Sermon Tone Analysis

By Pastor Glenn Pease

The question was asked of a class of Catholic girls-"What is matrimony?"

One girl confidently stood and said, "Matrimony is a state of terrible torment which those who enter are compelled to undergo for a time to fit them for heaven."

"No, no," said the priest, "You have given the definition of purgatory."

"Let her alone," said the Archbishop, "Maybe she's right."

Her definition of the word was wrong, but her description of the experience of many in the state of marriage was right.

Matrimony can be a purgatory rather than the paradise God intended it to be.

Marriage can produce a paradise, or it can produce a paradise to ashes by means of the fires of conflict.

Marriage is a paradox.

It can be the best or the worst state.

We commit ourselves in marriage for better or for worse because both our equally possible.

Conflict is just as real a potential as cooperation.

There are those who tell us that even conflict can have its values, and there is truth in this perspective.

What of the couple who reached the height of their argument, and the wife exploded, "I wish I'd taken mother's advice and never married you."

The husband said, "Do you mean to say your mother tried to stop your marrying me?"

She nodded.

"Well now," sighed the husband, How I've wronged that woman."

Whatever value was gained, it is doubtful that the quarrel can be counted a positive factor in marriage bliss, even if there are poets who claim it is so.

O we fell out, my wife and I,

O we fell out, I know not why,

And kissed again with tears.

And blessing on the falling out

That all the more endears,

When we fall out with those we love,

And kiss again with tears.

The only reason there is any truth to this poetry is because some mates only show affection to each other when they make up.

Just like some children can only get attention by causing a disturbance, or by getting in trouble.

It is not the conflict that is of any value, but the peace settlement, and the kiss of peace.

Anyone with a taste for kissing, however, knows that its better without any salty sauce from the eyes.

Kissing again with tears is not a gourmet delight.

Far superior is the relationship where affection does not depend on conflict.

I read of a wise man who quarreled with his wife during their 50th year of wedded life.

He tucked this note under his wife's pillow.

"My darling bride, let's put off quarreling until after the honeymoon is over.

Your devoted husband."

Here was a husband who took the high road to marital bliss by avoiding quarrels instead of the low road of squeezing some value out of conflicts.

Carlton could write-

And if ever we meet in heaven

I shouldn't think it queer

That we loved each other the better

For the way we quarreled here.

My response is- When we meet in heaven

I should think it odd

If we loves each other better

For disobeying God.

It is always true that God can bring good out of evil, but it is never wise to do evil in the hopes that good will come of it.

Our objective as Christians and as mates is to live in harmony and never desire discord.

What Paul says to Christians in general applies to mates in particular.

In Eph.

4:31-32 he wrote, "Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.

Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you."

Following this path will lead to successful marriage, and Peter tells husbands how they can be successful in seeing that their marriage follows this path.

Any husband who will follow Peter's advice will not only be a successful husband, but he will be an exceedingly happy husband.

Any wife whose husband treats her with the respect involved in what Peter says in this one verse will lavish upon him more devoted love than all the harem of Solomon.

What does Peter say a husband must do to be successful?

He must first-

I. RESPECT HER EXISTENCE AS A PERSON.

Peter says the husband is to be considerate as he lives with his wife.

This means that a husband is to care about what his wife needs as a person to make her life fulfilled.

She is a person who has special needs and desires, and it is a husbands obligation to know what they are.

To ignore another's needs is to lack respect for them as persons.

Wives need to be treated as people worth understanding.

Phillips translation puts it, "You husbands should try to understand the wives you live with."

The NEB has it, "You husbands must conduct your married life with understanding."

Peter clearly implies that it is possible for a man to understand a woman.

Peter has a high view of the perceptive powers of the male.

He says these powers are to be applied in marriage.

Someone said there are two periods in a man's life when he feels it is impossible to understand a woman.

One is before marriage, and the other is after.

Peter does not agree.

It may take more than a grain of faith to remove the mountain of doubt that has accumulated in the minds of men on this issue, but it can be removed.

The Gospel according to Peter is that wives can be understood, and not only by experts who study them and write books about them, but even by their husbands.

This opens up a great hope for marriage from a Christian perspective.

For most of history men have not been able to treat women as equals because they could never accept them as persons.

They never tried to understand the needs of wives, but only the function whereby wives met the needs of husbands.

Christianity raised the level of women from possessions to persons who are created in the image of God, and endowed with intelligence, and great potential as children of God.

Understanding this makes a Christian husband desire to treat his wife in a manner worthy of a person made in the image of God.

D. H. Lawrence in one of his assorted articles wrote, "Man is willing to accept woman as an equal, as a man in skirts, as an angel, a devil, a baby-face, a machine, an instrument, a bosom, a womb, a pair of legs, a servant, an encyclopedia, and ideal or an obscenity; the one thing he won't accept her as is a human being, a real human being of the feminine sex."

Peter says a Christian husband is obligated to rise above this historical hang up of men.

Before marriage men tend to see women as persons, and they treat them as such.

They are aware of the needs of the female to be appreciated.

They are free with compliments, and they give them undivided attention.

Marriage, however, often causes a man to regress.

He ceases to think of his wife as a real person.

He ceases to live with her with a considerate attitude.

He takes her for granted as part of the total machinery of life.

She keeps the wheels of life rolling in the home.

He forgets that she is a person who needs to feel loved and appreciated.

She needs to talk and be heard.

Helen Rowland complained, "Before marriage a man will lie awake all night thinking about something you said; after marriage he'll fall asleep before you finish saying it.

Its as hard to get a man to stay home after you've married him as it was to get him to go home before your married him."

When husbands do this it is because they have ceased to be considerate.

They are not thinking of their wife as a person but as a possession.

Peter says don't do that, but respect her as a person.

Everything you gain in terms of fulfillment in the world of your job she must gain through you, and this is often just as true for wives who work.

A wife needs a husband who makes her feel important.

She needs compliments and encouragement.

She needs to feel she has value, and only a husband can adequately meet these needs.

Listen to the tribute of a wife to her husband who succeeded in doing this.

Jessie Rittenhouse wrote,