In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, amen.
At the beginning of the history of our race, the Lord gave us dominion over all the creatures. He told us that they were our responsibility, and this cultural mandate has never been revoked. Not only has it not been revoked, but in the New Testament it is picked up and expanded in remarkable ways. The God of all creation has shown Himself—in the resurrection of Jesus—to be the God of the new creation as well, the new heavens and new earth in which righteousness dwells.
“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them” (Gen. 1:26-27).
The assumption in the early chapters of Genesis, in both stated and unstated ways, is that the earth, skies, and seas will fill up with all these creatures that God created, and that man and woman together would follow them all, tending them, taking care of them, and exercising dominion over them. But this means, as a corollary, that God intended for us to explore our world. We have done so, and while some ages have excelled others in their zeal for exploration, the history of our race over all has been a history of growth, expansion and exploration.
All around the world, there have been a countless series of spectacular firsts. There was a first man to walk up to the rim of the Grand Canyon, and look across at the striking view. There was a first man to walk on the moon. There was a first man to see Niagara Falls. There was a first man to come across a pod of whales. After these explorers came the settlers and so it is that we have gradually gotten used to the world around us. A few have lamented the fact that we seem to have run out of frontiers, and so they expend energy trying to develop new and genuine places to explore, perhaps at the bottom of the ocean or with colonies in outer space. All of this is quite fascinating, of course, but why bring it up at a wedding? In all these firsts, I left out the most remarkable one—the first man meeting the first woman.
“And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man” (Gen. 2:21-23).
As one insightful minister has pointed out, the first recorded words of the first man are on the occasion of his encounter with the first woman, and those words are poetry. The poetry is necessary because lesser instruments are incapable of this task of exploration, which we have scarcely begun.
In verse 26 of chapter 1, we saw that the Lord gave us license to explore the world, and exercise dominion in it. In the next breath, in v. 27, He says that man was created in the image of God, both male and female. Now on the obvious level, this made it possible for mankind to be fruitful and multiply. Without that, it would be impossible to explore the world, impossible to exercise dominion. A childless couple all by themselves would have trouble exercising dominion over a couple acres—a globe the size of ours teeming with life would be utterly beyond them. And so we were created male and female, giving us the ability to multiply right along with the creatures we were tending. Men and women together were therefore created as co-explorers, working shoulder to shoulder in the tasks assigned to us by God in the world.
All this is quite true, but if we take it in a superficial way, it will become a dull and pedestrian truth. The thing that will enable us to function in the world the way we ought is imagination, the poetic response of Adam when God ushered Eve to meet him. If we have been given the grace of that imagination, we will be stunned long before we get to the marvels of the outside world. There is another world right across the breakfast table.
God has created our race in such a way that every man in each generation of men and every woman in each generation of women will all experience the other half of the human race as alien territory. Men have no comprehension of what it is like to be a woman, no matter how often they hear it explained. Women have no comprehension of what it is like to be a man, no matter how close they are to men. All of us, all the time, are dwelling domestically in a far country. Creating us male and female has placed extreme distance in close proximity, and this ought to be recognized for what it is—a great miracle.
Men and women are complementary, and God has created us with reciprocal natures—physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional. We answer to one another. We complete one another. We enjoy one another. We harmonize with one another. Do we “get” one another? Not even close.
“There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not: The way of an eagle in the air; the way of a serpent upon a rock; the way of a ship in the midst of the sea; and the way of a man with a maid” (Prov. 30:18-19).
In addition to all this, there is an analogy between the world to be explored and women. Feminists have seen this reality, and have done their best to disparage it, speaking as they do of domination or colonization or exploitation. And because our race is a fallen and sinful one, many of their bitter charges have more than a little truth to them. Unfortunately for them, the abuse of a creational reality does not free us of our obligation to the godly use.
Brad, the worst thing that an explorer can do, once he has found a delightful country, is to settle there in a way that causes him to lose his sense of wonder. Far too many husbands have done this, taking their wives for granted, assuming that everything is exactly the way it appears to their superficial eyes. But I am charging you to nurture your wife by nurturing your sense of constant wonder. As your years unfold together, never forget that she intersects with you easily but is still totally unlike you. As God gives you children, marvel at the fact that women are the kind of people that people come out of. If more husbands actually reflected on that, their doctors would have to put them on bed rest. On your fifth anniversary, when you are leaving work early for your dinner out with your wife, I want you to say something like this to all your co-workers. “There is a person at home waiting for me, so I need to go. This person isn’t like me at all, for which I am grateful, and yet she harmonizes with everything I do. God calls this kind a person a woman, and I can’t really explain it much further than that. I can’t believe my good fortune, and I have to tell all of you frankly that science has no explanation.” And then leave, with a sober and grateful expression on your face.
Nicole, my charge to you is to be a blessing to your husband, thirty, sixty and hundred fold. The Scriptures teach us that the man who loves his wife loves himself. God has created the world in such a way that when a man sacrifices himself for his wife and family, he is blessed beyond all reckoning in the return. You are the central focal point of that return. He gives and you respond. He initiates and you reciprocate. He sacrifices and you adorn. When he does this kind of thing self-consciously, in faith, you have the opportunity to make the multiplied fruitfulness of his faith apparent to the world. I have charged Brad to never lose his sense of wonder. I am charging you with the responsibility to be a wonder. This is not beyond your reach—this is what God created women for, and when you step into that role by faith you are working at the center of God’s creation design. The Bible says plainly that women are the crown and glory of their husbands. Accept that honor gladly.
Brad and Nicole, together today you are assuming the roles assigned to you by God—for His glory and our good. Do what He says to do, and do it the way He says to do it. As you do so, in faith, His blessing will rest upon the house that is being established here today, and He will do so for a thousand generations. In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, amen and amen.