Men, tonight I'm preaching on the subject of divorce, and this is a great passage to
start with.
I was preaching on Wednesday night and I didn't get through a lot of Deuteronomy chapter 22,
so I figured I'd build in some of that material into tonight's sermon to make up for the part
of Deuteronomy 22 I wasn't able to cover on Wednesday night.
So in Matthew chapter 19, the Pharisees come unto Jesus asking Him a question.
They're testing Him, they're tempting Him, they're trying to trip Him up or find a way
to accuse Him and say that He's preaching false doctrine or heresy or even get Him in
trouble with the law if they can.
And so this is one of those incidents where they come to tempt Him.
Look at verse number three.
It says, the Pharisees also came unto Him, tempting Him and saying to Him, is it lawful
for a man to put away his wife for every cause?
And what they're asking is, according to the law of God, that's what they mean by is it
lawful.
According to God's law, is it okay to just divorce your wife for every cause, meaning
just for absolutely any reason, can you just divorce your wife?
And you say, well, that sounds kind of crazy to be able to just divorce your wife for any
reason.
Then what does marriage even mean at that point if you can just divorce your wife for
any reason?
But of course, that's exactly the situation today in America in 2023 where you can just
get a divorce for absolutely every cause or no cause.
You could just go to the judge and just say, I want to get a divorce and I don't even have
a reason, granted, right?
Because we have what's called no fault divorce, easy divorce ever since the year 1970.
This has been something that happened in California and then it spread across the nation and now
all 50 states have this where you just get divorced for absolutely no reason.
Islam has this.
According to Quran, you can divorce your wife for every cause, but is that what the Bible
teaches?
Well, they asked Jesus, they say, hey, is it lawful to put away your wife for every
cause?
Can you just get divorced for any reason?
He answered and said unto them, verse four, have you not read, he said, why are you asking
me the answers in the Bible?
Have you not read that he was made them at the beginning, made them male and female and
said for this cause shall a man leave his father and mother and shall cleave to his
wife and they twain, that means two and they too shall be one flesh.
Wherefore they are no more twain but one flesh.
What therefore God has joined together.
Let not man put a center at this point.
Jesus is done talking.
That's his answer.
There you go.
That's the answer done, right?
They say, hey, can a man put away his wife for every cause?
He said, hey, didn't you read the Bible?
What God has joined together, let not man put us under.
God wants the man and the woman to be married for life.
It's till death do us part and so that's his answer, but then they press him further and
they say to him, why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement and to put
her away?
There's a very strange way that they word this, isn't it?
I mean, did God, did Moses ever really command you?
Like you are going to divorce that wife, sucker.
Like where is that verse in the Bible?
It doesn't exist.
Why did Moses command to put her away?
To give her a writing of divorcement and to put her away, but that's not what the Bible
actually commanded.
What it actually said is, hey, if you put away your wife, then you have to give her
a bill of divorcement, but he didn't say divorce your wife and give her a bill of divorcement.
So you can tell just by the subtle way that they word things here that they have a wrong
attitude about this.
They're looking at this thing the wrong way.
They want to get divorced.
They want to justify divorce.
They want this to be the case and so that's why they twist things a little bit and then
Jesus picks up on this of course and he answers them according to the way they asked the question.
He says, Moses, verse eight, because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put
away your wives.
Now the word suffer means to allow.
So they're saying, well, why did God command her to put away?
Why did Moses command her to command you to put her away?
And he says, well, no, no, no.
Moses allowed you to put them away.
He didn't command you to put them away.
He allowed you, he suffered you to put away your wives because of the hardness of your
heart.
This wasn't God's original plan.
It's not God's original intent.
It's not his perfect will or his plan, but he just said it's something that he allowed
because of the hardness of your hearts, but from the beginning it was not so.
And I say unto you, whosoever shall put away his wife, putting away is just another word
for divorce, whosoever shall put away his wife except to be for fornication and shall
marry another committed adultery and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit
adultery.
He's saying, no, no, no.
That's not God's original intent.
Do not divorce your wives.
God, you know, Moses allowed you to divorce your wives for the hardness of your hearts,
but unless it's for fornication, he says, if you put away your wife and marry someone
else, you're committing adultery.
And if you marry her, which is divorced, you're committing adultery.
His disciples say unto him, verse 10, if the case of the man be so with his wife, it's
not good to marry.
They say, wow, you know, if I'm just stuck with her, no matter what, you know, should
I even get married?
Right.
And I hope that they were kind of kidding when they said that, you know, when I kind
of envision this, that they're kind of joking a little bit like, oh, man, well, in that
case, maybe maybe we shouldn't even get married or something, because I really hope that they
weren't serious, because that's kind of just a dumb statement.
It's the case of the man be so with his wife, it's not good to marry.
He said to them, all men cannot receive this saying, say they to him and he said, look,
some people can't handle this kind of preaching.
But it's truth.
It's the word of God, whether you can handle it or not.
He that is able to receive it, let him receive it.
And then he goes on to use this illustration about eunuchs.
Eunuchs are men who've actually had their gonads cut off, OK?
Not their privy member, but their stones, trying to word this in a biblical way here.
They've had part of their anatomy removed, OK, so that they can no longer perform as
a man would perform in marriage.
And the reason for this is because you'd have queens throughout history that would have
male servants and male attendants, and there's a fear that basically these men could seduce
the queen or have their way with the princess or whatever.
And so they want to have these male guards around to protect them, but they don't want
any hanky-panky happening between these male guards and servants and the women that they're
protecting.
So basically they would make it physically impossible for them to have relations with
these women.
This is just a practice throughout history.
God never prescribes this.
God never condones this.
God never tells anybody to chop off anybody's parts.
But it's just something that has happened throughout history.
It's a reality of the world that we live in.
And so he says there are some eunuchs which were so born from their mother's womb.
These are basically men that are born in such a way that they're physically deformed, right?
They don't have a functioning reproductive anatomy from birth.
They're just deformed, right?
They have a birth defect.
And then he says there are some eunuchs which were made eunuchs of men.
That's what we just talked about, right?
Where they would make them eunuchs.
Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they were made eunuchs by the Babylonians when
they were taken into captivity.
How do we know that?
Because the guy that was in charge of Daniel was called the master of the eunuchs, and
that was his master.
So put two and two together.
And then it says here that there be eunuchs which have made themselves eunuchs for the
kingdom of heaven's sake.
He that is able to receive it, let him receive it.
Some people have misinterpreted this that somehow men have chopped off their own anatomy
for the kingdom of heaven's sake.
No, God does not ever want us to mutilate ourselves.
He does not condone of that kind of mutilation.
That's not what he's prescribing here.
He's talking about they've figuratively have made themselves eunuchs, not literally chopping
anything off, but that they have just abstained from that relationship.
They have just remained single, like, for example, the apostle Paul just remained single
so that he could just focus on serving God full time.
Most men, that's not going to be the will of God for their lives.
It's not going to be the best way for them to live their lives.
But there are exceptions to that, like an apostle Paul.
And so there are some men who have made themselves eunuchs in that sense for the kingdom of heaven's
sake.
He that is able to receive it, let him receive it.
He's just saying, look, you know, there are people who've foregone that relationship to
serve God.
So therefore, you know, I'm not being too strict in saying that if you get married,
you need to just stick with that one woman for the rest of both of your natural lives.
That's not that extreme in light of the fact that some dudes are a eunuch.
Hey, you're sorry, you're sorry that you have to be stuck with the same woman for the rest
of your life.
Hey, at least you're not a eunuch, bro.
You know, get over it.
That's what he's basically saying.
It could be worse.
It could be a eunuch, you know.
But obviously, marriage is a beautiful thing.
Being monogamous is beautiful.
What this world offers of just going and whoring around is not going to be what it's cracked
up to be anyway.
It isn't right.
It's ungodly.
And it's not going to bring you happiness anyway, right?
You're going to have happiness in following God's plan, staying married to the same person
till death, you do part.
So that's the basic teaching here in Matthew chapter 19.
Pretty clear, but I want to delve back into some things in Deuteronomy because there's
a little bit of debate about what this means when it says, whosoever shall put away his
wife except it be for fornication and shall marry another committed adultery.
Some people will try to take this really broad interpretation of this and say fornication
is just any sexual sin whatsoever.
They'll just try to just paint with a really broad brush.
That could be adultery.
That could be pornography.
That could just be your husband just looking at another woman or your woman just looking
at another man.
And obviously that's just crazy, okay, to try to broaden it in that way.
When the Bible says fornication, it's talking about fornication, okay?
And fornication is different than adultery, okay?
What is the difference, okay?
Adultery involves a married woman.
Fornication does not, right?
Fornication we're talking about singles versus adultery is breaking a marriage vow, right?
So two singles sleep together, that's fornication because they're not married, right?
Sleeping with another man's wife, that's adultery, okay?
And so this is not the same thing, okay?
It's quite different.
And the Bible is pretty consistent about using these words differently.
Some preachers will come along and say, oh, fornication, adultery are synonymous, but
they really aren't, okay?
And so where they get the pornography thing is they go back to the Greek and they look
at the word and they say, oh, porneia, that sounds like porno.
But just because things sound alike doesn't mean that they mean the same thing.
You have to be careful of what's called a false friend.
When you're learning another language and you see a word that you think you know what
it means because it sounds just like something in English, but it turns out to mean something
totally different, okay?
Here's a good example.
There's the word actual in German, actual.
What do you think that means, actual?
Like actual or actually, right?
And I believe this is in French as well.
Where are my French speakers tonight?
Who speaks French?
Actuelmo, right?
Is that a word?
Currently.
So it doesn't mean actually, it means currently, okay?
So if I said, das ist meine Actuelle Frau, that wouldn't mean that's my, she's actually
my wife, it would mean like she's my current wife, okay?
So that's a totally different meaning, right?
It's not my actual wife, it's my current wife.
That'd be a weird thing to say for me because I've only had one, okay?
And so the point is that's a false friend.
Here's another one in Spanish, embarazada, embarazada, right?
It sounds like you're embarrassed and it can mean that, but usually embarazada means pregnant,
okay?
Or then there's las esposas.
It sounds like it's the wives, but las esposas are handcuffs.
You can psychoanalyze that all you want.
But anyway, in Spanish, the only word that I've ever seen for handcuffs is esposas.
You know, policemen will say, dame las esposas.
That's what it is.
So anyway, these words are like a false friend, so you can't just, these guys just go back
to the Greek and they see, you know, oh, dunamos, that's like dynamite.
You know, dynamite is invented like thousands of years later.
But then they're going to read that dynamite back into the text, you know?
They're going to read some of those modern ideas back into the text, like, oh, porno,
porneia, okay.
You know, obviously you can see why these things are related, but you can't do that.
That's why you need to just read the Bible in English, folks, okay?
And don't just be dabbling in the Greek when you don't know the language.
You can't read it fluently, you're just looking things up and then you get all these crazy
ideas.
No, no, my friend, the English word fornication is what we're looking at.
Study that word, see it throughout the Bible.
It's talking about sex outside of marriage.
That's what we're talking about with fornication.
In general, we're not talking necessarily about adultery, right?
That's something different.
So he says, whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall
marry another, commiteth adultery.
So let's delve into this a little bit.
Before we go back to Deuteronomy, though, let's go back to Matthew chapter 1.
Matthew chapter 1, and let's look at an example of divorce here in Matthew chapter 1, because
of course the story with Joseph and Mary, they are actually married, but they haven't
consummated the marriage yet.
So they're basically, we could call it engaged, but it's a little more than being engaged
because he's already espoused her, she's his spouse, but they have not come together yet.
They've not consummated the marriage.
They haven't gotten to that stage in the process yet.
And before Joseph and Mary have come together, she is found to be pregnant.
Now what's going through Joseph's mind?
He's not envisioning the virgin birth.
That's never happened before.
He doesn't have a copy of the New Testament in his back pocket.
So you've got to put yourself in his shoes.
He's got this fiancé, all of a sudden she's pregnant.
Pretty obvious what's going on here.
She has played the whore.
She has been with somebody else.
So let's look at the story together in Matthew chapter 1.
It says in verse number 18, now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise, when as
his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph.
So you know the contract has been made, they got the marriage license, but before they
came together, right, what does it say?
It says, when as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph before they came together, she was
found with child, and of course we know that that child is of the Holy Ghost.
But Joseph doesn't know that.
Joseph just thinks that she's been unfaithful.
Verse 19, then Joseph her husband being a just man and not willing, that means not desiring,
not wanting to make her a public example, was minded to put her away privily.
So Joseph is not being ungodly or wicked here by wanting to put her away or divorce her
because of the fact that the Bible says he being a just man and not willing to make her
a public example, he was minded to put her away privily.
Now two different facts about Joseph in this verse.
Number one is that he's a just man.
What he's doing is lawful and right.
The second thing is that he doesn't want to make her a public example.
Why does he not want to make her a public example?
You could speculate about this.
You could say, well, he just loves her so much that he doesn't want to make her a public
example, and that's very possible.
The text doesn't really tell us why.
Another thing could be is it might just be kind of embarrassing for him too.
He doesn't really want to go down as the guy whose fiancé was out doing this stuff or
whatever, but for whatever the reason, he doesn't want to make her a public example.
He doesn't want to make a big deal out of it.
He just wants to just quietly annul this thing is what we would call it today.
We wouldn't call that divorce, would we?
In 2023 America, we would call this annulment.
Now that's not what the Bible uses.
The Bible never used the term annulment, but that's what this is when we have it at this
very early stage because in 2023 America, if you get married and you go to consummate
the marriage, and I mean I've heard some horror stories about people who literally
got married and like on the wedding night, they had a big fight.
They tore up the license.
They got angry.
They're yelling, and they literally broke up on the first night.
Okay, well, in that case, what it's called in America is you don't get divorced.
It's called you get it annulled.
Who knows what I'm talking about, annulment, okay?
When something happens really early on and you say, hey, this isn't what I expected.
This isn't the person I thought they were.
They get an annulment, okay?
That's basically what Joseph is doing here.
He doesn't want to go through and consummate this marriage.
He wants to get it annulled right away.
I read a biography about this endurance athlete where he ended up, he got married to this
woman and she didn't want to marry him, but she was afraid to back out of the wedding
because so many people had been invited and the invitations had gone out, so she just
went through with the wedding anyway even though she knew she wasn't going to marry
him.
She had a honeymoon.
She just avoided him, wouldn't touch him, and then, you know, just tells him it's
over.
I'm in love with another man.
I was just too scared to tell you.
How humiliating.
How embarrassing.
So he didn't even consummate the marriage, but they end up getting it annulled.
They got an annulment, okay?
That's what that is.
Now, the Bible doesn't use that word.
The Bible just says put away or divorce, okay?
So he is going to put her away privily, secretly.
He just wants to keep it quiet, just divorce her, be done with it, move on.
Now, why?
Because of the fact that she has committed in his mind, he thinks that she has committed
what sin?
So this is an exact example.
Look, compare scripture with scripture, folks.
When you're in Matthew 19, we're in the book of Matthew.
Typically, before you read chapter 19, you read chapter 1 and we see an exact example
of divorcing your wife or putting away your wife because of fornication.
Because some people would say, well, how could you divorce your wife because of fornication?
You're married, so it's adultery.
Well, exhibit A, Matthew 1, she is put away because of what?
Fornication.
And this might seem odd to us, but we have to understand that there are going to be some
cultural differences between the way we live in 2023 America and the way things were back
in the Bible days.
So you got to compare scripture with scripture and take the bottom of what it says.
Keep your finger here, go to Luke 16.
Now Luke 16 is a book or I should say the Gospel of Luke, the whole Gospel of Luke is
a book that's not really written with a Hebrew or a Jewish audience in mind.
Now the book of Matthew is just constantly quoting the Old Testament and it's really
geared toward people who know the Old Testament.
You could say it's geared toward the Jews or it's geared toward the Hebrews and so it's
constantly referencing Old Testament things and expecting them to understand those things.
Whereas the book of Luke is more written to just a typical Greek speaking audience, just
kind of the Greek world at that time.
And so it doesn't really get complicated on those type of issues.
Look at Luke chapter 16 and we'll find a parallel passage.
In Luke 16 it says in verse 18, whosoever putteth away his wife and marrieth another
comitteth adultery and whosoever marrieth her that is put away from her husband comitteth
adultery period.
So notice that there's no exception given there.
Whereas in Matthew 19 we have this exception given, right?
Now that's pretty different isn't it?
Well maybe it's not that different because if that was just super different whether you
have this exception or not, that'd be a little weird to have Luke 16 and Matthew 19 to be
teaching things that are so different.
But how about this?
How about the exception in Matthew 19 is so rare that it's not even worth bringing up
in Luke 16?
How about that?
How about it's 99% not going to happen so we don't need to bring it up in Luke 16 because
in general if you divorce your wife and marry someone else you're committing adultery.
In general if you marry a divorced woman you're committing adultery so therefore Luke
16 is true.
Matthew 19 speaking to an audience that is more familiar with the law while arguing with
the Pharisees about this issue and they're really pinning him down, well why is divorce
happening in Deuteronomy, he says well if you do it except for that cause of fornication
you're committing adultery.
But people want to just take that fornication and just run with it and just try to find
all these exceptions.
And then of course now modern day independent fundamental Baptists say there's an exception
for adultery, abuse, abandonment, okay now look let's just stop.
I know they all start with an A and pastors love things that come in threes that start
with an A. You know adultery, abuse, abandonment.
But here's the thing about that, you could pretty much make every single situation, every
marriage fit one of these three.
Here's the problem with this doctrine that says well don't get a divorce except for adultery,
abuse, abandonment because you know what you'll find is that Christians will fit their situation
to one of those three.
They'll say well he's kind of abandoned me emotionally or what they'll do is they'll
just start treating each other like garbage seeing who's going to abandon first.
Like they'll try to push the other person to abandon them it's like yes she abandoned
me I'm free you know that's their attitude okay and I've seen it I've seen people
literally just like trying to get the other person to pull the trigger so then they can
just say oh I was abandoned or and I've literally I'm not making this up folks this
isn't theoretical I'm saying I've been to King James only soul winning independent fundamental
Baptist churches where the pastor literally told a woman well he's abandoned you emotionally.
He's abandoned you emotionally you know what is that?
It's garbage is what it is or abuse what does that mean?
Well verbal abuse, emotional abuse right or he threw a raw hot dog and hit me in the face
or something you know I mean what is that like again people will just say you know he
used profanity he yelled at me I heard another pastor say oh well if he has drugs in the
home you have every right to leave him.
If he's doing illegal activity get out of there if he's smoking pot get out of there
is that what the Bible says and that doesn't start with an A either there's no word for
pot that starts with an A that I can think of is that I know there's a lot of slang words
for marijuana but I don't think any of them start with an A anybody?
Yeah see what I'm saying but case closed let's pray and go home no but my point is
you know they just start making up things like oh your husband spoke pot divorce him
oh you know he you know he's I don't know rip the tags off the mattress illegal activity
you know illegal guns divorce him.
Folks the Bible doesn't teach that the Bible says don't get divorced God made them at the
beginning male and female don't have this Pharisee attitude where you just got to find
that loophole you're just trying to find a reason to get divorced and you say well Pastor
Anderson I'm already divorced and you're offending me right now.
Well look love the one you're with my friend okay if you're married right now then stay
married instead I'm not trying to beat you up about your past I don't care about your
past you can't change the past so what move on go forward I'm not here to make anybody
feel bad about something that happened in the past I'm telling you right now if you're
married you better be committed and it's till death do you part and you don't get divorced
for any reason take that word out of your vocabulary it should never come up in a fight
it shouldn't you know look you get mad you say stuff that you don't mean in a fight but
don't ever say that don't ever say the D word okay it should not be in our vocabulary.
You shouldn't sit around thinking well we could always get divorced no you are married
for life and don't be trying to find a loophole because if you want to find a loophole you're
going to find one right abandonment abuse you know which aren't even biblical by the
way no chapter and verse on abuse no chapter and verse well the abandonment they're twisting
1st Corinthians 7 that's another sermon but it's an abuse they're the only abuse that's
going on is the way they abused 1st Corinthians 7 the way they abused the Bible the way they
abused doctrine look Jesus Christ is flat out saying don't do it in Matthew 19 and in
Luke 16 he's doing he's not even giving a caveat he's not even bringing up for an occasion
he's just saying don't marry the divorced woman don't get divorced don't put away your
wife because if you put away your wife you're causing her to commit adultery because she's
virtually guaranteed going to eventually marry another dude especially back then because
women you know didn't really just live on their own they ended up you know being with
somebody pretty much in those days and so you're putting her in a position where she's
going to end up marrying another dude which is adultery according to the Bible now once
you're remarried you know okay then it is what it is at that point because now you've
made that vow you're in that new marriage so don't make the same mistake again if you're
on your 5th husband Jennifer Lopez or whatever you know then you got to stay married all
right and you stay married to the one that you're married to right now and you don't
just keep sinning again and I'm not trying to beat you up over the past but guess what
when you got divorced you were wrong but I don't care about that all I care about is
the future right we need to have a church where we hold up marriage and exalt marriage
and where we teach that divorce is wrong why because you know what the Bible says God hates
divorce is a quote from the Bible the Lord God hateth putting away God hates divorce
so you're like oh well maybe I just hate divorce and you know I'm in good company because God
hates divorce all right let's go ahead and back up though to Deuteronomy as promised
Deuteronomy 22 so we talked about Matthew 19 and then we kind of looked at Matthew 1
and got a little context on a scenario that some people would say is impossible I would
just say it's rare it's a it's not impossible scenario it's a rare scenario it's in Matthew
1 at least they thought it was there and so that helps us define it when we get to Matthew
19 Luke 16 it just isn't it doesn't even show up because it's not worth talking about now
if if fornication meant looking at a woman or committing adultery or something like that
or a woman looking at a man or committing adultery with a man then that'd be kind of
a big except because there's a lot of people commit adultery unfortunately in this world
that we live in adultery is not super rare I wish it were it's not that rare if there's
this big exception that's not that rare well then you think that God would have mentioned
it in Luke 16 he didn't feel like he needed to mention it because it just wasn't that
big of a deal he only mentions it when he's in a really specific argument with the Pharisees
where they're really splitting hairs about these things and they're bringing it up to
him all right so let's go to Deuteronomy actually before we go to Deuteronomy 22 let's go to
Deuteronomy 24 we're going to look at quickly Deuteronomy 24 then we'll go back to Deuteronomy
22 it says in Deuteronomy 24 and tell me if this reminds you a little bit of Matthew chapter
1 and Matthew chapter 19 it says in Deuteronomy 24 when a man had taken a wife and married
her and it come to fast that she find no favor in his eyes and this is the key because he
had found some uncleanness in her now this isn't just saying that he just doesn't like
her okay he's found some uncleanness in her okay now what is unclean is the opposite of
being pure it is that which is defiled okay now I think that this is clearly talking about
sexual sin because that's a term that God uses for uncleanness when he tells us we should
flee fornication in the New Testament verse Thessalonians 4 he says why should we flee
fornication because God has not called us to uncleanness but unto holiness okay and
so that's what the unclean he's finding an uncleanness in her in fact you know the Bible
is that you have someone's they have like in the column they give you like a little
help thing or whatever in this Bible I just looked at it for grades it says an unseemly
thing that's you know people probably are more familiar with the word uncleanness than
an unseemly thing but you know even when I hear the term unseemly it's like we're talking
about something inappropriate we're talking about something sordid in fact what about
the word sorted sorted literally means unclean it literally means dirty but when we say the
word sorted what are we talking about we're talking about fornication we're talking about
adultery we're talking about things of that nature those are sorted things dirty things
unclean things okay and so if he goes in under her and finds some uncleanness in her right
let's jump back into 24-1 here then let him write her a bill of divorcement and give it
in her hand and send her out of his house this is similar to what happened in Matthew
chapter 1 except instead of finding uncleanness in her what he found was just that she had
apparently committed fornication of course she had not because she was a virgin and it
was a miraculous thing the angel comes to Joseph in a dream and explains all that to
him but until he found that out he's thinking that he has found some uncleanness in her
that she has been out there being unclean committing fornication so he puts a bill of
divorcement and gives it in her hand and sends her out of his house and when she's departed
out of his house she may go and be another man's wife what is the point of a bill of
divorcement why does it even exist the the the point of the bill of divorcement here
in Deuteronomy 24 is to annul the marriage so that she can get married to someone else
because she can't be married to two dudes at the same time so you have to dissolve the
first marriage so that she can go and be married to someone else that's what it's saying here
then it says in verse three if the latter husband hate her and write her a bill of divorcement
and giveth it in her hand and sent her out of his house or if the latter husband die
which took her to be his wife her former husband which sent her away may not take her again
to be his wife after that she is defiled for that is abomination before the Lord and thou
shall not cause the land to sin which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance
what is the Bible saying is abomination here okay and I know this gets a little technical
but everybody pay attention all right so let's say you got a man and a woman and they get
married right at the beginning he finds someone clean that's in her and they annul the thing
right he divorces her and then she ends up marrying a second guy right because he sends
her out she can marry someone else and then let's say those are married for five ten years
or something and then he dies now she's free to get married again right can she go back
to the first dude you say well yeah because then they can make that right you know and
they can they can fix that no okay look once people get divorced they you know the bet
look people that are divorced when when they come to me and ask what should I do my first
advice to them what I would always want to see happen is that they could reconcile with
their spouse before one of them marry someone else because once one of them marry someone
else it's over does everybody understand so when you know when people get divorced
and I've seen this happen where people have gotten divorced and they're divorced for years
and then one of them gets saved or both of them get saved and they decide hey you know
I shouldn't have done that I want to fix this I'm gonna go back and and and fix my marriage
and and I've seen people who were divorced get remarried to one another again and to
me that's a great success that's a great triumph that's a blessing to to basically
undo that mistake that happened in the past and be able to fix that right that's always
a best case scenario when that can take place but once one of the people gets married to
someone else that is no longer an option anymore okay my parents are divorced okay my parents
are divorced and they each have their respective my mom has a husband my dad has a wife okay
if those other people were to die I wouldn't be like okay mom and dad let's let's get you
back together you know parent trap part seven or something you know and we're gonna get
you guys back together no because that would be an abomination to God right because you
the Bible says no to that but here's what's funny you've got a teaching out there that
says oh if you're divorced and remarried if you're on your second wife you're on your
second husband you need to immediately leave that person go back to the first person who's
heard this teaching before you've seen people arguing for that these people are a little
bit illiterate okay because the Bible is so clear on this both in Deuteronomy 24 and in
Jeremiah chapter 3 this teaching is crystal clear you must stay married to the person
you're married to right now you can't just decide well I'm on my third spouse I just
learned about the sanctity of marriage I'm going back to the original person wrong you
got to stay married to the person you're married to right now okay and not violate that marriage
vow and especially going back to the the previous spouse is an abomination that's what the Bible
says and that if they do that the land will be greatly defiled Jeremiah chapter 3 and
so forth and even here it says you know that will cause the land to sin okay let's go back
to Deuteronomy 22 we're comparing scripture with scripture here okay Deuteronomy 24 he marries a
wife he finds uncleanness in her now look the Bible is real clear in Deuteronomy 24 it says she
find no favor in his eyes because he had found some uncleanness in her it doesn't say she find
no favor in his eyes because she she is not as pretty as when they first got married it doesn't
say she find no favor in his eyes because she turns out to be a bad cook she finds no favor in
his eyes because they just the the spark has gone out of their relationship no it's a specific
situation she find no favor in his eyes because he finds some uncleanness in her the uncleanness
is the key okay now let's compare that to Deuteronomy 22 what am I doing tonight what am I
defending marriage tonight I'm up here defending marriage and I'm up here saying that God hates
putting away and I'm up here telling you that when you get married you need to stay married
for the rest of your life till death do us part is the vow look what the Bible says in Deuteronomy
chapter 22 and starting in verse number 13 Deuteronomy 22 13 if a man take a wife and go in
unto her now what does that mean to go in unto her this is basically talking about entering the
bedroom going in unto her it's like about going into the bedroom and shutting the door and you
know you know what comes next he goes in under her he goes to consummate the marriage and what
happens he gives occasions of speech against her so he goes in under and hates her and gives
occasions of speech against her and bring up an evil name upon her and say I took this woman and
when I came to her I found her not to be a maid now what's our modern word for a maid there a
virgin he's saying hey I married this woman and I went to consummate the marriage and I found her
not to be a virgin and he starts talking all this trash about her around town then shall the father
of the damsel and her mother now they're super offended right because they gave this woman to be
his wife and now the whole family's name is being dragged in the mud that she had played the whore
in her father's house then shall the father of the damsel and her mother take and bring forth the
tokens is the proof for the evidence of the damsels virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate
and the damsels father shall say unto the elders I gave my daughter unto this man to wife and he
hated her and lo he has given occasions of speech against her saying I found not thy daughter a maid
and yet these are the tokens of my daughter's virginity and they shall spread the cloth before
the elders of the city and the elders of that city shall take that man and chastise him and they shall
immerse him in a hundred shekels of silver and give them unto the father of the damsel because he
had brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel and she shall be his wife he may not put
her away all his days but if the thing be true and the tokens of virginity be not found for the
damsel then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house and the man of her
city shall stone her with stones that she died because she had wrought folly in Israel to play
the whore in her father's house so shalt thou put away or put evil away from among you okay so
hopefully everybody understands the basics of this story obviously some of these things are difficult
for us to grasp being removed by you know what 3500 years and and and having a totally different
culture and having a different way of looking at some of these things but the timeless truths of
the Bible still come through regardless of a difference in culture the bottom line is that
this guy if he right at the beginning says you know you lied to me right you lied to me you said
that she was a virgin she said she was a virgin the parents said she's right and then I went under
and found her not to be a virgin and this is kind of Joseph's situation of course he found because
she was with child that was how he ascertained that if this thing turns out not to be true then
basically he has to pay a fine and this is where we get the idea of like a defamation lawsuit in
modern America right you know it has its basis somewhat in Scripture because what's he doing he's
defaming her he's he's ruining her reputation and not just her reputation but the reputation of her
parents because why are her parents involved because it's the parents job to raise their
daughter to protect her and to keep her from just being out there doing whatever and by the way we
should supervise our daughters and keep them from just being out there doing whatever and we don't
know what they're into we know what they're doing we're not watching them you know these parents are
taking responsibility for their daughter and so basically it's it's a slap in their face if
they're saying you know you gave this this woman to be to be my wife and then turns out she's not
a virgin and that's not what I thought I was getting when I married her it turns out to be
false then this guy has to pay a fine for the defamation lawsuit and he had he can't ever
divorce her he's just married to her because that's what marriage is it's a lifelong commitment
but if it turns out to be true if it turns out that she really was lying and pretending to be
a virgin and yet she had gone out and played the horn her father's house she's trying to pass
herself off as a virgin to her husband then what happens she is put to death the Bible says right
and then that way others would hear and fear and they would not do such evil again now normally the
Bible would not put a death penalty on fornication typically if and again I don't have time to go
over every law in Deuteronomy we're already running short on time here for that type of a
study but the idea here is that if a man and a woman commit fornication nobody's engaged nobody's
a spouse to someone else nobody is is getting married or already married if you just have two
singles that commit fornication with one another then basically the punishment is that the guy has
to marry the girl or he has to pay a fine if she doesn't want to marry him her dad doesn't want her
to marry the guy and they they're just like no we don't want this marriage to happen then he has to
pay a fine he has to pay compensation for damages for deflowering their daughter for taking her
virginity you know he has to pay a fine yes pay damages okay that's not the death penalty this is
the death penalty because she's a spouse to another man she's already promised to another
man there's the understanding that she's supposedly a virgin and yet she's out doing something on the
side so it's kind of it's not quite adultery but it's kind of more like adultery right because the
Bible has a different punishment for a man who lies with a married woman versus a woman who is
a spouse to a man versus just a single woman okay all of it is sin all of it is wrong right because
you know that type of activity is only supposed to be kept within the confines of marriage right
it's only supposed to be between a married man and woman that's it that's the only legitimate time
that that can ever take place and so just to kind of sum all this up and boil this down what we see
in Deuteronomy 22 sort of reinforces a little bit what we see in chapter 24 and here's why okay
because in chapter 24 we see the Joseph option the Joseph scenario he goes in under he finds
uncleanness in her he writes her a bill of divorce meant and sends her away it doesn't seem to be any
involvement of parents there was no lying there was no misunderstanding there's no she went off
and played the whore it's just you know that's not what he expected he got you know he didn't
get what he wanted but it happened here's the key thing folks this happens right at the beginning
right right this isn't talking about we've been married for ten years divorce and that's why I
say that there is no legitimate divorce according to the Word of God there are no grounds for
divorce according to the Word of God okay that's what I would say because of the fact that I don't
think that this is what we mean when we say divorce this is called annulment there could be
some legitimate annulments according the Word of God right we see some annulment type of a scenario
in chapter 22 an annulment scenario in chapter 24 but what we don't see is people in the Bible
they're married for five years married for ten years married for 20 years get divorced and
married someone else and that that's somehow condoned in Scripture it just isn't my friend
you stay married till death do us part now you could always pull out some super extreme scenario
to find the exceptionist and here I'll give you the only possible exception that I could see to
and actually I changed my mind there's no exception okay and let me tell you why I say that because of
the fact that what I was gonna say is that the only time I would say get away from your spouse
and run screaming in the other direction would be if your spouse is a is a literal confirmed for
reprobate okay why because the Bible says that you should even if your spouse is unsaved you're
supposed to stay with your spouse if you're saying that it's stay with your spouse it's still death
do us part obviously if you're married to like some child molester like somebody who's just a
confirmed reprobate a confirmed faggot or something because you know that happens right you know
woman's married to a dude and then you know it turns out to be a closet faggot you know I would
say get away from him but but the reason why I don't say that's an exception is because I didn't
say divorce him and marry someone else because no you don't divorce me marry someone else you'd have
to get away from the guy and be single because I'm telling you when you're married you're married for
life it's still death do us part okay and these exceptions that pastors are teaching the reason
that they're teaching these exceptions is because half of their church is divorce why because half
of America is divorced and guess what before this permissive no-fault divorce communist garbage and
the reason I call it communist is because the Soviet Union is the one who did this in 1969
before the United States and California followed suit this this no-fault divorce
garbage has caused divorce rates to go through the roof and you know what you want to know why
divorce rates aren't even higher because now half of couples just live together instead of even
getting married I mean if you counted those as divorce which obviously they're not divorces but
I'm just saying if those people were actually getting married you'd probably see even higher
divorce rates if all these people actually got married they're just living in fornication but
even in spite of the fact that half of America is just living in fornication even amongst people
are getting married divorce rates are so extremely high because of this easy divorce mentality and
I'll tell you who a big part of the blame belongs on is pastors getting up and giving this garbage
of Oh abuse abandonment adultery which just basically gives a green light for virtually
every divorce because virtually ever look at people were happy they wouldn't be getting
divorced people are getting divorced because their marriage is messed up and it's kind of
hard to find a really messed up marriage that doesn't have any abandonment adultery or abuse
in it you know it's like oh man horrible marriage no adultery no abandonment no abuse well you know
it doesn't sound like it's that bad and that's why if you start making these exceptions you can
you can just make it fit the exception and that's why divorce rates amongst Christians are pretty
much the same as divorce rates among worldly people and let me tell you why because pastors
aren't preaching this like this sermon I'm preaching right now is not being preached in
the vast majority of churches the opposite is being preached this modernistic liberal
interpretation that's just a divorce for every cause virtually that's the junk that's being
taught today I had an independent fundamental Baptist pastor tell me well I've never I've never
told anyone to get a divorce I've never in so many years of pastor I've never counseled anyone
to get a divorce and yet I know for a fact that this man has counseled person after person after
person to separate from their spouse what is that oh your husband's smoking pot separate oh you know
he's doing this he's doing that separate so he's just he's just counseling all these separations
and then the separations lead to a divorce he's like well I didn't tell him to get divorced you
told him to get separated guess what when people get separated they're just getting set up for
divorce because now they got their two separate households that you know once he's in his own
apartment or whatever and they got their own thing going and then they they're apart and then things
get worse and worse and they're you know it's just it's just a technicality so he can grandstand
about he how he never told anyone to get a divorce no but you preached your watered-down
crap on divorce and then that's why half your churches divorce and then you go to this church
like five years later and you see people in the church like married to different people in the
church I mean that's freaky it's like it's like something went wrong in a time travel scenario or
something you know and you show up and people like people are married to each other's spouses
and you're like what's going what what timeline am I in we got to go back you know we got to go
back and fix this folks let me tell you something it isn't normal to come back to faithful word
ten years later and that like the couples that we have right now there's been like a swap that
has taken place there's something wrong with that picture amen I mean I understand look look people
in this church have gotten divorced I get it but when there's just a when there's this swap thing
going on and I'm talking fundamentalist Baptist churches where you show up and you're like wait
that's your wife because last time I was here she was his wife and you were married to her over
there and who who is who's that dude that she's with now what you know it's just like what and
I'm not folks this is not a hypothetical I'm not making this up I'm saying I've walked into a
church that I went to years later and a few spouses had swapped and it was it was just it
was bad real bad okay if you don't think that that's weird or bad then I don't know what to
tell you but it really freaked me out I'm still freaked out folks we're supposed to be different
supposed to be a peculiar people quit being so selfish quit being so obsessed with yourself
figure out a way to make your marriage work love your wife love your husband figure it out you say
well I tried everything and it still sucks well then it's just gonna suck then life sucks then
you die let's bow our heads and pray I'm just saying I'm saying oh so bad you know what everybody's
got their cross to bear in life and you know I I hope it's not your marriage I hope that your
marriage is a source of joy I hope that your marriage is a source of pleasure and blessing
and happiness in your life I really do but if it's a source of pain well then you just better suck it
up because you know what that's life you married her you married him it's life it's no fun but it
is what it is okay and you know what we've all got across the bear if we have a great marriage
we have other problems so you can't just sit there and say like oh well you know I just don't know
if we're happy anymore I'm just not sure if I love you anymore and I mean you'll literally today in
2023 you'll have people where their lives are just totally fine I mean the husband is squeezing the
toothpaste from the right part of the tube and the wife is is put in the toilet paper the right
way where it rolls over the top and I mean she's cooking the meals and he's going to work and paying
the bills and everything's fine and they're just like yeah but I just don't know if I love him
anymore you know what it's because you're trying to find happiness and some Hollywood rock and roll
song type of a worldview you know find your happiness and serving God and look there's a
lot of happiness in marriage I've derived a lot of happiness from my marriage I hope my wife derives
a lot of happiness from it as well but at the end of the day though it was I just put on this earth
to be a husband I mean is that really why God created me like God just created me and he's like
your number one mission is to be happy in a marriage no it's no my job I have other things
to do in life marriage is a really important part of my life but did you hear that is an important
what part of my life it's not my it's not like you're the reason I believe in love from this
moment I am blessed I live only for your happiness no because I don't live only for her happiness you
know what I live for Jesus it's funny I've got a Christian wedding and they're singing that song
actually I've gone to like four Christian weddings where they sang that song and I did whenever I
heard them say you know I'm just like I'm being a big stick in the mud because they're like I live
only for your happiness I'm just thinking in my heart like blasphemy blasphemy only for your
happiness and you know what here's the thing about that is that you know marriage is great
marriage is beautiful but don't expect too much where you're like this is gonna fulfill every
desire I've ever had in my entire psyche no it isn't no it isn't my friend because you know what
marriage is super important it's a big deal I'm not trying to downplay it but I'm telling you it
is not the only thing in life okay and people in this room that are actually married right now they
agree with me they know like yeah I love you I love you married but but you know there's other
things too that I want to accomplish that I want to do that I want to care about then just this
one thing you know this part of my life and you say well you're you're not very romantic pastor
Anderson but here's the thing about that the reason why I think it's so important is because
if you go into marriage thinking like you like I guarantee you that if I told my wife tonight if I
said like I live only for your happiness she would not want to hear me say that she would not be like
you know at last you see it you know if I told that to my wife she would be like you're freaking
me out right now because like it's because it's kind of putting a little bit of pressure on her
you know it's like give me some space cut me some slack you know it's kind of a tall order if like
I'm 100% responsible for her happiness and she's 100% responsible for my happiness like no you know
you got to find your own happiness people and you know what happiness is the Lord right like the
song the Sunday school song goes you got to serve God and have other things going on in your life
as well and so look if your marriage is in the toilet right now well then you know what you just
got to just derive joy from other areas of life and continue to do right in your marriage even
if it's a bad marriage do right follow the Bible do what God told you to do husbands love your
wives wives submit yourselves on your own husbands love your husbands love your children even if
your marriage is a messed up marriage you do what's right you just keep going and you say well but my
whole life is in the door and your whole life's not just your marriage is in the toilet but that's
not your whole the good the bad news is your marriage is a toilet good news is that's not your
whole life because another guy could come along and say my career is in the toilet yeah but you
got a great marriage huh I mean look if you got a great marriage and a horrible career you're doing
pretty good okay well let's flip that over you got a great career you know you you you're serving
God you're going to heaven you're winning solace to Christ and your marriage is in the toilet well
you know what two out of three ain't bad you know what I mean like it is what it is you can't have
everything life's never gonna be perfect it just isn't now again I hope that your marriage is one
of the things in your life that's going good I'm not gonna ask for a raise of hands if your marriage
is you know and and look if I could pick one thing to be going good in my life I would pick
the marriage because it's it is super important to me but is it the only thing nope because there's
other stuff going on in my life there's other stuff and if there's not anything else going on
in your life well then you're creepy okay just saying so I don't know I hope this helps because
you know some young people they get obsessed and they I think that Hollywood and the music
industry kind of trains us to think that all the meaning of life is romantic love and let me tell
you some romantic love is not the meaning of life Christ is the meaning of life romantic love is a
nice icing on the cake but Jesus is the cake okay and we need to keep that in perspective and so
that's why I say you know that yes if you're in an unhappy marriage you stay in an unhappy marriage
and you eat an ice cream cone if you want to get happy okay but you stay in that marriage why
because it's the it's a commandment of God and by the way I'm not just commanding misery and
unhappiness because number one I didn't write the Bible I'm just preaching what the Bible said look
if I believe that the Bible taught easy divorce I would get up here and teach easy divorce right
now because I'm just here to teach whatever the Bible says I don't believe it for one second I
don't believe in these three A's or any other A's you could think of alcohol you know or whatever
and then I somebody said that the Catholic Church gives divorces for alcohol I'm thinking like every
Catholic I've ever known is a drunk are you serious right now oh no divorce of the Catholic
Church unless there's an alcoholic involved oh okay so basically everybody except five people
can get divorced in the whole Roman Catholic religion it's like what in the world now I lost
my train of thought so I mean I lost my train of thought I'm just gonna end the sermon okay
it's over done all right stay married let's power it's over to prayer father we thank you so much
for your word Lord we thank you so much for these passages and Matthew and Deuteronomy Lord God I
pray that our people would be different than this world around us that they would really believe in
marriage that they would really be do or die literally when it comes to their marriage just
in it to win it just failures not an option cut divorce out of the dictionary Lord I pray that our
young people would go into marriage with an attitude of this will work this must work not
an attitude of like try get divorced Lord God help us to respect the sanctity of marriage and Lord
help those that that are that are married currently to stay married to put effort into fixing their
relationship to do the best that they possibly can to fix their relationship and if they can't
fix it to just stay married anyway Lord because life is is about serving you first and foremost
and we thank you for the opportunity to serve Christ and it's in his name we pray amen