12 What did Moses command? Mark 10:2-12

Speaker 1: Welcome to Wednesday in the Word with Krisan Marotta. This is the twelfth lesson in the series questions Jesus asked. Moses permitted divorce for a certain reason, but the Pharisees stretched his word. Jesus challenged their misunderstanding by asking, What did Moses command? Today, Krisan Marotta takes us through Mark chapter 10, verses 2 through 12. Krisan Marotta: You may recall, or if you weren't, if you're new, this will be new to you. But Mark divides into two sections pretty evenly. There's the first eight chapters deal with who Jesus is, and that's Mark's primary concern, who he is and his authority. And what we're going to look at now is the second half of the book. And you'll see that the second half of the book, Mark shifts his focus from who Jesus is to what he came to do. That is primarily that he came to give his life as a ransom for many. He came to die for us. So the focus is on the cross. And you'll see that the questions are now going to shift to more instead of who Jesus is, kind of questions, what does that mean for me? kind of questions. The so what? Well, if he is the Messiah, how should I respond to it, or how should I live, or what does that mean for my life now? So most of the questions we're going to look at now are not centered in miracles or healings like we saw in the first eight chapters. You're going to see a lot more. Now they're in discussion with the disciples, or they're in confrontation with the Pharisees, or some life event has happened, and he's responding to it. So today we're going to jump back into Mark chapter 10, and the very the first question deals with marriage and divorce. So that's our topic this morning. A few years ago I saw a newspaper cartoon and had a mother, and she's sitting in bed with her little girl and she's reading a book, and the title on the book says Grim Reality Fairy Tales. And the caption says, And the prince kissed her and they fell in love, dated a while and moved in together, broke up, got back together, got married, had a baby, got separated, got back together again, broke up, got divorced, spent a little time alone rediscovering themselves, met someone new, fell in love, and repeated the pattern habitually ever after. Okay. There's another one I like, very similar. It was a speed bump cartoon when the artist was Dave Coverley, and this has a father reading a bedtime story to his daughter, and the text says, and they lived happily ever after for a few years until the quirks they found so cute in each other while they were dating eventually drove them both crazy. The end. So those cartoons express the reality that marriages do not always end happily ever after, and that is the subject of our passage today. We're going to look at Mark chapter 10. And the question is, Jesus asks, What did Moses command it's in the topic of divorce? And marriage. So turn to Mark chapter 10, and we're going to start, we're just going to jump right in. We're going to read look at the first twelve verses. So Mark 10 1. And he left there and went to the region of Judea beyond the Jordan, and the crowds gathered to him again. And again, as was his custom, he taught them. And the Pharisees came up, and in order to test him asked, Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife? He answered them, What did Moses command you? They said, Moses allowed a man to write her certificate of divorce and to send her away. And Jesus said to them, Because of your hardness of hearts he wrote you this commandment, but from the beginning of creation God made them male and female. Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and cle 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. And in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter, and he said to them, Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her, and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery. Okay, so let's to understand this, we have to understand a little bit of what was going on at the time the Pharisees asked this question. And what the Deuter what the Pharisees are referring to, and they are referring to a passage in Deuteronomy 24. So I want to backtrack there for a minute. So keep your finger in Mark and turn back to Deuteronomy 24. Because the Pharisees come and they say, Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife? And they're essentially asking Jesus for commentary on this passage. So in Deuteronomy 24, one, we read, When a man takes a wife and marries her, and if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of the house, and she departs out of his house. And if she goes and becomes another man's wife, we're following all this, and the latter man hates her and writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of the house, or if the latter man dies who took her to be his wife, then her former husband who sent her away may not take her again to be his wife after she has been defiled, for that is an abomination before the Lord. And you shall not bring sin upon the land that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance. So the the question in this passage is a woman is divorced, she marries someone else, something happens to that husband, can the first man take her back? And Moses is saying no. But the cause of the debate was what does the phrase summon decency mean? So you'll notice in verse 1, if she then finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her. Well, you know the Pharisees, they love to define exactly what the law means. So there was this great debate over what is summon decency, and there were basically two camps. One followed the Rabbi Hillel, and they thought that summon decency meant anything at all. You know, poorly cooked meal, you don't like the way she looks anymore, she talked back to you, you just don't like her anymore, basically anything. Um they were kind of a liberal side. The other group followed the Rabbi Shemai, and they thought summon decency meant immorality, and they said that's adultery and only adultery. So that's the only cause for which he could write her a certificate of divorce. And it was a big debate among the Jews of the day, similar to, I think, our debate over abortion today. It was kind of a litmus test of where is someone going to stand. You wanted to ask them where they stood on this issue. And at the time, only men could initiate divorce. It was relatively simple for them to do. All they had to do is write her certificate, and they also had to return her dowry, which was not always easy, but that was they were supposed to do that. But for women, even though they couldn't legally initiate a divorce, I'm told that at the time they could force a divorce by committing adultery. So if they wanted out, they would go ahead and commit adultery and then they could get out. Now you may say, wait a minute, under Jewish law, adultery is punishable by death, by stoning. That is true, but at the time it wasn't enforced because uh the Jews were under Roman rule and they were forbidden to enforce their own laws, and the Romans were not uh, they thought adultery was an okay thing. So divorce and adultery were not as as uh punishable under Roman law, and the Jews were forbidden to punish their own. Plus, it frequently went unpunished because it was pretty rampant at the time. So the Pharisees are inviting Jesus into the debate. They're saying, okay, what do you think? Now, before we look at his answer, I want to you can leave Deuteronomy and turn to Matthew 19, because this is Matthew's telling of the account, and he gives us a few extra details. So Matthew 19, verse 3, is where I'm going to start, for verses 3 to 9. And the Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause? So you see, Matthew makes it a little more specific. They want to know, where do you stand on the debate? What is for any cause? What does some indecency mean? And 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. They said to him, Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away? And he said, Because of the 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. Okay, so you notice again, Matthew brings out this is a test. They're wondering about this debate for any cause at all. And Jesus gives a little more detail on his answer, although it's essentially the same thing. So the Pharisees understood Deuteronomy to mean that whatever, whenever a husband is displeased for any reason, he can divorce her. They were on the liberal side. And for them, they thought they could be fully justified in doing this as long as they wrote a piece of paper. So they could still call themselves righteous as long as they wrote out the certificate of divorce first. So they're saying, okay, Jesus, where do you stand? Because each of these camps had a large following, they figured they have Jesus in a lose-lose situation. I think my guess is they expected him to say, no, you can't divorce your wife for any cause at all. Because if you look at his teaching up to this point, you can guess that he's going to land on the more conservative side. Well, you can guess which side was more popular, at least among the men. So if he says, no, you can't divorce your wife for any cause at all, he's going to contradict a very popular practice, and that'll get the crowds upset with him. And if he says, yes, you can divorce your wife for any cause at all, then they can go, well, you taught this other thing, you know, back here. So they can point out that he's inconsistent. Now, notice that their question concerns what's lawful. They're not asking what's the right thing to do, what's the wise thing to do, what's the the honorable and righteous thing to do. They're asking, where's the line? You know, where's the line that I can rush up to and still call myself righteous? So they want to know the technicalities. They're not asking, what would God think? What's the right thing to do? They're essentially saying, how much can I get away with and still be righteous? So notice that's their heart attitude. Um let me make a couple more comments on Deuteronomy. Uh, because that what I want to make clear is that Deuteronomy is not advocating divorce. It's not saying divorce is a good thing and um pro what would I say, but fostering it or encouraging it. I think Deuteronomy is acknowledging that divorce happens and regulating the circumstances under which it can happen. And the primary importance of Deuteronomy was to protect the wife. Because Moses is insisting if you're going to divorce your wife, you have to document it. You have to make it legal. You can't leave her in this ambiguous state where she's married to you but she's not. And it was a protection for a woman because women couldn't just go out and get jobs and support themselves. So if a man essentially treated her as if she was no longer his wife, but didn't actually divorce her, she would be left in this basically economically bankrupt state of now what? She can't marry someone else, she can't she's not really supposed to go back to her father, although that's probably what she would do. So Moses is saying you can't leave her there. You have to make it public. You have to give her the freedom to move on. It's also, I think, a discouragement against wife swapping or other forms of marital abuse. So he's prohibiting them from saying, okay, I'm going to divorce you and give you to this man, and then when he gets tired of you, well, we'll divorce you and give you to that man, and then this kind of marital abuse. So he's saying, you can't do that. You can't just trade wives back and forth by writing them a piece of paper and calling it divorce and thinking you're righteous. So I think the laws in Deuteronomy were designed really to protect women and to regulate if this is going to happen, this is how it's going to happen. You may recall the kind of the famous the eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth passage in Deuteronomy. I think it's the same kind of thing. That law does not advocate revenge, it limits revenge. It's saying if revenge is going to happen, it's got to be equitable. You can't say, someone stubbed my toes, so I'm going to kill him. You can't take that kind of unjust revenge. And it's putting limits on it in the same way I think what's going on here in Deuteronomy is it's placing limits on divorce. It's regulating how it can happen if it's going to. So notice they're quoting Deuteronomy, which was written by Moses, and Jesus says, Well, what did Moses command? That's not the only thing Moses wrote on divorce. And he takes them back to Genesis, which Moses also wrote. Okay, so let me just make one more comment. I am going to get to the text, I promise. Let me make one more comment about this. Both the Old and New Testament do allow for divorce, and I want to say at the outset, this is not the unforgivable sin. This is not something you have to feel, and I I think it's probably not as true today as it say it was 30, 40, or 50 years ago, that somehow divorce is like the one thing Christians can't do and still call themselves Christian. The both testaments allow that divorce is going to happen. It is forgivable like every other sin. Uh and the New Testament acknowledges that. So, you know, you have this situation where it's you have this incredible intimacy in marriage, and with intimacy, of course, comes great power, and because we are sinners, we abuse that and we can um inflict great pain on each other. And I think the New Testament acknowledges that. It acknowledges divorce will happen. It is not not the unforgivable sin. God can restore anything, he can redeem anything, and you can certainly go and sin no more, as we're going to look at in a passage later on. So just want to say at the outset, like every other sin we struggle with, um, we can take that to the cross and be forgiven. We can, Jesus knows the hardness of our hearts in all areas, whether it's pride or selfishness or uh financial struggles or whatever, and we can bring that to Him. Okay, so let's look at Jesus' answer. In verse 5, he says, we're back in Mark now. Jesus said to them, Because of the hardness of your hearts, he wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. Therefore man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh, since they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate. So I think from the outset he says, Because of the hardness of your heart, he wrote you this commandment. I think that's an acknowledgement. Because we're sinful people, divorce is going to happen. And because it's going to happen, we want to at least place some limits on it and protect the people involved so there's not abuse or as little abuse going on. So I think that's his where he starts from. It's allowed because we're sinful. But what was God's plan? He takes them back to verse 6 and says, at the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. Now, just as an aside, since there's so much debate in our culture today over what is marriage, I think we have it right here that Jesus would say, marriage is between one man and one woman, that this is male and female, and that marriage comes within that context. So our culture today is trying to tell us, well, you know, maleness and femeness is a choice that we can make and we can change with surgery and whatever, and God say no, or Jesus I think would say no. This was the design, that it was a complementary, different sexes made to come together in marriage. And then he reminds them of what the marriage commitment is. He quotes Genesis, and most people see this as the definition of marriage. And I'm going to go through this real fast. I have other talks on the website on that the Genesis passage, so I'm not going to go into a lot of detail. I think some of you have probably heard this before. If not, I'll leave you to further study. But I do I didn't want to go through this Genesis verse without at least explaining it a little bit. It says, therefore, for basically the therefore is because of marriage, for this purpose, a man shall leave his father and mother, cleave to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. There are three commitments to marriage: the leaving, the cleaving together, or hold fast, as this translation says, and then the one flesh. So the first one is leaving, and that is the commitment of specialness. The idea of that is that I promised to make my spouse the most special thing in all creation. Because at the time it was considered that a man's highest obligation was to his parents. They were the most important people in his life. He was duty bound to honor them. And you can there's a lot of New Testament and Old Testament passages you can see that bring that out. Now he's making a new commitment. He's committing to his wife, and his wife becomes his most important commitment. So that if it comes to a choice between what my mama wants and what my wife wants, your duty is to your wife. So the idea is more than move out of your parents' house. It's a very strong word that's used in the Genesis passage. It's it's leaving his father and mother has the idea of abandoning them, of making a break, and now you have a new commitment. So the first commitment of marriage is we make each other the most special thing in all creation. Now, in creation, God is still number one. But apart from God, our next highest priority, our next commitment ought to be to our spouse. Okay, hold fast or cleaving, that's the promise to share my life with this person. So they are now my highest priority, and I am willing to share every aspect of my life with them and share every aspect of their life. So there's not one thing I hold back and say, well, this is mine, and my husband can't ever have any interest in that or be a part of that in my life. That that would kind of break the commitment. So it's I stop thinking about I and me and mine, and I start thinking we and ours and what is God calling us to, not just what is God calling me to. So the analogy that's often used with this one flesh is I treat my husband like I would my own body. So, you know, if I break my leg, I don't say, oh, it's just my leg, I've got another one, you know, no problem. It's like, ow, that's me. That's part of me. That hurts me deeply. In the same way I should think of my spouse, the way I treat him as part of me, as part of my life. So it's the we have one calling, one purpose, um, and that, you know, I shouldn't start thinking, what is God calling me to if he's calling me to California? And it's very clear my husband is not. I should could be uh not being called to California. I could guess that I am misunderstanding that calling, that God having called us together would not call us apart. So my husband becomes the most special thing in all of creation. To me, it's a commitment to share my whole life with him and to be willing to share all of his life. In my case, that meant I had to learn to like Star Trek, comic books, and I have, I actually like them now, so anyway. Um just an aside. And then the last commitment is uh permanence. The idea of they shall become one flesh or the cleaving is uh till death to us part. I promise to make this permanent. And permanent provides the security for the other two commitments because I can't open my whole life to someone and make them special if they're gonna walk away in a week. It's just too um you can't most people can't take that risk. But if I know that he's gonna be there every morning when I wake up for the rest of my life, then it becomes easier to make those commitments. So marriage is specialness, one flesh or sharing your whole life and sharing it permanently, making that commitment no matter what through all the ups and downs. And that's Jesus' answer. He's saying, What did Moses command you? Basically, marriage is forever. Divorce is necessary, it's an allowable because of our sinful natures, but God's plan if if in a an unfallen word world would be that marriage is forever. And it would be forever if we weren't sinful. But because we are sinful, uh, we have to allow for the divorce. So then he has then the we have this discussion with uh verse in verse 10 where he is talking with the disciples later. Okay, no, wait a minute, before I get to that, the fair look how this contradicts the Pharisees. They're saying, I can divorce my wife for any cause at all and still consider myself righteous. And Jesus is saying, basically, you shouldn't divorce a unknown: All. Krisan Marotta: And and so he's turning them on his head, and they're trying to say, I can be righteous and blameless before God as long as I write a piece of paper first. And Jesus is saying, No, in God's design, marriage is permanent. But we're sinful people. So then they go into the house and the disciples ask him about them, and he makes this statement which sounds really harsh. He says, Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her. And if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery. So what's he adding to the debate? Why why would he we add this into the discussion? I think what he's saying here is he's trying to say, call it what it is. We have all these euphemisms for for our sinfulness. You know, I'm just I'm just starting a new chapter in my life, or I'm just leaving this bad thing behind, or I'm closing the past, or or I just broke up with my uh you know, my girlfriend or boyfriend because it was the most loving thing to do. Well, I think what he's saying is call it by its real name. It's sin. The sin that causes the relationship to end is the same sin that causes adultery. Now, he's what he's doing here, I think, fits a pattern we're going to see elsewhere, especially with the Pharisees. It pattern may be too strong a word, but if you read through some of his discussions with the Pharisees, you'll see him often quote an Old Testament commandment, which has a moral law, and then say something like, But I say to you, or have you not read also? And then he explains the morality from a different perspective of what would perfect obedience look like. So probably the most famous example of this is Matthew 5, 27 and 28, where he says, You've heard it s you have heard it that it was said you shall not commit adultery. But I say to you that everyone who looks on a woman to lust for her has committed adultery with her already in his heart. So here's where he's quoting the moral law. He's saying, You shall not commit adultery. But I say to you, if you've looked at a woman with lust, then you've already committed adultery. Now, what's he doing there? Is he redefining the legalities of adultery and saying that now all these people that look on someone else with lust should be stoned because that's adultery? I don't think that's his point. I don't think he's making a legal ruling, but instead he's saying, look at what perfect obedience is. You think you're righteous because you have refrained from committing adultery, but the same evil that would cause you to commit adultery is already in your heart if you look on someone with lust. And I think he's trying to say, we we want to set the bar down here and say, I can do this. I so far I've refrained from that, so I'm righteous. And he's saying, hold it, the bar's up here. If you were really perfectly obedient, this is what it would look like. So I think that kind of thing is what's going on here, where he's saying, you think you're righteous because you have written your wife a piece of paper first, but I say to you, it's really adultery. The same evil that causes adultery causes divorce. In a perfect world, with perfect people, we would stay together. So the same sinfulness which causes adultery causes lust and causes divorce, and don't think you're righteous because you have refrained from one or the other. So he's not saying, you know, adultery and lust are the same thing. There's a big difference between the one who acts on their lustful thoughts and the one that merely has them. The consequences are different. Um it's much better for my husband if I don't act on those lustful thoughts than if I do. The consequences of acting on them are much greater and damaging. But I don't want to fool myself into thinking, oh, you know, I'm great. Look how good I am because I have refrained. I think he's Jesus' at least part of his point is be honest about yourselves. We're sinful. And but for the grace of God, we would all be in a bigger mess. So the same evil that causes lust causes adultery and causes divorce. Now I may be a better spouse, it may be better for my husband that I have not committed adultery, but I am no more righteous. Okay. So is that clear? Have I beaten that one to death enough? Okay. Again, divorce is not the unforgivable sin. Restoration is possible. In Jesus' saying, from God's design, he wants us to stay together. We shouldn't separate what God has put together. But if you do, recognize, don't try to whitewash it over. Don't put a euphemism on. Know that this is a sin like any other sin. Okay, so in the time we have left, I want to try to get practical and give you some guidelines. If marriage is supposed to be permanent and we're sinful people, okay, so what? How do we live our lives? What are we supposed to do? How do we deal with that? Now I have to give you a disclaimer right up front. I as I I would call these guidelines. I recognize that every case is different, that our lives are messy and complicated, and that there isn't I cannot there's nothing I can stand up here and say that will blanketly fit every case in this room and predict the right course of action. Um there's I don't want you to get that idea that I'm laying down the law for you in any way at all. I'm not a licensed counselor, I'm just a student of the Bible, and I can tell you, based on what I've studied in these passages, here's some ways to start thinking about your lives and and uh situations you may be in. So but I'm not going to pretend to to say to be able to predict the right course in every single situation. And I don't want to spark another like Hill El Shemai debate, you know, over what's right and wrong and what constitutes legitimate divorce and what doesn't. I am not that wise. Um and so these are just a starting point. So I'm not here to judge or condemn you, but I do want to give you some ways to start saying if you know someone who's struggling with divorce or in a troubled marriage, how do you even begin to unravel that knot? So here's my best guess at this part. The first guideline, or the first thing to realize, is marriage is permanent, and as far as we are able, we ought to seek to keep it that way. So marriage at a minimum requires that both people be committed to it. And when one person has given up on that commitment, I think the marriage is essentially over, and divorce is just a legal recognition of that fact. But you want to keep from getting there. So you don't want to go into a marriage thinking, well, I can always get divorced. It just doesn't work out. I've always got a back door. That's the wrong attitude. You're not helping yourself from the get-go. It would also imply, I think, don't give up too quickly. Give God time to work, give him time to do something. Remember, his timetable is not ours. We want everything wrapped up by Friday, and God may take 40 years, you know, or longer. I mean, think about Abraham. He had to wait essentially 488 years to see some of his promises fulfilled, and he waited a long time for Isaac. But anyway, our starting point ought to be marriage is permanent, and as a believer, I ought to try to the best of my ability to keep it that way. Now, what do you do when it's over? And it and there's and one person, hopefully the other person in the marriage, has given up completely on the marriage. Then I think divorce is allowed. It's a recognition that's that's saying what has already happened in reality, that the marriage is essentially over. So, how do you know? This is where I'm gonna get into the sticky wicket. How do you know if one person has given up or the marriage is essentially over? So, what would be legitimate, if you will, grounds for divorce? I would say adultery is not necessarily grounds for a divorce, and it is not the only grounds for divorce. It depends on the attitude of the adulterer. I have known at least one situation where uh a friend of mine committed adultery and she desperately wanted her marriage to end, and she desperately wanted to get her husband's attention, and this was a misguided way to do it. I would never recommend it, but it actually did get his attention. Um But in her heart, she did not want her marriage to end, but she was so desperate to wake him up to the fact that they were in deep trouble that uh the adultery happened. And I if he had come to me for counseling, I would have said, try to work it out. She wants to work it out. Um the other hand, adultery may be the sign that I've given up, I've over, I've moved on. Um so adultery is not the only legitimate grounds for divorce, but like if my husband moves to Alaska and cuts off all communication, but he doesn't commit adultery, I could say yes, he's given up on the commitment. He is no longer here. So in that case, I'd say yes, divorce would be a recognition of that. So how do you decide? How do you know? I would my best advice is seek help. Don't try to make the decision alone. Seek help as soon as you see the first warning signs. Pray, talk to a trusted friend, a pastor, a counselor, an elder, um, a relative, of course, your spouse. But don't get caught in the trap of I don't want any other of the believers to know that I'm struggling. Because we all struggle. Um marriage in this church is perfect. And if you think there are perfect marriages in this church, you're wrong. Um and you m what you may not know is a marriage that looks perfect now was a sinking ship five years ago. But for you look at it now and think, gosh, they have it all together. So do not fall into the trap of thinking I'm the only one in this church who's struggling with a marriage, and I can't tell anybody because then they'll know I'm not perfect. We know you're not perfect. We're not perfect. There's no perfect marriage in this church. Ask for help. We had a case, you know, about it's probably been ten years ago now, where a couple in our church got divorced and they did not, they hit it so well when it finally happened, it was a shock to almost everybody. And the tragedy to me, part of the real tragedy, was it probably could have prevented two years earlier. If they had told anyone we're in trouble, it might have been uh preventable. But by the time it came to light, there was so much damage and so much hurt, it was uh beyond repair. So seek help early. Um don't try to make this on your own, don't try to tough it out. Having said that, there are four really good ways to kill a marriage. So if you want to stay married, avoid these at all costs. And in the PCA, these four are often recognized as grounds for divorce. They all begin with the letter A, so it's easy to remember. So here I'll give them to you not as guidelines for now I can get divorced, but avoid these at all costs to keep your marriages healthy. So the first one is adultery. Breaking that one-flesh commitment often inflicts so much damage that it's irreparable. It and it doesn't have to be, but it can be a sign that the marriage is over. And we've already talked about that one. So adultery. The second one is abandonment. That is either physical abandonment or emotional abandonment. Giving up on the marriage and just withdrawing so that you are no longer there. And it may be moving out, moving away, or it may just be you're still in the same house, but you have so emotionally separated yourself that you might as well not be there. So adultery and abandonment are often grounds that it's over. Abuse is the other one. There is no kind of abuse. If you think about what the marital commitment is, there's no kind of abuse which supports it. Whether it's physical abuse, emotional abuse, verbal abuse, it's just a mockery of the marriage commitment. It's like 180 degree opposite of the way you're supposed to treat your spouse. So if you're in an abusive relationship, protect yourself, protect your children. It may not lead to divorce, but at least you need to be uh make become safe, find a safe place. So adultery, abandonment, abuse, and the last one is addiction. Um Jesus said, you know, you can't love both God and mammon. I think it's equally true, you can't love your spouse and alcohol or drugs. It the addiction takes over your life, and in most cases the addiction leads to one of the other three. So it is often the first step to either abuse or abandonment or adultery. So if you're in an addictive situation or your spouse is in an addictive situation, get help. Seek help. Um it's it's one of those things you can't really do alone. So those four things, I think if you avoid those four, the good news is you've you've avoided the main trouble spots of marriage: adultery, abandonment, abuse, and addiction. Um and if you're in one of those, seek help. God doesn't make it easy on us, but he knows our hearts. And I think if we're trying to find a way out of the marriage because we're just sinful and selfish, we're not gonna fool God. But if we're seeking obedience and wisdom and we do trying to prayerfully do what's right and what's best, and then you just have to throw yourself uh on God's mercy and grace and take what you think is the right step for the your situation. Okay, I want to close on a little a happier note because I think it's interesting that Mark uh puts verses 13 through 16 immediately following this section on marriage and divorce. So let's go back to Mark for a minute. And look at Mark 13. And they were bringing children to him that he might touch them, and the disciples rebuked them. But when Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it. And he took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands on them. A lot of commentators put a major break between verses twelve and thirteen. But as I was looking at this, I started thinking, well, is that really a break? Why would Mark link these two passages together? If they're not linked in time and place, which I actually think they are linked by the time and place, there's certainly a thematic link because who suffers the most when a marriage breaks up? The children. The children always suffer the most. And um and so you have this passage where the people are rebuked for bringing the children to Jesus, and he says, No, let them come to me. And he holds them in his arms and he touches them. And I think that ought to be encouraging. If you're a child from a broken home, or if you know a child from that, or if you're going through those circumstances, it's I think it's a recognition that Jesus can heal anything. That you let them come to him, he will touch them, he will hold them, he will bless them. And I think that's a tremendous word of hope that there's nothing beyond the healing power of Jesus. There's nothing that he can't fix. We cannot mess up our lives so badly that Jesus cannot still bring good out of it. And that's our hope. No matter how bad it gets, there's no loss or failure that he cannot restore with the touch of his hands. And anyone who comes to him for mercy, like this little child, he will wrap his arms around them and bless them. So whether you're divorced or a child of divorce, you can receive his healing touch and his blessing. I mean, every one of us has failed the standard of righteousness, whether we've been divorced or not. I mean, just go back to the Matthew 5 passage. Whoever's looked on a woman to lust for her has committed adultery already in her heart. Well, none of us in this room can pass that test. I mean, substitute man for woman, but um I don't there's no one in here who has not failed that standard. And his point is the same sin that causes lust, causes adultery, causes divorce, and I may not be divorced, but I am no less a sinner, and I have absolutely um no grounds of claiming that I'm better than someone else or I'm more spiritually aware of something. We're all in the same boat. But the good news is there is hope. God can overcome the hurt of every sin. And I think divorce is devastating. Um it's it can be tragic and painful beyond belief, and yet the hope of the gospel is God can restore that. Our guilt and our shame says, you know, I'm I'm uh I only deserve bread and water. You know, that's all I could get. And God is saying, come to the feast. There is a feast of forgiveness waiting for you. True, we are sinful and we only deserve bread and water, but that is not what God in His grace gives us. He gives us a feast of forgiveness. So in this age, remember, God is more concerned with faith than with perfect obedience. He wants to make you a person who has a strong and mature and enduring faith. And sometimes, well, not sometimes, almost always struggle is part of that plan. Struggle and tragedy and suffering. And how we respond to that is often the path of the Christian life. And the best way to handle failure is to know it's forgivable. And that that struggle may be the very tool God is using to shape us into the person he wants us to be, to make us someone who comes to him, who's on our knees trusting him, uh, no matter what. So divorce, like any other sin, is just an o is another opportunity to trust God, to throw ourselves on his mercy and say, Look, I can't do this by myself. Uh give me the faith to get me through. Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Wednesday in the Word. For notes and study questions related to this message, please visit our website, wednesdayintheword.com. Thank you for being with us, and we hope you'll join us again.