Mark 10:2–16 ² And Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” ³ He answered them, “What did Moses command you?” ⁴ They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away.” ⁵ And Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. ⁶ But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ ⁷ ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, ⁸ and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. ⁹ What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”

¹⁰ And in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. ¹¹ And he said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her, ¹² and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

¹³ And they were bringing children to him that he might touch them, and the disciples rebuked them. ¹⁴ But when Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the children come to me; do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. ¹⁵ Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.” ¹⁶ And he took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands on them.

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.

Some things just never change.  When people look at the state of marriages in our society, many will wring their hands and say, “This is terrible.  If only we could go back 20, 40, 80, or 100 years to when marriage was honored.”  You know what?—it wouldn’t help.  Sorry, folks, despising marriage is nothing new.

Marriage was in just as bad a position in Jesus’ day as it is in our day.  The Pharisees ask, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?”   Is it lawful?  Even the question shows a mindset, a desire, to meet the minimum requirements.  Is it lawful?  When that is your view of things, even the bare minimum is done grudgingly.  Is it lawful?  They might as well have asked, “How much can we get away with?”

The Pharisees had two schools of thought on divorce.  On the one hand you had Pharisees (Shammai) who taught that adultery was the only legitimate cause for divorce.  The far more popular view among the Pharisees (Hillel) was divorce for many reasons—a spoiled meal or, simply, if the husband found another woman fairer than his wife.  One Jewish historian wrote in his autobiography, “I divorced my wife, not liking her behavior” (Josephus Life 426).

“Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?”  Ins’t it interesting that even the Pharisees, with all their rules and additions to God’s law, even they wanted to get away with doing the bare minimum.  More laws and rules do not make you more pious and righteous.

Jesus asks, “What did Moses teach about divorce?”

Now, Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.  You need to understand what where the Pharisees go to answer Jesus’ question—they go to Dt. 24:1-4.  The passage does talk about writing a certificate of divorce, but the focus of the passage deals with remarrying your first husband if you get a divorce from a second husband—it is an abomination before Yahweh.  The Pharisees, these experts in Scripture, twist a passage to fit what they want.  People still do that today.

The Pharisees use Dt. 24 to answer Jesus’ question; now, see where Jesus goes to talk about marriage.  Jesus gets away from the, Is it lawful? away from the, What is the minimum required?  These questions reveal a hardness of heart—a cardio-sclerosis—which desires to dumb down the holiness of God to something attainable.  As though reluctantly sloughing off and doing just enough to get by will make a marriage work.  Cardio-sclerosis indeed.

Jesus goes to the beginning, to the Divine intention for marriage.  Marriage is rooted in creation, rooted in the beginning of life.

From the beginning of creation, Jesus says God had an intention for man and woman.  God created the universe to house life; He created the plants and animals to sustain life; He created man and woman and marriage to propagate life.

God defines marriage.  No ballot initiative has the authority to define (or ‘redefine’ marriage); it cannot be done.  No human institution has that authority.  Marriage is defined by God, “God made them male and female.”

As He created, God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone.  I will make a suitable helper for him” (Gen. 2:18).  God put Adam into a deep sleep then took out one of his ribs.  From that rib, God formed and crafted Eve.

Marriage was God’s idea—not Adam’s.  God created a woman—not a buddy or a chum or a pal.  God created a single woman to be Adam’s wife; He didn’t create not a herd of women for Adam to choose.  God created marriage to be a relationship between one man and one woman working together to subdue and dominate the world (Gen. 1:27-28).

God opened Adam’s flesh and removed part of Adam, but God’s intent was for that piece of Adam to be united with Adam once again as one flesh.  God brought Eve to Adam, and Adam responded, “This at last (how long had Adam been alive?) is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”  God created precisely what Adam needed and desired.  God brought Eve to Adam and Adam to Eve.

In marriage, God joins man and woman together.

Husbands, God brought your wife to you, and your wife is God’s gift to you.  Wives, God brought your husband to you, and your husband is God’s gift to you.  Live that way.

Jesus teaches “The two become one flesh.”  God’s intention for marriage is that one man and one woman equals one flesh.  One plus one equals one.  When you take one away from that, what are you left with?

“The two become one flesh” by way of what happens in the marriage bed (1 Cor. 6:16), and “the two become one flesh” by the natural results, the fruit, of what happens in the marriage bed—children.  Children of a husband and wife are the ‘one flesh’ fruit marriage.  You cannot separate what God has joined together.

Oneness is God’s wonderful way to build husband and wife up, but husbands and wives can also use this oneness to tear each other down.  If there ever was a legitimate reason for divorce, the Fall into sin was it.  How can you remain one with someone who is brought death to you and to creation?  Now, both Adam and Eve share the blame for the Fall.  Yet, their marriage survived.  Marriage survived the Fall.

The Pharisees want to know what is lawful.  Jesus doesn’t deal with the lawful;  Jesus doesn’t work within the set of minimum requirements.  Jesus talks about God’s intent—what God has joined together better not be separated by anyone.  God’s intent for marriage is never divorce.

Several other passages of Scripture (1 Cor. 6:12-7:40) teach that there are Biblical grounds for divorce—adultery, an unequally yoked situation where the unbeliever abandons the believer (which includes abuse).  Divorce is always caused by sin.  One spouse may be ‘innocent’ by our standards, but divorce is always caused by sin. Divorce is always a result of something that needs to be repented and confessed.

Know that God truly does forgive—even divorce—through Jesus’ death and resurrection.  Those of you who look down on people who have been divorced, knock it off.  God forgives.  Even if you are guilty of adultery or were abusive, Jesus took that sin and buried it in the tomb where it remains condemned and killed forever.

And God knew what He was doing when He inspired Mark to write about Jesus receiving the children immediately after this encounter with the Pharisees with their question, Is it lawful?

The fruit of ‘one flesh’ unions—the fruit of marriage—children, the ones of whom Jesus says (Mk. 9:37), “When you receive one of these little children you receive Me and when you receive Me you receive not Me but God the Father Who sent Me.”  The disciples are hindering them.  They allow the unbelieving Pharisees to come to Jesus with their questions about what is lawful, but hinder these children who come simply to receive blessings from Jesus.

Many denominations do the same thing by denying baptism to infants.  But if you only look at others as falling short of God’s standard, you are just as concerned with the minimum requirements as the Pharisees.  The Pharisees are not alone despising marriage; the disciples are not alone when it comes to hindering children from coming to Jesus.

As your pastor who loves you, it kills me to say this, but you people, whom I love, are guilty too.  Some of you by the way you speak of your relationship reveal that you want to get by doing the minimum in your marriage.  Stop despising God’s gift to you.

Some of you hinder children and tear apart marriages by getting upset with the parents who do not “properly” control their kids here in church.  You Pharisee, you hypocrite.  There are enough ways that Satan is attacking children and marriage.

Serve those parents; help them.  Instead of complaining about the kids who run in church and scream during the service, instead of dragging your spouse down with you while they listen to you complain on the drive home, help and serve where it is needed.  Encourage parents; thank them for bringing their kids to church.  Offer to help; don’t give condescending advice.

When you hinder the children, Jesus is indignant, enraged.  He receives and blesses those who are not concerned about meeting the minimal requirements of the lawful, and He receives you.  He receives you precisely because He suffered the unlawful for you.

He has made you, the church, His bride.  He has made you one flesh as He gives you His flesh to eat, and His blood to drink.  Receive from Him, as a child from a parent, everything you need for life.  Amen.

May the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds and marriages and homes forever and ever in Christ Jesus.  Amen.