Saturday 10 August, 2013
1 Corinthians 7:8-16
8 I speak to those who are not married. I also speak to widows. It is good for you to stay single like me. 9 But if you can’t control yourselves, you should get married. It is better to get married than to burn with sexual longing. 10 I give a command to those who are married. It is a direct command from the Lord, not from me. A wife must not leave her husband. 11 But if she does, she must not get married again. Or she can go back to her husband. And a husband must not divorce his wife. 12 I also have something to say to everyone else. It is from me, not a direct command from the Lord. Suppose a brother has a wife who is not a believer. If she is willing to live with him, he must not divorce her. 13 And suppose a woman has a husband who is not a believer. If he is willing to live with her, she must not divorce him. 14 The unbelieving husband has been made holy through his wife. The unbelieving wife has been made holy through her believing husband. If that were not the case, your children would not be pure and clean. But as it is, they are holy. 15 If the unbeliever leaves, let that person go. In that case, a believing man or woman does not have to stay married. God wants us to live in peace. 16 Wife, how do you know if you can save your husband? Husband, how do you know if you can save your wife?
This is a difficult piece of scripture to comprehend. What it does say to me is that it is best to build a good relationship with a Christian/believer. Married life is a partnership with your spouse and is truly enhanced if you both include God into the partnership.
Marriage is also about sharing and not being selfish. Being able to share the love of God between us as a married couple has truly enhanced our life and marriage. There are many challenges in life in 2013, which make marriage difficult and society has made it easy to just give it up.
I thank God for his love and the gift of a wonderfull wife, who I must care for and continue to develop a relationship with. I pray that God continues to bless our lives together and enhances our love for him.
With divorce approaching one in three, people don’t like to spend much time thinking about the subject matter of divorce in the Bible. Paul sights a few factors to consider on the matter of divorce, but I believe there are many more factors that have been left unsaid.
We know that a marriage is initiated with a covenantal promise before God, but its is maintained through the loving relationship of the partners. With no loving relationship there is not much of the marriage left. We know that God hates divorce Malachi 2:16 but we also know that God wants us to live in peace.
In short, marriage should not be entered into lightly and neither should divorce.