The sealed source

Mark writes that while Jesus was on the way to Jairus’ house a woman suffering from an issue of blood touched the hem of His garment and

… Immediately her bleeding  (KJV: the fountain of her blood) stopped.   (Mark 5:29)

The source of her blood is also mentioned in the law given by God via Moses.
Moses writes in Leviticus 20:18.

If a man has sexual relations with a woman during her monthly period, he has exposed the source of her flow  (KJV: he hath discovered her fountain), and she has also uncovered it. Both of them are to be cut off from their people.

There is also a very beautiful verse in Song of Solomon 4:12, which says:

You are a garden locked up, my sister, my bride; you are a spring enclosed, a sealed fountain.

A splendid picture.

In His wisdom the Creator indicates hereby, through imagery, how valuable sexuality, which He has given people, is.
Girls are born as ‘a spring enclosed’, with sealed sexuality:

  • think of the hymen.

Sexuality is not only a physical experience; it has a spiritual dimension as well. This is why God warns against its incorrect use.

What does the image of the sealing represent.

Suppose you order a precious instrument from abroad, which you have first to pay for, before it is sent to you. When that instrument finally arrives in your own country it is stored in a sealed customs warehouse. Even though you are already the owner of the instrument, you will only be able to claim it after having fulfilled the required formalities. Only then will customs open the warehouse for you and hand the instrument over to you.

This is also the way God intended sexuality to be.

Concerning authority.

Because the woman’s sexuality is sealed, she is not free to do what she likes with it.
The woman may indeed grant authority to break her seal, to the man who fulfills the necessary conditions.
A man may only break a woman’s seal when he has received authority from her, because he fulfills the necessary conditions.

Indeed, God gives clear conditions concerning this authority.

Concerning the conditions upon which the authority is granted/obtained.

When God created man and woman He set the experience of sexuality within the protection of marriage.
He considers marriage to be a covenant for life between a man and a woman.
In the Bible, a covenant is always sealed with blood.
Blood flows here too, when the woman’s seal is broken.

The conditions of the authority are put into words, when God says in Genesis 2:24

That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.

This declaration is repeated three times in the N.T. (Matth.19:5 – Mark 10:7 – Eph.5:31)

God sets three conditions that have to be fulfilled so that the seal may be broken:

1. The man is to leave the house of his mother and father if he wants to start a family, to be free of the authority his parents have over him.
In marriage, as the apostle Paul writes in 1 Cor.11:3, a man is under the authority of Jesus Christ, and he will have to give account to Him as to how he has run his family.

2. The man must attach himself to his wife.
Translated alternatively: take hold of his wife / be hitched, glued to his wife.
This is the spiritual unity between a man and a woman, with a promise of faithfulness, for the full duration of their life on earth.

3. A marriage is a social event.
It is necessary for this commitment to be announced officially as well, according to the rules of the local government.

It is only when these three conditions are fulfilled that God says: … they become one flesh.

God, in His wisdom, has decreed that a woman may only grant permission for her seal to be broken, to the man who, under these conditions, makes a public, lifelong commitment to her.

The woman must be conscious of the fact that she is making a lifelong commitment to the man to whom she grants permission to break her seal.

 

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The sealed source.