Jo Fleming in her book His Affair reveals that almost every sinful emotion and action
known to man is kindled by lust that is not controlled. Her husband of 26 years went to
the apartment of a woman he worked with to return some books. This was an action he
could have avoided, but he chose not to. They had an affair, and sometime later she
discovered it, and was devastated. She writes of that day she learned of his
unfaithfulness. "Nothing will ever be the same again. Inside my head I am screaming,
screaming, screaming. Dear God let me die....give me oblivion. Please! Please! I can't
stand the pain, I can't live, I want to die, now, this minute."
The book is a diary of her journey through the hell of grief and back. It is a story of
the human heart, and its capability of all the evil's Jesus deals with in the Sermon On The
Mount, and especially this context of chapter 5. She experienced anger, hatred, thoughts
of murder and suicide, revenge, adultery and divorce. Forbidden sex is so glamorized in
our culture that people are blind to the terrible consequences, and the tremendous cost
involved. Her husband had to go through the pits of guilt as she went through the pits of
grief. Both suffered months of depression. But finally healing began to take place, and
they were able to talk about the cause of the affair. They discovered true intimacy as
they shared their self-fears and doubts, and talked to each other as never before about
their marriage.
There was much weeping, but she stopped praying for a fatal disease to remove her
from the battle. They made it without a divorce, but many do not. In fact, the number
one cause of divorce all through history has been lust. When I think of the people I have
counseled with about divorce, the common factor in all of them is lust for another
partner, and my reading confirms my experience. This is not the only cause for divorce,
but it is the primary cause. It is no accident that Jesus deals with divorce immediately
after the subject of lust. They go together like love and marriage, the destructive
duo-lust and divorce, and the constructive duo-love and marriage. Which duo becomes
the determining factor in your life largely depends on what you do with your sexual
energy.
If someone tells you there is a fire in your house, you do not know if this is good or bad
news until you know where the fire is. If its in the furnace, the stove, or the fireplace,
that is good and comforting news. If it is on the roof, the floor, or the walls, that is bad
news. Fire in the right place provides the pleasure of warmth, but in the wrong place it
destroys and brings pain. The sex drive is just like fire. Fire is not evil, but it is a power
that has potential for good or evil. It can save life or destroy life. Such also is the fire of sex.
There is so much love and warmth in the world because of sex, but there is also so
much sorrow and heartache because of it. Sex controlled by love is one of life's greatest
blessings. Sex controlled by lust is one of life's greatest burdens.
Jesus, as the Creator of sex knows this better than anyone, and that is why the love
versus lust issue is so vital to His whole teaching on divorce. The Old Testament law
allowed too much freedom to relate to women on the level of lust. The law gave men a
feeling that they were doing okay in their relationship to their wives if they treated them
legally. That is, if they divorced them, they gave them a certificate of divorce. This was a
great blessing to a divorced woman, for it gave her the freedom to go and remarry, and
not be labeled as an adulteress. Without that certificate the law demanded, she would
become an outcast, and if not stoned, she likely would be forced to become a prostitute
for survival.
This was a step up from the level where women were just sent packing when their
husbands were tired of them. Treating a wife legally was a higher level of righteousness
than giving her no rights at all. However, it was still far short from the ideal of treating
her lovingly. Jesus is calling men to a higher level of relating to their wives. It is a level
beyond the legal level to the level of love. That is what this passage on divorce is all
about, for you will observe that in these two verses Jesus condemns two men. The man
who divorces his wife for any cause other than being unfaithful, and the man who marries
this innocent woman. Here are two men not treating their women in love, but with lust
and legalism.
This is a radical reversal of the Old Testament, and from the world perspective. The
focus of all condemnation before Christ came was not on the man, but on the woman. In
every nation the unfaithful wife was treated unmercifully, and almost always killed. For
men it was a different story. Adultery did not mean the same thing for men. If he took
another wife or two, he was not being adulterous. If he went to a prostitute, he was not
being adulterous. If he went into a single girl, he was not being adulterous. The only way
a man could be guilty was to violate the property rights of another man by laying with his
wife. You could not be guilty unless you hurt another man. Violating any number of
women was no problem.
Women were property and not persons of equality. Their lives were regulated like
property. Cato the Roman wrote, "If you take your wife in adultery you may freely kill
her without a trial. But if you commit adultery, or if another commit adultery with you,
she has no right to raise a finger against you." The Jews were only slightly ahead of the
pagan Gentiles in this respect. Their wives were possessions. They may have had to
capture her in battle at the risk of their lives, or pay a large sum to acquire her. She was
his most costly possession. Any threat to this prize was a great offense to men. It was like
someone throwing rocks at your new car. The result was, the legal system developed
almost entirely along the lines of protecting a man's rights and possessions.
The Code of Hammurabi in ancient Babylon decreed that a wife accused by her
husband of being unfaithful had to take the water test. She was thrown into the river,
and if she drowned it proved she was guilty. If she survived, she was innocent. In reality
all it proved was whether she could swim or not, but the point is, only a wife had to
endure such a test. The Old Testament has a test for accused wives as well. In Num. 5 we
read of how the priest was to mix dust from the floor of the sanctuary with water, and the
accused woman was to drink it. If she was innocent nothing would happen, but if she was
guilty, her body would swell and give her away. This test was based on well known
psychosomatic facts that show that the guilty can produce the very effect that is feared.
Again, the test is only for wives. There is no such test for men. The double standard has
been a part of both sacred and secular history.
Now Jesus comes along in this great sermon, and He says the good old days are over,
for they were bad old days for women. The double standard is done, and is no longer a
level of righteousness acceptable in the kingdom of God. Women are to be treated
equally, and from now on they are to be treated lovingly. Legalism is only a support for
male lust, and that is what Jesus is attacking. A husband may feel he is being a nice guy
by giving his wife a certificate of divorce. Jesus says, that may be the legal thing to do,
but it is not the loving thing to do. He says to this husband who is putting his wife away,
that he is forcing her into adultery, if she has not already committed it. He says the man
is the cause of his wife committing adultery. This was a shocking approach. You are not
suppose to blame the man. But Jesus says that idea is obsolete, and now we go to the
source of the problem, and stop dealing only with symptoms. The real issue in adultery
and divorce is the way a man treats his wife. In our day, of course, it can also be how a
wife treats her husband.
Jesus knew that the only reason a man usually wanted to divorce his wife, if she had
not been unfaithful, was because he has lust for another woman. He wanted to get rid of
her so he could remarry another. He knew this because that is the way it was, and the
way it is, and the way it will be. Lust for another is the key cause for divorce. No Jewish
man remains single after a divorce. They soon remarried. This was all fine and dandy
for him, for he could legally put his wife away, and legally be nice enough to give her a
chance to remarry. In fact, the whole thing could already be legally arranged as he
would marry his friend's wife, and his friend would take his wife. The husbands could
feel that all is legal, and their lust was perfectly compatible with being a nice guy
according to the law.
Jesus says, yes, that is the way it use to be. You could be righteous and legal if you did
not murder, even if you were full of hatred. You could be righteous and legal if you did
not commit adultery, even if you were full of lust. You could be righteous and legal if you
did not send your wife away without a certificate of divorce, even if you were full of lust
for another, and were very unloving toward your mate, and you were putting her away
just to take another partner.
Jesus will no longer tolerate this level of righteousness in the kingdom of God. You
deal with the problem in the inner man, and prevent all of these person destroying
actions. You deal with anger and hostility, and prevent murder. You deal with lust, and
prevent adultery. You deal with your unloving perverted value system that makes a
woman a piece of property, and you prevent divorce. Divorce starts in the heart right
along with all other human follies. It starts in a heart that refuses to treat a mate as a
person equal in all that really matters. In Jesus' day the problem was to get men to see
women as equals made in the image of God. Today the female has the same responsibility
to love her husband as a person, and not just a paycheck provider, and fix it man.
In this passage Jesus is condemning the man, for this has been the main problem all
through history. Men did as they pleased, and what did not please was the woman's fault.
Jesus says this is not so. The men are the culprits. They unlovingly cast their wives aside
for another. They rush to marry another who is then cast aside. The women are just
pawns in their hands, but Jesus says these men are the ones who are guilty. Today, the
wives who cast aside their husbands to go off with another on a new fling are in the same
category. Whoever lets lust determine their relationship to their mate is the source of
the problem that destroys marriage.
Where lust is in power divorce will rise. Where lust is controlled by love divorce will
subside. There is a direct connection between lust control and divorce. Japan had no
divorce problem until they become westernized in the last several decades. The western
promotion for lust in male-female relationships has caused divorce to skyrocket in that
land. Christian divorces are on a rise everywhere because of the influence of lust.
Wherever there is a promotion of lust there is a loss of respect of the sexes. They each
treat the other as objects of gratification. Personhood is lost, and all that matters is the
pleasure of the moment. Marriage cannot build on such a foundation, for marriage
demands commitment. Marriage cannot survive on lust. It has to have love that says, for
better or for worse. Lust wants to bail out. It says, only for better, and when it is not
better it says goodbye.
Today, the need for love is equal for both sexes. In the day of Christ He is dealing
with a male dominated society. He started the process that led to females gaining
equality as persons, but that victory only raises them to a higher level of responsibility.
They are now equally responsible when it comes to lust that leads to divorce. The
important thing according to Jesus is to get to the cause. If your right hand causes you
to sin, or your right eye, deal with those causes directly, and cut off their power to
produce the negative effect. So here He says of the husband who divorces his wife: He
causes her to commit adultery. He is the cause of this evil, and he not only causes her to
be adulterous, but the man who marries her is also guilty of adultery.
We have a tendency to get all caught up in the effects, and neglect the cause. Jesus is
not condemning the woman at all. Yes, He says, if she is not already an adulteress, she
becomes one by her remarriage, but He does not say she should not remarry. In fact He
assumes that she will remarry, or go live with someone, like the woman at the well did,
for if she did not, she could hardly become guilty of adultery. If she stayed single, she
would be totally innocent, but Jesus says she is forced to commit adultery, because He
knows a woman has no choice but to remarry, for the only other way to survive is to
become a prostitute. He assumes that she will remarry, and thereby commit adultery.
The cause, however, is the focus of condemnation. The husband who forces his wife
into this is the culprit, and that is where prevention has to take place. No mate is to force
another into immoral behavior, for each is responsible for what they make the other do.
Under the law you can get by with such unloving conduct, but not in His kingdom. Legal
won't cut it any longer, for only love will.
Now the second man that Jesus condemns may not be quite as unloving as the first
husband, but he is still primarily guided by lust rather than love. This has to be seen in
the light of what the law permitted. The law allowed a man to put away his wife, and give
her a certificate of divorce. She was then a free woman, and so she was available.
Another man could take her to be his wife, and when he got tired of her he could send her
off with another certificate. She could be tossed from one to another by as many men
who would have her. The Hollywood system is not new, for the woman at the well had 5
husbands. Deut. 24 makes it clear, however, that she could not go back to her previous
husband. This prevented men from using the law for legal wife swapping. Nevertheless,
the woman was the pawn in the chess game of lust.
Jesus says this is no longer acceptable. This going from one man to another is to stop.
The man who gets in on this game of serial polygamy is also guilty of adultery. Jesus
slams two doors shut on men's freedom to abuse women, and treat them as objects of lust
rather than persons to love. It was all a matter of self-centered lust with no thought
about God's plan for marriage. One of the reasons Jesus was not harsh in condemning
the prostitutes of His day was because He knew that many were forced to this choice by
the lusts of men. They were victims of a system that treated them like property, and they
were helpless things. But it was all legal, for legalism only cared about the right paper
work, and not the person. As long as men gave their abused wives the proper papers,
that is all mattered.
Jesus says, no more is a piece of paper primary. The personhood of a woman is to be
primary. Both men are condemned, for both treat women as objects of lust. Jesus
condemns the first husband, for he has permitted lust and not love to determine his
course of action, and it destroyed his marriage. This is not acceptable in the kingdom of
God. It might be legal to let lust guide you to divorce and take another, but it is not
loving, and what is not loving is not Christian, and not acceptable to God.
Divorcees are prime targets of lust. Talk to any divorcee and you will discover they
become objects of lust to most every man who knows them. She is depersonalized as few
others ever experience. She is such a threat to other women that she is rejected, and
such a temptation to men that she is tempted to believe their attention is love. She is in a
terrible bind, and often gets on a marriage-go-round of lust that she hopes will lead to
love.
There is one bad lady we need to consider in this passage, and that is the wife who is
guilty of being unfaithful. The husband who divorces her is not being unjust, or for that
matter, even unloving, for the more he loved her, the more deeply he would be hurt, and
the more he may feel the need to escape. He is not commanded to divorce her, but he is
not condemned if he does, for he is not the cause of her becoming an adulteress, like the
other man. She has chosen on her own to be guilty, and the blame cannot fall on the
husband who puts her away. He is like a man who chooses surgery, not because he wants
it, or enjoys it, but because he has to have something cut out of him that does not work right
in order to survive.
Keep in mind, Jesus is adding something new to the regulation of marriage and
divorce. In the Old Testament there was no provision for divorce because of adultery.
Adultery was punished by stoning, which left the innocent mate free to remarry. Jesus is
making divorce the way to deal with unfaithfulness, and there is no death penalty. He
knew that much unfaithfulness is caused by the supposed innocent party. That means the
unfaithful mate is now left in the land of the living, and can carry on a new life, and
possibility get their act together, and make something of themselves. Jesus offers the
guilty a second chance. This complicates life somewhat, however, for many who try to
figure out how to deal with every conceivable situation.
What if this guilty wife remarries? Is she, or the man she marries, committing
adultery. Jesus does not say. He only deals with the innocent wife who is faithful, but
who is put away by her husband. Jesus is not giving a law that covers all possible cases.
He is dealing with the abuse of women. This woman is being forced into adultery by her
second marriage, and so is the man who marries her. But the guilty one is already guilty,
and so rightly divorced. How can her second marriage be adultery if she is divorced, and
rightly so. She is a single now, and free to remarry. What about the husband who puts
her away for her unfaithfulness? Is he free to remarry? Why not, if he is no longer
married, and so truly single again?
Many Christians get all bent out of shape over the remarriage of divorced people, as if
that is the thing Jesus is trying to prevent. That is not the problem at all. Jesus and the
Old Testament agree on this principle: Anyone who is rightly divorced is single again,
and free to remarry. What Jesus is trying to prevent is illegitimate divorce, and the
remarriage of people who have no valid divorce. He is trying to prevent divorce and
remarriages of convenience for the sake of fulfilling lust. You do this the same way you
prevent all the other evils Jesus is dealing with in this context. You get back into the
heart, and deal with the causes of conduct. Deal with anger to prevent murder. Deal
with lust to prevent adultery. Deal with disrespect of your mate as a person to prevent
divorce.
Prevention of all this unloving behavior is the purpose of Jesus. But if you read a lot
of Christian literature on the issue of divorce and remarriage, you would think the
purpose of Jesus was to prevent people from ever being happy again if they make a
mistake. If you applied all the rest of what Jesus says like you do their view on divorce,
no one who has ever been angry with his brother, or lusted after a woman, should have
any right to ever be happy again. Christian legalism is often more unloving than the
legalism of the Pharisees. Jesus has been anti-legalism all along, but now many feel He
has shifted gears, and chooses to come down hard and strong on the divorced who seek to
remarry. This Christian legalism becomes a contradiction to the whole spirit of Christ.
For example, some Christians feel that even the man who puts His unfaithful wife
away is not permitted to remarry. Jesus says nothing about it, but they make it a law.
The guilty wife is free to become a swinging single, or remarry, or do as she pleases. He,
however, is never to remarry. If he does, he is either excommunicated, or made a second
class citizen of the kingdom. He is condemned to suffer the rest of his life for the lust of
his mate. He must struggle with his own lust now for the rest of his life with no legitimate
outlet. This kind of hard nosed legalism is so contrary to the spirit of Christ, and of Paul,
and is so anti-loving in its dealing with people that I fear for Christians on the day of
judgment who impose such laws on some of God's children.
If you are going to make a mistake, err on the side of being too loving and forgiving,
and not on the side of being too legalistic. Jesus did not condemn the woman taken in
adultery. He said to her, "Go and sin no more." We know that many people ignored
Jesus, and did not obey Him, and she could have gone on in her sin, but He chose to give
her the benefit of the doubt, and go the way of love rather than legalism. This has to be
our attitude toward the divorced. Many, including Christians, are divorced for reasons
that may or may not be legitimate. They have not prevented this tragic result of loss of
love. It is tragic, but it is part of reality we have to live with. God Himself could not
prevent His bride Israel from going after other gods, and damaging their exclusive
relationship. God finally divorced Israel, and took a new bride, which was the church.
The point is, not even God can prevent all the tragedies of man's fallen nature. Men
cannot do it either, and so they end up in situations which are bad.
We can only assume from the context where Jesus goes on to say, deal with your
enemies even in the spirit of love, and not a spirit of revenge, that this certainly applies to
brothers and sisters in the family of God who blow it. If you are to go out of your way to
be like God, who causes the sun to rise on the evil as well as the good, how much more is
this the case with those who are good, but who allow evil to gain a victory in some area of
their life? Jesus treated the woman at the well who was divorced five times with a spirit
of love. You will look in vain in the Sermon On The Mount for any basis for a
hard-nosed, legalistic spirit of rejection of the divorced person.
Those who treat the divorced harshly reveal hypocrisy when they do not treat
themselves equally harshly by gouging out their eyes and cutting off their hand for their
own lust. They choose to be harsh on sins they do not commit, and go easy on those they
often commit. Where Jesus does advise severe action, they ignore it. Here, where Jesus
has no action recommended, they want to write a book on all that should be done to show
how strongly they stand for righteousness. They have all kinds of laws and regulations
for the divorced and remarried. It is such a conspicuous evasion of their own guilt to
judge others. It is like the picture of the man with a log in his eye trying to help another
with a speck in his eye.
If you are going to be a stubborn legalist demanding justice be done, and not mercy,
you will be dragged into court on the basis of your own lust, and you will be treated on
the same legalistic basis, and you will made to pay the last penny for your hardness of
heart. Many Christians get hard hearted because they develop the elder brother
syndrome. Why should that louse of a little brother get to go off and indulge in wine,
women, and song, and still be able to come home and be treated with love? It is just not
fair to me. So many who have never known the heart ache of divorce say, why should
they be able to break God's ideal, and indulge in more than one sex partner, and still be
accepted on the level of equality with myself, who has been faithful all along? It is just
not fair. This leads to Christian legalism that prevents grace from having its way.
God is always into prevention so that at some point you block Satan's victory. If
Christians do not prevent lust, at least they are to prevent actions that lead to adultery.
If they do not prevent adultery, at least they are to prevent its dissolving of marriage in
divorce. If they do not prevent divorce, at least they are to prevent the divorce from
being treated as an unforgivable sin that makes them feel rejected. This final prevention
can still redeem the total life, and make it possible for love to win. Unless love steps in to
stop the erosion at some point, lust will be ultimate victor. The cause of divorce is always
some sinful behavior, and the cure is always to deal with the sinners with a spirit of love.
