Yes, Terry, I have seen this situation more than a few times.
There are many in the so-called "Church of Christ" who counsel these couples
to divorce and get back with their original spouses. Sad, terrible counsel.
Such instruction is contrary to the teachings of Torah. They arrive at the
viewpoint because they ignore Torah and yet take a legal viewpoint of the
New Testament's teachings about what marriage is.
The hardness of people's hearts makes the area of marriage, divorce,
remarriage, etc. very complicated. There are many issues that can be
involved, and hence when Paul teaches on this, he sometimes cautions that he
speaks by permission rather than commandment. The one area where he speaks
by commandment is to the married, that they should not divorce.
In the past when I pastored and was in the position to give counsel in these
situations, I would call the couple's attention to 1 Cor. 7, coupling the
teaching of Torah about marriage and divorce, and the New Testament's more
stringent and higher standard of marriage that can only be realized with
grace for past mistakes. For example, the concept of the past being sin and
forgiven is an important one, with the idea of starting anew sometimes being
appropriate. There are some situations, however, where a continued
"marriage" relationship is bad and should be abandoned. There are no
universal, clear answers for these situations, but there is wisdom in God
for each and every situation taken on a case by case basis.
Peace be with you.
David Miller.
Terry wrote:
I have run into the following situation at least twice. Some of you
probably have too. Here it is.
Sally was cheer leader in high school. If you were to choose a mate
strictly on physical appearance, she would be right up there among the top
five. Billy was the typical small town football hero. Billy went for
Sally because of her looks. Sally went for Billy because he was somebody,
a big duck in a little puddle. They married right out of high school.
Billy was a big guy in a small town, but when the college coaches went
shopping for recruits, they did not stop in Billy's town. No scholarship,
not even an offer. Billy ended up driving the town garbage truck. The
marriage lasted a little over a year. Sally felt cheated. She deserved
better, so she filed for a no fault divorce.
The following spring she met Joe A. Verage. Joe was the son of the owner
of the local super market. Joe, in fact, was manager of the market,
making a good salary, and sure to inherit the business when the old man
passed on. In time, Joe and Sally were married, and in more time they had
a couple of kids. About the time the first kid turned nine, they went to
a Billy Graham crusade and were saved. They started attending church,
then started attending Sunday school and everything went well for a couple
of more years, then they started reading the Bible. Eventually they
discovered that they seemed to be living living in an adulterous
relationship.
This bothered them a lot, and so they asked the pastor to tell them what
to do about this.
You are the pastor. What do you tell them?
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"Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you
ought to answer every man." (Colossians 4:6) http://www.InnGlory.org
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