Perhaps you have seen the bumper sticker or heard the U2 song lyric: "A woman needs a man as much as a fish needs a bicycle!" I do not know where this saying originated, but I wonder if it was penned by someone who was badly hurt in marriage and is now cynical and angry. Marriage has been compared to a beleaguered city with all those on the outside wanting to get in and all those on the inside wanting to get out. It is easy to become cynical when you look at the state of marriage in our world, but the Bible provides us with a very different picture of marriage.

Years ago my wife and I lived in an apartment complex among students training for ministry. One evening we invited a couple over to our house to play table games. As we were playing a game that requires animated conversation, we realized the guest wife was not really participating. In fact she was playing so miserably that the situation became rather awkward. She would hardly speak up. When the social tension became intolerable, the husband finally explained to us that the reason his wife was not speaking was that he had recently been embarrassed by things she had said in the company of others. As a result, they had agreed that since he was the head of the house, she should not speak in public unless he granted her permission. They were serious about this! and consequently did not win any of our games that night.

From the world of evolutionary psychology, we have good news and bad news: The good news is that human beings are designed to fall in love. The bad news is that they are not designed to stay that way. The synapses just start firing differently after two years.

From the realm of statistics we have good news: The number of divorces in America is dropping. We also have bad news: The reason for the decline is that millions decide not to get married at all. They just live together for a while and split up.

What has gone wrong? I believe the root of our distress is the loss of a Christian concept of love. People’s natural tendency is to get married selfishly. The main love they seek is self-love, and self-love will not carry a marriage.