Summary: The expression "man of God" is one of the Bible's highest praises accorded to mortal man. Every believing man or woman can find a pattern for God-pleasing living in the biblical man of God.

1 Samuel 2:27 Now a man of God came to Eli and said to him, “This is what the Lord says...”

•• (1) The man of God hears from God (“...this is what the Lord says”). He is spiritually sensitive and discerning.

•• (2) The man of God, when He has heard from God, speaks without fear, even to prominent people (here, to Eli the priest).

1 Samuel 9:6But the servant replied, “Look, in this town there is a man of God; he is highly respected, and everything he says comes true. Let’s go there now. Perhaps he will tell us what way to take.”

•• (3) The man of God should live his life in such a decent and honorable way that he is “highly respected”.

•• (4) He should have a track record of reliability and accuracy in the things of the Lord (“...everything he says comes true.”).

1 Kings 13:1-5By the word of the Lord a man of God came from Judah to Bethel, as Jeroboam was standing by the altar to make an offering. He cried out against the altar by the word of the LORD: “O altar, altar! This is what the LORD says: ‘A son named Josiah will be born to the house of David. On you he will sacrifice the priests of the high places who now make offerings here, and human bones will be burned on you.’ “ That same day the man of God gave a sign: “This is the sign the LORD has declared: The altar will be split apart and the ashes on it will be poured out.” When King Jeroboam heard what the man of God cried out against the altar at Bethel, he stretched out his hand from the altar and said, “Seize him!” But the hand he stretched out toward the man shriveled up, so that he could not pull it back. Also, the altar was split apart and its ashes poured out according to the sign given by the man of God by the word of the LORD.

•• (5) A man of God is precisely guided“by the word of the Lord”. He acts on God’s directions, not his own agenda.

•• (6) He does not hold back a negative word from God, even (as here) in the presence of the king.

•• (7) Men of God may have remarkable “signs” accompanying their ministries.

2 Kings 4:8-10 ...(9) She said to her husband, “I know that this man who often comes our way is a holy man of God. Let’s make a small room on the roof and put in it a bed and a table, a chair and a lamp for him. Then he can stay there whenever he comes to us.”

•• (8) The man of God is recognized by others as a holy person, a good example of the godly life.

•• (9) He is someone whose presence people covet. Over my past 41 years as a born-again Christian, I have greatly enjoyed the fellowship and positive influence on my life of true men of God.

2 Kings 5:14So [leprous Naaman] went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy.

•• (10) Men of God may have remarkable manifestations of the supernatural power of God including healings, in their ministries.

2 Kings 6:5-7 ...“Oh, my lord,” he cried out, “it was borrowed!” The man of God asked, “Where did it fall?” When he showed him the place, Elisha cut a stick and threw it there, and made the iron float....

•• (11) The man of God may be used in miracles.

•• (12) He will undoubtedly be a man of great faith in God.

1 Timothy 6:9-12a...(10) the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.... (11) But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith.

•• (13) Men of God refuse to let the love of money affect their life and ministry.

•• (14) The man of God actively pursues that which is godly, including:

• Righteousness

• Godliness

• Faith

• Love

• Endurance

• Gentleness

•• (15) He is a fighter for the faith.

2 Timothy 3:16-17All scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

•• (16) The man of God is a man of God’s word.

The Rivers of Godby Pastor Jim Feeney, Ph.D.



Summary: Feeling spiritually dry? in a personal desert place? God is ready and willing to pour out streams, springs, and rivers of life-giving spiritual water on your parched soul.

Deuteronomy 8:7For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land — a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills.

•• This is God’s intention for His people --

• to bring us into a good land

• to bring us to streams and pools of water

• to bring us to flowing springs

• to refresh us from the rivers of God

Psalm 78:15-17He split the rocks in the desert and gave them water as abundant as the seas; [16] he brought streams out of a rocky crag and made water flow down like rivers. [17] But they continued to sin against him, rebelling in the desert against the Most High.

Psalm 78:19-22They spoke against God, saying, Can God spread a table in the desert? [20] When he struck the rock, water gushed out, and streams flowed abundantly. But can he also give us food? Can he supply meat for his people?” [21] When the Lord heard them, he was very angry; his fire broke out against Jacob, and his wrath rose against Israel, [22] for they did not believe in God or trust in his deliverance.

•• Here we see God bringing His people towards the promised land --

• In the desert He gave them abundant water. It can be the same for your desert, if you’ll by faith seek and receive God’s living waters.

• In the desert He brought His people “streams out of a rocky crag”. If your life seems “rocky”, God is ready and willing to bring His streams of blessing into it.

• In their helplessness and need, God “made water flow down like rivers”. In your times of need, the refreshing, life-giving rivers of God’s blessing are available to you.

•• But watch the warnings here, too --

• They sinned and rebelled against God in the midst of His provision of rivers of water.

• They spoke against God, essentially and ungratefully saying, “Can’t God do more?”

• In their rebellion and disbelief, they “did not...trust in [God’s] deliverance.”

•• The lesson to us is: Don’t overlook and underappeciate the present rivers of God in our lives, the present blessings of God, His present provision in our rocky places.

Isaiah 44:2-4This is what the Lord says — he who made you, who formed you in the womb, and who will help you: Do not be afraid, O Jacob, my servant, Jeshurun, whom I have chosen. [3] For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour out my Spirit on your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants. [4] They will spring up like grass in a meadow, like poplar trees by flowing streams.

•• God gave them natural water. More importantly, for them and us, He poured out on them Spirit-ual water. He poured out His Spirit and His blessing on His people. And God is the same today. He is ever ready to pour out His Spirit on you.

•• Where? On dry, thirsty ground. Thirst for the living waters of God's Spirit.

• The result? God’s blessing.

Isaiah 41:17-18 The poor and needy search for water, but there is none; their tongues are parched with thirst. But I the Lord will answer them; I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them. [18] I will make rivers flow on barren heights, and springs within the valleys. I will turn the desert into pools of water, and the parched ground into springs.

•• Search for this water ... God will answer!

• Are your heights barren? Search for God’s living water, and He’ll make His rivers flow into your barrenness.

• Are your valleys parched? Seek after God’s water, and He’ll cause springs to burst forth in your parched land.

• Is your devotional life dry? Search for God’s water, and He’ll turn your personal spiritual desert into refreshing springs and pools.

Isaiah 43:18-21Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. [19] See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland. [20] The wild animals honor me, the jackals and the owls, because I provide water in the desert and streams in the wasteland, to give drink to my people, my chosen, [21] the people I formed for myself that they may proclaim my praise.

•• Don’t dwell on the past. God likes to do new things in the lives of His people. Look ahead!

•• In the desert wasteland, God will “give drink to [His] people”.

• You say, “Well, it’s been awfully dry.” Remember, God says, “I am doing a new thing.... Don’t dwell on the past.” Get ready for God’s “new thing” in your life. Look for His water in your desert and His reviving streams flowing into your wasteland.

Jeremiah 17:7-8 But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. [8] He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.

•• Trust God. Have faith and confidence in Him.

• You’ll be like a tree rooted by His rivers of water.

• You’ll have no fears of the heat.

• Not only will you survive times of drought, you will stay green and continue to bear fruit.

John 7:37-39aOn the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. [38] Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.” [39] By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive.

•• You don’t need to travel to find the rivers of God. They are within everyone who will:

(1) Thirst for them...

(2) Believe in Jesus...

(3) Come to Him...

(4) and drink deeply of the Holy Spirit offered by Jesus. And that Holy Spirit, whom Jesus likened to “streams of living water,” will change your life.

By, John Piper

Romans 12:1-2

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world,but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

As I have thought and prayed about these verses, it seems to me that there are two more very large issues we should deal with before moving on to verse 3. I would like to give a week to each of them.

“The Will of God” One, which I hope to deal with next week, is the meaning of the term “the will of God.” Verse 2 says that we are to discern what is “the will of God.” It’s a very common phrase and I think that sometimes, when we use it, we may not know what we are talking about. That is not spiritually healthy. If you get into the habit of using religious language without knowing what you mean by it, you will increasingly become an empty shell. And many alien affections move into empty religious minds which have language but little or wrong content.

The term “the will of God” has at least two and possibly three biblical meanings. First, there is the sovereign will of God, that always comes to pass without fail. Second, there is the revealed will of God in the Bible—do not steal, do not lie, do not kill, do not covet—and this will of God often does not come to pass. And third, there is the path of wisdom and spontaneous godliness—wisdom where we consciously apply the word of God with our renewed minds to complex moral circumstances, and spontaneous godliness where we live most of our lives without conscious reflection on the hundreds of things we say and do all day. Next week we need to sort this out and ask what Paul is referring to in Romans 12:2.

Transformation by the Renewal of Your Mind But today I want to focus on the phrase in Romans 12:2, “by the renewal of your mind.”Do not be conformed to this world,but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” We are perfectly useless as Christ-exalting Christians if all we do is conform to the world around us. And the key to not wasting our lives with this kind of success and prosperity, Paul says, it being transformed. “Do not be conformed to this world,but be transformed.”

That word is used one time in all the gospels, namely, about Jesus on the mountain of transfiguration (the mountain of “transformation”—same word, metemorphõthë): “And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light” (Matthew 17:2-Mark 9:2).

The Transformation Is Not Just External I point this out for one reason: to make the point that the nonconformity to the world does not primarily mean the external avoidance of worldly behaviors. That’s included. But you can avoid all kinds of worldly behaviors and not be transformed. “His face shown like the sun, and his clothes became white as light”! Something like that happens to us spiritually and morally. Mentally, first on the inside, and then, later at the resurrection on the outside. So Jesus says of us, at the resurrection: “Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father” (Matthew 13:43).

Transformation is not switching from the to-do list of the flesh to the to-do list of the law. When Paul replaces the list—the works—of the flesh, he does not replace it with the works of the law, but the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:19-22). The Christian alternative to immoral behaviors is not a new list of moral behaviors. It is the triumphant power and transformation of the Holy Spirit through faith in Jesus Christ—our Savior, our Lord, our Treasure. “[God] has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2 Corinthians 3:6). So transformation is a profound, blood-bought, Spirit-wrought change from the inside out.

The Freedom of Being Enslaved to Christ This is why the Christian life—though it is utterly submitted (Romans 8:7; 10:3), even enslaved (Romans 6:18, 22), to the revealed will of God—is described in the New Testament as radically free. “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom”(2 Corinthians 3:17). “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” (Galatians 5:1). You are free in Christ, because when you do from the inside what you love to do, you are free, if what you love to do is what you ought to do. And that’s what transformation means: when you are transformed in Christ you love to do what you ought to do. That’s freedom.

An Essential Means of Transformation: The Renewal of Your Mind And in Romans 12:2 Paul now focuses on one essential means of transformation—“the renewal of your mind.” “Do not be conformed to this world,but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.” Oh, how crucial this is!

• If you long to break loose from conformity to the world,
• if you long to be transformed and new from the inside out,
• if you long to be free from mere duty-driven Christianity and do what you love to do because what you love to do is what you ought to do,
• if you long to offer up your body as a living sacrifice so that your whole life becomes a spiritual act of worship and displays the worth of Christ above the worth of the world,

then give yourself with all your might to pursuing this--the renewal of your mind. Because the Bible says, this is the key to transformation. “Do not be conformed to this world,but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.”

What’s wrong with the human mind? Why does our mind need renewing? And what does this renewal look like? And how can we pursue and enjoy this renewal?

The Problem with Our Minds There are many who think that the only problem with the human mind is that it doesn’t have access to all the knowledge it needs. So education becomes the great instrument of redemption—personal and social. If people just got more education they would not use their minds to invent elaborate scams, and sophisticated terrorist plots, and complex schemes for embezzling, and fast-talking, mentally nimble radio rudeness. If people just got more education!

The Bible has a far more profound analysis of the problem. In Ephesians 4:23 Paul uses a striking phrase to parallel Romans 12:2. He says, “Be renewed in the spirit of your minds.” Now what in the world is that? “The spirit of your mind.” It means at least this: the human mind is not a sophisticated computer managing data, which it then faithfully presents to the heart for appropriate emotional responses. The mind has a “spirit.” In other words, our mind has what we call a “mindset.” It doesn’t just have a view, it has a viewpoint. It doesn’t just have the power to perceive and detect; it also has a posture, a demeanor, a bearing, an attitude, a bent. “Be renewed in the spirit of your mind.”

The problem with our minds is not merely that we are finite, and don’t have all the information. The problem is that our minds are fallen. They have a spirit, a bent, a mindset that is hostile to the absolute supremacy of God. Our minds are bent on not seeing God as infinitely more worthy of praise than we are, or the things we make or achieve.

This is what we saw last week in Romans 1:28, “Since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind.” This is who we are by nature. We do not want to see God as worthy of knowing well and treasuring above all things. You know this is true about yourself because of how little effort you expend to know him, and because of how much effort it takes to make your mind spend any time getting to know God better. The Bible says we have “exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man” (Rom. 1:23). And the image in the mirror is the mortal image we worship most.

The Relationship Between Verses 1 and 2 That’s what’s wrong with our minds. This illumines the relationship between verses 1 and 2 of Romans 12. Verse 1 says that we should present our bodies—that is, our whole active life—as a living sacrifice which is our spiritual service of worship. So the aim of all life is worship. That is, we are to use our bodies—our whole lives—to display the worth of God and all that he is for us in Christ. Now it makes perfect sense when verse 2 says that, in order for that to happen, our minds must be renewed. Why? Because our minds are not by nature God-worshipping minds. They are by nature self-worshipping minds. That is the spirit of our minds.

Two Other Biblical Diagnoses of the Problem Now before I turn to the remedy and how we find the renewal of mind God demands, consider two other biblical diagnoses of the problem. Consider the way Peter describes our mind-problem in 1 Peter 1:13-14, “Prepar[e]. . . your minds for action. . . . Do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance.” There is an ignorance of God—a willful suppression of the truth of God (Romans 1:18)—that makes us slaves to many passions and desires that would lose their power if we knew God as we ought (cf. 1 Thess. 4:5). “The passions of your former ignorance.” Paul calls these passions, “desires of deceit” (Eph. 4:22). They are life-ruining, worship-destroying desires, and they get their life and their power from the deceit of our minds. There is a kind of knowledge of God—a renewal of mind—that transforms us because it liberates us from the deceit and the power of alien passions.

The other biblical diagnosis is in Ephesians 4:17-18, “You must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. 18 They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart.” Paul takes us deeper than Peter here. He penetrates beneath the “futile mind” and the “darkened understanding” and the willful “ignorance” and says that it is all rooted in “the hardness of their heart.” Here is the deepest disease, infecting everything else. Our mental suppression of liberating truth is rooted in our hardness of heart. Our hard hearts will not submit to the supremacy of Christ, and therefore our blind minds cannot see the supremacy of Christ (cf. John 7:17).

The Holy Spirit Renews the Mind Which brings us finally to the remedy and how we obey Romans 12:2, “Be transformed in the renewal of your mind.” First, before we can do anything, a double action of the Holy Spirit is required. And then we join him in these two actions. The reason I say the Holy Spirit is required is because this word “renewal” in Romans 12:2 is only used one other place in all the Greek Bible, namely, Titus 3:5 where Paul says this: “[God] saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit.” There’s the word “renewal” which we’ve seen is so necessary. And it is renewal “of the Holy Spirit.” The Spirit renews the mind. It is first and decisively his work. We are radically dependent on him. Our efforts follow his initiatives and enablings.

The Double Work of the Holy Spirit Now what is the double work that he must do to renew our minds so that all of life becomes worship? 2 Corinthians 3:18 sets the stage for the answer: “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord,are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” What does the Spirit do to “transform” us into the image of the God-exalting Son of God? He enables us to “behold the glory of the Lord.” This is how the mind is renewed—by steadfastly gazing at the glories of Christ for what they really are.

But to enable us to do that, the Spirit must do a double work. He must work in two directions: from the outside in and from the inside out. He must work from the outside in by exposing the mind to Christ-exalting truth. That is, he must lead us to hear the gospel, to read the Bible, to study Christ-exalting writings of great, spiritual men, and to meditate on the perfections of Christ. This is exactly what our great enemy does not want us to do according to 2 Corinthians 4:4, “The god of this world [Satan] has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.” Because to see that for what it really is, Paul says, will renew the mind and transform the life and produce unending worship.

And the Spirit must work from the inside out, breaking the hard heart that blinds and corrupts the mind. The Spirit must work from the outside in, through Christ-exalting truth, and from the inside out, through truth-embracing humility. If he only worked from the outside in, by presenting Christ-exalting truth to our minds but not breaking the hard heart and making humble, then the truth would be despised and rejected. And if he only humbled the hard heart, but put no Christ-exalting truth before the mind, there would be no Christ to embrace and no worship would happen.

What Then Shall We Do? What then do we do in obedience to Romans 12:2, “Be transformed in the renewal of your mind”? We join the Holy Spirit in his precious and all-important work. We pursue Christ-exalting truth and we pray for truth-embracing humility.

Listen to rich expositions of the “gospel of the glory of Christ.” Read your Bible from cover to cover always in search of the revelation of the glory of Christ. Read and ponder the Bible-saturated, Christ-exalting writings of great, spiritual men and women. And form the habit of meditating on the perfections of Christ. And in it all pray, pray, pray that the Holy Spirit will renew your mind, that you may desire and approve the will of God, so that all of life will become worship to the glory of Christ.

May the mind of Christ, my Savior,
Live in me from day to day,
By His love and power controlling
All I do and say.

May the Word of God dwell richly
In my heart from hour to hour,
So that all may see I triumph
Only through His power.

May the peace of God my Father
Rule my life in everything,
That I may be calm to comfort
Sick and sorrowing.

May the love of Jesus fill me
As the waters fill the sea;
Him exalting, self abasing,
This is victory.

May I run the race before me,
Strong and brave to face the foe,
Looking only unto Jesus
As I onward go.

May His beauty rest upon me,
As I seek the lost to win,
And may they forget the channel,
Seeing only Him.

May the Mind of Christ, My Savior

Kate Wilkenson

The Attitude of Jesus toward Women and the Family

by Rudolf Schnackenburg


The foundation of holy and happy marriage and family life is
reverence for the dignity of women. What was Jesus' attitude to
women? He did not undertake to make changes in their legal status,
which in the Old Testament and Judaism was far from being one of
equality of rights, but his actual behaviour bears witness to high
esteem, serious evaluation of their religious aspirations, and
delicate tact, rarely encountered in later Judaism. There is also
his love, as their saviour,. for sinners and prostitutes (Luke
7:36-50; John 7:53- 8,11; Matt. 21:31f.), which was totally
incomprehensible from the point of view of the Pharisees. But when
it seemed necessary to him for his work as Messias, Jesus even
overstepped the bounds of Jewish custom and outlook in his dealings
with women. He spoke to the Samaritan woman at Jacob's Well, though
to do so was considered unseemly for a man and especially for a rabbi
(John 4:27). He allowed himself to be touched by the woman with an
issue of blood, though that made him ritually unclean (Mark 5:27-34
par.). For the sake of a poor, bent woman "whom Satan hath bound
these eighteen years" he broke the Sabbath in order to free this
"daughter of Abraham" (a title of honour not often recorded) from the
evil besetting her (Luke 13:10-17). He performed a strikingly large
number of miracles of healing for women (in addition to the above,
Simon Peter's mother-in-law, Mark 1:29-31 par.; Jairus' daughter,
Mark 5:21 to 43 par.; the daughter of the Syro-Phoenician woman, Mark
7:24-30 par.; Mary of Magdala, Luke 8:2). The sorrow of the widow of
Naim moved him to sympathy (Luke 7:13); he did not refuse the request
of the Syro-Phoenician woman (Mark 7:28 f.). He praised and called
attention to the great spirit of sacrifice of the widow who threw her
mite into the temple treasury (Mark 12:41-44 par.). He defended the
act that Mary of Bethania performed for love, anointing his head and
his feet (Mark 14:3-8 par.; John 12: 1-8). He allowed women among
his following and accepted the help they gave (Luke 8:2f.), visited
the family at Bethania, and wished both sisters to listen to what he
had to say (Luke 10:38). On the way of the Cross he instructed the
grieving women (Luke 23:27-31). Even his conversation with the
Samaritan woman shows him primarily (at least in the mind of the
evangelist), not as a master of spiritual direction but as a preacher
of revelation. St John's account is directly concerned not with the
woman's moral conversion but rather with her faith and Jesus gladly
allows this woman to help him to make the fields ripe for harvest in
Samaria also (vv. 28 ff.). The conversation with Martha (John
11:20-27) is another act of lofty self-revelation on the part of the
Johannine Christ The same evangelist tells of the appearance of the
Risen Lord to Mary Magdalene, who becomes his messenger, the first to
bring to his brethren the news of the ascent to the Father (20:
11-18). The only conclusion to be drawn from all this is that Jesus
did not differentiate in his preaching between men and women; women
were to hear the word of God, experience messianic salvation and
participate in the future kingdom of God in complete equality with
men. Then, after the general resurrection, sexual differences will
become meaningless, for marriage and giving in marriage will come to
an end (Mark 12:25 par.). The religious equality of rights
recognized by Jesus for women and given expression by him in
practice, this equality of dignity in the sight of God, was bound in
the long run to exert a deeper influence and be more conducive to the
raising of the dignity of women than any particular social reforms
could have done.

Above all, by his attitude, Jesus saved women from being thought of
as merely sexual beings, honouring them as human beings, persons,
children of God.

Of great significance for the status of women and for marriage and
family life was Jesus' decree that according to the will of God
originally marriage was indissoluble, and was now obligatorily so
again. Already in the Sermon on the Mount there are sharp words
against adultery (even that simply committed in the heart by desire),
and also against all divorce. But he also took up a definite
position on this question in a discussion recorded by Mark 10:2-12
and Matthew 19:3-9.

Jesus brought two earlier scriptural passages (Gen. 1:27; 2:24) into
the field against the Mosaic dispensation allowing a bill of divorce
to be made out and the woman sent away (Deut. 24: 1). From them he
argued that the primordial will of God at the beginning of creation
intended the indissolubility of marriage. Moses' "commandment" was
given only because of the "hardness of heart" of the Jews, and now
the order established at the creation is once again to prevail, so
Jesus announces in God's name, "What therefore God hath joined
together, let not man put asunder."

By the reference back to the texts in Genesis, woman is assigned
equality of dignity with man. "Male and female he created them";
"And they shall be two in one flesh." The husband leaves the
community of his family in which he has lived hitherto ("leaves
father and mother") and forms with his wife a new community. The two
become so completely one that they can never again be separated; such
is the conclusion Jesus draws from the Scriptural text, the proof
follows precisely from this oneness of husband and wife.