Janine
(12
Nov 2007)
"To Dawn Re Divorce"
Dawn,
Thank you for sharing your wonderful story of God's
protection and grace. What the church needs to rethink regarding
"the BIG D" is that while it is a hateful thing and far from God's
plan for humanity, God allowed it. With Moses, He allowed it because
human beings are fallen creatures. Jesus' admonitions regarding divorce
reflected God's perfect standard. They were not prescriptions for
saying if you have done this, then you have somehow committed an unpardonable
sin. Paul comes along and gives additional words concerning divorce
and because of persecution notes, "are you bound to a wife? seek
not to be loosed. Are you loosed from a wife? Seek not a wife.
But and if thou marry, thou has not sin; and if a virgin marry, she hath
not sinned. Nevertheless such shall have trouble in the flesh." 1
Cor 7:27-28. The loosed from part uses the same terminology as that
used in divorce. Loosed from meaning once bound to but no longer.
It may be stated, well that is loosed from for biblical
reasons. First, that isn't what it said. But second, okay.
Let's give that to you. So, remarriage is somehow a sin. Is God's
forgiveness so shallow that this is a sin that he can not and does not
forgive?
Divorce is a pet "sin" that the church likes to
pick on. It needs to repent of what it has done to divorced people
. We are ALL sinners and NOBODYS marriage is beyond danger - simply
because we are fallen people.
Remember, God Himself was a divorcee. He divorced
Israel. He will also take her back again. He commanded the children
of Israel to divorce their foreign wives. If divorce in and
of itself were a sin, would He have done that?
No, the sin is not the divorce. The sin is
in what leads up to divorce. Poor choices and evil actions/thoughts.
Yet, for all of our faultiness, we serve a God who specializes in working
with broken vessels. And, as we turn to Him with nothing to offer
but our own messed up lives; He says, "now, you can be useful."
Isn't it cool how God can use our inperfection to
His glory and our good?