Utumishi Blog

Don’t worry I’m still very happily married. But I’m a bit worried about the frequent application of Ecclesiastes 4 to marriage. I don’t doubt this Scripture is inspired and useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training – and I guess even in wedding services. But is this the best the Bible has to say on marriage?

Correct me if I’m wrong but Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 seems to me (a) not to be particularly related to marriage and (b) to be straightforward pragmatism – practical worldly wisdom and common sense.

• If you want to make more money, the clever thing to do is work with someone else. Generally speaking a business partnership will last longer and get further than a lone entrepreneur – pooling time, resources, skills and talents. 
• If you’re travelling on a journey – that is literally (driving to Marsabit) or metaphorically (through life) it’s good to have a travelling companion who can pick you up out of the ditch / help you change the tyre / keep you going.
• If you’re in a cold part of the country then you need a hot water bottle when you go to bed – any warm body will do (1 Kings 1:1-4).
• If you’re walking home through a dodgy part of town then don’t walk on your own – two will be less likely to be attacked and will put up a good fight if you are.
• The cord of three strands may just be illustrating the same point that a multiple is better than a single (three is the fewest number of strands you can make a rope out of so it’s not going to say ‘A cord of two strands’) or it could be making the point that three is even better than two: Three workers will make even more money per person than two business partners. Three journeying together will be even better at getting each other out of ditches. Three in a bed will be even warmer than two. Three warriors make a good fighting force (e.g. 2 Sam. 23:16) – not easily broken.

It’s pure pragmatism. Nothing particularly wrong with that. Perfectly good common sense. Fine to apply some of it to business, ministry and even marriage. But it is only pragmatism. And pragmatism has its limits. It’s not always true. It can be disappointed. And it’s not the gospel. It’s not distinctively Christian. And it tends very easily to selfishness and idolatry. If this is what you go into marriage with as your highest ideal of marriage then there’s a big problem. If this is what drives your marriage – maximising output, finding companionship, sex, self-protection, ‘adding value to me’ – then there’s a big problem.

This is how Piper finishes his great little book on marriage:

I have said nothing about the effect of marriage on poverty, or health, or employment, or earnings, or the material success of children. The reason for this omission is… focusing on the pragmatic effects of marriage undermines the very power of marriage to achieve the effects we desire… This is the way life is designed by God to work. Make him and the glory of his Son central, and you get the practical effects thrown in. Make the practical effects central, and you lose both…. Crass materialism sustains very few marriages….  I want people to flourish in every way. I want the poor to rise into joyful, self-sustaining, productive work and stable households. Therefore, for the sake of these good effects of marriage, let it be heralded with joy that there are reasons for marriage that are vastly more important.

Marriage is not mainly about prospering economically; it is mainly about displaying the covenant-keeping love between Christ and his church. Knowing Christ is more important than making a living. Treasuring Christ is more important than bearing children….

If we make secondary things primary, they cease to be secondary and become idolatrous. They have their place. But they are not first, and they are not guaranteed. Life is precarious, and even if it is long by human standards, it is short. “What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes” (James 4:14)….

So it is with marriage. It is a momentary gift. It may last a lifetime, or it may be snatched away on the honeymoon. Either way, it is short. It may have many bright days, or it may be covered with clouds. If we make secondary things primary, we will be embittered at the sorrows we must face. But if we set our face to make of marriage mainly what God designed it to be, no sorrows and no calamities can stand in our way. Every one of them will be, not an obstacle to success, but a way to succeed. The beauty of the covenant-keeping love between Christ and his church shines brightest when nothing but Christ can sustain it.

(Piper, This Momentary Marriage, p177-178 – available to download free here)

And for an example of a very unpragmatic, stunningly Christ-displaying marriage…