FOR THE HARDNESS OF OUR HEARTS!

THIS WEEK I am thinking of DIVORCE, and how it has increased since I was a child.   Of course as a conclusion to a marriage Divorce has always been an option.     We have got used to it.
The Christian World for a thousand years based its permission for Divorce upon Unfaithfulness.
Only if one or the other partner in the Marriage were found to be Unfaithful to the other could Divorce be considered.     In being questioned about Divorce JESUS CHRIST said in the Gospel of Matthew chapter 19 v8-9  -  'Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, suffered you to put away your wives; but from the beginning it was not so.    And I say unto you, whoever shall put away his wife,except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery; and whosoever marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.'    Even then, in Jesus day, His followers  did not like this word, and their reply to His words were, in verse 10 - ' ...If the case of the man be so with his wife, it is not good to marry.'     Even the first Christians seemed to feel that divorce was inevitable!!  Certainly in THIS generation the assumption is even more universally held.    BUT it was not the original INTENTION;  not God's Plan or Purpose
However, one can assume that Moses was so inundated with petitions to allow Divorce, so that in the end he gave in to giving his permission, but only when the complaint accused the wife of unfaithfulness;  of fornication!     BUT NOWADAYS it can be ANYTHING that irritates, offends, or annoys either partner.     It is generally called INCOMPATIBILITY, and the Courts will usually grant the Petition, whatever the offence might be, with certain conditions attached.  

There has been so much increase in the incidence of Divorce in the last 50 years that it has caused young people to become cautious and suspicious of committing themselves to any long term relationship; the emphasis being on 'long term'!     Marriage was meant to be a life time commitment of one man to one woman.     In the average Wedding Service in the Christian Church the words 'until death do us part' forms part of the Promise made to each by the other.   I will NEVER leave you.......I will never look at another....I will always be faithful.....till death do us part - for EVER!       AND it is supposed to be promised in front of God as Witness of our sincerity.       But of course God has not been counting for much in recent years.    Who needs to get married in Church anyway?    We can do a civil Wedding in front of a District Officer or Magistrate!    Why we do not even need to get MARRIED!       Such a bore!     As long as we love each other, have lust for each other, what does it matter.       So LESS marriage candidates tend to marry in Church, and more just have relationships, unsubstantiated by any Oath or Public Promise to bind them together.   Yes, the whole idea of being bound together in front of God is slowly receding in the bulk of world usage.
AND EVEN MARRIAGE AS A WORD is in danger of disappearing from society, and with it also the understanding of Family, and thus the loss of the concept of Home, the very building block of our race and civilisation.     Home and Family!  They are both in danger of vanishing, and with them the foundation of our humanity.

This year I, and my wife Esther, have been married for 44 years.  We met and fell in love, and determined to stick together through thick and thin, and bring up a family (we were to have three of our own, and four adopted) in a loving home environment.        Neither of us were saints, and when we go married both of us had lived alone a long time.    My wife was twenty seven and I was thirty one.     We were only engaged a year before making our promises to each other in Church.    Then after the initial romance and excitement of the first month we began to discover exactly what the other one was really like.    We discovered we did not agree, or see everything the same, in so many areas of our life.    We each had habits of living developed over decades of living alone.   I was white and British, she was Brown and Kikuyu!     Did we have confrontations?  Of course.    At the end of the first year she was thinking of leaving me........It was Christmas almost, and we sat together before she was to leave - we were living with 28 orphaned boys at the time, and one of them, a five year old, came to sit between us lovingly, worried because WE looked so sad.       Esther and I looked into each other's eyes.    We loved each other.   Why could we not forgive each other's different ways? Why could we not suffer each other - after all we DID love each other, and wasn't that love worth more than all the imperfections that each of might have.       And so she unpacked her bag and stayed, and we have gone on suffering and forgiving each others faults, and grown in our love for each other right up to the present.     Because of this we have been able to see hundreds of children leave our home (Testimony Faith Homes) to make homes for themselves, knowing that they too can find a lasting relationship and build a loving home together.      No regrets, only Thanksgiving.      But I must be honest and say that we had one huge advantage together.     We both believed in God's Love for each other, and both wanted to faithful to GOD and not just to ourselves.

Regretfully, even in the Churches, marriages are coming unstuck - often in the first two or three months or years!.....Certainly this implies that when these couples married they had not learned much about loving each other in the highest sense, and were not prepared to be cheated of anything.  Today the quality of SELFISHNESS controls more and more of our lives.     Culture can in part be responsible for this..      Since the turn of the 20th Century Women's Rights have been in the ascendant, and Men have increasingly been threatened with take a back seat.   There has been a huge drive to give total equality sexually in all areas of human life.       Women want to be freed from male domination.    Men do not take kindly to being dominated by emancipated women who want to take the wheel in everything.     This poses so many problems in actually living together as ONE.
You see, when you marry, you are intended to become  ONE with the other.       TWO are to be ONE, not just in bed, but in LIFE.       BUT no!  The husband wants to be heard - and the woman no less. Same sex marriage is more than gender - it the both sexes wanting to have equal rights in everything, and to have it over the other!

IT CAN BECOME VERY UGLY INDEED.    But then the WORLD is becoming generally more ugly isn't it.       And perhaps at least some of that ugliness is developing from the breakdown of Marriage, and of loving homes and families.    I read recently 'The rate of divorce in Kenya is on the rise.....reports indicate that there is a divorce case in Court every day.   Married couples are now divorcing fast in Kenya than new couples are getting married.  WHY?  It was cited that lack of parental guidance had become a factor in failing Kenyan Marriages.'  Considering this latter point it may again have to do with the fact that parental guidance can itself be divided due to having been broken up itself by divorce!!    A vicious circle?   Perhaps, at least to some extent.    My parents divorced......the effect on me was to make me WANT a lasting marriage and relationship that would provide a lasting and secure home and family base for my children.    THAT stayed with me, and by the grace of God that is what I have been given.

MARRIAGE SHOULD BE ONE OF THEM MOST IMPORTANT EVENTS OF OUR LIVES, and one of the strongest foundations on which to build upon,      There may be exceptions, but for the most part every husband and wife should continually remember the love that drew them to the other, and to overlook the offences and shortcomings of the other;  no one is perfect and in fact no one will be MORE perfect than another.   My mother ran away from being battered to death by her husband, a drunkard, and at that time she was probably right - yet ten years later she was back with her husband, both having forgiven the other.     Be GLAD for your husband, and be Glad for your Wife, and ignore all reasons, temptations, attractions and even excuses to lust after any other.     Your love and your respect; your trust and reliance toward the other will establish you more and more.   Believe it!   It is true.     BUT you have to learn forbearance and merciful forgiveness in your attitude to each other's foibles and mistakes. There will be plenty of them as there have been on both sides of my own marriage experience.  But now we do not just love each other's bodies; we love each other's person, and have gained respect for each other, and a 'togetherness' we never thought possible.      Marriage is something planted, that needs time and space to GROW, develop, and flourish.

I commend Marriage, with no thought of Divorce as a an 'escape route. for any reason.     If our marriages cannot succeed and endure conflict and opposition then we should not expect Nations to agree and live in peace with each other either.    Dr. Martin Lloyd Jones emphasises this when he says 

'What right have we to expect nations to stand by their promises and to keep their vows to each other, if men and women do not do it even in this most solemn and sacred union of marriage?  We must start with ourselves, we must start at the Beginning.   We must observe the Law of God (not Moses) in our personal and individual lives..'       

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