Husbands, not only can you cause your wives to divorce you, biblically, you can also bring the discipline of the Lord God onto your life. Below right now is an outline I’m working on, but since I feel so strongly about this warning, I want to get it posted before it’s fully developed.
Men of God, if you abuse your wife with your words (it doesn’t have to be physical), if you look at pornography and especially if you dare to try to bring it into your marital bed and so defile your wife, if you live a life filled enough with the things you want to the point of excluding her you may “remove her husband” and cause her loneliness and depression.
UNDER CONSTRUCTION – ENJOY
Scripture shows that God allows the divorce of a saved couple who were supposed to be married “unto death,” but because of our hard hearts – both in the Old and New Testament – under certain circumstances He allows it. Think of that for a moment. At one time there was no such thing as a divorce allowed by God. Imagine living an entire life with someone you married, and who fell out of love with you. The rest of your life! That’s the way marriage was intended, but God, through His grace at some point in the Old Testament began to allow it.
This is a list of the reasons God allows divorce, with the interesting addition of #3 which isn’t specified in scripture so far as I know, and #4 which may be shown by precepts or examples of saints who fell into it:
- adultery
- an unsaved spouse leaves
- physical or emotional abuse
- you don’t heed God’s warnings, and he may step in and discipline you
Let’s start off with Hebrews 12:3-13, here’s the text from our Lord written by the Apostle Paul, then I’ll break down the beauty of the Lord’s warning toward us, and consequences for those :
3 Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. 4 In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. 5 And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?
“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
nor be weary when reproved by him.
6 For the Lord disciplines the one he loves,
and chastises every son whom he receives.”7 It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? 8 If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. 9 Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? 10 For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. 11 For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
12 Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, 13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.
Hebrews 12:3-13
Starting with verses 3-5, this is an introduction with important reminders, v3 Jesus took the penalty for your sin, and taught during His earthly ministry which offers us His support and peace; v4 in your struggle against sin (temptation, fighting your fleshly desires, you have not resisted to the point of bleeding as Jesus did in the Garden of Gethsemane. The Merriam-Webster dictionary online defines exhort as “to give warnings or advice : make urgent appeals” and the Greek translation of that term as show in the Logos is “encouragement, comfort,” so I imagine God as the perfect, loving Father gently encouraging us of something very important for our protection and benefit (think Jer 29:11).
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Then in verses 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 discipline is mentioned 9 times in these 7 verses. Most probably get the idea of discipline, you put your child in time out, or they get a spanking, or write sentences. You choose a wise consequence designed to teach your child that this behavior is not good. But also in this sense I think of Luke 17:1-2:
And he said to his disciples, “Temptations to sin are sure to come, but woe to the one through whom they come! 2 It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin.
In my mind, in this situation it points toward an inferred discipline, because Jesus essentially tells his disciples that if someone tempts “one of these little ones” he would be better off if a huge stone were hung around his neck and he was tossed into the sea. I feel like “these little ones” can not only apply to children, but since we are all God’s children it can apply to us as well. I feel like Nathan’s message from the Lord to King David concerning his killing of Uriah the Hittite, a man who very well may have been brought into the faith through his marriage to Bathsheba. Whether or not Uriah assimilated into the Israelite community and worshiped God, his murder brought a discipline from God upon David. Read 2 Sam 12:7-20 to see or be reminded of that discipline. The Lord does not always stay his hand with the grace of light disciplines like a slap on the wrist.