marriage
is simply a human invention, rather than something rooted in nature.
The continuity and regularity of marriage that we observe throughout
the course of human history and its various cultural and religious
expressions reveal how natural and basic marriage is to humanity.
These three developments have all weakened marriage in unique,
but significant ways.
Good News
There is, however, a vibrant movement to recover marriage as
an ideal, led by sociologist and academics who are recognizing
the large body of professional literature indicating that marriage
provides rich health benefits for women, men and children. These
scholars are joined by religious leaders, family therapists and
political and community leaders who are working at national and
local levels to recover the ideal of life-long, happy marriage
as the foundation of family life in our nation.
Bush calls for amendment to 'defend
marriage'
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush says legalizing gay marriage
would redefine the most fundamental institution of civilization
and that a constitutional amendment is needed to protect it.
A few activist judges and local officials have taken it on themselves
to change the meaning of marriage, Bush said Saturday in his weekly
radio address.
Leading the chorus of support for an amendment, Bush said, "If
courts create their own arbitrary definition of marriage as a
mere legal contract, and cut marriage off from its cultural, religious
and natural roots, then the meaning of marriage is lost and the
institution is weakened."
His remarks follow the opening of Senate debate Friday on a constitutional
amendment effectively banning gay marriage.
Reflecting the election-year sensitivity of the issue, Sen. Patrick
Leahy, D-Vt., said Republicans are using the constitutional amendment
as a bulletin board for campaign sloganeering.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, accused Democratic presidential candidate
John Kerry of holding inconsistent positions.
Kerry and running mate Sen. John Edwards
oppose gay marriage, but support civil unions.
Bush singled out Massachusetts' Supreme Judicial Court, which
called marriage an evolving paradigm. "That sends a message
to the next generation that marriage has no enduring meaning,
and that ages of moral teaching and human experience have nothing
to teach us about this institution," he said.
The president urged the House and Senate
to send to the states for ratification an amendment that defines
marriage in the United States as a union of a man and woman as
husband and wife.
Senate Democrats signaled they will not throw barriers in front
of the resolution, paving the way for a vote on the amendment
as early as next Wednesday.
A constitutional amendment should never be undertaken lightly,
Bush said, "yet to defend marriage, our nation has no other
choice."
The vote puts some Democrats and Republicans in a difficult position.
One senator acknowledged the political risk in trying to walk
a line supporting both traditional marriage and gay rights.
CONCLUSION:
Theologically, marriage is the first human institution. Sociologically,
marriage is the glue that holds communities together, regulates
sexuality, civilizes the home and provides for the proper development
of the next generation. Anthropologists tell us marriage, a permanent
linking of men and women, is found in every civilized and uncivilized
society throughout human history. However, as Professor Don Browning
of the University of Chicago explains, "the idea of marriage
as an institution has lost favor." In the past 3 decades
we have seen a dramatic increase in rates of cohabitation, divorce,
and single-parenting by choice. At the same time, marriage rates
have significantly declined over this same period. And this is
not just an American problem. Marriage has been declining in Canada,
New Zealand, Australia and many European and Central American
nations. It is critical that we recover the idea of marriage for
it is the bedrock of a healthy, productive, safe society.