Marriage, Divorce, and More Marriage

Blog On Hold

2010-12-16T19:02:00.002-05:00

My life is so full of living right now, I have no time to do justice to this topic as I set out to do. So for anyone who may happen to find this spot, live long and prosper and come back in early summer 2011 where I hope to have restarted.

Until then, here is my statement of belief for marriage, and I really don't care if you disagree, you are just wrong.

A Scriptural marriage is the exclusive lifelong and intimate union of one man and one woman that results from the witnessed mutual covenant between them to live as husband and wife according to Scriptural principles.

A Scriptural marriage is dissolved by the death of either spouse and by Scriptural divorce on the grounds of unrepentant immorality of one of the spouses. The divorce can be originated by either the offending spouse or the victim spouse.

A Scriptural divorce is NOT sin. Once divorced, it is the immoral spouse, the one that caused the strife in the marriage that led to the divorce, that is held accountable for adultery, NOT the victim spouse.

Any repentant sinner on the other side of divorce is permitted to marry again according to Scriptural principles. There is absolutely NO prohibition in Scripture against "second marriages" except to remarry one's original spouse after they had been with another (i.e. you can't go back to the first one once either of you have been married to another). And still, that argument is based on OT Hebrew Law.

I was married once. My wife left me and we divorced. I am married again. I married a woman who was divorced also. Neither of us were the "offending spouse" and neither of us can completely blame the other spouse for all the problems. It takes to make it or to break it. My wife and I were brought together as a direct intervention in our lives by God and we have ample proof of that. We have been blessed and our family has grown to "hers, mine, and ours".

I am in a second marriage. And God is completely fine with that.

No comments allowed, good or bad. Sorry, that's just the way it is.

Preamble To The Marriage Blog

2007-04-23T22:05:00.000-04:00

Never did I imagine that when I laid out what seemed to be a logical and simple outline of what I wanted to accomplish in this blog would I encounter so much analysis paralysis. When I went to the OT and NT Scriptures, using an inter-linear Bible so I could see the original Hebrew and Greek, I found myself digging deeper and deeper into the nooks and crannies of Scripture. I was seeking a concise definition of marriage and specific Scriptural instruction regarding marriage. The passages I found were mostly examples. There was no concise definition of marriage and how it was to be undertaken.

Yes there were some specific instructions to be found. And there were quite a few instructions on how to live as a godly husband and a godly wife. But what I did not find was an example marriage that could be used as a "type" for understanding Scriptural marriage from a perspective of how one enters it and the marriage becomes "realized". But what I did find was that there are three examples of marriage that provide the bulk of the understanding of the "realization" of marriage: the first marriage of Adam and Eve, God's marriage to His people Israel, and Christ's marriage to the church.

Though we tend to think chronologically and would order Adam's marriage prior to God's marriage to His people (through Abraham) and Christ's marriage to the church, when you think about it, that is incorrect. Firstly, the human marriage is modeled after the divine marriages and not the other way around. We know this because God did not change His plans through time and decide at a later time to marry His people, nor did He set about the marriage of Christ to the church as an after thought. All these things were determined long before the foundation of the world. Which leads to the second point: the first human marriage actually actually took place in time after God designed the divine marriage.

In those three models of marriage we see in each a different emphasis for our study. In the marriage of Christ to the church, we see marriage from the perspective of a betrothal, for we the church are betrothed to Christ and have not fully realized that marriage. It will come in the fullness of time. In God's marriage to His people Israel, we see marriage from the perspective of a realized marriage. God did dwell among His people and they enjoyed the benefits of His presence. And finally in the human marriage of Adam and Eve, we see those two divine models scaled down to one man and one woman and it shows us how we are to think about marriage in terms of human relationships.

What is also significant is that in all three models we see some things in common and some things that are uniquely different. And it is in those similarities and differences that many people get caught up. They either try to over-extend the divine model of marriage onto the human model of marriage, or they sell the divine model of marriage short as their grasp of it is limited by their understanding of the human model.

It is my desire that through this blog and the posts I write in it, that I will be able to explore the Scriptural construction of marriage and its various facets in greater detail. I come to the Scriptures to learn from them, not build a case for a position. So any conclusions posted will be in reality "conclusions" and not presuppositions around which a defense case has to be built. And that is as it should be with all Scripture: bend your mind and your will to the Scriptures, do not try bending them to your will and the fancies of your human mind.

More Thoughts on Divorce and Remarriage

2006-03-08T11:43:00.000-05:00

Recently I was debating with someone in a forum about divorce and remarriage. They said some things I did not agree with and I thought they personally attacked another poster. However, it was my rebuttal that was moderated and deleted. But cache is a wonderful thing. It preserved my post enough for me to repost it here. I post my rebuttal here, with the original poster's names replaced with something Bob and Alice.

Bob, let me explain something. My ex-wife stood in front of our pastor and church elder and asserted that she had prayed about leaving me for years and that she KNEW it was God's will for her life to leave and divorce me EVEN WITH NO LEGITIMATE JUSTIFICATION. We all questioned her about that. Yet this was where I saw the hardest heart I have ever encountered.

It is terribly wrong of you to assert some of the things you did to Alice in my opinion. Apparently you disagree with her so therefore you conclude she does not know how to pray. You disagree with her so therefore you conclude you know God's will for her life. You don't agree with her so therefore you tell her that how you would do it.

Let me explain something, when it comes to knowing when it's over, only God can tell the people involved, not you or anyone else. When you say "you have to do what you can to fix it" you make a presumption that it can be fixed.

You said "no matter how many I love yous she won't believe" you. The thing is, you are not claudient and you cannot read her mind. Or her heart. I know in my case, before the divorce was final, my ex-wife was unrepentant and unreconciling. She had no positive thoughts about me. In fact when I and the church assured her that I would make things better and they would enforce that, she said "I do not want it to get better".

So then I was left in this perplexing situation. She said she and her entire family were praying for a solution and they knew divorce was it, unknown to me however. I, my family, and our church were praying we stay together.

This is a classic example of contradicting prayers.

Now I do not think the result had anything to do with her family's prayers and her prayers were "more correct" or "stronger" than ours. I also do not think that God was so casual in this entire thing. What I did see amazed me.

You see I have thought about contradicting prayers before. When two football teams were playing, each would have a prayer before hand at times and would pray for safety and success. But only one could win. So how does God choose?

God does not pick and choose to answer prayers and does not merely look at contradictory prayers and try to deal with them as they come. Instead God works in each of us all the time. His work is so complete in us we have no idea it happens and cannot often see the result until after the fact. It was not God reacting to our contradicting prayers. It was God working through our lives that caused us to pray the prayers we did pray.

My prayer daily was for restoration of the marriage. Hers was that I would just bow out and allow her the divorce and walk away, leaving behind 45% of my income for her to continue to spend.

Here was her problem. She was praying for herself, I was praying for the marriage. Yet in the end, she still left, she still filed for divorce, and we are divorced. So yeah, I can see where it looks like God answers a prayer and not another's and it is confusing. Until we realize we are not God, can never be, and must not try to contain God in human reasoning.

What I realized then, and I know for an absolute fact of the universe now as given to me through the Holy Spirit in my grief and subsequent healing, is that God allowed this terrible thing to happen, not to reward her and not to punish me, but to accomplish His will.

This disciplining process was very thorough and worked not only on me but my kids as well. We have come to the other side of this whole thing as stronger believers and have shed many of the improper parts of our life that had clouded our daily living.

Something I thought of daily at the time was Hebrews 12:11

No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.

And when I could look at the situation and see beyond my own hurt and realize that God was not punishing me and was not just allowing me to be destroyed, but everything that happened was somehow "sequenced" and I could see Him at work, I began to look with eyes that I did not have previously.

So Bob, I started from your position, that I could never divorce and that remarriage was not allowed. But through it all, God showed me those errors and many, many others I had, including the error of putting my wife before Him. I was being refined. And through that refiner's fire I came to see passages of the Bible that I never saw before. Not because I had not read them, but because I could not see until then. I know there are still some scales on my eyes, and that is why I seek God daily and read and absorb the Scriptures not from a standpoint of my own foolishness, but of God's purpose, love, justice, and mercy.

Sorry for the long post, but I felt that it was needed to be said. Not all things can be fixed. Some things God destroys. But God does not leave holes in the lives of His followers. God replaces what is destroyed so that He may fill it with something better that suits His purposes. In my case, it was that God excised out of my life great hunks of sin and troubles. Certainly I still have troubles and some new ones. But the sin and troubles that prevented me from walking closer to Him were surgically removed. I say surgically because He left me with so much and I am thinking of mainly my kids here. They remained with me.

So then, on the other side of that experience, I can look back and say "it was terrible, I never want to go through that again, I will do anything and everything to avoid divorce in the future, but yet I know that God is in control". That is when God met me at the place He brought me, I was not looking for anyone at that time, I had given up and decided to allow God to do His will in my life, that He led me to the woman that I am now married to.

So no, it was never my "flesh" talking that said "divorce your wife! get married again! chuck her aside!" Instead it was God saying "just follow Me". And I did. And I can say "thank you God for the entire thing, for the hurt and the healing". Think of Hebrews 12:7

It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline?

Marriage After Divorce

2005-12-30T09:04:00.000-05:00

You know a lot of opinion and verbiage has been cast about about remarriage being sinful. Well boys and girls let us look to the real sin and the real problem.

Here is the real problem: people sin.

Now that is not mind boggling or all that enlightening. Each of us knows this simple truth. But what needs to be emphasized more than anything else is that people continue to sin every day in many ways. And what is really evident from this thread and from the "thou canst remarry" crowd is this: they commit a grievous sin of false teaching.

Yes, when you lay out the claim that Jesus does not allow second marriage in the case if Biblical divorce, you are spreading a lie about Christ. Christ never said it, never meant it, and in fact acknowledged and laid out the case of Biblical divorce. So before you go about telling someone else they cannot remarry simply because they are divorced, you should stop, drop, and pray. Remove that giant redwood log from your eye and think to yourself "maybe I don't know the situation" and even better think "what is the loving thing to do in Christ's name".

You see, people are not robots, they are not drones, and they are not minions of God. We are children of God. We ARE seated in the heavenly places right now. This is not some future event (check it out for yourself). We are children of God and we are loved by our heavenly Father. And as such, He blesses us with many spiritual blessings and many physical blessings.

So then to tell someone that their second marriage is a sin, even though it was put together by God, ordained by God, presided over by God and His representatives on Earth, and affirmed in more ways than your tiny brain can even conceive that our loving Father chooses to bless us, is even more sinful. In fact, it is blasphemy.

I am so tired of the same identical debate which has been put forth time and time again and which we as a collective group have debunked many times over. So then here it is again. There are scripturally valid reasons for divorce, and in so doing, their are scripturally valid later marriages. I would even say that a truly repentant sinner is free to marry again as well.

The legalism that preaches a false doctrine that repentant sinners cannot marry again is a lie and sinful. And in fact, downright damaging to families. Especially when it is preached to people with perfectly normal healthy families and it causes them to fall into sin and divorce to satisfy the Pharisee's legalism.

If you want to be pro-family and pro-God, then you will support the families that have struggled out of horrible divorces and found peace in Christ in a new family under a second (or even later marriage). Anything less than that and you are simply working in the service of the minions of those in this world that seek to dishonor God.

I am neuronstatic. I was divorced on scriptural grounds. I am married again in the presence and power of God. I was married by a minister who himself was divorced previously and is married now. I am at peace and I am focused on God to build a new combined family from the remnants of 2 seriously hurting families.
In other words, I am doing the will of God. How about you?

Divorce and Second Marriage

2005-12-02T15:20:00.000-05:00

Many people seem to be confused by divorce. Some call it an impossibility with God. Others call it a necessary evil. And others call it relief. But when you get to debating the finer points from scripture, it is very easy to get caught up in misconceptions and modern contextual thinking. One of these misconceptions is, believe it or not, the precise meaning of divorce and does it really mean that that marriage is dissolved. The following attempts to explain that it does.

Divorce means dissolving the marriage covenant. You can call it one flesh union, you can call it marriage, you can call it a marriage covenant. But it is a vow made by two people to each other. Vows are broken. And when the marriage vows are broken, specifically in terms of sexual immorality in this discussion, the covenant is at risk. If both spouses reconcile, then the covenant is restored.

However, as it often happens, and increasingly so it may seem, at least one of the spouses refuses to repent of the immorality that broke the vows and shook the covenant. Once they have their hearts hardened to that point, and they do not repent, the other spouse is to give them some time to repent of their sin and reconcile. If after some time, and that amount is dependent on the situation and the individuals involved, that erring spouse does not repent and reconcile, then yes, Jesus said you can divorce them and thus dissolve your marriage covenant with that person. And once the covenant is dissolved, the spouses are no longer in a one flesh union.

Jesus lived in this definition of divorce. When the Pharisees attempted to broaden the grounds for divorce, Jesus narrowed them. But Jesus did not abolish divorce. In the OT, God said that He made an eternal covenant with His people. That covenant was one way, from God to man. Human marriage is like that heavenly covenant in that we bind in exclusivity. However, unlike the eternal God, we are incapable of making vows that we will not break. Our marriage is a pale imitation of the marriage of God to His people just as it is a pale imitation of the marriage of Christ to His church.

God established divorce in the OT because He divorced His people. He removed from them the benefits of the union He had with them. Completely removed those benefits and left Israel on its own to whore after other gods. When that happened, there was no union with God. Then God raised up prophets at those times to deliver His words to His people, to bring them back. But until that time, they were divorced, they had no union with God. Once the people returned to God, He restored a union with them.

Now then, Jesus would never be diametrically opposed to God the Father. God instituted this concept of divorce in the way he disciplined His people. We also know that in Christ, "nothing can snatch those the Father gives Him from His hand." Again, like the Father who made an eternal covenant with His people, Christ continues that same eternal covenant with His people. And those that He saves, He keeps. He keeps them safe like a shepherd. He does not abandon them.

But just like sheep, people abandon Christ, and they abandon God. That is how we know when someone is not one of His. Their walk falters and we realize they were a goat all along.

Now I have just spoken of the divine marriage of the triune God to his people. Now let us look again at human marriage.

Human marriage is a pale imitation of the divine marriage. There is a covenant between two sinners. Neither of the spouses are capable of sitting in the place of God and keeping the covenant eternally. Because of this we can only say human marriage is like the divine marriage. The covenant is not made by divine and eternal beings. It is made by beings that sin and fail.

It was because of this very thing that God allowed Moses to institute divorce. God demonstrates divorce means dissolution of the union, and in the case of Moses, it was written into Law that it meant the dissolution of the marriage. So that when any Jew from the time of Moses on ever used the word divorce, they knew it meant the dissolution of the marriage covenant and the complete breaking of the one flesh union.

God allowed this because of the hardness of human hearts and our inability to not sin at times. God allowed this not by concession to sin. God is capable of overcoming any barriers to His plan. He allowed divorce not from frustration, but from compassion. This is what I have been trying to get across to everyone all along on this thread. God is compassionate. It is not compassionate to leave someone in a situation where they are dishonored daily by an adulterous spouse or worse, being abused. God requires the sinner to repent. but they don't always. The pride in their sinful hearts makes them hard as stone and they do not repent.

When that happens, in compassion, God allows the divorce to occur. This serves two purposes. The first purpose is for compassion and mercy to the innocent spouse. The second purpose is to disconnect the adulterous spouse from the union. This is exactly the same concept as removing the unrepentant sinner from amongst the congregation when they do not repent (as Paul instructed). So then by being apart from the union it is the intent that this serve as a means of rebuking the sinner and bringing them to repentance.

Now in the case of marriage, God in the OT established a few more regulations through Moses to control divorce. Like all good things from God, even compassion can be abused. You can "love" your kids so much you spoil them and that is wrong. And likewise, a tool for compassion and restoration of sinners, namely divorce, was abused as well. The OT Laws sought to contain that abuse. And that is what Jesus did in the NT. He sought to contain that abuse.

God also directed through Moses to write into the Law provisions for remarriage. It was implict from the nature of divorce that the divorced spouses were free from the covenant, free from the bondage of marriage, and therefore free to marry again. However, to prevent further abuse, there were limitations put in place so that you could not return to a spouse once they were defiled.

God created marriage for permanence. He created love to be ever present. Just as we do not love as we should, we do not keep marriage as we should. There is an important lesson here in that we can never meet the mark. What this literally means is we cannot do all God calls us to. If we were able to love perfectly, worship perfectly, keep marriage perfectly, and do all the other commands of God perfectly, then there would have been no need of Christ. However, Christ was with God at the foundation of creation. He has been in the plan all along because we cannot earn our way to God through our works. We must rely on grace. There is no other way.

Because of this, God does not require us to keep a perpetual marriage covenant when it is impossible to keep because of the hard heart of one of the spouses. When one spouse leaves, and there is divorce, there is no more covenant. To require an innocent spouse to continue in a broken covenant completely defies the compassion God instituted when He created divorce.

Now then, where does that leave Jesus teaching in the NT on divorce and second marriages? If you still hold that Jesus was in opposition to the Father in His design of marriage and divorce then you are wrong.

What Jesus did do was clarify the misunderstandings of the Pharisees, and by way of God's plan for the scriptures, we believers as well. Jesus clarified many things the Jews had wrong. They had a wrong view of murder, adultery, lust, marriage, and divorce. Jesus clarified all these things. But neither did Jesus deny divorce nor did he deny marriage after proper divorce. And Jesus did not deny the cleansing of a repentant sinner by the forgiveness from the Father.

So again I say, marriage after divorce is not only allowable, whether the person was the innocent spouse or the repentant sinner, as long as they build their marriage on God, then God will honor that marriage. And I further say that to tell anyone that they cannot marry after divorce when they were the innocent spouse or they are repentant, is diametrically opposed to God. And that puts the position that divorce does not allow for subsequent marriage directly in that light.

Denial of marriage to those that are free to do so is no different than what the Judaizers were doing in the time of Paul that attempted to prohibit marriage, eating of all foods, and all other freedoms in Christ. Furthermore, to insist that a person in an honorable marriage to God must divorce and return to their original spouse or forever remain single is completely wrong and does considerably much more damage than the original divorce did.

So then as it comes all the way full circle, when a spouse is sexually immoral in their marriage, and a divorce occurs, their marriage covenant is dissolved and the innocent spouse is immediately free to marry again. The immoral person must repent of their sins completely and then they likewise, as forgiven sinners cleansed by God, are free to marry again.

Does Divorce Dissolve The One-Flesh Union?

2005-10-04T16:40:00.000-04:00

The question was raised in a forum debate regarding whether or not it was allowable for a divorced person to marry again. The following are excerpts from my posts on the subject.

Post:
Someone please resolve 1 Corinthians 7:15 in light of what has been said:

1 Corinthians 7:15

Yet if the unbelieving one leaves, let him leave; the brother or the sister is not under bondage in such cases, but God has called us to peace.

Marriage orchestrated by God, whether a remarriage or original marriage, when God is the uniter, and both are in complete obedience to God, and they keep Christ at the center of their marriage, brings glory to God.

According to R.C. Sproul in his book Now, That's a Good Question!, from pages 401 and 402 in answer to the question "There seems to be a difference of opinion as to whether a divorced Christian can remarry. When, and under what conditions is this permissible?"

Incidentally, I share this opinion with Dr. Sproul.

quote:

It is difficult to sort out Jesus' teaching on this, partly because, when he addressed the problem, it was in the context of settling a dispute between different rabbinical schools of the day. The religious scholars came to Jesus and asked about the lawfulness of divorcing - a man divorcing his wife for this cause or that cause. Jesus in responding to that, reminded the Pharisees that Moses did give a provision for divorce in the Old Testament, but that at the same time the original design for marriage did not include the concept of divorce. He acknowledged Moses' provision, but he's not rebuking Moses for doing that. So God, in the old covenant, did clearly give provision for divorce.

However, because Jesus speaks to that and reminds them that the original purpose was no divorce, some have concluded that what Jesus was doing was removing the Old Testament provision for divorce and saying that there's no justification for divorce whatsoever.

Now how you view divorce will have tremendous bearing on how you view the question of remarriage. If you take the position that divorce is never legitimate, then you would have to say that the remarriage of a divorced person is never legitimate either. So before you can talk about the legitimacy of remarriage, you first have to settle whether or not there are any legitimate grounds for divorce.

I take the position that there are in fact legitimate grounds for divorce: Sexual infidelity is one, and the other one is separation of the unbeliever. Paul says that if an unbelieving spouse wants out and departs, the believer is then free. Now he doesn't define what free is. Does that mean free just to let him go and then live a life of celibacy and singleness? Some people take that view. I think that Paul means free from the marriage contract, from the oaths and obligations; that person is now considered single and, I would say, free to remarry.

So I take the position that an innocent party in divorce is free to remarry. Now, when we say innocent or guilty, we recognize that everybody contributes to the breakdown of a marriage. By "guilty party" I mean the one who committed the sin serious enough to dissolve the marriage. But I would also say that even the guilty party can get remarried if there is authentic repentance.

end quote:

Post:

quote: ORIGINAL:

I take the position of no divorce (initiated by the believer) and no remarriage until the death of one of the spouses(Rom. 7:2-3, I Cor. 7:39). That is the only position I can take based upon the scriptures as I have studied them.

I disagree. And I cannot take your position, but I am convicted of my position based upon the scriptures as I have studied them, and using nearly 2000 years of church history and the works of many great theologians as well.

Post:

quote: ORIGINAL:

Have you read the writings of the Early Church Fathers? The very earliest writings(pre Roman Catholic) will show that the church overwhelmingly believed in the permanency of marriage until death-----even in the face of unrepentant adultery. The "church" really started changing it's stance after the reformation(though divorce/remarriage was still a RARE thing until the early 1900's). After that, (1950's and on) we see HUGE changes in the church's practices which affected their written doctrines. Many denoms started revising their doctrines, I believe based upon societal attitudes and practices. Many used to believe remarriage=continual adultery, if one had a living spouse, but now have changed their stance to the adultery only being a "one time" sin. If you do a thorough study of Church History, you will see just how far we have come..............not only away from historical Christian practice, but of the Word of God itself. Blessings in Jesus

It was the general thought in the early church that, as you have suggested, divorce between believers was unconscionable and was not to be tolerated. From Augustine to Zwingli this was the unified belief and I assert rightly so. I have no dispute as to that. And therefore, divorce, with the implicit right of remarriage, was not an option for Christian couples (though Origen admits some toleration existed), but permanent separation was.

So for the Christian couple to divorce and then one to remarry, the remarriage was viewed as adultery. Again I have no dispute.

However, the dispute arises amongst the church fathers in regards to "mixed" marriages, where one spouse either a) was not a believer from the beginning, b) converted to being a believer in an unbelieving marriage, or c) demonstrated by their abandonment and/or way of life that they refused to live as a believer in believing marriage.

In such cases of mixed marriage, the prevailing view was that one could invoke the Pauline privilege of permissible separation (1 Cor. 7) as legitimate grounds for allowing a believer to be freed from the covenant of marriage to the "unbelieving" spouse.

Following the beginnings of the reformation, this long standing view was incorporated into the Westminster Confession of Faith (chap 22) written in 1646.

So again I disagree. There is Scripture, history from the church fathers, writings of the reformation, and my own intense study of this to assert that in the case where there is a "mixed" marriage of believers, it is permissible to dissolve the union, and the "innocent" party may remarry.

There is an implication that the innocent party is the believing spouse and the guilty part is the unbelieving spouse. I assert that this must stand true for this to apply. And when it does stand true, and therefore applies, the abandonment of the believing spouse by the "unbelieving" spouse, and the subsequent divorce, permits the remaining believing spouse to remarry.

As an aside, the only unforgivable sin is that of rejecting Christ unto death. In all other offenses there is the possibility of repentance of the sinner to restoration of Fellowship with God. Granted there are consequences. But it is clear from scripture that God is a God of mercy.

However your assertion is that the sin of breaking the marriage covenant cannot be appeased, even through sincere repentance, on the part of the erring spouse who caused the divorce. And therefore adultery itself cannot be repented adequately from. I cannot agree with these assertions.

Post:
Covenants did not always require loss of life. Covenants are contracts, simply put.

If I sold a horse to someone and I said it was 4 years old, but it was really 12 years old, I would have some consequences for breaking the contract, but they would not have stoned me for it.

In the OT there were some covenant violations that resulted in stoning. Some did not.

When you have a covenant between two individuals, whether it is over a cow or a horse, or even in marriage, if one willingly breaks that covenant and forfeits their position and terms of the contract, with no repentance or reconciliation, why do you conclude that the one party is still bound? That is not consistent with ancient near-east covenant thinking.

When I study scripture, I see only a little about remarriage. And you are correct in the position that it is typically in the negative, thus disallowing remarriage. The exceptions are 1 Cor 7:39 which specifically addresses the death of a spouse, and earlier in 1 Cor 7:15 where it says that if the unbeliever leaves, the remaining spouse is not bound in such circumstances.

A question comes to mind about the idea that the right to remarry comes from the heart of men alone. Are you suggesting that God would never or could never direct someone to marry a divorced person?

Post:

quote: ORIGINAL: <name removed> This is what I have a problem with from a scriptural standpoint. The reformers acknowledge a Pauline privilege of "separation", but they do not show that Paul gave permission for the dissolvment of the marriage. They (the early church)practiced "separation"----but the separation was not view as "dissolution"---a position which is consistant with Paul's teachings as well as Jesus' on divorce/remarriage. In the early church, some couples did not have the desire to reconcile or a marriage partner was in unrepentant adultery (see the Pastor of Hermas' writings). Could this not be construed by some of the reformers as the "fruit" of an unbeliever? The statement you give above seems to believe it ok to judge in such a manner. Who are any of us to give another believer the AOK to go ahead and possibly join themselves in what the Lord may look upon as adultery? I don't see any biblical support for this type of administering judgment. We are called to "separate" ourselves from those in unrepentant sin, but does the Lord give man the ability/power to dissolve what HE put together? Can we 100% with assurance rightly divide at all times the salvation of another? Personally, I don't believe so.

Ok, let me pull all this apart and deal with it. You have several things intermixed here.

Privilege of separation. Paul said in 1 Cor 7:15 the remaining spouse is not "bound" in such circumstances. I assert that the binding is the marriage binding as that is the subject in context of 1 Cor 7. That means dissolution.

Fruit of the unbeliever. When the unrepentant sinner, though having previously fully demonstrated they were a believer, refuses to discontinue their sin, refuse rebuke, and leaves, then yes, this is the fruit that likens them to an unbeliever.

Judging such a person. See 1 Cor 5:1-13, yes we are to judge such a person.

Dissolve what God put together. Defer to end of post.

Discerning another's salvation. No we can't but that is not the point. Even in 1 Cor 5, the man in question was not "judged" as God judges. So it was not salvation judgement. It was lifestyle judgement and the removal of the man from their fellowship and consequently, it was an example to the man that he was no longer in fellowship with God.

quote: ORIGINAL: <name removed>

I think it boils down to this: WHAT dissolves a lawful marriage needs to be discerned ONLY from what the Word of God declares........and the only thing I can see that dissolves a lawful marriage in the sight of God (believer/believer, unbeliever/unbeliever, believer/unbeliever) is death. Not adultery, not remarriage, not abandonment, etc. If you say it is the abandonment which dissolves a marriage, how about a believer who WANTS to stand for their unsaved spouse? Do you believe the marriage they are standing for is dissolved anyways? Is it the "desire" of the "left" believer which dictates which marriages are dissolved and which are not? If the believer wants to remarry another, THEIR previous marriage is dissolved, but the other believer who is standing for their unsaved loved one, their marriage is still intact?

What dissolves a lawful marriage is death and an unbeliever abandoning the marriage. That part I have made clear multiple times now.

If the remaining believing spouse chooses to stand for their unsaved spouse, they are free to do so. Though not required because they are not bound any longer. Because once the covenant was broken by the leaving spouse, the articles of the covenant are no longer binding. It's bindings have been voided.

As the marriage covenant is voided at such a time when one abandons the marriage, does it not also say that if the one who left was to return must "remarry" the one they left? That is a clear indication that a new covenant is needed because the old one no longer stands.

As to how long the person waits or does not wait, that is up to God working in their particular circumstances. Their desire or lack of desire to wait for the spouse to return will be directed by God to the accomplishment of His will, whatever that may be in the case.

Your last question is answered by the fact that there is no marriage left intact.

quote: ORIGINAL: <name removed>

But the history of the church does not support the dissolution of marriage outside of death, nor can one find such clearly written of/taught by Paul or Jesus.

Paul clearly taught in 1 Cor 7:15 that there is another means of dissolving the marriage.

quote: ORIGINAL: <name removed>

The big difference between us is that I don't believe man can "break", meaning dissolve the marriage covenant. He can injure it, but only God has the power to dissolve a marriage since it is HE who joined it. I do agree that all sin can be repented of. I think the difference lies in how we view repentance. I believe repentance entails forsaking the said sin----whatever sin that may be. If one is in an adulterous relationship, the fruit of repentance would be to forsake that relationship. Just because the civil laws of the land say that a union is lawful (whether adulterous or homosexual) does not mean that God sees it as lawful/not sin. God is the judge of all such things, not man. Blessings in Him

Believe it or not, I disagree with our differences. In fact, I concur that man cannot dissolve the marriage covenant. Yet through man's sin and their hardened hearts, for whatever purposes, our sovereign God allows the man (or woman) to sin to the point of being like an unbeliever, and breaking a marriage. Thus while it may seem insane in the world's logic to assert that God would willfully allow the dissolution of the marriage covenant, I can see no other interpretation of why divorce among believers occurs.

Since I assert the full sovereignty of God in all things, including marriage, I see no other way to explain this. If it is not part of God's will, then it doesn't happen. If a person is so sinful and hardened to the point that they abandon their spouse and divorce, how can that not also be a part of God's will?

I do not pretend to fully understand God. So I will make no defense for this apparent enigma. But do I also not accept and enjoy the good things from God? So then I must accept the bad things that happen as they are for my discipline.

So then to answer the basic opening question "does a certificate of divorce dissolve the one-flesh union of a husband and wife", the answer is "no" the mere certificate alone does not. It is the path of sin and hardened hearts and the final working of God in their lives to retain the marriage or dissolve it. God only can dissolve the one-flesh union of a husband and wife. The argument is on the manner in which He does that.

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We disagree. You have not addressed the statement by Paul that the remaining one is "not bound". I conclude further debate is pointless.

Thanks for participating in this discussion with character and remaining reasonable. However, we are at an impasse.

Suffice it to say, when I was faced with abandonment, when my ex-wife had committed multiple infractions of sexual immorality with multiple men, I was still willing to stay in the marriage. She abandoned me and the kids, filed for divorce, and simply left. This left me with a dilemma. My only recourse was to do what I always did: study the word of God.

So I entered the study with the following premise: believers are not allowed to divorce. Then I had to look for answers, willing to accept what God would teach me. I came to my views and beliefs not because I wanted to justify my actions or find a way of rationalizing activities. I came to this belief because it was what God lead me to believe.

So that is it. Yes it was through prayer, fasting, study, and meditation. I drew my conclusions from scriptural truths. Current culture was not part of the answer. And this was the conclusion I had.

When a person abandons a believer and divorces them, and shows no signs of repentance, the remaining believer is free from the marriage covenant and is permitted to remarry.

If you do not share this belief, at least think this: either one of us could be wrong, it could be you. So lest anyone judge me (as you have pointed out that would be wrong to judge my salvation), I offer that this is truly the will of God in my life.

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Jesus also calls each and every lustful thought adultery. And it is. Just a thought for all you folks out there.

I assert that God recognizes mixed marriages, and I assert he upholds the laws of the land. And I assert that when Paul says "let the unbelieving spouse leave" is a valid dissolution of the marriage since Paul is describing the practice of the Gentiles in divorce, including legal divorce among the Gentiles.

So then you assert that Paul says "let them leave" but it is not a valid dissolution. However, legally in the Gentile (i.e. Greek) cultural context that was a legal divorce by the laws of the land. And then you assert that "she is not bound" refers to she is "not in subjection".

I assert that she is not in subjection to the marriage covenant. This text does not refer to being in subjection to the husband as the context of this chapter is clearly "marriage" and not the role of the husband or the wife.

Now to discuss the "lost" state of the errant spouse you raised previously. They are not "lost". In fact, it appears that you and I may share something in common here. I assume then from your statement you assert the Calvinistic view of "preservation of the saints". I am reformed and do accept the 5 points of Calvinism, including preservation of the saints. With that said, the errant spouse, and indeed the sinner in 1 Cor 5, is not lost. However they have hardened hearts and have been removed from fellowship with God. So for the duration, they are living the life of an unbeliever and God DOES hold back blessings from them. And note the "remove the evil man" instruction is very clear. You remove them from the fellowship EVEN if they are not truly "lost", but only in unrepentant error.

Now at the time when one spouse is to that point, you are unequally yoked, and you are in a mixed marriage. Yet there is a chance for the errant spouse to return. But there comes a point of no return. When is that? Once the errant spouse has abandoned the marriage covenant, and has gone off to live an adulterous life and a legal divorce - not merely separation - then the marriage contract is dissolved.

This is the purpose of separation, a chance to fix things, a chance to come to reconciliation. But once the legal divorce is obtained, reconciliation requires much more. At that time, reconciliation requires remarriage - (why? because the old covenant is dissolved), and that requires that the remaining spouse is agreeable AND the errant spouse has fully and truly repented of not only the sins that lead to the divorce but also the divorce itself.

But the remaining spouse is not "subject" to that old covenant or that former spouse. Let them leave.

And finally, please explain how you see repentance and forgiveness coming into play in a divorce? Not the forgiveness of one spouse to another, but the forgiveness of God to the errant spouse should they choose to repent any amount of time later. Also please explain how someone could "repent" of a second marriage and divorce their spouse, and return to their former spouse given that there is instruction not to accept a spouse back after they "have been defiled". Describe this in terms of God's forgiveness and mercy.

And on that note, please explain God's requirements for the repentance of a second marriage, you deem unlawful, from the scriptures. Does God require them to leave their new spouse and family? Does God require them to return to the former spouse after being defiled? Does God require perpetual flagellation and penance? Does God require blood? Where does one get the instruction that the repentance of a second marriage requires a second divorce?

I see your viewpoint as well. And I pray this only ever becomes an academic endeavor for you and you never have to live it out. Because if the unthinkable should happen, you cannot violate conscience, and your conscience is clear in this. Please understand my conscience as well is clear. For me to disobey the calling of God and to be errant myself is unthinkable. That would be a violation of conscience.

I do have the realization of the permanency of marriage. However, that permanency requires that there be an existing marriage covenant that was not violated and abandoned by a spouse. My next marriage is arranged by God. He alone brought her to me, and He alone orchestrates it. We follow Him in prayer and practice.

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I read part of your story, but I did not go into the detail of your reasoning at the end. I have seen all this before. Please understand, I have no fear in reading it. I would hope that you could discern from my previous posts, I really have been through these considerations already.

I am so sorry you went through all that. Perhaps had you come to those conclusions before, and not married this man to begin with you would have not had so much turmoil and then you too would not now be bound by that same principle you hold to. I assume from your testimony that you will never marry again now. That is sad. This is why we all need to take serious consideration of what it is we do.

I do not condemn you for what you did. It was what you felt God lead you to do. Perhaps it was so that you could get a taste of marriage in preparation for a single life. I don't know.

I now, with all due respect to those that share your opinions, I have been called to be a godly husband and a godly father. I know this in my heart, in my mind, and in my spirit. I also know that Satan whispers in my ears many things to distract me from the truth God reveals to me. So I pray and seek clarity and truth. I have found it. I stand on what I have said and what I believe.

I do not presume that what I believe to be true will be acceptable by every one. Clearly I know there will always be those out there that will assert legalism over grace and mercy. And there will be those that will assert grace and mercy over truth and accountability.

I have sought to balance my life. What was such a hard 18 years to live in the past was all preparation. God has shaped me and molded me and has told me time and time again that He requires my service as a husband to one special woman who needs exactly what it is He has prepared me with.

I must explain the primary consideration in the source of my beliefs: I do not trust the words of men. It is because of that, I use the scriptures as my primary source. My exegesis of the scriptures with a prayerful heart, truly seeking God, is my main source of my belief. I can quote authors and theologians ad nauseum on both sides of the debate. This debate is not new. It has been going on for centuries.

We will no more settle the matter here than we will settle the matter of predestination vs "free will" or the case for infant baptism. These are simply difficult issues that we all wish God had spoken more precisely on in the Word, and not just in our hearts, which seem to differ.

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quote: ORIGINAL:

People can believe what they want about what I did but I have found that we are led by the Spirit. The Holy Spirit will convict and teach you the scripture. Romans 8:14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. Romans 8:9 But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.

So what happens when you are lead by the Spirit, davew is lead by the Spirit, I am lead by the spirit, and say 3 other posters are lead by the Spirit and we have 6 different opinons that are orthogonal with respect to each other but all are equally convinced that each is right?

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Well I am saying "God bless His grace and mercy" and not "God bless legalism".

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There are also many credible stories, mine included, where it is clear that God was at work to completely shake things up, with no possibility of restoration, and then to continue to bless the remaining believer and permit them to marry into perfectly permissible, lawful, and godly marriages. These marriages are testimonies to the God of second chances and grace.

Furthermore there are many credible stories about the errant spouse finally undergoing repentance later on and being forgiven, and God blessing them through His grace and mercy and allowing them to go onto perfectly permissible, lawful, and godly marriages. These marriages are testimonies of second chances and grace.

What you describe forbids mercy. And I cannot accept a legalistic approach that forbids mercy from God or from other believers.

Matthew 12:7
If you had known what these words mean, 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice,' you would not have condemned the innocent.

Romans 9:14-21
14 What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15 For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." 16 It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: "I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth." 18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
19 One of you will say to me: "Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?" 20 But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?' " 21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?

James 2:12-13
12 Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, 13 because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment!

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quote: ORIGINAL:

It wasn't the pagan practices or other Hebrew practices that I was refering to but the type of covenant that Abram entered into with Jehovah. It was most definitely of the blood letting variety from my study. Except YWHW walked the blood trail once for Himself and a second time for Abraham. He entered into the covenant and took the punishment for either one breaking the covenant. Abram knew God would uphold His part of the covenant but he knew he couldn't. Jesus fulfilled the old covenant on the cross. This is the same type of covenant that a marriage is from my study. What was the penalty for violating the marriage vows?

That is odd, I don't recall reading about the requirement to butcher animals for the marriage ceremony. I wonder what the folks on the "you don't need witnesses and a ceremony" thread would say about this requirement. And as I recall, that was a VERY unique covenant indeed. It is not a model for a marriage covenant as it was one sided.

quote: ORIGINAL:

God wouldn't tell us to do that which is in opposition to His Character and Will. We know Him through His Word. He would not command us to sin. However He does forgive those whom He wishes. He did command Hosea to return to his wife. But then again she was in covenant with him.

Hosea and Gomer are a parallel for the relationship of Israel and God. Israel being the harlot wife, Hosea being the forgiving God.

And you know, you showed in your text above about God's one sided covenant with Abraham, that God made the covenant with Israel alone. That was not a two way covenant. Which is why He always took them back.

God would never tell us to do something against His character. That is why He tells me NOT to enable my ex-wife's sin any further. And that is why He tells me to move on. He will deal with her. He forgave me of my sins that caused my ex-wife to be unhappy when I repented. As to His forgiveness of her for her adultery and divorcing me, that is between them, not me.

And thank God that God is not a legalist, but a caring Father of mercy and forgiveness. And does NOT require me to stay bound to someone who has broken our covenant. Thank God that God has done away with that broken covenant. Thank God it was never up to any of you fine people to judge my divorce or my remarriage. Thank God that people who are legalists are in the very small minority. Thank God that most His people practice mercy and grace as He has taught us.

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I will give an opinion on your situation. However I must tell you, it is my opinion and you may not like it. But since you asked, in love as a brother in Christ, I provide it.

I need to address your post piece by piece. Remember I am not judging, but I am rendering an opinion based on what I think is right in this case.

quote: ORIGINAL:

I was young..20 when I married the first time and I thought I was saved but I was not and we did not live a christain life and did not go to church.

I assume I do not need to tell you how wrong this was. You appear to understand this now.

quote: ORIGINAL:

He was abusive to me for 19 years and I finally go out. I was saved and baptized, and a single mom and I attended church and got really involved,

This is good. you realized the error, you were saved, you started a correct walk with Christ, and it sounds like you were heading down the right path.

quote: ORIGINAL:

and then I got out of the will of God, and I spent 8 years alone and didnt wait on the Lord and married again, he is not a bad man, in the sense of physical abuse.

Well, this is a setback on your part, but I understand loneliness and pain.

quote: ORIGINAL:

But our marriage has never been consimated,

Do you really mean that you have never had sex with your husband? This is amazing to say the least.

quote: ORIGINAL:

he has no desire to be intamite and we have tried the counseling.....

Was the counseling from the church? Was it Christian counseling?

quote: ORIGINAL:

but he can be intimate on the computer if ya know what I mean, is this not a form of adultrey?

Are you talking about porn? Does he have a problem with porn or do you and he exchange sex talk on the Internet? It sounds like you are saying he is engaging in Internet sex with others. I cannot tell you how bad that is. This is clearly sexual immorality, adultery, grounds for divorce.

quote: ORIGINAL:

I can not live like this and he agrees and doesnt want to either so we both agree. All I have ever wanted was a relationship with a man who could love me unconditionally like God intended; and to serve God as one.....not found that yet.

This man is obviously not serving God in his walk. Is he a Christian at all? He does not sound like one.

quote: ORIGINAL:

So I want your oppinion on this, and how it relates to God and his will for my life and divorce and remarriage. And what do you think of people who stay in a marriage that hinders their happiness, and well being just to not break a commentment; do you think God wants us to live like that? Sorry for such a long post ......but I wait on your oppinion and felt I needed to explain the whole thing for you to understand what I am asking.
Now my opinion. The root cause of your troubles is you have not sought God in your marriages. In your first marriage, you were not capable of seeking God, because you were not a Christian believer. In the second marriage, you have not sought God because you married out of some emotional consideration and not out of the longing to serve God in your marriage.

However, this is what really tears at you now. It is not a matter of legalistic compliance with a covenant, it is not a matter of being happy, and it is not a matter of being unhappy.

You are now and have been always unequally yoked in your 2 marriages. Furthermore your first husband physically abused you. And now your second husband is emotionally and mentally abusing you. Right now, you are in an abusive relationship.

Some thoughts cross my mind at this time. If you really had not consumated, I wonder if annulment is possible. However that has a lot of entanglements. I am not sure that is exactly biblical. I know there are some on these forums would simply tell you to repent of your "sinful" marriage and leave your current husband. I am not inclined to acccept that thought, nor that reasoning.

I personally think you and your husband are in serious need of outside help. If your husband continues his current denial of you, he is in violation of scripture. He is living a life in violation of scripture. And honestly, I am not judging his salvation, but in discernment, you have not given enough proof of his fruit to determine if he is a believer. My gut feeling is he is at best a very very weak believer, if one at all.

You are definitely in a tough situation. I would not presume to be able to tell you what is right and wrong in all of this. However, to relate it back to the topic of this thread, it does not even sound like there is a "one-flesh" union.

Personally, I think the first marriage, being between two unbelievers, and ending in utter failure, is part of the sin you repented for when you were saved. Therefore, and though I know this will generate no end of controversy, leave that broken marriage in the past.

Now to the current marriage. If your husband is any kind of believer at all, and he does NOT want to improve things, then he is a loser. Seriously. He would need serious help. And his walk is suspect.

If your husband seriously attempts to improve the situation, I believe you MUST remain in the marriage and work on it yourself. Honestly, it is not about your happiness at this time. These consequences are for the your sins and your husband's sins. If you look in 1 Peter 3:1-2 you find:

In the same way, you wives must accept the authority of your husbands, even those who refuse to accept the Good News. Your godly lives will speak to them better than any words. They will be won over by watching your pure, godly behavior

So my opinion is not to give up until it is clear you have been abandoned. And you must submit yourself to the authority of the church and their accountability. You must talk to your pastor and/or elders about this. You must be open and honest and confess your sins. Who knows wife, if your witness will bring about saving your husband? See 1 Corinthians 7:12-16.

I pray you can see the truth in what I say. And be forewarned, there are many "judges" about. Focus on Christ. Seek God's forgiveness. And above all, SEEK GODLY COUNSEL from trusted member of the clergy of your church, experienced in dealing with marital counseling. I am not a marital counselor. Avoid secular counselors at all costs as they WILL NOT address the spiritual issues.

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quote: ORIGINAL:

Can someone please show me where the Bible says it must be a "lifestyle" of adultery vs adultery that happens once/twice. What exactly defines a "lifestyle of adultery?

It doesn't. But Jesus also says that "every lustful thought is adultery". So do you call it quits when your spouse had one lustful thought? Two? Five hundred in 20 years?

I know the verses about forgiveness and it is to be 70 times 7. Ok, so that is 490. Anyone here want to lay claim to that being the exact number of times we are to forgive and no more? I didn't think so.

The general principle of scripture and forgiveness is "as often as it takes". And for some, that is a few, for some that could be a lifetime. The key point is once someone stops truly repenting and really asking forgiveness, but just paying it lip service, they have stopped trying. Arguably, that is a lifestyle of sin. When you can treat a repeated sin that lightly, whatever the sin is, you are not repentant and you are continuing in it.

But I say that if your spouse, in a moment of weakness commits a single act of adultery, and they are truly repentant. Then you must forgive and work on redeeming the marriage.

If the spouse is in denial of their sin, or they continue to do it - how many times is unique to the individual couple - then that is a lifestyle issue.

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quote: ORIGINAL:

It is this very issue why I believe the earliest Christians did not practice remarriage----not only because scripture teaches marriage is til death, but because if one remarries another, restoration and forgiveness is IMPOSSIBLE. The door has been shut for the person who is sin to repent and return.................Blessings in Jesus

It is this very issue why I believe all the remarriage verses were put in God's word in the first place. People cannot take this lightly. If someone is living in unrepentant sin, they are cut off from fellowship. While God will allow the repentant sinner to return, there are consequences. The remarriage verses in the scriptures guard against "stepping in and out of marriage" for what suits our purposes. It was the case then, it is the case now, that people do not like to commit to something.

So when Jesus and Paul speak of marrying a divorced person as adultery, I believe it is fitting, proper, correct, true, and right to accept that we are not to marry someone in unrepentant sin, who is cut off from the fellowship of the body of Christ, and is an adulterer. Hence this person who has divorced and has not repented, and therefore an adulterer, is off limits until they repent and are returned to a right relationship with God.

Now there are many examples in the scriptures of when someone, even a believer, sins, God acts swiftly and they suffer consequences that make it IMPOSSIBLE to restore what once was (sell any land lately and break a promise to God?). There are other times when there is a chance to restore what was broken, lost, or destroyed (care to be a pig feeder or go home to your parents?).

When David sinned with Bathsheba and had her husband murdered, David's son died. David repented but it did not save his own son. There are consequences. It was impossible to undo his sexual sin with Bathsheba. And it was impossible to restore her husband's life.

You can't always repent and restore what was lost. In fact, it is impossible. Why? Because you cannot take back words, you cannot erase the past. Once you have destroyed someone's reputation, inflicted pain in their hearts, murdered someone, or divorced someone, you cannot undo it. No matter what your repentance and reconciliation consist of, what was once there is lost forever and gone.

So to return and reconcile a marriage is not restoration, it is also the consequences of the sin. You cannot restore the trust and love that was there simply by returning. You can build new trust and love. Yet though you can work on it for the rest of your lives, and even possibly have a better marriage because of it, the simple fact is what was once there is lost forever.

When someone sins against God and their spouse and divorces, they have done something terrible. When there are children involved, it is even more heinous. And what happens is the marriage dies. If you have lived it, you know of what I speak. If you haven't, then this is all academic to you anyway, just take our word for it.

Now the dilemma. A spouse commits continued unrepentant adultery, leaves the home, and divorces. The spouse leaves behind the "innocent" spouse and "innocent" young children. The leaving spouse is in denial and refuses reconciliation, let's say for at least a year by this point, just for example. Which of the following is the more Christ like scenario:

A) Adhere to a legalist standing with no chance of remarriage, and thereby condemn the remaining spouse and the remaining children to live out the consequences of the leaving spouse, with only marginal hope of reconciliation possibly years later if ever, and to suffer the emotional, financial, and sociological difficulties and problems that DO exist in such cases. This means the remaining spouse is condemned to remain single and alone the rest of their life. They chose the intimacy of marriage, it was taken away from them. But now they and their children must pay the cost of the other's sins.

B) Adhere to a doctrine of grace, and thereby allow the remaining spouse to remarry, to provide the missing godly parent to the children, with immediate hope of a mature, sound, and godly home, and to alleviate the emotional, financtial, and sociological difficulties and problems that DO exist. This means the remaining spouse and the children are no longer under the condemnation brought on by their former spouse.

So pick A or B. In this example there is no C or D or other.

It would be easy for some to pick A and quote "I am the Father to the fatherless" and "God will provide all your needs". Those that quote these typically do not have to live that way. Though I am sure now we will hear from someone who has done just that. We call such extreme minority cases "exceptions".

It would also be easy for some to pick B and quote "ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete" and "I desire mercy, not sacrifice".

So what is it then? Legalist adherence to every jot and tittle of your interpretation of the scriptures in which you put your faith? Or rest in God's mercy and put your faith in Christ and God's grace?

Now back to the unrepentant sinner. The unrepentant sinner has a heart hardened to God's will and God's word. At a time such as that it is IMPOSSIBLE to restore and reconcile. Only when they are broken, and their hardness is shattered will they be receptive. If they are not broken, and indeed, die to their former self that caused the divorce, they will suffer in life.

And if their walk was only a superficial walk and they never return to Christ, they will be forever cut off and burnt with the other dead wood and chaff.

Yes marriage is serious. Breaking one is serious. But a marriage is a human institution. God walked the covenant path between the dead animals to seal the contract with Abraham because only God can keep that kind of Covenant. Only God is that faithful. And only Christ could keep the whole law and be without sin.

There is a direct comparison between the relationship of Christ and His church and the husband and wife. God refers to himself as married to His people and uses those terms. Yet I assert that we are incapable of keeping that relationship like God, no one is capable, no not one.

So before we get more comparisons between God as the husband with us the wife, and the human institution of marriage, remember that God knew from the beginning that Israel was going to sin and play the whore with other gods. When we entered into marriage we all believed that the other would never leave. The expectations are completely different. Therefore the covenant is completely different.

I am divorced. Not by my choosing. I expected to grow old and die married to my wife. That was robbed from me by her hardened heart and her unrepentant sin when she divorced meafter her adultery. Through prayer and study I KNOW that God's will for my life is to move on from her. This is clear to me. Had it not been I would have told you so. Had I not been in the will of God, He would not have brought me someone that I love and could marry.

God does not tempt His people. What God has brought together now, I delight in. I am thankful for my new relationship. And I will be even more thankful when God makes her my wife. And no, I have no issues with your legalist interpretation. You will find the truth you seek no matter what the entireity of scripture say. As for me, I seek God's will first.

May God who is rich in mercy and will obliterate the merciless, bless you and keep you, in Christ's name, Amen.

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Matthew 12:1-8

1 At about that time Jesus was walking through some grainfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry, so they began breaking off heads of wheat and eating the grain. 2 Some Pharisees saw them do it and protested, "Your disciples shouldn't be doing that! It's against the law to work by harvesting grain on the Sabbath."

3 But Jesus said to them, "Haven't you ever read in the Scriptures what King David did when he and his companions were hungry? 4 He went into the house of God, and they ate the special bread reserved for the priests alone. That was breaking the law, too. 5 And haven't you ever read in the law of Moses that the priests on duty in the Temple may work on the Sabbath? 6 I tell you, there is one here who is even greater than the Temple! 7 But you would not have condemned those who aren't guilty if you knew the meaning of this Scripture: `I want you to be merciful; I don't want your sacrifices.' 8 For I, the Son of Man, am master even of the Sabbath."

quote: ORIGINAL:

quote: ORIGINAL: neuronstatic

`I want you to be merciful; I don't want your sacrifices.' 8 For I, the Son of Man, am master even of the Sabbath."

Personally, neuronstatic I don't see how this passage fits giving "allowances" for things that the Lord has forbidden.................Saying it's ok for someone to disobey God and sin is not showing mercy..........it is causing a brother to stumble. I could never intentionally do that in good conscience. In Him

Because it establishes the principle that addresses the heart of the matter. Is it the keeping of the letter of the law or the keeping in God's will and that we are to be merciful? Too often the opinions expressed in this thread for the forbidding of remarriage have been utterly devoid of mercy. There has been shown through dissentious debate great concern for keeping the letter of the law without regard to the condition and provision of the innocent spouse. There has been an overt attempt to elevate the law above love, mercy, and forgiveness.

What I was trying to do in the course of this debate, and apparently unsuccessfully, was to render an understanding in those reading this that God is not so easily put in a box. One would assert that God demands A, B, C and then asserts that because of an instruction we can ignore B. Several of you have accused me of this in that I assert remarriage is allowable, right, and good in cases where the innocent spouse was left by a sinning and immoral believer. But I would assert that those that deny that historical position of the church are themselves ignoring the instruction on mercy and forgiveness.

That was my point. This has become a debate on literal interpretation by some. I could therefore assert, to be divisive, that additionally we MUST then keep "women remain silent in the church", "only men may be church leaders", "a woman may never teach a man", and an array of other instructions in the Bible that many find divisive and subject to controversy. I could do that, but I will not use deflection to an easier argument for my purposes.

quote: ORIGINAL:

Does grace give us license to sin against God? Why not say that we can steal, lie, covet, or murder and God's grace will cover us also?

No one is saying that these sins are allowed and I disallow the implication that attempts to thereby afflict my assertion with rampant immorality and sin. Rejected. Like I said above, I will not accept deflection to an easier argument for the purposes of debate.

Now to address the regulative principle of remarriage.

It has been asserted by the early church, the middle church, the reformed church, and the present church that there are regulative principles of marriage, divorce, and remarriage.

There is a regulative principle that only God can bind two people together in marriage. There is an entire thread on the ridiculous assertion that two people can do it on their own without witnesses and a ceremony. I accept the assertion that only God can bind the a man and a woman in marriage.

There is a regulative principle that there are only two exceptions allowable for divorce, unrepentant adultery and abandonment. Any other use of divorce is illegitimate. I accept that regulative principle.

There is a regulative principle that when there is divorce, someone must be in sin. This is obvious. What is not so obvious is that the "innocent" party may or may not be in sin. This is the nature of divorce. However, it is asserted that when the innocent party is not in sin, and the leaving party is in sin, the guilt of the divorce sin falls on the leaving party and the consequences are theirs alone. Yes I know it takes 2 to really destroy a marriage, but to get to that point of divorce where it is only 1 in sin, the other has repented and is blameless.

There is a regulative principle that only the "innocent" remaining person after the divorce may remarry. This is because the innocent spouse is blameless for the divorce, the leaving person broke the covenant, rendering it no longer binding to the innocent person, and that person is free to forgive and remain waiting for reconciliation AND free to remarry, whatever God calls them to do.

There is a regulative principle that the leaving spouse can repent and remarry later. This is because when a person truly repents, and they are forgiven, the old sins were washed away. The old marriage covenant was broken and rendered no longer binding. This person may still suffer some consequences, but they are now, after repentance, free to remarry or free to attempt to reconcile with their former spouse should they have remained unmarried.

There is a regulative principle that no one is to marry an unrepentant divorced person. This is because they are still in sin, have not repented, and it is adultery to marry such a person. There is a general principle that believers are not to marry unbelievers or immoral persons anway, so this is a specific instance of that general principle.

So then What do we do with 1 Corinthians 7:10-11? That is the same basic instruction Jesus gave in Matthew and Mark. It is literally saying that the one who divorces is committing a sin. We already know this to be true. The one who leaves is in sin. And if they continue with the divorce, they are in unrepentant sin. They have broken the marriage covenant and rendered it no longer binding. Until they repent of the sins that led to the divorce and the sin of the divorce itself, they may not remarry. But after true repentance, they are free.

For some reason, this seems to be a stumbling block to many. And honestly I cannot understand why. Yes God says it's sin to divorce. Yes God says it's sin to marry an immoral person in unrepentant sin. However, neither of those things bind the innocent ex-spouse to a life of servitude to an impossiblity or the grief of that life.

I think I am done with particular debate. The original point of this thread was the dissolution of the one-flesh union, not remarriage specifically. I may offer further proof text and discourse on that topic should this thread actually return to it. However, as far as remarriage goes, I have stated what I believe to be true and right from study of the scriptures and prayer. It also happens to be the position of the Westminster Confession of Faith, chapter 24, a document that is accepted by many denominations in addition to my own. And should you assert that document was written by immoral persons, I exhort you to "duck".

I think it sad to see that some believe the principle of remarriage after a divorce to be something of the last few generations. These principles have been around since the Old Testament. For conscience sake, if you think it is sin to remarry after divorce, then you yourself should not remarry after your own divorce. But leave me out of your personal bent on literalism and legalism.

Post:

quote: ORIGINAL:

Concerning your comment to Marcus, it is not deflection on his part to ask "what about other sins". It is a contrast question. If you think it ok to disobey God in one area of sin(I Cor. 7:10-11), why not the others? I think that is a very legitimate question and worth pondering it's validity..............Blessings in Jesus

Do you remain quiet in church? Do you only receive instruction from your husband in quiet submission? Do you keep your head covered whenever you pray?

Answer those questions and I will answer the contrast.

Post:

quote: ORIGINAL:

When I look at what Jesus taught the disciples in Matthew and Mark, I realized I wasn't being punished. I am living with the consequences of her decision and action. But much more than that, I have more of an opportunity to serve God now than before. I understand what God means about keeping my oath or my word than I ever did previously. In my life this is one of the greatest burdens I face. I understand more clearly what keeping my oath means, especially in our age. I see my own sins more clearly and I don't make excuses for them as I once did.

When I look at what Jesus taught us all in the scriptures, I know that I am not being punished. I am living the consequences of my own sins, not her decision and action. I take care of my two teenagers by myself. I have to be the dad. I have to be the mom. I have to do everything by myself. I have to discuss feminine things with a teenage girl. I have to be manly, I have to be less manly 1 week a month or no one is happy in the home. I live consequences every day. Consequences it sounds like you do not have.

When I look at my children I realize they have their own consequences to deal with. Yes they sinned and still are in their bitterness. And I do all I can to help them get through that. Yes I know their consequences well. I know them because I live them. If this is an academic discussion to you, then I suggest you really jump down off your hypothetical horse, look around, and think to yourself "what would Jesus tell me to do".

Well I have my consequences. She has hers. Hers are far worse than mine because she is hard hearted, she is unrepentant as far as I can tell, and she is living her own way. She is free to do that. I do not care what she does or who she does it with. I do pray that she returns to the right path before she gets seriously hurt, but I am free from the covenant because she divorced me. She abandoned the contract, she broke the terms. She is living out the teeth of that contract now. She is denied the marital relationship. So be it.

Now I see other consequences. I hear the cries of another's small children saying "why doesn't my daddy want to see me" and "do you think my daddy still loves me even though he doesn't want to see me". I hear the cries. I feel the pain. I see the consequences they live out. However if you think for one minute the God intended for small children to suffer because of the sins of one man, their father, then you are sorely mistaken about the character of God. And you are sorely mistaken about the quality of life we believers are to present to others.

And I see other broken people who have been abandoned by the one person that was supposed to never abandon them. Sometimes, praise God, they can manage through on their own and remain single. Great! Wonderful! Stupendous - for them. Others cannot do so. And in some cases the financial and emotional situations are so bad, you cannot even begin to imagine how hard it can be. And then there is their own longings and desires. And when those longings and desires go unquenched, it can lead to distress, sin, or worse.

I know these things because I am called to them. I know these things because God has made it clear to me. I know these things because I studied this hard when I was divorced. I spent six months working on my beliefs and principles in divorce and remarriage. I started with "believers may not get divorced for any reason" and I had to seriously consider if I was allowed to remarry. And I know I am.

I know these things. God has called me to something that does not include a life of singleness after my ex-wife walked out. How do we know when we are called by God? Ask a missionary. Ask a pastor. It is the same calling I have in my life. To be a father and the godly husband I was not capable of in the past.

You and others argue that because two people entered into a covenant, both are required to keep it unto death EVEN if the other should not only abandon that covenant, but totally obliterate it. Well those marital covenants we take today are the same ones then. They were middle Eastern contracts. And when one side broke the contract, they had to pay the penalty and the contract was OVER. God knew this and that is why God Himself "walked" the path between the dead animals witnessed by Abraham. Only God can make such a binding covenant. Only God promised to be subject to the penalties of His contract.

You are free to attempt to keep your covenant. I will keep the whole of scripture in my heart. I will live a life that is a believer should be. And I will live that life remarried when the times comes. And it will not be a sinful marriage because God Himself calls me to it.

Just a personal question marcus, how many times have you violated that covenant since your wife left you? That would mean every single thought of lust, every single time that you did not support your ex-wife emotionally, financially, and in all things. Tell me, do you keep that covenant? Or only the part about keeping yourself from others? The covenant you took with your wife should include all the basic needs of life; shelter, food, clothing, emotional support, financial support, and being her friend. Do you do these things every day? Or have you slowly and gradually changed the interpretation of the covenant to just include chastity? Inquiring minds want to know. Do you REALLY keep your covenant with your wife, or is it all talk?

Post:

quote: ORIGINAL:

ORIGINAL: neuronstatic

Do you remain quiet in church? Do you only receive instruction from your husband in quiet submission? Do you keep your head covered whenever you pray? Answer those questions and I will answer the contrast.

Well, I don't hollar across the church, if that's what you mean (they used to separate men and women in the synagogues and women were disrupting the teachings asking questions).......so no, I don't do that.

As for head covering, yes my head is covered in the manner the Lord has shown me in His Word. Blessings in Jesus

That is not what I meant. Tell me do you keep all those rules? Do you remain SILENT in the church? Do you agree with male only church leadership? Do you follow everything ver batim? Or is this one topic the one you really are interested in. You have 27 posts here on these forums and 26 of them are to this thread. So I don't know where you stand on things in general. Only this one. You have appeared to taken a keen interest in it.

Post:

quote: ORIGINAL: name removed

quote: ORIGINAL: neuronstatic

The covenant you took with your wife should include all the basic needs of life; shelter, food, clothing, emotional support, financial support, and being her friend. Do you do these things every day? Or have you slowly and gradually changed the interpretation of the covenant to just include chastity? Inquiring minds want to know. Do you REALLY keep your covenant with your wife, or is it all talk?

Well, I really await the reply from marcus on that one. Not you.

quote: ORIGINAL:

neuronstatic, you know what? There is a whole lot of people in your very situation----abandoned and treated badly by their spouses........they are hurt deeply as you are. They have children who too are hurt. I know many of these people because I am part of a support group.

Great. Keep up the good work of holding them in place. Maybe they will get on with their lives anyway.

quote: ORIGINAL:

These people are incredible. They are awesome witnesses to their children because they "wait"............and "wait" and forgive.

Then that is already incorrect. They should have already forgiven their former spouse. Forgiveness does not require the return of the offender or their asking forgiveness. We are required to forgive them anyway.

quote: ORIGINAL:

When their children watch their parents, they see a person who LOVES God, to the sacrificing of their own flesh.

Mine saw a father who loves God. Yet they were angered if I even showed her the slightest compassion. And they were even more angered when the sacrificing was not only my own but I was sacrificing parts of them. Do you like someone else sacrificing you for something you have nothing to do with and no control over? Is it right? When has God required us to sacrifice our children's welfare because another person sinned? Had the sin of divorce been mine, I would not be here arguing. Yet it was not my sin, it was hers. I am not required to sacrifice for her sins. Neither are they. Are you saying that when an immoral person leaves a marriage the remaining believing spouse and children should sacrifice their lives - figuratively - to atone for that person's sins?

Did I still show her compassion even after the divorce? Yes. I showed my kids how a man keeps his commitments and covenants up to the very end of them. And I show them by my life how I do not run down my ex to them. I show them a man that loves God and can look past the personal offenses to encourage them to love their mother. I give her the respect and dignity of the position of her mother. She does nothing to deserve it. And they know that. They know that I am a man that loves God AND loves them.

quote: ORIGINAL:

They also see a parent who will not give up on their beloved other parent......That is an incredible thing and a picture of the longsuffering of Jesus............hoping for the endgoal.......

They saw my long suffering in divorce and refusal to give up to the very end. It was an incredible thing and it stands out in the kids minds. They have told me that I went above and beyond what I needed to do. They know this. They respect this. It was an incredible thing. It is a good thing the suffering ended when the covenant was obliterated by the final divorce decree.

quote: ORIGINAL:

not willing that the other should perish, but that they would obtain everlasting life. Is this impossible? Not with God. With Him, ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE!!!

Her everlasting life is between her and God. I have nothing to do with it. Is it impossible for her to reconcile with God? No, she can. Is it impossible for her to reconcile with me? No, she can. But what she cannot do is return to that former state. The covenant is completed. We are no longer bound. I have and am moving on. I do this for myself and for my children. I once thought it was impossible. But nothing is impossible with God. He presented a woman in my life with 3 lovely little girls. This woman was also under a marriage covenant at one time. But she was abandoned as well. She thought she would never find someone. But what is impossible for us, was possible for God. And we literally came together "out of the blue". Thank God.

quote: ORIGINAL: name removed

Every child, no matter what they say.........has a DEEP desire for their parents to get back together. They do NOT want their parent replaced!! I know of what I speak very well.

You do not know of what you speak. Not every child wants this despite your experiences. I know of what I speak VERY well. Every child wants both of their parents to love them. I would only agree that to be the case.

The bond is not intact. The contract is fulfilled by application of the penalties. Until the one that left repents, they cannot remarry. That is the teeth in the contract. As for me, I kept the covenant as best I could. No one keeps it perfectly. But it simply is no longer binding.

It was not the certificate of divorce that dissolved the marriage covenant. It was the sin in my ex-wife's life that led to her hard-hearted condition. She sinned. She has not repented. She must. But she hasn't. Her sin is not my sin nor are her consequences mine.

This begs the question in regard to the OP about the "one-flesh" union. My ex-wife has had a "multiple-flesh" union. That in and of itself did not destroy the covenant. It was her willful extension beyond just adultery and other sins to defy God and break the covenant. And it is broken. Not bent. Not damaged. It is broken. Once the marriage covenant is broken, it is broken. In the scriptures it even requires that for a spouse to return they are to "remarry" and establish a new covenant. Why? Because the old one was broken.

I find this to be fitting in the way an ex-spouse leaves the marriage and destroys the covenant and how sometimes, like my case, remarriage is impossible, and it is very non-scriptural, just fitting, note the one that left is dead to me:

quote:

"The way is shut. It was made by those who are dead, and The Dead keep it. The way is shut."

Post:

quote: ORIGINAL:

To the best of my ability concerning the clear things, yes I try to follow the "rules" as you say. I'm not perfect though by any stretch of the imagination. As the Lord opens my understanding (of the hard things), I obey. What I have issue with is taking allowances where God does not give them. Many people "ADD" to the allowances God gives-----allowing sin to occur, in the guise of grace and mercy. We should be VERY, VERY careful not to treat God's Word to us in such a manner. Where there is question on meaning, wisdom says that we should take the conservative road----to avoid sin, not the liberal road expecting God's Grace to cover us. When "I" want to do something I see that "may" be in opposition to God's commands, it makes me more suspect on where that want is coming from.........usually it's my own fleshly desire driving me to take the 'liberal' path or it is downright rebellion. The Christian's life is not an easy one.......I know, but when we walk in a way desiring to please the Lord ABOVE all else, there will be peace----real peace that noone will be able to shake. Blessings in Jesus

You are right. The Christian's life is not an easy one. I have to deal with those of weaker faith all the time. They intend to oppress my Christian liberty and satisfy themselves with lists and checkboxes. So perhaps this is one of those times I should just allow it to drop. Yes it is difficult. I know this. I live it. I also know that when we walk in a way desiring to please the Lord ABOVE all else, there will be peace in our spirits and hearts, real peace, not peace of life, peace of spirit.

And if that kind of peace is your criteria to know if one is walking in God's will. Then I have walked in His will all through the divorce, after the divorce, my current relationship, and my future plans. And incidently my DFW feels the same peace in her spirit. Thank you for clarifying your position. You and I finally agree and by that criteria you should no longer find fault with me.

Blessings, I think now we are done.

Post:

quote: ORIGINAL:

People try to end covenants that God puts them into, but....

People cannot end a Godly covenant....

Nor can sin...if that were the case, we'd all be divorced a the first sign of sin and there would be no more marriages..

You are correct, the sin does not cancel the covenant. If that were the case, then every lustful thought would end the marriage. However, that is not the issue. The issue is one of the heart. When the sin is to abandon the spouse, to no longer provide the fundamentals of the marriage, that being shelter, food, clothing, fidelity, financial and emotional support, etc., then that person has broken the covenant.

Additionally, the covenant is not totally broken by simply leaving. But it is broken when the one leaving does not return, does not discontinue their course of action, then the covenant is broken by means of abandonment of their responsibilities and the terms of their contract. This is simple near east contract law.

What seems to be the issue with some is how long it takes to determine they are not coming back and hence when to determine adandonment. Some assert you wait until you die using some literal sripture references. However I do not see that to be the case in light of the cultural context of marriage law at that time or in light of Galatians 5:16-26 which dicusses our life by the Spirit.

People can end a human covenant when that covenant is broken and no longer held by the offending party. The marriage covenant is between the husband and wife. We also covenant with God to keep ourselves faithful to the covenant of marriage. But once that covenant of marriage between the humans is broken, when the offending spouse rejects God and the marriage, then there is no covenant to uphold. This is simple. This is fact.

Til Death Us Do Part

2005-10-04T16:16:00.000-04:00

A story in a long post:

Once upon a time, a young man prayed sincerely to God to bring him a wife. A few years past and while in high school this young man met a Christian girl. She was pretty, but not the prettiest, she was well liked, but not popular, but she was sweet, she loved God, and she liked him. The young man took an interest in this girl and they became a young couple. For 3 years they went out together, went to church together, and prayed for each other.

Then one fall day, the young man asked the girl to be his bride. She immediately said yes. Their families were overjoyed. Everyone knew they were a happy couple, and that God had been blessing them. They had not set a date for the wedding yet as he was still in college, and they did not want to rush into things.

Another year past and they set the date for another year away. They wanted the wedding to be near Christmas. They both loved Christmas for its meaning. They wanted to celebrate their love in marriage at the time of year that the gift of Christ came to earth. They and all who knew them knew that God was with them and blessed them.

In all, they had dated for over 5 years with a 2 year engagement by the time they were married. And though life was hard at times, they persevered through it. They went to church, they worked, they had a family. All seemed right and good. There were times when they cried together, laughed together, and even argued with each other. But still, a husband and wife work through things.

The years passed and it seemed that something was wrong. Surely God did not intend that they would have grown apart. Yet that was happening. They both tried for a while to improve things. They tried together, then separately, then one of them quit trying.

Both the man and the woman were Christians their entire marriage. Yet after 18 years married, the woman left the man. She quit trying and caring. She said she had been praying for years for an answer to her question: should I stay or should I go? She said God answered her prayer and her question with "go".

The man tried to fix things. He prayed fervently every day. But with her "answer" to prayer, the woman refused to change her mind. So she divorced her husband after 18 years of marriage, and over 23 years being a continuous couple.

The man remained faithful to the marriage until the final day the official decree was signed and sealed by the courts. He did this even though his wife had already left and had already had a boyfriend to some extent. He didn't want to do that. But he had been praying for months for God to help him make sense of all this. But this was what God told the now much older man to do: remain faithful to your covenant until you are released from it.

The man prayed many times daily for months for an answer to his question: why? His answer came after the divorce was final. The man knew the answer from God was this: "Do these things because it is what I require of you. You need discipline, you need correction. I do this because I love you."

There was evidence in both of their lives that they loved God and tried to serve Him as best they could. Both produced much fruit. Both were without question firm believers in Christ.

So now some questions .

Was this union the will of God to begin with?

Did God allow the dissolution of the marriage?

Did God make a mistake?

Did the man and woman mistakenly marry?

Was the dissolution of the marriage the result of not having been chosen by God or by the hard heart on the part of the one or the other?

Reconcile all these things with the fact that we all serve a sovereign God. There is nothing that can happen outside of God's will.

I have my own answers to these questions and this reconciling. I do not ask you these things to assist me in discovering God's purpose in these things. I am the man. I have spent the last several years in prayer for my marriage. I have spent nearly a year with no wife and being in counsel with my pastor and elders. I have my answers.

The reason I post this is because it is very easy to say something is this way or that when you are only speaking hypothetically. It gets a lot more complicated to explain when its real. Yet even in this complexity I have the straightforward answer from God: I am that I am, I am your God and My will reigns supreme.

The marriage and the divorce were the will of God, but for reasons more difficult to understand than to grasp the infinite universe. God did not make a mistake, all things were planned by God and all things happened according to the will of our unchanging Lord. The marriage was not a mistake. And the divorce was the result of the hardened heart of the woman, though I know that I gave cause for much grievance in the marriage.

Even before the wedding, the marriage was prayed many times for. It was not decided in haste. There was much discussion between the two of us before marriage about how to handle hard things. The decision to marry and the timing was rationally thought out and was definitely of the brain and heart, not merely emotion.

Just my experience and something I think you need to consider in your thought process.

Edited to add: As I read this story well over a year later, I can still say that it fits. Everything that took place, the good, the bad, and the ugly, were all part of God's will to accomplish His purpose. And the result has been that I am a better man, a better husband, and a better father than I was before. God brought to me a woman who is now my wife. She also had similar circumstances in a previous marriage. She also underwent the discipline process of God. And though discipline is not normally joyful at the time, looking back now, it was all worth it. Thank you God.

How To Open A Jar Of Spaghetti Sauce

2005-10-04T15:48:00.000-04:00

The man's man methods to open that spaghetti jar:

1) use 1/4 stick of dynamite duct taped to the lid, set off in an open field
2) place the jar on a fence post at 20 paces, shoot with large calibre gun
3) secure the lid to your car with duct tape, secure the jar to the road, take off
4) throw that jar away, learn to make sauce yourself

But the one thing you will never, ever do as a man, is ask a woman to open the jar

You know I just thought about this more. Wrap the entire jar in duct tape then freeze the entire jar of sauce and lid with liquid nitrogen, you could crack the lid and jar off, easily remove the glass fragments that are somewhat still bound together with duct tape. Then put the frozen sauce globule (jar shaped still) in a pan to heat. Be careful to use protection in picking up the frozen sauce globule.

This has the added benefit of using both duct tape and liquid nitrogen. The man coolness factor is off the scale.

MacGyver would have to manufacture his own cutting torch using 3 matches, a shoestring, aluminum filings, and a caulking gun. Then I am sure it would involve duct tape and the properties of some obscure household item. But there is no doubt it would be cool, innovative, and have just enough credibility to make it sound possible.

This hand technique you speak of to open the jar, does it involve danger or explosives? I can't see its advantage unless there is some danger or science involved.

Hmmm...

I suppose that if it stated differently it has an appeal....

The elusive spaghetti sauce jar. When seen in captivity, they appear harmless and even lethargic. But here in the wilds of the modern kitchens, their natural aggression lurks just beneath the surface. Its simple glass body is docile when content, but should the jar be broken, those smooth sides instantly becom razor sharp deadly talons. Capable of slashing through your body muscle, tendon, and sinew, the jar can turn from domestic to destructive in a moment. Its unrelenting terror could render you helpless in a heart beat. And its sharp pointed daggers of glass could rip your throat right out.

What's this? We see a woman entering the kitchen... I think she is going to attempt to capture and open the jar of sauce. She is circling, circling, the jar is unmoved oddly enough with all this danger to its contents. At last! She seizes it with both hands!

She is now in a desperate struggle with the jar beast. She is trying desperately to force the lid off. But this is no ordinary jar of sauce and it is reluctant to give up its contents. Oh wait! She has called a male of the pack to come help. She is handing off the jar to the male...

They are struggling! It looks like we may see those razor sharp daggers at any time. But wait!!!!!! The male has the jar wrestled into submission now. He places his hand on the lid... yes... he definitely has his hand on the lid...

This could be it... Yes! He is turning the lid the full 90 degrees! And he has done it!!!!

Oh look! It is a bit gruesome to watch... but the female is now pouring out the insides of the jar of sauce into a pan. Oh Lord! The humanity! She has drained every drop from the jar and tossed it in the trash can.

And that is how males view opening the jar of spaghetti sauce

quote: ORIGINAL: <name removed>

quote:
Goobers, all of you!
join me next week when i incorporate power tools and home-made explosives to my aunt's famous mac and cheese recipe.
mmm, i'm sure i'll have lots left over, i am single. any takers?

That's Pro Goobers.

Macaroni and cheese. This could be a challenge... some appropriate containment strategies will have to be employed. I'll put together a dossier and notify the CIA.

I will file the flight plan with NASA. This should be interesting.

I just got a shipment of titanium wire in. Been looking for a good use for it. I think maybe we could use it to create a suspension rig for the magnetic rail gun to project the jar.

quote: ORIGINAL: <name removed>

Give me a can instead. Not a jar, a can. Actually three of them.

1.) Pork & Beans.
2.) Stag Chili.
3.) Canned Green Beans (preferably Green Giant brand).

Ah. Cans. Multiple. I see a home made mortar or cannon requirement. Man, 3 of them. How to get them all opened and combined at once. Now that will have be a clever trick.

Or maybe I am over-complicating this. Perhaps an old-fashioned trebuchet would do the trick. But we need to simmer, that means heat.... hmmm... AHA! Greek fire!

Oh yeah, this could be good. I will need my hard hat for this one.

quote: ORIGINAL: <name removed>

src="http://forums.crosswalk.com/upfiles/smiley/icon_smile_yikes.gif" alt="" align="middle" border="0" /> Spaghetti sauce, broken glass, and explosives. My oh my. The only thing missing is a torch. Ladies, isn't this why we don't let the guys in the kitchen unless they behave?

Did someone say they needed a torch? I have oxyacetylene, propane, and in a pinch, I can rig an oxygen tank together up with other flammable sources. Or do you just need the plain old "there's the ogre, grab your torch and pitchforks" kind of torch? I can soak some old rags in kerosene if you want.

All you ladies need to do is ask. When it comes to pyrotechnics, we men will try to oblige.

quote: ORIGINAL: <name removed>

quote: ORIGINAL: neuronstatic

You mean you guys don't have your OWN jaws of life? Weird.

I stupidly, stupidly lent my to a friend and now when I tell him I want it back, he gets all staticy on the phone like he doesn't have signal. And then I don't hear from him for awhile. What do you think this means?

It means it is time for some explosives to extricate said item from friend's domicile. Or just eliminate the domicile. Either works for me. I still get to wear my hard hat either way.

First off, I haven't figured out WHY you want to take the tire tracks off the entree. I mean, its like a garnish or something. Part of the presentation.

Oh man, a shop welder. Wow, that could be used to cook the meat by electrocution, or to build a custom rig to roast the roadkill on a spit. So many possibilities.

Can You Marry Without a Ceremony and Witnesses

2005-09-12T16:52:00.000-04:00

The following question was asked:

If a man and woman proclaim their love to one another with only God as their witness and they ask God to bless them as man and wife without a ceremony or legal papers, and the man and woman stay faithful to one another and uphold their vows, is this considered in Gods eyes valid? Or is it sinful?

Ok, I don't normally venture into these forums because of how quickly it becomes an opinion war, but I am going to risk it. I have read through most of the posts. Most are simply arguing back and forth it appears. And I *gasp* found myself agreeing with robalan at times. Had that not happened I would have ignored this entirely.

So here is my "opinion" to add to this, since that is pretty much all that is being discussed here.

The OP is definitely making some assumptions here, let me state them:

Both the man and woman are TRUE believers
They MUST make each some vow, at a minimum to God, then to each other
The vows to God must at a minimum be for the man to live as her husband, the woman to live as his wife

So first the validity of the assumptions.

If the man and woman are not TRUE believers, they will never approach God in honesty and integrity with God's will in their hearts. This assumption must hold true for the OP to even be considered.

Simply asking for a blessing is one thing. But the OP did mention "they uphold their vows". There is a presumption then that this couple made some vow. If there is no vow to God, then this entire argument falls apart. If the first assumption holds, that they are believers, then they will make a vow to God. And if they make a vow to God, it is logical to conclude they made a vow to each other, though not a requirement and I don't know why I even mentioned it.

Lastly, these vows, for the argument to stand, must include a promise made by the man to live as her husband and the woman to live as his wife or there is no cause for debate, because there is no marriage and therefore no requirements.

So if all 3 assumptions hold we have then: a man and a woman, both true believers, vow to God to live as husband and wife. Ok, that is the baseline of the argument to draw from.

So then, if the man and woman are alive, they exist in some society. Any society of humans has rules, even if they are unwritten. Though a hypothetical case could be crafted, it is irrelevant. We live in a real world. There are no societies of humans without rules. And if the first assumption holds true, then at a minimum they have God's word and laws etched in their heart. So yes, they live in a society with rules.

If the couple do not abide by the rules (we call them laws) of the society in which they live, they are now in error with God. See Romans 13:1

Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God.

To not submit to the local laws of the society you live in is therefore sin.

Now just for discussion's sake, let's grant a case in which the local custom is that no legal papers are required, but the mere testimony of the couple as to their vow is sufficient. Though it is arguable that their verbal and non-verbal testimonies as lived out each day constitute legal papers.

So then is a ceremony required?

Arguably no. However, it depends on what you consider a ceremony. A quick search on The Free Dictionary produces this:

A formal act or set of acts performed as prescribed by ritual or custom
A conventional social gesture or act of courtesy
A formal act without intrinsic purpose; an empty form
Strict observance of formalities or etiquette

Using definition 1, a ceremony is not required.

Using definition 2, by the act of the vows themselves, they have fulfilled this definition.

Using definition 3 would render the entire argument a moot point as it trivializes their vows to being empty and useless.

Using definition 4, a ceremony is not required.

So then we have that by definition 2, some kind of ceremony is held, if the assumption of vows holds.

Therefore it is illogical to posit the question as to whether or not a ceremony is required, because the act of vowing to God to live as husband and wife is some ceremony in and of itself.

I must therefore conclude that the only logical response to this OP question is the following:

Marriage outside of the rules of society violates God's requirements for us to live by the laws of the land and is therefore sinful.

This is my opinion. You mileage may vary.

Response was given:

The flaw in your conclusion is, as already stated, that there is nothing in social law or rules that requires a legal marriage for two partners to cohabit domestically.

Nor is there anything in social law making the act of living together unlawful or illegal without the benefit of a marriage license.

This makes your argument and conclusions moot....and the act of not marrying or living together without the benefit of a legal or religious observance not sinful at all based on God's requirements for us to obey the laws of the land.

The Laws of the land do not prohibit this type of arrangement, and therefore living together without the benefit of a marriage certificate remain perfectly legitimate before God based on the social rules test.

My response to that:
Negative on the flaw. Where does the cohabitation reference come from? I never mentioned it. It was not in the OP. Why did you inject it? Cohabitation is irrelevant to the conclusion and was not part of the assumptions or the OP.

And in some American states, per the local social customs AND laws (yes on the books) cohabitation with sexual activity has been illegal in the past. But we are not discussing is it ok to have sex outside of marriage. Again you are introducing something that is irrelevant to the OP and the conclusion.

And you are misquoting the OP when you rearrange the words to suit your cohabitation argument and thus redirect the discussion beyond the OP.

I never addressed cohabitation. It was not part of the OP. If you want to craft a question that incorporates cohabitation I would gladly address that as well.

As far as I can tell, nothing you have said negates my assumptions or conclusions. The cohabitation argument is not part of the question that was being answered.

And another response, quoting another poster:

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ Cohabitation is entirely relevant because the question has been raised by the original poster whether or not a living arrangement by couples without the benefit of a ceremony is valid.

Was this raised in a later post? It is not in original.

quote:

ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~

There is no legal or Biblical mandate to have a civilly or religiously recognized marriage or union.

Point to consider in the old testament. The Jewish culture was closely aligned with local culture when it came to business and contracts. In all cases of marriage in OT (at least that I could find), a woman was "given" in marriage and indeed there were legal penalties in the Mosaic Law for when the giver, the woman, or the receiver broke any of the terms of the contract. And furthermore a "certificate" of divorce was required to be written to terminate that contract. Explain why there are legal implications of contractual violation of marriage and a legal certificate was required by the Mosaic Law to release from contract if marriage was conducted in absence of a civilly or religiously recognized marriage or union.

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ The Bible does not prescribe a means by which a marriage should take place or be recognized.

Arguably true. Neither does it prescribe manner of attire, music, dating, cuisine, and many other facets of human existence. Granted.

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ Neither do US states. US states recognize anything from common law marriages from other jurisdictions, to common law marriage within their own jurisdictions. Some states even recognize marriages having ocurred after the fact for purposes of probate and inhertance when two people have merely lived together.

All US states require official documentation to be granted legal status as married couples. Even in the form of common law marriage. To obtain the legal status as married, documentation has to be filed. Thus there are 2 primary methods prescribed by most US states. Some may have more. But the first is filing of a marriage certificate that MUST have witnesses that observed the marriage "happening". The second is that the person administering the marriage (i.e. doing the paperwork) is licensed in that state to do so.

All US states recognize each other marriages, and in general this is also part of international law. There are laws in place to protect the marriage internationally and domestically. However in the US, each state is responsible for its own laws, procedures, forms, and processing. That is why some states, notably Virginia for it less stringent requirements, are so popular to get married in.

Just because you can't see the legal machine at work does not mean it does not exist. Marriage and the protection of marriage is also discussed in the United Nations. And they approach these very issues. That is why almost without exception among all the countries that are part of the UN have some legal policy on the prescribed legal attainment of marriage and its preservation.

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ Those who choose to cohabit, yet consider themselves married before God with no civil or relgious recognition have no requirements placed upon them by the state to act otherwise, nor is their arrangement deemed illegal by the states.

Some states, though they do not enforce the laws today, retain laws on the books that do just that and were enacted at the foundation of the state. However as they are not enforced I can allow their dismissal for debate.

However, when you turn the argument to the positive, every state has filing laws that require a marriage to be legally filed, usually requiring some small fee, that documents the marriage. This is so that there is proof that there is only one spouse per person (not sure about one particular state). Thus monogamy is supported legally through filing and paperwork. Polygamy is illegal in most states (maybe 49 in all - not sure about one).

Therefore you are incorrect about cohabitants considering themselves married. Indeed, they may think it, but there are legal ramifications. For example if you cohabitate with a "spouse" for a couple of years and then take a job that provides family health insurance, and you do not have proof that your "spouse" is your legal spouse, you are denied benefits in most cases. This is the case for federal employment and *most* large companies. Though some companies now offer medical insurance benefits to a "significant other". This is due mostly to homosexual tolerance and pandering. However, even in those cases, there has to be a documented monogamous relationship. Again, rules.

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ This makes your conclusion that a marriage not legally recognized as sinful to be completley false, because there are no "rules" or "laws" requireing such arrangements to be legally recognized or religiously recognized.

No, you have yet to show proof that marriage laws do not exist. Therefore my conclusion as I wrote it stands. I have shown in the above that such rules and laws exist not only domestically but internationally as well. I welcome to hear about exceptions. Yet as I said in my assertions, if you live in human society, there are rules and laws. And it IS the case that marriage is governed by all governments throughout the planet. Any exceptions are just that, exceptions.

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ Those who choose such arrangements simply do not share or partake of the legal benefits legal marriages may automatically convey.

Then by choosing not to obey the laws of the land, they are in sin. Again, my conclusion still stands.

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ The point is, you claimed that if it goes against local law, it is sin in God's eyes, because God requires us to defer to those in authority over us. While it is true that God requires us to obey the rules....there are no rules to obey in this case.

But there are. Prove it otherwise. All US states, all countries have rules regarding marriage. Prove that statement wrong with more than opinion.

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ There are no legal requirements to marry...

There is no requirement to seek marriage. But there are legal requirements for marriage. Blood tests, filing fees, assuring there are no existing marriages, mandatory waiting periods, etc. Again, where is your proof that these do not exist?

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ There are no legal prohibitions against living together or cohabiting or whatever one wants to call it without the benefit of marriage.

True. So what? That was not the question. I can cohabitate with someone of opposite gender for convenience of paying a mortgage and sleep in separate bed rooms. Possibly a dangerous thing to do for sure, but nothing prohibits this. If there is sexual relations, that is sin covered VERY well by the scriptures.

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ It therefore remains a false and erroneous conclusion that God considers such arrangements as inately sinful, because no civil laws or rules are being broken. PERIOD.

You are incorrect again. I have shown it clearly and you must show proof otherwise to make that assertion. There are civil rules governing marriage and rights. Are you talking about rights or sex? I think you appear to be justifying sexual relations outside of marriage. That is an entirely different thread. Do not take that up in this one.

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~ Back to the original question:

Please!!!

quote: ORIGINAL: ~name-withheld~
quote:

"If a man and woman proclaim their love to one another with only God as their witness and they ask God to bless them as man and wife without a ceremony or legal papers, and the man and woman stay faithful to one another and uphold their vows, is this considered in Gods eyes valid? Or is it sinful? "
The answer to this question here, is an emphatic YES the arrangement is a valid marriage in God's eyes and an emphatic NO it is not sinful.

If they live on this planet, then no it is not valid. Yes it is sin. Emphatically. Grammatically. Economically. Ecumenically. Theoretically. Stochastically. Scholastically. I think I have run out.

I ask you please. Show me the proof that there are no laws governing marriage? There is no place you can go to escape social laws, morays, customs, isms, rules, etc. As long as there are societal rules governing marriage, one must follow those rules. Only if those rules directly defy God's ordinances can they be suspect.

Edited: I asked if you were married. I checked out some of your posts. You are married. So I change my question to "are you legally married and gone through the legal process?

Edited again and for the last time.

~name-withheld~, I have now gone through some of your posts about this. You will never agree with me. I will never agree with you. When I saw you make the assertion that one cannot legally marry after divorce I realized something about your posts. Legalistic when convenient. Ignore laws when convenient. I am divorced and quite legally can remarry in God's eyes. Please pm me for disagreement and keep it away from these fine folks.

I cannot continue this debate despite the fact that I like debate. Your faith basis and mine are too far different.

I extract myself from this thread entirely. Have a good day folks. Sorry to have stirred the waters and left, but I see no logic in continuing.

Should Women Approach Men?

2005-09-12T16:29:00.000-04:00

The following are some posts I made in a singles thread once about women approaching men for dating:

I see nothing wrong with a woman approaching a man.

I see two aspects of this. First is there a scriptural element, is this appropriate per the scriptures? Secondly, in our respective societies and cultures (not all are Americans here in these forums), what are the practical and security considerations?

I think that regarding the first part it is my assertion that a lot of our beliefs about this aspect of relationships comes from our cultural context. However, I think this deserves some exegesis.

So I am going to start looking through the scriptures for general and regulative principles. Just to keep things out of the Jewish cultural context, I will not be going to the Old Testament scriptures at this time, but instead I will concentrate on the New Testament scriptures first, then look to the OT second. I believe this is proper given that my pre-supposition is that our beliefs are mostly cultural and the NT has the most cross-cultural instructions.

This should be fun. I am really curious what scriptures will be used to support the various opinions.

Now regarding the second part, as an American, our culture and society is fairly level in this regard and has been for many generations. There exists a prevailing myth that the woman never approached first. However in hearing the stories from my own extended family about our past and present, I don't see there being any major alignment to either side.

Yet, I think it is culturally appropriate for Americans at least that the man be the one to propose. Maybe this is just tradition in me speaking, but as I think about it, it makes more sense. Using the scriptural model of the man being the head of the house, it only makes sense that he be the one to initiate such a union as he will be absorbing the bulk of the financial and leadership responsibilities.

Still, I have no problem with a woman approaching a man like me first to say "hey I like you". In fact, where is she?

post:

So when asked about the kinds of signal's a girl can give, the most "obvious" signals by girls' standards are not even seen by a guy. Subtlety is not the art of the male typically. It's easy. Follow me here.

1. Sitting alone looking pretty is not an obvious sign, maybe you always look like that. We can't tell if you are looking pretty specifically for us.

2. An occasional smile is not an obvious sign, everyone smiles. If you just smile at me when I stare, you could be just being polite, or smiling at the person behind me.

3. Laughing at his jokes is not an obvious sign, he obviously thinks they are funny anyway. We think we are funny. The laugh is expected anyway. Again, not a sign.

4. Doing things in secret hoping they are noticed is not an obvious sign, ask any woman in a relationship, they will tell you, guys don't notice this kind of stuff.

5. Giving gifts could be a sign, but could just weird us out unless we knew you better. So avoid this sign.

6. Hanging around near us a lot is not necessarily a sign. If we are confident, we expect people to want to. If we are not, we may think you are a loser like ourselves.

So what do you do then?

1. Just smile, say "hi", and follow that with "I noticed you" or "I like you". Trust me, if the guy is at all remotely interested, his brain just went from park to overdrive. That is how simple it is.

Thar's all. But I must caution you. Do not walk up to a guy and do that unless you want his attention, because you will get it.

post:

I was asked what it meant to "approach" a male. I responded with the following.

Well I don't think it means approach as in landing lights, wind sock, radar tower, and the like. I think of it as simple as a girl walking over to a guy and saying "hi, I just noticed you and wanted to introduce myself". Or even sending an email to a guy to say "hi, I just saw something you posted and wanted to talk about it with you"

post:

Let me just say I am truly thankful for one woman in particular to take a small amount of initiative and email me just to say "hi" and "that was a good post". And then to email me a second time to say "isn't that sig line from Dune?"

That is all the approach it took. And I am thankful and happy for that approach.

Amy, thank you for approaching me so I could approach you and God could bring us together in His timing. And as we continue to walk toward each other, and cover these miles, it was you who took the first step. Thank you. I love you.

My "Icky" Love Letter Posts

2005-09-12T16:15:00.000-04:00

8/1/2005 6:28:25 PM

My dearest love,

I look at your long ebon locks of hair draped on your shoulders that frame your sweet face. I think of the veil of night that frames a dream. Your eyes are the starlight in this night. Your sweet smile is the crescent moon that lights a path to love. In dreams my heart takes flight through your skies. And on silken wings you fly to me. How long until the distance is gapped? How long until we at last embrace in unabashed love? Until then, my dearest, I dwell in your visage.

Your admiring slave of passion,

neuronstatic

8/1/2005 8:36:56 PM

My astral sweet,

Your love is like a supernova in my heart. I quantum leap when I but think of you. I get lost in the constellation of your eyes, and I don't want to steer a course away. I trek across the universe and no other as sweet as you do I find. You are my stargate to love. You are my peace keeper and I am your wanderer so far from home.

Your devoted human,

neuronstatic

8/5/2005 3:27:59 PM

<name withheld>,

I saw you today, though you were no where around. I sat at my desk and I closed my eyes and I saw you. I could see your smile, your eyes so bright, and you were so happy. I could see your hair, a light breeze blowing it loosely. I could feel the chill on my arms at the thought of touching your hair, of running my fingers through it.

I drew closer and I could hear your laugh. And I held that moment. Standing there, the living breathing woman that my heart longs for. I wanted to take you by the hand and tell you I love you. I wanted to tell you so many things, and I wanted to hear your voice. I wanted to hear just four words. I desperately wanted to hear "I love you too" spoken from your lips.

Yet slowly the sounds of an office rose up in my ears. I opened my eyes, and you were gone. I lost you without every having you. And I stare at my computer monitor. I sigh, and I go back to work. I live and I breathe, but my heart lingers on you. I write and I read, but my mind still holds that image of you.

I am hopeless.

8/8/2005 9:49:35 PM

C,

Tonight I saw your eyes. I looked into them and I saw beauty. The smile on your face made my heart leap. Time stopped and I drank in the vision of you. How I want to drink in that vision always. How do I wait? How do I go on? My dearest, do not keep me waiting forever. But as long as I must wait, I shall. You are worth the wait. And in waiting, I will dream of you. Until then, I hold the vision of your beauty near. I hold it tightly and I dare not let go. To let go of that vision would be madness. Until then my sweet. Until then.

K

8/13/2005 7:57:00 PM

To the love that was not,
But I wanted it to be.
See not from without,
Look inside of me.

See things that are kept
In secrets and dreams.
To long for you still,
Is harder than it seems.

Hope is now all but lost,
To find love in my life.
Yet still I continue to pray,
For a godly loving wife.

8/31/2005 11:28:01 PM

Dearest one,

You are so far from me, and yet I hold you in my thoughts so closely. I see your face in my dreams. And I picture us walking arm in arm. I long for a day with you, and even more so I long for a night. I long to make you my wife and enjoy you forever.

I would so much like to reach out to you right now and hold you. Pull you tight against me and feel our hearts beating together. And feel the warmth of your skin against mine. I have these desires, they are so strong. God requires me to wait still. And wait I shall. But I wait in hope that I will hold you one day.

I must now be patient and wait for the Lord's leading. Oh how I pray that the Lord leads you to me. My heart is yours for the asking. I willingly share it with you. Come now and take my heart and take my hand. Walk with me through life and let our love grow always.

Good night my sweet, may God keep you in the hollow of His hand. And may I soon caress you each night.

Do we over spiritualize dating?

2005-08-19T09:38:00.000-04:00

There has been a lot of verbiage tossed about regarding how we are to approach our singleness and dating. I have seen a lot of confusion on the part of many, myself included, as to how spiritual our approach and our dating should be. Some hold to an extreme that it is just dating, no big deal, just don't sin. Others hold to an extreme that sees the entire approach to singleness as a spiritual matter second only to their salvation. While I know that I may be exaggerating a bit, it is to illustrate the range of opinions.

To me, finding my life partner is an overtly spiritual journey. But there are general and regulative principles from scripture to apply here. These principles tell me that my focus is to be on God, but I am perfectly free to seek a life partner, and in my case, should do so. There are also principles that tell me that God is in control, and I must be active in seeking this partner to work with God. At no time are these scriptural principles at odds. On the contrary the complement each other well.

So my question is:

How much of our dating and seeking a partner in life is overtly spiritual and how much is under spiritual principles but is more akin to just daily living?

To be sure, I am not condemning anyone for how they perceive their own spiritual life or how they proceed with their singleness. I just don't agree with everyone.

For starters, some have the impression that I have somehow separated out finding my future special woman from my spiritual walk. Well, you were wrong in the presumption and over-analysis of my question. That is simply not the case.

Indeed, as this is one of the most significant journeys of my life, I involve God in all aspects of it including praying for wisdom and guidance for myself, praying for God to provide me with the right woman, and praying that God protect me from the pain, betrayal, and my own fears of the past.

What I personally think of when I refer to over-spiritualizing our singleness and dating, is when people do one of the following:

Apply general and regulative principles from the scriptures inappropriately. For example, there is a general principle that we be in the world but not of it, and then misapplying that to say I could never take a date to a non-Christian movie.
Translate a command of God into a set of rules to limit freedom in Christ. For example, we are commanded to do all things to the glory of God, and then misapplying that to say that based on their opinion of some things, like going bowling or to the movies, certain activities are prohibited because they do not overtly glorify God.
Look at practical living and place undue spiritual emphasis on physical matters. For example, there is no spiritual dilemma in choosing the color of my shirt when I would go to meet my special woman on a date. She may have a preference for a specific color for me to wear, and I want to please her, but I do not have to fret and wring my hands over it.
Take spiritual direction in one person's life and assume it is generally applicable to all. For example, some may have been single a long time and now feel that God has given them the direction that they are to remain single and not to worry about it. But that does not mean that all singles are to simply accept that direction given to another. We are to look to God in our own walk, our own situations, and pursue His purpose for our lives with vigor and clarity, and I believe that means at times doing something that may seem completely opposite of what another has been directed to do.
Looking at a particular situation in your life and using the temporal feeling you have as your spiritual barometer. Two examples: a) you find someone you are REALLY attracted to and you know "this must be the one" and you move too quickly, when it may just be your natural attraction to them and you end up getting hurt, and b) you find someone you are REALLY attracted to, but you don't get that feeling of "the one" and you move too slowly and lose the opportunity and end up getting hurt.
Taking the scriptures too far in our practical daily lives. For example, some have made statements that sound pious, but when taken exactly as written, without the context of the scriptures around it, would indicate our very existence should be day and night reading the Word and praying with only minimal bodily sustenance and the rejection of all pleasures. God never intended that for everyone, and only arguably for monks.

As I have said many times before, I seek balance. There has to be a balance in all things.

This does not mean I set up the scales with God on one side and all my other stuff of life on the other. Absolutely not!

This DOES mean that I have to balance all things in my life on the fulcrum of God. He is my underpinning, my foundation, and in Him only do I find my existence. But He also destined me for a full life to enjoy His creation and all His spiritual and physical blessings He has in store for me.

For this man Kevin, I fully believe and feel directed by God, that I am to seek and pursue a godly woman to fulfill my emotional and physical needs as my wife. And she will be the one that, in like fashion, God would have directed her to seek me to be the one to fulfill her emotional and physical needs as her husband.

You know its interesting to note that the longer I walk the earth, the easier it is to see how amazing God is and how He has planned and moved completely without my help. I find that comforting. And when I see God in everything, it becomes quite natural to see how God weaves our lives together. So the longer I walk with Christ, the more natural it becomes to see the handiwork of God in all things.

And for me, the more natural that becomes, and the more I see His hand at work, the more natural it looks. So it is no longer some deep spiritual movement that I see in a particular situation or event, but the quite obvious and natural movement of the Holy Spirit at work. And thus all things are of God's creation, order, and design and are moved according to His purpose.

So then the "natural" world for me becomes God's world. It is not God moving in a foreign world. It is God moving His plan, and His works, through His creation. And knowing that I am a part of that creation, I know that He has placed me in this world specifically, it was not by chance, it was ordained of God. And to this purpose: we are all here to Glorify God.

God delights in His creation. He has created a marvelous dwelling for us all. Even while it is in this fallen state, it is beautiful. I can only imagine how much more beautiful it was before the fall. So when I look to the creation, I see animals moving and living, birthing and dying, and hunting and eating. God has made it clear that it is He that feeds all these creatures and sustains them. Yet they still take action and move and hunt and kill in order to survive. The images that come to mind are that of lions chasing prey and, funny enough, a bird "listening" for worms to pull from the ground.

So it appears to me that living in the creation with God at the helm and in control of all things is a fact of existence. And like the lions and the birds, I must be at all times actively working for God, to do His will in my life, and listen to him for my sustenance.

And now back to the OP. It is clear to me, that there is no conflict between my active participation in my relationships and pursuit of a wife and my being mindful and listening to God for His direction. I must do both. I must work according to His plan for my life and I must listen to Him to know what that plan is.

For me, then, living is spiritual by nature and so I find God in all events and activities of life even when I am not looking for Him. Thank God for that.

Edited to note: And all that worked. I found my lifelong mate, Amy. I was not looking for her, but God drew us together and we only did as He would have us do. So we emailed, we called, and we talked. And in all things, God was moving. I love that woman, Amy, my wife.

What To Expect

2005-08-19T09:17:00.000-04:00

Welcome to the ADD world of neuronstatic.

Allow me to describe what not to expect here in this blog. First and foremost, do not expect to find things you will always agree with. Secondly, do expect to find things that always have a simple answer.

What should you expect? You should expect to see some controversial things you may or may not agree with. You should expect to see things that are often complex and cannot be easily summed up.

Why did I create this blog? Because I have been posting on Crosswalk forums and some of the things I have posted were my honest thoughts and I decided I wanted to explore some of those ideas a little further without boring everyone in the threads.

What do I expect of you? Just respect me and know that my intentions are not to attack any one person nor am I seeking to try to elevate myself above others. My honest intentions are to record here some of the things I think about, regardless of what any others may think of them. So therefore expect that I will delete any flaming comments. I can take criticism, but I will not leave acerbic comments on this blog.

With that, I bid you peace. Enter or leave at your leisure. No one will force you to read anything.