Divorce and Remarriage    Matthew 19:3-6

This post discusses what Jesus taught about divorce and remarriage.

Divorce and remarriage, always a controversial subject, involves many in our society. Some 41% of first marriages end in divorce and 60% of divorced people remarry. Jesus, asked by the Pharisees about divorce, quoted from Genesis 2:24 what God had said about marriage, Matthew 19:3-6. “And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So, they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”

So, Jesus taught what God said about marriage.

Men should not separate a married couple, because God had joined them into a single married unit and forbids separation as in a divorce.

Then, the Pharisees, looking for a chance to pit Jesus against Moses, continued to press their practices according to what Moses allowed, Matthew 19:7. “They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?”

At that point, Jesus corrected them. Moses had not commanded a divorce certificate. He allowed it. Then, Jesus gave the correct view of divorce, Matthew 19:8-9. “He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”

Thus, Jesus now labels the result of divorce as adultery except for sexual immorality of one’s partner.

The percentage of people divorcing for many other reasons does not change what Jesus taught.

So, what was learned?

1.From the beginning of time, God did not intend for the marriage vows to be broken.

2.According to Jesus, divorce for any reason other than sexual immorality results in adultery.

For more on the Bible, click tdroberts.org or https://justchristian.com or https://podcastjustchristian.com

#adultery #breakingApartMarriage #divorceForSexualImmorality