Identity – Relational Realness

Paul – The Apostle   !!!PG RATED!!!

SLIDE:  Identity – Relational Realness  NOT Marriage

RECAP from last week.

SLIDE:  Ephesians 4:19 Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity with a continual lust for more.

sensitivity – vs – sensuality  –   Continual lust for more

Paul’s Letters

Correction – Direction – Answering Questions

Jesus introduces a radical notion –

SLIDE:  Matthew 20:25-28 

²⁵ Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. ²⁶ Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, ²⁷ and whoever wants to be first must be your slave— ²⁸ just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

SLIDE:  Matthew 23:11  The greatest among you will be your servant.

SLIDE:  Positional Authority = to Serve Others

CHANGES PEOPLE

Now lets talk marriage.

SLIDE: Ephesians 5:21-33. 

21 Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

22 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

25 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, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church— 30 for we are members of his body. 31 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”[c] 32 This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

SLIDE: Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. Ephesians 5:21

MUTUAL SUBMISSION!

²⁵ Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her²⁶ to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, ²⁷ and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.

SLIDE: Wives submit – Husbands love

Submit – as to Jesus

Love – like Jesus

JESUS IS AT THE CENTER?

Jesus wasn’t married!

Abraham & Sarah. Jacob & Rachel

SLIDE: The Emotionally Healthy Spirituality video study

SLIDE: BIG SCREEN  1 Corinthians 7:1-7

Concerning Married Life

7 Now for the matters you wrote about: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” ² But since sexual immorality is occurring, each man should have sexual relations with his own wife, and each woman with her own husband. ³ The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband. ⁴ The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife. ⁵ Do not deprive each other except perhaps by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. ⁶ I say this as a concession, not as a command. ⁷ I wish that all of you were as I am. But each of you has your own gift from God; one has this gift, another has that.

SLIDE: The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife.  1 Cor 7:4  

MUTUAL SUBMISSION!

the valuing of women sky rockets

SLIDE: BIG SCREEN  1 Corinthians 7:25-28.  ²⁵ Now about virgins: I have no command from the Lord, but I give a judgment as one who by the Lord’s mercy is trustworthy. ²⁶ Because of the present crisis, I think that it is good for a man to remain as he is. ²⁷ Are you pledged to a woman? Do not seek to be released. Are you free from such a commitment? Do not look for a wife. ²⁸ But if you do marry, you have not sinned; and if a virgin marries, she has not sinned. But those who marry will face many troubles in this life, and I want to spare you this.

SLIDE:  But those who marry will face many troubles in this life, and I want to spare you this.

God-Blessed route- 20-24 married.  NOT SINGLENESS

SLIDE:   I wish that all of you were as I am. But each of you has your own gift from God; one has this gift, another has that.    1 Cor. 7:7

SLIDE: I would like you to be free from concern. An unmarried man is concerned about the Lord’s affairs—how he can please the Lord. But a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world—how he can please his wife— and his interests are divided. 1 Corinthians 7:32-34

1 Corinthians 7:29 What I mean, brothers and sisters, is that the time is short.

SINGLENESS – what the bible has to say –

(the prescribed God blessed future).

The wider community of the text so we do not have be ashamed of them.

SLIDE: Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do. But if they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion. 1Cor. 7:8-9  

SLIDE: FEET YOUR FAITH:  

SLIDE:  Emotionally healthy spirituality