Would you please turn with me in the word of God to Genesis chapter 2. Our text this morning is chapter 2 verse 18 through the end of the chapter. I want to begin our reading by looking at chapter 1 verses 26 and 27. So we're in Genesis 1 beginning in verse 26. Then God said, let us make man in our image. according to our likeness, let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him. Male and female, he created them. And skip down to chapter two in verse 18. And the Lord God said, it is not good that man should be alone. I will make him a helper comparable to him. Out of the ground, the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name. So Adam gave names to all the cattle, to the birds of the air and to every beast of the field. But for Adam, there was not found a helper comparable to him. And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and he slept, and he took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh in its place. Then the rib which the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman, and he brought her to the man. 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. Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And they were both naked, the man and his wife. And we're not ashamed. Let's pray. Father, we would pray for the outpouring of your Holy Spirit upon the truth of your word. Lord, the spirit's presence is not a vindication of me as your servant is a vindication of your son is a vindication of your word, which you've given us by inspiration, which is infallible and inerrant in all of its parts and is sufficient for us, for our souls. that we might be saved and that once we are saved, we might grow to be more like Jesus. As your son prayed to you, father, sanctify them in your truth. Your word is truth. So sanctify us and teach us things that perhaps we've never considered that we might be more like Jesus than we were when we came. We pray it in Jesus name. Amen. Two weeks ago I told you that Genesis 2 is to Genesis 1 very much like the key of a map is to the larger map. When you have a large map have you ever noticed that you'll have these sections that are put in bubbles or in rectangles or squares that magnify and give you an exploded view of a particular portion of the map so you can see it in greater detail. Even so, Genesis 1 tells us that on the sixth day God created man and He created woman as well. The first couple were created before the end of that day. But then when you come to Genesis 2, in verse 4, it begins this whole thematic shift of where the scriptures are focusing in more minutely on how Adam was created and then how Eve was created. So two weeks ago we considered the creation of man magnified and saw that God created man with both a body and a soul, that He put him in the garden and we considered what that garden was all about. That garden wasn't just a garden where you went and ate fruit, it was a temple, it was the Holy of Holies where God met with men. Adam was the first prophet, priest, and king as a type of Him who was to come, that is Christ. Last Lord's Day, we saw that God gave Adam a specific commandment. He told him, you can eat. First of all, he enumerated his liberties. You can eat of all the trees of the garden. They are yours for food. There's just one prohibition, one no. And the one no is there's a tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and of that you shall not eat. And if you do eat it, if you violate my commandment, here is the consequence. On that very day, you're going to die. So he's given fair warning. So he's given a commandment, but we also considered this wasn't God just making a commandment. This was God making a covenant with Adam. And I gave you seven different proofs to show you that that's the case because he was representing you and I as our covenant head when he was given this command not to eat of the forbidden fruit. And that brings us then to the text this morning, which begins in chapter two and verse 18. If two weeks ago we were considering the creation of man magnified, today we're considering the creation of woman magnified. He's going to tell us specifically how the woman was created. And as I preach this to you, I want to preach it under three simple headings. And it's actually a very simple text, isn't it? It's not complicated. It's not hard. So we're going to take some time to go over it and then I'm going to give you five applications of the text at the end. But I have three headings that I want to preach the text under. First of all, we see a need revealed. Secondly, a woman created. And third, a marriage consummated. So first of all, a need revealed. Verse 18 begins with a very remarkable statement. And the Lord God said, it is not good. That's an amazing statement because it's in contrast to what has been said all up until this point. Repeatedly, God created things on the days of creation and said, God saw that it was good. God saw that it was good. God saw that it was good. And finally, after it's all said and done, He looks on all of creation, and by the way, one was created by this point, and says it's very good. All of creation was good. But when we go back in time and go back to the sixth day after Adam was created, but before Eve was created, God Himself says something's not good. And that's an amazing thing when you realize that there was at this point no sin in the world. There was no death. There was no disease. There was no sickness. Everything was perfect. Adam was perfect. Adam had a relationship, a perfect relationship with a perfect God. As I said to you last week, you realize at this point in creation, Adam did not have to approach God through a mediator. Adam could come to God directly. He could come as it were dressed in his own righteousness because there was no sin in Adam at this point. He comes to God as a perfect man with a perfect relationship with a perfect God and a perfect creation and there's no sin in the world. And yet God himself looks upon his creation and says, it is not good. Something's not good. And what is it that's not good? It's not good that the man should be alone. I will make him a helper comparable to him. Now notice some things about this first verse here, this verse 18. First of all, God is not speaking to Adam. It seems that God is speaking in the inter-trinitarian council. As if we could say by looking at it by implication, it is not good that man should be alone. Let us create a helper comparable to him. So Adam apparently is not even aware that he has a need. But before he's even aware that he has a need, because he's never met a woman before, so you can't know that you need something if you've never met it, right? But God knows he has a need. And that's an amazing thing to me. It's an encouraging thing. Remember in Matthew 6, Jesus says that when we have financial distress and financial needs, that we need to come before our Father, but not to be anxious about it. Why? Because your Father knows that you need these things. He knows what you need before you ask Him. He knows what you need before you even know you have a need. Back when I graduated from Bible college in 91, 1991. Some of you weren't even born then, which makes me feel really old. But anyway, when I graduated in 1991, I graduated with my undergraduate degree. I majored in Bible, minored in pastoral ministries at Columbia Bible College, but I did not know who I was going to marry. I did not know what my career path was going to be because I had this vague notion that maybe God was calling me to the ministry, but I did not have a clear sense of calling at that particular time. I knew I was nowhere near ready to be in the ministry at the time, but I remember in the summer of 1991 being extremely depressed because what's next? Is there a woman that's going to be in my life? Am I ever going to meet someone who would be willing to marry me and, and live with me? I sometimes look at my wife now and go, why do you hang out with me? What's, what's the secret here? But I was, it was depressing. I was scared, you know, feeling anxiety about the future and it weighed me down heavily and it grieved my parents because they saw me going through it. And my dad, they always love to go to yard sales, and he found this little sign at a yard sale that he bought and gave me, and it's still floating around our house somewhere. I'm not sure where it is. But it said this, God has a solution planned before we ever know that we have a problem. And it's true. And that's comforting, isn't it? I don't even know I've got a problem, and God already has a solution planned for me because I'm one of his children. Even so, Adam had a problem and Adam didn't even know he had a problem. But God already has a solution planned, but now he's going to do something else. He's got a problem, but I want Adam to first understand what his need is. And so he gives him an object lesson. And this is what it says, verse 19, How the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name. So God gave names to all the cattle, to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field." Now this is part of him being God's vice-regent. He is given dominion over the creation, therefore he has the authority to name that creation, and he's categorizing these various creatures into various groups, and he gives them names. But notice at the end of verse 20, there was not found a helper comparable to him." Do you see what God's doing? He's giving him an object lesson. Adam, there's a he-giraffe and a she-giraffe. And there's a he-zebra and a she-zebra. And a he-horse and a she-horse. And there's a you and what? He's making him conscious, I'm missing out on something here, right? I don't know what it is, but there's not one like me that I can be with, that I can have companionship with. So he's showing him his need that Adam didn't even realize he had. So we see, first of all, a need revealed, but the second thing we see is a woman created. The same God who showed him he had a need is now going to provide for the need that Adam has. And notice how he does it in verse 21. And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam. In other words, he's about to perform surgery, so like any good anesthesiologist, he puts him to sleep so he won't be hurt. I also wonder, did he put him to sleep because he's about to surprise him with what he's about to bring next? So he puts him into a deep sleep so he won't feel any pain, and he takes out one of his ribs and closed up the flesh in its place. I suspect he didn't even leave a scar. In other words, he does surgery to pull this rib out from under his side so that he can then fashion this into a woman. He fashioned her, he built her literally into a woman. So he fashions from him this woman. Now think about it. God created the universe out of nothing. But then, He didn't create Adam out of nothing. He created Adam out of pre-existing materials. He took the dirt that He had made and He fashioned a man's body out of that. Now that man has a body, He now takes one of the ribs and fashions it into a woman. I love what Matthew Henry has to say about this. I've heard it quoted different times. But he gets almost poetic really about why did God create woman from the rib of Adam. He says this, quote, that the woman was made of a rib out of the side of Adam, not made out of his head to rule over him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected and near his heart to be beloved. I think it's a great way of expressing it, that this is how God created the woman. So we have a need revealed. Then we have a woman created, and in the third place, we see a marriage consummated. Notice what happens next, verse 22, and he brought her to the man. God himself brought Eve to Adam. Now here's the thing. He had brought the animals to Adam, and now God himself brings Eve to Adam. And there's something very significant about that, which I'll get to in just a moment. Notice what it says, 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." Now that sounds Shakespearean almost, doesn't it? This is bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh. What he's saying is, hubba hubba, whoa, this is awesome. This is perfectly suited to meet me and to complete me. This is what I've needed and hadn't even known I needed. There's a he zebra and a she zebra, and now there's a she one of me. And he calls her woman, which indicates that, again, his dominion and also the fact that he's the head of his home. He calls her woman, which means taken out of man. She's taken from man and she's made for man to be a helper suitable to him. He's looking at what God has created and says, this is perfectly suited to meet a need I didn't even know I had. God has provided for me the things I needed. And notice that it was a precedent setting event. It was a creation ordinance. Verse 24, therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, or literally shall cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. Typically in weddings, it's very often the case that a father walks his daughter down the aisle and gives her away to a man. Well, that was established at creation because Eve's father, God, created her and gave her to the first man and God himself performed the first ever wedding ceremony. So God himself officiated this wedding and this man and woman entered into a covenant with one another. It doesn't use the word covenant, but we know from the rest of scripture that marriage is a covenant. What's a covenant? A covenant is a bond in blood. a bond in blood. It's a swearing of oaths by two separate parties that binds them together upon pain of death. In other words, when you watch a wedding, do you know what the heart of the wedding really is? The heart of the wedding is when you hear the man and the woman exchanging vows with one another. They are swearing oaths. The husband is saying to the wife, I bind myself to you until death do us part. I reject every other woman in the face of the earth. in favor of you. And the wife is looking at the husband and saying, I reject every other man on the earth and I am binding myself, body and soul to you for the rest of my days. Whether you're rich, whether you're poor, whether you're sick or whether you're healthy, I am going to stay with you and may God do so to me if I do not stand by this covenant that I have made. you enter into a bond and blood covenant, a one flesh union with one another. And in that moment, husband, a man and a woman become one. And God's created order from the very beginning was that one man should be with one woman for life. And that was how it was to be. So as we're going to see later, polygamy begins to be a part of the created order after the fall. And this was never God's intention. but nonetheless it begins to happen because men are not content with God's created order. One of the great first things that happens with sin is that we're discontent with the way God has made us and we don't like the way things are. That's why homosexuality exists. It's unnatural, but men grow discontent with the way God has done things. That's why I can't. Men are not satisfied to have just one woman because they're discontent and discontentment and covetousness. leads to all kinds of misery and difficulty and all those sort of things. And then notice the 25th verse. And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed. It's an amazing statement. There are those who think that the forbidden fruit spoken of in the Garden of Eden was the sexual consummation of Adam and Eve, as if somehow sexual things were dirty or sinful or bad. Well, the very fact that the Bible says in chapter 1 verse 27 that He created them male and female tells us something. First of all, that means they were created as sexual beings by God Himself before there was sin in the world. And the point of verse 25 of chapter 2 is that this husband and wife consummated their relationship in the garden and they did so without shame. They did not have to repent of their sins. They didn't have to confess it to God. They were completely holy before God and yet entered into this one flesh union and relationship because God Himself created and blessed it and ordained it. As a matter of fact, they could not fulfill their commission that God had given them, their mandate, to fill the earth and subdue it. That is multiply. Be fruitful and multiply, have children and grandchildren and great grandchildren. And you couldn't have done that without this consummation. Now, I told you that the text itself is simple, covered the ground, but there's a lot that we can draw out in terms of application. And so I have five applications that I want to draw out from the scriptures, which continue to expound it to you. First of all, you singles. you should never feel guilty for your desire to meet and marry a godly mate. When I was a teenager, I was exposed to teaching from a parachurch leader. where he taught, he spiritualized the language of verse 21, that when the Bible says that God caused Adam to fall into a deep sleep, he slept and then he brought him his wife. And this particular teacher taught that you young men, you just go to sleep and when God brings you your wife, he'll wake you up. In my own heart, I'm going to tell you that that brought all kinds of difficulties in my own conscience. because I spent a lot of my time as a teenager feeling guilty because I had these longings and desires that God would someday bring a wife for me because I'm just supposed to fall asleep, whatever that means. Well, that is spiritualizing the text and it is not a valid application of the text because God himself said Adam had something that was missing, something that was not good. As a matter of fact, sometimes in, Perhaps well-intentioned speakers will say things to singles like this, you know, if you're struggling and longing to have a spouse someday, just find your contentment in God. How many of you have heard that kind of talk before? I'm not sure that that kind of talk can be justified from the scriptures. Now, my wife cannot replace God in my life, obviously. Your husband, your wife cannot replace God for you. And there's a certain element of truth that we need to find our contentment in God. But think about it. Adam had a perfect relationship with God. He was a perfect man. with a perfect relationship with God. And God himself said, something's not good. Something's not complete. Something's not finished. And the only way I can provide for that is to make a woman who is comparable to the man. And my point is this, if you're here as a single person and you have longings to marry someday, don't feel guilty because you have those desires. Because there's nothing to feel guilty about. This is a God given desire that most of us have felt in our lives. I remember almost all my life until I met Angela, a sense of feeling very lonely and very incomplete, a completion that only came once I entered into the covenant of marriage. Now, God himself provided for that. But my point is, You're not supposed to sit there and say, well, I'm just going to destroy these desires. I feel inside my heart to be married because those are God given desires and longings, and you don't need to feel guilty about those kinds of feelings. Here's the issue. What you have to guard your heart against as a single person is not compromising God's ways because you get so desperate to find someone to marry. And that's the hard thing. It is waiting upon God's time for him to bring his best. When I was wrestling with dating different girls and stuff like that and wanting to find the woman I was supposed to marry, I remember my dad saying, be careful, don't settle for the second best. Find the best for you for what God has fashioned for you and marry that person. Because sometimes the second best will come along before the first best comes. And so often people do it. They, they get desperate. That woman starts dressing immodestly because she wants to attract men to her, to herself. Well, you're going to attract the wrong kind of men if that's what you're doing. Or let's be involved in sexual immorality because somehow this will tie the relationship and settle the relationship. And that's also wrong. You need to not compromise God's ways and be content with God's timing. And that's the hard thing. But you know what God's doing? He's maturing the person you're going to marry. And that takes time. And he's also doing something else. He's maturing you. And when that person's mature enough and you're mature enough, he'll bring them in his time together. Now, I'm not suggesting that you have to have it all together before you get married because none of us do. Angela and I look back constantly and think about when we first got married, we're like, man, we were kids. We had no idea what we were doing. We loved each other as best we knew how, but man, we were in elementary school when it came to all of that. And so is everybody who gets married. But then you grow together and you learn together. And I heard somebody say one time, I love my wife now as much as the day I married her. That is not a healthy marriage. I thank God I don't love my wife as much as I loved her when the day I got married. I love her so much more. And she loves me so much more. And we know each other better. And we know more about our faults and our warts so that our love is more realistic now than it was then. We know each other more deeply. We love each other more deeply. We've passed through hardship together. And we've gone through joys together and all those things serve to strengthen the bond and to deepen our love for one another. But you singles don't compromise. Trust the Lord. Don't feel guilty that you have the desires, but submit yourself to His timing and trust Him that in His providence, He knows how to bring your husband or your wife to you in His time. It's never your time. I will tell you that right now, but it's always His time. I love when Ray Gibello was with us last time. He says, you know, I grew up in New Jersey. My wife was growing up in Papua, New Guinea. We were 10,000 miles away from each other. And yet somehow God knew how to bring us together when it was time to get married. And that's true for all of us, isn't it? Don't think, oh no, I'm going to miss my wife or I'm going to miss my husband. No, God knows you follow Him. You set your goal and your journey and your sights upon the celestial city and be faithful to Him. Post your colors and go. And as you're going, God in his providence will bring that person alongside of you and you realize we're heading the same direction. And it'd be a lot easier to just go there together, married, than it would to go separate. God has shown himself faithful time and time and time again to this very thing. Second application. Parents, you must actively shepherd your children's souls regarding their romantic interests. Now, most of you, many of you have grown children already. But some of us don't, not yet. Adam and Eve entered into the covenant of marriage with the blessing of their heavenly father. And it was a precedent-setting event. Do you notice something in our text? A man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife. There's a pattern all throughout scriptures found in both the Old and the New Testament. Sons leave and daughters are given. Over and over again you find the same thing. And so I would submit to you that whenever it is possible, there's a specific emphasis upon the father of the bride, whenever it is possible, parents ought to be playing an active role in the romantic relationships of their children. Now, the reason I use that qualifying word whenever possible is it's not always possible. For example, if a woman became a Christian and her father is a devout Muslim, I'm pretty sure he's not going to give his blessing to her marrying a godly Christian man. But she has to obey God rather than man. She cannot be unequally yoked with a Muslim, and so she has to obey God rather than men. There's also circumstances where a man may not be a Muslim, but he's become very hostile to the gospel. And therefore, because he's hostile to the gospel, he's never going to approve of anybody because his problem is with the gospel itself. Furthermore, there are sometimes men, and there's no shortage of this, who are spiritual absentees in their homes. And you can't be a spiritual absentee and not shepherd the souls of your children. And then suddenly when they're in their twenties and thirties, suddenly think that you can be a proactive shepherd when you haven't been a shepherd all their lives. Let's put it this way. This shepherding of your children's romantic interest starts when your kids are little. I've had numerous conversations with my two daughters over the years. And I've said to them, now someday, right now you're four, but someday, someday you're going to be interested in a young man. But before that young man can get to you, he's got to come through me and he's got to get permission from your father to date you. He's got to have permission from me and my blessing before he can marry you. And you need to submit to me and trust your father and my judgment that I am going to seek to shepherd you with wisdom. Do you understand, Mark?" Yes, Daddy. Now, when they're 18, they may have a little bit more of a hard time, but that's why I'm ingraining it to them right now. It's because you need to understand, sweetheart, this is how things are going to be. Because your daddy carries a big shotgun, and I'm not afraid to go back to jail again. And young people, If you have parents in your life that you can get such counsel from, you need to listen carefully to them. And if they're telling you, honey, this young man, there's some things we're seeing that are yellow flags or red flags. And you're saying, Oh, you just don't understand him. Oh yes, they do. Believe it or not, your parents were your age once. And, and sometimes parents can see things more objectively than you can. I have the privilege, and it's a rare privilege, and the older I get, I'm realizing just how blessed I have been. That I have had two parents who love the Lord, and my in-laws love the Lord, and I am very blessed in that. But when I first began dating Angela, I came to her father and asked his permission to date her. And I told him, I submit myself to you for your accountability of how I treat your daughter physically. and he puts down some ground rules. He didn't micromanage our lives, but he put some ground rules, more ground rules. I want her back home by this time. Uh, we don't want you ever to be in a home or any place by yourself with my daughter, not just because of the temptations, but because of the appearance of evil, there were just common sense parameters that were put there. And I said to her parents and I said to my parents, if any one of you, says to me that you don't approve of this relationship going forward. I will submit to you and I will break the relationship off. I only request that you meet with me face to face and tell me why. And I prayed specifically Lord open her parents eyes to see me not just for strengths, but for my weaknesses, help them to see me as I am. And I sought to pursue a relationship with her so that I could know her as well as I righteously could, because there's some things that I like being surprised by, but I didn't want any real major surprises. I wanted to know who it was I was marrying. And that relationship with her parents has paid dividends ever since, because they treat me as if I am their son, and my parents were always able to treat my wife as if she was their daughter. And I thank God for those opportunities. So wherever it's possible, Submit yourself to your parents and their counsel. Third, fathers, when your son leaves your home to marry a woman or when your daughter, you give your daughter away to a man, you are no longer the head of your daughter and you're not the head of that home. A new home has been formed. A son leaves his parents to form his own household and a daughter is given away. You realize that when on January the 16th, 1993, Mike Strickland gave his daughter Angela Strickland to me. And when he gave her to me, he ceased being her authority and he ceased being the head of her home. And she became, came under my authority and I became her new head. As a matter of fact, that was reflected in the fact that she was no longer Angela Strickland. From then forward, she was Mrs. Angela Slate. Let me put it to you this way. I look at my vocations and you heard that said vocations. We all have callings. All of us do. Every one of us. You know what my first and foremost calling is? It's not to be a pastor. My first and foremost calling is I'm called to be a child of God. That is my first identity. Whether I'm a pastor or whether I'm doing secular employment or whatever it is, my first and foremost identity is I am a child of God, the father by the grace of adoption. And that will always be my prime identity. My second identity is I'm a pastor. Nope. My second vocation is I'm called to be Angela's husband. My third vocation is I'm called to be the father of Samuel, Luke, Grace, Jackson, Malachi, and Margaret. And connected with those callings, I'm called to be a provider, a breadwinner for the home. Fourth, I'm called to be a pastor. And it's important that you understand that because if I lose the heart of my wife, lose the heart of my children, I don't have the right to be in the ministry anymore because I've lost my ministry. My point is Angela is first and foremost a Christian. She's a child of God and that is her first and foremost identity. That was her identity before she met me. It was her identity before she married me. Her second identity before she married me was she was Mike and Ellen's daughter. But what is her second identity now that she's married? She is secondly my wife. That's her identity. And this is my point. I cut up about being protective about my daughters. I really am protective of my daughters, but I really do want them to be married. I love being married to Angela, and I want my children to share the same joy that I know in marriage by seeing them married. But here's my point. If I give my daughter Grace to a godly man named Mr. Aragorn, Then from here on out, her name is not Grace Slate. And I can't treat her as Grace Slate. I have to treat her as Mrs. Grace Aragorn. And if I give Margaret away to a godly man named Samwise Gamgee, then her name is Mrs. Margaret Gamgee. And I've got to treat her as if she's Mrs. Margaret Gamgee. I can no longer treat her like she's Miss Margaret Slate. Why? Because she has a head over her. And that head is not me. And if my children or my in-laws, my sons-in-laws and daughter-in-laws are living in sin, I have every right, in fact, an obligation to go to them and to rebuke them for their sin. But at the same time, I also have to recognize that once I give my daughters away, they are required by God himself to submit to the husbands they have married. Even if it turns out that those husbands don't obey the word of the Lord, they're still obligated to submit. Now, if their spouses give grounds for divorce by being adulterous or whatever, If their spouses begin physically hurting them, I will step in and protect them. My sister Rose years ago had a woman who was a Christian, she went to church with, call her up and say to her, he goes, my husband's beating me. And my sister said, your husband beat you? So do you know what I would do if my husband beat me? I would call my daddy and I call my brother. And when they got done with him, I'd call the police. And the woman said, Oh, I can't do that. It says, I know you can't do that. That's why your husband beats you. In other words, there are authorities over your husband and you don't leave a woman in a vulnerable position where she's physically in danger. You intervene. But beyond that, what I'm getting at is this. Once I give my daughters away, so long as they're not those things going on, they are under the authority of the men to whom I have given them. And so I must recognize that. And I have to give my sons and my sons-in-law latitude to make decisions that I may not always like, like which local church you're going to go to. Maybe your children choose to embrace liberties, Christian liberties, legitimate Christian liberties, and practice them in your home, things that you yourself wouldn't do. But nonetheless, this is a decision they've made. And you know what? They get to do that because they are the head of their home and you're not. And you're going to harm your children in their marriage if you try to intervene in things that are not under your jurisdiction. And so it's very important to give that latitude and to recognize those things because they're the head of the home and you're not. And you don't want to harm the relationship by treating them otherwise. I have a dear friend, a sister in Christ, who was having some struggles in her marriage years ago. And she went to her father and said, I'm struggling to submit to this man and struggling with all this. And he certainly didn't like hearing that things were not going as well as he wanted, of course, can you imagine? But he looked at her right in the eye and said, baby girl, you go back to that home and you love that man. You submit to his authority. And she did. Later, she would testify, years later, how much it meant to her. Their father was wise enough, discerning enough to say, this is how things ought to be. About a year ago, we were cutting up at Angela's parents' house, and Angela and I were having some playful banter back and forth. And Angela, she was joking, but she said, I'm going to go back to my mother's. Her mother looked at her and says, I'll just send you right back. And then a few months ago we were having some more playful banter. And I promise it was playful banter. We weren't really having an argument, but we were having some playful banter. And I, and I just looked at Angela's dad and I said, you know, your daughter's getting kind of hungry. And he says, well, you can't bring her back. And it was joking. We were cutting up, but the sentiment behind it was right. It was right. And so understand when a son leaves, he leaves. You've got to let your children leave and cleave. Fourth application, marriage is honorable among all and the bed undefiled, but fornicators and adulterers, God will judge. You know, that's a really safe application because just quote the scriptures is all I did right there. That's from Hebrews chapter 13 and verse four. We live in a depraved world. We live in a fallen world. And there are tens of thousands of ways for this world and our culture to show their sin. But is there any more explicit way that they show their depravity than when it comes to the issue of sexuality? We drive down the street. You can't even look up the signs that are displayed, even coming here. You can't look at the signs that are displayed because of the immodesty that's shown. You can't watch your television without encountering it. If the show itself doesn't get you, the commercials will. You can't open a magazine. You can't go into a bookstore. I love books. When I go into a bookstore, typically I send a text to some brothers and say, I'm going into a bookstore. I'm going to text you how I did with what I set before my eyes because I want to be very focused. Want to go to a specific place, but not set unclean things before my eyes. The problem is there's unclean things in every genre of literature out there. You open up a magazine, you open up a novel, you open up any kind of thing, you turn on your television, you go and look at the silver screen, the things that people are exposed to on a regular basis on the silver screen are hideous. But what's worse in our day is because of the phenomenon of the internet. Now this raw sewage of pornography can be piped right into your television screen, it can be put on your computer, it can be put on your tablet, you can download pornography, pornographic images to your cell phone. Never in all history has this been more accessible. And because of that, we have to have safeguards. We have to protect ourselves. We have to really take the scriptures literally say, don't look to the right or the left. Just keep your eyes on what's straight in front of you. We need to surround ourselves with accountability and things like that. It's everywhere we go, but here's the problem. Here's the danger in responding and reacting to those things. Our pendulum can swing so far in the other direction that we began almost unconsciously to embrace what I would call an extra biblical prudishness. He said, what do you mean by that? To somehow think that sexuality in of itself is dirty. And I believe that you find this in the church so often. Think about this. How many of you have ever heard someone say, young people, you need to commit to stay pure until you're married? How many of you have heard anyone say that? What are the implications of those words? Stay pure until you're married. On your wedding night, you're going to give yourself to impurity. That's the implication, isn't it? Well, that's terrible advice. My advice to you, the biblical advice, is stay pure all your life. You should see when I tell that to young people outside of our church. Our church is used to it, but they look at me like, wait, are you saying what I think you're saying? And I have to explain to them. And this is what I mean. Stay pure until you're married by refraining from all sexual activity of any kind whatsoever. Guard your virginity. But stay pure after you're married by being faithful to one spouse. And by giving yourself body and soul to that spouse, by rendering to each other due affection as the Bible says. Think about what the Bible literally tells us is any form of sexual intimacy before marriage is sinful. But to not be sexually active after you're married is also sinful because the Bible itself commands us to render due affection to one another. My point is this, God himself created man and woman to be sexual beings. And Adam and Eve consummated their relationship in the garden without shame. And there was no shame. There was no sadness. There was no coming back and saying, forgive us for we have sinned because it was pure and holy and right. And we need to have that view as well. It's all about context, isn't it? The illustration I've used over the years is this. If it's a really cold, snowy winter's day, and it's freezing outside, and you're inside trying to get warm, and you have a fireplace, and you build a big, crackling, hot fire, and you sit around, you benefit from the warmth of that fire. But take that same fire, pull it out of the fireplace, put it in the middle of your living room floor, and it's going to destroy the house and kill everybody inside of it. And even so, this fire has a place where it's to reside, and it's inside the covenant of marriage, and there only. And there, it's a great blessing. But take it outside the context of the covenant of marriage, and it will destroy you. Isn't that exactly what the text says? In Hebrews 13, verse 4, marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled. It's pure, it's holy. But fornicators and adulterers, God will judge. So let's realize that there is a place for sexual intimacy, but it's in the confines of the covenant of marriage. But inside of the covenant of marriage, it's not unpure. It's not unholy. It's good, right, pleasing to God. And that's the mentality we should have. Save the most important application for last. Adam had a need that he was ignorant of. God first made him aware of his need. and then made provision sufficient to meet his need. And every time I see that, I see a parallelism between how God dealt with Adam, who was sinless at that time, and how God deals with sinners now. Because as sinners, we come into this world with a need. And most sinners don't realize the need that they have. They need a Savior. Why are people not rushing into our church to hear the gospel? because they don't believe they need a Savior. They think they're doing just fine without Him. Men do not know what they need. Martin Lloyd-Jones very boldly said, and he's 27 years old in a place called Sanfields in Wales, and he was preaching there, and he says, you know, when you come to the Lord's Day, our churches aren't being filled to the brim with people hungering for the Word of God. Most of them are going down to the beach. And the truth is, if they really believe that their happiness consists in going to the beach, that's where they ought to go. If you really believe it's more important for your soul that you be at the beach today, then be at the beach today on the Lord's Day instead of being here. He says, but when a loved one dies, don't come to us wanting us to perform the funeral. Go to the beach for your comfort. That's bold words, isn't it? But he's right. In other words, you don't perceive what your need is. But God, in His mercy, shows us our need, just as He showed Adam his need. And how does He show it? He shows it through His holy law. That's how He shows it. He exposes us to His holy perfections by giving us the law of God. And the law of God requires of you perfect righteousness from cradle to grave. God doesn't grade on the curve. He says, you're going to live by this. You're going to do all of it perfectly from the heart. And what the law shows us is this. You're full of pride. You're full of yourself. You love yourself more than you love God. You love yourself more than you love your neighbor, more than you love your spouse, more than you love everybody. Self is at the center. Your heart is a big factory for idols. It's constantly looking for something else to worship, something else to love. Look at the world. They want to love anything and everything but God and his word. Everything else is central. Calvin was right. Our hearts are factories for idols. They just spit them out all the time. And it shows us we will hurt other people no matter what we have to do to them to gratify us. What the law shows you is as bad as you let yourself think you are, you're worse. It shows you that you are permeated with sin. Rosetta Butterfield. was a lesbian who was converted to Christ. I love something that she points out. She said, you know, you would think that what brought me to Christ was God exposed my lesbianism and showed me that it was my sin. That isn't what God did. Now, he did deal with that in her life, but he says what he dealt with was I started reading the Bible and I realized I was so full of pride. Because believe it or not, we struggle with other sins besides just sexual depravity. In other words, it showed me how proud and arrogant I was, how I have been usurping the glory of God and trying to take it for myself from the time I was an infant. The law shows you your need, but the law that shows you your need can't fulfill your need. The law shows you're a sinner. It shows you the righteous requirement of God, but it can't fulfill that. It can't do anything about it. It can just condemn you. You know, people often say that the doctrine of hell is a cruel, vicious, hateful doctrine. God sure is vicious and hard and mean and hateful because of this doctrine. And we admit it's a hard doctrine. But when people say that, what they're revealing is they have not apprehended how holy God is and how serious and affront sin is to Him. They've minimized their sin in order to say, well, God's just being mean. But if the Spirit of God has truly convicted you to the core of your being, you come to acknowledge eternal damnation in hell is what I justly deserve. It's the only sane conclusion a just God could ever come to. I am deserving of a thousand hells. If God punishes me for all of eternity, I am getting my just due. But then, when he's brought you to see that, Here's the thing. What did God do for Adam? Adam had a need. He didn't know it. God showed him what his need was, and then God Himself provided for the need. What has God done? The law shows me my need of a Savior, and God has provided the Savior that I need. That is, the righteousness which God requires of you in His law, God has provided for you in His gospel. His son, Jesus Christ, is the eternal son of God. He's uncreated. He has always existed. He was involved actively in the creation of this world. But in the fullness of time, in obedience to his father's command, Jesus became a man. God and man in one person. So that he could reconcile us to God and reconcile God to us. And he lived a life of obedience you and I could never live. If anyone could be saved by their works, the only person who ever could do that was Jesus himself. because he fulfilled the law completely from his heart. You imagine Jesus never had a single lustful thought entertained in his mind. Jesus never said a foul word. Jesus never lied. Jesus never coveted the glory of God. All these things he perfectly fulfilled and submitted to and then voluntarily laid his life down upon the cross and was punished in the place of us for our sins. The book of Isaiah tells us to this. I know you know this text, but turn with me to Isaiah 53 verses four to six. This is speaking of Christ is the prophecy of the coming of Christ and his crucifixion. Verse four says, Surely he that is Jesus has borne our griefs. and carried our sorrows. Yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. But he was wounded. That is, he was pierced for our transgression. He was bruised, crushed for our iniquities. The chastisement for our peace was upon him. And by his stripes, we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray. We've turned everyone to his own way. And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. God took our sin, placed it upon Christ and punished him as a substitute in our place so that anyone and everyone who repents of their sins and puts their faith in Jesus can be saved. We took our sin so that when we believe on him, he now gives us his righteousness, a righteousness which satisfies the law, not a righteousness you perform, a righteousness God freely provides through his son. And it's yours for the taking, whoever you are, however sinful your past is. Maybe you say, well, you don't know my past. I aborted my own child. Maybe several. I've lived in sexual immorality. I've been a drunkard. I've been this. I've been that. If you knew my track record, You wouldn't even want to talk to me. Well, if you knew my track record, you wouldn't want to talk to me either. Because we are all great sinners. Jesus didn't come to save people who are righteous. He comes to save people who are sinners. People who've made an absolute royal train wreck of their lives by their sin. That's exactly whom Jesus came to save. Remember the woman at the well? There's a perfect example. Here's a woman who Jesus says, go call your husband, bring him here. I don't have a husband. She says, he says, you're right. You don't have a husband. You've had five husbands and now you're living with a man you're not married to. And yet this woman becomes a recipient of saving grace. We're going to meet her in heaven because she found salvation in the Messiah, the gathering demoniac. What kind of life did he live that a thousand demons would be inhabiting him? And yet we find that after he met Jesus, he was clothed and in his right mind begging, please, wherever you are, let me go with you. Jesus says, you can't go with me, but. Go tell everybody. Go tell your friends what great things God has done for you. And we find out He's the greatest evangelist in all the Gospels. He goes through the Decapolis, the ten cities, telling everybody what great things Jesus did for me. Let me tell you what I was, but what Jesus did for me. A man like that becomes the greatest evangelist? If that's not grace, I don't know what is. If you're here and you're outside of Christ, Jesus is able to save you. He's just as willing as He is able. Come to him for the salvation only he can give. The law shows you your need, but Christ is the fulfillment of that need. And we thank God for such a savior as he is. There's no one else who is so perfectly fitted to be a savior like Jesus is. He's full of pity and compassion. He desires mercy more than justice. Come to him for the salvation that only he can give. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for providing for our need. We thank you for loving us enough to show us our need. Grant us grace, O Lord, for anyone here who doesn't know you, that they might be brought to the Savior. For us who do know you, Lord, we thank you for a perfect righteousness by which we can come boldly before the throne of grace. We pray, O Father, that as we partake of the Lord's supper now, your spirit will be poured out upon us, that we would commune with you and be able to draw near to you and meet with the living Christ. For we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.