Greatness: Matthew 14-20ਨਮੂਨਾ

There is something sacred and weighty about the way Jesus speaks of marriage and children in Matthew 19. He doesn’t appeal to convenience or compatibility. He reaches all the way back to the beginning, to Eden. In a world obsessed with autonomy, authenticity and self-expressionism, Jesus points to a covenantal promise of grace and surrender. He reminds us that marriage and children are not human inventions but divine gifts that find origin in God’s perfect architecture, purposefully revealed to humans in the first garden.

But notice this: when Jesus is asked about divorce, His answer feels almost unbearably high. The disciples, in fact, say it might be better not to marry at all. Why such a strong reaction? Because Jesus confronts our deep desire for love without loss, commitment without cost, and intimacy without surrender. Yet, the gospel tells a different story.

Genesis 2 shows us the very first marriage, not as a legal contract or social construct, but as a covenantal union, a promise, where two become one, bone of bone, flesh of flesh. It’s a mystery, not just of romance or companionship, but an echo to the gospel. It’s a story that foreshadows Christ, who would one day leave His Father to be united with His Bride, the Church, through pain, sacrifice and blood. A story of relentless love and grace.

And, just as Jesus lifts the beauty and burden of marriage to its divine design, He immediately turns to children and says, “To such belongs the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 19:14, ESV). He’s telling us not to try and carry this alone. The covenant life, whether in singleness, marriage, or parenting, requires a childlike dependence, not a grown-up self-sufficiency. The way forward in the kingdom is not through strength but surrender, not by clinging to control but by placing ourselves into the arms of a Father who loves us, in Christ.

Today, ponder this: Where in your relationships (marriage, family, or otherwise) are you resisting the kind of costly, covenantal love Jesus models and invites you into? Where in these relationships are you relying on your own strength rather than embracing the childlike faith and dependence Jesus calls you to?