Hello, welcome to this special B-Side…. Our text this morning is Mark chapter 10 v1-12….. This is a special B-Side today, (we will look at Sunday’s text, but will spend the majority of our time on the theme of divorce)

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10:1 And he left there and went to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan, and crowds gathered to him again. And again, as was his custom, he taught them. 2 And Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” 3 He answered them, “What did Moses command you?”

Ironically, Jesus has just come from the amount of transfiguration, where He was having a conversation with Elijah and Moses himself, Jesus responds to their question with a question, except He makes it a little bit more personal, as He respond with you…. He says, what did Moses command you…. And naturally, they're going to go to Deuteronomy 24, and it seems from Jesus's response, they hold to the more liberal view… that you can divorce your wife for any reason you so choose….

4 They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away.” I believe it's telling that they spoke about divorce, but not the grounds for divorce, which was their question in the first place…. So they don't really seek an answer for their question, they are here to test Jesus….

5 And Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. 6 But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ 7 ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, 8 and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. 9 What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” 10 And in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. Again, this was a large conversation happening in this day, and the disciples want more clarity here… They want to understand precisely what Jesus means…. Now this event is also recorded in Matthew 19, and in Matthew 19 we are given a little bit more detail… 8 He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. 9 And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.” So Jesus put sexual sin, as a legitimate reason for divorce…. Now, in Mark 10:10 we read 10 And in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. , and in Matthew 19:10, we are given more detail and are told what they said, 10 The disciples said to him, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry.”… here is the weight of what Jesus was teaching, that the disciples heard it, and thought, it would be better not to marry….. (clear) Marriage was meant to last until death, and it has been this way since God created, invented marriage…. And the only legitimate reasons you may divorce your spouse, that Jesus highlights here, is in the case of sexual sins…. Now the disciples, like the environment we live in, the disciples are thinking, what if I marry a girl and she turns out to be a nut, or angry, or argumentative, or difficult, or she withholds sex, what if we grow apart…. And Jesus’ stance here, (statement) is you stay together, apart from the sin of sexual immorality, you make it work….. And so Jesus is talking about married believers, as if divorce isn't even in your vocabulary… and obviously, there is so much wisdom here…. Because if you're in your marriage with a foot out the door, you're going to be the worst version of yourself, and in all likelihood, it's just not gonna work….. a Christian needs to be all in, and part of the reason, is to withstand temptations….if you're married, and a girl takes a pass at you, if a guy hits on you, you don't even begin to entertain the thought of cheating or divorce… It's not an option… it's not something that’s done…. And the disciples who live in a culture where you divorce somebody once you're done with them, Jesus’ teaching on this, really freaked the disciples out… They concluded that it would be better not to marry in order to not be stuck , but Jesus goes on to say in Matthew essentially, some people do live lives of celibacy, though it may not be for everybody (and of course, Jesus himself was single - in Matthew 19 he talks about Eunuchs… Jesus wasn’t a Eunuch of corse, but lived as one for the Father)….

11 And he said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her, 12 and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

OK… let's talk about divorce and remarriage here, and let's organize our thoughts into 3 sections…..

1 - Sexual sins in Marriage…

2 - Abandonment and Unequally Yoked issues in Marriage…

3 - Remarriage….

4 - Miscellaneous….

1 - Sexual sins in marriage

I want to give a quick content warning… Some of the themes of this section are going to be of a more mature, an adult nature, so if you have little ears here, I would pause and listen later….

Matthew 5:31–32 says 31 “It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ 32 But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery…. Also, Matthew 19:9 says 9 And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”

1A - What is sexual immorality? Jesus says, that sexual immorality is a permissible, an allowable reason to divorce somebody… really interesting, Jesus does not use the word for adultery… He actually uses the word pornia, which is a term that means sexual sins, it's a broader word… obviously God's wisdom is boundless, and the teachings of Jesus is timeless….. and so obviously, adultery is one of the sins of Pornia, obviously, that's the big one, but pornia involves more than just Adultery……. again I'm gonna speak explicitly here, so content warning, when it comes to sexual sins in marriage, obviously sex with somebody who's not your spouse constitutes pornia, but what if someone didn't have sexual intercourse, but maybe oral sex, or maybe they were fooling around with someone…. You can see it, that the sort of person that would be willing to do that, would also be the sort of person to believe they have found a loophole… that they have sinned, sure, but that they haven’t done a divorcable act because though they've engaged in some sexual sin, they might be able to justify to themselves, well, we didn't go all the way…… but Jesus does not use the word adultery, He uses the broader term for sexual sin, pornia, because there are things that are in that realm, that clearly are a violation of the marriage covenant….. now…. Lets go to the fringes here…. does kissing somebody else constitute, breaking marriage vows, well maybe, that would be a type of sexual sin, but not all forms of Pornia are created equal… could you divorce somebody if they got drunk and made out with a coworker? Possibly, maybe… obviously, that is a horrible and deplorable thing, but I also wouldn't put that in the same category as sexual intercourse with somebody else (so did they break your marriage vows, the marriage covenant, maybe, and there's a discussion to be had there….)… and this leads us to pornography…. Let's say you're a a wife who catches her husband in pornography use… obviously this is a shameful, evil, from the pit of hell, deplorable thing, and certainly it is a form of pornia, pornia is literally where we get the word pornography…. Now as terrible as pornography is, is it as bad as outright adultery?… I would say no…. Is it an action that could justify divorce?… and I believe, in some cases, yes, and maybe….. now let me say plainly, to catch your spouse in pornography, is incredibly painful, is unbelievably evil, and if you caught your husband doing this one time, or he came to you and said he was having an issue, I think it would be wrong to immediately jump to needing a divorce…. I'm not convinced that constitutes breaking marriage covenant…. However… what about persistent porn pornography use… some women have husbands that are addicted to pornography, and this goes on for years and years and years, He apologizes, but He never truly repentants, he keeps doing it, and at some point, I believe you could justify say, he is going out of his way, searching for other women, and sexually pleasing himself with them…. And I believe a woman could justifiably divorce her husband for this (I would highly recommend talking to your pastor first, but at some point, I would argue, that pornography usage can really take on a life of its own, and can really distort somebody into abandoning their spouse)…. Now… I'm recording this in 2026, for those of you listening to this year's down the road, and AI is starting to get pretty powerful… and I'm reminded of the great industrial revolution that brought humanity so many new technologies… and many people believed, that the industrial revolution, the age of science, was going to bring about a utopia upon the world… but what really ended up happening?… yeah, we invented wonderful things, wonderful technologies for farming and housing, but we also used these advancements to kill one another…. The industrial revolution of the 18th and 19th centuries, led to the bloodiest century in human history, the 20th century… With World War I in World War II…. Planes that were meant to be used for transport, that were meant to bring men into the sky, were strapped with bombs and machine guns to kill their fellow man…. And in many ways, that's how I think of AI…. I believe it will be used for a lot of good and wonderful things…. And obviously AI will be at the forefront of all future warfare… but as I think about AI, I think it will be quite a tool for the evil one, especially as it relates to pornia, sexual sin….. if the Lord doesn't return soon, I really believe people are going to start getting into sexual relationships with AI companions, robotics, virtual reality world’s, and all kinds of crazy things… and just like pornography, except worse, at some point, a married man or a married woman doing these things, searching out sexual relief from people other than their spouse, it's going to take the form of covenant breaking pornia…… So I believe Jesus used a very specific word here, that is future proof here…..

1B - does a Christian have to divorce if pornia, or adultery takes place? No… Though, you are totally free to, if your marriage does end in divorce, because the other person is guilty of adultery, you do not need to feel guilt for separating, you need to carry no guilt for that… they are the ones that divorced you, by their actions, you're just signing the paperwork…. And I wanna be clear here, the term divorce means the breaking of the covenant and sending away…. When someone engages in adultery, they have begun the divorce… they have broken the covenant, and all you're doing is formalizing the paperwork and sending them away…..

1C - what if you have been cheated on? If that is you, and you have been cheated on, maybe this is fresh, maybe it's been a decade, or somewhere in between, let me first say, I am so sorry… you are experiencing a death, a depth of betrayal that is truly terrible, and I just want to say, as much as this hurts, the Spirit of God will help you, and it will get better…. But betrayal is a terrible terrible thing….. in the book Dante's Inferno, there are different layers of hell, each one getting worse, reserved for worse and worse crimes, and the very bottom of hell, the worst part of hell, was reserved for the betrayer…. Betrayal is a truly unbelievable evil…. Because in order to betray someone, you first had their trust…. So if you have been betrayed, that level of pain that you are feeling, is the feeling of broken trust… someone has abused your trust, and betrayed you…. and what a terrible thing…. Now, I'm going to get into this a little further into the study, but let me just say here, you may have been a wonderful spouse, maybe you were a nightmare to live with, in either direction, nothing justifies adultery… you maybe lost your temper daily, you may be a constant complainer, maybe you are overweight, maybe you're too thin… that's irrelevant… nothing gives anyone the excuse, or the right, to break their marriage vows in such a deplorable way….. That weight of sexual sin, rests entirely upon them…. Now… I do want to give a little footnote here… if you decide to take them back, you are probably going to be wounded for a long time, and you do not need to feel bad for that… you have been put into a position, that you should never have been in… you have been put in a position, that you did not choose…. And so it is totally understandable If you are suspicious of them for a long time, they've earned that suspicion, but if you are going to try to make this work… Of course you are allowed a time of morning, but if you decide that you are going to try to make this work, this is not something that you should hold over them for decades, this is not something that negate your duties as a husband or a wife…. If you decide to move forward, if you are going to move forward, then move forward, and if you're not going to move forward, then don't move forward… remember Ephesians chapter 5… if you are going to stay in the marriage, if you are a husband, and your wife has cheated on you, again you are allowed a time of morning, but at some point, you need to love her as Christ love the church… if you're going to stay in the marriage, then you need to live like you're married…. Or maybe you are a wife, and your husband has cheated on you… again, you are allowed a time of sadness, of anger, of rage and depression and whatever… but if you're going to stay in the marriage, if that's what you choose, then at some point, you have to come under his authority, and respect Him, as the church does the Christ…. (Wow, clear) And under these conditions, you understand why Jesus says He permits divorce, in the case of sexual immorality… because though God could totally heal the marriage, it is a very difficult thing to get back to this level of love and respect, once the vowels have been broken and trampled on…. This is very hard…. And something I see happened from time to time, is couples try to make it work, and that can be a very godly, a noble thing, but then they never enter back into the sort of marriage that God has called them to… and that's a problem…. So if you're going to try to make it work, you actually have to go for it….. And I would say, if you have been cheated on, and you're not sure if you should stay or go, I would go and talk to your pastor, your church, other believers in your life for wisdom…. And if the person that cheated on you objects to this, they don't want you seeking council, run….. They are trying to control the damage, they don't want their reputation ruined, or people to know, and so clearly, they are not truly repentant… run…. they are trying to control you, the narrative, are attempting to minimize what they've done, and it's going to be near impossible to rebuild a broken marriage with an unrepentant adulterer…. And if they do not want you seeking help, they don't want your family to know, they don't want the Church to know, they don't want your friends to know, what they are really doing, is continuing to abuse you… because they just hurt you, they did one of them worst thing you can do to another human, and then they expect you to suffer alone… they're actually continuing to abuse you by denying you help….

1D - what if you are not the victim, but the victimizer?… what if you were the one that cheated?…. Here is what I will tell you… If what you have done is still not known to your spouse, you must confess…. confess it first to God, and then to your spouse… and until you do, you are living a lie…… before God, you have violated your marriage vows, and there is no restoration, until your spouse knows, so there can be real restoration (your marriage is a lie, you have broken the covenant, and they deserve to know)…. Now let me say, you might have the best or the worst spouse, you maybe feel like you were pushed into the arms of another man or another woman, stop it… this is never going to get better until you own it… you blew apart your marriage… and even if your spouse is difficult, a nag, a drunk, a nightmare to live with, that gives you no right to cheat on them…. So the first thing you have to do, is repent of your sin, you need to cut all contact with this person you were having the affair with, you need to get yourself right with the Lord, you need to come under and confess your sins to the leadership of your church, and to your spouse…. Now…. once you have come clean… if your spouse chooses to divorces you, and they have every right to do that… If they are proceeding with the divorce, I want you to understand that under the Old Testament system, throughout much of human history, people were publicly executed for what you just did….. And anyway you slice it, you have royally screwed up, and the best thing you can do now, is admit you were wrong, don’t make excuses, and if they want to leave you, (clear) do not be a pain in the butt over who owns what, and how much money everyone should get… what I would say is, you should be very generous in in order that they, the person you cheated on can go on with their lives without you (and not have to get into a long settlement. Period., a long divorce dispute with lawyers…. At the very least, send them away with more and without argument)…. Again, you have royally screwed up, and they are incredibly wounded, and in order for them to heal, they need to move on… and the very least you should do, is not drag that out…. Now…. Let's say, you are guilty of an affair, and you come clean, and your spouse graciously wants to make it work… first of all, you should be beyond thankful…. And if you are married to a godly person, they'll probably forgive you pretty quickly… but forgiveness and trust are 2 different things…. And though they may forgive you quickly, it's likely going to take a very long time to earn their trust…. And you need to make them feel no guilt for that….. Your job now is to humbly earn their trust back, by living righteously, by living like a godly

2 - Abandonment and Unequally Yoked issues in Marriage

Exodus 21:10 says 10 If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights. 11 And if he does not do these three things for her, she shall go out for nothing, without payment of money…. This is talking about abandonment…. Paul tapped into this in first Corinthians chapter 7…. 1 Corinthians 7:1 Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” 2 But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband. 3 The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. 4 For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 5 Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. Before we read any further, I do want to lay out the obvious truth, that if you are going to marry somebody, it is incredibly foolish and ungodly to withhold sex from the other person (never be withholding)…. Now I want give a little clarity here… I am talking about normal, healthy sexual practices…. I want to give a quick little content, warning here… so if you are near little ears, please pause this and listen to it later………….. As Paul talks about having sex with your spouse, and not withholding sex from your spouse, he's talking about normal sexual behavior… we live in such a perverse, overly sexualized time, that so many people that have been exposed to pornography for years before they got married, and there can be really sick sexual expectations…… so if you are married, and your spouse wants to do really disgusting things, things that make you uncomfortable, that's not what Paul is talking about…. A person that wants to do these kinds of things, needs to repent of their sin, they need Christ to cleanse their minds, and I would argue, that they need to completely unplug from the Internet, and TV, movies, smart phones, and rewire their brain to be unbelievably attracted to their spouse and no one else, or these weird expectations, in order to be stimulated…. But speaking about normal, healthy sexual practices, between a husband and a wife, you shouldn't withhold from one another…. I know some people withhold, in order to gain power, or get what they want, when really all they are doing, is creating bitterness, resentment, and temptation to sin for their spouse….

Lets keep reading… 6 Now as a concession, not a command, I say this. 7 I wish that all were as I myself am. But each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another. 8 To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single, as I am. 9 But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion. Obviously, in light of the OT, it's good to marry, And have large families, but there is a truth, that if you don't have a spouse, a family, you could be free to go wherever you please for the Lord, you are not bound by anything… but if you cannot live a celibate life, than it's good to get married, rather than to be burdened with sexual sins, and desires… 10 To the married I give this charge (not I, but the Lord): the wife should not separate from her husband 11 (but if she does, she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband), and the husband should not divorce his wife. 12 To the rest I say (I, not the Lord) that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her. 13 If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him. 14 For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy. This is one of those completely misunderstood. Passages of scripture… let's say two atheists get married, and then the wife gets saved… this passage is not saying, the husband is now saved, as well as the kids… no… this passage is saying, that God recognizes the marriage…. He recognizes the marriage, and the kids as being born into a married household…. 15 But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace. 16 For how do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband? Or how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife? So, back to our example… let's say two atheist get married, the wife comes to the Lord, and the atheist husband can't stand his wife now… he thinks she's a fool, I can't believe she doesn't want to smoke pot anymore, or get drunk, or whatever, and so he ends up, leaving her…. What is Paul describing?…. Exodus 21, abandonment….. that if your spouse abandons you, they divorce you and completely walk away from you, you are now not trapped forever to that person… you can go in peace, which would mean you are divorced, and I believe this means, though others would disagree with me, this would mean you could get remarried….

So as we begin our second point, is that, the kind of divorce that is permissible, is not just because of sexual sins, but also in the event that you have been completely abandoned by your spouse, or if you are un equally yoked, and they no longer want to be with you and initiate divorce…. Under those situations, the divorce seems to be legitimate, and that means you may be free to leave them, and I would argue, able to remarry, because before God, you are not in a covenantal marriage with anybody, those things have been totally severed….

And let me give a clear, believable, example of abandonment here… lets say a husband or wife completely runs out on you, and they start living and sleeping with someone else, maybe they get a second house somewhere, maybe they move to another bedroom and have been there for years, and it's clear they are content with this arrangement, and are never going to live as a married couple… under those conditions, that is a clear case of abandonment, and if you wanted, you could pursue divorce (though you don’t have to)…

Ok… lets get into the weeds here…

2A - obviously, a Christian can divorce if their partner if they run out on them, starts living somewhere else, abandon them… However, can a Christian divorce if they have been mentally abandoned?…. Can a husband or a wife abandon a marriage (slow) mentally… Can a spouse abandon a marriage mentally, but physically still be in the same room (the Bible doesn't say)… however, I once was working with a man whose wife was a horrible woman… she would scream at him on a regular basis, their adult children would invite the father over, but not the mother… and this husband and wife were in such a state of disunity, that in order for there to be any semblance of peace, he ended up living in the basement of his own house, while she took the rest of the home… now… she did not physically leave the house, but she definitely abandoned the marriage… so personally, I believe there is a way that a husband or a wife can be abandoned, even though the spouse is in the same house…. (Clear) but let me just say, we have to be extremely careful here, because this is a very slippery slope to go down…… this can become a sinful scapegoat… I hear people talk about mental abandonment all the time, like let's say, your husband comes home from work, and he is a disengaged father, an unengaged husband, and he just lives his life on his cell phone, or plays video games all the time….. obviously, everybody is allowed times where they are just not their best version of themselves, and we don't want to claim that they have abandoned the family when they are just in a rut…. But at some point, someone can be so checked out, they stop providing, they stop paying attention, they stop caring for anybody other than themselves, and then maybe you can begin that conversation (but I would have this conversation with your pastor, well before you take anything into your own hands)…..

2B - What happens if a woman is married to a man who is physically beating her up?…. The light that 1 Corinthians 7 would shed on this, is this this person a believer at all? (Probably not)… but if he is not a believer, and he is beating his wife, I would say he has abandoned his husbandly duty, in a way, he has abandoned her physically, and he has trampled on his marriage vows, and I would say divorce is permissible (I certainly would say she needs to get out of there for separation she does not need to stay there and get abused, that's crazy, and bad council…. But after a time of separation, if she wants to keep it working, she certainly can try if she wants) …. And I do want to say a little footnote here, physical abuse is not exclusively a problem for women…. I know plenty of men who have been physically abused by women too…. And again this is a slippery slope, but if someone is physically hurting you, there is a very legitimate argument, that they have broken, abandoned their marital vowels, because they treat you like an enemy… They have rejected the very nature of the relationship itself…. And in all likelihood, you are unequal yoked, and they have abandoned the marriage, though they may physically be present…. And just as a second brief footnote, what about mental abuse… mental abuse is a hard term, because some people are too sensitive, and some people are really just that harsh and oppressive in how they speak to their spouse…. (if you feel like you're being mentally abused, I would talk to your pastor about that for counseling, and under extreme conditions, separation and or divorce)

3 - Remarriage….

Deuteronomy 24:1–4. 24:1 “When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, and she departs out of his house, 2 and if she goes and becomes another man’s wife, 3 and the latter man hates her and writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter man dies, who took her to be his wife, 4 then her former husband, who sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife, after she has been defiled, for that is an abomination before the LORD. And you shall not bring sin upon the land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance.

3A - If someone divorced their first spouse, and then later wanted to remarry them, is that OK?…. in Deuteronomy 24, God permitted remarriage, however, once someone has been handed a certificate of divorce, biblically, it is an abomination before the Lord, for that person to go back to them….. So, when a couple divorces, if it gets to the point where there is officially a divorce, this is beyond a temporary separation, than that divorce is final, and that couple is never to be back together again…. It is permanent…..

3B - Should Christians remarry at all?…. Let’s get something straight…. The reason there is an emphasis in the teachings of Jesus, about illegitimate and legitimate reason reasons for divorce, and then a conversation about the sins of remarriage, is because, in that culture, people were divorcing each other for illegitimate reason reasons, and then getting remarried… and this led to adultery, because you never really separated from your first spouse, because the reason you separated was illegitimate before God…. Now, some people believe, that Christians should never remarry, but in Deuteronomy 24, remarriage was totally OK….. so as we take this biblical teaching as a whole here, I believe we need to think about what divorce is….. a legitimate divorce, a divorce that meets biblical guidelines, is a total separation…. Let's say a wife has an affair… and the husband decides to divorce her… once He has handed her a certificate of divorce, he is no longer bound to her, there is no more connection….. She has broken the marriage covenant, she has ripped up the marriage vows, and the husband is walking away….. She has already begun the divorce, he is just signing the paperwork…… the word divorce means to send away, it means someone has done something covenant breaking, and are sent away….. so when they do something, like having an affair, engage in some sexual sins, they have begun the act of divorce… They have broken the covenant, and a permissible response is to send them away… and so they have broke the covenant, you are not bound to them in anyway, and I believe, free to remarry….

3C - What happens if someone got married and divorced as an unbeliever? And let's say, it was your fault… let's say, you blew apart your marriage, or even, you guys split up because you drifted apart (and that would be an illegitimate reason for divorce)… in that situation, let's say years later you came to the Lord, would it be a sin for you to remarry?…. according to 1 Corinthians 7:15, I do not believe you would be in sin to get remarried… I don't believe a husband or a wife have a scarlet letter, that follow them around, in the event of their mistakes or sins pre-conversion… and remember, What is conversion?…. It's being born again….. You are a new creation, and so I do not believe you carry that into your new life….. and I just wanna say out loud, sexual sin is absolutely terrible… but it is not unforgivable… God's grace is very wide and very deep…..

3D - Is there a difference between a man and a woman getting divorced and remarried?… lets think of Matthew 5, 27 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’ 28 But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 And if your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it from you! For it is better for you that one of your members be destroyed than your whole body be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it from you! For it is better for you that one of your limbs be destroyed than your whole body go into hell. 31 “And it was said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.’ 32 But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for a matter of sexual immorality, causes her to commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. So people read that last line, about marrying a divorced woman, and place divorced women, in their own unique category, not free to remarry…. But it's important to understand, Jesus in the sermon on the mount, especially in the text we just read, he is addressing the leadership of Israel… The men…. That why v28 says everyone who looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart….. and then a few verses later and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery…. Jesus is talking to men…. He is raising leaders for His kingdom… so, to say that only women are affected by divorce, based upon this section, and then using that same line of logic, this is to also say that women are also unaffected by lust, that’s not the case, nor is that what Jesus is saying… so here in Matthew, Jesus is telling men to not fall into sexual sin, He’s telling men to not leave their wives for ridiculous reasons… And He says if they marry a divorced woman, presumably, for the same illegitimate reasons, as seems to be echoed in Matthew 19, they would be committing adultery with her, and she with Him (as they aren’t properly divorced in God’s eyes)… I am of the persuasion, that Jesus is not saying woman are tainted from divorce, but rather that divorce, remarriage for illegitimate reasons is sin, and remarrying from your illegitimate divorce, or remarrying someone else from an illegitimate divorce, is sin…

4 - Miscellaneous….

In the section, I want to talk about some things that didn't fit cleanly into our other three sections…

4A - If there has been an affair or an extreme case of abandonment, does a Christian have to divorce?… no… I would even say, there is beauty in trying to make this work…. It reveals the grace of God, it reveals your long suffering and patience, it reveals your love for somebody, regardless of how terribly they have treated you….. so no, you do not have to divorce, and if you stay, that can be a powerful testimony…..

4B - Even though God allows divorce, should a Christian remain with a spouse who has cheated on them?…. And again, this depends on the severity, it depends on the repentance, but no, I do not believe you are wrong for separating… in Jeremiah chapter 3, God Himself, said He handed Israel a certificate of divorce…. In that context, He forgave them of their first affair… it seems He forgave them of their second affair….. but yet, they remained unrepentant, and kept persisting in their sinfulness…. And there are many marriages that end up looking like that….. someone gets caught in some sexual sin, and they apologize with tears on their face, And their spouse forgives them…. And then a few years later, they do it again….. and again… and again…. Not that it's a true statement, but there's a reason the saying exists once a cheater, always a cheater…. There is something about infidelity and sexual sins, that mars the conscience… and once someone has gone down that road, so often, though not always, but so often, they go down that road again….

4C - Jesus says, 8 He said to them, “Moses, with reference to your hardness of heart, permitted you to divorce your wives, the question is, when Jesus talks about hardness of heart, whose heart is He talking about?…. He's not talking about the person divorcing the cheater, He's talking about the cheater….. and this leads to something that I believe is really important for us to wrap our heads around….. sometimes divorce happens…. And when divorce does happen, it is a horrible, horrible thing…. But when you look at the way the Bible describes divorce, and legitimate reasons for divorce, you realize that legitimate divorce is rarely between two offenders…. Sometimes, you'll hear someone say, well, there are two sides to every story, implying, both people are guilty, and share the blame of the divorce, but biblically, that is not true …. Listen… When you read the book of Malachi, and certainly in Matthew 19, the reality is, a marriage is made up of two people, and nobody is perfect… but being married to a spouse who is working too much, being a nag, being overbearing, being contentious, bad at money management, that's an awful thing to be married to, but those are not legitimate reasons for divorce…. Let me give you an example… let's say there is a wife…. And she she's a bad cook, and bad with finances, generally, just not a nice person…. Now let's say the husband gets fed up, and runs out on her., he gets caught up in an affair… biblically… Are they both at fault?….. no…. Because only one of them did something that broke the covenant….. Both people did deplorable things, but one of them did something that ended the marriage….. The covenant between a man and woman, where the two are made one flesh and God has joined together, that is not easily separated… you don't leave your wife because she's difficult… you don't leave your husband because he has a short temper… those things are horrible to live with, that might make them a bad spouse, there are plenty of bad spouses out there, but that does not give you the right, ever, to break the covenant… no one is driven into the arms of another man or woman, justifiably…. Marriage vows are stronger than our feelings, stronger than our preferences, stronger than our desires…. And when is engage in sexual sin, biblically, the one engaged in sexual immorality, is the one at fault….. And I believe this is so important for us to understand, because it keeps someone in a bad marriage, from even entertaining the idea of leaving, or feeling justified to run out on their spouse…. It's never OK…. And this is something so important to understand, because often, the kind of person who is going to engage in an affair, or some grotesque sexual sin, is also the kind of person who is going to blame their victim (now this doesn't always happen… But it happens a lot)… often the cheater blames their spouse, the victimizer blames their victim, and claim you didn't put out enough, or claim that you weren't attentive enough, or attractive enough, or whatever…. And even if there is some truth, in any of that, it is irrelevant… one of you broke the covenant… now I want to add a little footnote here… because I once knew a couple, they both claimed to be Christian, and the wife, so badly wanted a divorce, because, it seems, she wanted to be single and date other people without feeling like she was in sin, there was some chat room stuff going on with her and other men, and so she treated her husband so terribly… I mean, red in the face screamed every time she saw him, and had him living in the basement of their house…… now that kind of person, they may hear what I just said, and think, well if he runs out and has an affair, or if he divorces me, than I will be free to remarry, and he will be under sin…. But lets think about this… I would strongly argue, that this woman, is in all likelihood not a believer, that they are un equally yoke, because a believer, I'd imagine, would never treat their spouse that way, but I would strongly argue, that she had already initiated the divorce, by abandoning her husband…. She has completely trampled on her marriage vowels, she abuses’ her husband, she won't come under his leadership, and really, she has sent him away… so the kind of people that are married to absolute nightmares, at some point, whether it's a crazy manipulative woman, or an animalistic-gaslighting-violent man, you enter into the abandonment conversation…. You enter into the uniquely yoked abandonment conversation….

4D - Are men only allowed to initiate divorce? No… Paul in 1 Corinthians 7 says 12 To the rest I say (I, not the Lord) that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her. 13 If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him. So the women have just as many rights as the men in the area of divorce….

4E -Are there illegitimate reasons for divorce? Yes… obviously, I have made this point many times, but just to say briefly, the fact that you have grown apart, love someone less, are not as attracted as you used to be, are annoyed by them, as much as it may stink to feel that way, Christian marriage is bigger than our emotions (Ephesians 5 - it serves a larger mission than our feelings)… there's a reason we say for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, till death do us part…. So anything outside of sexual immorality, and cases of abandonment…. You need to do your absolute best to ride it out…. Husband's, you are to love your wives…. Wives you are to respect your husband….. and the more both of you grow in Christ, the more both of you reject selfishness, and learn to serve one another, the better your marriage will become… and that's a scary thing… It's a heavy thought to think I'm going to respect my husband's leadership, I'm going to serve him, and he may not reciprocate…. I know…. This is why, outside of coming to Jesus, who you marry is the most important decision in your life… so I understand that this is scary. … however, the more you retreat, the more Walls you build, the worst your marriage is going to get… and the more vulnerable, humble, the more you serve, the better the chance your marriage will heal and get better, and without a doubt, the happier you will be… Jesus says it is better to give than receive…. Have you ever met a happy selfish person?… because selfishness, Walls do not lead to happiness…. Service is the path to Joy… It is the person who gives they are the ones who receive more from the Lord…..

OK… We have reached to the end of this discussion… hopefully if you had any questions, I was able to answer them, or begin to bring clarity to them…And let me say this as we go…. If you are considering divorce… Please please please talk to your pastor, or the elders of your church… if there is a clear case of sexual sins or abandonment, they are going to comfort you and hopefully be a support while you are grieving… but also… Because we are in such a divorce-heavy culture, you're going to want to make sure, that if you go down that road, that you are going down that road with the Lord… that you are not an outright rebellion and sin by initiating an illegitimate divorce…. Marriage and divorce are some of the most weighty and consequential decisions a person can make… and so go to your Pastors, go to your spiritual leaders, and ask them to help you in this season to make wise decisions… to go to counseling if they recommend it, to do a temporary separation if necessary, and last resort, to divorce, if that seems to be the only recourse…..

And I want to say personally, to the church that I Shepherd, if you have any questions, or concerns, or just need to talk with somebody, or pray with somebody, I am here for you, please do not hesitate to reach out……as your pastor, it is my duty to teach you, and to tend to you…