God’s Design Of Marriage – Part 1 (Genesis 2:4-25)

Valley View Baptist Church                                                                 Pastor Curt Audet

6N656 Route 25                                                                                    March 15, 2026

St. Charles, IL  60174                                                                       VVBCIL.com

“God’s Design Of Marriage” Part 1 (Genesis 2:4-25)

6th in the message series Harbors For Our Soul

BI: God designed marriage to bless Man and Woman with fulfilling companionship and fruitful family life and faithful testimony to their Creator.

As we have been working our way through our series, Harbors For Our Soul, we have been recognizing from the book of Genesis foundational truths that not only inform us, but also change us as we put them to practice.  We are being exposed to God’s wisdom, design and intentional way for us to see and to live in the world. This is what we call a Biblical worldview.  For the disciples of Christ, these are conscious decisions we make to listen and follow God’s Word on the truth-for-living.

Like basic principles of safe boating in Lake Michigan, the plan for every ship—and for our illustration, every human life—is to not shipwreck, but instead experience deep joy in the journey of life. Shipwreck too often accompanies the idea human relationships.  .  You and I are learning how to protect our mind, our heart and our families from shipwrecking. But God has a design, and a plan:  Healthy, strong, enduring worshipping together marriage.  This is the ideal.  Hard heartedness often rips this apart.  Grace, forgiveness, humility and godly character can help to restore and rebuild.  This week and next week we will pursue this ideal at its beginning in Genesis.

Let me recognize that not everyone is married.  Some are widowed.  Some are divorced.  Some are single.  And some have no personal goal for marriage.   We can be faithful disciples of Christ in any of these scenarios. Whatever status we are in, think not just of our own situation.  As disciplers of others—think how you can pray for, encourage, build, counsel and strengthen marriages nearest to you.  You should desire a blessed voyage for every marriage.

Ways to avoid becoming a shipwreck statistic in Lake Michigan are well known to us now:

(1) Know where to find the safest harbors.

(2) Get to a safe harbor before its too late.

(3) Understand on-ship person-to-person communications

Everyone onboard works together to avoid shipwreck. Notice the screen (another type of ship!) and safety orange tags on the walls.

* The  bow is the front of the ship. Point 

* The stern is the back of the ship. Point. 

* Whose on the Starboard (right / steering) side? Report.

* Whose on the Port! (left / loading) side?  Report.

Like every ship set in open waters, lets focus every marriage begun on not shipwrecking.  Turn your attention please to Genesis 2:4-25.

⁴These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.

⁵ When no bush of the field was yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up—for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground, ⁶ and a mist was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground— ⁷ then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. ⁸ And the Lord God planted a –garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. ⁹And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

¹⁰ A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and there it divided and became four rivers. ¹¹ The name of the first is the Pishon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. ¹² And the gold of that land is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. ¹³ The name of the second river is the Gihon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Cush. ¹⁴ And the name of the third river is the Tigris, which flows east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.

¹⁵ The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. ¹⁶ And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, ¹⁷ but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” ¹⁸ Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” ¹⁹ Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. ²⁰ The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him. ²¹ So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. ²² And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. ²³ Then the man said, This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman,  because she was taken out of Man.” ²⁴ Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. ²⁵ And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.” (Genesis 2:4-25)

God’s Word                                     Cultural Idea

God designed, created the World.       The world evolved over millions of years.

God made humans male and female.   Genders are fluid and self-determined.

God made people in His image.          People evolved from other life forms.

Marriage is God’s design.                   Marriage = human idea. (Defined widely)

Marriage is holy, sacred.                     Marriage is not holy.

The perspective, lifeview, and worldview cannot be seen more different.   God’s plan is filled with hope. 

1.  “LORD God” created Man in the Garden of Eden. (v.4-9; 1:26-31)

Verse 4 gives us the overall summary of Genesis 1:1-2:3.  During chapter 1 all the way to chapter 2:3, God revealed something about Himself.   He introduced Himself with the same Hebrew word for God 35 times!   The only word He used until verse 2:4 was  “Elohim”.  This word begins as a general word “God” that is defined by His power emphasized by what God was doing.  The everlasting, Almighty Creator God of the universe!  He speaks! He commands!  And the Heavens and the Earth are born!

Following Creation, the focus slows down and shifts in 2:4 with finer detail of what occurred on Day 6 when “God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” (1:27).  Beginning in 2:4, God is described as “YHWH Elohim” Genesis 1:1-2:3 introduced God  using a general term for God (“Elohim”) created Man in His own abecause now God add another name of God in front of ‘Elohim”.  When you see the Word, LORD, this is the relational name for God.   We pronounce this word almost the way we breath: YHWH.  Or, YH (inhale), WH (exhale).  Yahweh. Why the switch from Elohim to Yahweh-Elohim?   This done to now empahasize the relationship God has with humanity.  This will be the primary terminology going forward in Genesis.

Creation took 6 days—and a 7^th day to gift by example—the principle of Sabbath Day-Rest. 144 hours of breakneck speed, precision and perfection forming all things out of nothing.  God the Holy Spirit hovered with anticipation to facilitate God the Son’s execution of God the Father’s spoken, sovereign plan for each day. Referencing Jesus Christ, three New Testament writers vividly describe this scene:  

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ²He was in the beginning with God. ³All things were made through Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made. ⁴In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. ⁵ The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it (John 1:1-5) . . .  ¹⁶For by [Jesus] all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through Him and for Him. ¹⁷And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together (Colossians 1:16-17) . . . ² [God the Father] appointed [Christ]the heir of all things, through whom also He created the world. ³He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature, and He upholds the universeby the word of His power.” (Hebrews 1:2-3)   

• The Garden Of Eden was Mankind’s first home. (v.9-17)

Genesis 2:4-25 is a slow-motion look at God creating and caring for humanity on Day 6 of Creation.  So precious.  So tender.  So, all that takes place here is during the 24 hour cycle of day 6.

• So Large, So Incredibly Beautiful! (v.11-14)

Four Rivers create the boundaries of this majestic garden.   Some estimate the Garden could be several hundred square miles big! The trick is that the Euphrates River and the Tigris River are well known and mapped and are located in and around Iran and Iraq and other nations. The Gihon River and the Pishon are largely unknown.  Just keep in mind that God’s amazing garden was likely to be bigger than all of Lake Michigan!  Think about this.   Two human inhabitants.   Thousands of beautiful as well as fruit bearing trees; fields, hills and lands filled with plants and flowers each bearing seed so they can reproduce across the earth. 

• Two Enigmatic Trees (v.9, 15-17)

It is very significant that God had put the Man in the Garden, and mentions in v. 8 that there are two very consequential trees that exist in the midst of the Garden.  The Garden was large; yet it was important for the Man and then, later God’s handiwork in Creation designed and engineered stretching as far as the eye can see!  And the Man—even before the Woman is made must know about these two trees.   The human beings were given trees of every fruit and beauty across the great Garden.  But there were two trees. 

First, ‘The Tree of Life’.   No warnings, or instructions are given with this tree.  It was one of the unnumerable Trees that the humans could eat—until something BIG happens (3:22-24).  This Tree will become a very significant throughout Scripture even into the Revelation, the last book of the Bible.

Second, the ‘Tree Of The Knowledge Of Good & Evil”, was a totally different matter.  This tree could never be eaten of without dire consequences. 

“And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, ¹⁷ but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (2:16-17)

Hold the presses!  Wait a minute!   This incredibly large, beautiful and awesome gift of the Garden is the same place where a warning of this magnitude comes?   Here is chapter 2:17 is the first mention of this things called “death”.  We will learn much of this in the next chapters.  And all it would take would be a simple bite of the presumably luscious fruit  of this tree to bring about death.  Of course, with all the great blessing and joys and gifts poured upon them, there practically NO WAY they would be eating the fruit of that tree any time soon.  Right?

• The Man was formed with the raw materials of the earth—like all the animals a day earlier. (2:7-8, 1:24-25)

God moved on the 5^th day to use the dirt, dust and soil of the earth; the nutrients, the chemical elements Oxygen (O), Carbon (C), Hydrogen (H), and Nitrogen (N) to form human bodies.  This accounts for 96%  total body of the human. The high mass percentage of Oxygen and Hydrogen is directly attributable to water (H₂O), the most abundant molecule in the body. Water accounts for 50% to 70% of an average adult’s body weight, making these two elements primary components of all biological fluids and cellular cytoplasm. Hydrogen is a necessary component of this universal solvent, which facilitates nutrient transport and body temperature regulation.

God tasked the Man with naming the animals.  This was part of Man’s role as stewards of God’s marvelous Creation.  I suppose as he saw a mate for each of the animals and birds, he may have felt of bit of loneliness.  Is there anyone for me?   Perhaps he was looking at this point for his match. Of course, he had perfect fellowship with God and no carnivores were there yet to eat him.  But God was helping him to see that there was even then an unmet need.  Still, shockingly, something was ‘not good’ in God’s ‘perfect’ Garden!

What?  The Man realized what most wise men realize:   It is not good for man to be alone.  God made us this way! And, He made a companion perfect for the man.   The bigger picture—which is part of our discussion on marriage is that She needed Him too.

• The Woman was uniquely designed and fashioned by God partly out of the Man. (2:18-23)

You have to see this.   This alone tells you the difference between a male and a female is not just visible parts.   Its DNA deep.  We do not determine our gender.  Neither does our doctor.  Nor, our parents.  God chooses your gender.  And your baby’s gender.  We can act out the other gender, but we can never be the other gender.  Man was formed with the soil—like clay pottery carefully shaped and breathed in with life. The focus in on the action of Creation.  Another word is used altogether to describe the Woman’s Creation. The Woman was fashioned. Woman was designed, engineered and built to specification to be the equal partner to the Man.   Perfection complement!  God even uses the Man’s rib rather than a clump of soil.  The first surgery ever done was done right here to prepare to build the Woman out of the Man’s side!  God could have just said, “Let their be Woman!” You know what would happen next.   But, the Man had the naming tour of all the creatures in the Garden—mainly to open him to the companion that God was giving to him, and to her.    There was something extraordinary in store for this Man and this Woman!  Men, value your wife over every human being on earth.  Women, honor your husband over every human being on earth.  This is the design.

Conclusion of (Part 1): The very first ‘Man Meets Woman Story”. Since then, the story has been lived out with personal details in your lives; in the lives of nearly every living soul.  Next Week we will pick up here.