Malachi 2:10-12: Unequally Yoked

OUTLINE

The sin in Israel
The sin in the Bible
The sin in our experience

INTRODUCTION

Marriage is an institution created by God and as sinners we reject God’s institutions and sin against them just as we sin against God. In the endless creativity of our sinfulness there are many sins against God’s institution of marriage. We sin against marriage when we do not keep sex for marriage, not seeing it as a seal of the covenant bond, a picture of our union with Christ, an expression of committed love, and the means of bringing children into the protected environment of a committed life long relationship. Pornography, prostitution and promiscuity which take sexual satisfaction and turn it into a personal pastime and a selfish pleasure. Polygamy, where a man has more than one wife, or polyandry where a woman has more than one husband is a defiance of God’s pattern of the two becoming one flesh. Open marriages where you do not have to remain loyal to your spouse; swinging; contractual not life-long covenants; concubinage; homosexual marriage; adultery; divorce; child brides; incest; deliberate childless marriages; cohabitation. I am sure you could add to my list. The portion of scripture that we are dealing with today Malachi 2:10-12 addresses two key areas of marital sin that were deeply impacting on Israel’s holiness and provoking the justice of God—divorce and being unequally yoked to an unbeliever. V10-12 deals with the issue of being unequally yoked and v13-16 the matter of divorce. Today our focus is on the matter of Jews marrying people of other religions.

We will divide our message into three sections. Firstly, we will look at this sin in Israel doing a short exegesis of v10-12; then we will look at what the Bible says about this sin in general in both the OT and the NT; and then we will look at this sin in our experience looking at the difficulties it creates and how someone who is married to an unbeliever can have hope.