Signs of the Time

From an MSNBC article about the royal couple:  “The modern-day tolerance of William and Middleton's living arrangements, many say, just brings the House of Windsor in line with the times.”

My what ‘tolerant’ times we do live in. Is that biblically correct?  I can find quite a few verses advocating morality, can one be given to advocate fornication?

As for “in line with the times,” those words appear in a good many places, but what is the definition? Does that mean tossing out items from previous times and starting new?  Why?

If that were the way we raised children, would we need to ignore that previous generations learned when best to introduce solid foods, and what foods should be introduced first.  Start them off on spicy foods because that’s “in line with the times?”  OK, so maybe we really do need a sarcasm font so it’s obvious that’s where I’m going.

For those who believe in God and strive to live by His word, there are some absolute truths.  Whether it is called fornication, living together, shacking up, one-night-stand that stretches, why is its rejection being called “intolerant”?  Why, if it is working so well and tolerated by “the times”, are William and Kate marrying?  Why not continue living together, as they have in the past?  If it is tolerated short term, why is it not acceptable for the long term?  Is that not “in line with the times”?

There are tons more questions I could ask, most of them rhetorical. But my own answers are tied to scriptures God introduced:

Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. (Genesis 2:24 KJV)

Christ endorsed:

And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. (Matthew 19:4-6 KJV)

Paul used the joining as an example:

What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh. (1 Corinthians 6:16 KJV)

How then about the argument that young people cannot control their sexual drive and must give in.  Have they not read – or been taught:

There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it. (1 Corinthians 10:13 KJV)

It is a matter of setting personal goals and standards that do not fluctuate “with the times.”  I know people who have set them – some have failed, but the majority did not.  Those who failed spent a great deal of time with others who encouraged their fall.  Those who did not fail placed purity above friendships and peer pressure.

Those who did not fail are looking at marriage as a life-time commitment.  Their marriage contains the goal of sharing their children and subsequent generations together, not dividing holidays between mom and dad and half/step siblings.  I looked at a photograph today of half-sisters who love each other, but each has a parent not welcome in the home of the other parent.  A part of their life that cannot be shared in their love for each other because at least one parent did not work at marriage as a life-time commitment.

I feel strongly about this.  There is very little special about me except as seen through the eyes of my husband.  Special enough that soon we will have lived through fifty years of marriage.  All of our children come to one house to see their parents.  We have dinner and games every Thursday night with six other couples who have achieved the same anniversary, some surpassing that half-century mark.

How are we different?  The answer apparently is not “in line with the times.”