Divorce and Remarriage -- Why All the Passion?

by Robert Waters

No subject has generated more passion among certain preacher circles in the last forty years than the popular MDR theory, which is basically a quest to determine "Who may marry?" This doctrine, which we shall refer to as the "traditional view," holds that the "divorced" must remain celibate. The concept has been vigorously promoted by Christian colleges and journals; however, I attended Florida College in the mid '70s, and I do not remember hearing it even brought up. One has to wonder why many today are pushing their teaching with great fervor. Are they helping the Lord's cause or doing great harm? Are good hermeneutics being used in their study for their sermon, article, book, tract or Facebook post; or are brethren merely responding to the passion and jumping on the bandwagon? Is there a "smoking gun" passage that gives every appearance of this dogma's being unjust, morally wrong, and contrary to scripture?

All soldiers of Christ need passion for truth as well as love for the church and the lost. Love for truth will direct one to seek to understand Jesus and to hear Paul's teaching that demands that those who have no marriage be allowed to marry. Those who love truth and seek the lost will think long and hard before attempting to twist Paul's teaching to harmonize with tradition that teaches the divorced must remain celibate.

Occasionally, someone accuses me of riding a hobby horse because of my passion and effort to reach others with what I believe to be the simple truth regarding marriage. Some have even accused me of not teaching on anything else. But a visit to my web site www.TotalHealth.bz will reveal that my accusers are either uninformed or have deliberately made this false accusation. This illustrates that the problem is not just a matter of teaching. A number of preachers zealously seek to destroy the influence of those who disagree with their teaching and practice. They have little effect on me, and they know it, but they also know that their attacks will be seen by others who will then be afraid to speak the truth. And their tactics are working. I know many preachers who know the truth but choose to keep a very low profile. They may teach the truth individually to those whom they view as honest and who love truth, in keeping with what Jesus said, "Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you" (Matt. 7:6). This passage teaches that there are men who hate the truth that will seek to hurt us if we teach something they do not like.

Neither the apostles nor the pioneer preachers during the Restoration Movement taught the idea that the divorced must be forbidden to marry. In the '60s several influential gospel preachers endeavoured to divert the thinking, prevalent today, that churches must look into (investigate) and break up marriages that some question or deem to be unscriptural. And some clearly taught against the idea that the divorced may not marry. Below are some examples:

1) Roy Lanier, Sr.

"Of course, my general advice to all is that they should obey the Lord's will, bring their lives into conformity with the demands of the Lord, but to determine whether a certain marriage is an adulterous relationship is not the preacher's responsibility, unless it is his own."

2) O.C. Lambert

"There can be no doubt but that the church in the first century contained Christians who had been married more than once before conversion and were not required to separate."

3) Foy Wallace Jr.

"With no course of action legislated, revealed or prescribed, we cannot make one without human legislation. The course of some preachers in demanding separations and the breaking up of family relations, and the refusal to even baptize certain ones whose marriage status does not measure up to his standard of approval, is a presumptuous procedure. It reveals the tendency to displace God as the Judge of us all, and a preacher ascends to the bench. More than teaching the moral principles involved, the preacher has no course of action revealed, and to establish one would result in human legislation, more far reaching in evil consequences than the moral effects of divorcement limited to the persons involved. There are some things that are not subject to the law of restitution, things done in certain circumstances which cannot in later circumstances be undone, which remain as matters between God and the individual, and therefore reserved for the judgment. It is certain, however, that if the Lord Jesus Christ had intended a course of action in these cases, he would not have left it for preachers to prescribe, but would have himself legislated it"

4) Dillard Thurman

"When you try to teach a family about Jesus, do so without prying into their personal lives."

Had there been more brave soldiers of Christ like these noted above, the tide might have been turned. Unfortunately, with few in number taking God's side the result was not unlike what happened when the ten spies contradicted Joshua and Caleb in their positive report to the people and their effort to embolden them to follow God's command to take the land. Those who lacked faith outnumbered the faithful spies and their great passion contributed to their disbelief, which influenced others; thus evil prevailed.

Friends, have you considered the implications of what many are teaching on MDR? First, their teaching actually has Jesus teaching the opposite of his actual intentions, which was to put a stop to the evil practice of Jewish men's "putting away" but not divorcing, which he called "adultery against her" (Mark 10:11). The truth regarding the so-called "exception clause," the most perverted and misused phrase in all the Bible, can easily be seen once one understands that "put away," from the Greek word "apoluo," is not divorce as defined by God (Deut. 24:1,2; Jer. 3:8). It simply means the man who sends away his wife, but does not follow Moses' teaching regarding divorce, does not "commit adultery against her" IF he is ending the "unlawful marriage" because of fornication. The context indicates that the type of fornication alluded to is when a marriage is not legal, and we have TWO examples of such illegal marriages in the New Testament (Matt. 14:4; 1 Cor. 5:1). Note the rendering of Matthew 5:31-32 by Holman Christian Standard:

"It was also said, Whoever divorces his wife must give her a written notice of divorce. 32 But I tell you, everyone who divorces his wife, except in a case of sexual immorality, = fornication, or possibly a violation of Jewish marriage laws [emphasis added] causes her to commit adultery. And whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery."

While many think they are doing the will of God in "forbidding to marry" (which, by the way, Paul put into the category of "doctrines of devils" [1 Tim. 4:1-3]) and helping God by preventing "adulterous marriages," their teaching actually benefits only the devil, and does so in many ways. Their teaching has: 1) Moses teaching what God did not like, even though he was inspired in his writings; 2) Jesus contradicting Moses; 3) Jesus breaking his promise not to change the Law before the cross; 4) Paul contradicting Jesus; 5) and Christians teaching that the divorced, even those innocent of sin in the matter, must remain celibate.

Requiring celibacy is contrary to God's thinking and teaching that "it is not good that man should be alone." Paul, who answered questions Christians asked regarding this important issue, said to let every man and every woman have a spouse; then he gave the reason: "to avoid fornication" (1 Cor. 7:1, 2). Thus, those who put tradition above Paul's teachings take away God's tool to help people avoid fornication. Paul went on to make it clear he was talking about the divorced. Regarding the "unmarried" (divorced) he said, "let them marry" (1 Cor. 7:8, 9). Then he used different terminology to help assure it was understood that he was talking about the divorced. He contrasted the word "bound" (married) with the word "loosed" (divorced) and said in no uncertain terms that if they marry they do not sin (1 Cor. 7:27, 28). Unfortunately, some are teaching that one can be bound but not married and loosed but still bound. This theory arose due to desire to justify the traditional MDR teaching, but is nothing short of a denial of what Paul clearly taught.

At the beginning of this article I referred to the popular MDR teaching as a theory. It certainly is not factual because it is based on mere assumption regarding what Jesus meant, and the conclusion has many serious hermeneutical problems that make it unbelievable. On the other hand, the truth is backed up by clear biblical teaching, such as presented above.

We SHOULD have passion for truth, as revealed in the Bible, and for the souls of those that are being lost because of the devil's most successful doctrine. He uses this "MDR" creed to keep people out of the church, to cause people to leave the church, to divide churches, and to render ineffective sound preachers of truth. While unbridled passion, which Paul describes as "zeal without knowledge," can be a driving force for evil, passion for truth can be a driving force for good.