Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1227 | These Lies About Divorce Are Fooling Christian Women

Starting point is 00:00:00 A Christian woman in a viral video claims that she is divorcing her perfect husband. This has caused a debate about marriage and divorce. So we are going to take a look. What does the Bible actually say about divorce? When is it justified? Is it ever justified? Let's look at what God's word says. This episode is brought to you by our friends at Olive.

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Starting point is 00:00:54 Hey guys, welcome to relatable. Happy Wednesday. Hope everyone is having a wonderful week so far. Okay, watch this viral video from a TikTok influencer talking about her potential divorce and tell me if you can spot the problem. Here's out one. I don't know if I'm going to actually post this because this is super vulnerable for me and I'm a pretty open person.

Starting point is 00:01:15 But earlier this year, I told my husband I wanted a divorce. I feel like I have been searching for something in my relationship that we don't have for the whole time we've been married, which has been 10 years. There is not a single thing about my husband in and of himself that I do not love. Let me be very clear about that. He is the most self-disciplined, loyal, hardworking, good person that you could meet on this planet. And that is probably the reason, that is the reason why I have not left. Our relationship and what my expectations are for my marriage and what they always happen are not met, right?

Starting point is 00:02:03 Which I don't know if anybody's are. The reason that pushed me to even bring up divorce and talk about it was the fact that I feel like I don't, I can't be myself with my husband. And it's really confusing because I'm 32 years old. I am a mom of three and I still don't know who I am. This video started a firestorm on social media with all different kinds of people debating whether her reasons were legitimate. What is the real purpose of divorce and marriage? Today, we are going to analyze this video, but in a broader conversation, talk about what does the Bible really say about

Starting point is 00:02:49 divorce? When is it justified? Is it ever justified? There's a lot of disagreement about this, even among Christians. So we are going to try to get as much clarity as possible. Before we get into that, I want to encourage you to not only subscribe to this YouTube channel, subscribe across all platforms. It really helps us out a lot. Leave us a five-star review if you love this show, if it's meant anything to you. That is how we continue to give you the content that you love for free. So subscribe across the platforms. Leave us a five-star review.

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Starting point is 00:04:37 And before we get into that response, I've got a few specific points to make on that. Let's look at the context. Who is this? Camille White is a social media manager. She's a content creator. And she puts out TikTok videos of her and her family. She actually gained a following. I think she's got maybe 60,000 followers on TikTok.

Starting point is 00:05:01 from posting pro-Trump, pro-God, pro-family content. And so when she posted this, a lot of her audience felt betrayed. And other people started circulating this video to show this is emblematic of the problem with our culture. Some people also used it to show the problem with the flippancy that feminism has encouraged among women, that if something isn't right for you, if it's hard for you, then you can just leave it in accordance with your feelings. So in other parts of this video, it's like a five and a half minute video that we couldn't play the entire thing. She talks about telling her husband that she wants a divorce, working out the logistics, like where she would live. She goes through as you heard

Starting point is 00:05:53 all of these wonderful characteristics that her husband has. But as they're approaching their 10 year anniversary. She's just not sure if this is the place for her. If she is getting all of her needs, Matt. And as you heard her say, if she's really finding herself. Now, she does say she wants to work on their relationship, but she also said that the easier option would be to get a divorce and try to go find the love that I'm craving. She asked what other couples have done. So she's couching this confession in kind of asking for advice. She's saying that she's being vulnerable here and that she just wants to know how she can salvage her marriage.

Starting point is 00:06:42 And because of that, there are a lot of people that are showing her sympathy. But as you can understand, there are a lot of people who are expressing their ire as well. For example, you've got Matt Walsh saying this is horrific, narcissistic, sociopathic, you've got Michael Null saying this is self-sabotage. And I've got my own response to this. Posting a video, confessing your soured feelings about your husband, talking negatively about your spouse, talking negatively about your marriage indicates a lot of very profound, spiritual and mental issues going on here. You've got to honor your husband more than this. You've got to cherish your marriage more than this. You've got to protect your privacy better than this.

Starting point is 00:07:34 Love your kids more than this. This creator publicly claims the name of Christ, so I can speak to her in Christian terms. Number one, marriage is for life. Except in rare circumstances, divorce is not allowed. Jesus says what God is join together, let not man separate. Number two, life isn't about finding yourself. It's about denying yourself, as Jesus calls us to do. The journey to self-discovery is endless and self-fulfillment is a very heavy burden to bear. Number three, your kid's well-being matters more than your wants. Your feelings will change. Your kids' emotional, psychological, and spiritual need for an intact home will not. And number four, marriage is not primarily about happiness. It is primarily about holiness.

Starting point is 00:08:28 Marriage can be extremely happy. It can also be really hard. You wed two sinners together. Things are going to be less than perfect. You learn to love this person through various seasons, various versions of themselves, various spots in their road of sanctification, all for the glory of God. And then finally, number five, feelings are real. They are strong and it is so tempting to follow our feelings, but it is a trap. Our hearts cannot be trusted. Jeremiah 17.9. So go to people at your church and your life that won't just affirm how you feel, but will actually point you as uncomfortable as it may be to the unchanging truth of God's word. That is your responsibility to God as a Christian, to your husband who you made a vow to and your children who need their mom and dad to stay together.

Starting point is 00:09:25 And also, as an aside, before we get into the bigger conversation about the biblical explanation for what marriage is and the justification of divorce, here's what I would ask. And I think this is a question for all of us to consider from time to time. This is a question not just for this creator, but also to all of you women out there, what are you watching? Who are you following? What are you listening to? What are you reading? Are you reading unrealistic depictions of what romance looks like? Are you looking for that unhealthy codependence that you read about in the Colleen Hoover novels? Are you listening to music that glorifies really destructive relationships? Are you watching movies that is painting this picture of this hot and heavy sinful romance and that has rewired your desires to want something like that instead of the

Starting point is 00:10:30 biblical marriage that God has called you into? Whatever fills us controls us. That's why we read in the book of Ephesians to be filled with the Holy Spirit, not to be drunk with wine, because what ever fills us, our bodies and our minds will control us. We might think, oh, these desires are telling me something, but we mistake our sinful desires for conviction. Conviction comes from the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit is God. Therefore, the Holy Spirit will never convict you to do something that is against God's will. And divorce here is against God's will. So let's get into it. What does God actually say about marriage and divorce? First, let me just say if you feel that you need a time of refreshment, like if you feel that you need encouragement,

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Starting point is 00:13:53 Plus, when you use my code Allie, you get an extra 10% off your order. So that's seven weeks coffee.com code Alley. So first, before we get into what the Bible says about divorce, I think it's probably a good setup, give us some good context to talk about what the world has to say and what the world tells us about divorce. So first, let's get into some numbers. In 2022, the divorce rate was 14.56 per 1,000 married women aged 15 and older, a slight increase from 14 in 2020 and 2021, but still below the pre-pandemic level of 15.5 in 2019. This rate peaked in 1979 at 22.6. Isn't that interesting? The popular idea that 50% of marriages end

Starting point is 00:14:55 in divorce comes from kind of a flawed calculation, so you've probably heard that before, that 50% of marriages end in divorce, but that's not actually true. true. That divides the annual divorce rate by the annual marriage rate, but this number compares two different groups, those getting divorced and those getting married in any given year and tells you nothing about the long-term trends and the overall pool of marriages. Now, when you break down the demographics that are most likely to get a divorce, Asian Americans have the lowest divorce rates. It's so interesting to look at statistics around just Asian Americans and They're low divorce rates.

Starting point is 00:15:34 They're low fatherlessness rates. So very rare for them to have a child out of wedlock, high graduation rates, high test scores, low poverty rates and welfare dependence rates. It really all goes back to the cohesion of the family. Black Americans have the highest divorce rate, 30.8 per 1,000. And then you've got Hispanic Americans and then at 18.5 percent. in white Americans at 15.1%. First marriages last eight to nine years on average. Second marriages seven to ten years and third marriages five to eight years, which is very unfortunate. So even if that number isn't 50 percent, you can see that in general the culture does not see marriage as

Starting point is 00:16:27 necessarily permanent. And we'll find a graph to put up. I would also like Bree, if you could look up when no fault divorce was allowed. And if you could find a graph that we can put up that shows the divorce rate increasing, at least over time as we'll get into it, has gone down a little bit in recent years, but it is increased over time. Now, what does the world actually think about marriage according to what they say? There are all kinds of op-eds, especially in recent years post-COVIDs. of usually women talking about how hard it is to be married and the unfair disproportionate load that women carry in marriage and how liberating it is to get a divorce.

Starting point is 00:17:16 There's a New York Times op ed titled a 50-50 custody arrangement that could save your marriage. This was in 2002 by Amy Shurn. She argued that her life was easier as a divorce day than it was during her marriage because of her 50-50 custody agreement with her husband. ex-husband. She said that divorced dads were forced to do their fair share of managing the household and caring for the children and for themselves. She implied that even married couples

Starting point is 00:17:42 should try a 50-50 arrangement. Look, nothing is really 50-50 in marriage. Everything is kind of like 100, 100, but there are different seasons of life where people have different responsibilities and things simply look different. There was a time when Chief Related Bro, he was having to go into an office from like he had to leave maybe at 7 a.m. He didn't get back until 6 p.m. And I was doing almost all of the load of the parenting and the cooking and all of the stuff around the house. And that was fine. That was a season of life. And now we work together full time. And there are a lot of things that we share and our schedules look different. And there have been so many different seasons where we just help each other out. That isn't

Starting point is 00:18:33 mean you change the biblical dynamic of the husband being in the lead and the wife submitting to the husband. But there are different kinds of responsibilities that are shared in different seasons of life. So this person wants it to be clear cut 50-50 and it comes down to not understanding, I think, sacrificial love. She said every divorced woman I know is happier post-marriage, even the ones who didn't instigate or want the split. Now, that may be true. And if your goal in life primarily is happiness, then having fewer responsibilities that demand your time, energy, and sacrifice will make sense to you. But if it's something deeper, if your purpose is more than just your fleeting happiness and doing things that are convenient for you, then this is not

Starting point is 00:19:24 the route to take, which indicates the direction that we'll be going in. So, there is a note from Brie about no fault divorce. So no fault divorce began in the United States with California's adoption of the Family Law Act in 1969. This law signed by Governor Ronald Reagan allowed couples to divorce without proving faults such as adultery or abuse. Prior to this, at fault divorce, was the only option in most states. So I'm sure that the change in this law that then spread across the nation over the subsequent years probably had an effect on that peak that we talked about in 1979 with the divorce rate. Ronald Reagan, I love you, but there were a lot of bad things that he did when he was in charge. I mean, a couple bad things, maybe not a lot of bad

Starting point is 00:20:14 things, but a couple bad things like no-fault divorce and then also mass amnesty. It's just true that history is very complicated. There's another example. that conveys the message of what the world thinks about divorce. Atlantic Senior Editor, Honor Jones, wrote in a 2002 op-ed that her ex-husband was a good man and only vaguely explained why she ended up leaving the marriage. She said, children are supposed to be the death of freedom, but that hasn't been my experience. Okay, that's a good thing. But she said it was my marriage that took these things for me, free time and free thought. She said, I could be myself and be a mother. I got divorced because I could not be myself and be a wife.

Starting point is 00:20:56 This is the glenendoyalification of women and the culture. In another article, she explains, I loved my husband. It's not that I didn't, but I felt that he was standing between me and the world, between me and myself. Everything I experienced, relationships, reality, my understanding of my own identity and desires were filtered through him before I could access them. I, I, I, me, me, me, my feelings, my identity, what I want. The Guardian talked about an anonymous writer in The Guardian did a week-long series talking about the ending of marriage and that it doesn't have to be that big of a deal

Starting point is 00:21:41 when you get a divorce. She said there doesn't have to be dramatic infidelity or plate smashing argument. Sometimes a handful of tiny sad moments are enough to indicate that a relationship is fragmenting. So such a low tolerance for hardship, such a low view of marriage. I've seen this multiple times on social media, these things called divorce parties, where people celebrate divorcing their husband. And just to be clear, like we are not talking about situations in this segment of abuse.

Starting point is 00:22:11 We are talking about mild unhappiness. Okay, so the text on this video that I'm about to play, says POV, your friends throw you an iconic divorce party. So this is a trend that's going on. Very cursed. Sot 2. Here's my hot take. Even if you are divorcing someone, say, in some other hypothetical scenario for abuse, as we'll get into, that is a legitimate reason to get yourself safe and to leave. That's not something to glorify. That's not something to celebrate. That's not something to celebrate in this way, no matter what divorce is sad. It's not something that should be met with a party. All right. So now, what does the Bible have to say first about what marriage is? Because we have

Starting point is 00:23:18 to know what marriage is, why it's important to know why divorce matters so much to God. But let me pause and tell you about our next sponsor. And that is Good Ranchers. Y'all, you know, I've been telling you for years. And it's still true. We love good ranchers in our home. We made some salmon this weekend. We've got some fillets that we love. Chief Relatorbrough made filets a couple weeks ago. So good. So full of flavor. Just add a little salt and pepper. Amazing. Good ranchers, a great way to get in healthy protein every day. We love their non-premarinated chicken breast because our kids will actually eat that any night that we cook it and that's just a great way to make sure that they're eating healthy and getting their protein as well. Unfortunately, most of the products in the grocery

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Starting point is 00:24:59 the very first chapter of the first book of the Bible. It's like God is saying, if you don't get further than the first chapter, understand this. This is fundamental to our theological understanding, but also societal cohesion and survival. Genesis 1-27 through 28. So God created man in his own image and the image of God he created him. Male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them be fruitful and multiply in fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth. So he married them together. He said that the man and the woman are made for each other before this first, the first time that God says that something is not good.

Starting point is 00:25:48 He says it is not good for man to be alone. He had created all of these other things, the stars, the land, the animals, vegetation. And he had said, over and over again, it was good. And then he made man in his own image, but he saw that man is alone, was alone. And he said, this is not good for a man to be alone. I will create a helper suitable for him. And so he creates Eve and Adam rejoices over this. He says, Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh. He is just in all of the beauty of this woman that God created just for him. He creates this man. He creates this man. marriage between Adam and Eve, man and woman to be for life, to be a covenant. Genesis 2.24,

Starting point is 00:26:38 therefore a man. So this is beyond Adam and Eve now. He's not just saying, okay, this was just for Adam and Eve. Other people can do other things. No, he's saying, therefore, because I have done this, because I have made these first parents, Adam and Eve, together for each other in marriage, a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife and they shall become one flesh. That is a connection that cannot be broken. This is how much God cares about marriage, that he set it up in the very beginning as an example for all men and women to follow. When God instituted marriage originally in creation, there were no provisions for divorce,

Starting point is 00:27:24 none R. C. Sproles says in a sermon in 2006 called Marriage and Divorce, marriage was intended to be forever. The marriage vow does not say as long as we stay in love, as long as we get along, as long as we remain faithful. Rather, the marriage vow is as long as we both shall live. And that's absolutely true. While the Bible does talk about different forms of relationships, like we see with Hagar, There was a surrogacy situation. We see, of course, Solomon, polygamy, and all of his wives. And some people will say, see, marriage wasn't really just between man and a woman. What we have to remember is that in every situation, including Jacob and Leah and Rachel, every situation in which there was marriage or sexual relations or even sexual desire, like when we think of David and Beth Sheba, outside of marriage between one man and one woman, it causes problems. Okay, these were not written about positively. These were written to show us a variety of things, one of which is when we go outside of God's original design, we suffer consequences from that. Remember, not everything in the Bible is prescriptive. Sometimes it's just descriptive. It's just saying what happened, and that actually lends a lot of credibility to scripture, because if the writers of the Bible were trying to make themselves look good, If they were trying to make man look strong and wise and victorious and make Israel look awesome,

Starting point is 00:29:01 they would have written things very different. But they write about when their leaders messed up, when they sinned, when they did things that were straight up stupid and rebelled against God and suffered the consequences for it. So some things are simply descriptive, not prescriptive. Deuteronomy 1717, when God is outlining the regulations, for the king of Israel. He says he shall not acquire many wives for himself, lest his heart turn away, nor shall he acquire for himself excessive silver and gold. More women mobe problems. That's what he's saying, that his heart will turn away from the devotion to God that is required to be a righteous king of

Starting point is 00:29:45 Israel. Also, we see Exodus 2014, one of the Ten Commandments, You shall not commit adultery. And in fact, two of the commandments of the ten commandments. That's a lot. Have to do with keeping your desires, your eyes, your hands, your faithfulness to your wife, exclusive to her. Exodus 2017, you shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey or anything that is your neighbors. And so it's not enough not to do it. You're not even supposed to want to. You're not even supposed to want. to do it. So guard your heart against sinful desires. The book of Proverbs continually warns against adultery, which points to the significance of the exclusivity of marriage, the permanency of

Starting point is 00:30:40 marriage. In the Gospels, Jesus reiterates God's original design for marriage. Mark 10, 6 through 9, he is answering a question to the Pharisees about divorce. They're trying to trap him as the Pharisees often did. And Jesus says, but from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. Therefore, a man shall leave his father and 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 we've got our five R's that we talk about typically when we're defining marriages between one man and one woman. And hopefully so far as you're hearing scripture, you see that reiterated over and over again. It's never described as gender neutral or interchangeable

Starting point is 00:31:33 between men and women over and over again. It's very specific, including in Jesus's description. One man, one woman, that's marriage. The only definition of marriage. Rooted in creation, reiterated throughout scripture, like honor your father and mother, repeated by Jesus himself, as we just read in Matthew 19 and then our fourth run representative of Christ and the church. We read this in Ephesians 5. He says in verse, Paul says in verse 31 through 32, therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is profound and I am saying that it refers to Christ in the church. And if you back up a little bit, he roots his commands to the wife to be submissive to her husband and the husband to be loving to his wife

Starting point is 00:32:23 in this earthly representation of the eternal reality of Christ's marriage to the church. Christ is depicted as the groom of his church that is the universal body of believers in Christ here on earth. And we are his church, we are his bride, and he is our groom. And the faithfulness in marriage, even though we're talking. talking about two imperfect people is to reflect the faithfulness, the unwavering dedication in love and cherishing and commitment to sanctification and holiness that Christ demonstrates to us, his people, his flock, his sheep. According to desiring God, this is the ministry by John Piper, marriage was created by God as a picture of the covenant-keeping love of Christ in his

Starting point is 00:33:16 church. Jesus said, what therefore God is joined together. Let not man separate. John Piper said this in his Ask Pastor John podcast. We of course see throughout Paul's letters to Timothy and Titus the importance of marriage and how faithfulness to one wife indicates that you are a good responsible leader. We see 1 Timothy 3.2, an overseer in the church must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, 1 Timothy 312, let deacons be the husband of one wife. Titus 1 5 through 6 says if anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife and his children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination that these elders must fit those qualifications.

Starting point is 00:34:06 Pastor Chuck Swindal said in an article published on Insight for Living, at the most basic level, the phrase husband of one wife refers to a man who is married to one woman and living in harmony with her. It implies sexual purity and a reputation for devotion to his mate. This would have been countercultural at the time. It would have been seen as absolutely radical because at that point, women were seen as property. Prostitution was rampant. You could take as many slaves as you wanted as concubines and it wasn't frowned upon. There was no stigma around this.

Starting point is 00:34:41 This is just how this ancient pagan world in the Roman Empire functioned because they operated under this philosophy that you were only a full person if you had the fullness of the logos. And that is word or reason or rationale. And the belief was that only the adult free male did. So the woman didn't really have it. Children didn't really have it. They were sexually exploited and aborted and murdered and all kinds of things. And so the adult free male was really seen as being able to do whatever he wanted to do. exploit whoever he wanted to exploit. And so Paul, writing to people at this time saying,

Starting point is 00:35:16 no, no, no, you have to cherish your wife. You have to protect your wife. Don't provoke your wife. Don't provoke your children to anger, but you were to love her. You were to care for her. And she is the only one that she should be having a sexual relationship with. That was radical at the time. And guess what? That was really good news for women. That was really good news for children. So any feminist out there who wants to read this and feel restricted by it, know that this was God's good grace and protection specifically for vulnerable women and children. It took the capital L. Logos, word made flesh, John 1, to come and overturn and revolutionize how culture saw vulnerable people. All right, we've got one more point on what marriage is, according to the Bible. But let me pause and tell you about our next sponsor.

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Starting point is 00:37:21 The amazing thing is that the Bible starts with a marriage and it also ends with a marriage. Wow. Revelation 196 through 8. Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out, hallelujah, for the Lord our God, the Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory for the marriage of the Lamb has come. This is the Lamb of God who also comes back as a mighty lion, Jesus Christ himself, and his bride has made herself ready. That is the church.

Starting point is 00:37:56 That's us. That's a universal body of believers. We are anticipating this wedding supper, this ultimate uniting with Jesus. It was granted her, the church, to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure, for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints. And the saints and all the members of the household of God, again, are all believers who have been saved by grace through faith and Christ alone. There's a Presbyterian pastor named Trent Castro, and this is the denomination's official magazine. He wrote an article that says this, about this culminating. passage of not only scripture, but all of time. So it's not just that the Bible starts and ends with

Starting point is 00:38:41 the marriage, it's that time starts and ends with the marriage. The marriage supper of the lamb is the culmination of every biblical feast. It is the end of God's redemptive work in the beginning of perfect eternal communion between Christ and his bride to the church. The great feast describing Revelation is our future. Okay, so now we have a better understanding of what marriage. is it is not an agreement between two people who want to have sex. It is not just a promise that is made between two people who really like each other. It is not just a partnership. It is not just a team coming together with a shared goal. It is not just an earthly human institution, whether you want to believe it or not. There is a spiritual and eternal significance.

Starting point is 00:39:35 reflection and representation in the earthly combination covenant between one man and one woman in marriage. There's no such thing as any other kind of marriage, by the way. We see so clearly here, it's not possible for two women to be married. It's not possible for two men to be married. The law in America might say so, but the law can't change what God has defined because God predates America and predates the law and he is the source of truth and he created marriage one man one woman for life as a reflection of the eternal marriage between christ and his church crazy crazy how much this actually matters so it is no wonder that we read for example in malachi 216 that god hates divorce but this is not all the bible has to say about divorce

Starting point is 00:40:30 And before we even say specifically what these verses have to say about the tearing apart of a marriage, it's just important for us to realize that as we are reading scripture, if we love God, we read scripture asking what does God want? What does he want? What is he asking of me? How can I best please him? How can I best glorify him? That is what you think when you're thinking of someone that you love, whether it's a spouse,

Starting point is 00:41:00 whether it's even just a friend, whether it's someone in your life, when you love someone, you want to meet their needs. And God doesn't have any needs, but I'm using an earthly comparison here. You want to go above and beyond for them. You're motivated, not by fear, but by love for them. But if you are reading the Bible asking, what can I get away with? What can I use as a loophole to sin? How can I kind of finagle these verses and pick and choose different rules and say, well, that counts and that doesn't count. You are not operating from a place of loving God. We read the Bible asking, how can I glorify God best? Not what can I get away with? So people who say, well, the Bible doesn't talk about divorce all that much.

Starting point is 00:41:46 It talks about marriage a lot. So we don't ask ourselves, what does God say in the negative? But what does he say in the positive? So let's look at Malachi 2.13 through 16. So the prophet Malachi is condemning unjust divorce as a violation of God's covenant, emphasizing that it disrupts the sacred unity of marriage. It harms spiritual well-being, and it negatively impacts the community. So this is the commentary from my favorite study Bible that I use, and that is the ESV study Bible. So here is the prophet Malachi speaking to God's people.

Starting point is 00:42:22 And this is the second thing you do. You cover the Lord's altar with tears, with weeping and groaning, because he no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. But you say, why does he not? Now, Akai is answering, because the Lord was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant, did he not make them one with a portion of the spirit and their union? And what was the one God's seeking, godly offspring?

Starting point is 00:42:52 So, guard yourselves in your spirit, and let none of you be faithless to the wife of your youth, For the man who does not love his wife but divorces her, says the Lord, the God of Israel, covers his garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So guard yourselves in your spirit and do not be faithless. So some translations say, as I said earlier, Malachi 216, that God hates divorce. The NASB, for example, says, for I hate divorce, says the Lord, the God of Israel. And this is more commentary. There is no doubt that God hates divorce because it destroys what he loves.

Starting point is 00:43:32 Marriage. Marriage is the Lord's holy institution, which he loves Malachi 211. Specifically, we can say that God hates divorce for at least three reasons. One, it breaks a solemn vow. Two, it is harmful. Number three, God hates divorce because it illustrates apostasy and damnation because it is that earthly reflection of an eternal reality. it is an earthly representation of the separation of Christ in his church, which we know won't happen because of the faithfulness of Christ.

Starting point is 00:44:06 He's not here saying that everyone who gets a divorce is automatically going to hell, but he's saying that is what it represents on an earthly level. That is the picture that it paints. Of course, in the Old Testament, there was divorce. God created provisions for divorce, which Jesus explains later, this was not because God wanted divorce or because he liked it, but because people were sinful. And so because people were sinful, God had to create a law and he had to create a way to deal with people's sin. It's actually very gracious of God to deal with people's sin through the law and

Starting point is 00:44:41 through the sacrifices that we see in the Old Testament because it shows how much he wanted a relationship with his people. So much so that he not only went to, you know, went through Moses to distribute this law, which in some way seems very complicated. But later we see that he sent his own son to die so that we would be cleansed and he could have a relationship with us. So we see in Deuteronomy 24, for example, that there are all these kinds of provisions for divorce, how you can have a certificate of divorce, what this means for the man, what this means for the wife.

Starting point is 00:45:15 And it was so significant that he said her former husband, this divorce woman who sent her away, may not take her again. 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. Okay, so there's all different kinds of things there. So it's actually talking specifically about the woman, then going to another husband and then going back to her husband. And God is saying that is defilements. You just can't do that. Divorce causes all kinds of layers of messiness there, but we'll read about what the New Testament, how the New Testament interprets what God's heart was

Starting point is 00:46:00 behind all of that. We read in Matthew 19, 4 through 9. He said, and we already read this verse, that Jesus says, have you not read that he created them from the beginning male and female? Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother. Two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two but one flesh, what therefore God is joined together, let not man separate. And the Pharisee said to him, why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away? And Jesus said to then, 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. So we have to look at that exception, right?

Starting point is 00:46:46 there, except for sexual immorality. What does that actually mean? Let me pause, tell you about our next sponsor first, and that is Shopify. Shopify makes it really easy to sell your stuff. If you're not super tech savvy, you don't have to be. You don't have to create this complicated e-commerce site just to get people to buy your products. You just need to use Shopify. They make it as simple as possible. And so you can focus on creating the content, the products that actually make you money. And you just let Shopify take care of the rest. They will even help you with product descriptions and they can make your Shopify site look really good. This is what we use to sell our merchandise on Alleymerch.com. It makes it really easy for us. You guys have never had any problems using it.

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Starting point is 00:48:27 But I say to you, Jesus says, that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery. And whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. So we've got some commentary on this. This is a reformed pastor teaching on marriage, David Guzik. He says, if the divorce was not established on biblical reasons that it was never a divorce at all in the eyes of God, even though the government, the community, and the people involved may have considered it a divorce. Such a divorce is only in the eyes of man and not in the eyes of God. And the parties involved are still obligated to a marriage bond as far as God is concerned.

Starting point is 00:49:06 So you're not free in God's eyes to go and get married and have sex with someone else. Every time you do that, if that is the case, you are committing adultery. That's what Jesus is saying here. The Greek word for sexual immorality is pornea, and it encompasses all illicit sexual activities such as homosexuality, fornication, etc. It is where we get the English word for pornography. Through the writings of the Apostle Paul, the Holy Spirit once again affirms this lifetime commitment of marriage in 1 Corinthians. Chapter 7, verses 10 through 11, to the married I give this charge. not I but the Lord, the wife should not separate from her husband. But if she does,

Starting point is 00:49:45 she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband. And the husband should not divorce his wife. First Corinthians 715, but if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. So this is talking about cases of spousal abandonment. So you've got an unbelieving spouse. They don't believe in God's precepts. They're not honoring this as a covenant. They leave. So Paul says, in this case, the brother or sister, so the Christian in this case is not enslaved, God has called you to peace. So Paul seems to be saying here that if your partner abandons you, then you can remarry and it is not considered adultery. Death also dissolves the marriage covenant so that widows and widowers are free to remarry and actually he says that they should. This is Roman 7-2-3 for a married woman is bound by law to her husband.

Starting point is 00:50:40 he lives. But if her husband dies, she is released from the law of marriage. Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law. And if she marries another man, she is not an adulterous. So what we see over and over again, old to New Testament, if you divorce for an unbiblical reason, except for spousal abandonment and sexual immorality, you are committing a adultery by getting in another marriage every single time because God doesn't consider that second marriage a marriage it would seem. Abuse is not explicitly mentioned as grounds for divorce. So this is where there are a lot of questions. Abuse is not explicitly mentioned by Jesus or by

Starting point is 00:51:30 the Apostle Paul as a grounds for divorce, but there are theologians who argue that that is what is implied if we properly translate and interpret 1 Corinthians 715 and Matthew 199. Denny Burke is a seminary professor and I've cited a lot of his stuff before a very thoughtful, a theological thoughtful person and we are very aligned. He argues this in his 2013 book, What is the Meaning of Sex? An abusive spouse has made choices that force a separation. and the abuse therefore can become tantamount to desertion. That is why I conclude, Denny says, that when the abuser leaves the marriage in this way, so by abusing his wife or children, the exception for desertion comes into play that we see in

Starting point is 00:52:20 1st Corinthians 715. In any case, the victim must be protected and the abuser sanctioned. Wayne Grudam writes this in a 2020 article for the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. if an abused spouse is forced to flee from the home for self-protection from ongoing violent abuse, and my judgment, that would be a situation where the damage is sufficiently similar to the damage from adultery or desertion. So the divorce would be a legitimate option. So it is tantamount to abandonment. One of the reasons for divorce that we read in 1st Corinthians is tantamount to the damage at least that we see from the betrayal in adultery. There is also a pastor, Jared Wilson. He is a Midwestern seminary professor who says physical abuse constitutes a kind of sexual immorality, Pornaya. In fact, because it is direct and sinful bodily unfaithfulness. It is just as much a violation of Ephesians 5. Of Ephesians 5 marital nurture is having sex with someone outside the relationship. It is a destruction of one's body and dignity and thus a destruction of the vow to protect, cherish, and

Starting point is 00:53:32 nurture. What we see, though, and what we understand is that marriage is supposed to be for life. That covenant is supposed to be forever. However, we live in this very simple fallen world, and there are provisions that God gives for separation, for protection when it comes to abuse of you and your children and when it comes to sexual immorality. However, when we're talking about sexual immorality, that does not mean that you have to get a divorce. That does not mean that you have to separate. It doesn't mean that you shouldn't try to reconcile because God still considers your marriage a marriage. And God can redeem that and he can heal that and he can bring people back together. I know people who went through many, many years ago. I mean,

Starting point is 00:54:29 talking like decades ago went through infidelity and went through that betrayal and stayed together. I'm not saying that's easy and maybe that's not the situation that every person finds themselves in, but the goal of unity and reconciliation in that kind of situation should be primary because that redemption and forgiveness and reconciliation and restoration when possible is God's will because of all of the reasons we listed of what marriage actually is. So there are grounds for biblical divorce, but understand that they are rare. They are rare grounds for biblical divorce. They are not being hurt emotionally by your spouse. They are not wanting to find yourself. They are not wondering if you made a mistake 10 years ago.

Starting point is 00:55:26 They are not wondering if the person you're married to is the same person that you married 10 years ago. Those are not the reasons. Now, that's not to say that those aren't real problems to work through. I'm not saying that you should just push it down. I'm saying that you should figure it out with however much help you need, whether it's professional help, whether it's church help. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. so prayer, Holy Spirit help, but your goal should be to honor God in your marriage.

Starting point is 00:55:59 I'm not saying that's not difficult. I'm not saying that that doesn't require a lot of sacrifice, but as we read in scripture, it is so incredibly important to the God who is love, 1 John 4-8, for marriages to stay together. There's also, of course, the offspring and the product of marriage that we have to consider, and that, of course, is the kids. And what we read statistically, for example, from the Institute for Family Studies, is that children of divorce face a 35% to a 55% increase in mortality rates with effects persisting for at least 10 years. Teen birth rates among children of divorced parents increased by 63%. Children of divorced parents are more likely to experience emotional and

Starting point is 00:56:46 behavioral problems with studies showing a 20 to 30 percent higher risk of anxiety and depression. And I could go on and on with the statistics there. But God has ordered us and ordered the family for kids to be protected, for kids to be cared for and stewarded and nurtured. And that is very hard to do when you are divorced. Your kids need you to be, yes, safe. but aside from that, they need their parents to be together. It is such a lie that kids just want their parents to be happy.

Starting point is 00:57:22 Not primarily. Sure, they would like that ideally. They want their parents to be together. They need their parents to be together. All right, before we get to this last segment, I just want to play you this heartbreaking video that I saw of this child and this view that we don't see very often from a girl whose parents got divorced. Here's not three.

Starting point is 00:57:42 This is a poem I wrote about being a childhood for us. It's called One Gift. You're lucky, they say. Two Christmases, two birthdays, two roles to play. Double the presents, double the gifts, double the families to exist. And although it's true, they love me, they do. I don't love each other. And my dad is just the father of her children and her the mother. There may be two Christmas celebrations, two birthday parties, but there is never enough of me, enough time, and of the mother. And my dad is just a father of her children. And her the mother. There may be two Christmas celebrations, two birthday parties, but there is never enough of me, enough time in one day, and then I get the text from my dad saying, hey, what do you want for your birthday this year, and cash is what I say. Now I can't tell them what I actually want, that wouldn't be fair, to say that I want both of my parents to be there. So when my mother asks what I want next year,

Starting point is 00:58:29 cash is what I'll say, because what I really want is something they don't want to hear. Thank you. Oh, sweet girl. That was great, by the way. You have a real talent for creating those thoughts and putting them together in a poem. But that just breaks my heart so much. Guys, our kids' well-being is more important than our wants.

Starting point is 00:58:52 Our kids' well-being is more important than our wants. Being a grown-up very often means pushing our desires, especially our fleeting feelings aside for the well-being. of other people, especially the children that have been entrusted to us. All right. We've got actually something very hopeful to talk about here as we end this episode. And that is the statistical trend that we are seeing. The divorce rates are actually going down and marriage rates are going up. Praise God.

Starting point is 00:59:26 Hallelujah. But let me go ahead and pause, tell you about our last sponsor for the day. And that is NetSuite. suite is what you need if you are a business owner, your AI-powered business management suite trusted by over 42,000 businesses. It is the number one cloud ERP for so many reasons. It brings accounting, financial management, inventory, HR into one suite. You have one source of truth giving you the visibility and control you need to make quick decisions. It's got real-time forecasting, and so you're peering into the future with actionable data and with AI.

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Starting point is 01:00:48 He's a sociology professor at the University of Virginia. He wrote an article in the Atlantic on July 29th about the perspective that people like Andrew Tate has. There is no benefit to men for marriage and, um, that men should be single, they should have lots of baby mamas, lots of kids so that, you know, they can conquer. Basically, Andrew Tate's idea of being a man is having no self-control. And actually, part of being a strong man is being able to rein in your most base desires. Otherwise, you're just an animal. You are not ruling your desires. They are ruling you. And that is maybe the least

Starting point is 01:01:33 masculine and least impressive characteristic that you can have. Lack of self-control is just the biggest ick in the world. But this article refutes what he is saying about a lack of need for marriage and rebuts the hostility that he articulates about marriage by showing that men actually are benefiting a lot from marriage and that is showing up in fewer divorce rates. So we see in 1960, divorce rate was 9.2, went up, as we already said, 1979, 22.6. In 2010, it was at 18.8, and now it is down to 14. That is pretty awesome. Now, some people might say this is, you know, fewer people are getting a divorce. Some people are getting married. And some people might say, well, it's because people are waiting longer to get married. And so they really know who they want to

Starting point is 01:02:31 Mary, I wouldn't say that. I wouldn't argue that. I would say maybe people are seeing the chaos and the problems that divorce causes. Also, there is for the first time in years a rise in religiosity and Christian conversion, which is exciting. We also see that kids growing up and married two parent homes, that that number is going up slightly. And so that's a good thing. Gosh, I mean, that's a very depressing graph, though. 85% grew up and married two family homes in 1970, and it has just been a steep, steep drop off 64% in 2014. And now it's up slightly to 66%. So let's keep going in that direction. According to the 2024 general social survey, married men and women aged 25 to 55 or over twice is likely to report being very happy with their lives.

Starting point is 01:03:30 compared to their unmarried peers. Marriage changes men, this article says, but not in the nefarious ways Andrew Tate might think. Men work harder, find more success in work after they get married, they drink less. Marriage can channel noble characteristics and behaviors that have classically been identified as masculinity, protection, provision, ambition, and stoicism. And of course, it is a protection for children. It's a protection for women, just physical protection as well. And as as well as provision. So marriage is good. It is practically good.

Starting point is 01:04:04 It is spiritually good. It is eternally good. There is not a reason to dissolve your marriage just because you feel like it. Very, very, very, very rarely is there a justification for divorce? This should be talked about more from the pulpit. This should be talked about more among our friends. This should be talked about more in society, the practical benefits of marriage, but also the beauty of the unity between one man.

Starting point is 01:04:30 and one woman and the unique ability this relationship has to produce future generations. And so thank you, God, for knowing what you're doing always, for being so wise and so loving and creating this institution that gives you so much glory. And we as Christians should honor that, protect that, and use it to honor him as much as possible. All right, that's all we've got time for today. We'll be back here on Friday.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1227 | These Lies About Divorce Are Fooling Christian Women

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