This morning I was reading in Mark 10 where Jesus was talking about divorce. It brought to a mind a recent podcast (iTunes) that I listened to from str.org’s Greg Koukl. A caller was questioning what the Bible really taught about divorce and remarriage and Greg said the usual things on the topic of divorce concerning adultery and desertion. He followed this with another angle that I had never heard of before that may be a bit controversial, but I think is well worthy of reflection.
He asked the caller, “Does the Bible tell us it’s ok to lie?” – answer –“NO”
“Does the Bible ever tell us to lie?” – answer – “NO”
“Are there times in the Bible when lying is the right thing to do?” answer – “Yes”
The classic example of this is the story of Rahab and the spies found in Joshua, chapter 2. Greg went on to explain that there are moral absolutes in the Bible, but those absolutes are graded.
Some are more important than others. At times we are put in a position where we have to choose one or the other. For example, tell a lie, or allow Joshua to be captured and killed.
The Bible is not explicit about circumstances where divorce may fall into this sort of category, but it seems to be implicit that there will be moral dilemmas at which point you will be obligated to do the lesser evil.
For example, the Bible does not say that it is ok to get a divorce if the father is committing physical abuse upon the wife or the children to the point of murder, but is it not implicit there that the greater of the two evils is murder and not divorce? Choosing divorce over murder seems to be more moral choice in this instance.
Some may say that this leads us down the path of a slippery slope and that divorce is never an option (excluding the above exceptions), but separation is what we should embrace instead. I agree that adding this line of thinking to the conversation about divorce and remarriage may lead to come very challenging sets of circumstances, but at least we need to consider this third option carefully and Biblically as we attempt to discern God’s will for his people.
1 comment:
Les McFall has an interested way to deal with the exception clause in Matthew 19:9. He has written a 43 page paper that reviews the changes in the Greek made by Erasmus that effect the way Matthew 19:9 has been translated. I reviewed McFall's paper at Except For Fornication Clause of Matthew 19:9. I would love to hear some feedback on this position.
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