Divorce is real.
Marriages be joined with a strong adhesive.
Matthew 19:1-6 NIV – When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went into the region of Judea to the other side of the Jordan. Large crowds followed him, and he healed them there. Some Pharisees came to him to test him. They asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?”
“Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate.”
1) The Church must champion the sacred nature of marriage.
Ephesians 5:31-33 NIV – “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
Matthew 19:7-11 NIV – “Why then,” they asked, “did Moses command that a man give his wife a certificate of divorce and send her away?” Jesus replied, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning. I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, and marries another woman commits adultery.” The disciples said to him, “If this is the situation between a husband and wife, it is better not to marry.” Jesus replied, “Not everyone can accept this word, but only those to whom it has been given.
2) The Church must champion gentleness toward the divorced.
John 4:4-9 NIV – Now he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph.Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.
When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman.
John 4:13-18 NIV – Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”
He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
“I have no husband,” she replied.
Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband.The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”
Ezekiel 3:15 NIV – …I sat among them…
3) The Church must help people identify the right goal for marriage.
The goal of marriage is not divorce avoidance.
The goal of marriage is intimacy.
I Peter 4:8 NIV – Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.
Three Audiences:
To those yet to be married: Enter marriage with the end in mind
To the currently married: Remember your early days and re-engage with your mate
To the divorced: Receive God’s Grace
