Do not divorce your spouse for foolish or sinful reasons.

31 “It has been said, 'Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.'  32 But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, causes her to become an adulteress, and anyone who marries the divorced woman commits adultery.

INSIGHT:  There is not nearly enough room in this short devotional to being untangling the mass of confusion in Christianity today, because of the lopsided view of the “God hates divorce” message. 

This one teaching of Christ is not the full counsel of God on divorce, any more than John 3:16 is His full counsel on salvation.  The aim of Jesus’ teaching here is not just keeping marriages together for the sake of marriage, and He is not dismissing the Bible’s other legitimate reasons, or even good reasons for divorce, beyond sexual unfaithfulness.  He is not addressing unequally yoked marriages in this teaching where one spouse is abusive, or neglectful, or dangerously irresponsible, or antagonistic towards the other spouse’s true Christian faith, or when they have abandoned the marriage, and remain unrepentant. 

In this one teaching of Jesus, He is teaching the Law of love to Jews, some of whom apparently had been divorcing their wives for any and every reason, even for bad cooking.  This teaching of Christ is important because God would not have them, or us divorce our spouse for any unloving, sinful, or foolish reasons.  To do so violates the Law of love a Christian is bound by, which does no harm even to its neighbor.  In Malachi Ch. 2, God told Israel that He hates the “putting away” of a spouse (divorce) and commanded them not to break faith with their spouses.  He gives two main reasons.  First, because He desires godly offspring, but even more so because when a man “put away” (divorces) his wife, he would be putting her in a very vulnerable and dangerous state of life, especially in those days where help for her would have been so limited, and she would have had a hard time sustaining herself in life.  God saw this as “dealing treacherously” with your spouse.  Doing this without good cause is unloving, selfish, sinful and wicked behavior towards someone you are to love, and indeed, that is why God said He hates “divorce”.

But that is only one side of how God views divorce.  How did God feel about Abraham “putting away” Hagar (his 2nd wife), or all of Israel “putting away” their wives in Ezra Ch. 10?  Why did God not only, not hate these divorces, but why did He also approve of them?  Today, as counterfeit Christianity reigns, it is rare beyond rare for God to find a spiritual equally yoked marriage where both spouses have a true saving faith in the true Jesus Christ.  When I surrendered my whole life and will to God on Oct 30, 2009, I accepted, in that moment, a very different Jesus and gospel from my spouse.  She refused to leave the counterfeit and come with me, so we were now in a very unequally yoked marriage, where she became antagonistic towards my faith.  I have pointed out on our website over two dozen types of counterfeit faith in God and Christ, listed in the Bible, which cannot save their possessors.  Prior to divorce, mine could not save me. 

Jesus said, “He who is not with me is against me.”  How do you then think God feels about divorce when it becomes a tool of righteousness to liberate a true child of His, from a child of Satan, a wheat from a tare, a sheep from a goat, an Isaac from an Ishmael, an obedient follower from a disobedient?  This is what God did with me and with countless others, through divorce, because He cares far more about the eternal soul of one individual, than He does about a thousand temporary institutions called “marriage”. 

I too am against divorce, except when it frees a true child of God to love and serve Him fully unto eternal Life.  Please be careful about judging someone who God may have preserved through divorce and be sure to read the short article I have written called “God’s Whole Counsel on Divorce and Remarriage is much larger than just the three words, “God hates divorce”.