God Hates Divorce (Matthew 5:31-32)

The Sensitivity of Divorce and the Need to Address It

Well, go ahead and open your copy of God's Word to Matthew chapter 5, starting in verse 31. Matthew 5, 31, as we continue our study on the Sermon on the Mount. And so as you're turning there, I just want to let you know that today is a very sensitive topic.

And it's sensitive because of how pervasive it is in our culture today. So much so that most of us, if not all, in this room have been scarred by its collateral damage in one degree or another. It has overtaken family members, it has overtaken friends, loved ones, and for some of you in here, maybe even yourself at one point in your life.

And so because of the deep scars left in its wake, we often ignore this topic in church as to not reopen the wound. And I respect and understand an element of that, but it's the topic of divorce. You can understand what I mean now, right?

It's a hard one. So today we have no choice but to address it, despite how difficult it may be for some, because Jesus addressed it. And as we go through this study, we don't skip anything here at 12 .5 Church, do we?

We address everything, no matter how hard it may be. Because you see, this topic of divorce is the third out of the six examples that Jesus gives here in this Sermon on the Mount. Just like the first one we looked at, when he said, you shall not murder, but anger in your heart has caused you to commit murder.

You've sinned against God. The second one that we looked at was you shall not commit adultery, but if you lust in your heart, you have committed adultery in your heart. And even though this topic of divorce is a separate example, let me pull it up here.

There it is. How's that? All right, there we go. Even though this is a separate example, it is a bit of a subcategory to adultery. You can see why Jesus flowed out of this and into this topic, because they're so tightly connected.

So let's read our passage, Matthew 5, starting in verse 31. Jesus says, it was also said, whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce. But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual morality, makes her commit adultery.

And whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. These are the two verses we will be addressing today, and this is God's holy inspired word. And so since it is such a difficult topic, and since it is God's word, let's go to him in prayer now once again, and let's ask that he illuminate our hearts and minds to this difficult truth.

Dear only Father, we come to you, we bow before you once again, and we ask in our humble state that you would illuminate our minds and our hearts to see your truth. And God, I pray that me as a fallible man, that I would not speak my opinion, that you would guard the hearers from any wrong that I might speak, that I might align my words with your truth.

In Christ's name, amen. So I have to be honest, I've wrestled with this text over the past few weeks. I've wrestled with it in a way that I haven't wrestled with a text in a long time. And I wrestled with it not simply because of the fact that it's a difficult subject, but I wrestled with it seeking to truly get to the root of its meaning.

At face value, these two verses, they seem pretty cut and dry, don't they? They seem like, well, Jesus said what he said, and that's it. And a lot of people will address it that way. And in a way, that's true.

It is pretty cut and dry. Yet as I was studying it in light of other passages of Scripture that address the topic of divorce, I found that Jesus' words here are quite complex. The fact that Jesus is saying a lot with a few words.

All good communicators are able to do that, aren't they? They're able to say a lot with a few words. But unfortunately, you all are stuck with me today, so you're getting a lot of words. But I have to be able to look at the totality of Scripture and not just build an entire doctrine based off of two verses.

And so there's a little bit of complexity here. So in light of the complexity, I realize that we can either this morning begin a roughly 8 to 10-week series on the topic of divorce. And at the end of that 8 to 10 weeks, we might have scratched the surface of the topic.

So if that gives you any indication as to how deep this goes in all of Scripture. But the other option would be for us to seek to simplify it for the purposes of our study through this sermon. And for your sake, I have decided on the latter.

We are going to try and simplify this as best we can for the sake of staying within the context of the Sermon on the Mount. Because that is exactly where Jesus is speaking of this truth. We are seeking to focus on the heart of and not losing the text of what Jesus is getting at.

The idea of Jesus giving these examples of, you've heard it said, but now I've said. He's speaking of the heart of the law compared to the letter of the law, right? So we're going to keep that. We're going to try and seek to do that.

So I've broken it down into three things in this text that I want us to see this morning. The first is the world's view of divorce. Second, God's view of divorce. And thirdly, God's gracious exception for divorce.

The World's View of Divorce in Deuteronomy 24

So let's look at that first one, the world's view of divorce. Let's look back at our passage there, verse 31. It was also said, whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce. So just like with the previous two examples of murder and adultery, Jesus begins this section pointing out the religious leader's interpretation of the law.

You see the pattern here with every one of these examples so far? Hey, it was said, or you've heard it said, he is quoting now what they've been told by the religious leaders who are the people that are tasked to interpret the law of God.

And so he tells them what they've said here. And the religious leaders come up with an interpretation, which is what he just said. And it's not like they pulled it out of thin air, is it? What Jesus just quoted here, they didn't pull out of thin air.

But just like any good distortion of God's word, it has traces of the truth. They didn't just come up with a certificate of divorce, did they? But it's how they perceive it. As a matter of fact, this comes from Deuteronomy chapter 24.

As a matter of fact, go ahead and turn there. The Old Testament book of Deuteronomy 24. I want you to see the source of where these religious leaders are getting their interpretation. Deuteronomy 24, verse 1.

And mind you, once you get there, please keep your thumb there because we're going to reference this passage back and forth a couple of times. It's one of the first of the books right there at the beginning of the New Testament.

Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers. Deuteronomy, all right. Deuteronomy 24, verse 1. It says, when a man takes a wife and marries her. Now remember, this is the law of God. They're coming through Moses.

They're coming from God through Moses to the people of Israel. When a man takes a wife and marries her, 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.

There it is. And puts it in her hand and sends her out of the house. Now remember, keep your thumb there because we're going to be referencing back to this here in a moment. So you see, this is obviously a thing.

This certificate of divorce wasn't just pulled out of thin air. So these religious leaders, they felt as though they were interpreting the law the way it was given to them by Moses. This is directly from the law, so what's the problem?

Why is Jesus, just like he was with the other, why is he getting ready to contrast their interpretation of it if he's the one that had actually given them the law that they can give a certificate of divorce?

See how we start to dig into it a little bit and it becomes a little more complex. The problem is, just like with the previous two examples, right, of murder and adultery with the law, he is quoting their misinterpretation of it and they're looking, again, at the letter of the law with no regard to the heart of the law.

Why did God create the law? What's God's intention for you to carry out the law and to obey the law? Is it to obey it outwardly, down to the T, down to the letter of it, or is it to obey from a heart matter?

And so that's what Jesus is getting at. And since they could only see through the physical realm because they were unregenerate men, right? These religious leaders were not followers of Christ. They were not believers.

So in their deadness, they could not comprehend it, and so they could only see it from the physical side, the letter of the law. Their flesh was seeking to find a loophole. Seeking to find a loophole.

Ways to not be guilty of breaking the law yet still get away with what they want to do.

Did you catch that?

They're looking for a loophole. That's why we want to follow the letter of the law because if we can manipulate the verbiage of the law or we can slightly interpret something different, then we may be able to get it.

It's just like the debate with Pastor Jeremiah the other Friday night. The other side wanted to take a verse or two verses and manipulate it to fit an entire context of what they wanted to fit. We do that all the time, and these religious leaders are guilty of doing that because they can only see the physical realm.

Now, sounds familiar, doesn't it? We do it in our own lives. We seek to do the same thing. We clearly see what God has said, but what do we do? We try and find loopholes to do what we want to do.

I do it.

I find myself in the flesh seeking to find those loopholes all the time and to be able to live the way I want to live. But then there's others that just want parameters. The legalist. At times, some of us fall into that category that the rules, want a set of rules that we can follow, right?

A set of rules that can feed our own self-righteousness. So you see the two extremes? The ones that are looking for the loophole to do anything and everything that they want to do and the ones that are looking for the rule book so that they can feed their own self-righteous attitudes and actions as if they're doing something good before God.

And most people fall into one of those two categories. And to be fair, many of us have fallen to them at different times in our life, right? Now this is nothing new. This is what's going on with the religious leaders of that day.

And there was a battle that was actually raging between one family, one group of religious leaders and another. It was kind of like the liberal group and the conservative group. That sounds familiar, right?

There's this liberal group and a conservative group. And they have been fighting over this very verse in Deuteronomy their entire lives. They have been debating and dialoguing as to what this little one phrase in this passage means.

And so that sets the background for Jesus speaking this in the Sermon on the Mountain. And I'll make that clear here in just a moment. They want to see how to interpret. And here's the phrase they want to figure out.

This is the phrase they're fighting there in Deuteronomy 24. It says, When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes. So there's one group that they come to the conclusion that this phrase encompasses anything.

I mean they go as far as saying that if your wife burns your dinner and she doesn't find favor in your eyes, by the law of God you can give her a certificate of divorce and send her on her way. So this one group thinks this way.

But then the other group, they came to the conclusion that unfaithfulness in the marriage is the only exception. And that that is the only option. Now you may be saying, well, wasn't the conservative group right?

Isn't that true, the exception of unfaithfulness? Yes, that is a right outcome. However, they did not come to this conclusion out of a heart of obedience. That's important. They did not come to this out of a heart of obedience.

They just wanted clarification so they could follow the letter of the law. Because here's what both sides wanted. Both sides desperately wanted an out. They weren't looking at the heart of how God feels about divorce.

They wanted the ability to divorce. So this is coming from the letter of the law, not the heart. They're not looking at the heart of God. They want it without consequences. So they have different interpretations of it.

And this gets to the very heart of the world's view of divorce. This is how the world sees it. Even the pagan world knows there will be consequences to their actions. There's consequences to things like divorce, aren't there?

There's consequences to everything that God hates. There's consequences in this life. And that's why we seek in this world to normalize things. We desire to normalize things like divorce. Because if it's frowned upon and no one's doing it, then what do we feel, that conscience?

We want an out. We want the option. But that consequence is nagging at us. But if it's not frowned upon in a culture and everyone's doing it, then I'll be okay. I can sear my conscience. I don't have to look for

I don't have to feel the weight of consequence in my life. I'll give you an example that actually reminds me, and I'm going to share a story of how stupid I was as a young boy. But in seventh grade, I tried to talk everyone in my class into skipping the rest of school, the whole class, into skipping the rest of school, and we would hide in the woods.

And we would just hang out there until the end of the day, and then we'd come when our parents come to pick us up. And in my seventh grade mind, I think this is a foolproof plan.

And you know why?

Because I legitimately thought that if everyone is doing it, none of us can get in trouble. So if I skip class on my own, I'm obviously going to get consequences for it. But if I can talk the whole class into doing it, then they can't punish any of us.

Dumb, right? I just gave you a little bit of insight as to middle school Nathan. But I share that example because even though I wasn't the brightest kid in the class, the other kids saw right through it, thankfully, and we didn't skip class, by the way.

Don't skip class. But I thought it was a foolproof plan. But yet this is precisely what man tries to do. If everyone is doing it, I can't be held accountable. Hence, that's why man seeks to normalize unnatural things.

That's why man seeks to normalize divorce. And this isn't a new thing. As I said earlier, this topic of options for divorce was a highly divisive topic. There in Jesus' day as he's preaching this sermon, and it's so much so that the religious leaders tried to entangle Jesus into it in hopes that the people would turn on him.

As a matter of fact, turn over in Matthew chapter 19. This is another one. Keep your thumb there. I know we're jumping around a little bit today. Matthew 19 starting in verse 3. I want you to see how big of a topic this was and how serious they took this.

Matthew 19 .3 says,. And Pharisees came up to him and tested him. Get that? This is similarly to the example I brought up last week with the woman caught in adultery. But these Pharisees, they seek to test Jesus.

They're seeking to trap him, really. And they came to him testing him by asking, Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause? Now, we're going to stop there for a moment. Again, keep your thumb there because we're going to look at it here in a moment.

The Pharisees knew that no matter how Jesus answered this question, he would be turning away half the people in that crowd. You get that? It was a trap. All of those people knew there would be consequences for divorce that are standing there.

Yet, they could not let go of the option. And so they had different interpretations. And this was amongst the religious leaders and people of Israel at the time. These are the people that have the law of God.

These are the religious folks. But the Roman culture, they had already completely normalized it. All you had to do to divorce in Roman and Greek culture was to leave the house. If you left the house, that was officially divorce.

And so they had already completely normalized it. But this is God's chosen people here. These are the people of Israel that have the law of God, and they're still seeking for loopholes. They're still seeking for an option for it.

It makes me think of with the Greek and Roman culture compared to the religious culture, it makes me think of today. It makes sense that the world would normalize divorce, doesn't it? It makes sense. If there's no consequences, no judgment, and we don't believe in Scripture, then it's not wrong.

So it's normal for them to do it. But then look around at the church. We're still seeking loopholes, aren't we? Always looking for an out. Always looking for an option. Now I have to be clear. I don't believe the statistics today.

Much of the statistics that we see claim that the divorce rate within the church is just as high as it is out in the world. I don't believe that's the case, and here's why. It's because I don't believe that 90 of the churches out there in America are actually Christian churches.

So there's still the world with some religiosity and moralism, right? And I would bet you in those 10 of churches out there across this country that that divorce rate is much lower, thankfully. But it's still there.

It's still present, and at times it's still abused. However, when we look at a topic from our perspective and not from God's, we will always seek to lessen the consequences. And that's why the church has done so.

This is why Jesus is contrasting the world view of divorce. The world's perspective, and he's contrasting it with God's view. Look back at our passage in chapter 5 of Matthew 31 when he says,. It was also said, this is what they're saying, Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.

God's View of Divorce and Christ's Interpretation of the Law

So this leads us to our second thing that I need us to see. We see the world view of divorce. Now let's look in contrast to that, to God's view of divorce.

Verse 32, he says,.

Now remember, this is Jesus contrasting. This is what they said. Now here is the creator of all things, the one that has actually created the law of God. So he gets to interpret it. I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual morality, makes her commit adultery.

And whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. Now we already know what God has to say about adultery, don't we? You shall not commit adultery. But now if a man divorces his wife, he is causing her to commit adultery.

So this is obviously making a distinction from what the religious leaders of the day are trying to argue between versus what Jesus is saying is the true heart of the law. The Old Testament law required the death penalty for adultery.

That's what God thought of it.

That's what was required of adultery in the Old Testament. So is Jesus really tying divorce to adultery? Let's look at the passage in Matthew 19. Told you to keep your thumbs there. Matthew 19. Is Jesus really tying divorce to adultery?

Starting again in verse 3, we'll read it up through that. And the Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause? Verse 4 he says, Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female?

Now what's Jesus do here? He ties it all the way back to Genesis 127, doesn't he? He's quoting Genesis 127 from creation with Adam and Eve.

He says,.

Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female? Verse 5, And said, This is God saying, 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. So what is the purpose of joining the two together? What's the purpose in tying the man and the woman together the way that God has into one flesh?

You don't have to turn here, but you can jot this passage down because Paul clarifies it for us in Ephesians 5, 31 and 32.

It says,.

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. There's Paul reaffirming that what God said back in Genesis. And verse 32 says, This mystery, so it's obviously a mysterious thing.

Why is he tying these two together? This mystery is profound. And I'm saying that it refers to Christ and the church. Because if you read back in chapter 5 there of Ephesians, what's Paul doing? He's contrasting the marriage between the relationship of the man and the woman in a marriage relationship, and he's comparing it to Christ and the church.

What does he say to the husbands? Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church, and gave himself up for her. So he's tying these two things together. This is imagery of the gospel itself. This is imagery of the redeemed us in here.

The church, the church universal is the bride of Christ. And so this is what Paul is doing. He's tying this together. So that's why it's important, because God has set it down into the DNA of marriage that this is a picture of the gospel.

This is what it boils down to. To understand God's view of divorce, we must understand God's plan for marriage. And this is what it is. That representation of the gospel. Do you know why God hates divorce?

Does he just arbitrarily pick divorce and say, I don't like it.

I hate divorce.

God never arbitrarily does anything, does he? Everything has a purpose, and everything is perfect that God does, but yet we know he hates it. But why does he hate it? Because it distorts the imagery that he placed into the very DNA of the marriage.

That's what Paul says in Ephesians 5, isn't it? It's tied inseparably together as imagery. So if that is the case, why do we have an exception for divorce? That leads us to our third and final point, God's gracious exception for divorce.

God's Gracious Exception for Divorce and the Covenant of Marriage

Now God in his goodness, knowing our frailty, he has given an exception. And it is there in verse 32 of our passage in Matthew 5, but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife,.

Accept.

There's an exception. Accept on the ground of sexual morality. These are Jesus' very own words. So he's already said what the law was interpreted by the religious leaders. He could have put that section in with them and said that their interpretation is that except for adultery, except for sexual immorality.

But he doesn't. He ties it to what he's saying is truth. So back in Matthew 19, starting in verse 7 says, they said to him, these are the religious leaders, they respond to Jesus after he has told them that how God sees divorce and that no man should separate it, God's own words from Genesis.

So they ask, why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and send her away? If that's the case, if that's how God sees marriage, if God sees divorce as something that is evil and that he hates, why even give us a certificate of divorce?

Why even have that in there? Why would that be the case? Verse 8, he said to them, Jesus responds, he says, because of your hardness of heart, Moses allowed you to divorce your wives. Okay, we'll talk about that in a moment.

But he goes on, he says, but from the beginning, it was not so. God did not create it to be so. When God created Adam and Eve, he said, what I put together, let no man separate. Those two have become one flesh.

It was not so. In verse 9, he says, and I say to you, whoever divorces his wife except for sexual immorality and marries another commits adultery. So he reaffirms what he has already said back in chapter 5.

What Jesus is saying is that your sinful desires, our sinful fleshly desires are the only reason that there's an exception.

Did you catch that?

Our sinful desires. He says, but from the beginning, it was not so. This is not God's intent. Now, you may be saying, wait a second. God doesn't bend to the will of man's sin. He's not making an exception for us based upon our sinful weakness, right?

That can't be the case. And you're right, he doesn't bend to man's sin. So why does it seem as though he is giving in here on this matter? Why does it seem as though he hates divorce and he didn't mean for it to be so, but yet he gives an option, right?

That's a good question.

The answer is he's not. That's not the purpose. That's not the core of the reason. In order to understand this, we must go back to our passage in Deuteronomy 24. I told you we're jumping around. I'm pulling a Pastor Jeremiah today.

Deuteronomy 24. Looking back again at verse 1. When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes, remember this is the argument. What does that mean? And he says, because he has found some indecency in her.

So this word, indecency, in the Hebrew is erval. The word that's being used here for indecency. In order to understand the meaning of this word, we need to see it in a similar context somewhere else in Scripture, right?

That's the only way we're going to be able to identify because those religious leaders, they apparently couldn't come to the conclusion. But let us look elsewhere in Scripture. You can jot this passage down.

You don't have to turn there, but you can look at it later. It's found in multiple places, but let's look at one. Ezekiel 16 .36. Now this passage is not speaking directly about marriage. It's tying imagery.

It's talking about Israel is what it's talking about. But we see the word used in a similar context. Ezekiel 16 .36 says, Thus says the Lord God, because your lust was poured out and your erval, that same word, uncovered your whorings with your lovers and with all your abominable idols.

Did you catch that?

So when we see this word back here in Deuteronomy 24, and he says because the husband has found some erval, indecency, this is direct adultery at its very definition. This is what the husband has found.

Now mind you, this is speaking from a very patriarchal perspective. This also includes women. That's the beautiful part about Deuteronomy 24. People like to say that the old law was oppressive on women.

As a matter of fact, this very law of a certificate of divorce was an unbelievable protection for women because back then men could just abandon their wife, say, I don't want you anymore, boot her out of the house, and then if somebody else marries her, she's unclean, she's not acceptable to marry, and no one would touch her with a 10-foot pole, and she's left abandoned.

But by the grace of God, he forces the men to give a certificate of divorce, which allows her to be free. So don't think of this as an oppressive thing, that just the man has the option for this and that.

But what it comes down to is that very understanding of the exception. Now, with all of that being said, and this passage in Ezekiel is obviously talking about Israel, but this word's in the same context, here is the root of the exception.

You're allowed to divorce if the spouse has already abandoned the covenant. You've not abandoned the covenant. You've not broken the law.

They have.

The indecency broke that image that God put together. You did not.

Why is that?

Because that picture of marriage back in Ephesians 5 that Paul explains, what marriage emulates and what marriage is symbolizing is Christ and the church. That has now been perverted and distorted. But then God also knows our frailty.

And let's be honest, if a spouse has been cheated on, regaining that love and unity required in marriage may not be possible in our frailty. And that's what Jesus means back there in Matthew 19.

When he says,.

Because of the hardness of your hearts. Now this does not mean that divorce should be a first choice, even in the case of adultery. We should seek restoration even in those cases. We should seek to be restored and full and keep that image.

And why is that?

Because God hates divorce, and that has not changed. This exception does not change God's mind. And the church is not always true to her husband, is it? We as the church are not always true to Christ, are we?

We pursue other lovers. We flirt with idols, don't we? We are arrogant. There's indecency in us. Yet Christ remains true, doesn't he? Will he ever give us a certificate of divorce?

No.

We are secure in it. No, he will wash us in the word. We are made clean in him. That's what Paul said in Ephesians 5, isn't it? That's the church. So with that imagery in mind, if you have been a part of a divorce, trust me, there is great forgiveness.

That is not the unforgivable sin. And there are steps and there are options for you. You can come see myself or Pastor Jeremiah if you have questions or want to talk through that. But Jesus' intent in Matthew 5, 31 and 32 is not to look for loopholes in the law by looking at the letter of it.

Seek to be obedient to the heart of that law. And the heart of that law is marriage is sacred. Divorce is an evil perversion.

And it happens.

God knows the hardness of our hearts. God knows our frailty and our brokenness.

And it happens.

And there's great forgiveness. If you are in a situation where you are seeking to look for a loophole out of a marriage, I would encourage you to first spend some time looking at how Christ responds to his bride.

He will never hand her a certificate of divorce. And seek for restoration because it can be restored just like the church. When we flirt with idols and our Savior comes in and he continues to restore that relationship because he's already paid for all of that brokenness.

That's marriage. And marriage is a beautiful picture of the gospel of the world, isn't it? You know, the statement, always share the gospel, but when necessary, use words. Crumble that up and throw that out.

That's stupid.

But there is an element of imagery that God has placed within the family that preaches a sermon. How the man loves his wife and lays down his life for her.

Forgives her.

Lives in kind understanding with her. And when she, being an equal image bearer of him, loving Christ and seeking to be obedient to Christ, is then obedient to her husband, just as the church is to Christ.

And how Christ just lays down his life for her. The world looks on and they want to distort that. And that's why half of the marriages end. Because they don't understand that. But here in the church we should know the world is looking in and we are a picture of the very gospel that has redeemed us in our marriage.

I hope this is encouraging to you. I know that this is a hard topic. I hope that no one here is late leaving discouraged in a wrong way. If there's conviction, I understand. But please, if you would like to talk, I would love the opportunity to clarify things and talk through this with you.

Please feel free to do so. But in light of this, in light of the fact that we are married to the bridegroom, right? The groom, we are the bride and he is the groom. What a perfect opportunity for us to stop and go to the table again today, isn't it?

And remind ourselves of the oneness we have in him. This symbolizes the unity that we have in Christ. So let's pray for our time. And then Pastor Jeremiah will be at this side. I will be over here. Miss Karen, you mind playing a little bit for us while we do this?