Proper 22 Year B

The Pharisees ask Jesus, ‘Is it permissible for a man to divorce his wife?’

Mark 10:2-16

An eminent psychologist was called on to testify in court.  She sat down in the witness chair unaware that the rear legs of the chair were set precariously close to the back edge of the raised platform.

The district attorney approached her and asked, For the record, what is your name?

The witness was a little nervous, and she tilted back in the chair just a bit as she began to answer the question. Before she could finish saying her first name, she was catapulted head-over-heels and landed in a stack of exhibits and recording equipment.

Everyone watched in stunned silence as she got up, rearranged her disheveled dress and was reseated on the witness stand. The District Attorney paused, took a deep breath and then continued, Well, doctor, perhaps we could start with an easier question.

I wonder if Jesus would have preferred an easier question from the Pharisees than the one that opens our Gospel this week?  It’s amazing to me how Jesus can always stay steady in his seat.

Divorce was a hot-bed issue in Jesus’ day as it is today. 

Now usually, I tend to cut the Pharisees a little more slack than many writers and preachers, but this Gospel is an exception. John the Baptist was killed by Herod over some comments he made about the king’s re-marriage to his brother’s wife.  The Pharisees were trying, I think, to get Jesus to say something just as incriminating.

So, I should really be writing about the sin of deceit and collusion this week, but that probably wouldn’t be very satisfying in the face of a Gospel that hits so close to home, and it does hit home for all of us, doesn’t it? Who among us hasn’t, in some way, been affected by broken relationships, separation and divorce?

You know I have to be honest with you, during my work as a pastor, as one who cared for people in their moments of pain and grief, I sometimes found myself wishing that those Pharisees had never asked Jesus that menacing question. Because if Jesus had never run into those Pharisees, we wouldn’t have this scripture which I believe has been misused too often by well-meaning people in the church in a way that is so hurtful to God’s children!

I can’t tell you how many people came into my office who were there to inquire about getting married, but who were also terrified at the thought of telling me that they had a previous marriage that ended in divorce. They squirmed in their seats and stuttered and breathed erratically, and I could tell they were wondering, Why did I ever make this appointment?

I once had a couple come to me that was told by the minister of another church that they couldn’t get married in that church because they had previously been married, though legally divorced for a long time. They were told outright that they were living in sin, and they simply wouldn’t be welcome as members of the church.  That’s not just an illustration; it’s a real-life story.

I hesitate to repeat any of the other horror stories I have heard, stories of clergy who have used this Gospel from Mark to deny divorced people Communion and to make them feel like second class citizens.  Why? Because they sought a divorce as a means of moving away from a relationship that no longer sacramentally mirrored the love of God.

Lay People seem to have a problem with this also. Some time ago I was reading a book written by a leading Lay sociologist who was telling a story about a couple in his church who were getting a divorce.  He wrote:

It was a shock to me. I thought they were such SOLID CHRISTIANS!

Since when is Christianity about being solid?  Where did we get this notion that Christians have all of their little ducks lined up in nice little rows all the time?  Where does it say that Christians have to be among the morally perfect who only exist in fantasy land anyway?

That’s what the Pharisees are trying to do in this Gospel. They were trying to tweak the law just enough so they could claim a perfect ledger at the end of the day. And Jesus says in effect, Forget it boys; God’s standards are a lot higher than your puny legal manipulations… and besides, when you fail, that’s when I’ll be closest to you. We will die together and rise together.

I hear people say all the time:

In this ‘post-modern/post-Christian’ era in which we live, nobody is willing to work on relationships anymore.

Relationships seem to be disposable these days, they say.

People would rather end marriages than work on them. People just don’t value marriage like they used to in the good old days.

I always find myself wondering what planet they came from. 

I sat in my office for over 30 years before I retired. I looked into the eyes of literally hundreds of people whose marriages were in trouble. I have seen nothing but anguish and pain, grief and tears. I can’t think of a single case where a couple was flippant or uncaring in their approach toward divorce.

I have found most of those people willing to do anything. . . willing to try anything to save their marriage, and I’m afraid to say, that a fair number of them have stayed in marriages far longer than even I, an eternal optimist, might have recommended. I want those people to know that Jesus is right there in the middle of it all. Jesus is right there beginning the work of rolling back the heavy stone.

This Gospel does hold up the eternal hope of God and the Church that marriage be an indissoluble covenant. Few hold the promises of marriage to be more sacred than I.

When I did pre-marital counseling with couples, I would always tell them that I didn’t know how to take for better for worse any way but seriously and literally. . . that God wishes all marriages to last forever. But, my dear friends in Christ, while I believe that with all my heart, I also believe that it is a mistake to take these nine verses from the Gospel of Mark and attempt to turn them into a marriage code for all people in all situations.

The social situation in Jesus’ day regarding divorce was quite different from the social situation today. To help us understand, the first thing we should notice is the question asked of Jesus in our Gospel this week:

 Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?

Divorce in Jesus’ day was a man’s prerogative. Women didn’t initiate a divorce; however, a man could divorce his wife for just about any reason.

He didn’t have to go to court or even think twice about it, whereas a woman who was divorced became an anomaly in her community; she was damaged goods, and she was often reduced to a life of poverty.

A woman was victimized by divorce, and Jesus never approves of victimization. Jesus, while holding up God’s hope for marriage, is also lifting up women. Knowing that, it’s not such a mystery to me why the Gospel moves next into the story of Jesus and the little children. At first, I wondered why the compilers of our lectionary would put those two themes together in one reading, but once you understand what’s really going on, it’s pretty clear.  Women and children were the marginalized ones; they were the least, the lost and the little in Israel in the first century; just the type that Jesus wants on his team.

All that being said, it is also important to note that Jesus does not dispute the Pharisees’ reading of Deuteronomy. This Gospel is not a prohibition against divorce and remarriage.

But also note that Jesus goes beyond Deuteronomy, all the way back to Genesis, and says, God intended for people to leave their mothers and their fathers and to become ONE flesh.

Not one subjugated to the other… not one who owns the other… but simply and beautifully ONE. 

There are to be no victims.

This Gospel addresses a very hot issue in the first century, and it addresses a social problem that is very dear to Jesus’ heart, but it does not give us the last word on divorce and remarriage in the 21^st century. The misapplication of this Gospel, and all of the accompanying pain and grief that has been inflicted as a result, should raise a red flag to all Christians whenever they are tempted to take one passage from scripture out of context and apply it universally to people’s lives… doing so is almost always a prescription for disaster!

Divorce is not a sin; neither is divorce and remarriage. Divorce is part of real life, part of our sometimes, broken world. It is painful to all involved, but it does not, by itself, separate one from God.  

I believe Jesus understood that marriages are BLESSED in heaven, but they are not MADE in heaven. Marriages are made right here on earth by ordinary, hard-working people. Jesus shows us in this Gospel, how we can hold up the ideal of marriage and still accept the inevitability of broken relationships and sometimes the necessity of separation.

People who have gone through the anguish of divorce need to know that they are closer than ever to the love of Jesus. They are not in any way on the outside of Christ’s embrace but are held all the tighter in the divine embrace going all the way back to when the Spirit hovered over the waters.

God’s relationship with the world through Jesus is often described in scripture as a marriage. God meeting us in Jesus is often described as the meeting of a bride and groom. Nobody knows the pain and anguish of broken relationships better than Jesus.

He was married to us on Christmas, and we divorced him on Good Friday.

But God always makes sure that Easter comes, and what is Easter but the re-marriage of the Christ and humanity until the end of time?