Matthew 19, you've read the bulletin
and briefly looked at the title, the subject. The Lord deals with
the subject of divorce in these verses, but the first two verses,
and we want to be faithful to every verse, it says in verses
1 and 2, it came to pass that when Jesus had finished these
saints, We're just talking about forgiveness, remember? Forgiveness. We looked at that last Wednesday night, I believe. He had finished these sayings.
He departed from Galilee, came into the coast of Judea, beyond
Jordan. Great multitudes followed him,
and he healed them there. He healed them. Most of you know these verses,
but look at Deuteronomy 32. It may be someone who does not
know these verses, but they're very, very enlightening. If anyone is sick, the Lord God did it. They're not, there's not one
person in a million that believes that. You know that? You know that.
Not one person in a million believes that. If someone is sick, God
did it. It was His purpose. It was His
will. Though it might be some disease or whatever, it's the
immediate. Sickner calls God. Is behind if someone is healed. God did. Look at Deuteronomy thirty two
verse thirty nine. And he's talking to his people. See now or see here listen up
see now that I. Even I am he. There is no God
with me. I like the way he says that no
small G even a certainly not a capital G. But there's not
even a small ruler no one who has any control over anything. No God with me beside me. I kill. And I make a lot. Someone dies God killed Though
there are means, war, automobile crash, cancer, whatever, God
kill them. Now to the world, this is blasphemy,
and they hate the sound of this, but to the believer, this is
our peace, our comfort, and our rest, knowing that nothing, nothing
can befall us but what God Almighty has ordered Ordered in all things,
and sure. He said, I kill and I make alive.
I wound, that word there is whatever the wounding is from sickness
or injury or whatever, I wound. And I heal. You see that? You believe that? If you're a believer, you do.
That's what God said that. OK, go back to our text. It says he healed. He healed
that. Now, what about doctors and medicines
and means and so forth? I mean, let me turn up to one
more scripture on this subject with second Chronicles. Second
Chronicles chapter 16. What about doctors and medicines
and things like that means. Should we just ignore them then?
No. God uses means, with the reason being is to test man,
to try us. Who is going to get the glory?
It's like rain. Scientists can tell you the scientific
reason, or they think they can, why rain falls. I like to say
certain clouds gild up and certain warm air, this and that, and
the other comes through and it rains. It rains. We're guilty of saying that,
aren't we? It rains. Nothing happens, just it happens. God causes it. God sends the
rain. That's what the scriptures say.
He's sinned at the former and the latter run. God uses means,
but only to test and try men. Who gets the glory? Who is getting
the praise? God or the means? The means are
visible. God is not. Who's doing it? Who's behind it? You see, we
look not at the things which are seen, but the things that
are unseen. Look at 2 Chronicles 16. This
is a word of rebuke. This fellow named Asa was a good
man, God's man. And it says in verse 11, and
there's much written about Asa, it's a good study, but verses
11 and 12, Behold, the acts of Asa, first and last, though they
are written in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel, Asa,
in the thirty-ninth year of his reign, was diseased in his feet,
until his disease was exceedingly great. Yet in his disease, he
sought not to the Lord, but to the physicians. You see that with me? Hezekiah, you remember the story
of Hezekiah? Hezekiah was sick, nigh unto
death. Now, Hezekiah, first thing he
did was seek the Lord. Remember,
he turned his face to the wall when he heard that he was going
to die from this sickness, and he sought the Lord greatly, appealed
to the Lord, and the Lord healed him. How? You might know. He sent Isaiah
with a poultice to put on him. Now, did the poultice heal him,
or did God? Both. But it was God that did
the healing. God did the healing. So who did
Hezekiah give glory to? God. So this is what we're to
do in everything. Seek the Lord first in everything.
That way, when He answers, He gives glory. We give Him all
the glory. If the means are available, use them. But don't trust in
them. Don't lean upon them. Some people
hang on every word of physicians. Hang on their words like they
were gods with their lives in their hands. Don't do that. Hang
on God's word. Hang on God's word. Don't trust
in man in any way, shape, form or fashion. And if the means
are effectual, if God is pleased to use the means, thank him for
them. Thank the position, so forth. But don't extol and honor them
like they healed you. Don't do it. Extol and honor
God who did the healing. All right, we'll go back to the
text in Matthew now, Matthew 9-10. answers some questions regarding
divorce. And this is very needful. Very
needful. It wouldn't be in God's word
if it were not. And it's so relevant now more than ever. The divorce
rate in our country is right at 50%. And so it's And there are quite
a few people in this room who have been through it. So is it
necessary? Absolutely. Absolutely. Verse
three, the Pharisees also came unto him, tempting him. That's what Pharisees do. Trying
him. Pharisees listen for something
wrong. They're not listening to be instructed or learn the
truth. They're listening to find what's
wrong. Trip him up. Is it lawful, they said. Is it
lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause, or
that is, for any reason? Is it lawful to divorce one's
wife for any reason? That is, in every case. Then our Lord tells them, and
us, These things are written, Scripture
says, for our learning. Our Lord tells them and us who
it was that ordained marriage in the first blood. Who it was
that ordained marriage and the sanctity of marriage. Verse 4. And he answered and said unto
them, Have ye not read that he which made them at the beginning
made them male and female? and said for this call shall
a man leave father and mother and shall cleave to his wife
and they twain shall be one flesh. Have you not read? I love the
way the Lord dealt with these Bible scholars. Quite so often
he said, haven't you read? No, the fact is most people aren't
reading God's Word. They're only reading what they
want to read. And they turn in a way there are years from the
truth on the fables and had made so many perversions of scripture.
And it doesn't even resemble the original. Have you not read
haven't you read he said. And. He said he which made male and
female. Now, do we even need to get in
this present-day argument about what marriage is? Well, it's
an absolute shame to speak of those things that's going on
today, isn't it? They're not worthy to be dealt with, really,
to the believer, to anybody with any common sense at all. Marriage, true marriage, is a
man-at-warmth. And God is the one that ordained
it. that ordained and that this type
of thing that we you and I are witnessing in our day is further
proof of the reprobate generation that we live in the last day
Romans one clearly reveals. What God will give people over
to one time I made the statement that Dan Parks and I were together
and I made the statement that God is going to judge this nation
because of homosexuality. And he quickly corrected me.
He said no. He said that is the judgment. And he's right. According to
Romans 1, it's because they held the truth in unrighteousness
and weren't thankful and so forth and so on. So God gave them over
to these things. That is the judgment of God. Proof of a reprobate, that is,
a God-forsaken society. As Sodom, Sodom was given over
to these things, weren't they? And they were shortly destroyed.
They were finally given over to all these things and they
were destroyed. And unless the Lord, Paul wrote,
unless God had given us a remnant, Unless God had saved us, spared
us, we would have been the son of the mother. And this country,
did not God have more elects in it? It would have been gone
a long time ago. Well, verses 5 and 6 says, A
man shall leave his father and mother, cleave to his wife, and
the two shall be one flesh. Now, two be one flesh. Now, that two shall be one flesh. That does away with polygamy.
That answers all questions about multiple wives. That totally does away. The title of this was The Word
of the Lord on Divorce. There is no other word. There
need be no further appeal. This is the first and last word
on the subject. He is. He is the first and last. This does away with polygamy,
doesn't it? 2, 1. It can't be 3, 1. 4, 1.
5, 6, 1. Well, you say, why did God allow it? And the
many men of God in Scripture. Abraham. Significantly, Abraham
is called the father of the faithful, isn't he? Abraham, the first
Jew. She died and he married another
woman, but he had one wife. But why did God allow men like
David and Solomon? Solomon has 700. Why did God allow this? I don't know. Nobody else does
either. I don't know. But you can be
sure it was according to God's purpose and for some reason. I thought about this. I thought
maybe there were so few godly men that the Lord had mercy on
700 women who were married to a Christ-like man like Solomon.
I'd rather be married, share one godly man with 699 others
than be married to a monster. Maybe God had mercy on them for
that reason. And you and I have thought about
the fact that Christ is one. We have one husband. Yet we being
many, we're all his bride, we're all his wife. Good type of Christ. How could Solomon keep so many
people, so many women happy? He must have been quite a man.
And our Lord can do the same with his minute verse. But our Lord says what God have
joined us under are joined together. Let no man put Sunday what God
have joined together to. But no man divide that no man
put asunder that no man put away verse seven that they said unto
him, they argued with him. Why did Moses then command to
give a writing of divorcement? And to put her away, this is
found in Deuteronomy 24. They say, why did Moses allow
this? Now, they kept appealing to Moses'
law. They always did this. That's
what legalists do, appeal to the law. Moses didn't write the
law, number one. You and I know that, don't we? Moses didn't write one law. He
took dictation, like the rest of the world. No man, no scripture,
no scriptures of any private interpretation. We go over to
1 Corinthians 7 in a moment where Paul said, I give my advice,
but it's not really his advice. It's God's word. Oh, God wouldn't
have allowed it to be written. But they say, well, Moses said
that Moses gave this right in divorcement, and the Lord answered
verse eight. He said, only Moses, because
of the hardness of your hearts, suffered you to put away your
wife. But from the beginning, it was not so. Our Lord did not
dispute Moses. The Lord honored his word, even
though men applied it to men. Our Lord honored his man before
men. Do you see that? God does this
throughout Scripture. In fact, when the people rebelled
against Moses, God said, In his word, through
the Apostle Paul, you tempted Christ. So God honors his man. Verse 8, he said, Moses, because
of the hardness of your heart. That is, God gave Moses permission
to insert this amendment, as it were, of divorce. God, through
Moses, because of the hardness of a man's heart. Now men, Today,
there's still a great deal of wife abuse today. A great deal
of actual physical abuse and most of it's mental abuse. Ill
treatment, violent treatment, and cruelty against women, the
weaker vessel. And if it's so now, with our
sundry laws and so forth, how bad do you think it was back
then? So God, in his mercy and in his
grace toward women, allowed this to happen to keep this down because
of the hardness of their heart. So many women would be so ill-treated. He allowed the hardness of heart. But, he said, from the beginning,
verse 8, from the beginning it was not so. This was not the
purpose of God for a man and woman to be separated at all. joined together. In verse 9 he
says, I say unto you, now here it is, here's the word of the
Lord Jesus Christ on this subject. I've heard many debate it. There
need be no debate. I say unto you, whosoever shall
put away, that is divorce, instigated, fouled, sued for divorce, put
away his wife, or vice versa now, except it be for fornication,
for this one reason, and shall marry another, committeth
adultery. And whosoever marrieth her which
is put away, doth commit adultery. What is fornication? Well, it's
any sexual infidelity. the adultery or homosexuality
or incest. These are the only lawful or
God ordained reasons to divorce. But. Now. As I say, there are several in
here who have gone through this. Should we avoid it because we
feel guilty about it? Should we not tell our children
this? Do our children not need to hear this? But, and here's the good news,
we're guilty, and many are guilty. There is forgiveness with thee. Did our Lord not just deal with
the subject of forgiveness? My husband's unfaithful, my wife's
unfaithful, so I'm going to divorce her, put her away. If your brother
trespassed against you, how many times should you forgive him? Four hundred and ninety times.
That would do away with all the divorce. And our Lord magnified the law,
did he not? He said, if you've looked on
a woman or man with lust and you have, you're an adulterer.
And he forgives that. Now, if someone is chronically
unfaithful, it's obvious that they, you know. The Lord gives
this reason, doesn't he? It's lawful. If someone is absolutely
an unfaithful spout, he gives this reason. Sexual uncleanness,
infidelity. Divorce them, put them away.
That's it. For any other reason, both become
adulterers, and they're guilty of it. But, as we say, thank
God, there's good news here, there's mercy with the Lord,
there's forgiveness with the Lord. That thou must be feared, that they might not make the
same mistake again. If we were doers of the word,
not hearers only, we might save ourselves. Well, I know we would
save ourselves a great deal of trouble, as Paul goes on to say. Well, let's turn over there.
Well, no, I've got to deal with these other verses. His disciples
said unto him when they heard this because of the strictness
of it. Verse 10, they said, if the case
of a man be so with his wife it's not good to marry and be
better never be married with you know the apostle dealt with
it. And our Lord. Gave him leeway
to do so to deal with it more fully. He's the one whom Paul
got this from and he said verse eleven our Lord said all men
cannot receive the same or what you just say. It's better not
to marry. When our Lord in the beginning
said it's not good for man to be alone, he created male and
female, but for some it's good. For some, like the Apostle Paul
himself, who was never married, was given totally to the work
of the Lord. And that's what he dealt with.
He said, he that is single careth for the things of the Lord. But
he that is married, as they should, concerned about their husband
and wife. And he said from the beginning,
verse 12, this may confuse you a little bit, but there's some
eunuchs born from their mother's womb, not physically, well, maybe
physically unable. That was God's doing. And there
were some which were made eunuchs of men. There were actual societies,
and still today in the Arabic world, that actually do this
to men to make their women safe. Around the men who attend to.
Women of the royal court and so forth, that's not God. Ordained, but there's some which
have made themselves unique, not physically, but who have.
Practice chastity like Paul. For the kingdom of heaven, say
for the ministry, for the work of the ministry, he is able to
receive it, let him receive it very quickly. We've got just
a minute. First Corinthians seven. is the chapter where God gives
Paul. Thank God he gave Paul this,
as we said, leeway and wisdom to deal further with this subject.
Aren't you? You've read it. And because, as we said before,
times are worse than ever. Believers live in a violent and
wicked world, and some people, ignorantly, or otherwise marry
monsters. And that's what unregenerate
people are, by and large, monsters. And look at this, 1 Corinthians
7, just read verses 12 through 15 with me, and he says, To the
rest speak I, and not the Lord. Paul said that in humility. It's the Lord. If any brother
had a wife that believeth not, an unbeliever, she be pleased
to dwell with him. Let him not put her away. Don't
divorce her. She be pleased to dwell with
him. She loves him and so forth. And
a woman which hath a husband that believeth not, if he be
pleased to dwell with her, let her not leave him. The unbelieving
husband is sanctified by the wife. That is, the marriage vows
are still intact and true. This is the reason I don't. I
just don't marry everyone that asked me. It's too serious. It's
too serious. I take it too seriously. Regardless
of some feelings that are hurt by various wants and nearly every
time it's it's been turned out to be. Right. But the unbelieving wife
is sanctified by the husband, if not, the children would be
illegitimate, wouldn't Children of this marriage, if it were
not. Sanctified, they would be illegitimate, but now they're
holding children are lawful before God. Children of these two pair. An unbeliever and a believer,
but if the unbelieving depart, that is someone leave believe
unbeliever leaves that person, male or female, let him depart.
A brother or sister is not under bondage in such Thank God for that, huh? If they
leave. And my advice many times to some
and sometimes some have been concerning this, that if someone
leaves or there's a separation or whatever, don't be the instigator. of the book. Don't file for it. Don't sue for it. Be blameless
in this thing. Be blameless. And the fact of
the matter is, though, that unbeliever will not tolerate that situation
of separation. They won't abide by it. They
won't remain faithful. And they will break that vow
and then you're free. That's the way it is. That's
the way it is. The rule is monks, believers,
forgiveness. Forgiveness. Four hundred and
ninety times. But our Lord, you see how the
Lord, in his wisdom, shall a man put away
his wife for any reason? No. No. Our Lord says all manner
of sin shall be forgiven you. Husband, love your wives as Christ
loved the church and gave himself for it, forgiving forbearing
one another as God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven you." That's
the word, forgiven. I don't know. I don't know. Okay. Okay. Thank you very much. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to go ahead and close
that. We're going to go ahead and get
started. We're going to go ahead and get
started.