Walking With Christ

(Part 1 of 12)

⚓ Floatie:  The Ideal We Keep Chasing

Genesis 2:24  Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.(ESV)

Marriage pain often carries a quiet accusation:  “If this were done right, it wouldn’t feel like this.”
Scripture does not support that accusation.  From the very beginning, marriage is introduced as something good, intentional, and designed by God—but never once as something we would see completed in a fallen world.  The problem is not that marriage is broken beyond repair.  The problem is that we keep expecting to witness a finished form that has never existed east of Eden.

This series begins with a hard truth that is also a merciful one:  There has never been a fully realized human marriage to imitate.

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✒️ Forge:  Why Scripture Withholds the Ideal

Eden Gives the Design, Not the Example

Genesis 2 gives us the design of marriage, not its history.  Adam and Eve experience unity, innocence, and mutual belonging—but only briefly.  Before marriage is lived, it is fractured.

The fall in Genesis 3 is not a side note.  It is the environment in which every marriage has existed since.

From that point forward:

• No marriage unfolds without fear.
• No union is untouched by distortion.
• No covenant exists without cost.

This is not because God failed to design marriage well.  It’s because sin entered the relational core of humanity immediately.

Why There Is No “Healthy Marriage” Model in Scripture

This is where many readers feel unsettled.

Scripture gives us:

• Faithful men with fractured households
• Courageous women trapped in relational distortion
• Marriages marked by favoritism, betrayal, silence, control, and grief

Consider the pattern:

• Genesis 3 (Adam and Eve)
• Genesis 12–21 (Abraham and Sarah)
• Genesis 29–35 (Jacob, Leah, and Rachel)
• 2 Samuel 11–20 (David’s household)
• Hosea 1–3 (faithfulness under betrayal)

These are not cautionary tales accidentally preserved.  They are diagnostic mirrors intentionally given.  If Scripture gave us one pristine example, we would turn it into a formula and condemn everyone who failed to replicate it.  Instead, Scripture points us forward, not backward.

The Ideal Is Eschatological, Not Historical

The Bible does not expect us to see perfect marriage.  It expects us to hope for it.

Marriage is introduced in Genesis, but it is fulfilled in Revelation (Revelation 19; Revelation 21).  Until then, marriage functions as a signpost—always pointing beyond itself.

That is why every human marriage feels unfinished.  Because it is.

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⚒️ Anvil:  What This Changes About How We Live

It Removes False Guilt

If no one has ever lived the ideal, then failure to reach it is not unique incompetence.  It is shared humanity.

Marriage struggle does not automatically mean:

• You chose the wrong person
• You failed God
• You lack faith

It means you are living east of Eden, like everyone else.

It Reframes Conflict

Conflict is not proof that love is absent.  Often, it is proof that two incomplete people are bound together without exits.

That binding exposes:

• Fear
• Pride
• Longing
• Control
• Shame

Marriage reveals what is already there.  It does not invent it.

It Protects Singles and the Divorced

If marriage is not the finished form, then singleness is not spiritual deficiency.  If marriage can fracture despite faithfulness, then divorce is not always moral collapse.

Scripture leaves room for:

• Faithful singleness (1 Corinthians 7)
• Faithful endurance
• Faithful release when covenant has already been shattered

This series will not pretend there is one relational path that proves obedience.

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🔥 Ember:  A Personal Word

I spent years believing that if I could just get marriage right, everything else would settle.  It didn’t.

What changed my marriage was not discovering the right technique.  It was realizing that I had been chasing a version of marriage no one has ever lived.

Once that illusion died, something better took its place:  faithfulness without fantasy.

That shift did not remove pain—but it gave pain meaning.

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🌿 Covenant Triumph:  Hope Without Illusion

Marriage is not meant to restore Eden.  Christ is.

Human marriage does not carry the weight of perfection.  It carries the privilege of pointing forward.

One day, the marriage we were never meant to see will be revealed in full.  Until then, every faithful step—married or single—is part of the preparation.

This series is not about fixing marriage.  It is about living faithfully east of Eden while we wait for what is still coming.

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[⚓ Floatie] [✒️ Forge] [⚒️ Anvil] [🔥 Ember] [🌿 Covenant Triumph]
This post follows the Forge Baseline Rule—layered truth for the discerning remnant.