They are no longer two but one

The Word of God tells us clearly in Genesis 2:24, “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and will cleave to his wife and they will be one flesh. Therefore, they are no longer two but one, and what God has joined together, let no man put asunder”.  This does not need any interpretation for it means what it says. Its best application starts from the couple. In case they do not know or they have forgotten, God’s position is that the moment they were joined in marriage, they ceased to be two persons but one person.

I love to stay close to new couples. I love to hear how they call themselves beautiful and endearing names. They talk and laugh without caring who is around. They show much concern for each other. One of them may not eat any food if the spouse went somewhere and has not returned. As soon as the footsteps of the partner are heard, the spouse is consumed with great affection. The bad news is that if you do not visit them for about twelve months, you may not recognize them when you do. You may be seeing a different type of couple, where one of them may be shouting at or insulting the other brazenly. From your observation, you may conclude, “There are no longer one but two”. You may even not be wrong to say that they are not even two but four, because each of them may be talking gloriously about the ‘third-party friend’.

No matter the chosen lifestyle of a Christian couple, God’s Word still insists that marriage is immutable. The husband and his wife are no longer two people, but one individual. They will be shortchanging themselves if they refuse to be what God has made them to be. The Lord Jesus, in Matthew 18:19, said, “If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them”. He was not referring to people on the street, but his own children. If God’s children, after God has joined them, decide to follow the standard of unbelievers, the blessing of answered prayers will elude them. The Lord Jesus declared it that he and His Father are one. May a Christian couple be what God has made them to be! Unity of a couple puts the devil in great danger since, only one of the couple will deal with one thousand demons but through synergy, the two of them will chase away ten thousand demons – Deut. 32:30.

The implication of realizing that a husband and his wife are not two distinct persons but a unified whole is that the wife will never dream of divorce because a left hand cannot divorce the right one. Nothing will make Uncle to dream also of telling his wife to leave his house because the left leg cannot, no matter what happens, tell the right leg to go on its own. For the almost past forty two years of our marriage, none of us has ever dreamt of temporary separation, not to talk of divorce. It played out well when my first daughter was wedding. It was our beloved brother, Dr. Wilson Badejo, the then General Overseer of Four Square Gospel Church, who gave the message. Surprisingly, at the end, he told me to say something. I told my daughter that from that day, she had become an Ohafia woman and no more from my town, Ovim. I told her that she must learn her husband’s local dialect.

It surprises me each time I ask a lady, where she comes from and she asks me whether I mean where she comes from or her husband’s place. Some of them will even give their answer straight, “My husband is from Owerri but I am from Aba.” I do not hesitate to tell them that I do not understand what they mean. If women are forgetful generally, should a married woman, some of them grandmothers, forget that they are married? One day in the church, their fathers or uncles handed them over to some men and the priest joined them to be one until they are parted by death. A receipt was prepared, and signed by them, their parents, the officiating minister and some other witnesses. They and their husbands, from that day, became one, in body, and of the same village and town!

Yes, unbelievers are ardent followers of culture. In some cultures, when a woman dies, she is buried in her father’s compound. God’s children abide by the culture of the Bible, God’s Word. It was Ruth, who declared, “Whither thou goeth I will go, and whither thou lodgeth I will lodge… and where thou dieth will I be buried…” She understood the meaning of marriage, though from Moab, a heathen country, but married to a man from Israel. It was even a declaration she made to her mother-in-law after the death of her husband.

No man or court is competent to separate a union God has established. Getting a divorce document from any court of law does not mean that the marriage has been dissolved. It is only death that can dissolve it and this is what couples vow: “Until death doth put us asunder”. As long as any of them is still alive, their marriage remains intact. God holds responsible any spouse that leaves the other on the pretence that their marriage has been dissolved. The same thing applies to individuals, such as parents-in-law, housemaids, servants, lawyers, magistrates and various individuals that may contribute in one way or the other, through bearing witnesses, whether true or false, if at the end, it will result in the divorce of people God has joined in marriage.

Some women ask me what should be done if the husband of a lady is so wicked that there is the fear that he might kill her one day. “Is it not better for them to separate, when the wife is still alive or should she wait until the man has killed her?” They ask. It is bad and gross evil if this is the testimony of a Christian couple. May we not forget that the minister of God was in his office one day when one of them informed him about a man that had proposed to marry her or about a lady he had wanted to marry. The minister then sent them to the Marriage Committee, which spent about six months counselling them. One day, they printed their wedding cards and invited people. The minister asked them, whether they would take each other as the wedded spouse, for better and for worse, and they agreed. He then joined them.

The implication of that question was that he did not know them in such a manner that would make him to conclude whether they would be a good couple or not. It was their positive answer to his questions that made him to join them. How can they be talking about killing or divorcing, since they are no longer two but one? What should concern them is how to rebuild their home. No matter what they do or tell us, may we never forget that they are no longer two but one.

For further comment, Please contact: Osondu Anyalechi:  0802 3002-471; [email protected]