During these summer months I will attend four weddings, officiating three of them. I am sobered by reports coming out that nearly half of the marriages in the USA are ending in divorce. This report dealt with Evangelical Christian couples. A Biblical marriage is not a partnership, it is a merger! Biblical marriages have their basis in covenant. "The two become one flesh." Breaking covenant is like unscrambling eggs! It is not a contract it is a covenant. Covenant is the most sacred and agreement that can bind two parties together. It was meant to be permanent, durable, unchangeable and indestructible. Nearly every ancient religion has covenant as its foundation. In fact, our Holy Bible itself consists of two covenants (modern usage has opted for the word Testaments). The Hebrew word for covenant is B'rith. It literally means a cut where blood flows. It is taken from the practice of drinking the blood of one another during a covenant ceremony. The Biblical type of this is the taking of the Lord's Supper (or communion). Since the Bible forbids the drinking of blood, the blood is replaced by wine. Here in Western civilization we have lost the meaning of covenant. The final vestiges of it are in marriage. In Eastern cultures it is more clearly understood, though due to the influence of the West, it is currently losing its meaning there, as well. David Livingston and Henry Stanley (who spent years in Africa) wrote that they had never heard of a covenant being broken in Africa. In every covenant blessings and curses are spoken. Keeping the covenant assured that the blessings promised would be fulfilled. Breaking a covenant meant that all the curses of the covenant were to be visited upon the offender. Deuteronomy 28 describes in vivid language the blessings and curses of the Covenants of the Scripture. In breaking a covenant, you "curse the very ground you walk upon." It is further reported that "if one was to break a covenant his own family would hunt him down to kill him." Paul tells us in First Corinthians 11:23-30 that many are sick and some sleep (are dead) because of reckless manner in which people partake of the Lord's Supper. Thankfully, according to Galatians 3:13 Jesus Christ has "redeemed us from the curses of the law” (Covenant). However, this is not meant to be permission to break covenant, let alone a license. Christianity has its very basis in relationships. Our relationships to God (vertical) and to one another (horizontal) form the beams of the cross for us. If either of these is not right, we have problems. Keeping covenant is the master key to right relationships. Anyway, that’s the way I see it…