Marriage is Serious

The disciples said to [Jesus], “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry.” Matthew 19:10

Most Christian college kids are very eager for marriage, and make no mistake, that is a good thing. We have a natural, God-given desire for sex and an intimate relationship with someone. But I think  many Christians don't understand how weighty a matter marriage is and are going into it hopelessly unprepared. After Jesus finished giving some of His standards for marriage His disciples concluded that it was better not to marry in the first place. God gave detailed instructions as to how families are to order themselves in order to best reflect His design and when we marry we have a responsibility to follow them. And in order to be able to follow His commands we have to know what He has commanded. Ephesians 5 is one place that addresses how a husband and wife should treat each other:

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband. Eph 5:22-33

Men are to lead as Christ leads the Church, giving himself up for his wife. Women are to humbly submit in everything to the God-given authority of their husband, as the Church submits to Christ.

Interestingly enough, Paul specifically identifies the marriage covenant as analogous with the covenant between Christ and Church. To marry is to bear the image of Christ's relationship with His Church. This is no small privilege, but it's also a significant responsibility.

This is why God so hates divorce, because it breaks a union that is supposed to be inseparable.
Divorce is an unimaginable evil that separates what God had joined together. In marriage God makes the two, one. In divorce, that new one flesh is torn apart, mortally wounded.