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 In other words, Jesus came not only to fulfill the law in his own work, he came to take his people to a radical understanding of the law and a radical obedience to the law that is not based on law but on himself, and therefore reflects the fullness of what God wills for us - and especially reflects the gospel, the covenant-keeping work of Christ at Calvary for his church.  Marriage among Christians is mainly meant to tell the truth about the gospel - that Christ died for his church who loves him and never breaks his covenant with his bride.

In essence, Jesus says, 'You have heard that it was said, 'You are permitted to divorce.'  But I say to you, 'I have come to conquer the hardness of your heart.  I have come to die for your sins.  I have come to count you as righteous.  I have come to show you the drama that marriage was meant to represent in my sacrificial, covenant-keeping love for my sinful bride.  I have come to give you the power to stay married, or to stay single, so that either way you keep your promises and show what my covenant is like and how sacred is the covenant bond of marriage.

 John Piper

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On Divorce: …Clearly Jesus sees a tension between Deuteronomy 24 and Genesis 1-2.  The but at the beginning of verse 6 ('But from the beginning of Creation…') means: God's will about divorce in Genesis 1-2 is not the same as his will expressed in Deuteronomy 24.  So the question is:  Which way will Jesus go?  Will he say, 'Well, there is still hardness of heart today, even in my disciples, and so Deuteronomy expresses God's will for my followers today'?  Or will he say, "I am the Messiah, the Christ.  The Son of Man has come into the world to gather a people who by faith in him and union with him display the true meaning of marriage in the way they keep their marriage covenant'?  Will the emphasis fall on the fact that in the church there is still hardness of heart, or will the emphasis fall on the fact that the old has passed away and the new has come (2 Cor. 5:17)?

John Piper

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"Be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives." If you didn't care about the Bible, you might say, "Submission has to mean taking a husband the way he is and not trying to change him."  But if you believe what the Bible says, you conclude that submission, paradoxically, is sometimes a strategy for changing him.

John Piper

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STAYING SINGLE TO SHOW THE TRUTH.

Keep your marriage vows in such a way as to tell the truth about the unbreakable covenant love of Christ.  But to close this chapter, I want to emphasize that what Jesus says here in Mark 10:10-12 is incredibly good news - even to those who have been divorced and are remarried.  Here's why:  Jesus says, 'Don't divorce your spouse and marry someone else.  If you do, you've committed adultery."  Why is it adultery?  Ultimately, it is adultery because it betrays the truth about Christ that marriage is meant to display.  Jesus never, never does that to his bride, the church.  He never forsakes her.  He never abandons her.  He never abuses her.  He always loves her.  He always takes her back when she wanders.  He always is patient with her.  He always cares for her and provides for her and protects her and, wonder of wonders, delights in her.  And you - you who are married once, married five times, married never - if you repent and trust Christ - receive him as the Treasure who bore your punishment and became your righteousness - you are in the bride. And this is how he relates to you. ….The radical call of Jesus never to divorce and remarry is a declaration of the gospel by which people who have failed may be saved.  If  Christ were not this way, we would all be undone.  But this is how true, how faithful, how forgiving he is.  Therefore, we are saved.

John Piper

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One of the emphases so far in this book has been that staying married is not mainly about staying in love, but about keeping covenant.  We did eventually come around to saying that precisely by this unwavering covenant-keeping the possibility of being profoundly in love in forty years is much greater than if you think the task of marriage is first staying in love.  Keeping first things first makes second things better.  Staying in love isn't the first task of marriage.  It is a happy overflow of covenant-keeping for Christ's sake.

- John Piper

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When Christ divorces we may....…if Christ ever abandons and discards his church, then a man may divorce his wife.  And if the blood-bought church, under the new covenant, ever ceases to be the bride of Christ, then a wife may legitimately divorce her husband.  But as long as Christ keeps his covenant with the church, and as long as the church, by the omnipotent grace of God, remains the chosen people of Christ, then the very meaning of marriage will include: What God has joined, only God can separate.

 

John Piper

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It is not enough to say, 'Serve one another.' That is true of Christ and his church - they serve each other.  But they do not serve each other in all the same ways.  Christ is Christ.  We are the church.  To confuse the distinctions would be doctrinally and spiritually devastating.  So also the man is the Christ-portraying husband, and the woman is the church portraying wife.  And to confuse these God-intended distinctions, or to abandon them, results in more disillusionment and more divorce and more devastation.  

One of the things that is crystal-clear in Ephesians 5 is that the roles of husband and wife in marriage are not arbitrarily assigned, and they are not reversible any more than the role of Christ and the church are reversible.  The roles of husband and wife are rooted in the distinctive roles of Christ and his church.  The revelation of this mystery is the recovery of the original intention of covenant marriage in the Garden of Eden. 

You can see this more clearly when you ponder what sin did to headship and submission and how Paul's teaching here in Ephesians 5 is so perfectly suited to remedy that corruption.  When sin entered the world, it ruined the harmony of marriage not because it brought headship and submission into existence, but because it twisted man's humble loving headship toward hostile domination in some men and lazy indifference in others.  And it twisted woman's intelligent, willing, happy, creative, articulate submission toward manipulative obsequiousness in some women and brazen insubordination in others.  Sin didn't create headship and submission; it ruined them and distorted them and made them ugly and destructive.

Now if this is true, then the redemption we anticipate with the coming of Christ is not the dismantling of the original, created order of loving headship and willing submission, but a recovery of it from the ravages of sin.  And that's exactly what we find in Ephesians 5:21-33, Wives, let your fallen submission be redeemed by modeling it after God's intention for the church!  Husbands, let your fallen headship be redeemed by modeling it after God's intention for Christ!

John Piper