Good information on 'Born Gay' Studies

[Floatingaxe]

God performed the very first marriage ceremony--He instituted it. No one has the right to remove it from His domain, and make something perverse out of it.

[billie]

God created marriage. God owns marriage. You're right, Eve. No religion owns it. He owns it. It's a gift from Him to us, so we could experience oneness as husband and wife, just as He experiences Oneness in three in the Trinity. Our faith and the idea of marriage both come from the same source: God.

I know what you mean: you believe that God created the world & everything in it, so that he created marraige for everyone. What I mean is that, historically, I don't think it's possible to believe that the world and all its cultures are 6000 years old, because we have evidence of cultures going back much longer than that. Ancient China, India, Malaysia, Nepal, Germany et al had concepts of marraige, which most certainly didn't stem from Judaism or Christianity. Now. If you believe this, it might still be possible to argue that God created the world and marriage in a different time-frame; but I don't think that adequately explains the cultural differences of the idea.

Who said anything about 6000 years? I don't believe that.

[secondeve]

Who said anything about 6000 years? I don't believe that.

I know. I meant it like this: if you believe God started up humanity and gave marriage to Adam and Eve 6000 years ago, which is approximately when Biblical events took place if you do the math and count back, regardless of theories about millions of years passing during creation or between the first seven days or whathaveyou, 6000 years for the first marriage doesn't work, because we know archiologically that there were civilisations thousands of years older than this. Ergo, man either didn't come about 6000 years ago and coutning back through Biblical years is inaccurate, which suggests that the Bible is wrong on this count, or Adam and Eve weren't the first humans to get the idea of marraige from God. See?

[Floatingaxe]

Nevertheless, marriage is a God-instituted union of a man and a woman.

[billie]

Yeah, I see. 6000 years never did sit right with me either. But, Axe, you're right, all comes from God.

[secondeve]

Nevertheless, marriage is a God-instituted union of a man and a woman.

Possibly. But if the first concept of marriage given to humans was the kind practised by, for example, the ancient Assyrians, then does that/should it broaden the current Christian ideas on what marriage means to God?

[billie]

No, Eve, because what always happens with things God gives man is, in our fallen nature, we pervert it. Look at even some claiming to be Christian with 7 and 8 wives. Without God showing us what to do with what He gives us, we don't use it the right way.

[secondeve]

No, Eve, because what always happens with things God gives man is, in our fallen nature, we pervert it. Look at even some claiming to be Christian with 7 and 8 wives. Without God showing us what to do with what He gives us, we don't use it the right way.

But if marriage as first given to man isn't the marriage described in the Bible, how do Christians know that God thinks their way is the only way, or that another one might not be right?

[Floatingaxe]

The first marriage WAS the marriage between the first man and the first woman. WE think GOD's way is the only way.

[billie]

No, Eve, because what always happens with things God gives man is, in our fallen nature, we pervert it. Look at even some claiming to be Christian with 7 and 8 wives. Without God showing us what to do with what He gives us, we don't use it the right way.

But if marriage as first given to man isn't the marriage described in the Bible, how do Christians know that God thinks their way is the only way, or that another one might not be right?

The marriage first given to man is the marriage described in the Bible, Adam and Eve's. Again we come back to the Bible on this one. Marriage God's way's described in the Bible. I wish I could tell you in a way where I wouldn't have to use the Bible because I think that's what you were looking for originally, but it's so basic to our lives as Christians that it's difficult to do. It's God's Words for us.