Continue to love each other with true Christian love. Don’t forget to show hospitality to strangers, for some who have done this have entertained angels without realizing it! Don’t forget about those in prison. Suffer with them as though you were there yourself. Share the sorrow of those being mistreated, as though you feel their pain in your own bodies. Give honor to marriage, and remain faithful to one another in marriage. God will surely judge people who are immoral and those who commit adultery. Stay away from the love of money; be satisfied with what you have. For God has said, “I will never fail you. I will never forsake you.”
Hebrews 13:1-5
Hebrews is an epistle written to Jewish Christians. The recipients of this letter had grown up under the Jewish Law. At some point they had ‘crossed over’ (that is the meaning of the word Hebrew) from Judaism (the Law) to Christianity (belief in Jesus Christ and God’s grace). Some of these Jewish Christians were considering returning to their Jewish practices, traditions and beliefs. After presenting the arguments for remaining faithful to Christianity … Jesus Christ is better than Moses, angels or the Levitical priesthood … the Hebrew author concludes with words of encouragement regarding their every day life. Isn’t it interesting that in the early church, just as today, there was a need to defend the institution of marriage?
Marriage is the foundation of the family. The disintegration of the family we see in society today is because we have gotten soft on this foundational principle. One man … one woman … united in holy matrimony before God. Anything else is sin and all sin requires the blood covering of Jesus Christ. Premarital sex … teen pregnancy … living together … unfaithfulness … STDs … divorce … homosexuality. These are all sin and/or the consequences of sin yet none are beyond the reach of God’s grace. Therefore I encourage you, as the Hebrew writer did. Don’t cross over to the ways of the world.
“Give honor to marriage, and remain faithful to one another…”
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