Have you ever tried a Melting Moment? Oh man, if you haven’t you need to. Google a recipe, bake a batch and eat one. They are awesome.
In case you don’t know, a Melting Moment is the pure, unadulterated, perfect combination of butter, sugar and flour sandwiching some kind of icing. It also tastes like it is made from the sweetened milk of rainbow unicorns. It’s kind of like a shortbread icing sandwich, if you can imagine that. Every single one is a miracle in your mouth waiting to happen. They are a mystery, a beautiful and delicious thing.
One of the most strange and wonderful things that the Bible speaks about repeatedly is another mystery, not of a Melting Moment—but a “melding moment”. It’s the time when two people from different families and backgrounds come together to meld to become one unit. This melding moment is what we call the biblical mystery of marriage. This mystery is first mentioned in Genesis 1:27,28.
“So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number . . .”
Right at the beginning of human history, God created an institution that was to form the bedrock of human society. The institution of the family unit would become the ideal model for millions of families to come. This family, standing together in unity, all bore the image and reflection of God—who is in His very being a loving relationship between three distinct but unified Beings—the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. That moment of the perfect marriage between our most ancient ancestors is described in more detail in Genesis 2:21–23.
“So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.The man said, ‘This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called “woman,” for she was taken out of man.’”
When speaking of relationships between men and women, the apostle Paul uses this story as a basis for arguing for the mutual dependence and equality of the genders for “woman is not independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God” (1 Corinthians 11:11,12).
Author Ellen White put it this way: “Eve was created from a rib taken from the side of Adam, signifying that she was not to control him as the head, nor to be trampled under his feet as an inferior, but to stand by his side as an equal, to be loved and protected by him.”1
This is why Jesus said, “This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one” (Matthew 19:5, NLT2).
What an awesome mystery! The mystery of the Melding Moment!
“This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one” (Matthew 19:5, NLT)
Unfortunately, as we look back through human history, we can see that this situation of perfect love in the family did not last very long. In fact, this very first family soon fell into pain and problems. These problems were most obvious when Adam’s firstborn son Cain murdered his younger brother Abel. What a tragedy to befall a family that had formerly known such divine intimacy and happiness.
With Abel’s death, God’s perfect plan of unadulterated love within the family unit was seriously scarred. Since that time, there has been a continual breakdown of the principle of selfless love in marriage and family that has led to untold pain and suffering through the ages. Unfortunately, there are many forces in this world that seek to destroy the harmony God has in mind for His children in their home life.
One sad consequence of this has been the terror of domestic violence; something that is never, ever acceptable, whether perpetrated by men or women. Sometimes, our marriages and families are attacked in more subtle ways though. Overwork, disrespect, insensitivity, communication problems, unforgiveness, thoughtlessness, neglect and unkindness are slow, silent family killers. They need work and intentionality to defeat.
God’s design is that His people model His love by mimicking (as closely as possible in this broken world) the original design He created in the beginning. The family home is supposed to be a little piece of heaven on earth. After all, the marriage institution ultimately is a divine parallel of how Jesus loves His people and died on the cross to save them.
Speaking to husbands, the apostle Paul said in Ephesians 5:25, 28, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her . . . In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.” Sadly, too many of us sacrifice our family to help ourselves, rather than sacrifice ourselves to help our family. Someone once asked a workaholic husband, “I know you would die for your family, but will you choose to live for them?”
Author Max Lucado relates, “Clovis Chappell, a minister from a century back, used to tell the story of two paddleboats. They left Memphis about the same time, travelling down the Mississippi River to New Orleans. As they travelled side by side, sailors from one vessel made a few remarks about the snail’s pace of the other. Words were exchanged. Challenges were made. And the race began. Competition became vicious as the two boats roared through the Deep South. One boat began falling behind. Not enough fuel. There had been plenty of coal for the trip, but not enough for a race. As the boat dropped back, an enterprising young sailor took some of the ship’s cargo and tossed it into the ovens. When the sailors saw that the supplies burned as well as the coal, they fuelled their boat with the material they had been assigned to transport. They ended up winning the race, but burned their cargo. God has entrusted cargo to us, too: children, spouses, friends. Our job is to do our part in seeing that this cargo reaches its destination. Yet when the program takes priority over people, people often suffer. How much cargo do we sacrifice in order to achieve the number one slot? How many people never reach the destination because of the aggressiveness of a competitive captain?”3
Being in a loving “melding moment” should give you the warm, delicious feeling of eating a Melting Moment! If it isn’t, are you sacrificing your family for the sake of selfishness? Do you put aside time with your partner and children to achieve your materialistic goals? Are you acting inappropriately, unkindly or even abusively within your marriage? If you are, the consequences will never be worth it. Healthy choices, whether confession, counselling or accountability, will lead to healthy relationships. God is always willing to help—if we ask.
1. Ellen G White, The Adventist Home. Ellen G White Estate, 2013.
2. Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright ©1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
3. Max Lucado, In the Eye of the Storm. Word Publishing, 1991.
