How do you view marriage? Is it a hopeful ideal, a dearly held dream out ahead for you? Is it your everyday reality, your bread-and-butter routine? Is it a sensitive or even bitter topic for you because of broken dreams or a broken home in your childhood?

My questions aren’t abstract. God’s Word says that marriage is what a real relationship with our Maker actually is. “Your Maker is your husband, the LORD of hosts is his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called. For the LORD has called you like a wife … says your God.”  Isaiah 54:5-6. So, to understand marriage properly is to grasp the Gospel.

Consider this contrast: What do we think of the person who insists everything orbits around them? A bridezilla or a narcissistic groom who expects everyone else to serve them? Or consider the beauty and attractiveness of two people who are mutually caught up in delight — each for the other’s joy. Why is it so innately captivating for us? The Bible says that we were made for this. From eternity, God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have been, as it were, in a Dance — mutually delighted, self-forgetful, full-hearted, enthralled in the Other. One God. Three Persons. All-generous in love and joy. Then, in that fullness, the LORD designed us to be part of the dance, both with Him and lovingly flowing out from Him. We were never meant to live by ourselves or only for ourselves.

But what if someone refuses to enter into God’s joyful, loving dance? Or hijacks people from the party to their own agenda? By our willfulness, not only have we offended our Maker, but we spoil the celebration and party-goers are deceived. Believing that we would leave God’s gathering for better times, we actually are misled, pushing out of a one-way exit that locks from the inside. And then, outside, alone and bitter, we learn too late that we were lied to, but there’s no way back in.

This is what the Bible says is wrong with all of us — turning each of us to our own way. And thinking ourselves to be wise, we have become fools, worshipping and serving created things rather than our Maker, who is blessed forever. Now, we’re wrecked in guilt and under the power of death.

From a worldly grid, what does that person deserve? Does God owe them any mercy? Having left the Dance, you may believe there’s no way back inside. Forsaken, you may think that everything is ruined, but what if God is different? What if He is unlike anything or anyone else?

The Law of the Rescue means that wherever someone is in peril and helpless, someone must have the will and courage to go to their aid! Whether it is an EMT, fire rescue, or a hostage-rescue team, a first responder has to go where the person in danger is — even if they drunkenly wrecked their car, passed out stoned in a burning building, or foolishly tried to do business with bad actors.

God knows the only thing that can break the bitter spell of our selfishness is that He would go where we have been, as captives, and that He would go first. The Gospel claims that God, in the Person of Jesus, saw our plight and that it was of our own making, yet He loved us anyway. While we were yet sinners, Christ came to our rescue. To save people like us, by His own death and resurrection, Jesus did what we could never do for ourselves, and He did what we never deserved.

Why on earth would Jesus do something like this for people like us? What if, in love and mercy, He wanted to invite us back into the Dance? In every wedding, you’ve seen it played out. It is subtle, but a groom walks out first, offering his hand, inviting his bride’s trust. And then, amazingly, gratefully, the bride leaves all other suitors in order to take him up on his offer. That is Grace (the first move of the Bridegroom) answered by repentance and faith (a gracious proposal accepted with trust by the bride).

Then what? First, we marvel as we watch them dance, and then, unable to help it, we join in right alongside them, laughing and full of grateful joy. Some may, very tentatively, take their very first steps onto a dance floor. Others may dance like no one is watching. And whether you’ve ever realized it or not, this is the storyline of the entire Bible!

If you think of yourself as a believer, then this will resonate deeply in your heart. And if you have never opened a Bible, then maybe for the first time ever, you’ll start to consider the miracle of God’s saving love — because it is played out in front of you through every husband and wife. Whether you are married in this world or not, if your faith is in Jesus, then He is your Husband and you are His cherished Bride.