The Marriage Covenant written in our bodies

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word,  and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. Ephesians 5:25-27

***Warning*** I have written some graphic content in this piece. This is not for children.

In my prayer, as I am sure many people have also felt, the Lord has impressed upon me the importance, to an overwhelming degree on my soul, of marriage.

You all know I have been taking classes on Kingdom and Covenant.  I learned a lot in this last class discussing marriage. In learning about covenant, we understand that a blood sacrifice is made, and we know that the Eucharist is the most Sacred and Profound covenant God made with us.  His own Son giving us His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity.  We are able to renew this covenant every single day at Mass.

Jesus gave us this outward sign of His love when he stated, “This is my body given up for you.”  And we know that the Mass is known as the Wedding Feast of the Lamb.  His outward gift of love presented to us, and we, the Bride of Christ (whether male or female) receive this gift of love.

Have you ever wondered about that marriage analogy?  About the fact that Jesus spoke of it?  Marriage must be important to God.

And Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day. Mark 2:19-20

Like the Eucharistic covenant, marriage is also covenant.  Two Sacraments gifted to us by God.  Now bear with me for a moment because I am going to get R rated here to some people, though what I am going to say is meant to show the beauty of God’s creation.  The covenant of Sacramental Marriage is written in the very body of the man and woman.  When a man, in love with his wife, is passionate for her, his very body has the outward expression of this.  And a woman can see it. On his wedding night, a groom says with his body, “this is my body given up for you”.  An outward expression of love for his wife.  Additionally, since marriage is covenant and covenant requires blood sacrifice, when a virginal woman sheds blood on her wedding night through intercourse, this shedding of her blood, is just as a covenant sacrifice, and the covenant is made.  Her body receives him, receives his love.  A husband and wife renew this covenant again and again throughout their marriage.  And the two become one flesh.

No longer two but one. These couples together, when they center their lives on Christ, their power grows exponentially.  Where one puts 1000 to flight, two puts 10,000.

“How could one man chase a thousand, or two put ten thousand to flight, unless their Rock had sold them, unless the LORD had given them up?” Deuteronomy 32:30

This is why the devil tries SO HARD to pervert sexuality.  If he can do this he perverts the beauty of the Sacramental covenant God created.  When marriage is strong, societies flourish and spread love, joy and beauty.  The devils goal is to destroy.  And in our day and age, he set his sights on the destruction of marriage.

When we have sex outside of marriage, we give a part of ourselves away.  Pre-marital sex takes part of our soul and gives it to another.  Then, when we enter into marriage later, we only can give what we have left of ourselves, it is not a complete giving, because of what was left behind.  When we are not whole from the start, it makes it harder to live a Godly marriage.  Sex before marriage is a way that we actually can destroy other souls and our own soul.  I think this is why God impressed upon me how deadly of a sin lust is.

The devil wants to pervert what God created beautiful as much as he possibly can.  This is why he tries to get you to have as much sex as possible before you’re married and as little as possible with your spouse after you are married.  Having sex a lot in marriage is healthy and powerful in the eyes of God because just like we renew Eucharistic covenant in Mass every day, we also renew the marriage covenant each time we have sex with our spouse.  But the devil has attacked marriage from every angle; divorce, pornography, masturbation, prostitution, contraception, adultery, homosexuality, abortion, you name it, he has thought of it and tried to attack us with it.

But lest ye despair, especially if you were one that committed these sins of perversion, you must know that our God is powerful enough to overcome your sins.

When Saint Paul was in Corinth, he was preaching to a people that worshipped Aphrodite.  Every woman was required at some point to be a temple sex slave.  Paul was preaching to whores and whoremongers.  Men and women who worshipped a goddess of sex.  And yet he said this to them;

“I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. I promised you to one husband, to Christ, so that I might present you as a pure virgin to him.” 2 Corinthians 11:2

How could he say this to them?  How could he promise them to Christ as pure virgins?  Paul could promise this because Paul knows Christ is a RESTORER who can DELIVER you.

If you have these past sins and you’re struggling in your marriage, Christ can deliver you.  Ask God to show you where you need healing.  Confess your sexual sins, forgive yourself, forgive those who took a part of you, and ask God to close those doors where the devil has an entrance to attack your marriage.  Christ can make you whole again.  You can be presented as pure before Christ.  The Church shows us the way.  Confession is healing.

If you don’t have these sins, ask God to protect your purity everyday.  Hand Him your purity to guard.

We must all of us get on our knees and pray for marriage.  For our own, and for others.  May God make us holy and pure.