Monthly Archives: December 2019

December 13, 2019

Fallen Man Abused God’s Institution of Marriage…So God Permitted Divorce for the Innocent Spouses.  Fallen Man Abused God’s Provision of Divorce…So the Church Shut the Door on God’s Divorce Provision.  God’s Response to Evil Was Good…The Churches’ Response to Evil Was Myopic.

By Josiah Portermaine

God instituted marriage in the Garden of Eden prior to man’s fall into sin.  From the beginning divorce was unnecessary because treachery and covenant breaking did not exist.  But very quickly man did fall into sin, and treachery and covenant breaking between marriage partners became far too prevalent.  God’s law responded with a permit for the dissolution of such marriages to punish the covenant breakers and to protect the innocent spouses.  Those who failed to respect the institution of marriage also exploited God’s permit to divorce and conspired to make it serve their wicked desires.  When the Church witnessed the treacherous, covenant breaking spouses using God’s permit for divorce to their wicked advantage they failed to look to God’s word for the answer and chose to take decisive action to stop the wretches.

In response to the godless exploiting God’s permit for divorce the church restricted access to divorce so severely that it became unavailable for the innocent spouses—those for whom God’s permit was graciously provided.  In the churches’ effort to restrict access it disciplined and even excommunicated members who so much as pursued dissolution of their marriage.  In addition they strong armed the state into making anti divorce laws making it a crime to get divorced.  The institution of marriage was exalted and referred to as holy matrimony and numbered among the seven sacraments for the Roman Catholic Church.  The idea was that if marriage was holy, then divorce must be unholy.  Ever since the church responded in this way pastors have pointed to divorce rates as one of the chief proofs of the declension in every century.

The church viewed the marriage union as sacrosanct and demonized God’s provision for its dissolution.  In so doing the Church missed the mark on both counts.  The church should have remained on the path that God provided.  It should have taken a position of rebuking covenant breakers and others who wanted to abuse both the institution itself and God’s gracious law ending the marriage union due to the treachery stemming from the hardness of men’s hearts since the fall into sin.

This move against God’s permit for divorce was entirely an initiative of man.  God would not legally grant the dissolution of marriages due to the hardness of men’s hearts only to change his mind later.  In spite of preachers holding the divorce rates out as the number one evidence of a declension in our land Paul never included it in any of his lists of sins (The Bible never calls or refers to divorce as a sin), but Paul did include 23 sins that preachers should be pointing out:

“Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?  Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Corinthians 6:9-10).

“Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God (Galations 5:19-21).

In fact, when the great apostle was asked whether or not believers should divorce an unbelieving spouse Paul responded first by saying, “But to the rest I say, not the Lord…”, which instructs the reader that Paul knew of no passage of scripture upon which he could site in order to prohibit marital divorce from an unbelieving spouse.  The shocking reality is that no verse exists in either the Old Testament or the New Testament that directly calls or refers to divorce as a sin.  Those who think marital divorce is a sin can only call upon three passages in the whole bible to make their claim, but clearly they misconstrue the meaning since God permitted divorce and since Paul could not claim a single biblical passage that forbid divorce for the unequally yoked believer.  Of course the abuse of God’s divorce provision is a sin.  It is the very sin that Jesus was pointing out in Matthew 5 and 19 when he called the religious leaders out and told them they were using God’s provision for divorce to commit the sin of adultery.  Those men as were the men in Malachi 2 were abusing God’s divorce provision to commit adultery.  But Even the Lord does not call or refer to divorce as a sin.  But in the very same passage Jesus says that He would not abrogate one jot or tittle of God’s Law, but rather He came to fulfill the Law.  Yet many have treated divorce as though Jesus did abrogate the Mosaic provision.

Not only are the innocent, believing spouses suffering at the hands of their treacherous, unbelieving partners, but they cannot count on the support of the church while they pursue God’s permit for divorce.  And if they avail themselves of God’s gracious escape they will discover that the church will hold them in contempt and treat them with disdain throughout the process.

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December 9, 2019

The View that Jesus Singled Out Adultery as the Sole Biblical Grounds for Divorce Is Wrong

By Josiah Portermaine

Among the more commonly held perspectives concerning the doctrine on marital divorce in Christian circles is that the Lord Jesus Christ offered adultery as the sole biblical ground for divorce in what is called the “exception clause” (Matthew 5:32, Matthew 19:9).  Our Lord was speaking to the “divorce for any reason” doctrinal position of the Pharisees and had no intention to provide a complete doctrine on divorce or even a complete doctrine on Biblical grounds for a marital divorce, yet these passages have been used to make this argument.  Taking what the  Lord Jesus says in conjunction with what the rest of Scripture has to say on the doctrine of marital divorce is the only sure way to discern God’s revelation on this important issue.  It is generally dangerous to build a doctrinal view from one Biblical passage unless the passage itself lends itself to such an understanding.

The reader may find it interesting that another very common view on divorce is that two biblical grounds for divorce exist.  First, adultery from Jesus’ confrontation with the Pharisees, and second, Paul’s instructions to the Corinthian churches in 1 Corinthians 7.  So then, the two most popular views on the Biblical view on divorce are contradictory of one another.  To make matters worse, many Biblical pastors and teachers will strangely hold both views at the same time–holding the position that adultery is the only Biblical ground for divorce, but also believing that if an unbelieving spouse abandons a believer, then the believer is not bound in such cases.  Apparently these scholars do not hold themselves to the standard of eminent reason and logic.

Logically, Matthew chapters 5 & 19 cannot rightfully be used as our Lord restricting divorce solely for those whose spouse committed adultery if Paul’s teaching on divorce is as clear as it would seem.  The Biblical ground for divorce found in 1 Corinthians 7 is traditionally called abandonment, which is unfortunate as Biblical expounders have understood Paul’s conclusion well enough, but they misapprehended the cause.  Paul says, “Yet if the unbelieving one leaves, let him leave; the brother or the sister is not under bondage in such cases, but God has called us to peace” (1 Corinthians 7:15).  It seems rather obvious that Paul’s instructions do not introduce the concept of abandonment, but Paul is, in fact, providing another biblical ground for divorce.  Many bible students refuse to acknowledge Paul’s clear portrayal of another biblical ground for divorce because doing so would logically mean that our Lord did not intend his “correction against permissiveness” recorded in Matthew’s gospel to limit the sole just cause for divorce to adultery, which is what the church has erred in doing with our Lord’s teaching.

In Paul’s teaching (1 Corinthians 7:12-16) to the churches at Corinth, he introduces a new doctrine regarding marital divorce for believers who find themselves married to unbelievers.  He is very careful to point out that he did not receive this doctrine from the Lord or from any other Scriptural passage.  It was, at that time, a new doctrine for the Christian Church.  Paul’s new teaching, though unprecedented, is consistent with the rest of the Biblical doctrine concerning unequally yoked marriage and divorce.  As Paul introduces his new teaching many mistakenly concluded it to be “abandonment”.  In so doing, church leaders demonstrated a complete failure to understand the divine inspiration and therefore the brilliance of Paul’s unequally yoked treatise for the church era.  Abandonment is not exclusively a failure that is committed by unbelieving spouses, who are the people Paul was discussing.  Paul did not add that if the believing spouse left that the unbelieving spouse was not bound.  Yet believing spouses abandoning their unbelieving spouse is not only a possible outcome, but is an outcome that has no doubt happened tens of thousands of times since Paul penned the new doctrine.  If his new teaching was on abandonment, then it was poorly constructed and insufficient, which is not at all like the great apostle.  No, Paul was not introducing a new rule governing abandonment.

If not abandonment, then what was the nature of Paul’s novel treatise?  The apostle is explaining a treacherous action committed by an unbelieving spouse that would cause the believing spouse to be free from the marital bond?  It had to be something that only the unbelieving spouse could commit because Paul did not flip the equation so that the unbelieving spouse was no longer bound if the believer was guilty.  Why?  It is not possible for the believer to be guilty of what Paul is introducing.  Unlike all other Biblical teaching on divorce both husbands and wives would no longer be bound due to this treacherous action or behavior.  Up until this Biblical passage only husbands had the option of divorce.  In fact, in the 21st Century, Jewish women still cannot get a divorce in Israel if their husband refuses to sign a certificate of divorce.  This has been Jewish law for millennia.

Paul’s Novel Treatise Article: https://wordpress.com/post/biblicalviewondivorce.com/612

Nevertheless, since God’s word unmistakably teaches at least one additional legal ground for divorce, then it is not logically correct to continue teaching adultery as the sole biblical ground for divorce.  Obviously, Jesus was saying that the Pharisees’ “divorce for any reason” doctrine was 180 degrees off.  In Jesus’ use of the Greek word ‘pornia’ he was elucidating that it would take very serious violations of the marriage covenant’s conditions such as adultery to justify dissolving the marriage.  Jesus was arguing that dissolving a marriage takes serious violations by one or both of the marriage partners.  Once covenant conditions have been broken, then dissolution of the marriage is justifiable, but without such treachery a divorce action is illegitimate and the married partners are in danger of committing adultery if they seek a partner outside of the one with whom they are still married.   In such cases, the marriage covenant has not been broken, which is to say it is still a valid and legitimate covenant between the husband and wife.

A divorce action, particularly between two believers, without just cause is not permitted and the marriage partner(s) who remarry will be guilty of adultery.  However, that very adultery provides biblical grounds for the innocent spouse to divorce.  So much of the church would deny this, but what does the Lord say?  “I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery” (Matthew 5:32).  At the very least, Jesus is saying that “unchastity” is biblical grounds for divorce, so when these Pharisees illegitimately “divorced” their wives and joined themselves to another woman, Jesus’ very words exclaim that their wives have biblical grounds for divorce and are now free to remarry in the Lord.  How has this obvious logic been overlooked?  Through an oppression that is always with us where those in power use it to their advantage and to the disadvantage of the weak.  Throughout most centuries women have been powerless when it comes to the doctrine of divorce.  If any legal divorce would be had it was almost never going to be by the wife.  Paul’s teaching corrects this wrong and, at the same time, shows the spuriousness of the argument claiming that our Lord Jesus allows only a single Biblical ground for marital divorce.

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December 9, 2019

The Extreme Positions on Marital Divorce

By Josiah Portermaine

The extreme positions for marital divorce are excessive liberty on the left and excessive restrictions on the right.  It is common for man to respond to an extreme position by moving too far in the opposite direction landing at the opposite extreme.  The Pharisees were practicing excessive liberty, so the church failing to understand our Lord’s correction swung to the opposite extreme and has held on to that extreme for most of its history with a few notable, and I dare say noble, exceptions.

So then, on the left, excessive liberty allows a failure to keep the conditions of the marriage covenant; a failure to even take them seriously.  When it comes to marriage this person fails to cleave, fails to forsake all others, fails to love and cherish.  They fail to take the marriage covenant seriously; therefore, they fail to keep the conditions of the covenant.  They are a covenant breaker.  They treat marriage like a merry-go-round getting off and on as often as it suits their self-centered heart.  The bible allows the innocent spouse the freedom to divorce such a treacherous spouse and remarry in the Lord.

Then we swing all the way out to the right extreme where excessive restrictions prohibit divorce for those who are married to covenant breakers.  Believers are bound up, by the church, where God’s word provides liberty.  They are coerced into a lifetime of being unequally yoked to a treacherous spouse who has broken the marriage covenant by breaking it’s conditions.  As promised in God’s word, this relationship destroys their peace, corrupts their sanctification and development in the Lord, and prevents a godly marriage in the Lord.   The churches’ divorce doctrine effectively treats marriage like a lifetime prison sentence for the innocent spouse handed down for the sins (crimes) committed by the treacherous spouse.  Ridiculously, in the eyes of many in the church, only the treacherous spouse has the ability to commute the innocent spouse’s sentence by choosing to leave the marriage covenant (1 Corinthians 7:12-13).

Both extremes destroy the sanctity of God’s institution of marriage, but today the world (including the false church) practices excessive liberty while the church fails to obey God’s Word by swinging to the other extreme of excessive restrictions on divorce (especially regarding unequally yoked marriages).  Church leaders require believers to serve the institution of marriage while God instituted marriage to serve man.  As the Lord Jesus taught on the institution of the Sabbath, marriage too was made for man and not man for the marriage covenant.  God instituted both the sabbath and marriage to serve man as he glorifies God.  If a particular marriage cannot serve God’s intended purpose because one of the spouses acts treacherously toward the other, then God made an allowance in the Law for divorce.  By overcorrecting from the extreme liberty position the church has effectively taken away God’s allowance and as a result changed God’s law.  The churches’ excessively restrictive position misses the mark that God set for marriage.

The rest of this blog lays out the biblical view on divorce.

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December 5, 2019

The Spirit of God’s Law Governing Divorce

By Josiah Portermaine

God’s law permitting divorce is found in Deuteronomy 21:10-14 and 24:1-4.  Jesus acknowledged God’s permission for divorce when he said, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives”.  Jesus was correcting Jewish leaders who had taken an extreme position on divorce by turning God’s permission into permissiveness.  Their custom became divorcing their wives without a valid reason.  Consistent with man’s tendency to swing out to extreme positions, the church over corrected by denying God’s permission for divorce almost entirely.  So then, one extreme treats marriage like a marry-go-round allowing anyone to get on and off at anytime, while the other extreme treats marriage like a life sentence.

Perhaps some are thinking, “What is the difference between a life sentence and until death do you part?”  Consider the difference between a “life sentence” and a marriage that honors God.  The life sentence is imposed by someone outside of the marriage and does not account for abuse, neglect, hatred, godlessness, wickedness, deception, adultery, treachery and most of all a false confession of faith.  From the first days of the church until now it is likely that more spouses have been murdered in their marriages under this monstrous view of marriage than have inmates in prisons.  By way of comparison, a marriage that honors God is happily maintained by both spouses; it supplies companionship, love, happiness, peace, belonging, comfort, friendship, fidelity, adoration, mutual desire to serve, edification, humility, meaningful sex and most importantly two regenerate spouses able to have godly fellowship together.  Godly spouses cherish and care for one another over and above all others and honor God in their marriage and family.  Marriage, as instituted by God, was never intended to be anything remotely like a life sentence.

Jesus spoke words to correct the permissiveness of the Pharisees, and then the church overcorrected by restricting divorce entirely.  The church misapprehended Jesus’ words and used them to abolish God’s law permitting divorce in spite of the fact that Jesus said, “For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished”, which includes God’s permit for divorce.  How has the church done this?  Note Jesus’ complete statement acknowledging God’s permission for divorce:  “Because of your hardness of heart Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the beginning it has not been this way” (Matthew 19:8).

Our Lord’s statement makes three distinct points:

First:       WHAT       Moses permitted marital divorce.     

Second:   WHY         The hardness of men’s hearts was the cause of Moses’ law.

Third:      WHEN      This law came after the Fall.  From the beginning it has not been this way.

Note that point 1 is WHAT God did. Point 2 is WHY He did it. And point 3 is WHEN He did it. Essentially, the church used the reason and the timing of God’s law, which was to make provision for divorce, and used them to nullify the law itself.  The argument completely misses the mark–so much so that it negates a commandment of God.  It is taught that Moses only allowed divorce because men’s hearts were so hard that they could not be stopped, so Moses had to provide some guidelines. In like manner, it is taught that divorce was not part of God’s plan from the beginning, so for the Christian era Jesus was simply restoring God’s original order by effectively abdicating Moses’ provision for divorce.

It is actually true that the heart of man was hard; however, God did not provide divorce as a legal permit for something they were already doing illegally.  God forbid.  God provided, even commanded, divorce as a protection for the innocent wives who were being put out of their home without a divorce decree.  And He did so in order that those women could marry a faithful man who would love them and treat them as a wife deserved.  Additionally, the divorce decree was a record of the man’s marital history.  He could no longer abuse women and discard them without a record of his actions.  This would be useful for any women who may be considering becoming his next spousal victim.

In like manner, it is taught that divorce was not part of God’s plan from the beginning, so for Christians, Jesus was simply restoring God’s original order by effectively abdicating Moses’ provision for divorce.  Jesus would not do that.  He said as much by saying, “Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill.  For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished” (Matthew 5:17-18).  God provided divorce post the Fall because the hearts of men are hard.  Nothing has changed during the entire history of mankind after the Fall; humans still have hard hearts today.

Because of The Hardness of Men’s Hearts

The Church has neither the power nor the mandate to restore God’s original design at creation.  Divine provisions, such as divorce, must continue until God punishes the wicked and creates a new heaven and a new earth.  It must be acknowledged that the “hardness of men’s hearts” is the cause of every law.  Man’s fall into sin required God’s Law.  Law is absent wherever sin does not exist.  So then, how did the church err in using Christ’s teaching in Matthew chapters 5 and 19 to restrict marital divorce?  Notice the second distinct point in Jesus’ statement: “because of the hardness of men’s hearts”.  This phrase has been misapprehended to mean that man relentlessly, stubbornly demanded permission to divorce, so Moses gave in to their sinful desires and permitted divorce. 

Many contradictions come up immediately with this interpretation.  First, was the law given by God or Moses?  This interpretation treats this law as though Moses, in a moment of weakness, erred, but God and not Moses is the author of the Law and God does not err.  Second, this interpretation assumes that marital divorce is sinful, but would God make a law permitting sin simply to please godless men clamoring for said sin?  Nowhere in all of God’s word is divorce called a sin.  The Pharisees became licentious in their use of divorce, but even then Jesus said they were guilty of adultery.  Of course, he did not say they would be guilty of divorce because our Lord knows that it is not a sin to divorce.  Scripture says that God divorced Israel.  In spite of the reality that theologians go to great lengths trying to prove that God’s divorce of Israel “isn’t real” neither was it an actual marriage, but Scripture still says God divorced Israel.  And God does not sin.  Third, the church has taken the Lord’s words and used them to do away with one of the Mosaic laws.  They have, in essence, declared that Moses erred and Jesus corrected or reestablished God’s original intent.  The facts are that Moses did not err and Jesus had no intention of restricting appropriate cases for divorce.  Jesus did not abdicate the Mosaic Law on divorce.

Technically, men could not have been abusing Moses’ divorce law regulations before he wrote them.  Moses wrote the divine law regulating divorce because people (primarily husbands) were abusing their spouses.  Prior to Moses’ divorce regulations the “putting out” of wives was practiced post the fall because in a fallen world spouses could be treacherous toward one another.  The treacherous husband would frequently put his innocent wife out of her own household often leaving her vulnerable and defenseless.  Divorce was provided to free the innocent spouse from their treacherous, covenant breaking spouse…so that she could remarry a faithful man.  After God’s provision of divorce regulations, treacherous husbands abused the divorce law to appear innocent in their desire to commit adultery.  This misuse of God’s provision is what Jesus condemns in Matthew’s nineteenth chapter.  Unbelievably, in the 21st Century thousands of Jewish women are still being refused the writ of divorce because only the man in Jewish law can sign a divorce decree to end the marriage.  Without his signature the women cannot remarry and are forced to commit fornication just as Jesus said would happen.

Consider the popular theological view on the phrase, “Because of the hardness of men’s hearts”?  A careful study of Moses action recognizes that he was not permitting divorce so much as he was placing restrictions and guidelines on the treacherous treatment of wives including putting them out of their own home and replacing them with another woman.  Moses was actually commanding these abusive men to free their wives with a divorce action.  However, God’s Law performed this function so as to condemn those who did so without just cause.  Moses’ restrictions demanded divorce to protect the innocent spouse without condoning permissiveness for the treacherous spouse.

Just as men would later do in Malachi and Jesus’ days, the men in Moses’ day were taking advantage of the permission for divorce and using it to justify sinfulness on their part.  Prior to the Mosaic Law, the ability to obtain a necessary divorce in the Old Testament was assumed.  In fact, many of the sins that made a divorce permissible also carried the punishment of death, so divorce was unnecessary when the offending spouse was stoned to death.  But if, for whatever reason, the penalty of death was not handed out certainly the spouse was free to divorce and find a more suitable marriage partner.  Therefore, we find Jesus doing exactly what Moses did when he put in place proper guidelines for marital divorce.  Jesus reinforces Moses’ laws when the church often sees Him as abrogating them.  Since all agree that Jesus would not have abrogated the smallest jot or tittle of God’s Law, how can the church view Jesus as effectively doing so with divorce?  They claim that Jesus abrogates nothing but rather restores God’s original order before man’s fall into sin.  The argument is a canard.

The final concern is less a contradiction but a mistaken notion nonetheless.  The church interpreted the phrase ‘the hardness of men’s hearts’ to mean that man stubbornly insisted upon ‘divorce for any reason’ when in fact Jesus meant nothing more than that man, since the time of the fall, is evil continually and have desperately wicked hearts, hence the necessity for an escape from a truly treacherous spouse.  Jesus’ statement on the hardness of men’s hearts is directed at the reality that sinful man is capable of weaponizing even God’s gracious allowances and using them to sin all the more.  So God provided Moses, not a prohibition for divorce, but guidelines to establish biblical grounds for divorce.  Those guidelines were intentionally vague because God understood that a simple rule of three (such as adultery, abandonment, physical abuse) could not possibly cover every legitimate need for a divorce.  God understood that the hardness of man’s heart makes many people treacherous spouses; spouses who would break the conditions of the marriage covenant.  Both Moses and Jesus needed to correct the permissiveness of the Israelites and the Pharisees while at the same time reinforcing God’s provision of divorce for the protection of the innocent spouses of treacherous husbands and wives.  Jesus gave an example of the type of covenant breaking that would permit divorce and the church turned it into a law of one biblical ground for divorce, but a careful study of scripture quickly sees the impossibility of that being the correct interpretation of our Lord’s meaning.

From The Beginning It Has Not Been This Way

We now come to our Lord’s third distinct point in His phrase.  Jesus said, “But from the beginning it has not been this way”.  The church has taken this to mean that God’s intention is for the duration of marriage to be for the entire lifetime of the marriage partners.  I think that we can all agree that God’s intent was for marriage to last as long as the partners lasted, but that is only part of what Jesus was saying.  Jesus’ use of the phrase, “from the beginning” is a clear reference to God’s institution of marriage prior to man’s fall into sin.  Then man’s fall into sin transpired subsequent to “the beginning” bringing the hardness of men’s hearts into every marriage occasionally necessitating divorce.  Then hard hearted men abused the natural law’s provision of divorce necessitating Moses’ guidelines for divorce, which still gets abused by the hard hearted.

The unmistakable point here is that the fall brought about hard hearts and that mankind must mitigate their own sins so that they can aspire to God’s original intent in their marriages.  However, Moses and Jesus did not prohibit divorce, but rather pointed to the guidelines of God’s Law on divorce so that the innocent partners of treacherous, adulterous, murderous spouses would have a way of escape.  The church effectively prohibited access to divorce entirely and ignored Moses’ guidelines reinforced by Jesus.  To make matters worse the Church’s catastrophic blunder was all done in the name of Jesus as it was our Lord’s words they misinterpreted in order to nullify God’s allowance for all necessary divorces.  So then, the church has failed where Moses and Jesus did not.

Finally, we arrive at Jesus’ second distinct point that reads: “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives.”  John Milton explained that God instituted marriage because Adam was lonely (“It is not good for the man to be alone” Genesis 2:18), and God provided the perfect solution (woman) to alleviate man’s loneliness.  God’s intentions were that this special friendship would last forever, but then man fell into sin; a fall so great that we have the following recorded in Genesis 6:5-7:

“Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.  The Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart.  The Lord said, ‘I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land…for I am sorry that I have made them.”

The very next chapter records God fulfilling His promise by sending a worldwide flood.  Therefore, man’s hardness of heart deserved God wiping out the entire human race with the exception of Noah and his 7 family members.

What God said in Genesis 6 and did in Genesis 7 demonstrates the spirit of God’s law permitting marital divorce.  It frequently happens that those who enjoy studying law tend to spend most of their time working on the letter of the law.  Man can manipulate the letter of the law to come up with whatever outcome he desires.  The Pharisees manipulated the letter of God’s law on divorce and arrived at licentiousness and permissiveness because that is what they desired.  The church has taken the very same law and turned the letter of that law all the way to the other extreme so that a permit for divorce is virtually impossible to obtain because that is what they desired.  But what does God desire?  Does anyone care to discover the spirit of God’s law permitting divorce?

Just as God frees himself from the wickedness of man both in his destruction by flood and in the eternal punishment of hell, he provides innocent marriage partners a permit to divorce spouses whose hardness of heart causes them to become treacherous spouses.  From the beginning divorce did not exist, but neither did sin, death and eternal damnation.  What is the heart and spirit of God’s permit to divorce?  God provides marital divorce to separate light from darkness, to punish the wicked and to protect the innocent.  The fact that the church has taken that protection away will forever be a sad chapter in the history of God’s church.  It is time to close that chapter and get this right.

God has indeed made a greater provision than divorce from a treacherous spouse.  God sent His only begotten Son into the world to receive in Himself the punishment due fallen humanity for our treacherous ways against God.  Those who repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ will not have perfect marriages but will be able to live together in peace.  Divorce is permitted for those whose spouse remains treacherous (thus unbelieving) refusing submission to the Lord Jesus.

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