Are Sex Rules Pro-Women?

Do all the stipulations in the Bible on sex benefit women? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

On yesterday’s blog, some commenters on Facebook thought that I had given the impression that in this society, women were only valued for sex. They were pretty much objects. One did rightly see I was trying to point out the sacredness of sex, but that didn’t come across that way.

So today, I want to clear things up as to why the Bible has these rules and if they are good for women or not.

Let’s start with something. I do think our society is led by men. That’s not necessarily a bad thing for women. When men are being men, they will look out for the women around them. I suspect there weren’t many feminists on the Titanic who were objecting when it was said “Women and children first!”

A man who abuses and/or uses a woman is not being a man really. He’s being less of a man. If you view yourself as a leader in society, your goal is to build up those around you and not to tear them down. Any man if he wants to can take a woman’s body. Not any man can take her heart. That requires that he be a real man and one she is willing to entrust her heart to.

So let’s look at some other realities. Are some men more tempted to just look at women as sex objects? Yes. Pornography is a great example of this. If anything has taught men to treat women as objects, it’s pornography.

In the ancient world, this would also be the natural temptation of men. After all, men by nature of the chemicals and hormones in their bodies tend to have very high sex drives. Not all do and in some marriages, the woman actually has the higher drive. We’re speaking of averages here.

A man and a woman would often get together immediately in an arranged marriage and then you could be introducing yourselves to one another and then sleeping together immediately as husband and wife. Why this way? Because sex is meant to be a bonding act. It releases scores of hormones and chemicals that bind the two people to one another.

This is one reason Christians safeguard this so much. Not because sex is anything dirty. After all, the joke is that many Christians are taught two things about sex growing up. #1. It’s dirty. #2. I should save it for someone I love.

Sex is in a sense like nuclear energy. If you use it the way it was meant to be used, wonderful things can happen. If you use it in a way it’s not meant to be used, Chernobyl can happen. Do we see this? Yes. Look at most any talk show on where they talk about who is the father of who and see it. Look at single mothers who have been kicked to the curb by a guy because he thought someone hotter came along or he didn’t want to get married. Sadly, look at our divorce culture where too many people don’t take their vows seriously and many times, one person is rejected and abandoned over it.

In sharing my own story of divorce, I have had men share stories with me that leave me thankful I didn’t go through that and I have heard stories in DivorceCare that are indeed horrendous. Even harder is the fact that so many men and women jump into relationships immediately before they are ready because of the intense loneliness. Some have said that being divorced is worse than the other person dying and I am inclined to agree. Death is normally not intentional. Divorce is.

The rules of the Old Testament also started with people where they were. Let’s face it again. Guys are very much driven by sex and our natural tendency will be the path of least resistance to get what we want. We were originally designed to use our drive for the good of the other. Now we often place the good of ourselves first and foremost. Women become just means to us. Even outside of sex, this is naturally how we tend to view other people. What can they do for me?

Women meanwhile live in a world where half of the people around them could overpower them if they wanted to for the most part. Yes. I realize that there are men who are not physically intimidating, including myself, and there are women who know how to fight well, but I am again speaking of averages. I will not claim to know what it’s like to walk as a woman in a parking lot at night, though I do walk out women who work at night where I work so they don’t have to go alone.

The Old Testament doesn’t expect perfection right away. Consider many of the rules as baby steps towards a better ideal. We have slavery at the start in the wilderness, but as time moves along and people become more and more capable economically, that starts to dissipate. Jesus Himself implies this when He says that Moses granted divorce because of hardness of heart, but this is not the way it was meant to be.

So God looks at sinful men and says that if they follow their natural instincts, they will pay a price. They will either have to be with the woman for life or at the least, pay a hefty fine. That’s to curtail the man’s strong desire. So if he wants to be with the woman then, what does he have to do? He has to work up and be a man and really impress the father enough that he says “Okay. I can trust you with her.” Many of us know that if we start acting a certain way towards someone, our feelings towards that someone can change. Lewis once said to not ask if you love your neighbor. Live like you do, and loving feelings will follow. Even if they don’t, you are still doing the right thing.

Within the past few years, I was at Celebrate Recovery and for the group sharing after, it was just me and one other man. He told me about how he doesn’t feel respected by his wife and XYZ and all this other stuff. I listened and then said, “You know, I’m hearing all of this stuff and I’m going to say something and it’s going to sound insensitive, but I think I need to say it.”

“Who cares?”

BAM! The guy said even the next week it was the slap in the face he needed.

After all, as I explained. You have a duty. You have a responsibility. You made a promise as a husband. You are to do that regardless of how you feel. Do your duty and let her work out her own issues.

The Christian call to a man is not to deny his sex drive. God made it for us and He made the woman’s body desirable to us for a reason. He built the engine. It’s instead to channel that into greater love for the woman. Saving sex for marriage is meant to say that you only get to love the woman this way after you make a lifetime commitment. There is no try before you buy.

This is also to make the woman feel safe. She can freely give herself to the man because she knows he has her best interests at heart. He has made the promise and he will keep it. Ideally, a woman will meet the needs of her husband sexually, and he will meet her needs as well, not just emotional, but every other need. Also ladies, if you have a good man, he delights in meeting your needs and wants to meet your needs.

I can safely tell you that when I was married, I loved doing things that I thought put a smile on her face. When our anniversary came, I tried to go all out every single year. I wanted to go above and beyond to please her. Some I remember well, such as taking her to the hotel we stayed in our first night for our first anniversary to recreate things. For the fifth, I took her to an Equestrian theater. For the seventh, a friend had given me $200 and told me to spend it on something fun explicitly. I spent all of it and even more on our anniversary which included eating out for every meal, getting her a PSP, and a singing telegram singing songs from our wedding and other songs.

For me, I just wanted to make her happy and have her feel loved.

Ladies. Please remember you are worth a lifetime commitment. Don’t give yourself to a man for anything less than that. Let him demonstrate his commitment by making the promise first.

God realizes our natural tendencies in Scripture and puts these stipulations in because He wants us to get the most out of what He has made. It is wrong to say God only cares about our happiness, but it is just as wrong to say our happiness matters nothing to Him. God created love and sex and marriage for us to enjoy it as well and we should. Marriage done right will have us living more holy lives and in those lives finding more joy in one another and in God.

As we go through Scripture looking at marriage and divorce, keep this in mind. We are talking about the sacred. Marriage and sex are sacred because they come from a God who is sacred and they involve two people who are meant to be sacred together and bring up holiness in the next generation.

I hope this clears up matters for readers and my apologies for any bad phrasing on my part yesterday.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Reuben’s Loss

Was it worth it for Reuben? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Jacob is about to die and has called in his sons to bless them all. We’re only going to focus on one son and that’s Reuben. Reuben was the firstborn and one would think that he would then be in the place of honor. Generally, he would, but this time, he isn’t. It’s not because Jacob has a revelation that God specifically told him to choose another. Only one reason is given.

He defiled his father’s bed.

Remember back when Reuben slept with Jacob’s concubine? Jacob didn’t do anything then, but he had heard about it. Now is the time. Jacob should be giving Reuben a great blessing and telling him what a success he will be and how he will lead his family.

Reuben has no one to blame but himself.

We live in an odd culture. In our culture, sex is treated like it’s everything. The goal of every romance? Sex. The only purpose of dating and marriage? Sex. We see it on advertising everywhere. What used to be done behind closed doors in movies is now done in the open.

At the same time, out society likes to treat sex in a way like it’s no big deal. Everyone does it. Want to have sex outside of marriage? No biggie. Marriage isn’t that important after all. Want to just live together? Go ahead. Who needs to make a promise.

Yet there is still this problem that we see that so many people when they find out the person they say they love is having sex or interested sexually in someone else and pursuing it, they think there is a betrayal going on. It stings them. We know that there is something different about this activity from all other activities.

It’s weird that the Christian community is said to be prudes in this area, and I won’t deny that many are, but in reality, we are the ones who have the highest view of sexuality. We put it in a marriage covenant because a marriage covenant is the place of a promise. You have promised total loyalty and exclusivity to someone and you are to be with them for life. (We will look at divorce more and more as we go on.)

It’s not because sex is dirty, though that impression has been given before. It’s because it’s something sacred and the more valuable something is, the more you protect it and keep it safe. The sexual revolution really hasn’t done us any favors. We now live in a culture with rampant STDs and broken families.

I sometimes surprise people by saying our culture doesn’t think a lot about sex. It’s entirely true. They do it, dream about it, talk about it, fantasize about it, etc. There’s very little real thinking about it.

Christians should know better. This is nothing to treat casually. This is God’s gift to us and if we misuse it, we will suffer the consequences. Reuben suffered some. We can do the same if we mess up.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Did Joseph Forget?

Did Joseph forget about his suffering? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Joseph does manage to escape prison when he’s thrown in by impressing the Pharaoh by interpreting his dream. The Pharaoh places Joseph second in command in Egypt and gives him a wife. Joseph has two sons through her and the oldest is named Manasseh while the youngest is named Ephraim.

Ephraim refers to being fruitful. We can understand that. Joseph is having a very fruitful time in Egypt. However, the name Manasseh is given because Joseph says that he has forgotten the suffering that he went through. He had forgotten his trouble and his father’s household.

Had he? When Joseph’s brothers show up not too far down the road, Joseph does remember them. He knows about them. If he’s able to talk about his father’s household, surely he hadn’t forgotten about his father’s household. Besides that, Joseph should have good memories of his Dad who favored him.

It’s my contention that sometimes when the Bible uses the word forget or remember, it doesn’t mean what we often think it means. In the flood, it says God remembered Noah. It’s not that God is looking down at the flood and sees that ark floating and thinks “Noah! I forgot all about Him!” Instead, it means that God returned his focus to Noah.

If that’s what it means to remember, then that would mean that Joseph had a new focus in life. He was not thinking about what happened growing up and how his brothers mistreated him and all the time he spent in prison. Instead, he was focusing on the future.

Joseph had come to see that God was with him in everything regardless of how his life was going. One day he’s in prison and has been forgotten by everyone. The next day, he’s the second in command in Egypt. The reader knows that God has been with Joseph granting him favor in the eyes of all who see him the whole time, but Joseph does not have that outside perspective. He is living the story that we are the spectators of.

Joseph having children is a sign to him that things are working out. God has allowed him the honor of having a family and having descendants. These are things he would have missed out on also if he had not been faithful in the house of Potiphar.

Speaking personally on this, divorce has been the worst event I have ever gone through. Something that has kept me going is a saying that I have heard before and I don’t remember where, but it’s that the best revenge is a life well-lived. I have decided I don’t want to be a victim of my past. I want to rise above. When I go to work, I try to see it as just a stepping stone. It is one spot on my journey and somehow it will lead to another and God has me here for a reason just like he had Joseph in prison for a reason that he didn’t understand.

After all, picture if Joseph had never been sold into slavery and then never been picked by Potiphar and then never thrown into prison. He would never have been made known to Pharaoh. He would never have led Egypt and the world would have suffered a famine. Joseph could have died anyway then. Every step of his suffering was used by God.

Joseph no longer had his focus on the past. He was looking to the future. Paul said the same in Philippians 3. He was forgetting what was behind and looking to what was ahead.  (Ironically, what was behind him was pretty good actually. It just didn’t compete with Christ.) Maybe we should all do the same.

It’s something that keeps me going in this.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Jacob’s polygamy

Where did Jacob’s troubles begin? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Jacob is the patriarch who embraced polygamy. To be fair, he was kind of tricked into it, but still, he had more than one wife. Unfortunately, as we go through the story, we will see that this leads to trouble for Jacob. After all, some siblings of his will not get along with others and considering they call different women, “Mom” that could explain some of it.

For the positives, it looks like when Jacob comes in at one point, Rachel has borrowed some mandrakes from Leah to increase fertility for herself and says Leah can sleep with Jacob tonight in exchange. Thus, one can understand that it looks like Jacob knew that when he came home that evening, he’d be sleeping with someone.

It wasn’t just Rachel and Leah. They also gave their female servants to Jacob to sleep with to continue their family line. Thus, four different women in the text become mothers and all do so through Jacob.

One reason for this is that Leah was being neglected by Jacob because he had a greater love for Rachel. As a result, God allowed Leah to get pregnant more often and closed the womb of Rachel. Leah is the one who in the end provides Jacob with half of his sons and has a daughter as well.

Still, polygamy is one of those practices that never seems to end well for those involved in Scripture. Rachel always carries a position of the favorite and thus, her children carry positions of favor with Jacob as well. As we go through the history of Jacob and his family, we will see this play out more and more. In the account of the birth of most of Jacob’s children, you find some squabbling taking place and if this was the worst of the effects of polygamy, there wouldn’t be much of a case, but later on, we’ll see more.

It’s also worth noting that Jacob’s brother, Esau, also had married multiple women and they were a source of grief to Rebekkah. Esau’s solution was not to get rid of them, but to marry another woman he thought his mother would approve of. Later on in Israelite history, getting rid of wives that are outside of the covenant would be more necessary.

Thus, aside from perhaps Pharaoh and Abimelech who have harems in Genesis, Lamech, Esau, and Jacob are the only ones I can think of at least that have multiple wives. We don’t know enough about the inner workings of those other families to speak about them, but we do know enough about Jacob.

Polygamy was one of those borderline practices God tolerated in the Old Testament, but in the time of the new covenant, He was much stricter on. Most Jews at the time of Jesus were highly monogamous. Paul will later write that an elder needs to be the husband of one wife and yes, we will look at that passage a lot more when we get there.

For now, just know Jacob has rough times coming ahead.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Why I Am Thankful

So why would a divorced man be thankful on Thanksgiving? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Yesterday was kind of a downer for a Thanksgiving, and i don’t want to really leave it there. I don’t really care for Thanksgiving, but mine was alright. I got in reading, writing, and gaming. I rented Free Guy for my Dad and I to watch together which he did like and in the evening we all watched the live-action 101 Dalmatians that had Glenn Close in it.

However, I didn’t hide that this holiday is not my favorite. Still, thankfulness is important. I have thought some on what I am thankful for.

My recent trip to Texas for ETS was an eye-opener in many ways. I am thankful for all the friends I have from ETS who were so caring for me. Some brought me gifts and some provided for meals. Many asked how I was doing and a couple prayed right there for me.

It also brought to mind my longing to be out on my own. Independence is a way that I thrive greatly. My therapist told me that a bird yearns to fly freely. I set my own schedule pretty much there and did everything the way I wanted and enjoyed walking down the streets of Texas by myself having to use my Waze to find my way. Of course, my gamer side was also doing Pokemon Go at the same time. Visiting a new city is a great way to do that.

I’m especially thankful because being on the spectrum, the “experts” were always skeptical of me. I’d never live on my own. I’d never graduate. I’d never go to college. My parents, thankfully, had their own never. They never listened. I have been told I am the first one on the spectrum to go straight through the Knox County public school system.

I’m no longer married, but I was. I am thankful for that, but I’m also thankful that I don’t live in the same stress anymore. I love her still and want the best for her, but I don’t want to be with her.

I also am thankful that ultimately, I only have to be successful with one woman to be married again. That’s hard on the spectrum, but it is doable. I am working to build up myself and working on my social skills because I want to reach that goal.

I am thankful I do have a place to stay meanwhile even if it is with my parents and I am thankful I have a way to provide for myself, even if I don’t enjoy my job at all. I am thankful for the donors I do have and if you want to join in that, please do click the Patreon link below. Every donor I get gets me closer to my goals of furthering my education and doing the podcast again.

I am thankful for the friends that I do have. Many people have surrounded me in this time and been there for me. Many times when someone gets divorced, friends can abandon them. Not here.

I’m also thankful Shiro is with me and I get to take care of him. (Even if the little guy woke me up a few times last night with the Zoomies.) Shiro is one of my best friends and he just loves to snuggle with me. It’s a joy to come home and see him in my room waiting for me.

I am thankful I have a good church home and DivorceCare group. My pastor is an academic like me and we have great conversations. He’s working on his PhD in Patristics right now. I find in DivorceCare now I am getting to give back a whole lot more.

I am thankful I have plenty to keep me entertained here. I get to play Final Fantasy XIV with friends and I have several games here that I can enjoy. I also have numerous books that I can keep going through and will never lack something to read.

I’m definitely thankful most of all for what Jesus has done. If it hadn’t been for Christ, I don’t think I would have made it through this time like I have. I strive every day to do something more for the Kingdom. It is always an adventure and yet my prayer with it is to please have God let me have a wife by my side again for the journey.

Again, please also consider becoming a partner in support. I want to be out on my own so I can do the podcast and I will have to pay for my upcoming education. Any help you can give would be greatly appreciated.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Divorce and the Holidays

What are holidays like for those grieving? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

I’m emphasizing divorce here because I can speak personally of that. I cannot do that for other situations. However, for anyone going through grief and loss, the holidays can be hard. I think of my friend Evan Minton, who lost his mother this year and how Thanksgiving could be very awkward this year. There are many widows and widowers out there who will be having a hard time. I think of my friend Christina in Charlotte whose young husband died this year.

Now for me, I have never really cared for Thanksgiving. I really like for the most part being on the spectrum, but Thanksgiving is awkward. The holiday is now pretty much all about the food, that I don’t care for aside from pumpkin pie, and then socializing. The first Thanksgiving I remember truly enjoying, I had the flu and had to stay home and Ocarina of Time had just come out and I spent the evening trying to get through the Forest Temple for the first time.

That used to be my second best also.

The best would have been the first Thanksgiving I spent with my ex-wife and her family. I can’t really say that anymore. That memory now only brings pain.

I noticed at my own job that I was becoming more irritable these past few days. I suspect it has to do with all these people coming in talking about the holiday and saying “Happy Thanksgiving.” It doesn’t help that my love life has suffered and just recently I thought I might have had something, but no, that didn’t work out. For me, Thanksgiving is a kind of loneliness.

Sure. I have my parents here, but I’m 41 years old and I thrive on being independent. Being in Texas for ETS was an awesome time for me because I was out there and on my own and making my own decisions. No. My parents don’t control me, but I am dependent on being in their house. They’re great people, but I do long to be out there myself.

I am busy preparing for the furtherance of my education and I don’t know how I will manage to pay for it all. I still want to earn enough to live on my own. I want to have a woman in my life again. I want to be able to go to a job that I enjoy and that I think I make a difference at.

In that situation for me, Thanksgiving is hard because I’m thinking about all the things I don’t have and I am tempted to cry, “How long, O Lord? How long?” I know I have many things to be thankful for, such as I am a child of the king, I live in the greatest country on Earth, and I do have my family and many great friends.

Sometimes, it’s just hard still.

You could call me ungrateful, and I suppose that could be true to some extent, but it’s something we all struggle with for the most part. We all can easily overlook our blessings, but for the holidays, those going through a real loss can still struggle with that. The things I write of I pray for every night.

This holiday season, through Thanksgiving and Christmas, try to remember those people around you who are grieving. If you know someone who has lost a loved one, do a kind gesture for them. Do something that says you’re thinking of them. Get a gift for a friend or invite them over to do something.

Remember also those less fortunate you don’t even know. Work with a charity this year to provide for someone in need. Provide a Christmas gift for a child who will have nothing this year without one. If you know someone who does care for food, invite them over to Thanksgiving dinner or provide a meal for their family.

This year can be hard for many people struggling and depression and suicide rates can easily go up. Please be remembering those people. For me, this is my first holiday season officially as a divorced person and don’t think it doesn’t come to mind that I proposed on Christmas Eve. It’s easy to tell someone to focus on what they have, but it can be hard as we all know. It’s far better to walk alongside those who are suffering.

Please be a gift to them this holiday season. Maybe they can be thankful in the end you’re in their lives.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Oprah Winfrey on Divorce

What do I think of Oprah’s message on divorce? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

We have been going through the story of the Bible to see what it says on divorce and marriage, but I’m going to interrupt that again to talk about Oprah some. Oprah recently interviewed the popular singer Adele. I didn’t bother watching because I don’t care for Oprah or Adele, but I did see Rebecca McLaughlin share a tweet about what happened in this interview.

Yes. What a great message this is. Women. If you are not 100% happy in your marriage, then you need to know you can get a divorce.

I can’t imagine that her husband feels the same way. Of course, I did see something that indicates he might have got a lot of money from the deal, but that might not matter. Many of us would gladly give up money to get love.

The couple also has one child together, a son named Angelo, who was born before the couple even married, big surprise there. As of now, Angelo is nine. The couple married in 2016 and divorced in 2019.

However, here a few lines from this interview about the divorce. See if you notice any common theme.

“I was just going through the motions and I wasn’t happy,” she told journalist Abby Aguirre.

“Neither of us hurt each other or anything like that. It was just: I want my son to see me really love, and be loved,” she continued. “It’s really important to me I’ve been on my journey to find my true happiness ever since.”

“Meanwhile, she told Giles Hattersley in British Vogue that she and Konecki “kept their split “to ourselves for a very long time. “We had to take our time because there was a child involved. I’d trust him with my life. I definitely chose the perfect person to have my child with. That – after making a lot of knee-jerk reactions — is one of my proudest things I’ve ever done,” she explained.”

“That said, Adele has had a hard time reconciling the fact that their divorce affected their son. “If I can reach the reason why I left, which was the pursuit of my own happiness, even though it made Angelo really unhappy — if I can find that happiness and he sees me in that happiness, then maybe I’ll be able to forgive myself for it,” she said of the family dynamic.”

It’s not hard to miss the common theme. I, myself, me, etc. Adele is all about what she wants here. The last quote is the saddest. Angelo is unhappy. The child is the worst victim in all of this and many children of divorce grow up to blame themselves for it. In what could be some self-realization, at least Adele seems to have some clue that she did something wrong, well if he can eventually come to see her as being happy, then all will be okay. After all, he needs to see her being loved.

Oh sure. She wants him to see her really love, but she hasn’t done a great start by destroying her own first marriage. If anything, she has sent Angelo a powerful message. Love is temporary. You can’t put your total trust in anyone. People will break your heart. Marriage is not meant to be a lifelong covenant. The focus of marriage is supposed to be your happiness.

If Angelo can’t even trust his own mother, who can he trust?

Now Oprah instead looks at this and sees this as an empowering message for women. Here you go women! Here’s your power! If your man isn’t making you 100% happy, then by golly, go ahead and destroy that relationship because the purpose of the man in marriage is to make you happy and the reason you marry a man is to make you happy.

Now to some extent, we do marry for our happiness. However, it is a different happiness. We are happy making the other person happy. We marry not just so we can be loved by the other person, which is a gift indeed, but so that we can love the other person.

Also, unless you’re talking about Jesus Christ, no one can make you 100% happy and when we are not 100% happy in Jesus, the flaw is not in Him. It is in us. If Adele was not happy, she should have asked herself “Why am I not happy?” She could have instead gone on to ask “What can I do to make my husband and son happy?” and found joy in that. She instead said “I don’t care about your happiness. I only care about my own.”

The article states that she is dating Lebron James’s agent, Rich Paul, now. If Rich is a smart man, he will leave right now. If she did it to her first husband, there’s no reason to think she won’t do it to you. Adele has already shown she is all about her and believe it or not, really passionate sex, while good, is not going to seal the deal on a covenant. If anything, both people could just be using each other. I can’t speak for Rich since I don’t know anything about him, but I think we’ve already seen what Adele is like.

Speaking as a man wrongfully divorced, I can easily say Oprah’s message is a horrible message. It does not empower women one bit. If anything, it makes them more victims. Oprah is telling them that their happiness is dependent on the man that they are married to. Why can’t they find happiness in how they love that man more? Sure, the man is to bring her happiness and a good man will want to, but if a woman is not happy, the first person to look at is herself.

Please keep in mind I am having in mind a normal marriage here also. A  marriage involving abuse and infidelity is a completely different animal. There are cases of rightful divorce. I was told before that I could have easily filed for divorce. Even an Orthodox priest told me that. In my case, it was my ex-wife who filed for the divorce.

No one should listen to Oprah on anything related to morality. Actually, we could cut out “related to morality” and it would still be a true sentence. Unfortunately, Oprah is the high priest of our culture and having a lasting impact on it. What she says here fits in just fine with an anti-family agenda that many people have today.

Oprah is creating more narcissistic women like Adele. These women might be able to provide men temporary joy in sexual passion, but they sure won’t be the wives that they will find joy in. They sure won’t be the mothers that their sons and daughters can admire. Sons won’t want to marry a woman like their Mom and daughters won’t want to be like their Mom, at least let’s hope they won’t!

It is often said that if you want change, be the change. Now that would be an empowering message for women. Tell women they have the power to bring joy and happiness into a marriage even if it seems dead. They have the power to fight for the promise that they made to their spouse and to show their children what a loving family is to be like. If a woman leaves a husband just because of her own happiness though, it will happen again with the next guy. Marriage is not about living for yourself. It is about dying to yourself and living for the good of those beyond yourself.

Men. Stay away from Adele and women like her. Women. Don’t be like her and don’t bother listening to Oprah please. There are plenty of good and godly women you can listen to instead. Show Oprah and Adele what real women are supposed to be like and how they are truly powerful.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

The Comfort of Isaac

What can a woman do for a man? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

There’s a striking line in the text when Rebekkah comes to see Isaac. Rebekkah does not know who Isaac is and sees a man off in the distance and is told that this is her new husband. She puts on her veil and then goes to see her new husband.

At this point in the story, Sarah has died and Isaac is grieving her loss. When he sees Rebekkah, he takes her into his mother’s tent and there, she becomes his wife. (Yes. We all know how that happens.) The text then tells us that Isaac loved her and he was comforted after his mother’s death.

Comfort.

Have you ever considered this as a purpose of marriage?

If you have, you might have thought that was for the women. A woman loves to be comforted. Right? Well, so does a man. A man just has a different way of being comforted than a woman does. A woman might want to talk or have someone hold her. A man will like to take action.

One way a man is comforted by his wife is indeed through sex. This is a way that a man gets some validation in his life as the woman tells him that he is her man and she chooses him above all others. This is also why an affair can be super hurtful for a man. It tells the man that he is seen as less than adequate. He does not meet the needs of the woman in his life. He has failed as a man.

As one going through divorce, yes, I have experienced all of that. It stings.

Thankfully, Rebekkah is not like that, and we know it’s not because they had a perfect marriage. As we go through the story, we will find that there can often be great turmoil between Isaac and Rebekkah. For example, when they have kids, they make the mistake of choosing favorites. This puts them against one another to an extent and the kids against one another. Rebekkah especially deceives her own husband for the blessing of her favorite, Jacob.

Yet to their credit, they don’t split. Divorce is not an option in the book of Genesis at least. Abraham stays with Sarah till the end. Rebekkah stays with Isaac. Jacob stays with Rachel and Leah both. Hey. At least there’s one way the patriarchs didn’t screw things up entirely.

However, think about this when you read this passage. A woman can be a great source of comfort to a man. This is also more than just sex. I think it’s noteworthy that the idea comes that after Isaac loves Rebekkah, he is comforted. Many a man wants someone in his life to treasure and adore. When I was married, it meant more to me to buy a gift for my wife than it did for me to buy something for myself. Getting to love someone like that was its own reward.

Ladies. Please realize in the life of your man, you can be a great comfort. The way you are with your man, you can make his life a picture of heaven that he will cherish, or a picture of hell that he will suffer with. It’s his choice how he sees things, but it’s yours what you will give.

Try to give him Heaven. You could be a great comfort if you do.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Abraham’s Remarriage

Who is Keturah? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

When we talk about the wife of Abraham, naturally, we all think of Sarah. That makes sense. Many of us do not think of Keturah. She’s barely mentioned in the text. The only thing we know about her really is that Abraham married her after Sarah died and she bore him six children.

Obviously, Abraham must have really wanted a younger woman or else she was a golddigger.

If we’re studying marriage and divorce in the Bible though, we need to look at this for one point. That is that after a spouse dies, there is no condemnation whatsoever for remarriage. We are not told the reason Abraham wanted to remarry, but since he had six kids, it’s pretty easy to guess what one of those reasons might have been.

In the nature of a covenant, we are told in the New Testament in Romans that if one spouse dies, the other is delivered from the covenant and is free to remarry. Paul tells us if a woman has sex with a man besides her husband while her husband is still alive, she is an adulteress, but if her husband dies and she remarries, then she is free to have sex with another man.

Naturally, this can lead to some of us asking the question about what happens after death. Jesus tells us that there is no marrying or giving in marriage in the afterdeath, but does this mean that there is no longer any covenant whatsoever between two people? This is something I am still thinking about and hopefully, by the time we get to the gospel of Matthew in this study, I will have some firmer positions on the matter.

We also know from Genesis 25 that Abraham gave gifts to the sons of his concubines, so apparently, there was more than just Hagar, while he was still living. In the end though, he gave everything to Isaac. He also sent his other sons away so they would not be around Isaac. As we go through Genesis, we will find that there are often troubling family dynamics that take place. These are actually events that Eastern readers who are actually much more family-oriented than we have no problem noticing.

When Abraham dies, it’s not just Isaac that is there. Ishmael is also there and helps to bury Abraham. We will find later on that while at this point Ishmael does not play a major role in the text, his descendants do. I have said in a previous blog that I know of no hard evidence that the Arabs today are descendants of Ishmael, but we do know of people who are descendants of Ishmael in the text.

For now, it’s just important to notice that not all remarriage is disallowed in the Bible. In the case of the death of a spouse, it is apparently allowable to remarry. Of course, we could say that concubines and polygamy were allowed as well so maybe things change in the New Testament. That will have to be discovered when we get there.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Genesis 1 and Opposites

What are male and female in Genesis 1? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Some people now are asking about my view of divorce and remarriage in the Bible. In order to explain that, I think we also have to look at marriage in the Bible. What is it and what is it for? For that, let’s just start at the very beginning with Genesis 1.

If you’re wondering here whether we’re going to discuss the age of the Earth or if evolution was a part of the plan, you’re going to be disappointed. Whichever the true view is in this, I fear that too often we get caught up in the hows instead of the why and read Genesis in a way it wasn’t meant to be read. It’s my hope that whatever view you take on the how of creation, my look at the why will be able to resonate with you.

Something you notice in Genesis 1 is that there are opposites and these opposites are usually separated. Light and darkness and different waters are opposite. Those things which are opposed are divided.

This seems to happen fairly consistently even if the word divided or separated isn’t used. There is one great exception. This is when man and woman are created and these are not separated.

Man and woman are when the text turns truly poetic as this is the peak of the creation of God. Now I am sure some people who are not Christians are saying “Well here is where Genesis 1 and 2 contradict since in 1 they are created together and in 2 at different times!” I hear that, but that is not going to be my focus today.

Now in my view of this, humanity is created in the image of God in that they are meant to be the idol of God, which will represent God in the temple He has built, which is the entire cosmos. Man is meant to rule over the creation on behalf of God. We are to be the stewards making sure everything is kept in good order.

Yet here, you have two that can be considered opposites, but there is no separation mentioned. These two are to work together. God could have created one gender if He wanted to, but He didn’t. He made two and He made them to work together.

Also note something for those who think the Bible is misogynistic. In this passage, men and women are both in the image of God. There is no distinction in this. Man is not made largely in the image and woman has a pale reflection of that. Both of them are in the image of God. It’s really hard to think of a higher way to lift up women than to say they are fully in the image of God.

This also helps explain how we can all be equally human. If you were to point to our genetics and say that based on that we’re all equally human, well aside from identical twins, we have different genes. Our bodies are designed differently. Our brains can work differently. Even within the same sex, there are vast differences between us.

So what do we all have equally? The image of God. We all carry that. Every man is to treat his neighbor well because his neighbor is a fellow image-bearer.

Next time we do this, we’ll look some at Genesis 2 where we will interact more with the idea of male and female and how they come together. I also have some specific thoughts on female beauty in Genesis 2 that may surprise some of you. I know I got surprised with my final conclusion when I took a deeper look at that topic, but that is for another time.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)