Well, good morning. If you would
open your Bibles with me to Matthew chapter 19. Matthew chapter 19. Before we begin, let's bow together
in prayer. Our father, which art in heaven,
holy, reverend is your matchless name. Father, we bow before your
throne of grace this morning. humbly, carefully coming into
your presence only in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. And
we come so thankfully, how we thank you for a savior whose
sacrifice atones completely and fully for the sins of his people.
How we thank you for a savior whose obedience makes us righteous
and able to come before your throne calling you our father.
Father, we beg of you this morning that you would give us a time
of true heart worship, that you'd speak to us through your word,
that you would enable me to rightly divide the word of truth, to
preach the gospel and the power of the spirit in compassion for
the hearts of your people. Father, I pray you'd give us
a hearing ear, enable us to hear and believe the things of our
Lord Jesus Christ that we hear from your word this morning and
to leave here rejoicing and resting in him. Father, we pray for our
children's classes that you would bless them in a special way this
morning. Bless our children with a receptive heart. Bless our
teachers that you might enable them to teach the word and point
our children to our Savior. Father, we continue to pray for
those who are hurting, those who are sick and need you especially.
We're thankful for the good report we've had on so many. Father,
pray you'd Be with your people, continue to watch over them,
be with them. We thank you for bringing Ron
back to us. Father, continue to be with him and strengthen
him and heal him, we pray. All these things we ask in that
name which is above every name, the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,
amen. Now the title of our lesson this
morning is Marriage, Divorce, Fornication, and Grace. I believe
that here within about 30 minutes, I can tie all four of those things
together. Let's look first at beginning our text, Matthew 19,
verse one. And it came to pass when Jesus
had finished these sayings, he departed from Galilee and came
into the coast of Judea beyond Jordan, and great multitudes
followed him, and he healed them there. Now this is just interesting. These verses are not just kind
of thrown in here as a space filler. It just really struck
me when I read those verses, how our Lord was always going
about doing good. He was always obeying his father,
honoring his father. He was always about the business
that the father sent him to do, the salvation of God's elect.
He was always obeying the law, always establishing righteousness
for his people. And at the same time, he was
always doing good for the bodies of the people that were around
him. The Lord cares both for the bodies and the souls of his
people. The gospel we have to preach
is a heart matter, it's a spiritual matter. But our Lord does care
for the bodies of his people. And here he was healing them. Everybody who was there needed
healing, he was healing them. And you just think of the benefit
that the Lord Jesus Christ is to the human race. He's the savior
of sinners. He's the friend of sinners, the
help of the helpless. He's the healer of the sick.
And what the Lord did in healing the bodies of people here is
a picture of how he spiritually heals and cleanses the souls
of his people, heals them from every spiritual disease, gives
them eternal life. And here our Lord was doing good,
helping people. And the Pharisees came, we'll
read this here in just a second, the Pharisees come and interrupt
him. Like, you know, I want to, I want to debate with you. I
want to talk to you here. And this debate I want to have
is more important than you helping these poor sick people, you know?
And they came trying to trap the Lord, trying to, to trap
him, thinking they could outsmart him and debate religion with
him. Now they came either, to justify themselves in, in, in
finding permission from the Lord somehow to, to divorce their
wives and do whatever it was that they want to do with their
wives. Or more likely what they cared about was this. They wanted
to trap the Lord and be able to say the Lord cared nothing
about the law of Moses. That's why I think this was the
real reason that they came. But either way, I can tell you
this, they did not come to be taught of the Lord. These folks,
the other folks came to be healed of the Lord. Others followed
him to hear him. They came to be taught of the
Lord. The Pharisees did not come to be taught and how I hope and
pray that the Lord will always deliver us from that attitude
thinking we know it all. We don't need to come and be
taught of the Lord. And I hope that's what the Lord
will enable us to do today, that he might teach us and enable
us to learn more of his grace in this subject of marriage and
divorce. Now, verse three, The Pharisees also came unto him,
tempting him and saying unto him, is it lawful for a man to
put away his wife for every cause? And he answered and said unto
them, have you not read that he which made them at the beginning
made them male and female and said, for this cause, shall man
leave his father and mother and shall cleave to his wife and
they twain shall be one flesh. Wherefore they are no more twain,
but one, one flesh. What therefore God has joined
together let not man put asunder. They say unto him, why did Moses
then command to give a writing of divorcement and to put her
away? And he sayeth unto them, Moses, because of the hardness
of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives. But from
the beginning it was not so. And I say unto you, whosoever
should put away his wife, except it be for fornication and shall
marry another committed adultery and whoso marrieth her, which
is put away. doth commit adultery. Now, marriage is such an important
topic. It's spoken of often in scripture,
such an important topic because marriage is given to us as a
picture of the union between Christ and his bride. The apostle
Paul writes so beautifully about that, In Ephesians chapter five,
we've read it so many times for time's sake, we're not going
to read it right now, but, but you know, those verses, how beautifully
Paul lays out this picture of marriage is he, it's a, he said,
we're speaking here. Yes. Husbands love your wives.
Let yes. Wives be submissive to your husband.
He said, but what we're talking about here is Christ and his
church, this beautiful picture of the union between Christ and
his bride. And that's such a common illustration. Most people in their lives end
up being married. And when we're married, we have
in our everyday lives, in our homes, we live it, a picture
of Christ and his bride, a picture of redemption. And our marriages
would be happier, would be stronger, would be more loving. If we would
remember that in our marriage relationship between husbands
and wives, Our marriages would be better if we'd always remember
this union, this relationship is a picture of Christ and his
bride. Now we'll come back to that picture of Christ in a minute,
but that's the main reason that marriage is so important. It's
given us as a picture of redemption in Christ. But marriage is also
good for us in this life. It's good for people to be married.
I am all for being married. I just, I think it's wonderful.
Marriage is good for us individually, and it's good for our society
as a whole. God made a man and a woman for
each other. He made them to be married for
life. God said it's not good that a man should be alone. It's
good for us to be married. God made a man and a woman to
love one another. He made them to be committed
to one another. He made them to compliment one
another. Men are not like women. Women
are not like men in many ways. He made them to compliment one
another. He made them to bring happiness to each other, to care
for one another. Marriage is good for us individually,
and it's good for the society as a whole. Society and nations
are always better when there are strong families, when there's
strong family ties, when there's strong family values, there's
a strong commitment to the family. Societies are better off when
mom and dad are both in the home, and mom and dad love each other.
raise their children, they teach their children, they take care
of their family. And in segments of the population where that's
not true, there's higher crime, higher poverty, and lower education. There's just no denying it. And
in case you didn't know it, that's bad for society. That's bad for
society. When I was a boy, I think I knew one kid in my
class when I was in third or fourth or fifth grade One, whose
parents was divorced. One. Now, it's higher than 50% or
close to it. Divorce became so popular, just
kept getting more and more and more popular. Tammy Wynette had
a great big number one hit, D-I-V-O-R-C-E. It got so popular, everybody
could identify with it. And the values and the conduct
of society has gone down as the divorce rates go up. Now, I know
that's not the only cause, but there is a direct correlation
there. And that's not God's way. It's just not God's way. God's
way is for marriages to stay together, for children to be
disciplined, spanked, and taught. God's way is for authority to
be respected, and it begins in the home, authority to be respected
and obeyed. God's way is for us as a family. This applies to the family, and
it applies to us as we go out into society, but here's where
you first learn this. You learn this at home. God put
us here not to be so selfish, but to look out for the needs
of others, to take care of others. And children learn to watch out
for others and take care of others. They learn that first in the
home. And our society, I understand, rejects that at every turn. I understand that. And society
as a whole will never learn It's better to do it God's way. I
don't care what you've got to give up. It's better to do it
God's way. If you've got to give up some
of your desires, you say, well, you know, I won't be fulfilled
if I'm taking care of my family instead of going off doing other
things. Well, you better give it up. It's better doing it God's
way. I know society as a whole will
never learn that. But maybe God teaches people
something about that before it's too late. Look back a few pages,
last book in the Old Testament, Malachi chapter two. See, the
society as a whole is never going to learn this. Divorce is so prevalent and I,
I suspect that it will get more and more so, but God still hates
it. I mean, this is not something
that God's ambivalent about. He says he hates it. Look here
at Matthew or Malachi two beginning in 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. The Lord will
cut off the man that doeth this, the master and the scholar, out
of the tabernacles of Jacob, and him that offereth an offering
unto the Lord of hosts. And this ye've done again, covering
the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping, and with crying
out, insomuch that he regardeth not the offering any more, or
receiveth it with goodwill at your hand. And yet ye say, wherefore? Why is all this happening? Why
is the Lord deal with us this way? Because the Lord hath been
witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom
thou hast dealt treacherously. Yet she is thy companion and
the wife of thy covenant, and did not he make them one? Yet had he the residue of the
spirit, And we're for one. Why did God make them one? That
he might seek a godly seed. And what that's talking about
is children, saying this marriage is good for children in the home. Therefore take heed to your spirit.
Let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth for the
Lord, the God of Israel, saith, that he hateth putting away. For one covereth violence with
his garment, saith the Lord of hosts. Therefore take heed to
your spirit that you deal not treacherously. And that separating
he's talking about there is divorce. God hates it. He hates this broken
wedding vows, the covenant vows of marriage. When they're broken,
God hates it. Because remember, this marriage
union is a picture of Christ and his bride, and they'll never
be separated. Christ will never leave his bride. He'll never tell his wife, I
don't love you anymore, because he loves her with an everlasting
And what's more, Christ's bride will never leave him. She'll
never leave him because he'll never give her a reason to want
to leave him. No, his love makes her want to be with him. She
loves depending upon him. She loves resting in him. So
God hates divorce. And he said that, God hates divorce.
So the Pharisees, I mean, this is a fair question. It's something
for us to consider. Since God hates divorce, why
did the Lord give Moses a bill of divorcement in the Old Testament
law? God hates divorce, but yet he provided for it in the law. Why did God do that? Well, God
didn't give a bill of divorcement because there are times God says
this is a good thing. No, he always hates it. God gave
a bill of divorcement for the sinfulness and hardness and deadness
of man's heart. That's why he did it. God gave
a bill of divorcement. I read this this week and I thought
and thought and thought about it and I think this is a true
statement. God gave a bill of divorcement to stop the abuse
and murder of women. That's why he did it. And divorce
was as bad in the day of our Lord ministry as it is in our
day today. The Pharisees in verse three,
they said they wanted a man to be able to put away his wife
for every cause, just for whatever cause, you know, he, for whatever
reason he wanted, he just should be able to divorce his wife.
The Pharisees are asking, Lord, don't you think that's so? It
was so common. This thing of divorce was so
common, even the disciples thought, you can't have a marriage that's
going to last. I mean, you just plan on getting a divorce, and
if you don't want to get a divorce, I'll tell you what, the disciples
said this, the best thing to do is just don't ever get married.
Because if you get married, surely it's going to end in divorce.
Verse 10, that's what they say. His disciples saying to him,
if the case of the man be so with his wife that he can't put
her away for any reason, well then it's not good to marry.
That's what they thought. And they thought that because
the society in which they live, marriages just dissolve so frequently. And our Lord says divorces should
never happen. Marriages should always be strong
and loving. Look, he says in verse five,
for this cause shall a man leave his father and mother and shall
cleave to his wife. And those two shall be one flesh. Wherefore, there are no more
twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined
together, let not man put asunder. God's joined them together, let
them stay together. Let them work on this to have
a loving, happy marriage. Marriages should not end in divorce. I mean, most people today just
get married just figuring, well, you know, this can be temporary
if I ever want it to be. Marriages shouldn't end in divorce.
And this is also true. People shouldn't be stuck in
bad marriages. They should not be stuck in bad marriages because
husbands and wives ought to love one another. They ought to love
one another. They ought to be committed to
one another. This is the thing I think people
just do not understand. There's honor in this thing of
commitment. Be committed to your spouse.
Be committed to make them happy. Be committed to making them want
to stay with you. That relationship ought to be
so good nobody ever even wants to get a divorce. That's on us. That's my responsibility as a
husband to Janet. That's my responsibility. Now
the Lord does say that there are cases where divorce and remarriage
is permitted in the cases of fornication and adultery. That's
what he says in verse nine. And I say unto you, whosoever
shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall
marry another, committeth adultery, and whoso marrieth her which
is put away doth commit adultery. Now in cases of fornication,
adultery, marriage is permitted. And if you look over 1 Corinthians
chapter seven, the Apostle Paul adds in here, in cases of desertion
and abandonment, look at 1 Corinthians seven. Verse 10. And under the married I command,
yet not I but the Lord, let not the wife depart from her husband.
But, and if she depart, let her remain unmarried, or be reconciled
to her husband, and let not the husband put away his wife. But
to the rest speak I, not the Lord. If any brother hath a wife
that believeth not, and she be pleased to dwell with him, let
him not put her away. And the woman which hath a husband
that believeth not, and if he be pleased to dwell with her,
Let her not leave him for the unbelieving husband sanctified
by the wife and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband.
Else were your children unclean, but now are they holy? And if
the unbelieving depart, let him depart. A brother or sister is
not under bondage in such cases, but God has called us to peace.
So in this case of abandonment of one depart, then you let him
depart and you're free to remarry. Now in these cases, fornication,
adultery, abandonment, divorce is permitted. Divorce and remarriage
is permitted. But listen, it's not required. It's not required. This book, thankfully, has a lot to say
about forgiveness, doesn't it? It's got a lot to say about mercy
and grace and reconciliation. And it could be best. It could
be best that a couple reconcile. I mean, what a horrible, horrible,
horrible, heartbreaking problem. But if it can be gotten over,
if there can be forgiveness and reconciliation, that's probably
best because marriage is still good for us. Marriage is still
a picture of Christ. All right. And in a nutshell,
that's what scripture teaches about marriage. in divorce. I
want you to please, please, please see this, this, this law, this,
the, if you will, I don't know if you can call it a law or rule,
whatever the Lord lays out here regarding divorce and marriage.
This law is not given. Please get this. This is not
given. So those of us who have never
been divorced can feel haughty and high minded and superior
and judgmental about to those who are divorced, who have been
divorced. Let that sink in for just a second.
I can't stress this strongly enough. God never gave a law
anywhere in this book that was given for this purpose, to make
me feel good about myself, to make me feel superior to somebody
else. That's self-righteousness. God
didn't give a law that would enable us to feel self-righteous
and judgmental over somebody else. God gave the law so we'd
feel bad about ourselves. So we'd feel so bad about ourselves,
we'd be hopeless about ourselves, that we look to Christ. That's
the reason for every law. If you want to call this a law,
this rule regarding marriage, it's the exact same thing. If
you've never been divorced, hearing, you husbands, You love your wives
as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it. I don't
care if you've not been divorced, you ain't lived up to that. That
makes us have to look to Christ, doesn't it? Our bridegroom, doesn't
it? And I know that folks are divorced
and these things happen. All I can tell you is that's
in the past. That's in the past. If you're
divorced and you're remarried, that's in the past. Press to
the future. Take care of your marriage now.
See, if we take what the Lord has given us here and use it
to look down our noses at people. I've been in congregations like
this that, remember we used to have men come up and they'd take
the plate and they'd pass the plate, the offering plate. You
hand out the Lord's table. And wait a minute, oh, this fella,
he can't do that. He was divorced once and he can't
do that. All that's doing is just being
judgmental. How long are you going to make the fellow pay
the price for that? All that is being judgmental. If we take
what the Lord's telling us here regarding marriage and divorce,
and we use it to look down our noses at people, to hold their
feet to the fire, we've missed the meaning of the text altogether.
Surely everybody here knows that, don't you? We've missed the meaning
of the text altogether. If we read any passage of God's
Word, and it makes us self-righteous, instead of being broken at defeat
of Christ, begging his mercy, being thankful for his mercy
and grace to us, and I promise you, we've missed the meaning
of the text. Now, so far, I've showed you
the law, the rule, whatever you want to call it, regarding marriage
and divorce. And what I've said is true, right to you from God's
word. But so far, I haven't preached yet. I taught you something,
I ain't preached yet. I haven't preached Christ yet.
I haven't preached salvation in Christ yet. I'm fixing to,
but haven't yet. And that's what I'm supposed
to do from every text. Now let me tell you about God's grace.
Let me tell you about his mercy. Let me tell you about his love.
Let me tell you about salvation in Christ. So you had to say
everything I said here all so far about marriage and divorce
to get to this place where I can show you Christ, where I can
show you Christ our bridegroom. And seeing this picture of him,
that's going to draw the hearts of God's people to Christ. It's
going to make us, bowing his feet, it's going to make us love
him and need him all the more. At the same time, what gives
us that spiritual benefit is going to give us another benefit.
Oh, if we see him, it's going to make husbands want to be better
husbands and wives want to be better wives. That's true. Let
me tell you, let me preach the gospel to you from this now.
Salvation began in eternity past. The father, he elected a people
unto salvation. He chose a people out of the
fallen lump of Adam's race. He chose those people and he
gave them to his son. He gave them to his son to redeem.
And the son promised his father, Father, I'll redeem them. I'll
go. I'll come and redeem them. And when God elected those people
and gave them to his son, basically what he did is have an arranged
marriage for his son. He chose a bride for his son.
And the father didn't choose that bride because she's beautiful.
No, she's ugly. He didn't choose her because
she's a beautiful virgin. No, she's a harlot. She's a harlot.
But the father still chose her. A sinful people, a wife of whoredoms,
he chose the worst of the worst to be the bride for his son.
The father chose those people because he set his love upon
them. And the son loved him too. This is his bride. He loves her. He takes full responsibility
for her and was glad to do it. But the bride, the one chosen
to be the wife of the prince, to be the wife of the king, you
think of that. You know what she did? She abandoned
the son. She ran away from him and Adam,
and she ran away as far from him as she could. And as she
was running, the bride, this one chosen, now chosen to be
the bride of the king, she committed spiritual adultery. She abandoned
him, she committed spiritual adultery. against the sun. Seeking
out pleasure in free will works self-righteous religion. Now,
there's a lot of different headings for religion in the world, but
that's all it is. All of it, no matter what heading
you put it under, is free will, man-exalting, Christ-debasing
religion. That's all it is. That's what
the flesh wants. That's what the flesh goes after.
The bride of Christ did the same thing by nature. It's spiritual
adultery. That's what exactly what it is.
Now, in that case, according to what we just looked at, divorce,
eternal separation will be permitted under the law, wouldn't it? In
this case, spiritually, Christ our King, that means damnation. God would be just in sending
those people to hell. That's what their sin deserves.
God would be just in doing it. He'd be just in having eternal
separation from them. But what about God's grace? What
about his character of mercy? What about God's love for his
people? The father's love for his people. What about the son,
his love? The bridegroom, what about his
love for the bride? What about that? What about forgiveness? What about God's character of
forgiveness? What are we gonna do about that? Well, you know
what the Lord Jesus Christ did as the bride, bridegroom for
his bride. He set about to redeem that bride. He set about to go get her and
bring her back to God. He became a man. How he humbled
himself. The son of God humbled himself
to become a man. Flesh and blood just like ours.
You know why he did that? So he could be bone of her bone
and flesh of her flesh. So he could come and be her representative.
He came and became a man so that he could have a body that would
be sacrificed paid the sin debt of his bride. He didn't come
reach in his wallet and say, all right, how much does she
owe? Silver and gold wouldn't pay the redemption price. No,
he came and he gave himself. He sacrificed everything that
he is. He paid the debt with his own
precious blood as he died in agony, suffering the penalty
of her sin that became his. It was his sin. And he suffered
and died to put her sin away. Oh, that's glorious, isn't it?
And think who he did that for. He loved a wife that had gone
after many different men, after many different religions. He
provided for her anyway. She ran away from him. She thought
she was away from him. But you know what? He's everywhere.
He's God over all. And while she ran away from him,
she was living in utter rebellion against him. You know what he
did? He provided for her. He didn't let her starve to death.
He provided for her. He didn't let her die out there
in rebellion. No. He protected her. He kept her
alive. He kept her safe until the time he'd come and bring
her back to himself. You know why he did that? Commitment. He's committed to her. He loves
her. He loves that bride. He came
and redeemed her. He paid the price and bought
her back to himself. because of his great love for
her. And he revealed himself to her.
He showed her how he loved her. He said, oh, here's how I loved
you. I gave myself as a propitiation
for your sin. And it broke her heart. It broke
her heart. And oh, she loves him. She loves him so much. In response
to his love for her, she loves him so much, she'd never leave
him. She lives thankful, thankful for his grace and for his mercy.
Look back at Jeremiah chapter three, Jeremiah chapter three.
We're going to look in a few moments at the book of Hosea.
You know, God gave us a whole book in the, in the Old Testament,
the book of Hosea to give us that picture of Christ going
to redeem his bride who committed such spiritual adultery and fornication
against him. But look first here, Jeremiah
chapter three, verse one, If a man put away his wife, and
she go from him and become another man's, shall he return unto her
again? Shall not that land be greatly
polluted? But thou hast played the harlot with many lovers.
Yet return again to me, saith the Lord. A man wouldn't love
you this way. God says, I do. I love my people
this way. Now you've gone off, you've committed
these spiritual whoredoms, you've played the spiritual harlot,
you've become polluted in your sin, but you come back to me. You come back to me. Now look
at the book of Hosea, right after the book of Daniel, the book
of Hosea, chapter two. Now you know the story here of
Hosea. The Lord told his prophet, go
down there and take a wife of the children of whoredoms, and
that's what he did. He went down there and found
Gomer, He married her, but she's from this society. She's the
children of Hortum. That's just what their whole
society did, and she played the harlot. Surprise, surprise, you
know, she played the harlot. She did that because that's her
nature. It's her nature. And when she did that, she embarrassed
Jose. She broke his heart. She did
that, but Jose wouldn't let her go. Look here at verse two, or
chapter two, verse five, excuse me, chapter two, verse five.
For their mother hath played the harlot. She that conceived
them hath done shamefully. For she said, I'll go after my
lovers that gave me my bread and my water, my wool and my
flax, mine oil and my drink. Therefore behold, I'll hedge
up thy way with thorns and make a wall that she shall not find
her pass. Oh, she'll follow after her lovers, but shall not overtake
them. She'll seek them, but she shall
not find them. Then shall she say, I'll go and return to my
first husband, for then was it better for me than now, for she
did not know that I was the one giving her corn and wine and
oil, multiply her silver and gold, which they prepared for
bail. Therefore, while I return and take away my corn and the
time thereof, and my wine and the season thereof, and will
recover my wool and my flax given to cover her nakedness. Now,
while I discover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and
none shall deliver her out of mine hand. I will also cause
all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her
Sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts, and I will destroy her
vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath said, these are my rewards
that my lovers have given me, and I will make them a forest,
and the beasts of the field shall eat them, and I will visit upon
her the days of Balaam, wherein she burned incense to them. She
decked herself with earrings and jewels, and she went after
her lovers and forgot me, saith the Lord. Therefore, behold,
I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness and speak
comfortably to her. And I'll give her vineyards from
thence and the valley of Acre for a door of hope. And she shall
sing there as in the days of her youth, as in the day when
she came up out of the land of Egypt. And it should be at that
day, saith the Lord, that thou shalt call me Ishi, my husband,
and thou shalt no more call me Belial. Now here's what the Lord
did. This is the picture. Hosea did
this, but this is the picture. The father chose a bride for
his people, and they left him. They went out and played the
harlot. He provided for her anyway, but then there came a time, and
she thought, oh, she's getting all this because of her rewards
for her false religion, you know. She didn't know it was the Lord
protecting her all along. She didn't know it was the Lord providing
for her all along. And then came the day, he's gonna
show her her need of him, and he took it all back. He left
her naked and destitute. She couldn't pay her bills. She
could be put on the auction block. Sold off to the highest bidder,
and ain't nobody bidding very much. She's worthless. She's
just an old, used-up harlot. Now look at chapter three. When
the Lord brought her to that low point, Then said the Lord
unto me, go yet, loved a woman, beloved of her friend, yet an
adulteress. Hosea, you love her according to the love of the
Lord for the children of Israel, who look to other gods and love
wagons of wine. So I bought her to me for 15
pieces of silver and an omer of barley, and a half omer of
barley. That's the price of a slave.
She's worthless. I bought her to me. I paid the
full price. It's the price of the slave, but I paid the full
price. There she was on the auction block. Anybody could have bought
her. Anybody could have done anything they wanted with her. He went
and bought her. He went and bought her. And I
said unto her, thou shalt abide for me many days. Thou shalt
not play the harlot, and thou shalt not be for another man,
and I will also be for thee. Now you see the picture of Christ
there, don't you? Oh, his bride, she's worthless.
She's worthless. She's got a huge price on her
head. And he came, and he bought her. He redeemed her with his
own precious blood. And he gathered her up in his
arms. He said, now you're coming home with me. You call me your
husband, because that's what I am. You call me your savior,
because that's what I am. You'll not be for another religion
anymore. You'll not be looking for other
gods anymore. I'll be your god. You'll be with me forever. Does that break your heart? Does
that make you love the Lord? It does if you know Him. And
at the same time, you know what that'll do? It'll make you want
to go home this afternoon and be a better spouse. All right. Hope the Lord blessed that to
you.