What Does The Bible Mean When It Says A Husband And Wife Become “One Flesh”?
Q: When the Bible says that a husband and wife become “one flesh,” what does that truly mean, and how can we live that out in a way that honors God throughout our marriage?
A: David Guzik: God bless you both. Okay, what does that “one flesh” union look like? Some people hear that phrase and immediately jump to thinking about marital intimacy. Look, I think that’s connected to it, of course, but I don’t think that’s the focus.
The first man, Adam, and the first woman, Eve, were separate individuals. They had two different hearts beating in their chests, two sets of lungs that that breathed, and two separate brains. They were two distinct individuals, yet God spiritually and mystically joined them together as one person.
Here’s how this plays out in marriage. There should be a real consideration of what it means that the couple is one. This is especially a word to husbands: you need to think and act in the marriage according to what’s better for us, not what’s better for you, and not even necessarily what’s better for your wife. Marriage shouldn’t be all about pleasing the husband and giving him what he wants. Nor should it be all about pleasing the wife and giving her what she wants. No, we shouldn’t look at it that way. The husband and wife should work together, with the husband as the head, to ask, “What’s best for us together as a couple and our life lived together?” It’s so much more than being roommates in the same house. Let’s be honest, a lot of Christian marriages effectively function that way. Marriage is about sharing our lives, in spiritual things, emotional things, duties, economic things, and yes, shared in the realm of marital intimacy. But that’s just one beginning area; I think the other areas end up being collectively bigger.
Inga-Lill Guzik: Think about the game you played as a kid where you were paired up with somebody else, and you had to strap your one leg together, the three-legged race. The two of you are connected by rope together, but you both have to communicate. You have to be in unity. You have to have a goal in mind. You have to know what you’re going to do and the pace you’re going to go at.
I think that imagery carries over into the spiritual, emotional, and mental realms of marriage. In every way possible, we are as one, moving in the same direction, with communication, with anticipation, and with purpose.
David Guzik: In Ephesians 5, that great marriage passage, Paul emphasizes the idea of “one flesh” so strongly, especially in his words to the husband. D. Martin Lloyd Jones wrote a massive six- or seven-volume set of preaching through Ephesians. In the volume where he covers this passage in Ephesians 5, he deals with it brilliantly. It’s one of the best things that I ever read on marriage. I’ll summarize what he said in a paraphrase: What the husband needs to always remember is that he is made one flesh with his wife, and in all of his thinking, in all his actions, in all of his heart, he needs to consider them collectively, not individually. What the wife is tempted to forget is that that oneness has a head, and the head is the husband. It’s not a two-headed being; it’s one being, but that one being has a head. The Bible makes very clear that the husband is the head. So, it’s important for the wife to give information, give counsel, give advice, give direction, and give her opinions on all the things that the husband is going to need to make decisions about. Any wise husband would delight in hearing his wife’s wise perspective on things.
Inga-Lill Guzik: We’ve practiced this principle a lot. When I say practice, I mean you don’t really know how to do this until you’re married and have been married for a while. It’s a dance back and forth in which you’re allowing the decision-making to be his, but your information has to be spot on in order for you to give him the information that he needs to have all parts moving in the right direction. It is a collaborative, informative way to make your marriage work well. And that takes a lot of effort.
David Guzik: God works through this process. It involves a lot of death to self. Husband, if you’re doing it right, loving your wife as Christ loved the church, considering that she’s one with you and that you’re one with her, it should lead to a lot of death to self. And wife, if you’re considering the same arrangement, and how God calls you to submit to your husband as head of the home, that’s also going to involve a lot of death to self. It’s a lot of dying, but then resurrection life in the midst of it.