The declaration, “What God has joined together, let no one separate,” is often pronounced during a Christian wedding ceremony. These words convey the expectation that a married couple will remain together until parted by death and that, because God has joined them together, becoming separated by other people – i.e., getting a divorce– is neither a threat nor an option.
In their eagerness to marry, many people don’t examine or grasp the powerful meaning of those words. They don’t consider whether their relationship can bear the burden the declaration places on a married couple.
To determine whether their marriage will be a covenant or contract, they should ask:
- How do we know that God is joining us together?
- Have we asked God if He approves of our relationship?
- Will we marry under a spiritual covenant established by God or a legal contract approved by human beings?
The God-Ordained Marriage Covenant
The answers to the above questions are essential for a couple who wants a God-ordained marriage covenant. They must seek the will of God and His blessing to determine if He is joining them in marriage or if they are joining themselves.
The marital relationship supersedes all other human relationships – even that of parent and child. A married man and woman become one flesh in marriage. As stated in Genesis 2:24, for a married couple to become one flesh, the man must leave his parents so that he can fully bond – become one flesh — with his wife.
But before they can become one flesh in marriage, they must be of one Spirit – God’s Spirit – for their union to stand as a covenant.
Be Fruitful, Prosperous, and Rule Over the Earth
God created the human being in His image and commissioned humankind to enjoy fruitfulness, prosperity, and rulership over the earth. He instituted marriage as the vehicle through which men and women, jointly and equally, could fulfill the purposes for which He created us.
When God created the human being, He proclaimed:
“Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground” (Genesis 1:28).
Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food” (Genesis 1:29).
To enable us to fulfill our duties to be fruitful, prosperous, and rule over the earth, God gave human beings life-reproducing capacity. Our ability to reproduce other human beings is one of our most sacred connections to God, the Creator and Giver of life. In fulfilling our God-given purpose, human beings must be able to reproduce other human beings.
Reproducing offspring requires a sexual act between a man and a woman. (This is still inarguably the case, even in the face of scientific interference in the natural reproductive process. Even though people can achieve fertilization without direct sexual contact between a man and a woman, sex cells from each gender are needed to make a new human being. And the womb of the woman is still essential to carry and nurture a fetus until a baby is born.)
Godly Offspring
Think about this: If human beings cannot reproduce, we cannot increase in number. Then we would not be able to rule over the earth because animals and vegetation would overwhelm the land and human beings. We would be too few to compete for the earth’s resources. And without rulership, we could not prosper from its bounty. It is the natural order that the dominant group rules over resources and benefits more than subordinate groups. Human beings could not have dominion over the earth without our continuously increasing in number and replenishing the human population.
The ability to procreate through sexual intercourse is God’s gift to humankind. God designed sex to achieve the deepest levels of intimacy and pleasure between a man and a woman. He also engineered the human body so that sexual intercourse between men and women results in our offspring.
And herein lies the most sacred commission for human beings: To produce godly offspring. For this is what God desires:
“Has not the LORD made them one, having a portion of the spirit [the residue of the breath of life]? And why one? Because He seeks godly offspring.” (Malachi 2:15, BSB).
God expects men and women to have a spiritual connection with Him so we can produce godly offspring within marriage.
What God Has Joined Together, Let No One Separate
“What God has joined together, let no one separate” is the foundation of the marriage covenant. Once married, the children of God cannot be separated physically or spiritually.
Physically, the couple who marries under a covenant and not just a legal contract lives and functions as one flesh. And their offspring are the product of their genetic material, which makes up their flesh. Their DNA — their flesh — cannot be separated once combined to make their children.
But the most powerful and beautiful reality of “What God has joined together, let no one separate” is this: God and His children are inseparable. Therefore, because they are one in Spirit with God and each other, a God-joined married couple cannot be spiritually separated.
When a man and woman are born of God, they are already of one Spirit before they marry. And no one can separate God from Himself. “…if we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot disown Himself” (2 Timothy 2:13).
Once God joins His children in marriage, they exist and function in oneness, in Spirit and flesh. And their marriage covenant stands on the foundation: “What God has joined together, let no one separate.”
Next: What God Has Joined Together: Marriage from Moses to Messiah
In the next article, we will examine marriage as a legal contract versus a spiritual marriage covenant.
We will examine questions such as:
- What does “What God has joined together, let no one separate” mean under the Law of Moses?
- What new understanding did Messiah Yeshua give about the marriage covenant?
- Is the marriage covenant the same under the New Covenant as it was under the Old Covenant?
