I have to admit I am somewhat loath to wade into the social media tidewaters surrounding the work of the Supreme Court this week. Most likely you've not escaped it. If you're a regular Facebook user, undoubtedly your eyes have been caught by the various changes in profile pictures to either support the work of the court, or protest it, as it relates to their deliberation over California's Proposition 8 and the National Defense of Marriage Act.
I must say that I am in agreement with the justice that voiced a question over the appropriateness of the high court ruling on the issue of what constitutes marriage. I have always felt as though it was fairly clearly delineated in both the Old and New Testaments. It is, in any case, the source I intend to use to support my argument that what we now call "traditional" marriage is worth fighting for since it clearly, in terms of relationships, represents a coming full circle. Allow me to explain.
At the outset I must first credit the source from which I'm gleaning this fundamental example. John Piper, in his book "This Momentary Marriage," argues, I believe convincingly, this point; the marriage of a man and a woman is a coming full circle of the creation of man and woman.
In Genesis 2:18ff, God, in his quest to provide for the man a "helper fit for him," creates woman. First, it's crucial that we don't apply a western mind to the definition of "helper." The Hebrew more closely resembles a "counterpart." God, in his eternal wisdom, having observed no perfect counterpart yet in existence, creates woman as the most suited, specifically designed answer to make this union complete, as it was birthed out of a desire to bring completion and unity (as the counter, "alone" in Hebrew is more closely "divided" ) to the man ("it is not good that the man should be alone;" Gen.2:18).
Key in that new creation is God's utilizing the rib, taken from man, in verse 21. There is a commonality in this creation, namely the rib, a part of the man, that does not exist in the animal or plant world. So this obviates that the perfect counterpart would not be found in anything other than that which would possess at least a portion of the man himself. The next verse reads "And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man." (Gen.2:22) Note carefully the man's response to the delivery of this one made from his own body: "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh..." (Gen.2:23)
"At last" he exclaims! What was taken from me has now come back in the form of a perfect and complementary creation!" The problem posed by being alone, that which God said was "not good" is now solved by coming full circle; manifested in the person of the woman; created as the perfect and complementary counterpart having used part of the man. As trite as it has become, she does "complete him!"
If we truly hold to "intelligent" design, believing that God IS that intelligence, can we not trust that how he completed the circle need not be improved on? I heard someone on the radio yesterday say that what is involved in the proposed change in the definition of marriage embodies a type of "evolving." Does that not imply a NEED to change from a deficit to a more complete, more perfect solution? If so, that renders God's original intent, the full circle completion via the creation of woman, as flawed and somehow in need of an evolutionary touch to "clean it up" and improve it. That becomes a slippery slope leading to a less than adequate God, which then calls into question everything, not to mention the efficacy of the salvation he's provided as well through Jesus Christ. I think I'd rather trust and believe that he got it right the first time!
