Why do Christians get divorced?

Neostarwcc said:

When Jesus said that a person who is married and gets a divorce and remarries another is guilty of committing adultery? He meant it. He meant that unless your spouse cheats on you.. Then you have no grounds for divorce and are guilty of committing adultery. Its the same as if you cheated on your wife! Why? Because in Gods eyes a marriage is a lifelong commitment. And there is no reason to God aside from adultery for a lifelong commitment to end. Plus once you start having sex with your new spouse God sees it as adultery because in Gods eyes you never got divorced! Yet so many Christians get divorced and do it anyway as if they don't care that they're hurting God and don't view marriage in the same way.

They're tricked by websites that say that divorce is okay and that Jesus didn't mean what he said. Divorce is NOT okay and Jesus DID mean what he said. Now I'm not saying that these Christians are still not forgiven or that they're not saved. I'm just saying that they WILL have to answer for it on Judgement day. Just like I personally will have to answer for my cussing on Judgement day. There ARE consequences to our actions and its like Christians don't even care that thier sins are hurting God or that Judgement day is only for unbelievers. No Christians will have to give an account to God as well and will be judged too. So before you get divorced remember that you're not only hurting God but that there are consequences to your actions.


I realize that there are abusive and sexless marriages and that people have the right to have sex and not be abused. But these things can be worked out in therapy and to me and to God these reasons are NOT reasons to get divorced. People are just way too quick on that divorce button that its not even funny!

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Divorce and remarriage on grounds of adultery was an OT provision for the hard hearted. And in which case the State killed the adulterer making remarriage possible. It is not an option for believers to seek divorce instead of forgiveness under the New Covenant for any reason. Separating from physical abuse is expected but not divorce.

Dave L said:

And in which case the State killed the adulterer making remarriage possible.

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Ulp.

Neostarwcc said:

People are just way too quick on that divorce button that its not even funny!

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Why do Christians get divorced?

Will a true Christian follow the way of religion, the way mankind/ the world/ the enemy ?

Not if they follow the Good Shepherd, even unto death.

Neostarwcc said:

Why do Christians get divorced?

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Up to half of them get divorced because the other person divorces them. Only one has to leave for that to happen.

Neostarwcc said:

But didn't Jesus say that adultery was the only reason in Matthew 5:32? And he says that anyone who marries a divorced person commits adultery because their marriage never ended in the eyes of God.

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Jesus was commenting on the now obsolete Old Covenant. Divorce isn't part of the New Covenant.

People get divorced when the marriage is damaged beyond repair.

Neostarwcc said:

But didn't Jesus say that adultery was the only reason in Matthew 5:32? And he says that anyone who marries a divorced person commits adultery because their marriage never ended in the eyes of God.

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As I potentially understand it , Jesus while speaking to the Jews to whom He was sent, said fornication..not adultery ( which happened PRIOR to marriage ) was the only reason . Fornication happened during the one year betrothal period prior to the wedding night consummation . As Dave L said , the penalty for adultery was stoning under the old covenant . Under the new covenant of love , If an unbeliever depart , let them depart ...we are not bound but called to peace but we are also told to remain single but should pray for reconciliation as also love and faith would dictate . ( Love hopes all things and believes all things . ) To remain in a state of chastity regardless of what your spouse does also demonstrate faithfulness ..For while we were dead in trespasses and sins , Christ died for the ungodly. Every person alive is probably guilty of cheating on God and His answer ? Life from the dead through the blood of His Son.

Why do Christians get divorced??????

"It is better to dwell in the wilderness, than with a contentious and an angry woman."

"“It needs but one foe to breed a war, and those who have not swords can still die upon them.” J.R.R. Tolkien

As someone who was decieved into an unwanted divorce, the above quote seemed appropriate.
Very few abusers are going to recognize they're abusers and go to counseling. And the different marriage theories out there that suggest that someone (almost always the wife) can pray her husband back into the marriage, or fix the marriage by behaving in a certain way are just simply mistaken. And when there is abuse to the level where there has to be some protection from the abusive spouse, a lot of the times the easiest and safest way to get that going is by a legal divorce.

That's not defending the "divorce for any and every reason" that is prevalent today even among Christians, but just stating that it is often times much more complicated then it looks to outsiders.

A Christian never has a reason acceptable to Christ to desire divorce instead of forgiveness and reconciliation.

However, a Christian cannot prevent a spouse from committing adultery.

Let me go deeper into "adultery."

Adulterate: To corrupt, debase, or make impure by the addition of a foreign or inferior substance or element.

Most people only think of adultery in terms of sexual intercourse. "Adultery"--when considering both Matthew 19 and 1 Corinthians 7--means that the spouse has permanently renounced the covenant terms of the marriage and adulterated the marriage.

For instance, in the OT, a man who refused sex with his wife (a hateful deed that prevented her from having children to care for her old age, consigning her to poverty and early death) gave her grounds for divorce--he was violating a covenant term of the marriage, he had adulterated the marriage with his hatred for his wife, even though he had not left the house.

Spouses being a pagan in their own actions doesn't give a Christian permission to divorce. If the pagan spouse is okay with the Christian being a Christian and doing Christianity with the Body of Christ while he continues being a pagan, the Christian still has no reason to desire a divorce.

An absolutely unrepenting abusive Christian spouse, refusing to repent--thus refusing to come back to Jesus--has broken the covenant terms of the marriage and adulterated it.

In a way, the Christian spouse must meet a higher standard in this regard than the pagan spouse--and this is implied by 1 Corinthians 5:9-11. It acknowledges that "pagans gonna be pagans--no surprise," but a Christian is required to act like a Christian if fellowship is to continue. So what Paul has to say a few verses later about marriage continues the same though marriage to a pagan.

In no case can the Christian spouse desire divorce, but if the so-called Christian spouse proves that he's not actually in Christ by refusing to repent--thus refusing to come to Jesus--he has broken the covenant terms of the marriage and adulterated it.

The Body of Christ has a role in this. Matthew 18 applies to offenses within marriages between Christians as it applies to offenses within any other relationship between Christians. There is a point at which the Body of Christ (the local congregation of which the married couple is a member) ought to intervene. It is by this intervention that it can be proven the offending spouse is not actually in Christ when he refuses to repent--thus refuses to come to Jesus--he has broken the covenant terms of the marriage and adulterated it. Matthew 18 tells us what happens in that circumstance.

In one of my former congregations, the pastor and his wife had set up a program called House of Ruth in which an abused wife and her family would be whisked away from the home to a safe house while a group of men from the congregation (certified therapists, lawyers, police officers, and some burly guys from the Security Ministry) would wait at the house for the husband to return home and do some "wall-to-wall" counseling. They'd make a determination of whether the husband was going to repent or not.

That spouse has left the marriage, and in such a case the Christian who has been abandoned can remarry.

However, to be sure, the entire situation of a spouse having left the marriage is breaking Christ's absolute righteousness--it's all within a cloud of sin because "it was not that way in the beginning."

However, Christ is perfectly aware of who has caused that sin to occur, and who must bear the guilt: "But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be thrown into the sea."

RDKirk said:

A Christian never has a reason acceptable to Christ to desire divorce instead of forgiveness and reconciliation.

However, a Christian cannot prevent a spouse from committing adultery.

Let me go deeper into "adultery."

Adulterate: To corrupt, debase, or make impure by the addition of a foreign or inferior substance or element.

Most people only think of adultery in terms of sexual intercourse. "Adultery"--when considering both Matthew 19 and 1 Corinthians 7--means that the spouse has permanently renounced the covenant terms of the marriage and adulterated the marriage.

For instance, in the OT, a man who refused sex with his wife (a hateful deed that prevented her from having children to care for her old age, consigning her to poverty and early death) gave her grounds for divorce--he was violating a covenant term of the marriage, he had adulterated the marriage with his hatred for his wife, even though he had not left the house.

Spouses being a pagan in their own actions doesn't give a Christian permission to divorce. If the pagan spouse is okay with the Christian being a Christian and doing Christianity with the Body of Christ while he continues being a pagan, the Christian still has no reason to desire a divorce.

An absolutely unrepenting abusive Christian spouse, refusing to repent--thus refusing to come to Jesus--has broken the covenant terms of the marriage and adulterated it.

In a way, the Christian spouse must meet a higher standard in this regard than the pagan spouse--and this is implied by 1 Corinthians 5:9-11. It acknowledges that "pagans gonna be pagans--no surprise," but a Christian is required to act like a Christian if fellowship is to continue. So what Paul has to say a few verses later about marriage to a pagan continues the same though marriage to a pagan.

In no case can the Christian spouse desire divorce, but if the so-called Christian spouse proves that he's not actually in Christ by refusing to repent--thus refusing to come to Jesus--he has broken the covenant terms of the marriage and adulterated it.

The Body of Christ has a role in this. Matthew 18 applies to marriage between Christians as it applies to any other relationship between Christians. There is a point at which the Body of Christ (the local congregation of which the married couple is a member) ought to intervene. It is by this intervention that it can be proven the offending spouse is not actually in Christ by refusing to repent--thus refusing to come to Jesus--he has broken the covenant terms of the marriage and adulterated it.

In one of my former congregations, the pastor and his wife had set up a program called House of Ruth in which an abused wife and her family would be whisked away from the home to a safe house while a group of men from the congregation (certified therapists, lawyers, police officers, and some burly guys from the Security Ministry) would wait at the house for the husband to return home and do some "wall-to-wall" counseling. They'd make a determination of whether the husband was going to repent or not.

That spouse has left the marriage, and in such a case the Christian who has been abandoned can remarry.

However, to be sure, the entire situation of a spouse having left the marriage is breaking Christ's absolute righteousness--it's all within a cloud of sin because "it was not that way in the beginning."

However, Christ is perfectly aware of who has caused that sin to occur, and who must bear the guilt: "But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be thrown into the sea."

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Sounds good. Now can you quote the place in the bible where it states that divorce is permissible when one commits Adultery ?

RaymondG said:

Sounds good. Now can you quote the place in the bible where it states that divorce is permissible when one commits Adultery ?

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That depends on whether you refuse to interpret 1 Corinthians 7:15 as not being that permission.

RDKirk said:

That depends on whether you refuse to interpret 1 Corinthians 7:15 as not being that permission.

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The questions is concerning the reason one departs.....not the permission to divorce. Are you equating the "unbelieving departing" with "Adultery?"

RDKirk said:

That depends on whether you refuse to interpret 1 Corinthians 7:15 as not being that permission.

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Brother ..It seems that to interpret 1 Corinthians 7:15 as permission to remarry verses just divorce , would make it contrary to what Paul just said in 1 Corinthians 7:11 . How does one reconcile the two so they agree with each other and the words of Jesus ? Popular and accepted does not make something true . And difficult does not make it untrue.

NeedyFollower said:

Brother ..It seems that to interpret 1 Corinthians 7:15 as permission to remarry verses just divorce , would make it contrary to what Paul just said in 1 Corinthians 7:11 . How does one reconcile the two so they agree with each other and the words of Jesus ? Popular and accepted does not make something true . And difficult does not make it untrue.

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Remember that this is a letter addressed to Christians. Paul is not talking to pagans. Paul speaks to three groups of Christians:

Christians who are unmarried: 1 Corinthians 7:8,9

Christians married to Christians: 1 Corinthians 7:10-11

"And to the rest"--Christians married to pagans: 1 Corinthians 7-12-16.

If the instructions to all three groups could be the same, there would not have been a need to make three separate addresses.

Notice that Paul was able to explicitly quote Jesus (Matthew 19) with respect to believers married to believers. Jesus had never, however, spoken about believers married to unbelievers, so Paul could not quote Jesus for their case, but he could speak authoritatively from his own inspiration by the Holy Spirit (see 1 Corinthians 7:40).

NeedyFollower said:

Brother ..It seems that to interpret 1 Corinthians 7:15 as permission to remarry verses just divorce , would make it contrary to what Paul just said in 1 Corinthians 7:11 . How does one reconcile the two so they agree with each other and the words of Jesus ? Popular and accepted does not make something true . And difficult does not make it untrue.

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"Divorce" everywhere in scripture indicates permission to remarry. If divorce were not the option for a Christian abandoned by a pagan spouse, then Paul's instruction to the Christian spouse would have been the same as his instruction to Christians married to Christians. That would be only separation. There would have been no need for a separate instruction to Christians married to pagans if they were under the same restriction. It would have been just "to the married" and no additional "to the rest."

But Paul is giving a different instruction in the case of a Christian married to a pagan.

And, no, this does not make divorce a "righteous" act even in this circumstance. It still occurs within a cloud of sin, but Jesus knows who caused the sin and who bears the guilt.

Dave L said:

Divorce and remarriage on grounds of adultery was an OT provision for the hard hearted. And in which case the State killed the adulterer making remarriage possible. It is not an option for believers to seek divorce instead of forgiveness under the New Covenant for any reason. Separating from physical abuse is expected but not divorce.

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Actually the OT says divorce and remarriage is allowed for practically any reason in general, as long as you don't get remarried to a former spouse who was divorced again. Deuteronomy 24:1-4 (NRSV): Suppose a man enters into marriage with a woman, but she does not please him because he finds something objectionable about her, and so he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house; she then leaves his house 2 and goes off to become another man’s wife. 3 Then suppose the second man dislikes her, writes her a bill of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house (or the second man who married her dies); 4 her first husband, who sent her away, is not permitted to take her again to be his wife after she has been defiled; for that would be abhorrent to the Lord, and you shall not bring guilt on the land that the Lord your God is giving you as a possession.

Neostarwcc said:

But didn't Jesus say that adultery was the only reason in Matthew 5:32? And he says that anyone who marries a divorced person commits adultery because their marriage never ended in the eyes of God.

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Actually Jesus said "sexual immorality" in general, not adultery.

Rubiks said:

Actually the OT says divorce and remarriage is allowed for practically any reason in general, as long as you don't get remarried to a former spouse who was divorced again. Deuteronomy 24:1-4 (NRSV): Suppose a man enters into marriage with a woman, but she does not please him because he finds something objectionable about her, and so he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house; she then leaves his house 2 and goes off to become another man’s wife. 3 Then suppose the second man dislikes her, writes her a bill of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house (or the second man who married her dies); 4 her first husband, who sent her away, is not permitted to take her again to be his wife after she has been defiled; for that would be abhorrent to the Lord, and you shall not bring guilt on the land that the Lord your God is giving you as a possession.



Actually Jesus said "sexual immorality" in general, not adultery.

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It matters not since God did not provide believers with a divorce option in the New Covenant.