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Speaker 1
So Carol is asking the true interpretation.
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Of the accept for fornication clause in Matthew 5:32 and Matthew 19:9 is.
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Accept the marriage itself be unlawful, as.
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Was the case with Herodius Philip’s wife and LTL and Michael David’s wife.
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It is a repentance clause, not an excuse to commit adultery clause, as the.
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Body of Christ teaches.
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I can reach a few, but you can reach millions. Please teach this truth as millions are.
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Perishing for the lack of knowledge.
Speaker 3
All right, Carol. Thank you. I’m going to say this is kind.
Speaker 4
Of the first time I’ve heard this, and I’m not sure where you’ve heard it, where it comes from. I know, for example, the Catholic Church has the concept of annulment, but even what you’re saying here I don’t think is consistent with Catholic concept of annulment of a marriage.
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So let’s talk about what the Bible says.
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And we could dig into the Greek and Hebrew on this, too. And the Bible is extremely consistent, so.
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I don’t think there’s really much room for guessing.
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So let’s start at the verses that Carol cites. So she talks about Matthew 532.
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Let’s read that. Matthew 532.
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And it reads, but I say to.
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You that whoever divorces his wife for.
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Any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery.
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And whoever marries a woman who is divorced commits adultery.
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Now, of course, we’re reading the English translation and anybody watches our show, you know, you can’t take the English translation at face value.
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So let’s dig deeper.
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What is meant by sexual immorality?
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That’s the Greek word pornea.
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And that’s the same word that we.
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Get pornography and those sorts of words fornication pornea. And in the Greek, according to the.
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Bible, concordance, it means illicit sexual intercourse can mean adultery, fornication, homosexuality, intercourse with.
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Animals, intercourse with close relatives with the divorced man or divorced women.
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So all of this just more or.
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Less means what that English translation was.
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Sexual immorality, you could say is a good way of summarizing all these things.
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From the biblical perspective.
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Let’s now look at Matthew 19, verses eight to nine. So he, Jesus, said to them, Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts.
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Permitted you to divorce your wives.
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But from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you, whoever divorces.
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His wife except for sexual immorality, that’s the word pornea again.
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And marries another commits adultery, and whoever.
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Marries her who is divorced commits adultery.
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So parallel verse, same thing, same. And Jesus there is quoting, right, Moses and the provision for divorce. Let’s talk about that. Let’s look at it.
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This comes from Deuteronomy 24, verses one to four.
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And it reads, and when a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor.
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In his eyes because he has found some uncleanliness in her. We’ll come back to that word, uncleanliness. It’s the Hebrew word erva.
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And he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand and.
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Sends her out of his house. When she has departed from his house.
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And goes and becomes another man’s wife if that later man detests her, and.
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Writes her a certificate of divorce but.
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Puts it in her hand and sends her out of the house.
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Or if the later husband dies, who took her as his wife, then her.
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Former husband who divorced her must not.
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Take her back to be his wife.
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After she has been defiled. For that is an abomination before the Lord and you shall not bring sin.
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On the land which the Lord your God is giving you as your inheritance. So if we look at this, let’s dissect it a little bit.
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Nowhere is God saying when you divorce, it’s as if that marriage never was or was invalid. It’s just saying more or less that the marriage was brought to an end. And what God’s really getting at also here too is God doesn’t like the concept that a man and wife sleep together, they’re intimate, have this close relationship, on a sexual level even, and then they split, have new wives, new spouses, get intimate with those people and then come back.
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Like God says, that’s disgusting to me. God doesn’t want that ever to happen.
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Where you get intimate with one person, then intimate with another and then come.
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Back with the first. That’s disgusting.
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So it’s not so much, oh, it’s invalid and all that stuff. God’s saying what God really makes the marriage is in the sense that sexual.
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Intercourse, that’s what really seals the deal. And then to split and go up.
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You can’t really undo that. You can’t say, oh, we’re going to.
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Pretend you never had intercourse. And that word erva there that the.
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Husband has a right to divorce his.
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Wife for going back to Deuteronomy 24 one.
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He’s found no favor in his eyes because he has found some uncleanliness. That’s an interesting word. It really means nakedness, nudity, shame, like your general parts are exposed. So suggesting that the woman maybe was.
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Actually intimate with someone else before getting married and being with a husband or a husband find out she was intimate with somebody else. That’s what it’s talking about.
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It’s again, no suggestion there that the.
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Marriage was just invalid. It’s that there really was infidelity whether.
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Before the marriage or after and the.
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Husband can call off the marriage.
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This is the same word, the irva for uncleanliness that was used in Genesis.
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Nine two, when Ham, the father of.
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Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father.
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Noah Leviticus 18 six none of you.
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Shall approach anyone who is near of.
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Kin to uncover his nakedness or irva.
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Verse after verse of verse, using the word nakedness. Ezekiel 1636 to 37 god talked about the Israel in comparing Israel as a spouse, but says, because your filthiness was poured out and your nakedness uncovered in.
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Your harlotry with your lovers and with all your Ominal idols goes on and on.
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I will gather you going on to verse 37. I will gather them from all around you and will uncover your nakedness to them, and they will see all your nakedness. So here God’s really emphasized nakedness is.
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A bad thing, and to the Jews.
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It was a terrible thing. And it goes again beyond just being naked in terms of clothes.
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I mean, it’s being fully exposed, totally shamed.
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So let’s fast forward to Jeremiah 38.
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Did you know God gave Israel a certificate of divorce? God divorced Israel. He says, Then I saw for all.
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The causes for which backsliding Israel had committed adultery, I had put her away.
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And given her a certificate of divorce.
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Yet her treacherous sister Judah did not.
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Fear, but went and played the harlot also. So is God saying, the marriage was invalid?
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We’re going to pretend it never existed?
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Or he’s saying like, there’s an end to it, it’s over.
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Isaiah 51 one where is the certificate.
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Of your mother’s divorce whom I have put away? Where are my creditors?
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So God again uses this divorce and certificate as an illustration of being done with his people. And sort of this happened again just.
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Before or just after Christ was crucified and around that time of the new church. Christ tells Israel, your house will be left unto you desolate.
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That was almost like a declaration of.
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I’m divorcing you again. But I agree with the premise that was being said that divorce isn’t supposed.
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To be something to just to jump.
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On, that God didn’t want people to really do it.
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Jesus says, because of the hardness of.
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Your hearts, that he let people have divorce. He made that a thing, but it.
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Wasn’T because he wanted it. It wasn’t initially part of God’s plan.
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And God himself shows that he was.
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Willing to take back Israel. Jeremiah 314 return o backsliding children, says the Lord, for I am married to.
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You, I will take you one from.
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A city and two from a family, and I will bring you to Zion. Ezekiel 1662 and I will establish my covenant with you.
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Then you shall know that I am the Lord. Our marriage is a covenant. Hosea is an amazing book.
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And there God uses an illustration of a real life illustration of his experience with Israel, where he has Hosea.
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Marry a prostitute and she eventually leaves him and God calls her back.
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And Hosea 31 god says, go show love to your wife again, though she is loved by another man and is an adulteress.
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Love her as the Lord loves the.
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Israelites, though they turn to other gods.
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And love the sacred raisin cakes.
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Jesus just forgives again and again and again. How many times shall we forgive?
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Jesus says in Matthew 821, not seven.
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Times, but 77 times, that’s 149 sorry, 490 times. For 490 years, God gave Israel, in fact, a time to renew the covenant.
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With him and really, truly live out.
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Being his people 490 years. And eventually, when they stoned Stephen and.
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Persecuted God’s church, god says, okay, it’s over. You’re killing me.
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You’re killing my people. I have no choice but now to.
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Move my people to the Gentiles and those who will call me by my name. But that was sad. Broke God’s heart.
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He doesn’t want us to see our.
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Relationships damage the euther. And I hope this is helpful to.
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You, too, to just get an idea.
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Of how divorce works and why it’s detestable to God. He does want to see it, but.
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Also why he understands why it has to happen sometimes.
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Tina, any thoughts? Questions?
Speaker 2
Good.
Speaker 5
I think divorce is definitely a sensitive subject, and we have to be really careful because there’s a time and a place for it, but it’s not for just something we take lightly.
Speaker 3
Exactly.
Speaker 4
That’s a good summary.
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In His Service
BibleAsk Team
