We are taking our time in Gen. 2:24-25 to learn the truth about marriage and sexual relations in the context of marriage, so that we can defend the truth against those who would teach the doctrines of demons. We have seen three purposes of marriage in Gen. 1 ruling, reproduction, and relational needs. We have also looked at the necessary criteria of marriage in Gen. 2:24 which have both sequential and practical significance. We learned: 1) God designed marriage, 2) marriage is between one man and one woman, 3) marriage requires public leaving of former commitments to establish a new family, 4) marriage involves emotional joining together in mutual commitment, 5) marriage requires becoming one flesh, physical consummation, and 6) God joins a couple together spiritually until death, if they meet the criteria of marriage and enter the marriage covenant.

The necessary criteria for marriage in Gen. 2:24, are quoted four times in the New Testament as God’s blueprints for marriage. However, there is one more statement that was made about the first and only pre-fall marriage, that though not a necessary criterion for marriage, certainly a necessary goal for any marriage.

We have been looking at marriage in some detail because Satan is waging a terrific battle against marriage. Satan knows that if he can destroy marriage, he can promote misery, pain, death, and topple nations. Marriage and the family are the glue of civilization.

Thus, we are going back to the beginning, looking at God’s design for marriage, and setting the record straight in the face of a hostile world and the forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Three purposes of marriage are given in Gen. 1 before marriage is defined. 1) Marriage is for ruling over God’s creation, 2) Marriage is for reproductive needs, and 3) Marriage is for relational needs both emotional and physical. In Gen. 2:24-25 God gives us the definition and necessary criteria that must be met in order to have a marriage that glorifies God and brings us blessing. The criteria God gives for marriage have both sequential and practical significance.

From Gen. 2:24-25 we are given six important aspects of marriage that we must understand in order to give God glory in our marriages, be blessed, and equipped to stand against worldly attacks that Satan is leveling against God’s glorifying marriage.

We must remember is that while many Christians are taking what the Bible says about marriage in a very cavalier way, Satan, the god of this world, is taking on the task of destroying your marriage very seriously. Satan wants you miserable in marriage.

Evolutionary thinking is destroying marriages because it has replaced God’s design for marriage with a worldly, man-made, self-serving model. Our text this morning brings us back to the truth as we go back to the beginning to see what God, the one who invented marriage, has to says about it.

From Gen. 2:24-25 we are given six important aspects of marriage that we must understand in order to give God glory in our marriages, be blessed, and equipped to stand against worldly attacks that Satan is leveling against God’s glorifying marriage.

What are we to do about the gender confusion, immorality, attacks on marriage and the family? We go to the book of Genesis where we are given God’s perfect design and instructions to be truly blessed, not by indulging in our fleshly desires and being slaves to sin and Satan, but repenting of our sin and submitting to the Lordship of Jesus Christ who has our eternal well-being in mind, by submitting to God’s original design.

In the last few weeks we have been looking at the world God created for man. Moses has let us know what the garden of God was like, its abundance of food, beauty, water, but also that God planned to bless man with natural resources outside the garden after he would sin. Moses, having given us some context, now turns to man himself, the pinnacle and focus of God’s creative acts. Adam is placed in the garden, given instruction about what he can and can’t eat, and all this occurs before the woman is created.

From Gen. 2:10-14 I want to point out three key aspects of the river that flowed into God’s garden in Eden, so that we can understand the kindness and goodness of God towards man in the pre-fall, pre-flood world, and later, in Chapter 3, the dire consequences of sin and the curse after the fall.

From Gen. 2:8-9 I want to point out five facts about the garden of Eden, so we can better understand the pre-fall, pre-flood world, the grace and kindness of God, and get a glimpse of the paradise that was lost because of Adam’s sin, but which will be regained by all who repent of their sin and place their faith in Jesus Christ alone for salvation.

From Gen. 2:7 we will consider the formation of man by God out of dust and how man became a living being, so we can know the truth about where mankind came from and see the goodness of God in placing man in a perfect place.

From Gen. 2:4-6 we will consider three characteristics of the sixth day of creation, so we can learn about God, the world right before man was created, and better praise and worship God for His goodness and kindness.

Though we have only covered Gen. 1:1-2:3 so far, we have learned a great deal of critical doctrine, coming to understand why the early chapters of Genesis are foundational for the Christian faith. If you can’t believe in the first chapters of Genesis, then when do you start believing the Bible? If you reject the early chapters of Genesis, you undermine biblical authority. Jesus and the authors of Scripture believed in a literal Adam and Eve, fall, serpent, flood, etc.