| Husband and wife.
Not only is this one of the most emphasized Scriptural images, it exemplifies
a bond more intimate than any other -- and I believe that the sacrament of
marriage is an icon (or image) of Christ's relationship to His Church.
Through our relationship with God -- which is, like marriage and unlike most of
your other examples, a covenant relationship -- we become one flesh, one blood
with our Bridegroom, Christ -- we become "partakers of the divine nature"
(2 Peter 1:4), come to share in the fullness of Christ's deity (Col 2:10), that
we "may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." God gives us
his divine life and plants the seed if His Word within us so that we might bear
spiritual fruit.
We have been bought for a price by our Bridegroom, just as grooms of old paid
a dowry for their brides.
Most of the relationships you mention are purely functional: teacher/student,
master/slave, savior/sinner. Some are blood relationships, which is better;
father/son, brother/brother (although one can reduce these to mere metaphor).
Only one is fundamentally covenantal, which involves a chosen but committed
relationship. Not based on mere function, nor on mere accident, it is based on
an ongoing union and communion between the two parties.
Eric
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| .3
> In the case of husband and wife that would make you the wife and would
> require complete submittance to God.
Precisely!
"Tell me, you whom my heart loves, where you pasture your flock, where you
give them rest at midday, / Lest I be found wandering after the flocks of your
companions." (SS 1:7)
"Bring me, O king, to your chambers." (1:4)
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| Hi,
Actually, the folowing is what I want to want.
Husband and wife. No doubt.
This implies being of one flesh with the groom and the
wife is 'dead.' All of her desires, all of her concerns,
all of her 'everything' is Jesus Christ.
Finally, self is crucified and "not I, but Christ."
Tony
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