To Divorce or Not to Divorce? That Is the Question.
“Who says divorce isn’t the right answer? Come on, you’re telling me I have to put up with this? When is enough enough?” Many people feel this way when marriage problems overrun the garden of love. Divorce is often assumed to be the natural next step, and people joke about it casually. But how do we decide whether it’s legitimate? And if it is legitimate in a particular case, should we actually go through with it? There is a standard of right and wrong that is universally recognized. Our circumstances, however dark, are not indicators of God’s will. The bloom may be off the rose, but we need the thorns of truth to prick our consciences, because knowing the truth is what sets us free.
How Can You Know If Divorce Is the Right Answer?
The same way we know whether anything is right or wrong? There is only one standard in the universe for absolute truth. Consider how people react when they’re mistreated. Their response shows that they are judging behavior by a standard of right and wrong. Across all of civilization there is a basic agreement on this. Can you name a group of people that tolerates selfishness or rudeness? If you doubt that there is universal agreement, try treating someone badly and watch how they react. And where do we get the idea that putting others first is right and thinking only of yourself is wrong?
You can deny that there are moral absolutes, meaning fixed laws and principles that don’t change, but you can’t live as if there are none. You may not believe God exists, but you can’t live as if he doesn’t, because you will still agree with someone else that something is right or wrong. Even an atheist will judge you by a standard of right and wrong.
People use the same faulty logic when deciding whether to divorce. And the real reason most marriages end is the self-centered thinking of one or both spouses.
Is the Collateral Damage Worth the Risk?
Since the world began, it has been universally understood that marriage is for life. Like our other standards of right and wrong, this one is still recognized unless someone simply says, “I don’t agree with those standards.” But we can’t live as though no standards exist.
Today, people of all faiths and beliefs take advantage of no-fault divorce laws, which remove the standards from view but not from reality. Even many who profess to believe the Bible and call themselves Christians aren’t seeking God’s will when they decide to divorce. What’s at stake is God’s blessing on your marriage and family, a blessing that comes from choosing to do what is right in his eyes rather than your own.
So how do we seek God’s will? There are two ways. If you want to know whom to marry, or whether to divorce in a situation where the Bible permits it, you seek God’s will in prayer. But if you want to know whether divorce is right or wrong in the first place, you have to go to God’s Word, because that is where the standard is found.
In Matthew 19, the religious leaders of Jesus’ day asked him whether a man could divorce his wife for any and every reason. His answer was an emphatic no, with one exception: marital unfaithfulness. Notice that Jesus names this as an exception, not a command. He grounds his answer in the permanence of marriage by quoting Genesis: “What God has joined together, let not man separate.” Marriage is for life, which means divorce runs against God’s mandate in Genesis 2 and Matthew 19.
The only reason Jesus himself gave for divorce to be justified is marital unfaithfulness. The Greek word is porneia, a fairly broad term covering a number of sexual sins, and it is best translated as sexual immorality. It is not identical to moicheia, the Greek word for adultery, which Jesus uses at the end of the passage. There, and in Mark 10, he uses “adultery” to describe remarriage after an unbiblical divorce. The only other exception comes from the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 7. If an unbelieving spouse wants to stay in a marriage with a Christian, you must not divorce over faith. If the unbeliever chooses to leave, let them go. You are no longer bound in that situation and are free to remarry. The bottom line is if you divorce your spouse for any other reason than the two given in scripture, you are committing adultery. Or if you marry someone who was divorced unbiblically, you also commit adultery.
The Long-Term Benefits of Not Divorcing
Staying faithful to the standard pays off in several ways:
It leaves a legacy that strengthens our culture. Marriages that last shape the families, communities, and generations that follow.
It gives you a clear conscience, which makes marriage more enjoyable. Many Christians today live by standards that are relative to their situation rather than absolute, and that leaves both them and their situation unsettled.
It resists the culture of easy exits. Only recently, in 1970, did the law make the so-called “no-fault” divorce readily available. It removed the requirement for either party to state wrongdoing, which made it easy and tempting to throw everything overboard. In effect, it removed God’s standard of permanence from civic law, not God’s moral law. But the exceptions God gives don’t lower that standard, because divorce is never commanded in Scripture, only permitted for two, and only two exceptions.
Understand the heart of Jesus in these passages, and pray to him for both wisdom and obedience to the will of God, and he will be with you in your distress, and guide you too!
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