You And Me Forever: Marriage In Light Of EternityНамуна

"No Marriage Lasts Forever"

Jesus taught that marriage is temporary. Seriously. 

Though He taught against divorce and clearly expected marriage to last throughout a person’s lifetime, in one situation Jesus clarified that marriage isn’t forever.

Jesus explained this to the Sadducees, who thought they could stump Jesus with a complex hypothetical situation: A woman’s husband dies, so she marries his brother. Then he dies, so she marries the next brother. This continues until finally she finds herself married to the seventh brother. So, they ask Jesus, which brother will she be married to in the resurrection? 

The Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection of the dead, and they were confident that this puzzle would force Jesus to acknowledge the absurdity of believing in an afterlife.

But Jesus escaped their supposed dilemma with ease because He was the only person on earth who knew what happens to marriages after death. He said: “In the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven” (Matt. 22:29–30). What the Sadducees saw as a fundamental flaw in the logic of the resurrection, Jesus sidestepped by pointing out that we will not be married in the afterlife. 

Marriage is temporary. Enjoy it while you can.

That might sound disturbing, but we have to trust God’s wisdom here. Whatever we will experience in the new heavens and new earth, it is guaranteed to be more amazing, more rich, than what we experience now. “Love never ends” (1 Cor. 13:8), but marriage is for this life only.

Marriage is lifelong, but eternity is much longer than that. So if you put all of our hopes and invest all of your resources into our marriages, then you are not investing in eternity.

Discuss with your spouse: If marriage doesn’t extend into eternity, is it possible that you are overvaluing your marriage? How so?