"Marry in the Lord"
What does it means to "marry in the Lord"?(1Corinthians 7:39b)
JCL, USA
- A. This question raises a most important principle found throughout this epistle: the rights of Christ, that is, His Lordship. His title as Lord is used at least 67 times (in combination or alone) in 1st Corinthians. While the immediate context of the verse is to a widow who desires to marry again, clearly the bearing of the chapter has to do with the marriage relationship, and the authority of the Lord. The question has been asked, "Does in the Lord mean marry none but a Christian," and the answer is an emphatic YES! But the matter goes far deeper. Now it is clear that the marriage relationship unites a man and a woman into one flesh. It follows that one flesh cannot have two minds-there cannot be a joining together of light with darkness. Speaking of believers the apostle says: "Ye were sometime darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord, walk as children of light" (Ephesians 5:8). Again, "Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?" (2 Corinthians 6:14).
To "marry in the Lord" then is for the Christian man and woman to be set to seek His will and so subject to Him, to have the same mind as to the truths made know in the Word of God (both doctrinal and ecclesiastical), and thus to bring the Lord Jesus into the most intimate circumstances of our life.
JAP
