Marriage and Singleness in the Kingdom
May 19, 2019 | Mike Stancak
Passage: Matthew 19:1-12
Over the past 100 years our country has undergone enormous changes in how we understand marriage. We live in a culture that enthrones sexuality and romance, and yet marriage is on a steep decline. Few of us even know why anyone would pursue marriage, especially as many of the marriages that do take place end in divorce and acrimony. In today’s passage, Jesus clarifies what makes marriage important, and what we will find is a vision of marriage that has the power to communicate something amazing to the watching world. It is a calling that is both sobering and exhilarating, a calling that is matched only by the calling by which Jesus lived his own life: the counter-cultural life of celibacy.
Discussion Questions:
- What stuck with you from the sermon?
- We talked a bit about our cultural perception of marriage and relationships. Where did you recognize yourself in our culture? What was surprising?
- How does Jesus’ idea of marriage challenge our usual ideas of marriage? If you’re married, how might this vision inform your day-to-day life, attitudes toward each other, attitude toward friends, etc.?
- What is striking about the biblical idea of celibacy/singleness? How does the biblical idea of singleness challenge our culture’s emphasis on romance and sexuality? How does it challenge our own glorification of marriage?
- What is one step we can take this week, whether married or celibate, to seek deeper spiritual friendships with each other?
Series Information
Matthew 12:22 - 20
In the next installment in our Matthew series as we see conflict heating up around Jesus. As his ministry continues, it becomes clear that the values of the Kingdom clash with the arrogance, pride, and apathy of his day, and people start to polarize around him. I'm sure the same will be true of us. At every step we'll find that Jesus' grace is sufficient for the journey, as we learn the way of the Upside-Down Kingdom.