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Tag Archives: Divorce

Mark 10:1-16

06 Oct

10 Then Jesus left Capernaum and went down to the region of Judea and into the area east of the Jordan River. Once again crowds gathered around him, and as usual he was teaching them.

2 Some Pharisees came and tried to trap him with this question: “Should a man be allowed to divorce his wife?”

3 Jesus answered them with a question: “What did Moses say in the law about divorce?”

4 “Well, he permitted it,” they replied. “He said a man can give his wife a written notice of divorce and send her away.”

5 But Jesus responded, “He wrote this commandment only as a concession to your hard hearts. 6 But ‘God made them male and female’ from the beginning of creation. 7 ‘This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, 8 and the two are united into one.’ Since they are no longer two but one, 9 let no one split apart what God has joined together.”

10 Later, when he was alone with his disciples in the house, they brought up the subject again. 11 He told them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries someone else commits adultery against her. 12 And if a woman divorces her husband and marries someone else, she commits adultery.”

13 One day some parents brought their children to Jesus so he could touch and bless them. But the disciples scolded the parents for bothering him.

14 When Jesus saw what was happening, he was angry with his disciples. He said to them, “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to those who are like these children. 15 I tell you the truth, anyone who doesn’t receive the Kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.” 16 Then he took the children in his arms and placed his hands on their heads and blessed them.

Mark 10:1-16

Dear God, I wonder how much of Jesus’s typical day on earth was spent with him just putting his face in the palm of his hand out of frustration. The two stories here are completely separate, but a theme is Jesus having to teach and correct things that had been generationally taught to the Pharisees, disciples, and everyone else in between.

In the first case, it was 1.) dealing with the skepticism of the Pharisees (which I don’t blame them for. I’d have been skeptical too) and 2.) having to correct an errant perspective on what marriage is. And I have to say that I do not know exactly what a first-century Pharisee thought marriage was, but it apparently wasn’t going back to the one basic fact that you built us for each other. You built us to humbly love and serve each other. You built us to fill a need each of us has that is part of our human condition (the perfectly created human condition, not the fallen human condition). Yes, there are times when we hurt each other. Yes, there are times when divorce has to happen because of the actions of one of the spouses over the other. But there are other times when both people are just failing to live up to what you’re calling us to do. To fill the need in our spouse that you call us to fill. I am here for her and to build up your daughter. She is here to build up your son. Yes, we each have calls on our lives. And one of my jobs is to make sure she has everything she needs to fulfill the call(s) you put on her. And one of her jobs is to help me fulfill the call(s) you put on me. To discern when one of us needs to sacrifice for that call. That is what you intended. So later when Jesus says a divorced person who remarries commits adultery, he is pointing his finger at the person who was not wronged through adultery or abuse by the other and recognizing the sin they are committing.

Then there is the disciples scolding parents for bringing their children for blessings. It’s hard for me to imagine the celebrity entourage aspect of Jesus walking around, but it makes me wonder if the disciples acted as his gatekeepers and how they made decisions on who got through the gate. Maybe they only let the really sick and lame through the gate. I don’t know how they drew the line, but they obviously didn’t respect the idea that parents were just wanting a blessing for their children from Jesus. They must have seen that as a frivolous use of Jesus’s (and their own) time. But Jesus pointed out that he loved these children, that the adults have something to learn from these children, and he wanted to bless these children. I’ve asked this before, but I can’t help but wonder what became of these children. How did their lives play out after having been blessed directly by Jesus.

Father, I have a lot to learn. I have so much to learn. My knowledge of you is steeped in my own selfish perspective, bad teaching from generations of errancy, and then a mix of actual knowledge of you through good teaching and times like this. Too often, I cannot tell what is right and what is wrong. So I am sorry for when I am wrong. I am sorry when I say things to other people that are wrong and I cause them to stumble from my bad teaching. I am sorry when I hurt your daughter, the woman I married 32 years ago. I am sorry when I don’t give her everything she needs to be the woman you created her to be. And I am sorry when I miss the mark on who you call me to be. But I bring you an earnest heart. I bring you a heart that wants to love you and love others. Thank you for the gift of Jesus and that that is enough for you.

I pray this in Jesus and with your Holy Spirit,

Amen

 
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Posted by on October 6, 2024 in Mark

 

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Mark 10:1-12

01 Mar

Mark 10:1-12 (NLT)

1  Then Jesus left Capernaum and went down to the region of Judea and into the area east of the Jordan River. Once again crowds gathered around him, and as usual he was teaching them.

2 Some Pharisees came and tried to trap him with this question: “Should a man be allowed to divorce his wife?”

3 Jesus answered them with a question: “What did Moses say in the law about divorce?”

4 “Well, he permitted it,” they replied. “He said a man can give his wife a written notice of divorce and send her away.”

5 But Jesus responded, “He wrote this commandment only as a concession to your hard hearts. 6 But ‘God made them male and female’ from the beginning of creation. 7 ‘This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, 8 and the two are united into one.’ Since they are no longer two but one, 9 let no one split apart what God has joined together.”

10 Later, when he was alone with his disciples in the house, they brought up the subject again. 11 He told them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries someone else commits adultery against her. 12 And if a woman divorces her husband and marries someone else, she commits adultery.”

Dear God, I wonder why the Pharisees picked this topic to trap Jesus. There were a lot of things they could have asked him about. Why divorce? What were they hoping he would say? Were they trying to get him to say that divorce was okay so they could pounce on him? Was one of them wanting a divorce? It seems like a weird thing to ask him.

“He wrote this commandment only as a concession to your hard hearts.” When I think about it, this is a surprising line. Why would Moses (or you through Moses) have made this concession in the first place? Is there a point that my hard heart/stubbornness can change your law?

Then I have to ask myself where my own heart is hard? Are there beliefs that I have that I stubbornly hold onto for selfish/self-indulgent reasons? Just because Jesus mentions in verse six that “God made them male and female,” I wonder about the gay marriage thing and if the belief that is spreading in our generation that gay marriage is biblically okay is an example of this hard-heartedness. I have certainly evolved on this issue over the course of the last 20 years. Is that me finding truth, or is it the hard hearts winning?

Well, I probably just touched the third rail of theological topics there, so I’m going to move on and wonder what other areas in my own life might be driven by a hard heart. The scary thing is that I can’t immediately think of any. That scares me because it makes me think I am likely blind to my own stubbornness.

Father, help me to hear your voice. Help me to know your truth. Help me to accept your will and submit to it. Help me to stand up for your Kingdom.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen

 
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Posted by on March 1, 2019 in Mark

 

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Emails to God – Marriage, Divorce, & Celibacy (Matthew 19:1-12)

19 Mar

1 When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went into the region of Judea to the other side of the Jordan. 2 Large crowds followed him, and he healed them there.

3 Some Pharisees came to him to test him. They asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?”

4 “Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ 5 and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? 6 So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”

7 “Why then,” they asked, “did Moses command that a man give his wife a certificate of divorce and send her away?”

8 Jesus replied, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning. 9 I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”

10 The disciples said to him, “If this is the situation between a husband and wife, it is better not to marry.”

11 Jesus replied, “Not everyone can accept this word, but only those to whom it has been given. 12 For there are eunuchs who were born that way, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others—and there are those who choose to live like eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. The one who can accept this should accept it.”

Dear God, there is so much here. I’m not even sure where to begin. I guess I’ll just do it from my perspective which nullifies the idea that I can be alone. One, I have already married a woman (for nearly 20 years), and I know I wasn’t designed to be one “who can accept” the idea of being alone. So taking that off of the table, and the debate over whether or not priests can marry and if this is something that this passage suggests, I want to go back to the part about divorce.

I am the product of a second marriage, for which I am grateful. Frankly, I have learned something about the Catholic process of annulment, and it seems to me that my mother’s first marriage would pretty easily qualify. I know that my dad has always struggled with these verses and the idea that he married a divorced woman, but the circumstances under which my mother was divorced were unique and I think okay from that perspective (I’ll keep her personal life her own and not share any details on the blog here).

I happened to sit through a session this year on Catholic annulment, and while some Protestants might think of it as a loophole through which Catholics jump to “legalize” a divorce, I came to appreciate it as more than that. I heard the testimony of a couple of people who have been through or are going through the process, and they say that it is gut-wrenching. The Church will tell you that it is about establishing whether or not the original vows were legitimate because they were or were not fully understood by both parties taking them. My opinion came to be that if divorce is the process of man separating what you have joined together, then annulment is the process of you separating it.

Father, I have to say, I knew what my vows were and what my commitment was. I have no regrets. Is it hard? Sure. Do we disagree sometimes? Yes. But I truly love her and I want the best for her. I am committed to being your best for her regardless of what that costs me. Lately, I think we have both been frustrated over a couple of issues, and with each other in the process. But you are among us and we trust you to guide us through it. I simply pray that you will unite us together and protect us from influences that might conspire to try and tear us apart.

 
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Posted by on March 19, 2012 in Matthew

 

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Emails to God – There’s a Time and a Place for Breaking the Rules (Matthew 12:1-14)

20 Jan

1 At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick some heads of grain and eat them. 2 When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, “Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath.”

3 He answered, “Haven’t you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? 4 He entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread—which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests. 5 Or haven’t you read in the Law that the priests on Sabbath duty in the temple desecrate the Sabbath and yet are innocent? 6 I tell you that something greater than the temple is here. 7 If you had known what these words mean, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the innocent. 8 For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”

9 Going on from that place, he went into their synagogue, 10 and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to bring charges against Jesus, they asked him, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”

11 He said to them, “If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? 12 How much more valuable is a person than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.”

13 Then he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” So he stretched it out and it was completely restored, just as sound as the other. 14 But the Pharisees went out and plotted how they might kill Jesus.

Dear God, I have to admit that I never liked the story of David and his men eating the consecrated bread. I don’t think Saul could have gotten away with that. The only thing I can figure out is that you realize that there is a time and a place for breaking rules. The times are few and the places are few, but apparently there is, indeed, at time and a place.

So what kinds of rules are open to interpretation at these special times and places? Of course, there is no way for me to figure that our here. And I think that I will end up having to make these evaluations as I encounter any given situation. But what I think the ultimate thing comes down to is, where is my heart in the decision to break a rule?

I spoke with a friend recently about her divorce. I have seen the pain of divorce up close and personal through my parents having been separated three times, so I can empathize, at least a little, with her pain. Ironically, that same night I was in a Bible study that discussed marriage. It was a Catholic study so they idea of divorce was nonexistent—you have to go through an annulment. The man who led the discussion, to my surprise, was on his fourth marriage. The first was in a Methodist church when he says he was young and dumb—it was short-lived. The second and third were done by Justices of the Peace—one was short and the other 16 years. Before he could marry the fourth time, however, he had recently become Catholic and they told him that he would have to go through the annulment process for at least the first one since that one was in a church (the other two were able to not count since they were civil ceremonies and not before you). The annulment process is apparently arduous, thorough, and not automatic. The Catholic church sees marriage as something that you joined together and only you can break. BUT, to their credit, I think, they do recognize that there is a time to break.

Father, I know my friend is still hurting. I know she would still love reconciliation. I don’t know that that is possible. That ship has likely sailed. So I ask that you would speak to her through your Word, through the books and devotionals that she reads, and through her friends. Help her to see how you are loving her through this. Help her to feel your hand on her life. Help her to see the ways you are touching her each day, each moment, that she didn’t realize before now. It’s an ugly situation, and while she is probably not totally blameless for all of the problems in the marriage, she is blameless in the area of wanting it to end. So honor her for that, help her to feel your release from it, and help her to live this day for you and not be distracted by what she no longer has.

 
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Posted by on January 20, 2012 in Matthew

 

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