Other preachers do. I don't have a problem with that, whatever. I don't care. But that's my hard, fast rule. I don't marry, divorce, remarriage situations. Other preachers do. I don't care. That's just my hard, fast rule for me. But I do a lot of marriage counseling, premarital counseling. So if you come to me and say, Brother Andy, I want you to marry my wife and I to be, I want you to marry us. Can you fit us into some counseling? I'm gonna say, do you have two months? And they'll say, no, I don't have but two weeks. Well, I can't marry you. You're going to spend eight weeks with me. All right? Eight weeks. In the eight weeks, here's what we're going to cover. Number one is the expectations week. In other words, you're going to come in, you're going to sit down with me, and I'm going to give you a steno pad, and you're going to write down everything that you think is expected of you during the marriage. And generally speaking, the ladies list is always longer. than the man's list. The man's real simple most of the time. This list is going to run for eight weeks. So secondarily you're going to go to the next page and you're going to write down everything you think is expected of yourself. Everything that you expect of your mate, everything you expect of yourself. It's a running list. A lot of eye opening. Then you're going to turn to each other and you're going to read this list to each other. That way everybody knows. And I've enjoyed sitting there listening to some of that. It's pretty interesting, interesting stuff. All right, so then week two, week two, it's personality profile. So I'm going to give you a 40 question personality profile test, and we're going to determine which mix of personalities that you are. There's different tests, some are the orange, green, blue test, others are the ABC test. We use the words from psychology that define the personality, the cleric, the sanguine, the phlegmatic, and whatever the other one is, melancholy. So you're gonna generally be a mixture of two of those. Here's what I'm looking for. I'm looking to see whether your personalities mesh. Oftentimes, I have found that people come into our marriage counseling and their personalities are opposite. And that lets me know what I need to deal with during counseling and how to deal with them on the basis of their personalities because they're going to be behind the eight ball from the start, see? So I got to know. All right. So week three through eight, we go verse by verse through the book of Song of Solomon. The book of Song of Solomon is not an allegory about Christ. Now you can make an allegory about Christ if you'd like to, but that's not what the book's for. The book is about a man and a woman and their relationship with each other. And if a man and a woman would read that book, the book of Solomon, and they would look at it practically, it would teach you how to talk to each other, it would teach you how to flirt with each other, It would teach you how to go on trips together. It would teach you about personal hygiene. It would teach you about a lot of things. And see, what a lot of people do not know, that a lot do not know, is that personal hygiene was extremely important in relationships. God created the chemical makeup of the body to secrete pheromones on the basis of smell. Those pheromones create memories of fondness with inside of a person that emotionally will marry them to the person that created that memory through smell. And so it's very important that God put all this stuff together in a fantastic way. And we just, you know, we don't care about all that mess. And that's why you've lived the way you've lived for the last 52 years, right? So it's important that we understand God has worked in a multiplicity of ways to help us. All right, so looking in Genesis 1, let's just identify a handful of things and let me get out of your way, okay? So when it comes to marriage, what do I know about this business of marriage? First of all, look in verse 26. God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them. So he is creating marriage himself. So this business of marriage is a divine design, okay? God instituted this. This was not something that man came up with just for the preservation of mankind. This is something God put together. Now God intended marriage to be pleasant. He did not intend for it to be a misery. So he created it, it's his design. So if I'm going to, if I am going to operate a piece of equipment or fly a plane, and I've never done this before, I can't come and just get in the cockpit of a helicopter or an airplane and say, well, I know how to drive a car, I'm just gonna do it the way I drive a car. I'm gonna have a real problem, right? I've got to do this according to the plan and the pattern of the laws that put it together. Now, isn't it amazing that if I'm going to be a plumber, I live in the state of South Carolina. If I'm going to be a plumber in the state of South Carolina, I've got to take a test. I've got to study. I've got to apprentice. I've got to take a test. And I've got to do continuing education. And I've got to receive a license from the state to be in that business. If I am an electrician, same thing. I've got to apprentice, be a journeyman, I've got to take a test, I've got to be licensed, and I've got to do continuing education. If I am a law enforcement officer, I'm going to have to take training, I'm going to have to take a test, I'm going to have to do continuing education, right? The marriage license is the only license that a state hands out that it requires no education and no continuing education. And yet it is probably the most important license you will ever acquire. It's a divine design from God, so we got to operate it according to His rules. Number two, notice that marriage is not only a divine design, but it is a, or a divine decision, it is a divine design. Now something about God in verse 26, he said what we're doing in this marriage is we're making this marriage like us. The us was God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost, right? He said we're making this marriage like us. So marriage is supposed to reflect who God is. So is God sovereign? Now the word sovereign just means ruling, in control. It means being in charge. It means being overall. Should that not be the most important factor in our life outside of our relationship with God if we're married? The marriage. Not my ball team. Not my hobby. Not my bass boat. Not my tree stand. Not my car. Not my ATV. The most important sovereign issue in my life outside of God is my marriage. Right? Number two. So God's sovereign, let me ask you this question, is God stable? Yeah, He's stable alright. He's unmovable. He's not going to diminish in any way. He's not going to fade in any way. God is stable. So the Bible said this in Ecclesiastes 3, 14 maybe. He said, Whatsoever God doeth, it shall be forever. Nothing can be added to it, nothing can be taken away from it. He does it that men would fear before him. So if God establishes something, His intent is for it to be stable and to last. God did not intend for marriage to be trial and error. The intent for marriage was for it to be forever. forever and ever and ever. There's no doubt some people that are sitting here, no doubt. It's in every place we go. It's just a part of the culture and society that we're in that there are people who have had failed marriages and they've tried it over again and some have failed again and some have tried it again and have succeeded the second go around. And I understand that. I get that. But the intent of God was for it to be stable from its start. Never ever to wobble. Number three. Marriage is intended to be sexual in its design, sovereign in its design, stable in its design, sexual in its design. For He said that there is a male and female in verse 27. There is a difference between the two. So why did God make a difference in the genders? Why did He? There's not a innumerable amount of genders. There's two. A man and a woman, a male and a female. They're different. They're emotionally different. They're anatomically different. They're different in every capacity. They're different in every way. God intended for it to be that way. And the difference is sexual in design. God intended this sexual design in marriage to be threefold. Number one, its intent was identity. God intended for me to be identified as a man and for my wife to be identified as a woman. There's difference between the two. And one of the problems is, and I do believe that this is one of the issues that's plaguing our homes, it is the masculinity of the lady because of the feminization of the man. Now sometimes it's not her fault. Sometimes she has to step up and be the man because the man has been so feminized that he will not stand up and take his responsibilities. Do you know what a woman really wants? She wants for a man, the man she's with, to take his masculine responsibilities not as an ogre or as an overlord, but as a watch-carrying warrior over the home and family. Our wives want to feel safe. Does your wife feel safe with you when you're in public? Does she feel safe with you? Does she feel safe with you when something goes wrong at home and something needs to be done about it? Sometimes it's our wives' responsibility to take care of all that because we've lost our manhood in regard to some of these things. So that's important. Number two, it's not only important for identity, it's important for intimacy. The intent of God with human intimacy was not procreation alone. I want us to understand that. The intent for God for intimacy was not procreation alone. I've known Baptist preachers who said that that was the entire purpose of intimacy was procreation, and you've got to be crippled in your cranium to believe that. If that was God's fullest intent regarding intimacy, there would have been no pleasure attached to it whatsoever and it would have been just like breathing or blinking your eyes. The intent of God in intimacy was the same mindset God made when it came to our food. Food is a necessity, but the intent of God when He created it was for that desire for food to bring pleasure, not just the fact that we ate it, but it brings us some element of pleasure. And for some of us, we're pleasured a lot. So, the same philosophy God brought to us in regard to human intimacy. His intent was not just procreation, which was a part of it, but his intent was for it to be a desirable pleasure for a husband and a wife. Now, let me make this statement, and I know that we have some young people here and some that aren't married, and so I'm very careful in the way that I phrase things, and I do this as benignly as I possibly can, but here's what I want us to understand. There is a lot of issues in marriage with this part of marriage, a lot. Now there are various reasons why there are issues with this. Various reasons why there are issues. And we don't have the time to get into all of them in this evening's hour. But let me make this statement. Any immorality outside the bonds of marriage is sin. It's sin. There is no justification for anything outside the bonds of marriage. No justification. Fornication is a word that is an all-encompassing word. It's not dealing with just two unmarried people. It's dealing with every sexual perversion. It's the word that covers it all, okay? And so there is no justification for fornication, period. None. And the individual who does so will answer for their infraction to God. Bottom line. However, when you study the book of 1 Corinthians 7, the Bible is very clear that the husband is to render to the wife due benevolence, speaking of intimacy, and the wife is to render to the husband due benevolence, and the only time that due benevolence is to be refused is for a time for you to go fast and pray over something spiritual. And then the Apostle Paul said, and he had never even been married, but he understood this. He said, you need to come back together quickly lest you be tempted for your incontinency. So there are, and I deal with this in counseling often, an individual who has lacked intimacy in their marriage because a husband or a wife will not render due benevolence, and as a result of that, they feel forced outside of their marriage vows to satisfy desires and needs that they have, and that is wrong. and they will answer to God for that. But let me make this statement and I don't want it to be twisted. The individual who does not render due benevolence and forces their mate to head into sin will stand before God at the same judgment and will give an account to God and receive the same kind of judgment on their life for disobedience in that area. So marriage is a sovereign design, a stable design, a sexual design. It's a satisfactory design. The intent of God for marriage is that it be very good. Marriage is a symbolic design. God is symbolic in, I don't know, maybe six ways. He's eternal, therefore we ought to view marriage that way. God is equal. God the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are not a hierarchy. They are equal. And therefore, in marriage, my wife and I are equals in this. We are partners together of the grace of God. Then, God is full of energy. He is constantly going, he's constantly moving, he is constantly doing. One of the things that I've seen in marriage, and I'm not a young guy, by no stretch of the imagination am I young, but I'm not as old as some, but I'm at that place and point in life where everything hurts and things hurt that I didn't even know I had. You understand what I'm talking about. Some of you do, some of you will. The very point I'm trying to get to is this, a home oftentimes, is lethargic and there's no energy whatsoever. They don't do anything. They don't accomplish anything. They have no goals. They have no aspirations. They have no dreams. They have no plans. They are simply coexisting under the same roof, paying the same electric bill, and they're going to live that way and die. And what a shame. If I am to be representing God, He is constantly moving, constantly operating, constantly... He's got a plan. God has a plan. He's working His plan. He's accomplishing His plan. So why don't we, as husbands and wives, have a plan that we're working together? It might be a financial plan. It might be a plan to visit another culture. It might be a plan to go on a mission trip. It might be a plan to spend time together in the Holy Land. It might be a plan to go hike the Appalachian Trail together. Why aren't we working some plan? Why are we just simply breathing the same stale air and the same four walls with no desire to do anything different? Some people, the only thing they have in common is the latest sitcom they're watching on TV, and that's all they have. He's equal. He's energy. He's energetic. He has endeavors. He has things he's doing. He's exact in every way. Now, I want us to see this, and I'm done. Okay? Look at verse 26 again. He said, Here's how I intend for this home to be. He said, My intent is for them to have dominion. over the fish of the sea, fowl of the air, cattle, creeping thing, all of that stuff. And then again, he makes this statement in verse number 28. He said, my intent is for them to be fruitful, multiply, replenish, and subdue and have dominion. Here's what he's saying. I'm going to put you guys together. And I want you to live a life that's under control. I don't want life to run you. I want you to run life. I don't want you to feel like a hamster in a wheel. I want you to be in charge and in control. So, have you ever seen homes that are out of control? Can I be honest? I don't want to be mean, but I do want to be honest. Let me spend maybe an hour with your kids and I'll tell you whether or not you have a home under control or not. Let me spend that same time with your kids while they're in your presence. And I can tell a lot. I can tell an awful lot. I can tell who's in charge of your home. By the way your children act, I can tell who's running the show. I wouldn't, I mean I wouldn't put up with a lot, you know. But there are a lot of people who have no control in their home, no self-control in their appetites, no self-control in the way that they keep house, none of that. God never intended for that to be. The intent of God is for your home to be under control. And if it is, you'll be happy and you'll be satisfied. You'll be contented and you can enjoy one another and it will be a blessing. Amen. Thank you for listening.