On Marriage and Divorce (1 Corinthians 7)

Welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist. My name is Keith Foskey, and I am a Calvinist. Today, we are going to be looking at 1 Corinthians chapter seven. 1 Corinthians chapter seven is Paul's writing to the Corinthian church on the subject of marriage and divorce.

Three Views of Marriage and Divorce

This is a very controversial subject within the church, one that, again, is not universally agreed upon, even among those who would consider themselves to be Reformed or Calvinists. Within evangelicalism, there are basically three views on marriage and divorce.

There's the first view that is called the permanence view. Permanence view says that there is never, ever any reason for a divorce. They would not accept any exception clauses to divorce. Divorces are ever biblical.

No divorces are ever right. No divorces are ever biblically warranted. And so that's the permanence view. Now, I'm not trying to do justice to any of these views. I don't have time. I'm just simply explaining that the permanence view is just that.

It's a view that marriage is a permanent covenant that cannot be broken. The second view is the view called semi-permanence. It would allow for divorce, but not for remarriage. So if a person was abandoned or a person committed adultery, they would allow for abuse, or not abuse, excuse me, or if abuse was involved.

So abandonment, adultery, abuse, any one of those things could allow a person to rightfully seek a divorce, but then that person would be bound to not ever remarry. That's the semi-permanence view. And then, of course, there is allowance view.

And this view says, yes, there are some things that would make divorce allowed, such as adultery. Adultery, that would be based on Jesus's words in Matthew 19. I know that's debatable. I'm just saying that's where that position would take.

And then, of course, in 1 Corinthians 7, the issue of abandonment, where Paul talks about the unbelieving spouse who departs, the person who has departed is no longer bound to that relationship. And so the third view, the allowance view, would say, well, if they're no longer bound, then that person would be allowed then to remarry.

And so would not be, the first covenant's broken. They would be allowed to go and get another marriage covenant. And so that's the three views. I'm not necessarily advocating one of those views today.

That's not my point for this lesson. But I do encourage you, as you're reading through 1 Corinthians 7, see where you think the apostle Paul is falling on this particular issue. One of the things that I wanted to mention also when you're studying is verse one is often very confusing.

Paul’s Instruction in 1 Corinthians 7:1

That's a verse I want to look at. He says, now concerning the matters about which you wrote, which tells us that Paul is addressing a direct question that they had written to him, it is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.

This is a confusing passage for many people because they say, wait a minute, marriage is good, and therefore the sexual intimacy in a marriage is good. Why would Paul be saying it's good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman?

Well, I understand this to be very contextual in that Paul is speaking to a group of people, many of which who have been married multiple times. Some of them had been slaves. Some of them had been sold in slavery and in their slaves' conditions had been married and remarried.

And so Paul is giving a general situation, a general statement to them. It'd be better if you can just simply not continue to engage in these relationships, but could stay as I am. He's gonna mention that.

Paul, obviously, at this point, is not in a marriage relationship. So he's saying it's better if you can just stay like me. But he goes on to say that that's not the norm, and that most people are not going to do that.

Most people want to be married. Most people are not gifted. And I do believe celibacy and the ability to be single is a gift, singleness is a gift. And most people aren't able to exercise that gift. And so Paul gives 1 Corinthians 7 as sort of an example of how marriage and divorce and those things are supposed to be handled.

Paul’s Use of Jesus’ Words and Biblical Inerrancy

One other thing I wanna mention here, very important when it comes to the issue of biblical inerrancy. This is one of the passages, 1 Corinthians 7, particularly verses 10 and 12, are one of the passages where people like to argue against the inerrancy of scripture.

Scripture inerrancy basically says we believe that God breathed the scriptures out, 2 Timothy 3 .16 .17 says that. And so because God breathed out the scriptures, there is an inherent truthfulness to it.

Everything that it says is true because it comes from God. And so in 1 Corinthians 7 .10, Paul says, I'm telling you something that the Lord says. But then in verse 12, he says, I'm telling you something that the Lord did not say.

And so a lot of people use that to say, see, this is Paul, this is not the Lord, this is not God, this is not the Holy Spirit, this is Paul's opinion. That is not what Paul is trying to indicate here.

What Paul is indicating in verse 12 is that the first statement he gave in verse 10 was a direct address of what Jesus said. And they have what Jesus said, they have the recordings of it, they know what he said, it has been passed along verbally, it's also been written, Matthew 19, Matthew 6, other passages where Jesus specifically said what he says there, the wife should not separate from her husband, and the husband should not divorce his wife.

That's a direct quote from Jesus. But then he says, to the rest I say, I not the Lord, if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and he goes on to talk about that, he's basically saying, this is what I'm saying to you, but I'm not saying to you independent of the Lord, I'm giving you additional information to what the Lord has already given.

So he's not contradicting what Jesus has said, he's adding additional parameters, and he's addressing the fact that these are not things that Jesus addressed, and so he's going to address them as a person with apostolic authority.

And that is a key important truth. The apostles had the authority that Jesus had given them, and so when he speaks, he is speaking to them with a certain level of authority, and certainly we believe that this is scripture, and therefore it comes with the authority of God himself.

I've had too many people who have told me, that's not God speaking, that's Paul speaking. That is not what Paul is intending to put out in this verse, that's not an out that he's giving to people, to say, oh, Jesus didn't say this, this is my opinion.

This is not Paul's opinion, this is a man who is writing a scripture, and the scripture is under the inspiration of God. So those are some thoughts that I have on 1 Corinthians chapter seven. If you have any questions, feel free to send me a message, you can comment below, and you can write questions, and I get those comments, I'd be happy to write you back and answer.

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Thank you for listening, I appreciate you being with me today. Again, I'm Keith Foskey, and I'm a Calvinist, and I'm thankful to be able to share the word with you this morning, and enjoy your coffee.

God bless.