You are listening to Heed the Word with our pastor and teacher Ken Davis. Pastor Ken is the senior pastor at Calvary Chapel Southwest Metro in Burleson, Texas. Please join us as we study the Gospel of Luke, verse by verse.

Our culture and our nation has a desire to redefine marriage as being something other than that, which is between one man and one woman. And so the institution of marriage, that first institution that was established by God for the preservation of mankind and the family, is under attack. And we as the church have a responsibility to speak out against that and to call divorce what it is.

The Gospel of Luke is the third account in the Gospels of the life and teachings of our Savior, Jesus Christ. As believers, there are few studies that will benefit us more spiritually than studying the life and teachings of the Master. Marriage has been established by the God of the Bible. Today, biblical marriage is under attack. Man is trying to change what God has already ordained, what he has already made holy. Let's not forget what the scripture says about adding to or taking away from his word. Don't forget to stay with us after today's message to hear more information about He the Word, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. But for now, please open your Bibles to the Gospel of Luke, chapter 16, verse 14. So join Pastor Ken.

This particular teaching of Jesus comes in the middle of a teaching on money and covetousness. And at that time, as Jesus was teaching regarding money and stewardship, the Pharisees, who were covetous by nature, began to deride him and to mock him. Let's back up a few verses for context. Verse 14. And he said to them, You are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts, for what is highly esteemed among men is an abomination in the sight of God. The law and the prophets were until John. Since that time the kingdom of God has been preached, and everyone is pressing into it. And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one tittle of the law to fail. One little mark, like the crossing of a T or the dotting of an I. It's easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for even one little mark of the law to be done away with. The law stands, and the law is the word of God. And Jesus is saying, you know what, you guys justify yourselves. You know, that's a problem that a lot of us have today, isn't it? We want to justify ourselves. We may do something that we recognize is maybe not the best thing to do. Or we may even go so far as to say that it's the wrong thing to do. But doggone it, we're justified in doing it because of what someone else has done, right? We justify our own actions predicated upon the actions of other people, and we blame what they've done and say, because of what they've done, that's why I have no choice but to do what I've done. Even though it may seem wrong, even though it may not be the right thing to do, we justify ourselves and we have a desire to say, regardless of how it may look, I'm right, don't we? And that's exactly what the Pharisees were doing. Now, many of the Pharisees had a very liberal view of divorce in that day. In that day, just as there are in this day, there's a wide range of opinions regarding many matters in Scripture. But at that time, it was very easy for a man to divorce his wife. In fact, to this day, in some countries, it's very easy for a man to divorce his wife. In Saudi Arabia, all that a man has to do is publicly declare, I divorce thee three times to his wife, and it's as good as done. She's put away, she's gone. He can go out and marry someone new, or two someones, or threesome's, as the case may be. So don't think that this is isolated to a time foregone in history. No, these things occur today. And so it is not unusual that in the midst of this discussion of money, and in the midst of their deriding him over it, and him accusing them of being those that justify themselves, that he would call them to a very interesting point. And in verse 18, he says this whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery. And whoever marries her who is divorced from her husband commits adultery. Now, let me tell you, this is one of those verses that I think many pastors would just love to skip. Just say, well, let's read through that and let's go on to the next section, right? Because it's a very uncomfortable topic. Why is it such an uncomfortable topic? Because so many people today are doing it. And because the world looks at it and it says, Oh, it's unfortunate, but there's nothing really wrong with it. Better to get a divorce than to be unhappy in marriage, right? That's what the world will tell you. Can I tell you that marriage today is under attack? Marriage is under attack in ways that it has never been in the past, even. There are basically three ways in which we could say that marriage is under attack today. Number one, marriage is under attack because of the ease of which people can be divorced. It's not that difficult to get a divorce. It's pretty easy. In fact, Nevada is called the divorce capital of the country where they have just the highest percentage of divorces are in Nevada because they've made it so quick and so simple. That people will actually move to Nevada, stay there long enough to establish residency, and then file for divorce under that state's laws, and as soon as they're done, move back. The second area in which divorce is under attack is, or where marriage rather is under attack, is in the sense of its needlessness. There are so many people today who say, why bother being married? Let's just cohabitate, let's just live together. And so they will go from one partner to another, to another, cohabitating and living together, and then breaking up and moving on to the next. And emotionally, it's as though they are divorcing, but without all of the legal ramifications, right? And the third area in which marriage is under attack today is in that it is being redefined. Our culture and our nation has a desire to redefine marriage as being something other than that, which is between one man and one woman. And so the institution of marriage, that first institution that was established by God for the preservation of mankind and the family is under attack. And we as the church have a responsibility to speak out against that and to call divorce what it is. Divorce is sin. And one of the reasons that it is so difficult for the church to teach on this, for people to teach on this, is because so many people within the church have been and are being divorced. The divorce rate inside the church actually is higher than that outside of the church. Now, I would argue the point that possibly the reason that that is, is because people outside the church just don't feel the need to get married in the first place. If we were to count the number of people who cohabitated and then separated and added that in with the divorces, I imagine that that in the world would indeed be higher than that in the church. I think oftentimes that what's happening is that people in the church feel the compulsion that they cannot be intimate apart from being married, and so they get married, and yet when the marriage falls apart or when the relationship doesn't work, they divorce. And so that I think is part of the reason that we see a higher rate of divorce within the church than we do in the world, is simply because the world doesn't bother to get married, whereas the church does. I don't have statistical information to back that up, but I think that it makes plenty of common sense. But the question is that if we, as believers in Jesus Christ, who acknowledge the fact that he is our Lord and our Savior, in other words, our master and our owner, the one who paid the price for our sins, if we claim to follow him and to serve him, then how is it that we can have so little regard for the commands and the covenants which he has made for us? And yet we do. Very clearly, Jesus says here in verse 18 of Luke chapter 16 Whoever divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery. And whoever marries her who is divorced from her husband commits adultery. Now, if this was all that was said about divorce in the Bible, then we would have to say that there is no circumstance ever under which any couple can ever be divorced. That's what we would have to say. Now, I have to tell you that the Bible actually says a great deal more about divorce than what we find here. When you study scripture, particularly in an inductive study, you have to ask yourself several questions. Number one, what are the observations we can draw from the text? What do we see happening here? Secondly, how do we interpret that? What is the interpretation? We have the observation, then we have the interpretation, meaning what is being said and what does it mean? And then thirdly, we have the application, which is how does that apply to my life? But in many cases, particularly in this case, we also need to look at the correlation, meaning, what does the rest of the word of God have to say on this particular subject? And so though we're only covering one verse in Luke today, there's a great deal more of scripture that we're going to review. Let's turn to Malachi chapter 2. Malachi is the last book of the Old Testament, just to the left of Matthew in your Bibles. And we'll be landing in Malachi chapter 2. One thing that we have to understand, and that must be very, very clear to us as we study this issue of divorce, is that God hates divorce. Understand that. We find that here in Malachi chapter 2, starting in verse 11. Judah has dealt treacherously, and an abomination has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem, for Judah has profaned the Lord's holy institution, which he loves. He has married the daughter of a foreign God. What is that holy institution that God loves? It's marriage. You see, guys, marriage, as we'll see, was God's idea. Not man's, but God's idea. And Judah, he says, has profaned that holy institution which God loves. Verse 12, may the Lord cut off from the tents of Jacob the man who does this, being awake and aware. That's referring to a willfulness of sin, isn't it? Yet who brings an offering to the Lord of hosts? And this is the second thing you do. You cover the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping and crying. So he does not regard the offering anymore, nor receive it with good will from your hands. Yet you say, For what reason? What they're saying is simply this. You know, you bring your sacrifice to the Lord, you desire to worship God, you're coming before the Lord, and you're covering my altar with tears, and yet the Lord's not receiving the offering. Why is that? Why they ask? He says, Because the Lord has been witness between you and the wife of your youth, with whom you have dealt treacherously. Yet she is your companion and your wife by covenant. But did he not make them one, having a remnant of the spirit? And why one? He seeks godly offspring. Therefore, take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously with the wife of his youth. For the Lord God of Israel says that he hates divorce, for it covers one's garments with violence, says the Lord of hosts. Therefore, take heed of your spirit that you do not deal treacherously. God refers to divorce as that which is done treacherously. Have you noticed very oftentimes divorce makes liars out of people in many ways? You know, you get them up on the witness stand there, and all of a sudden so-and-so did such and such, and we'll falsify records and we'll do whatever we need to do to make sure that we get what we want out of that settlement, won't we? There's an old country song. She got the gold mine, I got the mine shaft. Meaning, you know, she got everything and I got nothing, right? There's that idea that, you know, there's this monetary loss when divorce comes, and that no matter how equitably they try to arrange things, someone always ends up getting less than the other. It makes treacherous people out of people who otherwise might have been considered decent human beings. So clearly, God hates divorce. But let me tell you something, and it is vital, vital, vital that you hear me on this. God hates divorce, but he does not hate the divorced person. You see, so often in the church today, when a couple goes through a trying or difficult time and a divorce destroys this relationship, the church, rather than coming with comfort and healing, and compassion and prayer and a desire to see restoration, instead brings condemnation and judgment and drives those people from their midst. God loves the sinner, but he hates the sin. The problem with Judah, as we read in Malachi, was that they refused to recognize the fact that what they had done was sin, but wanted to justify themselves just as the Pharisees did by bringing sacrifices unto the Lord's altar. And what God was saying, in essence, is this don't bring me sacrifices without repentance. Don't bring me an offering without a contrite heart. Don't ask for forgiveness for something that you're not sorry for. Because that's not asking for forgiveness. It's asking for permission. And so often we want God to smile upon our sinfulness rather than to forgive us for it. Let's see what else Jesus had to say regarding divorce. Turn with me, if you will, to Matthew chapter 19. There's also a section in Mark 10. For the interest of time, we're going to look at Matthew 19 today. In Matthew 19, starting in verse 1, we see this. Now it came to pass when Jesus had finished these sayings that he departed from Galilee and came to the region of Judea beyond the Jordan, and great multitudes followed him, and he healed them there. The Pharisees also came to him, testing him, and saying to him, Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for just any reason? You see, many of them in that day did teach that, that it was lawful for a man to divorce his wife for just any reason, and they used the law given by Moses to justify that action, and we'll look at that in a moment. And he answered and said to them, Have you not read that he who made them at the beginning made them male and female? And said, For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So then they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let not man separate. They said to him, Why then did Moses command to give a certificate of divorce and to put her away? He said to them, Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, permitted you to divorce your wives. But from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality and marries another, commits adultery. And whoever marries her who is divorced, commits adultery. They wanted justification. And they sought for that justification in the law of Moses. And in the law of Moses, an edict had been given, or permission had been given for divorce after a nature. Let's turn to Deuteronomy 24. Hold your place here in Matthew, because we will be back to look at this in the book of Matthew. But turn, if you will, to Deuteronomy chapter 24. Let's see what they're talking about. Because they're claiming that Moses commanded that they give her a letter of divorce and put her away. So let's see what is the justification of the Pharisees here. Deuteronomy 24, verse 1. When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes, because he has found some uncleanness in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house. When she has departed from his house and goes and becomes another man's wife, if the latter husband detests her and writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter husband dies, who took her as his wife, then her former husband, who had divorced her, must not take her back to be his wife after she has been defiled. For that is an abomination before the Lord, and you shall not bring sin on the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance. Let's look closely at this for just a moment. When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes, because he has found some uncleanness in her, is that talking about what Jesus was talking about, where he said that except for sexual immorality, there's no grounds for divorce. No, it's not talking about that. The uncleanness that is being referred to here in Deuteronomy is not the uncleanness of adultery or fornication or sexual immorality. Because you see, in the Old Testament, they had a way of dealing with adultery and fornication and sexual immorality. They had a rock concert. Do you know what I'm saying? I'm saying that they would take the person who was guilty of adultery outside the camp and they would stone them to death. Adultery in the Old Testament was not a divorceable offense, it was an offense punishable by death. And so when he refers here to her not finding favor in his sight, or he finds no favor in her, and that he finds some uncleanness in her, what it's saying is, is that if a man marries a woman and for some reason just doesn't like her, maybe she insulted him, maybe he didn't like the way that she acted, or the way that she dressed, or the way that she kept house. In Jesus' day, this had become such a loose interpretation of the scriptures that if a man woke up in the morning and his wife had burnt the toast, he could divorce her for it and be justified according to the law. That's how loose an interpretation they had of this. Why is it that this was allowed? Jesus said, because of the hardness of their hearts. And if you examine the text there in Deuteronomy, you will understand that that certificate of divorce was given to protect the woman. It was given to protect that man's wife. Because after she has that certificate of divorce in her hand and she walks out of his house, what is she by law allowed to do? To marry somebody else. Whereas had he just cast her out and had not given her any letter of divorce, had she gone and married someone else, that would have been adultery, wouldn't it? Because she was still his wife. And so in his casting her out and giving her the certificate of divorce, she was protected. But then if that husband divorced her, or if he died, the first husband was not allowed to come back and marry her again. He wasn't allowed to say, Oh, you know, I don't know, you weren't so bad. Why don't you come on back? What is that? Go away, come here, go away, come here. It's designed again to protect this woman against the hardness of this husband's heart. It was for that very reason that dowries had to be given. When you married a woman and you gave her father a dowry, that dowry was to be kept by her father in the event that you cast this woman out. It was alimony paid in advance, is what it was. It was for the protection of that woman and to provide for her needs should you become hard-hearted against her and refuse her. And so this was allowed, not because God wanted to let people get divorces, but because God wanted to protect the innocent party or the weaker party in this situation. And Jesus tells the Pharisees, he says, okay, yeah, Moses allowed divorce, but it was because of the hardness of your heart that he allowed divorce. It was not that way from the beginning. Well, how was it in the beginning? You see, they pointed back to Moses, Jesus pointed back to the creation. Let's look there. Genesis chapter 2. Now you remember, God has created the world, he's created this beautiful place called the Garden of Eden. And he has created man in his own image. And in Genesis 2, starting in verse 18, we find this. Now remember, God has created man from the dust of the earth, he's shaped him, he's breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man has become a living being, and God has placed him now in the Garden of Eden. And in verse 18, the Lord God said, It is not good that man should be alone. I will make him a helper comparable to him. Out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name. So Adam gave names to all the cattle, to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him. And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall on Abraham, and he slept, and he took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh in its place.

Do you ever feel like the circumstances you're going through are more than you can bear? That God is in some way punishing you? Well, consider the words of Paul, and we know that all things work together for the good. To those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose. So we learn from this verse that all things, not some, but all things work together if we love God and are called according to his purpose. Just something to think about from your friends here at Heat the Word. Heed the Word is the daily Bible teaching ministry of Ken Davis, Senior Pastor of Calvary Chapel in Burleson, Texas. There's a great deal more that Pastor Ken has to share with us from the Gospel of Luke, so please join us again. Maybe you'd like to add today's message to your study library. Our online media is always available and free of charge. CD copies are also available upon request for free, but supplies are limited, so order today. To order a CD, simply log on to HeedTheWord.org and select the order a message option. There you'll find a convenient order form to fill out. The only information you need to remember is today's date. This ensures we get you the right teaching. So log on to heedtheword.org and place your order today. Or better yet, join us this Sunday for worship at 10 30 a.m. Directions are available on our website. That's heatheword.org. Well, we've run out of time today, but tune in next time as Pastor Ken will continue teaching verse by verse through the Gospel of Luke. That's next time on He The Word.