Sara G. began the lesson on Sunday by telling us that this was not a lesson about how to get married, or how to stay married, or even how to be happily married. It was a lesson about the doctrine of marriage.
Why is it important to know that marriage between a man a woman is ordained of God?
An answer from Sara's husband was that he wants to know what God knows. He wants to know what God thinks.
Another answer is that with so many bad examples in the world, it gives us hope that it is an important doctrine and that Heavenly Father believes in marriage profoundly.
If it is ordained of God, we can expect his help along the way.
How is the Lord's doctrine of marriage different than the world's doctrine of marriage?
The Lord has always seen us as equal partners in marriage, even when the world hasn't. We also talked about how the world's view of marriage is becoming selfish. It is only about what makes one person happy, not about helping each other or sacrificing to raise children.
Sara told us a story from a talk by Bruce Hafen. He talked about two types of marriages. There are contract marriages and covenant marriages. In a contract marriage, the couple is there only for their own happiness, and when opposition comes, they feel free to leave and find new happiness somewhere else. In a covenant marriage, the couple works together through opposition and gives 100% to the marriage. (We also talked about how there is a difference between being just being married and being part of an eternal marriage.)
Brother Hafen quoted from John 10 about the Good Shepherd who will lay down his life for his sheep verses the hireling that will run when the wolves come. There are three types of wolves that will come for us in our marriages. 1. natural adversity (illness, death, etc.) 2. our own imperfections and 3. excessive individualism (the view that our own happiness is more important than another persons, that marriage is oppressive and binding)
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