Turn with me to 1 Corinthians
7. 1 Corinthians 7. Last time we were
in this chapter, Paul said in verse 7, he said,
I would that all men were even as I myself, single, unmarried,
And he said some things to those who are single. He explained
why he said that in verse 32. He said, But I would have you
without carefulness. He that is unmarried careth for
the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord. That's why he would that all
men were that way. But he said back in verse 9,
If a man or woman has not been given this gift to remain single,
he said, if they cannot contain, let them marry, for it is better
to marry than to burn. So we pick up today with verse
10. This is where we're starting today. Verse 10 says, and unto
the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord. What he's saying
is we have a verse of scripture recorded from the Lord on this.
Let not the wife depart from her husband. That's Matthew 5
verse 32. Turn with me over to Matthew
chapter 5. Matthew chapter 5, look at verse
31 first. It says, It hath been said, whosoever
shall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement. 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. Brother David Edmondson,
last weekend in Cottageville, Sunday morning he preached a
message on thus saith the Lord. And it was such a It's eye-opening to me on this
right here. His text was Hebrews 1 which
says, God who at sundry times and in diverse manners spake
in time past unto the fathers by the prophets hath in these
last days spoken unto us by his son. Right here in verse 31 it
says, it hath been said by the prophets. Whosoever shall put
away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement." Moses
gave the people a bill of divorcement. Moses gave the people a bill
of divorcement. He gave them a bill of divorcement.
But it was because men were hating their wives. And that's not shocking
to this flesh, is it? They were treating them cruelly. They were beating them. They
were killing them. And for the safety of the wife,
Moses said just divorce them. just divorce them and men ran
with that and they started divorcing for whatever reason they felt
like divorcing for verse 32 the Lord said but I say unto you
God who spoke in time past by the prophets hath spoken unto
us in these last days by his son and he says in verse 32 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, commiteth adultery. So our Lord is saying, don't
think just because Moses gave a bill of divorcement that I'm
okay with it. But we have a law on it, Moses
said write a bill of divorcement. He's saying, don't think I'm
okay with it. It's adultery. No matter how you look at it,
it's adultery. Now go with me back to 1 Corinthians
7. 1 Corinthians 7 verse 10 says,
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. Let not the wife depart, let
not the husband put away his wife. It goes both ways. It goes
both ways. If two believers divorce, two
believers, for any other reason than fornication. God says they
need to remain unmarried or be reconciled. They need to remain
unmarried or be reconciled. The reason is because if they
remarry, God says they're committing adultery. If they remarry. If they remarry. God says they're
committing adultery. And not only are they committing
adultery, they're causing the ones that they marry to also
commit adultery. Just because I sign a piece of
paper that says, I'm not married to you anymore, that does not
mean God sees it that way. I see it that way, doesn't mean
God sees it that way. We made a vow, we made a vow
before God to leave that in His eyes is adultery. All right,
now listen to this. There are many believers, many
believers who are divorced and remarried. All right, many believers
who are divorced and remarried. And if fornication was involved,
clearly God is against that. Right? And if fornication was
not involved and they got divorced anyway, clearly God is against
that. It is a no-win situation. Now, I do have strong beliefs
about physical abuse. That's why God allowed Moses
to write that bill in the first place. But God does not deal
with that in these verses, so I'm not going to deal with that
in these verses. We're going to stay true to the Word of God.
We could say, well, you know, this person went off the deep
end. Physically, mentally, however you want to say it, sick. My
vow said sickness and health. Well, he started gambling. He
physically lost everything we had. He lost our house. He lost
our car. We lost it all. My vow said poverty
and wealth, right? We made a vow before God. This
word lays our sin out on the table. It's all out on the table. There is no sweeping it under
the rug. There is no way around it. We
are real sinners against God, and that's who Jesus Christ died
for. That's who Christ died for. That is who Christ died for. This subject of divorce, man,
I spent a lot of time thinking about this. This subject of divorce,
it might be pricking one and not another. All we have to do
is turn this page, and the next subject is going to prick that
one and not this one. We are all real sinners against
God. There's no excuse for it. We
cannot hide it. We cannot get around it. And
that's who Jesus Christ died for. That's who he died for. Now, if you're feeling the prick
right now, turn with me to 2 Samuel chapter 12. 2nd Samuel 12 Verse 1 says and the Lord sent
Nathan unto David and He came unto him and said unto him there
were two men in one city the one rich and the other poor The
rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds many flocks But the
poor man had nothing save one little ewe lamb, which he had
brought up and nourished up, and it grew up together with
him and with his children. It did eat of his own meat and
drank of his own cup and lay in his bosom and was unto him
as a daughter. And there came a traveler unto
the rich man, and he spared to take of his own flock and of
his own herd to dress it for the wayfaring man that was coming
to him, but took the poor man's lamb and dressed it for the man
that was coming to him. And David's anger was greatly
kindled against the man. And he said to Nathan, As the
Lord liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely
die. And he shall restore the lamb
fourfold because he did this thing and because he had no pity. And Nathan said to David, Thou
art the man. Thou art the man. It's all out
on the table. No hiding it. You've taken a
man's wife, you had the man killed. Verse 13, And David said unto
Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord. And Nathan said unto
David, The Lord also hath put away thy sin, thou shalt not
die. You're not going to die. You're
not going to die. Christ died for our sins. That is not just a catchphrase
that we have here. That's not a slogan we have. Jesus Christ died for our sins. Do we excuse him? No. We just
say thank you. Oh man, that's not enough, is
it? Just like everything else that we're guilty of, divorce
is sin against God. But Christ has put that away. Now look at this. Right here
in 2 Samuel 12, verse 14 says, how be it? There is a how be
it. All right? Christ has put that
away. You're not going to die. Yeah, but that's, you know, I've
done something so horrible. He came to save the chief of
sinners. How be it? Verse 14 says, because
by this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies
of the Lord to blaspheme. That's what our sin does. That's
what our sin does. It gives great occasion to the
enemies of the Lord to blaspheme. Oh, don't let that be me. Don't
let me do that. Even though I do, I don't want
to. So he said, because thou hast given great occasion to
the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also that is born unto
thee shall surely die. Even though our Lord has eternally
dealt with our sin, our physical actions have physical consequences. here on this earth, even though
eternity is squared away, set in stone, ordered and sure, the
blood of Christ covers it all, our physical actions have physical
consequences. And if I murdered somebody and
I belonged to Christ, I would not have to deal with that sin
throughout all of eternity. Christ dealt with it. But I would
have to spend the rest of my life, or whatever time they determine,
here in this earth, in prison. Does that make sense? Here in prison. This is why,
you know, well, Christ put away your sin, go do what you want
to do. No. Our physical actions have physical
consequences. And we're motivated by love.
The Lord really does give us a new heart. I don't want to do that. I don't
want to give him occasion to blaspheme. I really don't. But
turn with me over to Deuteronomy 22. Let me show you something
quickly. Deuteronomy 22, look at verse
13. If any 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, not a
virgin. It goes on the next few verses
to say, if he's lying, if he made that up because he doesn't
want to be married anymore, if he's lying, verse 19 says, they shall
immerse him in a 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 of his days. She's still going to be
his wife and he has to pay her father 100 shekels of silver. Verse 20 says, 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 men of her city shall stone her with stones that
she die, because she hath wrought folly in Israel to play the whore
in her father's house, so shalt thou put evil away from among
you." Now, this is God speaking, all right? If it's true, you
need to put this away. Verse 22 says, if a man be found
lying with a woman married, if she's married to a husband, then
they shall both of them die. Both the man that lay with the
woman and the woman, so shalt thou put away evil from Israel. Put that away. You just need
to put it away. Verse 23, if a damsel that is a virgin be
betrothed unto a husband, if she's engaged, and a man find
her in the city and lie with her, then you shall bring them
both out unto the gate of the city, and you shall stone them
with stones that they die. The damsel, because she cried
not, it was consensual, being in the city, and the man, because
he hath humbled his neighbor's wife, so shalt thou put away
evil from among you. It needs to be put away. Now,
this is not man's laws. These are not Moses' laws. These
are God's laws. And we see how serious he is
about this. He is so, so serious about this. Now, is everybody ready? There is a consequence. There
is a consequence that we as a congregation need to know about and understand
concerning divorce. There's something we need to
know about and understand. There's two things that I'm hoping
will come from this Bible study. I hope we end up knowing about
this and I hope we understand it. And may God's Spirit reveal
that to our heart if he would have us to know about this and
understand it. And I do pray this never happens
here. I really do. I pray this never ever. I pray
it's not even an issue for us. Never. Never. When we started
1 Corinthians 7, we spent a whole Bible study, the first three
verses, the very first Bible study, seeing how the union of
marriage represents our union with Christ. This is all because
of our union with Christ. And we saw how seriously God
takes that covenant. Without it, there is no favor
from God. None. Two people cannot be together
and have favor from God without the covenant of marriage. We
know that, don't we? That's clear. We are one with
Christ, and we are all one in Christ. We're one with Christ. We're all one in Christ. When
two of God's elect, two believers, now if one is an unbeliever,
this won't be an issue anyway. An unbeliever will not stay under
the sound of the gospel. But when two believers divorce,
whoever is at fault, if they're both at fault, if
it's just irreconcilable differences, Whoever files, whoever causes
the divorce must leave the assembly and go to another assembly to
worship God. Must leave the assembly and go
to another assembly to worship God. That person must. Must. Not only do we need to
know this, we need to understand this. This has happened a few times
over the years in a few different places. And when I was younger,
I heard that it happened. And I heard that the pastor had
to tell the one who was at fault, you need to go somewhere else.
And I did not understand it. I didn't understand it. It caused real inner struggle
with me towards some of the men that had to do it. How can you
tell a sinner that they cannot come hear the gospel? How can
you do that? That person's a sinner. Christ
came to save sinners. He came to save the chief of
sinners. How can you tell a person that
they cannot come hear the gospel? I just didn't understand it.
Where is love in that? Where is forgiveness in that?
Where is mercy in that? I did not personally understand
it. I do now. I do now. The pastor did not
tell the man that he couldn't go hear the gospel. The pastor
did not tell the man that he was lost. He just said you can't
stay here. You can't be here. And I now
understand why. Now that God has called me to
be an under-shepherd, I understand why. It has nothing
to do with the two people who are going through the divorce.
Nothing to do with either one of them at all. It has nothing
to do with punishing the one who was at fault. I mean, the
minute we start doing that, let's just go ahead and hold a mirror
up. What am I going to say? Hold the mirror up. What am I
going to point? Hold the mirror up. It has nothing
to do with punishing the one who was at fault. It has everything
to do with everybody else. It's all about everybody else.
Everybody else in the congregation. It's all about God's sheep coming
into God's house to hear God's message for peace, for comfort,
for unity, for love, for worship, without hindrance, without distraction. That's what it's all about. When something like that happens,
It destroys all that. It just destroys all that. It's
so distracting. That distraction is too great. It's just too confusing. It's
too much on us weak sheep. It's just too much. There's no
focus on Christ because all the focus is on me and who I'm at
odds with. That's what happens. This is a place of union. There
is no union out there. They're crying, peace, peace,
when there is no peace. This is a house of union, and
when disunion comes, it sticks out like a sore thumb. And that
disunion, that division, it'll spill out to the whole congregation.
What'll happen is, half will side with the husband, half will
side with the wife. It'll cause hard feelings, it'll
cause resentment, It'll kill the spirit of worship
in the Lord our God. That's what it'll do. It'll quench
the spirit. That's what it'll do. None of
us want that. Not even the two who are going
through divorce, really. Nobody wants to quench the spirit
of God. None of us want that. We don't
want anything that will take our attention off of Christ. Don't we thank God for the love
and the unity that He's given here? Wherever he's raised up
a congregation of his gospel, his truth, the peace, we want
to protect that, don't we? We want to protect that. May
God keep this house a house of worship, not a house of chaos
and distraction and disunion. May our Lord just keep our focus
on Him. Lord, just keep our focus on Christ, all of us. If a brother
and a sister cannot dwell together in their own house, they'll never
be able to dwell together in the house of God, never. So for the sake of the brethren,
here's why, for the sake of the brethren, for the sake of worship,
whoever's at fault needs to find another place to worship. And
again, my true prayer is that it never happens. Never. Never, never, never. We could
not have to talk about this again for 20 years, and the only reason
we'd bring it up is because we got to it in the scripture again.
May the Lord give us a heart to reconcile. Cause love to reign. Bring us back. Unite us. Do all
that for Christ's sake. Now let's close this by focusing
on our Lord, okay? Let's see something about our
Lord. Go back to 1 Corinthians 7. 1 Corinthians 7, these scriptures
that we have, they are, as one man put it, bifocal. We see us,
we see Christ. Verse 10 says, 1 Corinthians
7, verse 10, and unto the married, that's us, we are married to
the Prince of Peace. We are married to the Son of
God. Jesus Christ, our husband. Verse
10 says, unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord. Let
not the wife depart from her husband. Don't leave Christ. Paul wrote 1 Corinthians 7, and
he could have just put the word Gabe right after the number 10.
Gabe, don't leave Christ. Don't take your eyes off Christ.
Don't turn your focus from Christ. Verse 11 says, But and if she
depart, we sing that song. We love Come Thou Fount, don't
we? We all love that song. I love
Come Thou Fount. But it says that they am prone
to wander. Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave
the one I love. Here's the gospel, though. This
flesh, I have no excuse for it. Prone to wander, but I'm going
to turn myself around. No, I'm not. I'm prone to wander
and keep running. That's what I'm prone to do.
I don't care. I'm running. But here's the gospel. He has reconciled us to himself,
hasn't he? He will always Reconcile us the
end of verse 11 says let not the husband put away his wife
if God said that it will never happen It'll never happen. This flesh is so full of sin
every time we start to talk about the flesh at all It's just a
big pot of sin, and it's just filthy But the good news is he's
washed us, he'll keep us, he's reconciled us, he will not put
us away. He's not going to. He'll never,
ever put us away. And he's gonna see to it that
we live happily ever after. He's gonna see to that. So may
the Lord keep us until that time. All right, you're dismissed.