Please turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 7. 1 Corinthians chapter 7. We'll read from verse 35. And this I speak for your own profit, not that I may cast a snare upon you, but for that which is comely and that you may attend upon the Lord without distraction. But if any man think that he behaveth himself uncomely toward his virgin, if she pass the flower of her age and need, so require, let him do what he will. He sinneth not, let them marry. Nevertheless, he that standeth steadfast in his heart, having no necessity, but hath power over his own will, and hath so decreed in his heart that he will keep his virgin, doeth well. So then, He that giveth her in marriage doeth well, but he that giveth her not in marriage doeth better. The wife is bound by the law as long as her husband liveth, but if her husband be dead, she is at liberty to be married to whom she will, only in the Lord. But she is happier if she so abide after my judgment, and I think also that I have the Spirit of God. Amen. We've been looking the last number of weeks at kinism. First of all, its view of racial superiority, and then last time, its view of racial segregation. This evening, we want to bring things to a close by looking at this doctrine in connection to its view of interracial marriage. So from what we've considered previously, I trust you see that this is a theory, a doctrine, that opposes laws that don't accord with scripture. And therefore, as a result, it invents sins. This is true in the area of interracial marriage. Now some will come out and outright and boldly say interracial marriage is sinful. It's against nature. It's an overturning of the moral order of God. Others would like to say that, but they'll stop short so as to say, well, It's unwise and therefore it's sinful. Their conclusion, however, is drawn actually from their commitment to the previous two ideas that we've considered. With regard to racial superiority, it's a sin against your ancestors to intermarry with an inherently genetically inferior race. It's a sin against your children for putting them in a position as the result of that. And basically what you really have is superiority in relation to genetics or eugenics, the passing on of purportedly good genes. Well, this often shows scientific illiteracy. It looks good in an article, if you've got a degree of scientific skill to go and do the research, you may discover something very different. It's also frequently pressed with regard to a narrow argument from intellect or IQ level. So you have this idea of racial superiority, but then in connection to racial segregation, races are to remain separate. Therefore, they ought not to intermarry. And so they look back at the history of America and they tie this to the Civil Rights Revolution and the removal of miscegenation laws. And so interracial marriage is said to be a tool of cultural Marxism. And those who engage in it have become aiders and abettors of that revolution. It is, however, interesting to note that your own history is somewhat peculiar. As far as I can ascertain, no other European country ever had miscegenation laws apart from one in 1930s and 40s, and there's no prizes for guessing which country that was. But our approach this evening will be to look at scripture. What has God said? And in particular, What are the biblically established bounds of marriage? That's what we should all want to know. What are the biblically established bounds of marriage? Well, consider first of all, what is marriage? Marriage is the covenant commitment and union of one man and one woman to live together to be each other's and only for each other until they are separated by death. And it has its roots in the creation account of Genesis chapter two, when God said it is not good for man to be alone. And so out of the man, he formed woman and God himself brought them together so that the two were no longer two, but they were one united in the covenant of marriage. So it was the marriage of one man and one woman according to nature. It was a marriage of man and woman after their kind. Now there only was one man and one woman at that time. But it is interesting to note that as history develops and there are a number of people groups that come into being as a result of that, later revelation is still stated in the same genetic sense. Marriage is between one man and one woman. Nothing's added to that. Well, that helps us understand that marriage is more than a Christian thing. to say that though Christians are ultimately the only people who understand marriage properly as God has ordained it, especially as it's revealed in the scripture and a picture of Christ and the church, that marriages between people in all nations and in all religions are lawful. and they are valid marriages. Well, our Westminster Confession of Faith is a chapter on marriage, and it begins with a recognition of that very thing. It says, it is lawful for all sorts of people to marry, who are able to, with judgment, to give their consent. The proof texts include Hebrews chapter 13, verse 4. Marriage is honorable in all things. and the bed undefiled, but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge. So marriage is the covenant commitment, the agreement of one with the other. This is the way the Lord has given sanctity for sexual relations. Anything outside of that is whoremongery and adultery. Point is, this is true of all marriages. Another text that they offer is 1 Timothy 4, verse 3, where Paul speaks about those who are forbidding to marry. They have a false view of the holiness of the single life, and so they bring in those extra rules. Well, suffice it to show us this evening that marriage is this covenant commitment of man and woman and it is lawful for all sorts of people to marry. And the marriages of people all across the world are as a result of that valid. Secondly, the lawful bounds of marriage. The lawful bounds of marriage. While it is lawful for all sorts of people to marry, the Bible does introduce further restrictions upon marriage. So we can't simply say all sorts of people may marry, therefore I can marry anyone. And there are two categories of restrictive laws in scripture that speak to the question. The first are what we'll call natural restrictions, and the second are religious restrictions. And we want to consider here the natural restrictions. And I want to point out at the outset, race is not one of them in Scripture. Race is not one of them. When Adam and Eve had children, they were the only people living upon the earth. Sometimes we get the question, where did Cain and Abel get their wives from? Well, the answer is very simple. They married their sisters. Then throughout the patriarchal period, as man multiplied on the earth, there is further evidence of marriage between closer blood relatives than is permitted at a later time. So you can think of Abraham and Sarah. And in Genesis chapter 20 verse 12, Abraham points out that they are indeed half siblings. They share the same father. But by the time of the law, God clearly established tighter boundaries for the good of men. And those laws deal with blood relations, and then also the legal family implications of marriage. And we generally refer to those two things under two terms. The first is consanguinity, and the second is affinity. So consider the first, consanguinity, it's a Latin term that means with blood or with the same blood. And it's addressed in Leviticus chapter 18 that we read earlier in our service this evening. At the end of the chapter, God says that the heathen nations that you left behind and the Canaanites that you're going to encounter, they were all practicing these abominations. In verse six of Leviticus chapter 18, none of you shall approach to any that is near of kin to him, to uncover his nakedness, I am the Lord. And that's fleshed out. Your father or your mother, verse seven. Your sister or your brother, verse eight through nine. Your grandchildren, verse 10. Half siblings, in verse 11. Verse 12 and 13, your aunt and uncle. And so the closest boundary whereby it is permissible to marry in scripture would be at the level of a cousin. Now scripture recognized the violation of these principles to be incest. It is also of note that we know through scientific investigation that this closeness of blood in marriage as it pertains to the production of children has a significantly high incident of genetic disease. We even speak about it generically, about people being inbred. We can recognize the issues. And so we have an issue of incest, but of course the Lord knows what he's doing here with regard to preserving man's good. So we have consanguinity. The second is affinity. And this doesn't refer to blood relations. but legal relations formed by marriage. This is addressed in Leviticus chapter 18, and again in Leviticus chapter 20. And then in 1 Corinthians chapter 5, an abominable thing enters into the church in Corinth, and it's a violation of a number of things, but one of them is this principle of affinity. So in Leviticus chapter 18, verse 14, you're not to take your father's brother's wife. In other words, your aunt, not by blood, but by marriage. Leviticus 18 verse 15, you're not to take your daughter-in-law. She's not your biological daughter, but she's your daughter-in-law. Verse 16 and 18, you're not to take your sister-in-law. Again, there's no blood relationship. But there's a legal relationship established by marriage. This comes up again in Leviticus chapter 20, verse 19. And thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy mother's sister, nor thy father's sister, for he uncovereth his near kin. Not biological kin. Now it's legal. They shall bear their iniquity. And if a man shall take his brother's wife, it is an unclean thing, he hath uncovered his brother's nakedness, they shall be childless. So with these two things together, consanguinity and affinity, and they both forbid marriage on the basis of nearness due to natural or legal kinship. The reason is stated in a number of those verses. She is thy near kinswoman. He uncovereth his near kin. From this, we have a paragraph in our Westminster Confession, Chapter 24, Paragraph 4, that marriage must be within these boundaries. Let me read to you. Marriage ought not to be within the degrees of consanguinity or affinity forbidden by the word. Nor can such incestuous marriages ever be made lawful by any law of man or consent of parties. And then at the end of the paragraph, the man may not marry any of his wife's kindred nearer in blood than he may of his own, nor the woman of her husband's kindred nearer in blood than of her own. What I want you to note from this, is that there are moral restrictions placed on marriage in relation to kinship. But they all have to do with nearness of kin. All sorts of people, apart from those who are too naturally or legally close, may marry. It doesn't say anything about distance. Kinnest says, oh, you can't marry outside your kin. The Bible says the thing that needs to be restricted is marrying too close within your kin. That's where the scripture places the emphasis. So we've got these lawful bonds of marriage. Thirdly, we have covenant bounds of marriage. And this is the second large category of law. These don't have to do with blood or kin, but they are laws for marriage for God's covenant people. And God forbids them to marry outside the covenant with pagans or infidels. So let's work through the Old Testament first of all, beginning in Genesis chapter six, and verse one and two. And we noted this in God's providence in our sermon series on the Lord's day, that the sons of God, namely the line of Seth, intermarried with the daughters of men, the line of Cain. And this led to the corruption of the world through sin onto its destruction by the flood. So God is saying very clearly to us from the beginning, here is one way that Satan will seek to destroy the godly seed by violating God's boundaries of covenant marriage for his people. Then we move on in the book of Genesis and we discover Abraham and Isaac, a favorite of the kinesths. And they say, well, look, Abraham wouldn't take a wife for Isaac from the people of the land. And so he sends a servant back to his own kin to take a wife from his family. And so he does. And thus it is for Isaac and for his son. But they want to make this racial where the Bible makes it covenantal. They were living among the Canaanites. The people that we read off in Leviticus chapter 18, who were doing all of these abominations, and God says, you better not do this. Marrying too closely, bestiality. And Abraham says, no, I'm not taking to wife or my son, someone from here. Genesis chapter 34 verse 14 is an interesting associated passage with regard to Dinah. And is it Shechem or his son is wanting to take Dinah to wife? And the answer is no. And the reason is we cannot give our sister to one that is uncircumcised. It's covenantal, again. They don't say, sorry, we don't believe in race mixing. We cannot give our sister to one that is uncircumcised, outside the covenant people of God. Deuteronomy 7, verse 3 and 4. Israel is commanded not to give or take sons and daughters of the heathen in marriage. Again, people will focus on verse three. Look at that, it's prohibiting race mixing, but the purpose is stated in verse four. And it's actually a restatement to the second generation of Israel of that which God spoke at Mount Sinai in Exodus chapter 34, verse 16. And so the Lord says to his people, thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son for they will turn away thy son from following me that they may serve their gods. So will the anger of the Lord be kindled against you and destroy thee suddenly. Deuteronomy chapter seven, verse three and four is a proof text used in our Westminster confession of faith to teach us that believers are not to marry unbelievers. It's lawful for all sorts of people to get married. Yet it is the duty of Christians to marry only in the Lord and therefore such as profess the true reformed religion should not marry with infidels, papists, other idolaters. Neither should such as are godly be unequally yoked by marrying with such as are notoriously wicked in their life or maintain damnable heresies." Not a word about different nationalities, different people group, Different races. We move on, Judges chapter three, verse five and six proves the point that was made in Deuteronomy chapter seven. When Israel enter into the land and are canonized through marrying the heathen. And the children of Israel dwelt among the Canaanites, Hittites, and Amorites, and Perizzites, and Hivites, and Jebusites. And they took their daughters to be their wives and gave their daughters to their sons and served their gods. It was also the downfall of Solomon who took hundreds of wives. 1 Kings 11, verse 4, his wives turned away his heart after other gods, and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father. Then you come to Ezra and Nehemiah. The people return after Babylonian captivity, and Ezra comes, a number of years, a decade or a decade and a half before Nehemiah. And Nehemiah comes after. And then Nehemiah is there for a time and he goes back to Persia, and he comes back the second time about 40 years after he had come the first time. And in Ezra's days, and when Nehemiah comes back, The children of Israel have fallen into marrying pagans again. Ezra deals with it in chapter 9 and 10. He calls them to repentance, citing the laws that we've referenced already. Requiring that the people put away the wives that they've taken through these unlawful marriages. They have to be dis-annulled. When Nehemiah comes back, he rebukes the people for what they've done. And he appeals to the law given by Moses and also to the sin of Solomon. Don't you remember that Solomon, his heart was stolen away from marrying pagan wives. The prophet Malachi, the final prophet of the Old Testament period, is actually ministering around the time of Nehemiah's return. And he challenges the people, he brings them in a sense to the courtroom and he charges them with various crimes before the Lord. And in chapter two, in the middle of the chapter, the thing that is highlighted is their marrying with pagan women. And we read this in Malachi 2 verse 11, Judah hath dealt treacherously and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem for Judah hath profaned the holiness of the Lord which he loved and hath married the daughter of a strange God. And then he presses the point home and he says, you've forgotten the purpose of marriage. namely to raise a godly seed, a holy seed unto the Lord. And you're running off with pagans. Then you move from the old into the New Testament. And the New Testament is, of course, informed by the old, and we expect that the same principles would carry through. And when we come to the New Testament, we discover that, but also that they are reaffirmed and applied to the New Testament church. Now that the church is no longer contained in a nation or an ethnic group largely, but it is international and it's going to all nations. The Apostle Paul addresses it in 1 Corinthians chapter 7. and in verse 39. So if you could turn back to 1 Corinthians chapter 7 and verse 39. Now earlier in the chapter, he's dealing with mixed marriages where there's a believer and unbeliever, but that's the result of one of them having been converted after they're married. And he says to the Christian, you're married, you stay with your spouse. If your unbelieving spouse abandons you, let them go. You're not going to be under bondage to that marriage. At the end of the chapter, he speaks about remarriage, if the husband be dead or the wife be dead. The wife is bound by the law as long as her husband liveth, but if her husband be dead, she is at liberty to be married. Listen, to whom she will. Now comes the qualification, only in the Lord. To whom she will, only in the Lord. Do you know what that is, brethren? It's the same covenantal principle that we've just walked through in the Old Testament. It was always this. But there's no reference to nations here because of the international nature of the church. Further, Paul gives this commandment in the immediate context of a mixed race church. were the tensions that we considered last time that are like an undercurrent through the New Testament writings. They're live. Where the biggest racial divide and distinction known and felt is between Jew and Gentile, Paul says, whom she will, only in the Lord. In the church in Corinth, which began with Paul going to the house of Priscilla and Aquila, who were Jews, preaching in the synagogue. And Crispus, the leader of the synagogue, is converted. And the gospel goes from there out into a pagan city. And in the chapter before this one, such were some of you, homosexuals, drunkards, all kinds of wicked and immoral people, together, with Jews who were converted in the church, and Paul says, only in the Lord. Not only in the Lord, oh, by the way, as long as they're of the same ethnic heritage as you. So only Jewish Christians marry Jewish Christians, and only Gentile Christians marry Gentile Christians. Or if we were to go to Antioch, only those from North Africa marry North African Christians. Only in the Lord. Only in the Lord. In the second letter, he gives us the reason for this. They were not to be unequally yoked together with unbelievers, not unequally yoked by race, but by faith. In marriage, we are heirs together of the grace of life. What would you be thinking? To marry someone that you cannot share the most precious thing in the world to you. Jesus Christ. Paul asks you, what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? That's why you're to marry only in the Lord. So all sorts of people can marry. The Bible forbids nearness of kin by nature and by law. Then for believers, there's the added prescription that they have to marry within the covenant, only in the Lord. Well, that brings us fourthly to interracial marriage in scripture. interracial marriage in scripture. Those principles that we've just set before you, we see operative in the Bible, where there are many marriages between people of different races and different people groups, yet within the covenant people of the Lord. Sometimes we look at these and we say, well, examples are not law. That's true. But the point is, we have the laws, and the examples largely fall in line with those laws. So you're not left to guess. I say largely, because the first example that I want to bring before you is Joseph. Genesis chapter 41 and verse 45. Joseph is there in Egypt alone, having been sold as a slave, but he finds in God's providence that he's been exalted to the right hand of Pharaoh. And Pharaoh gives him to wife, Asenath, the daughter of Potiphar, the priest of On, which in that culture was a huge honor. Now with regard to the propriety of this marriage, we don't have any record. of the religious fidelity of Asenath, it appears that she's the daughter of a pagan priest or a pagan prince. But certainly from the perspective of Egypt, here's a foreigner, he's exalted to the right hand of Pharaoh, and he's given the honor of receiving this significant wife. The question of where her heart was in relation to God's covenant is not revealed to us. Many of the commentators, however, point out that there are typical foresights here. Joseph being the type of Christ who is sold and rejected by his brothers, he goes through humiliation, he's exalted to the right hand of Pharaoh, and then he takes a wife of the daughter of Ham, of the Hamites. Their emphasis is. an anticipation of Christ who will bring the Gentiles into his kingdom. Then we have Moses. This time I want you to turn to the portion which is Numbers chapter 12. Numbers chapter 12. And we'll read verse 1. and verse 2. And Miriam and Aaron speak against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married, for he had married an Ethiopian woman. They said, hath the Lord indeed spoken only by Moses? Hath he not spoken also by us? And the Lord heard it. So twice in verse 1, Moses takes an Ethiopian wife. That's a significant translation, by the way, in our Bibles. The word in Hebrew would refer to the Cushite, Cush being one of the sons of Ham, majority of whose descendants would have inhabited the region of Ethiopia, and they would be black Africans. Now when people come to this text, some of them say, no, this is speaking about Zipporah. But Moses had taken Zipporah to wife many years before Numbers chapter 12. Why would it be a cause for Miriam and Aaron to speak now? Nor was Zipporah a Cushite, by the way. So it's not speaking about Zipporah. It's contemptuous speech against another woman that Moses took to wife. And others say, well, the Kushites didn't all dwell in the region of Kush. Some of them dwelt in the southern peninsula of Arabia. And often, kinists will press this because they have an instinctive dislike to the idea that this could be a black African woman from Ethiopia. So they say, no, not a black African. Kush's descendants went elsewhere as well. But we can say that it's likely one of the Egyptians who came up with the children of Israel out of Egypt. And it is likely a black African from Kusher, Ethiopia. But what we know for certain is that she was off another race. And that Moses' siblings had a kinest issue. They speak against him because he had married an Ethiopian woman. They didn't support it. But God didn't support them and they come under judgment in part for this opposition to Moses. Maybe they thought Moses had been reading the Frankfurt School and become a cultural Marxist and had joined a revolution to destroy Israel. Who knows? But again, there's an emphasis by Matthew, Henry, and others that this is also prophetical and anticipatory. Moses' marriage with the Hamite woman foreshadowing, he says, the future union of Israel with the most remote of the heathen. We could see Psalm 68 as an example. Ethiopia will soon stretch out her hand to God. So we have Moses. Then we have Rahab. We considered her last time. When there was a clear command forbidding outright Israel to marry the Canaanites, Rahab by faith owns Israel's God and is welcomed in. She marries Solomon and is found among the ancestors of Christ. It's a faith issue, not a race issue with Rahab. We find the same thing with Ruth. She leaves her people, she calls Jehovah her God and Israel her people. And when the right of redemption comes up for her dead husband's land, there's a closer kinsman than Boaz, and he refuses his right, in part because it's not just the land, it's the land plus Ruth the Moabite. So he says no. Boaz steps in and is glad to play the part, and he marries Ruth, and she again is found among the ancestors of the Lord Jesus Christ. So what's going on in Ruth is twofold. It's actually redemptive history. These are the ancestors of Christ, and it's also a picture of the gospel in the romance of their redemption, the kinsman redeemer taking the Moabite bride. Well, there are other examples as well. An interesting one is found in 1 Chronicles 2, 1 Chronicles chapter 2 and verse 34 and 35. Now Shishun had no sons, but daughters. And Shishun had a servant, an Egyptian, whose name was Jarha. And Shishun gave his daughter to Jarha, his servant to wife. And she bare him Atai. We've got a genealogy of the various families of the tribes of Judah. A tribe of Judah, when they came up out of the land of Egypt. And here's a man, Shishan, who has an Egyptian slave called Jarha, who likely came out of Egypt with them in the Exodus, and Shishan gives his daughter to the Egyptian slave in marriage. And we come into the New Testament, and as we noted, the prescription of 1 Corinthians 7 verse 39. As the church goes to the nations, We wouldn't really expect this intermarriage principle to start being emphasized, and it's not. But we know from early sources that Jews married Gentiles, and there was no problem with this because the Gentiles had come in to God's covenant. Despite their different ethnic and cultural backgrounds, there was no hindrance to their marriages. So the issue of mixed marriages in scripture is a faith-based and not a race-based matter. And the examples follow the pattern that we would expect in connection with the stated commandments. Where there was no conversion to Jehovah, these marriages are condemned, sometimes disannulled, because they're destructive to Israel. because believers were not to marry unbelievers. Or the covenant people of God were not to marry pagans and infidels. But when the religious issue is addressed, the grounds change for the permission of marriage. That brings us fifthly to compatibility and parental consent. compatibility, and parental consent. With the question of marriage, we must also take up the question of prudence. Paul says in one place, all things are lawful for me, but that does not mean all things are necessarily expedient. And that's a question that should be addressed when we consider interracial marriage. marriage between people from different people groups. Because you're gonna be binding yourself together with this person for life. You're going to want to ask questions that deal with your compatibility because you want to be wise. So where there are large cultural differences, for example, in terms of language, you're gonna sit down and you're going to consider it. Everything that goes with isolation of language and the development of particular cultures and ideas and worldviews and expectations. And the greater the cultural differences, the greater the potential problems. Society kind of works that out, doesn't it? The incidence of people marrying outside their people group is relatively small. So these things should be discussed. But the kines gets his race goggles on and his mind is already made up, especially when it comes to black people. But there are larger cultural differences to be found between people sometimes who look the same. So you take from the American context, and then you think of marrying even to people from other European countries. They don't speak your language, they don't share your history, they don't have your culture, they won't like your food, trust me. You've got all of these things. that come up, but you look similar. Many things come into this question. I know someone who married someone from Eastern Europe. There was a language issue, there was a cultural issue, there was a host of differences in perspective on home life, what a man would do and what a woman would do, how to deal with problems, And the marriage was really, really tough from the outset. They're both white Europeans. The kinnest will emphasize this to support an already preconceived notion that people of different races should remain distinct. And then they will try to make their own conceived wisdom a law. We need to address the issue of compatibility between any two people who are going to get married, near or far. But then we have the issue of parental consent, which in scripture is to be sought and given. Parents are said to give their sons and their daughters, and they clearly have a right given to them by the Lord. It's understandable that parents would seek the good of their children. But it's also to be recognized that when children marry, it's not just this little individualistic thing they go off and do. There's actually a union of two families. That's why, to go back to the laws of affinity, you can't marry those that you are closely connected to by marriage in law, because they are your family. Marriage unites more than two people. So the parent has a right to offer wisdom and to give insight, and he's implicated in the marriage. We have that represented, and you'll see it in a few weeks' time. I'll ask one of our men who gives this woman to this man to be married, and he will say, I do. That's not just a quaint little tradition. That's the application of a biblical principle. He's giving his daughter into the care and authority of another man. Well, Kinnist exploit this too. The preference of the father for his children to marry in the same race is exalted to a moral principle and a law. Then they say, to disobey the father in this regard is a fifth commandment violation, because you're not obeying him. They bring in the daughters of Zelophehad from scripture, who submitted to their father to marry only in their own tribe in Israel. Therefore, godly people should honor their father and do the same. But again, we have to look at the law in context. The law concerning the daughters of Salathahad is connected to the law that was given by God concerning the preservation of lots to tribes in Israel, serving a redemptive purpose unto the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. So that the man who only had daughters, and if they married outside their tribe, then that man from another tribe comes in and takes the possession within his tribe. Well, to preserve it within his tribe. The daughters of Salafihad would marry only within their own tribe. You can't take that and apply it in a one-to-one way with our situation in life today. You conclude too much. Parental consent is spoken of in our Westminster standards in the Directly for Public Worship concerning marriage And it tells us that before we publish the bans of marriage, parents' consent is to be made known to the officers of the church. But then it goes on to say, parents ought not to force their children to marry without their free consent, nor deny their own consent without just cause, without righteous or lawful cause. without just cause, in connection to everything that we've just studied in scripture. I was asked on one occasion, would I support a parent forbidding their child to marry someone from another race? I asked, was the reason purely due to them being from another race because, of course, it's conceivable that I would support the father if he was to point out that this person was a complete infidel and immoral and wicked. Well, of course, of course we're going to support the father. But I said, is it surely down to them being of another race? Are we talking about a black person who's a solid reformed Christian? who's the child of one or two generations of solid reform Christians? And the answer was yes. The issue is race. And even though they're Christians, you'd be marrying all of their sins. I said, no, we would not support the father because he does not have just cause. He does not have just cause. We would walk through it with him and her pastorally, we would try to work things out, but this is a case where his preference is being made a law, binding the conscience of a child where the Lord has left it free. If the father told me, I forbid my daughter to marry that man because he's bald, and I'm afraid that my grandchildren will be bald, or he's got red hair, Am I going to say, you've got to obey your dad? It is a fifth commandment issue. But when you invent laws, it's a fifth commandment issue concerning you. You're provoking your children to wrath. You may have a preference in your own family. You may share that preference with your own children. They may agree with you. Go ahead. That's fine. But understand what it is. It's a preference. Don't invent laws, don't invent sins, and don't bind them on the conscience of others. So to conclude, the Kenneth's view of marriage is directed by its view of racial superiority and segregation. The previous two are wrong, and so is this. It's clearly wrong when you evaluate scripture. All sorts of people can marry. There are natural bonds of consanguinity and affinity. There are covenantal requirements to marry in the Lord and in the church where to see and test compatibility, we're to work at it with wisdom. But there are no racial prescriptions in the Bible. And therefore, we don't slip into racialistic or racially deterministic groupthink. As Christians, we evaluate the character of the person. We evaluate our compatibility. And if we're in the Lord and those things marry up or line up, we're free to marry. We're free to marry. So to close, five messages. When this issue arose in our congregation, we opposed it as an error. I trust that you understand why. It's divisive. It's a doctrine of division in the church. And it casts aspersions, wicked aspersions, upon godly marriages. It's also a distraction. So don't listen to the noise. It's actually counterproductive to this whole professed movement, that people are getting interested in Christian nationalism and seeing real reforms in our society, and then Satan chucks in this insanity. Pulls people in directions the Bible does not lead them. You won't even find them emphasized in Scripture, and where you find them addressed, you find those views contradicted. So I said in the first message that I was reluctant to even speak about it, because to speak about it gives it an attention it doesn't deserve. But it was raised, and so we deal with it, to help you to shelve it. And we pray that the Lord would use the instruction to that end, but that he would also enable us to move on to better and more edifying things. Let us stand for prayer. Our God and our Father, we give thanks for the teaching of your word. Your word is our only rule of faith and practice. It is profitable for all things. that the man of God would be perfect, throughly furnished unto every good work. And so we've seen it this evening. Rudin, ground us in the truth. Help us to walk in a plain path. May our love grow more and more with understanding and all judgment, that we would approve the things which are excellent. We ask in Jesus' name, amen.