Visit: Christianityculture.com
Have you ever wondered about the impact of divorce on Christian testimony? We're diving into it. From scriptural teachings to the big question of remarriage.
What are the takeaways from all that the Bible has to say about marriage, divorce and remarriage after divorce?
Be really sure the Lord is calling you to marry a certain person. Marriage is for life! Its “for better or worse.” Marriage is a death sentence to “self” and to “selfishness.”
Divorce should never be an option to a sold-out, born-again believer.
Make up your mind about the divorce and remarriage exceptions before you get married. There is no easy out…, except death of your spouse.
See your role, whether you are single or married, as an ambassador of reconciliation for friends who are having their martial struggles…., or for brothers or sisters who are struggling with their spiritual commitment to Christ.
Ponder and pray about how getting a divorce will impact your Christian witness to your unbelieving friends and relatives.
Ask Jesus to show you if you have been a faithful bride to Him. If you are convicted by the Holy Spirit that you have been pursuing other lovers (including your own flesh), then repent and seek that forgiveness that freely flows from His throne to those who are determined to never let go of the “Lover of their souls.”
Visit: Christianityculture.com
Have you ever wondered about the impact of divorce on Christian testimony? We're diving into it. From scriptural teachings to the big question of remarriage.
What are the takeaways from all that the Bible has to say about marriage, divorce and remarriage after divorce?
Be really sure the Lord is calling you to marry a certain person. Marriage is for life! Its “for better or worse.” Marriage is a death sentence to “self” and to “selfishness.”
Divorce should never be an option to a sold-out, born-again believer.
Make up your mind about the divorce and remarriage exceptions before you get married. There is no easy out…, except death of your spouse.
See your role, whether you are single or married, as an ambassador of reconciliation for friends who are having their martial struggles…., or for brothers or sisters who are struggling with their spiritual commitment to Christ.
Ponder and pray about how getting a divorce will impact your Christian witness to your unbelieving friends and relatives.
Ask Jesus to show you if you have been a faithful bride to Him. If you are convicted by the Holy Spirit that you have been pursuing other lovers (including your own flesh), then repent and seek that forgiveness that freely flows from His throne to those who are determined to never let go of the “Lover of their souls.”
Alright, good morning. My name is Slavic. This is my friend, chip and Chip, welcome to this episode of podcast where we want to spend some time talking about divorce and remarriage. Chip, I asked you to speak. A message at our church was a couple weeks ago, actually, it was.
Speaker 2:September 15th.
Speaker 1:Oh, you remember, so it's more than a few weeks ago, but, and I remember, during your message you've said some things that I didn't really think too much of, if I'm completely honest, and maybe because it didn't really come up in my life, but I do remember a lot of people were asking for that message. The problem is because I was in charge of the sound that night. It didn't really work out. The sound was really bad and we couldn't release that message online Just because, I mean, you could still hear, but it was really bad. So we thought it'd be great for us to spend some time just talking about this and keep on, keep on, keep on. Keep in mind that that I'm not married. Chip has been married for how many years? 53. 53 years, so it's safe to say that he's been married more than I've been alive. You're not that old, no. So tell us how you're able to manage to have 53 years of marriage with no problems whatsoever. So tell us a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 2:Okay. So the good news was is God works in mysterious ways and he's sovereign, and he brings people together before you even know him or have a need to know him. And my wife and I got married in 1970, when we were both beginning our senior year at USC. We were party animals in the Greek system. We didn't care about God, it was all. If it feels good, do it, let's go have another drink and another party. But God is sovereign.
Speaker 2:I got through law school, we moved up to Seattle in 1974 and God connected me with some very godly people who eventually invited us to go to church with them. We heard the word of God and that started our relationship with the Lord, which really began for both of us within three days of each other in 1977. But, needless to say, when you start your walk with the Lord, you don't know where you're going, you don't understand the Bible, and so it literally takes decades to get to the point where you understand God. But I will tell you that before we became Christians, my wife and I never fought, because we were always happy to feed the lust of our flesh and do what we wanted to do. But God's message to his people is that we're to be holy as he is holy and die to self, and that does not come easy.
Speaker 2:So I can tell you that marriage is a blessing, but at the same time it's a fiery furnace, because nobody knows you as well as your spouse and we both, intentionally and sometimes unintentionally many times unintentionally have hurt each other deeply, and so staying together has continued to be a challenge, even after 53 years, because the Bible calls me, as a husband, to love my wife as Christ loved the church. That's perfect love and that's his standard. It's set forth in chapter 13 in 1 Corinthians, and it is impossible without the Holy Spirit, number one and number two, without totally surrendering your heart to him and saying, lord, not my will, but yours be done. And so I think the secret of a healthy marriage is one in which we look to the grace of God, repent from our sins as often as we are convicted by the Holy Spirit or by our spouse, and ask God to give each of us his amazing, unconditional love for one another.
Speaker 1:How long were you married before you became Christians? Again? Seven years, Seven years so when you became a Christian. How has that changed your relationship? You've said it obviously caused even more problems because now you had to die to yourself. But how has that changed your marriage from the moment you were not a Christian and then you became a Christian?
Speaker 2:We've had a total new mindset, of course, but again, the revelation of God and the Word of God, as enlightened by the Holy Spirit, is something that takes place over time, and so I can't say that we were instantly amazing, wonderful people. We've grown by studying the Word, by participating in Bible studies and then leading Bible studies and then being missionaries and doing the various things that we've done together over our lives, and it is an ongoing work. As Paul says, he was never satisfied with the knowledge his own knowledge of Christ. He always wanted to know and more. And as we know Christ more, then I think we can be more Christ-like and learn to love one another more in a fashion that honors and glorifies God. Our prayer for us and for our two sons who are married is that our marriages would bring glory to God, because it reflects the love that Christ has for us as his bride.
Speaker 1:So, would you say then, the reason God hates divorce is because, ultimately, marriage is a representation of God's covenant to his people? How would you describe marriage in general, and why do you think God says that he hates divorce?
Speaker 2:Well, marriage in general. I think you got to go back to Genesis, chapter 2. God created Adam and then poor Adam was sitting around. He had the Garden of Eden, but he didn't have another person who was made in God's image, to be with him. And so Genesis, chapter 2, god says he determined it's not good that a man should be alone. He needed a helper who was comparable to him. And so again he said for this reason man shall leave his father and mother and hold to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And that one flesh thing, I think, is not just a picture of physical sexual intimacy, but also the fact that husband and wife are really one in the mind of God. We become one, and just as Christ and his heavenly Father and the Holy Spirit is one, husband and wife are supposed to be that way, spiritually and emotionally as well as physically.
Speaker 1:Yeah, one thing that you mentioned here Sermon. So, by the way, the sermon was on Mark. We were going through the Gospel of Mark and then there Jesus is challenged and he mentions how in the Old Testament they were allowed to do divorce because of the hardness of their hearts. So one thing that I was thinking, that you said that really stood out to me after like weeks after the sermon is you mentioned something along the lines maybe you can rephrase that, but you said something along the lines of how can I claim that Jesus can fix everything and then I divorce my wife? That would kind of have a negative impact I think lightly, I would say decimate, yeah, decimate.
Speaker 1:Yeah, not just negative impact. We decimate your witness, right. So do you want to expand a little bit on why do you think you know this would actually taint or decimate your witness?
Speaker 2:Well, christ calls us to be disciples and to make disciples, and as part of that, we are preaching the Gospel and we're teaching people what Jesus taught us through the Scripture, and that's just so filled with. I love you with an everlasting love. I'll never leave or forsake you. My grace is sufficient for you. No matter what you're facing, I will be with you and walk through it with you, die to self and focus your eyes on Christ as he perfects your faith. And so when we're sharing that with people who are potential disciples or people who are young disciples, we might call them the lambs of the flock. If, at the same time, we say, well, I'm done with my wife, she's just impossible, I can't get along anymore and so I'm going to divorce her. We won't even touch the remarriage thing at this point. But when you think about it, that's really saying you know what God's grace is not sufficient for me to live with this person in a fashion that glorifies him, and that's just a huge statement that the world or young believers can say well, if it's not good enough for that, then why do I need it? Okay, so to me.
Speaker 2:When I was thinking about the whole topic of divorce, I was reflecting on how it's going to affect the validity of my testimony. And I've told my wife many times when we have really had deep hurts and difficult things that we struggled through. I've said Christ says he'll never leave or forsake me and I am never going to leave or forsake you. I will never give up. I will continue to try to die to self and repent and love you sacrificially, but I'm not going to break this commitment that I made. And it all gets back to what Jesus said in Mark 10 in verse 12. He basically is saying what God joined together, let no man separate. And that is profound.
Speaker 2:If you really believe in the sovereignty of God, whether you met God after you were married, like we did, or you were a Christian and then you entered into marriage, when you get married you must be acknowledging in your heart this person, this man, this woman, is the person that God has brought me to and he has joined us together.
Speaker 2:And people make that commitment in the marriage ceremony many times saying I covenant to take care of you until death do us part. But if you look at the statistics of couples that get divorced, it is staggering to see how high the percentages are for Christian couples who get married and then end up getting divorced, and I think that that is a huge black eye in the testimony of the church. If we're claiming, come to Christ, he is sufficient, his love is amazing and he will provide all of your needs according to his riches and glory, and then you get divorced, think about it. If people are really thinking about it from a scriptural standpoint, I think you've lost a lot of credibility as a disciple who's trying to be a disciple maker, or even as an ambassador of reconciliation. We're imploring people to be reconciled to God and at the same time, we're saying it was impossible for me to be reconciled to my spouse because of abmc.
Speaker 1:So in your view, and obviously I think what's more important here is the biblical view. We see that people confront Jesus about saying, well, but you can get divorced, like in the Old Testament. Moses allowed us to get divorced. Sure, how would you explain that? Because I think Jesus explains it really well, but I think a lot of people just kind of skip that part Right. So why is it okay to divorce someone in the Old Testament but not in the New Testament? If that's even a fair question?
Speaker 2:I don't think that's a fair question, okay well, I'll try to at least shed some light on it. I think we have to keep in mind that when Jesus is asking the question of the Pharisees, the Pharisees go back and say you know, what did Moses say? And the Pharisees said to him oh well, moses told us that a man could get a certificate of divorce and dismiss her period. And Jesus the answer was was because of the hardness of your heart, he wrote this precept. Now, if you go back and look at the basis of that statement by Moses, you find it in Deuteronomy, chapter 24, verse one, and the amplified version is pretty amazing. It says when a man takes a wife and marries her and it happens that she loses his favor because he's found something indecent or unacceptable about her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of the house for any reason that you find she is unacceptable. Whoa, that is crazy.
Speaker 2:The people that Moses was talking to had been living for 400 years in Egypt in a society that was totally filled with idolatry, all sorts of sexual promiscuity. It was anything but Christlike, and so he was, I think, giving that rule at that time because of the hardness of their hearts that had developed over time. And sadly, that same hardness develops even today in the hearts of men and women. But when Christ came, he gave us a new covenant and he rose to His Father so that the Lord could send the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, to live in us. And that is the thing that allows us to do the impossible. And the impossible is to submit to one another, to die to self and to love your spouse like Christ loved the church. So we have a new beginning that I think supersedes the old Deuteronomy excuse. How can we say we have a hard heart when the Bible says when you come to me, I'm going to give you a new heart, gotcha.
Speaker 1:So I would say it would be fair to say that it's not God like divorce or hated divorce any less. It's just they had hard hearts and they did this because of the hardness of their heart. And if we claim to be Christians, if we claim that we have a changed heart, then that no longer applies, right, when you think about it.
Speaker 2:What is divorce? It is tearing apart what God brought together, right? It is a violent deed because God says they become one. In Malachi 2, verse 16,. God says for the Lord, God of Israel says he hates divorce. Now listen to why, for it covers one's garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. Therefore, take heed to your spirit that you do not deal treacherously.
Speaker 2:Okay, what is the Bible talk about in terms of garments? When we're sinful, our garments are filthy rags, they're spotted. And when we come to Christ through His finished work on the cross, we are given His robes of righteousness and he takes our sins on the cross and pays the debt. And so when we're ripping this thing apart, we are damaging our garment through the violence of tearing apart this union that God brought together. And there's a spiritual implication. He says take heed. He's warning people, take heed that you do not deal treacherously. What is treachery? It is really a violation of faith, trust, hope, commitment, and that's what happens when somebody gives up and says I can no longer do this, I am out of this relationship. You're basically acting in a treacherous fashion to eliminate that bond that God created.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I obviously haven't really thought this through, but if I could just ask you straightforward do you think divorce is acceptable anytime for a Christian?
Speaker 2:I think it's clear. You don't have to ask my opinion, you can see it in the Bible. There are circumstances and we all know of them when one of the spouses is acting in a fashion that is going to danger the life or the health of the weaker spouse or the children. The Bible says you can separate and it also says that you can, under those terrible circumstances, get divorced. But the question is what do you do once you get divorced? And the Bible's got lots of clarity on that and a couple of verses that have had people scratching their heads and trying to find a way out of what the biblical answer to that question is, which is a tough one.
Speaker 1:So divorce is one thing, but what I'm hearing you say is well, we also need to think about is remarriage. Is remarriage permittable if somebody's been divorced, because that's huge right? So if somebody say they were dealing with abuse in their marriage and they were separated for a while and they're considering divorce, how would you counsel somebody like that? Because, if I hear it correctly, should they ever remarry if they were to get divorced?
Speaker 2:That would give you a funny answer, almost. The answer is of course they can remarry if they marry the spouse they were separated from.
Speaker 1:The answer is no.
Speaker 2:The answer is yes. Why is that? When you think about this prohibition to remarry, which we'll talk about it from a scriptural standpoint here in a minute when you think about it, when spouses separate, get divorced and then remarry somebody else, reconciliation is no longer possible. You shut the door. You can't remarry the person unless you divorce that person. It just gets really, really ugly.
Speaker 2:So I think we have to think about when God says if you get divorced then you have to stay separate. That's a reason for that and I think the reason for that is over time hearts soften. God can do His work. People can see that the grass isn't greener on the other side of the fence and come back and start to see gee, I made a mistake. And so if you stay single during that period of time, the possibility of reconciliation is enhanced. We have had people that we've known over the years amazing that got divorced, lived separately and then they remarried and they had awesome marriages. At the same time I've had other friends who are godly people, who have gotten divorced and, after a period of time, remarried and they have wonderful marriages with their second spouses. So I don't consider them any more of a sinner than you. If you steal a paperclip. It's the same thing. You do it with a hard heart. It's clearly something that God cares about, and he says very clearly that when you're going to get divorced, you have to stay single.
Speaker 2:This is something that was clearly understood by the early church Over hundreds of years. There's writings from Hermes and Clement and Jerome and St Augustine and Orison and Basil that basically says if a spouse persists in an adulterous behavior and there's no other alternative, the marriage relationship can be terminated by the innocent party. And then it also says spouses that are divorced for any reason must remain celibate and single. As long as both spouses live, remarriage is expressly prohibited. So those rules were confirmed by 25 different authors over this period of time in two different councils of churches when they were trying to come up with what truth is.
Speaker 2:But man being what he is, people are always looking out for an exception and a way around it, and so the one place that we see a variation in Scripture is in Matthew. Luke is consistent and Mark is consistent you can't remarry. If you look at Matthew 532 or Matthew 19.9, they both say this is Jesus talking. I tell you, if anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality makes her a victim of adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery. And then in verse 19 it says whoever remarries, whoever marries this woman who got divorced except for sexual immorality commits adultery.
Speaker 2:So a lot of people point to that as the justification that they have for getting married to somebody else. The problem again is when you look at all the Scriptures together. I love Psalm 119, 160 that says the sum of the word is truth. There's so many other Scriptures from 1 Corinthians 7 and Ephesians 5 and in Romans 7 that make this statement very clear for the woman who has a husband, who is bound by the law to her husband as long as he lives, but if the husband dies she's released from the law of her husband, and so while her husband lives, if she remarries another man, she will be called an adulteress.
Speaker 1:So I don't mean to I kind of laughed at the beginning, but I don't mean to make light of this situation, because normally these situations, especially in the cases of abuse right, this is not an easy situation for the people involved, right? So I don't think anybody would say that, oh yeah, you should go and remarry your abuser. What we're talking about here is allow time for God, hopefully, to work on that person to repent, right, because this is a case of no repentance, right, like if somebody is abusing their wife.
Speaker 1:That's.
Speaker 1:At that point I'm kind of wondering if they are a Christian right, like if they're constantly abusing their wife, whatever vice versa it could be, it could be either way.
Speaker 1:So remarriage here is not going to get you remarried to the person who's abusing you unless that person is repenting, is changing right. And what we're talking about here is reconciliation. Right Is for God to bring together and restore a marriage, but that should never be done at the cost of that person feeling for their safety or anything like that. I mean, I don't know if you realize this, but this is not what a lot of the modern day Christianity is. I mean, I personally know pastors who have divorced their wives, have remarried right and they're still in ministry, right. So, and you know, obviously, like I'm a pastor and I'm not here to just point to, oh, look what pastors are doing it's just this is kind of a modern day thing where people just don't take this stuff seriously, right, like they don't take the kind of the historical precedent, I guess, of what even some of the early church fathers taught on this subject.
Speaker 2:They don't have fear of the Lord. Bottom line If you're talking about somebody who is a elder or a pastor or a deacon who has got divorced and remarried, then I think if you look at the scripture in 1 Timothy and in Titus 1, deacons must be a husband of one wife and I don't think that means one at a time. You know we're not talking about polygamy here.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, because 1 Timothy goes on and says the deacons should be a husband of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses. Well, when you have a divorce, the implications on the family per se are horrendous, which is another reason that no Christian person man or woman, in my opinion, absent really, really extraordinary circumstances, should think I'm going to walk out of this divorce and everything's going to be fine, because the impact on the children is horrendous. The parents are fighting, the kids are torn. They love both their mom and their dad. They have to pick one or the other and if they do, then there's a lot of guilt against the parent that they didn't support, etc. So that's terrible. And if you just look at the implications on society, there are statistics that are shocking that I want to just touch on briefly.
Speaker 2:When a divorce takes place, typically this isn't always the case, particularly recently when more and more women are in the workforce and they're making almost as much as men, sometimes more than their husbands, but by and large, most of the time, when the man leaves, he's running off of a sweet young thing and the wife is stuck with these kids and either she has to go to work or she has to continue in a low paying job, and so the result is there's nobody parenting those kids.
Speaker 2:So listen to these statistics that are just amazing. The strongest predictor of whether a person is going to end up in prison or have a significant problem is whether they're raised by a single parent. Okay, 70% of the inmates in state juvenile detention centers serving long term sentences were raised by single women. 72% of the juvenile murderers and 60% of the rapists come from single mothers. 70% of teenage births drop out. Suicides, runaways, jubile, nile delinquents and child murders involve children raised by single mothers. Can you see why God hates divorce? This is one of the sad ramifications that happens when a family splits apart. When the parents don't come together and stay together and work through their issues, then the children sadly pay a high price, not to mention the price that the individuals pay.
Speaker 1:So that's man. So that raises so many other questions. What would you tell to a person who has been divorced, who has been remarried to a different person just to be clear, yeah, they still have to be a Christian where they still claim that they were a Christian the whole time, there's not much they can do about the past, right? How would you even handle something like that? That is I mean because there's people right now who are on their second or third marriage and they claim that they were Christians the whole time.
Speaker 2:Well, I pray for them. I'm a one. I have two dear friends who are godly men who I love to death, and both of those guys, when they were relatively young, married. I can't remember. One of them clearly was a Christian and the other one I don't think had become a Christian at the time. But they both remarried and they both have wonderful relationships with their wives and with their children, and I don't judge them because of it.
Speaker 2:My friend, who was a Christian when he got divorced the first time, has repented from it. He sees that it was sin, but once you're remarried you can't break that one off. I think so I just, under these difficult circumstances, try to have God's love for these people and encourage them to have a marriage that glorifies God the second time around. I've never met somebody who's been married five or six times, though I've heard about them, and they're usually not Christians and they are a disaster because they're always looking for somebody better. But the ultimate reality is that nobody will ever fulfill the relationship in the heart of a man or woman that Christ died to make possible, and that's really what they're looking for. They're lost.
Speaker 1:Right. I would say that, at the end of the day, what God is looking for is reconciliation, right, is trying to find or bring healing in these situations that are extremely difficult to kind of navigate. But what the point of this whole podcast even is this idea that if anybody is considering to get a divorce thinking that they can find somebody better, there's not really a good reason. Even if there is something a good reason, like abuse or someone being faithful, I think that's kind of more. The point of this whole thing is to really consider you or bond in marriage as an unbreakable bond, right? Like make sure that you understand, this is not a contract. I work in real estate, so like contracts have. I mean, you're a lawyer, so you know contracts.
Speaker 2:I understand contracts.
Speaker 1:So contracts have a lot of ways out. I mean, there's a lot of contingencies, there's a lot of things that you can get out, but covenants are a whole different level. So can you talk a little bit about, from your experience as a lawyer, contract versus the covenant of marriage and the difference Because I feel like some people look at marriage as a contract- no, there's definitely that perspective in society.
Speaker 2:If somebody is a sold out, absolute, on fire, born again believer and is going into a marriage, that person is not thinking about an escape clause. That person is thinking about a covenant before God to love this person sacrificially, as Christ loved the church, and to be with that person in sickness and in troubles and trials until death. Do us part, so no escape clause. As a lawyer, I have represented many people who have had second marriages or have a great amount of wealth and they're about to marry somebody else and the parents are going. You got to protect all that wealth, and so I've drafted many cohabitation agreements, many prenuptial agreements and many post nuptial agreements and they all have escape clause. It basically says we hope this will work, but if it doesn't, here's what we're going to do, and so they agree ahead of time. It certainly takes a lot of romance out of the relationship. I love you, honey, but only if you sign here. So that's a tough one, but I've seen people do a good conversation.
Speaker 2:Yeah it's an awkward conversation I have, and fortunately for many of my clients, since I practice law for almost 50 years, I've seen that when they've done these prenuptial agreements many times, the marriage is just fine, they live together, and so it's just a precaution. But that's the world's way, and we are called to be of the world, in the world, but not of the world, and so there's no way, in my opinion, that a Christian should have that mindset. Now, slavic kind of narrowed the scope of this podcast more than I want it to be narrowed, because I think what we're talking about here is critically significant to you folks out there that don't have a spouse yet, who are hoping to be married someday and wanting to enter into this covenant of marriage with eternity in mind and with the goal of honoring God and making this a lifelong, lasting commitment. And so my exhortation to those folks is before you get married, number one, be really, really sure that you hear the Lord telling you this is the right person. Okay, so that's an absolute commitment.
Speaker 2:I like to say that marriage is a death sentence to self and to selfishness. Wow, that's hard to take, but that's the way you should go into it with that perspective, because otherwise, if you're marrying a man or a woman because he or she's going to do everything you need to feel loved. I got news for you. You're going to be disappointed as time passes. Never works out that way. So divorce again, in my opinion, should never even be an option for a sold out, born again believer. So you got to make up your mind about this divorce and remarriage exception before you get married, because if you really embrace the biblical teaching that once you're married, if you get divorced, you're not going to remarry until your spouse passes away, then that's going to make it even harder for you to get to the point of saying I'm done with this, because while you're happy for a while, I can assure you that after a few months or years you're going to be tired of sitting home alone wishing that you had that relationship that you shared with your spouse before things went south. So again, that's important. I also am sharing these truths because I want those of you who are out there who are married now or who may never be married to recognize that, as Christian brothers and sisters of people that we know who are married, we have an opportunity to be ambassadors of reconciliation to help our friends that are struggling with marital difficulties to come together and repent and recommit themselves to the relationship. And if you know these principles, I think that you can be that much more effective in the counsel and in the ways that you pray for the people that God connects you with that are having marital difficulties. So, again, that is really really important.
Speaker 2:Another point again we've started with this and I want to close with this we have to really pray about and remember if you are married, think about how getting divorces can impact your ability to share the gospel with unbelieving friends and family members, because it really is significant or it ought to be so. Those are kind of the broader scope of how I hope this podcast will speak to the hearts of people that, regardless of what your marital state is, there is wisdom in knowing these scriptures and understanding the mind of God about these things, because it'll help us, first and foremost, understand that God is our groom and we are His bride and, in the last analysis, whether you're single, whether you're married, whether you're divorced, it doesn't matter. At some point Jesus is coming back for His bride and he wants us to be waiting for Him and ready and to be set apart and to be faithful to Him, and that means that we're not going to have any other lovers in our life. Well, jesus, I'm a good guy. I've never had adulterers to share with another woman. That's way too narrow. The other lovers in your life are things like your job, food, alcohol, pornography you name it sports. Anything can become an idol that you're pursuing more than you're pursuing Jesus and pleasing Him, and so that is something that I got out of this myself to be able to see.
Speaker 2:You know, we all read this story about in Hosea, about how God told Hosea to Mary Gomer, and this woman was an absolute sex maniac, couldn't get enough and started selling herself, and then she started paying people to have sex with her.
Speaker 2:She was so unfaithful and God kept saying take her back, take her back. And that illustration, I think, is so that we would understand that God's love is there for us, no matter what our adulterous affair is with. He's always ready to take us back. But we need to repent and turn and come back and say Lord, I want to be your pure and spotless bride and I want you to be the love of my life. And when you think about it, this really is so simple. The gospel is so simple. It takes us back to Jesus saying the greatest commandment is to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, all your mind, all your strength. And when we do that he's number one and we're in the right position with Him. And when we have that relationship with God through Christ, then we can have His love for the people he connects us with, whether they are parents or siblings or spouses or prospective spouses. That's what matter.
Speaker 1:Earlier we mentioned prenup. So if a Christian comes up to you and says, hey, I have some wealth that I want to protect and I love this girl and I really want to get married to her, but I want to do a prenup Since I think you are one of the best people to ask this because you have been practicing law and a Christian what are your views and thoughts on that?
Speaker 2:It really comes down to who are you trusting, number one and number two. What's your perspective about who owns the stuff? Okay, okay, and this gets back to a principle in the Bible that's really, really clear when you think about it. I think it's James that says every good and perfect gift comes from the Father above, and so the concept here is that everything that you have and that you acquire is because of the gifts and talents and mind and opportunities that the Lord put in your life, and if you recognize it that way, it all belongs to the Lord. So if that's your perspective, then I think, as a mature Christian, my challenge would be who are you trusting? Okay, who are you trusting? You're trying to protect this stuff and you're telling this woman that you are about to marry, that you're going to love her sacrificially and that you want to be one spiritually, intimately etc.
Speaker 1:And you're dying to yourself and your selfishness.
Speaker 2:Yes, I love you, honey, but if you leave me, I get it all and you get nothing. So I think I've never done a prenuptial agreement for somebody who was an on fireborn again believer.
Speaker 1:Interesting, isn't it? Because I'm kind of wondering, like, if Jesus had the same sort of approach instead of okay, I love you and I will save you, but I'm in heaven and all that, Well, you know, I'm just gonna keep that away from you. So I do think that that goes back to how did Jesus give himself for us right? How did God's kingdom? Because, ultimately, marriage supposed to be a representation of that right. So if somebody says, well, I want to get married, but I want to do a prenuptial agreement, I love your answer. I think you know, sometimes I have to ask these because I think somebody listening to this podcast, they would probably think about this.
Speaker 1:So one thing I want to want to kind of emphasize on is what are some things that you would tell people like me, right, when, hopefully, I get married some point in the future? What are some things that you should talk to your future spouse about? Right, Like, what are some things that you should really cover and make sure you're going the same directions, right? Obviously, I think we both know that both have to be Christians, but I'm talking about more than nuanced approach. Right, Like where? Okay, how do you talk about money? I mean, we've addressed a little bit with prenupt. But what are some things you would tell someone who is considering marriage, or maybe they're, you know, maybe they're engaged right now, right, and they're not really taking this commitment seriously, whether thinking well, you know, if doesn't work out, doesn't work out right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, that's the first thing. If you can get the people focused on God's perspective of marriage, I think you're going to be preparing them tremendously. However, this podcast is not. We don't have enough time to cover all the things that my wife and I usually cover when we meet with a couple who comes to us and say we'd like to have premarital counseling, to talk about, so get premarital counseling.
Speaker 2:Find somebody whose judgment you respect and talk to them about marriage and hopefully they will have wisdom from God and give you biblically correct advice on all sorts of things about stewardship of finances, about you know how you make decisions about are you going to have children? If you do, how are you going to raise them? It just goes on and on and on. How do you deal with parents? What are your objectives in terms of where you live and the lifestyle that you want? How much of your time and money do you want to devote to serving the Lord, etc. Etc. There's so many things that couples need to explore, which is why I think it's imperative to have kind of a lengthy engagement, rather than let's get married three weeks from now, sort of thing, and spend some time really talking through and thinking about some of these big issues and making sure that again, spiritually. The one thing that I wanted to stress during this podcast is when you go into this relationship, it's forever, until your spouse dies, okay, and so because of that, it makes sense for both of you to make sure that you really know one another and your objectives for one another are the same.
Speaker 2:I've counseled people and told a lot of young men like you. When you're looking for a wife, first and foremost, look for somebody who loves God more than you do. If you can find that, you've found a good thing, yeah. So look for spiritual maturity and depth, and you know, I don't care how much prayer you put into it.
Speaker 2:After you get into the relationship, you're going to see things that you are blind to. You're going to have surprises and challenges and things that you have to work through, because this process of sanctification goes on individually if you're a single person all your life, and it goes on perhaps at an even accelerated speed if you get married, because then you're living with somebody day by day who can see you, who knows you better than anybody except the Lord, and that is a wonderful thing, but it's also a painful thing that God allows you know when he talks about you know, come to me and buy gold is refined in fire. I think what he's talking about is you come to me and the things that I allow you to go through from an emotional and a spiritual standpoint, individually or with your spouse, is going to refine your heart in a way that would never happen if life was groovy and everything was fine and you didn't have these problems, yeah, so again, this gets back to Romans 828 and 29, which says that God works out all things for good for those who love him, who are called according to his purpose and who walk according to the Spirit and not the flesh. And so that's the challenge, because flesh dies slowly and the sanctification process is wonderful, but it is painful, and the end result is beautiful because you end up with people who are Christ-centered and other-centered instead of self-centered, and that's so rare in this world.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So is there any reason to actually get divorced? I mean we covered a lot but say do you see a scenario where this you know should be considered?
Speaker 2:I'll give you a one. From a legal standpoint that would make sense. If you're working away and your spouse is working and then you find out that your spouse has a gambling addiction and is, you know, running up huge debts, as long as you're married you are personally liable for the debts of your spouse, and so if you're seeing that your spouse is creating financial havoc and huge debts that are going to impact you and put you in slavery and make it impossible for you to raise your kids, you can get divorced and cut off that legal liability that you would have for the debts of your spouse because once separated, those debts are no longer yours. So that's about the only one that I can think of from a legal standpoint. There's obviously the physical security standpoint. That is again a justification. If the spouse is so violently abusive that he or she is going to harm you or your children, that is a good reason to separate. And again, you can separate without getting divorced. But from the standpoint of this contractual exposure for liabilities of debts, you have to get divorced in order to cut that off. Separating that, separating from your spouse during that period of time won't do it. Another justification that I have recently sadly seen is if one of the parents is poisoning the minds and hearts of the little children exposing them to pornography, let's say, would be an example then in my mind that's a reason to separate that relationship. Let the courts decide how much access the parent who was doing that should have to the kids, but at least try to protect your children from that sort of Terrible thing.
Speaker 2:Again, the separation or the divorce, if you're a Christian, has to be with the thought that I'm going to hope and pray that God sets my husband free from the trap that Satan has taken him in to do his will and someday restores and renews his mind so that we can come together and raise our children together.
Speaker 2:Because again, as I've cited in these single parent divorce statistics, it's really really tough to have one person raising kids while she's also trying to work and do everything. The result is the kids are going to be ignored and many times the husband's watching his pornography or engaging in some other nefarious actions, so the children don't get the nurturing that God had in mind when he said okay, parents, you come together, be fruitful, have children and raise them up. So again, the divorce prohibitions in the Bible are part of God's remedy for why Christian families should be different should be solid. And when a community is transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit working in the hearts of people who repent, you can have transformations of the whole community. But it starts in the heart first, and then it goes to the couple, and then it goes to the family and from there it goes out. So that's my hope.
Speaker 1:So what I'm hearing you say is that this would be not necessarily acceptable for Christians. But when there's harm involved, right If it's financial harm. Right, like when I say financial harm, it's more than that. Right, it's like when somebody racks up $300,000 in debt.
Speaker 1:Right that can destroy a person's life. And then if the father or the mom is abusive towards the kids, you know whatever the abuse is, if it's physical, if it's sexual, right, like you need to separate for the reasons, make sure that there's no harm caused anymore, right. But the idea here is that you separate for a time or for a.
Speaker 2:And hopefully during that time, both couples are getting counseling from godly people. It's hard to find, but there are good Christian counselors out there that can provide the counsel and advice. But ultimately the Bible says the Bible says Thy testimonies are my counselors, and so the Word of God is the best source of counsel for somebody. But many times if a couple gets to this stage, they need to hear it from a third party, and sometimes they can't afford it. They won't be able to or won't be willing to go to somebody who's a professional that does this. Which is why I think it's so important that everybody who's a Christian understand this stuff and can at least approach their friends who are going through these traumatic experiences with the Word of God and prayer and hope that the Holy Spirit will be able to salvage this relationship that was so precious to the Lord.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but would you say that a person who claims to be a Christian, yet they're abusive? Right, they may be addicted to a sort of substance or porn or any of those things, right, at that moment I would say are they a Christian if they're abusing their life? Are they? You see what I'm saying? Because Apostle Paul does mention something along those lines where a person who's not a Christian, right If you're willing to, if they're willing to stay with you. So what's the difference between what Apostle Paul says and a person who is a Christian? So you know, he says, or she says that they're a Christian, right, but they act in an un-Christ-like way the whole time, which shows the fruit of you know of what they really believe, right? So what's the nuance there? Right, if someone because we're talking about Christian marriages, but you know you can be a Christian marriage, right, but a person that one of the parties in that marriage is not really a Christian.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, this gets into some deep theological issues about whether one's saved, always saved. My personal belief in that is that God loves us. His grace is amazing. But if we continually persist in sin if you look at 1 Peter I think it's 5, and Hebrews, chapter 6, there comes a point when that person is so depraved that he's no longer a Christian. It would be better for that person if they were never saved in the first place.
Speaker 2:So there is some scripture in 1 Corinthians, chapter 7, that talks about this, and there's a distinction made between a wife who's married to a believer and again, this is Paul talking to the church in Corinth. So I think we're dealing with Christians. And in verses 39 and 40, he says a wife is bound by the law as long as her husband lives, but if her husband dies, she's of liberty to be married to whom she wishes, only in the Lord, meaning for God's sake, pray about it before you go ahead, okay. And then, of course, he says she's happier if she remains as she is. According to my judgment, and that goes back to the scripture that says you know, when you're married you have to think about pleasing your spouse, whereas if you're single you can be totally focused on pleasing the Lord, okay. And then in 1 Corinthians 7.15, he's saying and to the rest, not I, not the Lord say but if the unbeliever departs, let him depart. Then he says a brother or sister is not under bondage in such cases, but God has called us to peace. What does that mean? Is not under bondage? I don't know. This is one of those things that I'm struggling with and it seems to make a distinction. If you're married to somebody who is clearly an unbeliever and that person departs, then you're not quote under bondage. Is the bondage referred to there the fact that you shouldn't remarry as long as that unbelieving former spouse is alive? I don't know. I don't know.
Speaker 2:Some people think that there is a exception to the adultery clause also, that's talked about in Matthew, chapter 19 and 5, for somebody who wasn't a believer when you got married. Oh, you know one of my two friends who are godly people, when he married his first wife, they weren't. Neither of them were believers. So some people say well then I should be able to get remarried, because Jesus says in Mark 10 what God has joined together. Well, god didn't join us together, we were just heathens getting married. Well, I personally don't believe in that, because I think God's sovereignty works in your life the moment you are born and he knows when you're going to become his. Become a sold out Christian and you might get married before that time, just like my wife and I did. But the fact that we got married in a Catholic church that neither of us cared about it was a ceremony for her parents only that doesn't give me an out to say, well, we weren't Christians when we got married, because I know we both are now and I know what the law says.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this is fascinating to really think through. I have so many questions and I don't think we're going to cover every single facet of this conversation. But what are some things that you would say to people who are ministers in the church? Right? And I remember when I got ordained, I asked the guy who was going to pray for my ordination. I'm like, is it okay for me to be ordained if I'm single?
Speaker 1:And he said something that was very profound. I think he said, listen, when we were dating someone who's married, we already kind of know what kind of marriage they have. But when we ordain someone that's single, we don't know what kind of marriage they will have. So giving the fact that Marriage will affect your ministry, like massively right, you're taking a risk, right, because you don't, we don't really know kind of marriage you're gonna have. So that's kind of that what. That's what he said to me. But what are some Advice you'd give to someone who is a ministry? Mm-hmm, but they're struggling in their marriage, right, okay, what should they prioritize first? Right, that's what I'm really getting at. Yeah, right, to some of them, they, the reason they struggle in their marriage, is because they prioritize ministry.
Speaker 2:Absolutely right. Remember we talked about the Hosea Gomer thing, where it doesn't just it's not limited to an adulterous affair with somebody else. The Bible is filled with verses that says God is a jealous God. The second Corinthians, 1112, says he's jealous for us, with godly jealousy, for I betroth you to one husband that I may present you as a chaste version to Christ. As good as it sounds, a Pastor who is more devoted to his church than to his wife is involved in an adulterous affair, wow, okay. Same thing applies to me when I am more concerned about my clients and not Giving my wife the priority she is entitled to and deserves scriptually than I'm having an adulterous affair. There's no difference.
Speaker 2:I need to repent of that, and so if there is a pastor like that, I would urge him, first and foremost, go open up First Corinthians, chapter 13, and read verses 4 through 12 and meditate on them and ask the Lord to show you all the ways that you have not been doing that. Okay, recently my wife have been doing that on a regular basis together, we read it and we pray about it in the amplified version, which is really powerful. But ultimately we need to have God's love For one another, and it's God's love, the amplified version. When it talks about love, it says you need to have love parentheses God's love, okay, because my Carnal heart is always going to default to self and what I want and my feelings are going to get hurt and I'm going to hold grudges and all that sort of thing. But when you think about Christ and His love, you know to be nailed to the cross and say, father, forgive them. They don't know what they do is profoundly Important and God wants us to have that love. So I would counsel that pastor. You have to go, start back and ask God to show you Are you loving your wife Like he loved the church? Yeah, first and foremost, and then come back and look at it.
Speaker 2:I think there's another challenge for the pastor, for people who are pastors, that people don't think about. But I think it proliferates this problem and which is why I'm glad that we could talk about this and try to get something out there, because many of the people watching this podcast are you know, we're all priests, we're all ambassadors for the Lord and every now and then some of us will get ordained and be able to marry people, and the question is if Somebody comes to you who's already been divorced, whose life is living. Former life is living. Are you going to marry that person? Yeah, that's a tough one to say no to. I personally have that experience with somebody that I was encouraging and Very close to spiritually and he got Twitter pated, fell in love with this person. It was so excited and he said, chip, I want you to marry me. And I said I can't do that. Yeah, and it was really a hard thing.
Speaker 1:I've been taking the same stance, so like when I've thought about seven weddings, and Every single time somebody asks me to do a wedding, the first question that I ask is have you been married before? And the second one is are you a Christian? Do both claim to be Christians, you know, do you claim to? But one thing I was gonna mention about the past, or your Okay, I'm issue. Do you remember that story in the Old Testament where Samuel Came to confront Saul because he he didn't really do everything that the Lord asked him to do? What?
Speaker 1:he didn't wait seven days, yeah, and then so then he comes back and then they went to like to war and and he sees Samuel says I've done everything that the Lord has asked me to do, and Sam was as well. What is the bleeding, the sheep that I hear right behind you, right? And then he says this famous lion was like to obey is better than sacrifice right mediums is better than sacrifice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and what I think of for someone who's in ministry, them loving their wife is required. The ministry they do is the sacrifice to go above of beyond right. So here they choose to sacrifice, but they're not obeying right. So what we've said about someone having an adulterous relationship with their ministry by not loving their wife.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:What they're doing is they want the extra credit but then they're not doing what's required of them. Right, and it's, it's, it's. They're trying to show everyone they're sacrificing but they're not really obeying what they're supposed to obey and unfortunately it's. It's really prevalent right now and I mean, I Is just so much that I want to get into pot. For, for the sake of time, what are some? You know, because we're coming up to an hour here Actually, it's been an hour already.
Speaker 1:What are some kind of final thoughts would you have? I'm sure we can do this again, maybe do a part two, part three. My hope is that if I hear comments from people, if you comment on this podcast, be it on YouTube or on the Platforms, or you reach out to me, we can cover those questions. Right, like whenever we get comments from people back Again, we don't claim to have all the answers. I think any answer that we give, if it's not biblical, then it's not really helpful to anyone. So Everything that we give, our hope is that that you understand that what is scripture is more important than what we say correct. But my hope is that we bring some clarity to this issue, because there's a lot of scripture and you know, obviously, me, I. I don't have the experience, but you've been married for 53 years.
Speaker 2:You're successful in that, even though I'm sure you've had I feel regularly and, through the grace of God, I'm still married to my wife and you know we have sweet times and we have painful times and I wish I could say life is great, but the reality is you guys can pray for my marriage as I pray for yours.
Speaker 2:That's what I tell my friends, and and I mean it because it is the grace of God that gives us the faith and the endurance and perseverance to continue on when the road is rough. And that is what I think everybody ought to really be thinking about. And again, I totally agree with you, slavic. The things that we shared here are my less than perfect interpretation of scripture after thinking and praying about it, and some experience over the years with different people. But ultimately, each of us have to be like the Bereans.
Speaker 2:You have to figure out what is truth for yourself. You got to go back and open up the Word of God and study these scriptures and see what they mean and then live your life in accordance with the Word of God. Yeah, ultimately, the Bible is God's Operating manual for the people he created. Yeah, and there is no better way To go through and navigate the tests and trials of life then, with the Word of God helping you discern and understand, because our ways are not God's ways. And it is so freeing when we get there through faith, and then we can turn to him and say thank you, lord, for your grace, because I'm going to do whatever I'm trying to do imperfectly, but I know that you somehow can bring life and good out of it, because I'm doing it with the right heart.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'd also say that, just like anything else, if you're considering decision, make sure that you really go and look at scripture, look at the precedent that we have two thousand years of church history and a lot of times from history where you learn things that we shouldn't do. Yeah, when Kings killed their wives, so they don't, you know, so they can get divorced. You know, like we have a lot of precedence.
Speaker 1:For this and my hope is that this will be helpful to you. But if you have the choice between obeying God's Word and sacrificing, I would say you need to obey. You need to understand that following Jesus is not just him being your Savior, but he's also your Lord. Right, and we need to look at that as if the Lord says this, we need to to obey that, and I know that's not really popular nowadays, but Ultimately, all of us will have to stand before him. We're gonna have to.
Speaker 1:We're gonna have to give an account for our faithfulness, and I Said something this Sunday at church a service I think you were there when, before the Lord, we're not gonna say, we're not gonna hope that the Lord would say that well done and successful Servant or well done and rich servant or famous servant or leader, right, he's gonna say well done, faithful servant, right, exactly, faithfulness takes time. It's it's being consistent over time. It's not all. You were here and then now you're faithful. It's faithfulness is the consistency of walking with him in every single decision. You know, not just you know. The highlights are alive. So any other thoughts you want to share before?
Speaker 2:well, I totally agree when the importance of faithfulness to God can't be overstressed when you read scripture. The one thing that impressed Christ when he was ministering and walking for three years doing his ministry was the faith of the people that came to him or the friends that brought them to him. And the opposite of faith is Treachery. It is, you know, deceit. It is all those things that we don't want, which is why I think God hates divorce.
Speaker 2:Again, the Malachi verse says I hate divorce. You're gonna foul your garment by doing this and it's going to destroy your spirit because it's causing you to deal treacherously instead of being faithful to me, to my word and to the wife that or the husband that I've Connected you with for life. So God is faithful. He promises he'll never leave her for sake us, and he's asking us, as men and women, to have the same commitment to whoever he Joins us together with, and that's my prayer. That think some of the things that we have shared during this podcast will Resonate in your heart and help you to get through those tough times and have the resolution to say no. Lord, I know that your grace is sufficient and I know that you're using this to refine my heart and make me more like you. So help me to humble myself, to repent and to go back and seek Reconciliation with my spouse in the midst of this challenging time.
Speaker 1:Well, hey, thank you so much for listening to a whole hour. So, if you're still with us, thank you so much. My hope is that I hear from you. If you write me messages with questions, maybe the next one we can cover it. Also, if you find find this Material helpful, if you, you maybe have a friend who's you know going through this right now, I, if you want to share this with them. I would really appreciate that. Our goal is not to Make money or be famous or anything like that. Our goal is that we, we hope that we see a body who comes together and worships the Lord and obeys the Lord, because ultimately, that's what we're called to do. So God bless you. Thank you so much for watching, listening, whatever platform you're on. God bless and take care.