The 'D' Word

This is the message given in the Wheatland Parish Sunday, April 28, 2013.  The Bible verses are Mark 10:1-12; John 4:1-26; and John 8:1-11.


We are near the end of our sermon series called, “Seriously, Jesus?” We're looking at the hard sayings of Jesus, the things we might wish Jesus had not said.

The fact is that I don't like some of these sayings any more than you do. It'd be a lot easier to just preach “love your neighbor” and “do unto others as you'd have them do unto you.” And there's nothing wrong with preaching that, of course. We need to do those things.

But the thing about doing a sermon series on this topic is that, by definition, it forces us to deal with some hard issues, issues we might really rather avoid. Today we're going to talk about one of those issues. We're going to talk about what Jesus said about divorce.

You know that divorce is pretty common today. Some of you may have gone through it yourselves. If not, you know people who have, maybe people in your own family. Both of my brothers married someone who was divorced. So did my niece and one of my nephews.

Now, before I go any farther, I want to make clear that I am not here today to judge or condemn anyone. Judgment is God's job, not my job, and I prefer to leave it in God's hands. Besides, I have not lived anyone's life but mine. I don't know the circumstances of anyone's life but mine. I'm not bringing this up to hurt anyone or to judge anyone.

Still, Jesus said what he said, and the whole point of this sermon series is to see how the hard sayings of Jesus apply to our lives. So let's look at what Jesus said in our reading from Mark, and also at what he did not say.

First, Jesus did not bring the subject up. Jesus was not standing there thinking, “I need to tell these people about divorce.” It was the Pharisees who brought it up. And we see that they did that to test Jesus.

That's something the Pharisees did a lot, of course. They were always trying to trick Jesus, to trap him, to get him to say something that would get him into trouble. And that's what they were trying to do when they asked Jesus about divorce. They thought that no matter what Jesus said, some people would be mad at him for it.

So, they asked Jesus “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife.” In that society, of course, a woman would not have been allowed to initiate the divorce against her husband. That's just the way it was—only a man could start divorce proceedings. So they asked Jesus, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife.” And Jesus answered, “What did Moses command you?”

Moses, of course, was the great lawgiver. He was the one through whom the Ten Commandments were given. Much of the book of Deuteronomy is Moses telling the people what God had said about the law. So, when Jesus asks, “What did Moses command you”, he's really asking “What does the law say about divorce?”

The Pharisees answer that Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and send his wife away. But people must not have been very comfortable with that, or there'd have been no controversy and they would not have asked Jesus about it. They knew what the law said, but it just did not seem right. It did not seem like that was really the way it's supposed to be.

And Jesus told them they were right. That's not the way things are supposed to be. Jesus said Moses allowed that because “your hearts were hard.” What Jesus was talking about is sin. He says that, when God created Adam and Eve and brought them together, divorce was not part of the plan. But then, sin entered the world. Adam and Eve sinned and so have all the rest of us.

In other words, every marriage, including mine, is a marriage of two sinners. And when two sinners marry, things happen, things that don't make God very happy. They don't make the people involved very happy, either. But they happen, and God knows they happen. So, Jesus says, God allowed divorce under certain circumstances.

Now, notice what Jesus does not say. He says divorce is not part of God's plan, but he does not condemn anyone who's divorced. He does not say if someone gets divorced, they're going to hell. The reason God is against divorce is not because God wants to condemn us, it's because God loves us.

Because God loves us, God knows how painful divorce is. Even under the best circumstances, it's a very painful process. It's hard. The effects never totally go away. That's not to say a divorced person cannot start over and have a happy life, but the effects of divorce are still always part of their lives.

When the Bible says that in a marriage two become one, that's not just a nice poetic phrase. It really happens. And when that one gets ripped apart back into two, it's painful. Even if the pain heals, it leaves a scar that never completely goes away. That's why divorce is not part of God's plan. God loves us and does not want us to go through that pain.

We're told that later, the disciples asked Jesus some more about this. And we're told that Jesus says “Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her. And if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she commits adultery.”

That's a tough one. I'm not very comfortable with that. I suspect a lot of us are not. We think of adultery as a serious thing, especially when we're in the context of the Bible. We wonder if Jesus really is saying that divorce leads to condemnation and to eternal punishment.

Before we decide that, though, let's look at a couple of other passages in the Bible. We read the story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman. Jesus knew who this woman was and the kind of life she'd led. He knows she's had five husbands and now has a man who is not her husband.

Does Jesus condemn her? No. He offers her salvation. He says, “Those who drink the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” And when she says she knows the Messiah is coming, he tells her, “I am he.”

You know, there were lots of times when Jesus was given the chance to claim he was the Messiah. Sometimes it would've really been to his advantage to make that claim. But he did not do it. Yet, when he's with this Samaritan woman, this woman who had five husbands and is now with another man, this woman who surely in that society would've been considered to have committed adultery, Jesus tells her right out who he is. He wanted to make sure she knew. He wanted her to be saved. Jesus did not offer this woman condemnation. He offered her salvation.

In John 8, the Pharisees say to Jesus, “This woman was caught in an act of adultery...Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” Does Jesus condemn her? No. He offers her salvation. He says, “Let any of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Then, when no one does and they all leave, Jesus says to the woman, “Neither do I condemn you. Go now and leave your life of sin.”

Jesus refuses to condemn the woman. But he also says, “Go now and leave your life of sin.” See, God knows we cannot go back in time. We cannot go back and correct our past mistakes and do away with our past pain. What we can do is start from where we are. We can drink that living water Jesus offers us and start over. We can learn from our past mistakes and start living our lives the way God wants us to live them.

We're all sinners. My sins may be different from yours, but we're all sinners. The fact that our sins are different does not mean anyone's sins are better or worse. In God's eyes, we're all equal. That means we're all equally in need of God's forgiveness, God grace, and God's mercy.

The good news is that all those things are available to us. Any time we turn to God and repent of our sins, God is there. God is there, and God offers forgiveness, and grace, and mercy. When we turn to God, God does not offer condemnation. God offers salvation. God does not want us to have pain. God offers us the living water.

Jesus does not say what he says in Mark to condemn people who've been through divorce. Jesus is pointing out how painful it is. The reason it's not what God wants is that God does not want anyone to go through the pain of divorce. God wants to spare us from it. But God knows it's going to happen sometimes, because we're imperfect, sinful people. So when it does, God does not offer judgment and condemnation. God offers forgiveness and salvation.

I think that's the message from Mark today. Jesus does not offer condemnation for divorce. He's saying he wishes no one ever had to go through it, because he knows how painful it is. And he's saying that, no matter where we are, no matter how much pain we're in, we can always turn to Jesus. We can always receive God's love, God's forgiveness, and God's salvation. We can have our pain taken away. And we can always make a new start. With God's help, we can then start living our lives the way God wants us to live them.