Alright Folks! This is an area of Christianity that has done tremendous damage to many people. Christians, pastors, and counselors have compromised so badly in this area that we now have a tragic situation on our hands. For almost two thousand years it was understood in Christianity that remarriage after divorce was not acceptable. The one passage in Matthew 19:9 has become the most quoted for everyone’s justification for their second marriage.
This article is not going to address this issue in depth. My purpose here is to state clearly that I do not believe there is any scriptural way to get remarried to another person after you become divorced. If you do marry someone else, you become an adulterer or an adulterous, and as long as you are “married” to this other person you are living in adultery. The adultery does not stop after the first time in your new marriage. You also have no way to stop this sin of adultery apart from separating from that second adulterous marriage.
I fully realize that this view is not held by many people, although it seems more and more that some Christian leaders are now beginning to see this is the scriptural standard. When I first began to seriously study this issue back in the 1980’s, I could only find three public ministers that took a stand against remarriage, but again gratefully there are others that are now agreeing with this view.
What about all those people who find themselves in a remarriage? Well, in one sense it is no different than any other sin that people find themselves in. The solution is the same. Repent from the sin, stop sinning, and move forward in your life. Obviously much easier to write here than to do. But nevertheless, it does not change the solution.
Those who disagree with this solution are going to talk about how it is going to affect so many people if we dissolve a remarriage; and how can any scriptural decision be right if it has such a significant impact on people’s lives. Actually this is my point in this article. Do you realize how huge of a negative impact your divorce and remarriage has had on so many people. Let’s just list a few of the devastating consequences that come from this wrong series of decision. When someone divorces and remarries another it:
- Damages the picture of the gospel with Christ and His Bride, the Church
- Breaks down family generational relationships
- Costs large amounts of money in the process
- Sends a message to unbelievers that Christianity does not work
- Sets a bad example to others in the Church
- Forces the Church to lower the standards to allow for adulterers to be members
- Weakens other Christians’ marriages
- Causes believers to go to court before unbelievers to settle matters that should be dealt with in the Church
- Allows the State to take jurisdiction over the minor children
- Causes those doing it to justify their choices to others
- Damages the children’s lives in indescribable ways
- Causes people to take sides which builds walls between people
- Causes people to lower other Scriptural standards because they begin to fail in other areas also
- Starts a cycle that often leads to second divorces and new “marriages”
- Gives Satan ground in many people’s lives to further cause damage and death
We could go on and on and on. The tragic consequences are unending. They will last for generations, but we want to end these thoughts on a positive note. Hopefully there are those reading this who have chosen to side with Scripture, Christian history, and the Lord Jesus Christ who said, “Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.”
But these words of Christ to conclude the subject in Matthew 19 probably better explain the situation in our day, which is similar to the situation in His day. “But he said unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given.” I want to encourage those who have taken the scriptural view – stand fast, stand firm, walk humbly. God will bless you for it. For those who want to justify your divorce and remarriage, we can only say – Let God be your judge.
