The SKV

Matthew 19-- Divorce

And it happened when Jesus completed these words, he left Galilee and went to the territory of Judea across the Jordan and great crowds followed him and he healed them there. And Pharisees came to him, testing him and saying if it is lawful for a man to divorce his wife according to whatever cause. And answering, he said, "Haven't you read that He who created from the beginning, he made them male and female? and He said, "Because of this a man will leave the father and the mother and will unite with his wife and the two will be one flesh. Thus they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God puts together a human must not separate.” They said to him, "Why then did Moses command to give a written document of divorce and divorce her?" He said to them, "Because of your stubbornness Moses permitted to you to divorce your wives, however, from the beginning it was not like this. And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another commits adultery.

Jesus completed his speech and left Galilee for a time, traveling to Judea, on the East side of the Jordan River. As usual, many crowds gathered to him and he healed many. And, as usual, the Pharisees followed him, and asked him a highly debated question to cause him problems. They asked, “According to Moses’ law, can a husband divorce his wife for any and all reasons?” He answered them, “Haven’t you read your Bible? Moses made it clear that God created all things in the beginning, including humanity which He created male and female. And God said, ‘Because I made humanity into two kinds of beings, the man will leave his father and mother in order to unite with his wife and make a new family, thus the two will make one family.’ Therefore a marriage is not two, but a single unit. So whatever God has fused together, it should never be right for a human to de-fuse, to tear apart into chaos.”

They replied to this, “So why did Moses give us the command of divorce? He said to give the wife a written document and to separate from her?” Jesus said, “Moses knew your hearts. He knew that you would divorce anyway, so he gave you the means of divorce. But God’s ideal from the beginning is not separation but union. Listen carefully, there is only one reason to divorce one’s spouse—adultery, for then the faithless spouse has already broken the union. But anyone who divorces for any other reason and then turns around to marry another person, they have then been faithless to their original marriage and is an adulterer.”

posted by Steve Kimes @ 9:45 AM