Why God hates divorce - an alternate look

[GoldenEagle]

@StanJ Question, if God didn't create us with the capacity to hate did something change at the fall when sin entered the world?

God bless,
GE

[GoldenEagle]

9 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

Jesus was addressing, in part, rabbinic excess in that the Rabbis at the time were guilty of frivolous divorces.  They could divorce their wives if they saw a younger woman they liked.  They would divorce their wives for the most ridiculous reasons just so they could marry someone else.   Jesus was protecting women because divorce left a woman with few options.  If she had no male family members to provide for her, she was left to either be a beggar or a prostitute.

God made concessions for divorce going back to Moses, but those concessions were pretty specific.   Any divorce outside those concessions was considered an invalid divorce.  From God's perspective, an invalid divorce didn't negate the marriage union.   So to marry someone else under those conditions was adultery.

When it comes to abuse, does divorce under those conditions constitute an invalid divorce?  No, it does not.  Again, Jesus was addressing this issue in the light of frivolous divorces.   He was not making a blanket statement saying that the ONLY allowable reason to divorce pertains to sexual immorality. 

There are moral issues not addressed in Scripture such as, spousal abuse, child abuse, child molestation, to name a few.   The Bible provides us enough light on the issues that it does address, that we are able to address issues that it doesn't mention.  It's called a behavioral paradigm.  It is foregone conclusion that God hates those things.  I don't have to mount an argument to defend that conclusion.   We know enough about God and His character to know that He does not expect anyone to remain in an abusive relationship.  No case can be made that a wife is expected to remain with a man that is abusing her and/or their children. 

 

@shiloh357 I would agree with what you've said. How would you approach this from a Scriptural standpoint?

I've heard many people invalidate any kind of divorce other than sexual immorality.

God bless,
GE

[GoldenEagle]

22 hours ago, nebula said:

"Jesus said what he said about divorce to protect women, not to imprison them. Divorce was a weapon foisted against women in the first century, not one they could use, and it almost always left them destitute if their family of origin couldn’t or wouldn’t step up.

"How does it honor the concept of “Christian marriage” to enforce the continuance of an abusive, destructive relationship that is slowly squeezing all life and joy out of a woman’s soul? Our focus has to be on urging men to love their wives like Christ loves the church, not on telling women to put up with husbands mistreating their wives like Satan mistreats us. We should confront and stop the work of Satan, not enable it."

http://www.garythomas.com/enough-enough/

 

*Note: Yes, the same could be said for abusive wives, but more often than not it is the wives who suffer.

Here's the full article:
 

Quote

 

“If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:26

What does it mean to “hate” someone we are elsewhere called to sacrificially love? We are told to love even our enemies, yet Jesus here tells us to hate some of our closest family members. What could that mean?

Hatred here is Semitic hyperbole. In essence, it means “love less than.” There are times when our love and allegiance to God may be at odds with human loyalties; in those cases, love for God, His light and the way of truth, must always prevail.

It’s okay (actually, commendable) for me to love the Seattle Seahawks. But if my wife needs me to take her to the hospital in the middle of a game or needs me to pay her some attention, I have to act like I hate the Seahawks and not even consider my love for them in service to my wife.

Let’s apply this principle in regards to how the church views marriage and divorce.

I recently spoke at a long-standing North American woman’s conference and was overwhelmed by the quantity and horrific nature of things wives are having to put up with in their marriages. Between sessions, I was bombarded by heartfelt inquiries: “What does a wife do when her husband does this? Or that? Or keeps doing this?” It broke my heart. I felt like I needed to take a dozen showers that weekend.

This may sound like a rant, but please hang with me, as I think this conference was a divine appointment. I can’t get this out of my mind.

One wife began our conversation with, “God hates divorce, right?”

“Yes,” I said. “I believe He does.”

“So I’ve just got to accept what’s happening in my marriage, right?”

When she told me what was happening, I quickly corrected her. “If the cost of saving a marriage is destroying a woman, the cost is too high. God loves people more than he loves institutions.”

Her husband is a persistent porn addict. He has neglected her sexually except to fulfill his own increasingly bent desires. He keeps dangling divorce over her head, which makes her feel like a failure as a Christian. He presented her with a list of five things he wanted to do that he saw done in porn, and if she wasn’t willing, he was through with the marriage. She agreed to four of them, but just couldn’t do the fifth. And she feels guilty.

God hates divorce, right?

This is monstrous and vile. This woman needs to be protected from such grotesque abuse, and if divorce is the only weapon to protect her, then the church should thank God such a weapon exists.

A young wife, barely in her twenties, held a baby in a blanket and looked at me with tears. Her husband has a huge temper problem. He’s made her get out of the car on a highway with her baby, twice. “But both times he came back for us,” she said in his defense when I looked absolutely appalled. They were separated and she was living with her parents. She wanted to know if she should take him back because his psychiatrist supposedly said there wasn’t anything really wrong with him. Her husband doesn’t think he has a problem that, in fact, the problem is with her “lack of forgiveness.”

They had been married only three years and she had already lived through more torment (I’m not telling the full story) than a woman should face in a lifetime. My thoughts weren’t at all about how to “save” the marriage, but to ease her conscience and help her prepare for a new life—without him.

Church, God hates it when a woman is sexually degraded and forced to do things that disgust her. It should also make us want to vomit.

When a young man is so immature he puts his wife’s and baby’s life in danger on a highway (amongst other things), the thought that we’re worried about the “appropriateness” of divorce shows that our loyalties are with human institutions, not the divine will.

As Kevin DeYoung so ably puts it, “Every divorce is the result of sin, but not every divorce is sinful.”

Another woman told me about putting up with her husband’s appalling behavior for over forty years. I was invited to look in her face, see the struggle, see the heroic perseverance, but also be reminded that counsel has consequences. So when I talk to a young woman in her third year of marriage and it’s clear she’s married to a monster, and someone wants to “save” the marriage, I want them to realize they are likely sentencing her to four decades of abuse, perhaps because of a choice she made as a teenager. When these men aren’t confronted, and aren’t repentant, they don’t change.

Jesus said what he said about divorce to protect women, not to imprison them. Divorce was a weapon foisted against women in the first century, not one they could use, and it almost always left them destitute if their family of origin couldn’t or wouldn’t step up.

How does it honor the concept of “Christian marriage” to enforce the continuance of an abusive, destructive relationship that is slowly squeezing all life and joy out of a woman’s soul? Our focus has to be on urging men to love their wives like Christ loves the church, not on telling women to put up with husbands mistreating their wives like Satan mistreats us. We should confront and stop the work of Satan, not enable it.

Look, I hate divorce as much as anyone. I have been married for 31 years and cannot fathom leaving my wife. I have prayed with couples, counselled with couples, written blog posts and articles and books, and have travelled to 49 of the 50 states and nine different countries to strengthen marriages in the church. By all accounts, I believe I’ve been an ambassador for improving and growing marriages.

The danger of what I’m saying is clear and even a little scary to me, because no marriage is easy. Every marriage must overcome hurt, pain, and sin. No husband is a saint, in the sense that every husband will need to be forgiven and will be troublesome and even hurtful at times to live with. I’m not talking about the common struggles of living with a common sinner, or every man and woman could pursue divorce. (There are many men who live with abuse and could “biblically” pursue a divorce as well.) Charging someone with “abuse” when it doesn’t truly apply is almost as evil as committing abuse, so we need to be careful we don’t bear “false witness” against a spouse to convince ourselves and others that we can legitimately pursue divorce to get out of a difficult marriage.

That’s why I love how some churches will meet with a couple and hear them out to give them some objective feedback, helping them to distinguish between normal marital friction and abusive behavior. Some women need to hear, “No, this isn’t normal. It’s abuse. You don’t have to put up with that.” Others need to hear, “We think what you’re facing are the normal difficulties of marriage and with counseling they can be overcome.” There’s no way a blog post (or even a book) can adequately anticipate all such questions.

I love marriage—even the struggles of marriage, which God can truly use to grow us and shape us—but I hate it when God’s daughters are abused. And I will never defend a marriage over a woman’s emotional, spiritual, and physical health.

I went back to my hotel room after that woman’s conference and almost felt like I had to vomit. I don’t know how God stands it, having to witness such horrific behavior leveled at his daughters.

Enough is enough!

Jesus says there are “levels” of love, and times when one loyalty must rise over another. Our loyalty to marriage is good and noble and true. But when loyalty to a relational structure allows evil to continue it is a false loyalty, even an evil loyalty.

Christian leaders and friends, we have to see that some evil men are using their wives’ Christian guilt and our teaching about the sanctity of marriage as a weapon to keep harming them. I can’t help feeling that if more women started saying, “This is over” and were backed up by a church that enabled them to escape instead of enabling the abuse to continue, other men in the church, tempted toward the same behavior, might finally wake up and change their ways.

Christians are more likely to have one-income families, making some Christian wives feel even more vulnerable. We have got to clean up our own house. We have got to say “Enough is enough.” We have got to put the fear of God in some terrible husbands’ hearts, because they sure don’t fear their wives and their lack of respect is leading to ongoing deplorable behavior.

I want a man who was abusive to have to explain to a potential second wife why his saintly first wife left him. Let men realize that behavior has consequences, and that wives are supposed to be cherished, not used, not abused, and never treated as sexual playthings. If a man wants the benefit and companionship of a good woman, let him earn it, and re-earn it, and let him know it can be lost.

Enough is enough.

I know I’m ranting. But I don’t think it was an accident that I was constantly stopped at that woman’s conference and forced to hear despicable story after despicable story (“forced” isn’t the right word. I could, of course, have walked away). I think God wanted me to see the breadth and depth of what is going on, and in this case, perhaps to be His voice.

Message received! We are called to love marriage, but when marriage enables evil, we should hate it (love it less) in comparison to a woman’s welfare.

 

 

[StanJ]

1 minute ago, GoldenEagle said:

@StanJ Question, if God didn't create us with the capacity to hate did something change at the fall when sin entered the world?

God bless,
GE

Indeed, as I just pointed out hate came in after the fall and is evidenced by the relationship between Cain and Abel.  Before sin came into our lives we were as God created us and he did not create us with the negative attributes we received after the fall. I recognize that there were a lot of barbaric practices throughout the Old Testament but as we are no longer in the Old Testament but under the New Covenant and that our mandate is to love one another as God loved us and he should not be allowed to enter in just as Jesus taught in the Gospels.

[Guest shiloh357]

The fact that God is love does not mean that God is incapable of detesting either people or things.   God detests homosexuality.  He calls it an abomination.   The Hebrew sahne  is a word that depending on context can mean to completely abhor or detest.  When used in connection to God's choice of Jacob over Esau the word usage is different.   Esau was not detested by God simply because chose Jacob. 

But the Bible says in Psalm 5:5 that God  hates (abhors)  workers of iniquity.

Before God is love, God is holy.  Holiness is not God's chief attribute.  Holiness is God's chief attribute. And God hates, detests abhors those things that violate His holiness.

[StanJ]

5 minutes ago, GoldenEagle said:

I've heard many people invalidate any kind of divorce other than sexual immorality.

God bless,
GE

GE... I think it is really important to understand what the Bible means when it says sexual immorality because fornication is not considered sexual immorality as it is already dealt with on its own. Fornication is indeed wrong as is adultery but the Bible doesn't say that fornication or adultery is a valid reason to divorce someone. Just as Jesus said the only valid reason is 'sexual immorality', which for all intents and purposes is depicted in Leviticus 18.

[missmuffet]

22 minutes ago, StanJ said:

First of all God commands us to love not to hate and I wouldn't go as far as to say that he created us with the capacity to both love and hate. Our fallen nature is the reason why we hate and was evidenced in the very beginning between Cain and Abel. 

Secondly I would find a better reference site than gotquestions.org if I were you.  It is a notoriously biased RT site.  God commands us not to hate then obviously he is not going to contradict himself by hating. 

Please see my last response on this thread to Davida.

 

Got Questions is an excellent online Bible ministry. Many people do not like it because they preach the literal truth. No false doctrine. Got Questions does not always line up with their interpretation of Scripture. So they shun it. God wants us to hate sin.

[StanJ]

Matthew 5:43-48  (NET Bible)

Love for Enemies

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor’ and ‘hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be like your Father in heaven, since he causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Even the tax collectors do the same, don’t they? 47 And if you only greet your brothers, what more do you do? Even the Gentiles do the same, don’t they? 48 So then, be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

[StanJ]

1 minute ago, missmuffet said:

Got Questions is an excellent online Bible ministry. Many people do not like it because they preach the literal truth. Got Questions does not always line up with their interpretation of Scripture. So they shun it. God wants us to hate sin.

Sorry but your perception is much different than reality and many biblical Scholars disagree with what it teaches.  It may be good for Christianity 101 but when it gets down to actually exegeting the word of God, it falls short.

[Guest shiloh357]

5 minutes ago, StanJ said:

GE... I think it is really important to understand what the Bible means when it says sexual immorality because fornication is not considered sexual immorality as it is already dealt with on its own. Fornication is indeed wrong as is adultery but the Bible doesn't say that fornication or adultery is a valid reason to divorce someone. Just as Jesus said the only valid reason is 'sexual immorality', which for all intents and purposes is depicted in Leviticus 18.

LOL, sexual immorality is fornication. 

Mat 19:9  And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery."

"Sexual immorality"  is from the same word in the Greek, porneia, which is where we get the word pornography and that is the same word translated fornication in other translations.   Fornicaition is sexual immorality.