The Marriage Masterpiece

The excerpt of this book includes unmarked quotes.

The Marriage Masterpiece takes a fresh look at the exquisite design God has for your marriage and brings to light the reason your union was intended to last a lifetime.

The author Al Janssen attempts to translate God’s perspective on marriage:

• What marriage looked like in its original state!
• Focus on self-sacrifice for the glory of God.
• God‘s relationship with us His covenant people.
• How God provides that covenant relation as a pattern for our marriages.
• How God uses our marriage for His glory.

He answers questions such as:

“Why marriage?”,

“Why remain in a tough marriage if there is little hope of lasting improvement?”,

“Did God really mean for marriage to be this tough?”

 

The Marriage Masterpiece consists of:

Foreword by Glenn Williams, Psychologist

Prologue

19 chapters

Study Guide for couples and small groups

Foreword: by Glenn Williams, Psychologist

 

Do we need another book on marriage?

How will this book make a difference where many others before it have failed?

What Al Janssen does in this book is unique: Couples are not treated to patronising prescriptions about what they did wrong and what they should do to correct it.

God knows that what we need more of in our marriages is mercy, compassion and grace, instead of finger pointing and a lack of forgiveness that otherwise becomes a hot-bed for growing a culture of blame.

Christians today are faced with the challenge of demonstrating in their marriage the love God has for them, and to show the difference the Spirit of Christ can have on their marriage relationship.

On the one hand we claim to have a relationship with God the Creator and speak of how fulfilling this is for us, yet many Christian marriages and families are crumbling in front of us.

Divorces are steadily climbing and as a result, we have a growing number of people who are left without role models to demonstrate to them what God’s intention with marriage really is.

The main focus in this book is on the nature of the relationship God desires to have with us and how it is to be a pattern for our relationship with our spouses.

This book serves as an instructive tool for those who intend to marry and those who are already married.

 

Prologue:

Restoring the Masterpiece

“Across the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel spans one of the greatest artistic triumphs in history. From 1508 to 1512 the artist Michelangelo lay on his back and painstakingly painted the creation, fall, and destruction of mankind by flood….

Michelangelo’s magnificent art started to fade almost immediately after he painted it. Within a century of completing his work, no one remembered what his original frescoes had really looked like….. In 1981 a scaffold was erected and plans were made to clean the artist’s priceless work.

There is another artistic masterpiece that needs serious restoration work. It is the relationship called marriage, and it was designed by the greatest Artist in history.

How has the picture faded in the passage of time? Can we discover the Artists original intent? For couples contemplating a life together or having just started new married life, how can they keep the masterpiece as intact as possible?

Let us lift the veil and explore the great Artist’s work.

Perhaps we can discover what our marriage should look like.

 

Chapter 1:  Whatever happened to happily ever after?

“Only seven months after my wedding day, my comfortable assumptions about marriage were challenged at the core”……

I’m thinking of leaving…I’m not happy. God wants me to be happy doesn’t He?

I think I should get a divorce.

….How would Bonnie feel about this? You can’t just leave her!

Why?…. Are you are going to tell me that God doesn’t want me to divorce.

Well, yes.. God hates divorce…..

Jim didn’t really want to know God’s views on this particular subject. He sought his own desires and self-fulfillment.

The culture of Self-Fulfillment

I wondered, if Jim and Bonnie were unhappy together, why not part company? If marriage hinders the things we seek such as-  self-fulfillment, personal growth and spiritual wholeness– why stay together?

What should we expect from our marriage?

Did God create marriage for our happiness?

In an attempt to translate God’s perspective on marriage author Al Janssen draws 9 biblical pictures or vignettes. These vignettes are bible stories that come to life and are written as though we and the angels were present.

 

Chapter 2: An Original Creation

God created man in His own image,

In the image of God He created him;

Male and female he created them.

” even the angels long to look into these things” 1 Peter 1:12

For the first vignette or picture, the author imagines the angels in a stadium, watching the Creation events unfold.

“I wondered what the angels saw at the time of creation.

 What was their perspective on the first couple?”

…… “The stadium was packed, and an ecstatic murmur ran up and down the stands.

No one was seated, for the crowd (angels) knew that the Creator, the focus of their attention, was about to embark on His greatest work.

For some time now, the angels had watched in awe. First, there was the formation of a dark ball of rock. Then a sudden flash of light illuminated the sphere.

 Next came the formation of water, followed by land, then plants, animals in the sea, birds of the air, and animals on the land.”

Then God created man and out of man made the woman as his helper…

Two incredible creatures, beautiful, each unique, but together revealing deeper aspects of the intricate beauty of their Creator.……..

How amazingly wonderful!

Truly this was a work of art. This was God’s masterpiece.

 

Chapter 3:  Analyzing the Masterpiece

God stood back and admired His wonderful masterpiece.

After creating man and woman and placing them in the midst of the garden God said “It is very good”.

Adam and Eve were content with what God gave them.

Then Satan comes into the picture suggesting their obedience to God was not the only way to true happiness.

Discontent has existed in marriage ever since.

 

Chapter 4: Adam’s Greatest Moment

I imagine Adam and Eve exploring one day in the garden. As Adam examined the delicate flower of a fruit, Eve wandered away. Something caught her eye, and she headed toward the two trees in the center of the garden.

The Genesis account gets right to the heart of the conflict. The serpent said to the first woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?      We all know what happened next.

 

Chapter 5: Every Marriage needs a Hero

 Apparently the first couple didn’t think paradise was enough.

They wanted the one thing God had withheld from them, the knowledge of good and evil. The sad fact is that when they got what they wanted, it did not make them happy.

The wife, in the process of childbearing, supposedly one of her greatest moments of joy, received increased pain.

The husband, rather than living out the great adventure, had to work hard in order to gain the food for his family.

We can conclude that whatever happiness Adam and Eve desired was not attained by disobeying God and eating the forbidden fruit.

 

Chapter 6: God’s Betrothal

If God really did get married, the logical question is, when?

I had to go back to Genesis, and when I found what I thought was the answer, I again tried to see this from the viewpoint of the two angels whom we met in chapter two.

What follows is the first of five frescoes (painted pictures), showing various facets of God’s marriage.

‘The angels Abdiel and Zephon faithfully served their Master’ then one day Zephon called to Abdiel “come with me, quick, ‘You’ve got to see this!”

They hurried to the stadium where the heavenly throng had watched God their Master, sculpt His masterpiece. ‘The Creator is talking to Abram as a friend, the way He’d talked to Adam in the garden’.

He said ‘Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you “ Our Master is making a covenant with Abram”, said Zephon. I’ve observed this on a number of occasions when a boy and girl are promised in marriage to each other….

Both man and God are bound by this agreement. If the man breaks his part of the agreement, God must pay the price for the breach.”

Zephon wondered, “I think God is saying He cares so much for the man that He is willing to do whatever is necessary to make this covenant relationship work”

Even die?,  Abdiel asked.  Zephon nodded his head in agreement,

Yes even to die!

 

Chapter 7:  The Covenant Marriage

“Though Abram and his descendants were married to God, it would be more accurate to say that they were betrothed. It is the same for Christ and His bride, the church.

The wedding feast to celebrate this marriage remains in the future.

Marriage is intended to be the human relationship that reflects how committed God is to us.”

“When God walked the blood path in covenant with Abram, He committed Himself regardless of how well or poorly Abram performed his part.

History proves that God kept His commitment-and if anyone had reason to divorce, it was God”.

 

Chapter 8: The Greatest Love Story

 The Shulamite woman as we find her in “Song of Solomon”

 

Chapter 9: The Passionate Marriage

“Commentators recognize that the Song of Solomon is also God’s story.

Song of Solomon is in Scripture for 2 reasons.

First, it upholds a picture of marital love as it was intended.

Secondly, it expresses God’s love for His people.

God is a romantic! He wanted a lover, and he passionately pursued her.

We know God is a King; He is a father; He is a shepherd but a passionate lover?

I’d read in Ephesians about the church being the bride of Christ.

But I viewed that more as a metaphor. Surely this didn’t mean God felt powerful emotions towards us. Or did He?

I reread the Bible in an attempt to clarify my understanding of God, and I was astonished to find passages where God spoke like a man hopelessly smitten:

“I am going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her.”

“How can I give you up”?   My heart is changed within me; all my compassion is aroused.  Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be moved yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken”

I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving kindness.”

What does that say to me? It seemed that God was not only blessing our desire for romance and passion, but also that those feelings are a reflection of His desire for us. He loves us and wants us to revel together with Him in that love.

 

Chapter 11: The Fighting Marriage

The Bible records many heated encounters between God and Israel.

God considered the nation of Israel His wife. He’d made a covenant, an irrevocable commitment to her, and He was hurt—just as anyone of us would be—when His wife committed adultery.

God wanted His love back, and he was determined to do whatever was necessary to accomplish that. God cared enough to confront.

God didn’t just endure Israel’s unfaithfulness. He didn’t simply vent His emotions; He also took constructive action.

For Israel that meant tough love. God sent them into exile.

Today with our busy lives, I have to wonder if we are willing to invest the emotional energy to fight for our marriages.

Our pursuits and goals should include our partners, and then we will have enough energy and vision for our marriage and families.

 

Chapter 12:  The Great Scandal 

Hosea’s wife is a harlot.

“The biblical vignette in this chapter is an important picture of God’s determination to save His marriage. By extension, I believe it demonstrates the high value He places on us and our marriages.

 

Chapter 13:  The One-Sided Marriage

 For centuries, God endured a miserable one sided marriage.

How bad was it? God gave us a taste through the life of the prophet Hosea.

When God told Hosea” Go take to yourself an adulterous wife ..,  Hosea went and married Gomer.

Does God really expect someone to endure such difficult circumstances and live with a harlot? The answer from Scripture seems pretty harsh, unless I consider the fact that God has endured a miserable, one-sided marriage and has stuck with it.

The heroes of Scripture are those men and women who obeyed God when it wasn’t comfortable or easy.

If God can take Hosea’s marriage and make it a means of ministry to the nation of Israel, then perhaps He can use any marriage where one partner is willing to let God work. I can only conclude that means He wants to make a masterpiece of my marriage and of your marriage, regardless of their current condition.

 

Chapter 14: The Hero Saves the Day

God’s desire is clear- He wanted the heart of His beloved. But she had been unfaithful to Him, and the price for her unfaithfulness had to be paid.

By law the price was death. But if she died, God lost what he most desired. There had to be some other way.

Just as Hosea redeemed Gomer, so God must redeem His beloved.

This is the bride price.

“So the Father sent His Son, and He’s been sacrificed.

By that He’s proven His love.

Jesus said” In my Father’s house are many mansions’ I am going there to prepare a place for you’. “Those are the words the engaged man says to his fiancée. Before their marriage celebration, he must go and prepare a place for them to live. Then he comes back for her and the wedding feast begins.

 

Chapter 15:  The Heroic Marriage.

Jesus gave up His rights, His power, and His glory in submission to His Father.

He emptied Himself, He humbled Himself unto death—even the death of the cross.

The most glorious God of Creation, submitting to His Father’s will gave up all His rights and privileges.

Both husband and wife are instructed to follow the example of Christ.

Jesus is the model for both headship and submission.

It goes against human nature to submit to anyone, especially to a husband who may be difficult to respect.

The Masterpiece Marriage of God with Israel, of Christ and His beloved church, brings me to this conclusion about the meaning of marriage here on earth:

Meaning in marriage is not found by pursuing happiness or self-fulfillment.

Meaning in marriage is discovered by practicing self-sacrifice.

Be imitators of God, therefore,… and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us       and gave  Himself up for us”

Christ knew the problems we would face in our marriages, and that’s why He didn’t leave us helpless.

Among His final instructions to His disciples, Jesus said, “If you love me, you will obey what I command. … I will give you another Counselor to be with you forever—The Spirit of truth”.

God, in the person of the Holy Spirit, provides us with all the help, wisdom, and power we need to be the husband or wife our spouse requires.

 

Chapter 16:   The Great Adventure

Unlike Adam and Eve before the fall, we do not live our lives in paradise.

The reality of a fallen world assaults us daily. However, the three-way relationship Adam and Eve once had with God—the chance to reflect God’s image- has been restored by the heroic work of Christ.

The life as Christians is quite an adventure. “By His grace, the adventure will continue until we, too, are ready to receive His reward.

 

Chapter 17:  Return to Eden 

The apostle Paul commanded us to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Here I believe is the greatest hope for marriages today. Just as God walked and talked with the first couple in Eden, so God comes to marriages today and offers to be our counselor, to walk with us and guide us day by day, moment by moment.

But many find it impossible to see beyond the trials in their relationship to the wonderful picture God is creating. For many the payoff to stay together has not arrived. So what reward can we expect?

To find out, we need to examine one more detail of God’s marriage. It is an event that has yet to occur, an event that will make all the persevering through difficult and good times worthwhile.

 

Chapter 18:  Michael Proposes a Toast

There is a reward for faithfully going the distance in marriage. One day, there will be a celebration, like none we have ever seen.

 

Chapter 19:  Living Out the Masterpiece

God will say, “Well done, good and faithful servants. Enter into the joy of the LORD!” This wonderful news removes the grime of disappointment or regret we all feel to some degree, at certain times in our marriages.

There is no such thing as an insignificant little marriage. Every marriage provides a unique opportunity for God to reveal Himself to the people around that couple.

A fulfilled life is one that has the will of God as its focus, not the appetite of the flesh. Our choice is between God’s way and the alternatives presented by the world.  Let’s face it, there are so many attractive people around us, at our work place, on our business travels, even at church-people who are interesting and who might fill the gaps we think we perceive in our lives.

There are seductive images from our filmmakers, and now on the internet, that barge into our lives uninvited.

And behind all these temptations lies the enemy who bides his time, looking for any weakness by which to destroy a marriage. Just as he set a trap for Adam and Eve in Eden, far too often today one of his traps suddenly snaps shut and claims yet another victim.  Society is so obsessed with the search for self-fulfillment. Self sacrifice is about doing small things for the good of the marriage.

The apostle Paul urges us, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” The only way to render mute the messages of society is to overwhelm them with the truths of Scripture.

Whatever situation your marriage may be in, God is busy making your marriage a work of art.

With the knowledge that God desires to make your marriage a masterpiece of art, would you ever want to break down that which God delights to build?

 

Study Guide– for couples and small groups

The study guide is divided into 12 sessions.

Sessions cover all 19 chapters

Each session has:

Points to ponder

Contrasting Pictures

Reflections on the Masterpiece

Application of the Masterpiece