Marriage and Divorce

Written By Bishop V. Bush

Is it right to divorce and remarry? This has been the practice among religious people for many years.  But this is not right.  Many people get married and when something goes wrong, they will get a divorce and marry someone else, and confess to be saved and living a godly life.  No one can put away his/her wife or husband and be right.  This is contrary to the scripture.  Matthew 5:32 "But I say unto you, that whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery: and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced committeth adultery." You cannot get into the kingdom of God in adultery.

Some will say that they put their wife away for committing fornication after they have been married for years. That is not so, because married people cannot commit fornication.  This is only among unmarried people. What Jesus meant when He said "whosoever shall put away his wife except it be for fornication" is, if a man marries a woman with the intention of marrying a virgin, and she deceives him as such and they get married and he takes her in and discovers she is not a virgin, he can divorce her and marry someone else. That is what Jesus Christ meant in Matthew 5:32, 19:9.  Also in Deuteronomy 22:13-19 "If a man take a wife, and go in unto her, and hate her, and give 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 a maid: Then shall the father of the damsel, and her mother, take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel's virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate; and the damsel's father shall say unto the elders, I gave my daughter unto this man to wife, and he hateth her; and, lo, he hath 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 amerce him in an hundred shekels of silver, and give them unto the father of the damsel, because he hath 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." So dear reader, that is the only way a man can put his wife away and remarry, not for adultery but for fornication only.

Some teach that if you got married while you were a sinner and get saved and your wife or husband did not, that marriage does not count. That is not the truth. Hebrews 13:4 says, "Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled, but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge." So if you got married while out of the church or in, it is honourable. After you get in church you cannot put away your unsaved wife or husband.  Romans 7:1-3 says, "Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband." So then, if while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called and adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man."

Some teach that after you have left your wife or husband you can get married to someone else using the scripture in 1 Corinthians 7:9 saying, "It is better to marry than to burn," not understanding that do not mean if you have left your wife or husband you can marry someone else. Let's look at this scripture for what it means. This scripture is talking to unmarried and widows, not to married people. 1 Corinthians 7:8-9, "I say therefore to the unmarried and widows,.....it is better to marry than to burn." This is for the unmarried and widows. Now the 10th and 11th verse will deal with the married people. "And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, let not the wife depart from her husband; but and if she depart, let her remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband; and let not the husband put away his wife."

So you see dear reader, divorce and remarriage is totally contrary to God's word. You will never get into the kingdom of God that way.

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May the Lord bless and keep you and give you understanding in all things before it is too late.