Pentecost 19

Pentecost 19 (Mark 10:2-16)

“From the beginning of Creation…”

God designed human beings to grow and transform through love. The operating principle of love is choice. The outward and visible expression of love is relationship. The inner and spiritual resource for love is the indwelling presence of God the Holy Spirit.

In the beginning, God gave our species one commandment, one governing principle, to activate choice. That commandment had a law, a warning, and a promise. The Law was: don’t eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge. The problem was not knowledge. God always wanted us to grow in knowledge. The problem was intent. The problem is how we seek knowledge not that we seek knowledge.

The warning is: if you seek knowledge apart from you relationship with God, you will separate from the very source of light, and life and love. You will enter into a way of existence that ends in death.

The promise is love. If you remain faithful and loyal you will live. You will indeed live forever in a world designed for your joy and you delight. You will live in union with the very source of life. You will live into the infinite possibilities of eternal love.

In order to tempt our first parents, Satan took the guise of one of God’s amazing and beautiful creations. He used the glittering beauty and subtly of the serpent to beguile, to confuse and tempt our first parents. There is a principle to be learned here. Temptation can be very subtle and enticing.

Since our species choose to separate from God, the laws of God and the way of love make little sense to us. We are seduced by knowledge acquired in separation from God. We are enticed by promises of power, dominance and control.

The Law of Marriage is one such divine principle most people most of the time refuse to accept. How do we know that most people most of the time reject the Law of Marriage? There are three primary sources of knowledge available to us. They are Scripture, history and personal experience.

Jesus’ teaching on marriage unfolds in a context. The first aspect of that context is original separation. All people actively participate in original separation from God.

The second context is one of the results of Original Separation. That is the context of law. What God designed as a fundamental principle of creation, people over the centuries have changed into an external law.  

The third context emerges from the way people react to law. We look for the loophole. We look for the loophole because we do not embody the principle of feel the principle as offering us a blessing. We seek to maintain our sense of righteousness under the Law and at the same time subvert the Law through the loophole.

The Pharisees specialized in loophole righteousness. They redefined divine principle as rigid, inflexible uncompromising law. They asserted their own individual righteousness in their ability to keep the law. And, they wove into the law certain self-serving loopholes that allowed them to subvert the law and still maintain their righteousness.

Curiously enough, they come to Jesus with a question. A question is the beginning of wisdom. The disciples very seldom asked questions. They feared the answers. They feared that Jesus would teach something new or something different.

The Pharisees asked questions to justify themselves and to trap Jesus. But, at least they asked.

On the subject of marriage, the Pharisees want Jesus to speak on divorce. They suspect he will not uphold the law of divorce. As with the question on paying taxes, they reason that if he upholds the law he will simply reinforce the religious system or rewards and punishments they administer. If he rejects the law, well, then they can claim he is a false prophet and is soft on sin.

I suspect, some of the Pharisees also genuinely wanted some fresh insights into the matter. Divorce created many problems in society. A man could divorce his wife but a wife could not divorce her husband. Husbands controlled the money and the property in a family. A divorced woman had only two choices for survival. One was to return to her parents or surviving relatives and hope they would take her back into their home. More often than not, the family would not take her back. The only other option was to become a homeless beggar.

The Pharisees were not monsters. They were lost. They were specifically lost in a law based religion that saw life in the categories of rewards and punishments, of righteous and unrighteous, of the just and of the sinners.

Jesus appeals to the first principles of Creation to answer their question about marriage and divorce. His answer is biblical and life affirming. It also is impossible to translate into civil law. If you really want to write divine principles into civil law this is the standard.

Jesus knew very well this standard was good, holy and life affirming. He also knew that a species lost in separation from God would not and could not accept this standard, or indeed any divinely designed standard.

The principles of God for human behavior and interpersonal relationships can only make sense in a real choice to enter into a personal relationship with God in Jesus Christ. The choice to follow these principles can only come as we make the next choice.

That next choice is what theologians call sanctification. It is the choice we make every day to pray the prayer that defined Jesus’ life. That prayer is: Heavenly Father, not my will but Thy will be done. That prayer only makes sense in the context of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. That prayer manifests a slow, steady and unfolding conversion of our thoughts, desires and choices.

The divine design for marriage is clear, explicit and impossible for the lost to accept. It is the image of God’s own relationship to humanity. It is the best and highest good God invites us to embrace. The best defense of Biblical marriage is not in law courts, legislation or civil disobedience. The best defense of Biblical marriage is to embrace, practice and delight in the sacramental grace of marriage.

Jesus once said: “let your light so shine.” How the people of God live our lives and manifest the grace of God in our words, deeds and marriages will proclaim the goodness of God and the gift of God more effectively in the Plan of Creation Jesus teaches us in this passage

Jesus did not answer the question about marriage and divorce from the context of either religious or civil law..

Jesus answers the question of marriage and divorce with a reminder of the original blessing the Father designed into creation by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit.