Why Are There Multiple Wives in the Bible if God Loves Women?

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God’s Design is One Woman for One Man

• We see this in the creation story.

• Genesis 2:24 says, "Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh".

When Sin Entered the World, Multiple Wives Began to Occur

• After the story of Cain and Abel in Genesis 4, there is Genesis 4:19-26: “Lamech married two wives, Adah and Zillah.”

• This is the first recorded instance of multiple wives in the Bible.

• Nowhere in the Bible does God order men to have multiple wives.

• While Godly men took multiple wives and concubines (such as King David and King Solomon), this was something God tolerated. Never approved. 

• God has given mankind free will which means sin will always be actively present (until Jesus returns).

• Note: You’ll find interesting things on the internet about the Law of Moses and God’s role in polygamy. I’m not a theologian, so I’m not going to dissect those kinds of statements or articles. However, the idea that God wants or approves of multiple wives in no way aligns with the rest of the Bible (including God’s character and the items below).

Satan has a Special Hatred for Women

• Note: Episodes 11 and 12 goes more deeply into this, if you’d like more information. They are based on the book: On Purpose: Understanding God's Freedom for Women Through Scripture by Julie Zine Coleman

• Part of the reason this hatred exists is because of how God created women as well as how much He loves us. (See Episode 9 for more details.)

Jesus Treated Women Differently While on Earth

• Episode 64 explains specific ways that Jesus went against the cultural norms when it came to the treatment of women. 

• That episode is also based on On Purpose: Understanding God's Freedom for Women Through Scripture by Julie Zine Coleman.

• When I was a newer Christian, I was angry that Jesus hadn’t brought back the gender equality that God designed.

• It took me a while to understand that He wasn't there to change the entire culture. (Just like the Jews at the time thought He was going to free them from Roman rule.)

• Instead, Jesus came to free - and empower us - in a much, much bigger way. 

• Case in point: Without Jesus going to the cross and dying for my sins; starting His Church so that the Good News eventually reached me; and the Holy Spirit becoming accessible Jesus ascended to heaven, He couldn’t have transformed me into the woman I am today - who is following God’s call to help free other women.

Broken Heart? 3 Ways Jesus Can Provide Hope and Healing

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1. Give Your Hurt to Jesus

• We can’t heal from something if we don’t go to the Healer.

• In Matthew 11:28-30 (MSG), Jesus invites us to come and lay down our burdens - whatever those are. He also wants to help lighten our load. 

• Jesus wants us to live by grace - not by what the world puts on us. 

• Which is often a lot. Plus, that load can include yuckiness that Satan wants us to carry - usually to keep us distracted or captive.

• In the four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John), we see Jesus’s miracles of healing people. 

• His healing isn’t limited to just physical aspects. It also includes emotional, mental, and community-related suffering. 

• But, no matter the type of issue, the first step is to approach Jesus about it. 

• We have to open our hearts and invite Him in to deal with whatever the hurt is.

2. Trust Jesus’s Solution

• You can’t give it to Him, but then take it back because you don’t think He’s handling it the right way.

• Disclaimer: If you’re currently learning the basics of who Jesus is, then know it’s okay if that does happen. Trust takes time to build. It’s a process.

• At the end of the day, though, Jesus knows the best way to bring healing. And like a lot of things God does, it likely won’t go the way you’re picturing it. 

• You need to trust Him with how you need to be healed. All wounds are different. We, as people, are different. So we can’t compare our healing, even in a very similar area, to someone else’s. 

• And we can’t place our expectations on God.

• Jesus will be faithful. 

3. Trust Jesus’s Perspective

• By perspective, I mean the fact that Jesus sees a much, much bigger picture than we (little humans) do. 

• And God the Father is the only one who knows everything - such as when Jesus will return.

• The tricky thing I’ve discovered about growing in the Lord - being healed, maturing, learning who I am, being freed from things holding me back or clouding my vision - is that because I’m where I am, I can’t see where I am.

• Think of it like this: When you want to learn a new skill, you seek out an expert who knows everything about that skill. 

• Even things you don’t even know that you need to know. 

• And it’s only by entering into a relationship with that expert (buying their course, listening to their podcast, becoming their intern) that you also begin to understand where you are on your journey. 

• Because we need someone who is a father along, who has walked that road, to help give us that larger picture and perspective.

• Jesus knows where we need to go; who we were created to be; and how we need to be healed, matured, developed, set free, etc. He has a much bigger picture than we do.

• Sometimes, He lets us in on what’s happening or gives us a short-range view of where we’re headed. But, most of the time, we’re walking forward in faith. Trusting Him.

• There’s been a lot of times in my 20+ years journey with Jesus where I really wanted something to be healed or handled one way, only to realize later, when I was farther along, that He didn’t do it that way because He had much bigger plans - for me and for the women He eventually called me to serve.
  

God’s Love Doesn’t Waver: 4 Traits of His Steadfast Goodness

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1. God is a Creator

• He’s the Creator of:

• The universe

• Of us (man and woman)

• Relationship (as we’re meant for relationship with Him)

2. God is Unconditionally Loving

• After sin entered the world in the Garden, there were consequences. But God already had a plan to deal with sin and bring us back into a relationship with Him. (That plan being Jesus.)

• Throughout the Bible, we see God’s love towards His people. 

• Genesis 12: Sarah and Abraham go to Egypt due to a famine in Canaan (where they lived).

• Abraham introduced Sarah as his sister, fearing he might be killed so another man could take Sarah as his wife.

• Pharaoh ends up taking an interest in Sarah as a potential wife, bringing her into his household.

• But then God strikes plagues upon Pharaoh's household; Pharaoh realizes who Sarah is; and she is given back to Abraham.

• Note: After this happens, in the beginning of Genesis 12, God tells Abraham that He is going to make him and his descendants into a great nation! 

• And - Abraham plays this game again (of having Sarah act as his sister) in Genesis 20!

• There are many instances of God protecting, blessing, and loving His people. Broken, sinful, and in-process though they were.
  
  

3. God is Gracious

• Grace is defined as “undeserved favor.” Or, to put it more simply, it’s when we receive something that we don’t deserve. 

• The biggest example of this is Jesus dying on the cross. Man caused sin to enter the world - not God.

• But God, in His goodness, sent Jesus to be the ultimate sacrifice in our stead. 

• There are many instances throughout the Bible where God gives favor to His people, despite who they are, because they are His. Because of who He is - not who they are.

4. God is Merciful

• Mercy can be seen almost like the opposite of grace. Mercy is when God withholds what we do deserve.

• Again, the biggest example of this is Jesus. We deserve death; to be eternally separated from God due to our sin; and to be fully left with the consequences of our sin. But God, in His mercy, hasn’t left us to that fate. 

• He was both gracious and merciful by sending Jesus to die in our place. 
  

3 Reasons The God of Your Parents is Causing Hopelessness

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1. Jesus is Not a Focus

• Jesus, and what He did for us by dying on the cross, is the Good News (or Gospel). 

• Everything in the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, is about Jesus. 

• Jesus was always God’s plan for reconciliation between Himself and us. 

• When Jesus is cut out of the equation, not only is THE solution omitted, everything makes less sense. 

• Also, things are going to be taken out of the correct biblical context or perspective.

• In addition, God’s simple and open invitation to accept that Jesus died for our sins gets lost. Instead, life becomes about what man has to do in order to save himself. (Which does not lead to good things.)
  
  

2. Man-Made Rules that Aren’t in the Bible

• These rules are usually present due to one of more of the following:

• Due to a lack of biblical teaching or understanding

• Patriarchal views that come into the Church

• Pride (the not-so-great kind)

• A lack of focus on Jesus in general and/or as our Lord and Savior who died for our sins.

• In Jesus’s day, the religious leaders had added a bunch of extra rules which were oppressing the people. This is a major reason why Jesus was so frustrated with the religious leaders.

• As it says in John, God is love. God’s solution to us being reconciled with Him was never, ever about man earning it…because we’re incapable of doing so. This is why, instead, Jesus died on the cross in our place. And all we have to do, to be seen as righteous in God’s eyes, is accept that incredible gift.
  
  

3. Who God is Becomes Skewed by The Man-Made Rules

• When Jesus is not a focus…when an inaccurate understanding of the bible exists…when man-made rules enter the picture, creating a high bar that we can’t meet and that makes us miserable as we try…then of course we’re not going to have a clear view of who God is.

• And, friend, if this has been what you’ve experienced, it’s not your fault. The deck has been stacked against you in a massive way. 

• But that’s why Jesus has brought you here, right? So God can finally introduce Himself to you as the real Him.

• It’s no wonder that you’ve been feeling depressed or hopeless. Anyone would. No one wants a God like the one you’ve been taught about. But guess what? Isn’t it great that God doesn’t exist!

• This is where finally finding those legit, true biblical resources makes all the difference. (I know this from personal experience.)

Wondering if God Still Loves You When You Sin? He DoeS

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God Loved Us First - and Will Love Us Always

• God’s love does not change due to our mistakes or sins

• God loves us so much that He sacrificed His only Son when we were still sinners. 

• Romans 5:6-8 (MSG): “Christ arrives right on time to make this happen. He didn’t, and doesn’t, wait for us to get ready. He presented himself for this sacrificial death when we were far too weak and rebellious to do anything to get ourselves ready. And even if we hadn’t been so weak, we wouldn’t have known what to do anyway. We can understand someone dying for a person worth dying for, and we can understand how someone good and noble could inspire us to selfless sacrifice. But God put his love on the line for us by offering his Son in sacrificial death while we were of no use whatever to him.”

• Romans 8:35 (MSG): “So, what do you think? With God on our side like this, how can we lose? If God didn’t hesitate to put everything on the line for us, embracing our condition and exposing himself to the worst by sending his own Son, is there anything else he wouldn’t gladly and freely do for us? And who would dare tangle with God by messing with one of God’s chosen? Who would dare even to point a finger? The One who died for us—who was raised to life for us!—is in the presence of God at this very moment sticking up for us. Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ’s love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not backstabbing, not even the worst sins listed in Scripture:

They kill us in cold blood because they hate you. We’re sitting ducks; they pick us off one by one.

None of this fazes us because Jesus loves us. I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.”

• Lamentations 3:22–24 (MSG): “God’s loyal love couldn’t have run out, his merciful love couldn’t have dried up. They’re created new every morning. How great your faithfulness! I’m sticking with God (I say it over and over).  He’s all I’ve got left.”
  
  

God is Love 

• 1 John 4:16 (NLT): “We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love. God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them.”
  
  

God’s Love is Not Like the World’s Love

• 1 Cor 13 (MSG): “If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.
  
  If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, ‘Jump,’ and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing.
  
  If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.
  
  Love never gives up.
  Love cares more for others than for self.
  Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
  Love doesn’t strut,
  Doesn’t have a swelled head,
  Doesn’t force itself on others,
  Isn’t always ‘me first,’
  Doesn’t fly off the handle,
  Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
  Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
  Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
  Puts up with anything, [note: does not mean abuse]
  Trusts God always,
  Always looks for the best,
  Never looks back,
  But keeps going to the end.

Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.

When I was an infant at my mother’s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.

We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!

But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.”

3 Biblical Facts that Reveal Jesus’s Character and Love for You

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Jesus Was Born Into Human History

• He did this to willingly die for our sins on the cross

• Romans 5:8: “But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

• You are loved more than you will ever know by someone who died to know you. (Ref. Romans 5:8)

• John 15:13: “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.”

Jesus Invites Us to Lay Down Our Burdens

• Matthew 11:28-30 (NLT): “Then Jesus said, ‘Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.’ ”

• Jesus talks about giving our lives to Him on a daily basis. 

Jesus Treated Women Differently Than the Culture

• Note: Listen to Episode #64 as it provides more details.

• Jesus didn’t look down on women.  

• Jesus didn’t adhere to the cultural belief that women could not, or should not, be educated.

• He had women in His circle. In fact, several women financially supported his ministry through the profits of their businesses or their personal wealth.

• A woman was the first person to see the resurrected Jesus.

• On at least two occasions, Jesus told a woman something before He shared it with others - including His male disciples.

• The first time Jesus openly admitted that He was the Messiah was to the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:25-26).

• Outside her brother’s tomb, Lazarus’s sister Martha was the first one to hear Jesus say that He was the Resurrection and the Life (John 11:25-27). In response, Martha stated that she believed Jesus was the Messiah and the Son of God.