MARRIAGE
What is it?
What does it mean?
What defines a biblical and scriptural marriage?
Can we give "marriage" a simple definition or is it so complex that it requires paragraphs to define? What is a marriage, in a nutshell? What does God call marriage? How do we define it -- in the BIBLE.
God has consistantly proven to me that to lean on my own understanding or to look to the servants of the enemy for the truth is a great folly under the sun. Rather than think myself so righteous that there is no possibility that I may be missing out on any aspect of the truth, I am opening this subject to see if I might learn something new about marriage.
I am not interested in the dictionary definition. The dictionary is not the authority over the word of God. I would like to examine some of the Bible definitions that the Bible calls marriage. I am also inviting your input, if you have any to offer. Perhaps there is something I do not know about biblical marriage.
If you believe that you know what the Bible definition of the word "marriage" is, please feel free to share it with me here. I am very interested reading a complete and concise definition that covers the word "marriage" between a man and a woman. What is the APO definition of the word? Does APO have one?
Thankyou and God bless
The above is a direct quote from me to an MSN GROUP message board. The name of the group is called Apostolic Pentecostal Oneness. Days have passed since the post was made and so far it has not attained a response. It would seem that this particular topic is not of interest to the members of this group. Personally, I feel that we do live in interesting times when any group proclaiming to be "Pentecostal Oneness" would fail to respond to an invitation such as the one posted above. The post was made in their "HOT ZONE" section and is readily accessible to all the readers. I replied to it once to encourge my fellow members of APO to reply but apparently did so to no avail.
As the founder of the FULL BIBLE TRUTH msngroup, I believe it is encumbant upon me to make every effort to provide the reader with a clear and concise biblical definition of the word "marriage" that lines up with all (not some) of the scripture. Notwithstanding I believe that in a demonstration of good faith and with respect to all my fellow readers, that I should also encourge and exhort them to provide me what they believe such a definition includes. After a month's time I will collect any responses forthcoming.
I am eager to see if I will learn anything new from any of the anticipated responses that might change the simple biblical definition that I currently have. Now I would not be so presumptuous as to even attempt to dictate any "private interpretation" to any of my comrades; therefore I would request a scriptural definition of the term "marriage" if any would be so kind as to offer one. Surely there are several authorities that are able to assist me in this simple exploit.
Let's wait and see what happens.
March 24, 2006
I believe that I may have an answer, but not from the good people of the APO GROUP. No, these have not presented any complete Bible Definition of marriage. My guess is that they do not know what God calls actual marriage between a husband and wife. I suspect that many churches today no longer know what God regards to be genuine, biblical marriage although one might think that this is important knowledge. How is it that so many church groups can talk so much about marriage and divorcement when they are unable to state just what marriage is? If this be the case then someone ought to start up a ministry of marriage.
My quest resulted in the following fruition from a different source:
See also:
I've been working on something...
I've been working on something...
The KJV New Testament Greek Lexicon
Strong's Number: 1135 | Browse Lexicon | Original Word | Word Origin | gunhv | probably from the base of (1096) | Transliterated Word | TDNT Entry | Gune | 1:776,134 | Phonetic Spelling | Parts of Speech | goo-nay' | Noun Feminine | | Definition | - a woman of any age, whether a virgin, or married, or a widow
- a wife
- of a betrothed woman
| | King James Word Usage - Total: 221 | women 129, wife 92 | | | |
Greek lexicon based on Thayer's and Smith's Bible Dictionary plus others; this is keyed to the large Kittel and the "Theological Dictionary of the New Testament." These files are public domain.