As is our usual habit on Saturday nights, we will simply present passages
on a topic, with little commentary-preferring to let God's word speak for
itself. Since we just celebrated Valentine's Day, tonight we will read passages
that reflect what God's ideal is for us, in relationships between men and
women. Of course, most of this applies to all our relationships, as well.
All verses are from the New American Standard Bible
1 Corinthians 13:4-7 Love is patient, love is kind and
is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act
unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into
account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices
with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things,
endures all things.
1 Timothy 5:2 {Speak to} the older women as mothers, and
the younger women as sisters, in all purity.
Ephesians 5:4 And there must be no filthiness and silly
talk, or coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of
thanks.
Genesis 2:24 For this reason a man shall leave his father
and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one
flesh.
Ephesians 5:25-29 Wives, be subject to your own husbands,
as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ
also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body.
But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to
their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ
also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify
her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might
present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle
or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. So husbands
ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his
own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes
and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church.
Matthew 5:32 (Jesus said) But I say to you that anyone
who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, causes her to
commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
1 Corinthians 7 But to the married I give instructions,
not I, but the Lord, that the wife should not leave her husband (but if she
does leave, she must remain unmarried, or else be reconciled to her husband),
and that the husband should not divorce his wife. But to the rest I say,
not the Lord, that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she
consents to live with him, he must not divorce her. And a woman who has an
unbelieving husband, and he consents to live with her, she must not send
her husband away. For the unbelieving husband is sanctified through his wife,
and the unbelieving wife is sanctified through her believing husband; for
otherwise your children are unclean, but now they are holy. Yet if the
unbelieving one leaves, let him leave; the brother or the sister is not under
bondage in such cases, but God has called us to peace.