Marriage and the 7th Commandment

In the previous post in this series going through the ten commandments, we began to look at the 7th commandment, which simply says, “You shall not commit adultery.” (Exodus 20:14, ESV)

We saw last time from the Sermon on the Mount (found in Matthew chapters 5 through 7), that Jesus taught that this commandment forbids not only the outward act of adultery, but even the inward disposition of lust in the heart as well. To look at another person with lust in your heart is to commit adultery in your heart (Matthew 5:28).

But God’s commandment against adultery also shows us something about the importance and sanctity of marriage, something which by any objective standard has fallen on hard times in our day.

Despite what you may have heard, God is not ant-sex. The Bible is not anti-sex. Christianity is not anti-sex. But sex is intended solely for within the confines of marriage, between a husband and a wife alone.

God instituted marriage all the way back in the garden of Eden in Genesis chapter 2. There in paradise, before the Fall of mankind into sin when Adam ate the forbidden fruit (Genesis 3), God saw that everything that He had made was good . . .except one thing.

Man was alone.

In Genesis 2:18 God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” (ESV) And so who was this “helper” suitable for Adam that God made? It was Eve, his wife. In Genesis 2:24 we read of God instituting the creation ordinance of marriage, saying, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” (ESV)

That is God’s purpose and design for marriage. And the 7^th commandment is given in order to safeguard it.

Why does God take marriage so seriously? Any number of things could be said in answer to that question. One could point to the many societal ills and the damage that is done by sexual immorality and divorce. The breakdown of the family has taken a truly staggering toll on our society.

But there is also another answer to that question that you might not have considered: Marriage is a picture of the gospel of Christ!

In Ephesians 5:21-33 the Apostle Paul has a lot to say about God’s design for marriage. (Space will not permit me to go into detail at this time.) And he bases everything that he has to say about marriage on Genesis chapter 2 (i.e. God’s original instituting of marriage).

But in v.32 he says something remarkable – he sums up everything that he says about husbands and wives by saying, “This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.” (ESV, italics added)

In his commentary on the book of Ephesians, James Boice writes,

“When God created marriage it was not simply that God considered marriage to be a good idea, though it certainly is that, or even because God thought it would be a good way to have and rear children. God created marriage to illustrate the relationship between Christ and the church.” (p.180)

Simply put, marriage between a husband and wife is a picture of the relationship between the Lord Jesus Christ and His church (i.e. His redeemed people). No wonder God takes marriage (and the sin of adultery which violates it) so seriously! And no wonder we should do so as well!

Adultery and the Seventh Commandment

In our series of brief studies going through the ten commandments we now come to the seventh commandment, which says,

“Thou shalt not commit adultery.” (Exodus 20:14, KJV)

This commandment (like the rest of the ten commandments) is what I like to call an “umbrella category.” What I mean by that term is that this commandment represents a particular category of sins or transgressions, and so there are many different ways that a person can break it.

The seventh commandment, simply put, forbids sexual immorality of all kinds.

In the sermon on the mount (Matthew chapters 5-7) the Lord Jesus put it this way:

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Matthew 5:27–28, ESV)

Here Jesus teaches us the proper understanding of the seventh commandment. And in doing so He makes it clear that this commandment forbids not just sinful actions, but also sinful thoughts and desires as well! A person can be outwardly chaste, and yet inwardly still be guilty of adultery. And so it is not just sexually immoral actions that are to be avoided and repented of, but also sexually immoral words and thoughts as well.

This commandment against sexual immorality is worded in terms of the particular form of sexual sin that in some ways is the most heinous and serious version of it – adultery.

What makes adultery so serious a sin before God? Adultery, properly-speaking, is not just sexual immorality (as serious as that is), but is also theft (and so a transgression of the 8^th commandment as well). Thomas Watson writes,

“It [adultery] is a thievish sin. It is the highest form of theft. The adulterer steals from his neighbor that which is more than his goods and estate; he steals away his wife from him, who is flesh of his flesh.” (The Ten Commandments, p.155)

It is also a violation of the marriage covenant, and so the breaking of one’s vows, and bearing false witness before God and man (and so also a violation of the 9^th commandment). Clearly there is a great deal of overlap between the commandments, and in breaking one of them, we often tend to break others as well.

I’m tempted to say that this commandment is the most-neglected and most commonly broken of all of the ten commandments in our day, even among professing believers in Christ. (In all likelihood that dubious distinction probably belongs to either the 2^nd or 4^th commandments.)

Whatever the case, the seventh commandment is disregarded, redefined, and transgressed among many professing Christians to such a degree that there no longer seems to be much of a difference or distinction between the church and the unbelieving world around her.

This simply should not be so.

In 1 Thessalonians 4:3 Paul told the believers in Thessalonica, “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality.” He said that, not because sexual morality is the end-all, be-all of the Christian life, but because in a debauched culture, abstaining from sexual immorality is one of the primary distinguishing marks that set believers apart from the world around us.

That is as true in our day as it has ever been. Abstaining from sexual immorality is still very much the will of God for His redeemed people, and it is still our “sanctification,” something that sets us apart from the world.

May the Lord grant revival and repentance to many, starting with those of us who profess to know Christ, so that we might follow the will of God in these things. And may He grant repentance, faith, and forgiveness to many who have committed sexual immorality, that they might know peace with God, and begin to follow His will in these things.