Hello All,
(This is just a general disclaimer that I must insert here at the beginning. I am but a lay person, like most of you. These weekly “thoughts” are but my own. Not the definitive word on any topic. Just my own conclusions derived from my own study and faith in our Father. The greatest hope I have for these weekly “thoughts” is to have them be a springboard for further study on your part. Not to be a weekly treatise to be blindly accepted. So, please read them with this intent, this motive in mind).
This week’s lesson from “The Adult Sabbath School Study Guide” is titled “Teaching Disciples: Part 2”. Another good study of Christ’s lessons that help “prepare the follower of Jesus – whether the disciples 2,000 years ago or disciples in the twenty-first century —for the challenges that come with discipleship” (Quarterly for Sabbath August 17). I pray you read and study these lessons each week. There is so much to glean for the diligent searcher.
As many of you know, for these weekly “thoughts” I look for subjects, comments, referenced Biblical texts that call-out for deeper analysis. This is very important to me. We have a rational God of love and truth. And just skimming over any troubling Biblical concept without digging to understand may risk missing the deep abiding lesson the Holy Spirit wants us to see and learn. Therefore, the concept that struck me this week was actually in the first day’s lesson. In Sunday’s lesson, the Biblical text referenced (Mark 10: 1-12) has Christ telling His listeners that startling truth, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another, commits adultery against her. And if a woman divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery” (verse 11-12). Wow… or even “Uh, oh”. So, so many couples are divorced and have remarried. What to do?
In the “sermon on the mount” Jesus adds some qualifying language here that may help us understand a little better. “But I say to you, that whoever divorces his wife for any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a woman who is divorced commits adultery” (Matthew 5: 31-32). Oh. So there are some situations that might merit divorce.
Another Bible writer also addresses this concept of marriage and divorce. In writing to the Corinthian believers, Paul is giving counsel to them at this time, based on the situations there in Corinth. This council could be used for us today in the twenty-first century. I will quote a little of 1 Corinthians 7 here. But I encourage you to read that entire chapter yourself to see the intent of Paul’s counsel.
In 1 Corinthians 7:10, Paul says, “Now to the married I command, yet not I but the Lord: A wife is not to depart from her husband. But, even is she does depart, let her remain unmarried or be returned to her husband. And a husband is not to divorce his wife”. This helps clarify things a little more. “For the Lord God of Israel says that He hates divorce, for it covers one’s garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. Therefore take heed to your spirit that you do not deal treacherously” (Malachi 2: 16). “Violence” meaning “damage” or even “cruelty”; and “treacherously” meaning to “deal deceitfully” (from “Strong’s” concordance). Divorce is meant as a last resort. Husbands and wives are to work mightily in good faith for a successful marriage. Divorce was never meant “for light and transient causes” (direct quote from our “Declaration of Independence”). If dealt deceitfully, divorce can do great damage to each person. Hence our Lord’s warning about divorce/ adultery.
Paul also issues another caveat to divorce/ adultery. “But if her husband dies, (a wife) is at liberty to be married to whom she wishes” (1 Corinthians 7:39). Remember, Paul’s counsel in 1 & 2 Corinthians is for the issues in that time and place. The Bible is not so much a codebook of deeds to be done and sins to be shunned. But more a casebook of God’s truth-filled love demonstrated over millennia to varied peoples and cultures under varied circumstances. God’s methods vary based on the situations. The reasons so many of us view the Bible as a codebook is because we are loath to allow the Holy Spirit to guide. Yet the Holy Spirit is precisely the One who can lead us to the right Biblical application at the right time. If not, then each of us sinners is making-up our own mind, usually developed on what pleases us. Not based on God’s truth-filled love-filled counsel given personally through His Holy Spirit.
What if you are remarried after divorce? Does our original verse cause you distress and cause you to question? All of us are sinners… every day. We lust after others (adultery); we see what our neighbors have and then desire what they have (covet); we get angry at others (murder); we put other things ahead of God (You shall have no other gods before me). Every day we sin. So your remarriage after divorce is not an unusual act for us sinners. The question is more, what do I do about my remarriage? Do I terminate this marriage? Paul’s counsel in 1 Corinthians 7: 12-16 about marriages that are not the ideal may be of help. Paul’s counsel? Live in faith as you are. Do not create more damage. “For how do you know, O wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, O husband, whether you will save your wife?” (1 Corinthians 7: 16). God does not hold you accountable for any past sin. All is forgiven. But He DOES hold each of us responsible for continuing on as we were… once we see. He has done everything for us to see, to learn, to confess and to align all our situations with God’s great plan of love. Do not forget this. Each of us finds ourselves in a sinful mess of other’s doing and our own doing. And this sinful mess is daily changing us. Yet, as we turn to the Lord he leads us to move forward with love and truth as our guide. He does not want us to create more damage to ourselves or others.
So fear not over past sins. The situation is not hopeless...not yet. For all sin is serious, changing us. Not to be lightly ignored. Each of us has past sins... but we are not to be condemned. “Neither do I condemn you” (John 8:11) says our Lord. And “if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our hearts and knows all things” (1 John 3: 20). However, He does expect us to move in His direction, even with our sinful situations. As Christ has said about divorce, “from the beginning, it was not so” (Matthew 19:8). Yet our whole lives on this sinful planet are also not the original design. Therefore, “your minds, then, must be sober and ready for action; put all your hope in the grace brought to you by the revelation of Jesus Christ. Do not allow your selves to be shaped by the passions of your old ignorance, but as obedient children, be yourselves holy in all your activity, after the model of the Holy One who calls us, since Scripture says, ‘Be holy for I am holy’” (1 Peter 1:13-16). In every situation, (divorce/ adultery, too) God will show you how to be holy… “the yielding of your heart to the sovereignty of love” (Mount of Blessing pg. 46 & 141).
With brotherly love,
Jim
