One In Jesus

To sum up, under the traditional view, we have sometimes counseled married couples with children to divorce, we have split churches, and we have denied remarriage to perfectly innocently divorced spouses, making their victimization by their former spouses permanent. We have a doctrine that allows for no mercy, that offends notions of common decency, and that drives our members from Christ.

Moreover, we have here a doctrine that is more legalistic than the Law of Moses. Jesus said (repeatedly), “I desire mercy, not sacrifice”[1] Paul taught (repeatedly) that the gospel is based on love not law.[2] And here we have an unmerciful law. The only justification is a legalistic policy argument — that by making divorce horribly painful, we discourage divorce. But this flatly contradicts the rest of the Christian message. And experience shows plainly that it doesn’t work. Continue reading →

The traditional view has raised a number of troubling issues over the years. And as divorce has become increasingly common over the last 40 years or so, these troubling issues have become commonplace for churches everywhere.

a. What about a couple unscripturally divorced and remarried prior to conversion? Does baptism cleanse the former sin and allow them to remain married? Christians have disagreed, but it has often been taught that no one can be saved without repentance (undeniably true!), repentance requires a change away from former sin (such as adultery), and so the divorced and remarried couple must divorce one another — putting their wrongful marriage behind them — to be eligible for baptism. Of course, the problem with this view is that we have preachers and elders telling couples to divorce to please God — often when they have children at home — causing unspeakable pain and harm: the very pain and harm that Christ’s teaching against divorce is supposed to prevent! Continue reading →

The struggle to understand the Bible’s teachings on divorce and remarriage is not unique to the Churches of Christ. Indeed, it is easy to find literature from all denominations dealing with the same issues and making most of the same arguments found in Church of Christ literature.

Thus, the “traditional” view is not only the view traditional in the Churches of Christ, it is also the view traditional in Roman Catholicism and most Protestant denominations. The traditional view is so pervasive that it has even affected the law of most Western nations and even our language and vocabulary. Continue reading →

When I was a child, growing up in the Churches of Christ during the 1950’s and 60’s, divorce was much discussed in our classes and from our pulpits-but the discussion was very much in the abstract. I mean, in the congregation where I grew up, of some 200 members, we only had one couple that had experienced divorce.

Times have surely changed! Nowadays, over 50% of all marriages end in divorce. It’s not surprising that many are calling for a renewed emphasis on the traditional teachings of all Christian churches on divorce and remarriage. It is hoped that, perhaps, a return to the stricter rules we grew up with will slow the Church’s decline into ever more frequent divorce — and who would disagree with the desire to reduce the divorce rate that afflicts even our members? Continue reading →