Marriage, Conception, Divorce and Sex—All My Blogs

Over the past several years I have written extensively about marriage, defined by our Creator as the life-long union of one man and one woman. Related topics covered include commitment, sexuality, relationship, the worship of sex, adultery, divorce and forgiveness. Following is a list of the various blogs. Insert their titles into SEARCH THIS BLOG to find them.

Marriage

• God created us male and female
• Guidance on beginning a new marriage: Leave, Cleave and Weave
• Compatibility in marriage
• The relational purpose of marriage
• The cross of marriage
• Marriage is the bedrock of family and community life
• Christ's secret marriage plan
• New revelations about the mystery of marriage
• Marriage: one plus one equals one
• The Christian view of single life

Conception and contraception

• Human life begins with conception
• Mary and Joseph never had sex
• One-step contraception—OK?
• Lutheran support of contraception

Conflict and divorce

• Marriage is no garden of Eden
• How to deal with selfishness in marriage
• Adultery: easier to commit than explain
• The pain and suffering of divorce
• The tragedy of divorce
• More on the Christian view of divorce

Forbidden relationships and the worship of sex

• The dark prince is behind the confusion
• The march into darkness: the worship of sex
• The leaven of immorality
• Forbidden sexual relationships and marriages
• Another look at capital punishment
• Dogs, pigs and addictions

If you study these blogs and the links to Holy Scripture provided in them it will become very clear that the LORD and Creator of all has defined marriage as the union of one MAN and one WOMAN. No other definition is available. Further, it is clear that sex belongs within marriage and never outside. From these guideline flows everything the Creator has to say about children, family and home. To reject this understanding is to reject the authority of Holy Scripture.

In my next blogs I want to trace the history of how we in the United States came to re-define marriage. When did this begin? And why?

Is It A Good Thing To Have A Large Family?

In my last post I quoted remarks by Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod president Matt Harrison as he discussed the Biblical encouragement to "be fruitful and multiply" (Genesis 1:22). I focus today on the final sentences of that quote.

However, I think it's time for us to preach "Be fruitful and multiply." That's what the Bible says. And we ought to encourage young people and families who have the ability to have families. And encourage them. 

The church needs to be a place... It's no time to despise family ministries. It's no time to despise those kind of diakonic efforts in the church to care for marriages and families, etc. It's time to redouble our efforts in those areas and it's time to speak clearly that it's a good thing to have a large Lutheran orthodox family. If Muslims are having an average of 4.2 children a piece and we're having 2.1 children a piece, I would say God would be really happy if we'd bump it up to at least 4.2 per family. Don't quote me on that. [Laughter]

In my own life, Sylvia and I decided not to limit the number of children we would have. We were convinced that the LORD would provide. However, He declared, after a couple miscarriages, that we were to have three precious and wonderful children. We now have six grandchildren and one beautiful great-grandson. By the way, I write to and about him in another of my blogs, Dear Byron.

Contraception, the process of preventing child birth, in one form or another has been in existence for as long as humans have given birth, writes Caroline Collard. She says,

It was the ancient Greeks who first realised that male and female union caused pregnancy and since then many methods have been used with varying degrees of success. A wide range of products have been used as barriers such as lemon juice and essence from mahogany husks, acacia tree and honey, oil of cedar and lead ointment, frankincense and olive oil, salt, cabbage or willow leaves, onion juice, peppermint oil and, soft wool. Since most of these are either quite acidic or quite alkaline, it is quite likely that they all offered some degree of protection, in fact it is quite surprising how effective some of them could have been, although they would not have been as reliable as the methods that we use today. The first suppository that was commercially produced was developed in England by Walter Rendell, it was made of cocoa butter and quinine sulphate. Pessaries, suppositaries and spermicides are still in use today, unfortunately they are not the best forms available partly because they need to be inserted as near the time of intercourse as possible, this is not always easy to judge. However, they are often used in conjunction with other methods, particularly the diaphragm and as such prove quite useful. Vaginal douches have been used after intercourse since the 1600s, however, they do not seem to be at all effective.

She continues with what appears to be a carefully researched and detailed history of the subject. She concludes,

More recent methods are the injectable contraception, hormonal vaginal rings, skins patches and gels, nasal sprays, contraceptive vaccines and the male pill. Obviously research still goes in many areas and presumably always will unless the population starts to rapidly decline and there is an ever increasing range of options available which are also getting safer and more reliable. Despite this, many of the methods that have been used for many hundreds of years are still very popular and presumably will continue to be so.

For more on the history of contraception and related information see FPA, the sexual health charity of the UK.

All this takes us back to Dr. Harrison's encouragement and the question, Would God really be happy if we Lutherans bump up our conception rate to 4.2 per family like the Muslims? Frankly, I do not know how to speak for God on this matter. Dr. Harrison's remarks puzzle me, especially since I understand from Holy Scripture that children are gifts, not decisions we make to conceive. Doubtless our LORD permits us to participate in His creative activities (Genesis 1:22; 1 Cor. 3:9; 2 Cor.6:1). Does that mean He gives us the power to prevent Him from creating children? Perhaps we all need to rethink the entire question.

For today, consider this Psalm:

Children are a gift from the LORD; they are a reward from him. Children born to a young man are like arrows in a warrior's hands. How joyful is the man whose quiver is full of them! He will not be put to shame when he confronts his accusers at the city gates. - Psa 127:3-5 NLT

Birthrates and Procreation: State or Church Issues?

John Ibbitson of the Canadian The Globe and Mail: asks the following question:

Does the state have a role in promoting married family life? 

. . . two facts remain: First, our underfunded pension schemes and skyrocketing health-care costs stem in part from the simple fact that, sometime around 1970, Canadians stopped having the necessary 2.1 children per woman needed to sustain the population.

Second, an increasing number of children are raised in single-parent environments, which places them at greater risk of poverty, poor nutrition and inadequate education. 

“Although there are always exceptions ... most scientists who study these questions would say that the stable two-parent family is better than the alternative,” Prof. Wilcox observes.

The same questions apply to the U.S. The U.S. birth rate is down to its lowest in at least a century. A Huffington Post report indicates the 2010 birth rate fell to 13.5 for every 1,000. Compare that to 30 in 1909, the year after my mother was born. When I was born in the 1930s it dipped below 20 per 1,000 and did not rise above that level until the early 1940s.

An October, 2011 NY Times report suggests that women are putting off having babies while the economy is weak.

The link between financial distress and lower rates of childbirth surfaced clearly in the regional data. North Dakota, with one of the lowest unemployment rates in 2008, about 3 percent, was one of two states to show a slight increase in its birth rate from 2008 to 2009. The other was Maine. 

In all other states, birth rates declined, said Gretchen Livingston, the lead author of the report. Arizona had the deepest decline in its birth rate, down by 7.2 percent.

All this raises yet again the issue of family planning and birth control. It is at this point that church and state inevitably tangle. This surfaces mainly when the state legislates the distribution of contraceptives, maternity care and family planning. In poor countries, like the Philippines where population is in runaway mode the Catholic Church views such laws as attacks on life and gateways to legalizing abortion.

If you are a Lutheran Christian you may wonder if all Lutherans agree that contraception is always a private matter and OK. Or do some Lutherans agree with the Catholic Church's view that all forms of contraception must be forbidden? Here's a website that discusses the issues from a confessional Lutheran perspective. It is called Lutherans and Procreation. One post on that site quotes Lutheran Church —Missouri Synod's president Matt Harrison discussing the Biblical encouragement to "be fruitful and multiply" (Genesis 1:22).

There are three things that are really hitting the Missouri Synod as much as anything. We're doing, I mean we're doing better than a lot of churches of course. But we've had a continuous slow decline over the last 50-40 years. I think 30 years ago was the last recorded yearly increase in our membership. Forty years ago, says Larry. That's all right, he'll, as he becomes president and becomes more and more of a fundraiser he'll become less and less of a historian. [Laughter] 

The biggest challenge we face is the birthrate. The birthrate of the Missouri Synod that is overwhelmingly white, descendent of European people in this synod - the birthrate of our church body has simply followed, mirrored, the broader birthrate of the United States among descendants of northern Europeans. That's a fact. There's hardly a single family out there that you're related to that has more children in the latest generation than it did in the previous generation. Now, do I expect any wholesale turnaround in this phenomenon? No, I don't. There are all kinds of intense pressures upon us. However, I think it's time for us to preach "Be fruitful and multiply." That's what the Bible says. And we ought to encourage young people and families who have the ability to have families. And encourage them. 

The church needs to be a place... It's no time to despise family ministries. It's no time to despise those kind of diakonic efforts in the church to care for marriages and families, etc. It's time to redouble our efforts in those areas and it's time to speak clearly that it's a good thing to have a large Lutheran orthodox family. If Muslims are having an average of 4.2 children a piece and we're having 2.1 children a piece, I would say God would be really happy if we'd bump it up to at least 4.2 per family. Don't quote me on that. [Laughter]

I'll take a look at his remarks and the issue of family planning in my next posts. You are always welcome to join in.

More On Human Conception And Plan B

In my last post I shared research about Americans of all ages having premarital sex. This brought up the question of Plan B one-step contraception, a pill opposed by many in the Christian community. The controversy stems from the long-held debate about when human life begins.

The pill works by elevating a female hormone called levenorgestrel. The hormone causes extra mucous to be released along the uterine wall, which prevents ovulation and fertilization if taken within 72 hours of unprotected intercourse. Discovery Health explains how Plan B works. They also tell us that . . .

"scientists aren't completely sure how it works, they believe that levonorgestrel prevents pregnancy either by stopping the ovulation process or by disrupting the ability of sperm and egg to meet in the fallopian tubes. Some speculate that the drug may prevent the fertilized egg from implanting as well, perhaps by making the uterine lining less receptive to the egg."

There is also a levonorgestrel intrauterine system, a plastic device that can be placed in the uterus where it slowly releases the hormone to prevent pregnancy for up to 5 years. This progestin hormone does not contain estrogen.

There are numerous possible side effects to the use of levonorgestrel. The medication should not be used if a woman has abnormal vaginal bleeding, pelvic infections and a variety of other situations. The intrauterine system can cause cramps, pelvic pain, heavy bleeding, fever, chills, etc. All these are matters that must be discussed with medically trained personnel.

By the way, Plan B is not the same as RU-486 or mifepristone, a completely different drug that performs a chemical abortion in women who are up to 8 weeks pregnant.

The central moral issue in this discussion is whether the Plan B process prevents sperm from fertilizing eggs, or whether the process takes a life. If indeed human life begins with conception, the union of sperm and egg, then the Plan B pill is potentially killing innocent human lives. It is a form of abortion. Dr. David Menton, in Answers in Genesis asks, Plan B—Over-The-Counter Abortion? He answers with a detailed outline of birth control pills and the process from fertilization to implantation. He says that some medical dictionaries have changed the definition of conception.

Medical embryology textbooks have long equated fertilization with conception and thus the beginning of a new human life. Essentially all dictionaries of the English language have defined “conception” as “the fertilization of an egg by a sperm.” But some within the scientific community are now changing the definition by shifting the moment of conception (and thus pregnancy) from fertilization to implantation. Stedman’s Medical Dictionary, for example, now defines conception as “the implantation of the blastocyte in the endometrium” (27th Edition, Lippincott Williams & Wilkins). By this new definition, a drug or procedure that prevents implantation of the embryo would simply prevent conception and pregnancy, and thus it would not be considered an abortion. 

Dr. Gene Rudd, an obstetrician and associate director of the Christian Medical Association, has pointed out that the packaging information for Plan B violates the vital medical principle of informed consent because it “falsely assures women that they are not taking the life of a human being when they take the pill.” Dr. Rudd said that “while some within the scientific community have obfuscated for political reasons the terms associated with early human development, a significant percentage of women still consider pregnancy to begin with fertilization.”

Dr. Menton concludes that children are God's precious gift and quotes some Bible verses, but it seems to me that he still does not adequately answer the question of when human life begins from a biblical viewpoint. I'll go into more detail in my next post.

One-Step Contraception—OK?

Pastors often tell me they seldom if ever counsel with couples planning marriage who have either not been living together or have never had sexual relationships or both. Virginity before marriage is almost an unknown phenomenon. WebMD Health News five years ago reported the same.

Dec. 20, 2006 -- Almost all Americans have sex before marrying, according to premarital sex research that shows such behavior is the norm in the U.S. and has been for the past 50 years.

The new study shows that by age 20, 75% of Americans have had premarital sex. That number rises to 95% by age 44.

Even among those who abstained from sex until 20 or beyond, 81% have had premarital sex by 44, the survey shows.

Premarital sex is  normal behavior for the vast majority of Americans. The study quoted was published in Public Health Reports and based upon six cycles of the National Survey of Family Growth from 1982 to 2008. 

Despite the opinion that many of us have, these surveys say that the number of Americans having premarital sex hasn't changed much since the 1940s. We are waiting longer to get married, however. So we Americans are sexually active and unmarried for longer than in the past. And only 2-3% of us between 25 and 44 have not had vaginal sex.

In the light of this research Lawrence Finer, director of domestic research at the Guttmacher Institute, questioned the government's funding of abstinence-only-until-marriage programs for 12-29 year olds. He said it would be more effective to provide young people with skills and information they need to be safe once they become sexually active. Continued research published by the Healthy Teen Network supports his conclusions. Well over $1 billion in federal funds have been spent for such programs teaching abstinence as the only certain way to avoid out-of-wedlock pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and AIDS. However, federally funded programs have had little effect upon high school pregnancy. For instance,

• Analysis of data from Youth Risk Behavior surveys found that sexual activity among high school youth declined significantly from 1991 to 1997, prior to large-scale funding of abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, but changed little from 1999 to 2003 with federal funding of such programs.

• The U.S. has the highest rates of teen pregnancy and STIs compared with other developed nations.

• In the Netherlands,Germany and France, adolescent sexual development is viewed as a normal, healthy biological, social, emotional and cultural process. Education focuses on making informed choices and on sexual responsibility.

These studies go on to point out that teen pregnancy is 9 times higher in the U.S. than in the Netherlands and the teen birth rate is about 5 times higher in the U.S. than in France. For these and related reasons the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommended that Plan B One-Step emergency contraception (levonorgestrel) be available for people under 17. It is already available for women under 17 with a prescription, and behind the counter, once age is verified, for those 17 and older. However, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services did not accept the recommendation. Opponents to the idea say that such a decision would expose girls and women to potential risks from taking high doses of a potent hormone, interfere with parents' ability to monitor their children and make it easier for men to prey on vulnerable minors.

I want to discuss these issues in upcoming posts in the light of Holy Scripture and welcome your input.

Lutheran Support Of Contraception

The Lutheran position on the issue of contraception is quite direct, emphasizing no basic objections: 

". . .in the absence of Scriptural prohibition, there need be no objection to contraception within a marital union which is, as a whole, fruitful. Moreover, once we grant the appropriateness of contraception, we also recognize that sterilization may under some circumstances be an acceptable form of contraception. Because of its relatively permanent nature, sterilization is perhaps less desirable than less-far-reaching forms of contraception. However, there should be no moral objection to it, especially for couples who already have children and who now seek to devote themselves to the rearing of those children, for those who have been advised by a physician that the birth of another child would be hazardous to the health of the mother, or for those who for reasons of age, physical disability or illness are not able to care for additional children. Indeed, there may be special circumstances which would persuade a Christian husband and wife that it would be more responsible and helpful to all concerned, under God, not to have children" (Human Sexuality: A Theological Perspective, pp.19-20).

However that is not the final word, for there are other views among Christian moral theologians, most notably Roman Catholic. The Catholic Church is morally opposed to artificial contraception and orgasmic acts outside of the context of marital intercourse. This was basically affirmed by Pope Paul VI in his 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae (Of Human Life). The only form of contraception permitted is abstinence or Natural Family Planning (NFP). NFP limits sexual intercourse to naturally infertile periods, portions of the menstrual cycle, during pregnancy and after menopause. Other forms of artificial contraception are strictly forbidden.


The 1987 document Donum Vitae (Gift of Life - respect for the dignity of human procreation) also opposes in-vitro fertilization on grounds that it is harmful to embryos, since some are always destroyed. Later on the 2008 instruction Dignitas Personae (Dignity of A Person—from conception to death) denounces embryonic manipulations and new methods of contraception.


It is unwise to simply write off these documents because you are not Roman Catholic. There is much that any of us may learn from reading and pondering them. For instance, Dignitas Personae emphasizes that . . .

"The body of a human being, from the very first stages of its existence, can never be reduced merely to a group of cells. . . from the moment the zygote has formed, (it) demands the unconditional respect that is morally due to the human being in his bodily and spiritual totality."

This teaching is quite in line with millions of us Lutherans and conservative Protestants who oppose abortion.


The study also emphasizes the dignity of every human being: 

"At every stage of his existence, man, created in the image and likeness of God, reflects “the face of his Only-begotten Son… This boundless and almost incomprehensible love of God for the human being reveals the degree to which the human person deserves to be loved in himself, independently of any other consideration —intelligence, beauty, health, youth, integrity, and so forth. In short, human life is always a good, for it ‘is a manifestation of God in the world, a sign of his presence, a trace of his glory’ (Evangelium vitae, 34)”.

I can only commend these documents to your personal study. There is much you can learn from them, even though you may, along with myself and most Lutherans, have problems with the complete prohibition of in-vitro fertilization and all forms of contraception.


In these posts I do not intend to deal with these matters in great detail as I move through this abbreviated study of human sexuality and the purposes of marriage. In my next blog I'll discuss what is usually called the third purpose of marriage, a negative one, namely marriage as a restraint of sin.