Many Christians insist that oral and anal sex are degrading and have no place in a Christian marriage. Others believe that these forms of sex can be enjoyed within marriage with the mutual consent of both the husband and the wife. But what does the Bible say? Learn more in this Little Lessons series!

What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? (Part 1)

Today’s question was sent to us by one of our beloved viewers, and I’ve hesitated for a long time in addressing this question because it is a delicate question, obviously, but something that Christians have questions about. And this one reader, I’m going to read her letter momentarily, is not the first person who’s asked me this question.

So what does the Bible actually have to say about oral and anal sex? Well, if you survey the spectrum of Christian thought on this subject, you do get a wide spectrum. And of course, that’s because the Bible really isn’t as specific in this regard perhaps as some of us wish it were. And that to me is kind of a telling thing right from the start, because the Bible is very specific on many levels when it comes to speaking of the subject of sex, and what is okay in God’s eyes and what is not okay.

And of course, all of God’s commandments are based on the overriding fact that he is love, and he loves us, and he wants what’s best for us. And so, that’s fundamentally the reason why God says, for example, that sex outside of marriage is displeasing to him, because it’s ultimately not the best for us. You only want to have a sexual relationship with someone with whom you’re in a covenant that’s good for life, until death do you part, within that context, that’s where sex is the best.

And there’s fundamental reasons for that. I think everybody can understand it. We could go into all the fundamental reasons that we could think of, but the one that’s most obvious is that sex produces children, oftentimes, right? And even in our day and age where we have methods of birth control that weren’t available back in Bible days, still, accidents happened and people conceive children even when they’re using birth control. And of course, that sets in motion a chain of events. And it’s best for children to be raised by a mother and father who are committed to each other until death do they part. That creates a solidarity and a stability within the family unit.

And we feel so sorry for children who are born out of wedlock because they’re missing out on what’s best. And adults should be thinking about that. We’re supposed to love our neighbor as ourself, that’s the second greatest commandment, right? Right. And are you loving the potential children that you’re going to produce by producing children who aren’t going to grow up with the benefit of a stable family, and an absentee father who’s got children scattered all over the place through many women? You’re not loving your kids, and so you’re transgressing the commandments.

So anyways, these are fundamental things. And I think if we overlay this conversation, and this will be part one, by the way, because I’ve got a lot to say, and I want to provide some context, first of all, if we overlay this with an understanding that God’s the Creator of sex, it was his idea, orgasm was God’s idea, procreation was God’s idea, having children through sexual relations, that was all God’s idea. God’s the one who put the nerves in your body and concentrated them in certain places that brings static sensations. And so, this is all God’s idea. So God’s not near the prude that some people make him out to be. The book that we all consider the sacred book starts off with two people romping around, naked, outside, right? And there’s lots of stories that are sexual in nature, in the Bible, that help us to understand the boundaries that God has set. Okay? So the big boundary is is marriage.

And God speaks specifically about things, you wonder why he ever has to say anything about this. Why does God have to say in the Old Testament, on several occasions, it’s wrong to have sex with animals? I mean, who’s wanting that? But there are perverted people who, yielding to base desires, which God has given them over to, apparently that’s a sin that was committed, for example, obviously with some degree of consistency and regularity, within Canaan’s land, by the Canaanites. And God said, “I’m bringing you in there, not because you’re so holy, but because they’re so wicked. And here’s the kind of things they’re doing.” And God lists some of those sexual perversions.

We know of the word “sodomy,” which of course is derived from the biblical story of Sodom. And there’s Lot living in Sodom, and these angels come to visit him. And the men of Sodom surround his house and they said, “Bring the guys out,” they thought they were men, “We want to have sex with him.” And so, that helps you understand why God destroyed Sodom. This is a sexual perversion.

And so, very clear from Scripture that homosexuality is wrong. I’m happy to tell you though, that if you’re caught in homosexuality, God loves you and God will transform you. And there are hundreds, if not thousands, we know hundreds have publicly professed that God has transformed them, who used to be caught up in a homosexual lifestyle, and God delivered them and transformed them, forgave them, made them into new creations.

And I may not have been guilty of those things before I became a believer in Jesus, but I was guilty of plenty of things that would have sent me to hell. So I’m not going to be able to point my finger at anybody. I’m here to offer the grace and the mercy of God.

Okay, so just to try to set a context. And again, if you are watching this video, we only go for eight or nine minutes, and then we’re going to have to pick up, all right, the next one. So this is going to be a series of lessons, and we’re going to talk about a broader spectrum. But we’re trying to answer that one question about, what’s the Christian view of oral and anal sex? And right off the start, we’re not talking about if it’s okay for unmarried people to engage, okay? Sex outside of marriage is condemned in the Bible because God loves us.

And if you’re involved in a sexual relationship and you’re not married, get out of it. Get out of it pronto, quick, because God loves you and he wants what’s best for you. And he’s shaking his head oftentimes and saying, “You’re a dummy to be having sex, giving your body to someone who’s not committed to you in a lifelong covenant. And you’re a fool to be yourself. If you’re in any way the aggressor in this, you’re wrong. You’re sinning against that other person by having sex with them outside of marriage.” Okay?

Now, I’m going to close with this, just to give you a little beginning of an answer. The Bible is not so clear. Nowhere you can read where it says anything like the words “oral sex” or “anal sex.” Of course, you can read about the sex … sin of sodomy from Sodom, men having sex with men. And that often includes anal and oral sex, copulation, because they’ve got no other way, other than stimulating each other by their hands. Okay?

So anyways, hope to see you in the next Little Lesson. Okay? Just laying a little foundation here today. Thanks for joining me. God bless you.

What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? (Part 2)

Hey, welcome to today’s little lesson. This is part two and I hope you saw the first one cause we’re laying a foundation. We’re going to go little lesson by little lesson to get through to what we want to get through here. And this is going to actually go for a while because I’ve got a lot to say and I know there’s been some pretty heavy duty discussions about this within the Christian realm and there’s a lot of diversity of viewpoint.

So this all started with a question that a reader wrote to me and I’m going to read this precious sister’s a letter because I think that there’s opportunity in it to see how many of us would be wrestling with stuff and hopefully it will help you. So here it is.

“Dear Brother David: May the peace, grace and blessings of our God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ be upon you.” There you go man. I love these letters that sound like they’re a New Testament epistle. “And God has used you to bless me and save my family unit.” Well that’s sure got my attention. So thank you so much sister for saying that. She said, “I am a new follower of Jesus Christ.” Wonderful. “I have been a,” and she puts it in quotes, “Christian my entire life. A couple of months ago, I actually became a true Christian and a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ.” All right, that’s what we love to hear. You’re not a Christian unless you’re a follower. You’re trying to obey Jesus. If you’re not trying to follow Jesus, then you don’t really believe that he is who he claimed to be, the son of God.

“I’ve delved into the Bible and read it in its entirety as well as listened to exhortations and sermons on YouTube.” Well, there you go. So she’s hungry. That’s shows sign of a born again Christian. They’re hungry for the truth. They want to know what God expects of them so that they can live up to his expectations. “I found a church an hour and a half away from my home that seemed to teach sound doctrine.” Okay, sad you have to go an hour and a half, not sure where she lives. “One of those doctrines is,” and here comes, “marriage permanence.”

“Both my husband and I have been married before.” Now I’m not going to take time to address the marriage permanence doctrine because I’ve done that quite frequently in the past. If you’ve heard about that, but these are the folks who say that if you’ve been previously married and now you’re remarried, you’re living in an adulterous relationship. You’re in God’s eyes, still married to the first person you’re married to, as long as they’re still alive and you should divorce your current spouse and go back to your previous spouse if possible. And if you can’t get back to that spouse, then you should remain single until that spouse dies, then you’re free to remarry.

Well of course they do have some scriptures, but as an all doctrinal air, their interpretation of those handful of scriptures that they utilize don’t harmonize with many other scriptures in the New Testament and don’t harmonize with some of the huge themes of the entire Bible. And so we love those marriage permanence people, but they’re wrong. And I’m glad that I was able to help this sister.

So she said, as you can imagine, so she’s going to this church and she hears this, Oh my goodness, I’m living in an adulterous relationship with my husband. And so God wants me to divorce him. So she says, “As you can imagine, this doctrine was an immense blow to me. My options were either divorce or be cast into hell.” And that’s the options that the marriage permanence folks give you. Because you’re living in adultery. No adulterer will inherit eternal life. And so you have to divorce if you want to go to heaven. Even if you’re married to a Christian, you’ve been married to him or her for 20 years and you’ve got kids and grandkids who are all serving the Lord, you need to get a divorce and go back to your previous spouse because that’s who you’re really married to in God’s eyes. Oh my goodness. Okay, so hardly have any words. I did have some words before. But I hardly have any words for that.

“So as I contemplated God’s will, that all Christians who were remarried, divorced…” Oh, excuse me. “As I contemplated this doctrine, I was not convinced that it was God’s will that all Christians who were remarried, divorced.” Good for her. She’s using her brain and God gave us brains to think. “I had a friend who got married very young when he went to the army and he divorced shortly thereafter and then remarried and had two children. Surely God would not want him to leave his wife of over 20 years and his children.” Way to go sister, you’re using your brain. Common sense. It’s just obvious. Obvious. God gave us brains.

“So my husband is an unbeliever.” Oh, this complicates things. “And the people I know, friends and family are, and she puts in quotation marks Christians. So I had no one to go to for guidance or discussion. While I’ve read the Bible once and I am rereading it, I haven’t even yet truly studied it, nor have I had the revelation to truly understand it.”

Well none of us fully understands it yet. So keep reading. “And I turned to the internet to try to find understanding fully prepared to divorce my husband if that was the result of my research.” So she’s committed to whatever she feels the Lord’s saying, but she doesn’t want to just jump to a quick conclusion. Way they go, that’s smart. “Then I found your little lessons. I had found some sermons and expectations against marriage permanence prior to finding you, however, I was not satisfied with the scriptures used to support their views. Your little lessons contain the scriptural support that put this topic to rest for me.” Well, you just made my day. “The way you explained it was plain, I will not be getting a divorce because of how the spirit of God moved in you. I wish that all Christians who have been fed that false doctrine could hear your little lessons prior to wrecking their families.”

And so do I. “You have been a blessing to me and to be sure to many others. Thank you.” Okay, so that’s the initial start. And I only read that just because I guess I just did. “There is another doctrine of which I am unsure. It is regarding oral and anal sex. The doctrine states that both are sodomy, are unnatural, defile the marriage bed and transfer unholy homosexual spirits and leads to hell. I am somewhat embarrassed to write this to you and would most likely not be able to say this if we were face to face.” Okay, I get that. “However, I’d love to view a little lesson on this topic.” Well you’re about to view a number of little lessons on this topic. And you’re the one that spurred me on. So thank you for writing.

“Prior to hearing this doctrine, my husband and I enjoyed oral sex,” and so can we just fundamentally say that they enjoyed it. Now some people watching this, and I’m going to try to appear to be as neutral as I can on this, but scriptural, okay, are going to think to themselves, well, how could that possibly be enjoyable? Because I view it, they view it, I’m imagining viewers because that’s degrading. That’s certainly understandable too how it could be viewed as degrading. That is putting your mouth on your spouses genitals to stimulate them sexually.

But here’s someone who’s saying, “My husband and I enjoyed oral sex. After hearing this doctrine, I’m not able to validate it at one way or the other. I have not been able to enjoy it and have altogether stopped practicing it.” Now remember, her husband’s an unbeliever, so here comes conflict in the marriage. “This has caused,” Oh, the next sentence. “This has caused some tension in my marriage, especially since I have no scriptural support for it. I am hoping that a little lesson will provide the clear understanding and scriptural support that I need to resolve this.”

I’m hoping to do that for you, but I’m out of time for today. So we’ve set the stage. This is part two. Next little lesson will be part three. “May God continue to bless you and bless us through you. Your sister in Christ,” and she gives her name there. So thank you again for writing. And I think we did learn something a little bit today anyways, for starts. Okay. Some married couples enjoy oral sex. Hope to see you next time. God bless you.

What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? (Part 3)

Hi, welcome to today’s lesson. Thank you for joining me. I hope you’ve joined me for the previous two little lessons, because this is part three of a multi part lesson. We’re trying to address a very delicate subject of which within the spectrum of Christian thought, there’s a lot of variation, simply because the Bible never says … It definitely sets boundaries for sex, limiting it between married persons, male and female, but it doesn’t say anything about oral sex is wrong, or anal sex is wrong. It doesn’t even say it in any other terms, okay? Some Christians on one side of the spectrum will say, “Hey there’s scripture that says … that alludes to oral sex.” We’ll look at those, okay? To see if we agree with that.

One overriding thought in all of this. Okay, so we’ve already set the boundaries that sex is designed by God to be a blessing. It’s not just for procreation, by the way, it’s obviously for pleasure, and enhancing of the relationship. It’s an expression of love. It’s a absolutely beautiful, beautiful thing, when enjoyed in marriage. It doesn’t mean there’s no boundaries, because some people quote that verse in Hebrews, that the marriage bed is undefiled, as if that’s the entire Bible’s revelation on sex, and say, “Well there’s nothing you could possibly do in the marriage bed that would be wrong.” Well, you know, I’ll bet you it’s wrong to beat your spouse in the marriage bed, right? You know. You still got to love your neighbor as yourself in marriage bed, right? Right? Okay, so there are things that could be done in the marriage bed that would defile the marriage bed, transgressing any other commandant, if there’s a commandment.

This is something I’ve observed in 40 years of being a Christian. You could actually put Christians in to three categories. Now, I’m sure there’s more, but for the sake of what I’m going to share, three categories. There are professing Christians, who I don’t think they’re Christians at all, actually, who believe that if we just believe in Jesus, quote unquote, believe in Jesus, we can live our life any way we want to. Of course, theologically that’s call antinomianism, and it’s heresy, okay? If you believe in Jesus, you’ll be transformed, born again, filled with Holy Spirit, and you have a desire to obey, and that’s part of the new covenant. Faith without works is dead. All these things. Okay, so that’s one category of Christian, and they’re not even Christians.

Then on the other extreme, you got the people who say, “Well, you know … ” Well let’s go to the middle of the road. The Christians who are biblically based, and they say, “Oh look, yeah. Faith without works is dead and if I believe in Jesus, I’ll be obeying him, so it’s important to obey his commandments,” and so they work hard on obeying his commandments, as he has revealed in the Word of God. Because they know that holiness is important. I count myself as being one of those people.

Then you have the folks on the far, far right, you know? Where they believe that holiness is important, but they believe it’s so important that they actually go way beyond the Bible, and they’ll come up with all kind of things that aren’t in the Bible, and tell you that this wrong if you do this. Even though they can’t give you a shred of scripture to prove it. We could call them maybe legalists, but I’m not sure that’s the right use of the term, but certainly they’re over in that direction, where legalists actually think we’re saved by our works. I’m going to say these are extreme holiness crowd, who they’ve actually put themselves a little bit above God saying, “Even though God never said this was a sin, I’m saying this is a sin.” Well, who are you? Are you God? Are you higher than God? I think it would be better to be very, very careful when you start saying, “This is a sin but I don’t have any scripture evidence for it.” Or the scripture evidence you have for it, you know, isn’t all that convincing.

We’re going to talk about one of those, because I just looked at a discussion in Facebook. A guy made a strong statement against oral sex in marriage. One of the commentators said, “Hey, that’s really good. I like what you said, do you have any scripture for it?” And said it very politely and kindly, you know, respectfully. He said, “Well, not really.” Okay, and so often these folks revert to, “Well, if you’d just listen to the Holy Spirit, you know, like me … ” these same people are telling us the Earth is flat, some of them are, so they’re not listening to the Holy Spirit. I happen to know the Earth is not flat. I’ve actually flown around the entire globe, okay?

Anyways, an overriding principle, so that we don’t defile the marriage bed, because this is a big biblical theme, is love your neighbor as yourself. The loving spouse is not going to ask … is not going to demand something of his or her spouse that his or her spouse is opposed to, or would think it would be degrading. Let’s find a scriptural verse, passage, that proves this, okay? We already have the second greatest commandment, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Do you want your spouse trying to force you to do the things you don’t want to do? I bet you not, so treat others like you want to be treated. Don’t be demanding something of your spouse.

Let’s hurry up and get into this scripture. 1 Corinthians 7, “Now concerning the things about which you wrote, it is good for a man not to touch a woman.” Now, boy, if that was the only verse in the Bible, we’d be in big trouble. This is why context is so important, okay? “Because of immoralities, each man is to have his own wife, and each woman to have her own husband.” Even though we’ve got examples of polygamy in the Bible, and God even blessed those polygamists like David, and so forth, God’s best is one man, one woman. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand why that is. All the polygamists in the Bible had trouble.

“The husband must fulfill his duty to his wife,” that’s a duty that not so hard to fulfill. “And likewise, also the wife to her husband. The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does, and likewise, also the husband does not have authority over his own body, but his wife does.” Boy, we can go deep, deep, deep into that, couldn’t we? That’s really interesting, worth meditating on, husbands and wives thinking about that, that if there’s something that my husband or my wife is commenting on, requesting in our sexual relationship, my body is not my own, and I ought to be considering them. See, it works both ways.

Paul is specifically addressing, again, if that was the only verse in the Bible, we could justify a lot of things that aren’t really justifiable, because here’s what Paul’s really addressing. Stop depriving one another, see that’s what was happening. Some spouses are withholding sex from their partner and that’s not right, because you really don’t have authority over your own body, so this doesn’t address the mechanics of sex, or whether oral or anal sex is right or wrong. It’s just talking in general about withholding sex. It ought to be a regular part of marriage. “Stop depriving one another, except for by agreement for a time that you may devote yourselves to prayer, and come together again, so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self control.”

Here’s an overriding principle, I’ve got to just say this very quickly as we wind this down. That anything that is done in the marriage bed should be done by mutual consent. Okay, because the principle is here. If we’re going to abstain from a sexual relationship for a time, because we’re going to devote ourselves to prayer, we have to agree on this. Only by agreement, if your spouse doesn’t agree to that, then you shouldn’t say, “Well, too bad buddy, I’m praying, so we’re not having sex.” Woe to you, you’re not doing what the Bible says, okay? You’re going to have to figure out how you can pray and have sex if your spouse is not in agreement with it, okay? Hey welcome to marriage. Marriage is two people who have to learn to work together, all right? On many levels. All right, that’s all the time we have for today. We really haven’t answered our question, but we’re trying to set some context here. Hope to see you in the next little lesson. God bless you.

What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? (Part 4)

Hi, welcome to today’s little lesson. This is part four. If you didn’t see the first three, we’ve laid a foundation, and we had to lay a foundation, and we still probably have some foundation to lay, but I’m addressing a, a letter, a question from one of our beloved viewers. And she asked about oral and anal sex, he said the doctrine states… What she’s heard from some folks that both of these things, anal and oral sex are sodomy, are unnatural, defile the marriage bed and transfer unholy homosexual spirits and lead to hell.

Okay, now, I would love to hear that sermon, to hear the scripture that was used to prove that, all those points. Because I’ve been studying the Bible for 40 years, I can’t think of any scriptures that would prove those conclusions. Now sodomy, that’s something you find mentioned in the Bible, not actually even using that term, modern translations, but we all know where that stems from. The sin of the men of Sodom who wanted to have a sexual relationship with the angels that came and visited Lot. They thought they were men. I guess they came in the form of men. And they said, bring them out, we want to have sex with them. And Lot wouldn’t let that happen.

To say that oral sex and marriage is sodomy, that wasn’t happening in Sodom, where we get the word sodomy, right? So we know that scripture condemns homosexuality there’s, no bones about that. And that you open yourself up to unholy homosexual spirits? I think I can say for a fact from serving the spectrum of Christian thought on this subject, that there are Christian married couples that engage in either oral or anal sex.

And they’re all opening themselves up to homosexual spirits? So the next thing is they’re going to be attracted to members of the opposite sex? Is that’s what’s happening? Is there any even anecdotal evidence for that conclusion? See, so these are the folks who are as I described on a previous lesson, Why Are We Here? The Christian sex police where even though the Bible is silent on something, they’re setting rules, because God didn’t think about these things in several thousand years of history of divine revelation in the Old and New Testament.

So I guess we better come up with something. Oh my goodness. And the person who wrote to me said that prior to her hearing this doctrine, her and her husband engaged in oral sex and they enjoyed it. And again, I haven’t ever had a personal conversation with any Christian asking them that question, but looking on the internet and so forth and different forums and different teachings and so forth, and Christian books and so forth, I have to say that there are people who I think are genuine followers of Christ, who are involved, I’d say at least in oral sex, you know, and I don’t, I don’t see them, you know, becoming homosexuals. And there’s tons of fruit in their life.

So God’s going to say, well yeah, even though you, you were a missionary and you won all kinds of people to Jesus and you fed the hungry and clothed the naked, you had oral sex with your spouse, so to hell with you buddy. See now the person who wrote this, I complimented her because the letter, I read it a couple of lessons ago, she’s using her brain to think this through logically. So that’s what I’m trying to do right now, do this logically.

The main principle of course is love your neighbor as yourself. And our last lesson we talked about the importance of mutual consent. I, for one, I’m not going to tell any Christian married couple what they can and cannot do sexually. Okay? Now, beyond what the Bible says, okay? Like you can’t invite a third or fourth person into your marriage bed and have an orgy, okay? So we know that’s wrong.

You can’t have an affair, okay? That’s not in the marriage bed, that’s outside the marriage bed. And so there are clear parameters, but I’m not going to be one of those ones among the Christian sex police who starts regulating what married couples do. People who obviously love the Lord and mutually consent, both find a desire and an enjoyment in something that they’re doing in the marriage bed. It’s not abuse if it’s mutual consent. I think we can all agree on that.

Okay, so let’s talk more specifically about oral sex. Folks said, can we find anything in the Bible? And I would actually say that, you’re hard pressed, but we’re going to go some scriptures that some people use to show prove that oral sex is condoned within marriage in the Bible. So I’m going to go to Proverbs chapter 5, starting in verse number 15. I’m reading from the New American Standard Version, drink water from your own cistern. Back in the day when they had cisterns, that’s where you’d be getting your water every day. And fresh water from your own well. Should your Springs be dispersed abroad, streams of water in the streets. That’s a veiled reference to sex outside of marriage. And it’s addressed to men in particular, you know, we’ll see.

We’ll see that he’s strictly, he’s talking to men. So it’s, it’s, it’s, you know, it’s not crude language, it’s a veiled language, but he’s creating an image. Should your streams of water be dispersed to the street? Okay, let them be yours alone and not for strangers with you. He’s not talking about sharing water. Jesus said, one of the signs of the Christians is that I was thirsty and you gave me a drink, okay? This is talking about sex. And then look at verse number 18, let your fountain be blessed. Well, what part of a man’s body he could be considered his fountain? Well, Oh, forgive me.

Let your fountain, men, be blessed. Do you want your fountain to be blessed? Keep your fountain not dispersing in the streets, okay? And rejoice in the wife of your youth. As a loving hind and a graceful doe, let her breasts satisfy you at all times. Be exhilarated always and literally in Hebrew, be intoxicated always with her love. For why should you my son, be exhilarated with an adulterous? This is a biblical doctrine about what’s right and wrong, regarding sex. And embrace the bosom, the breast of a foreigner. For a ways of a man are before the eyes of the Lord, and he watches all his paths.

Okay, so some said, we’re finding not mouth to genital sex, but mouth to breast sex here in Proverbs 5, as a loving hind and a graceful doe, let her breasts satisfy you at all times. And I’m sure that’s a picture of a nursing deer or whatever, but you know, let’s take it at face value. Let her breasts satisfy you at all times.

Well, men for some strange, God given reason, are attracted to female breasts. And so they can be satisfied by looking at them, touching them, kissing them and, and I’m not laying out any rules whatsoever here, okay? Because different strokes for different folks. All right, and we’re out of time, so I’m going to pick up right here in the next little lesson, this is getting interesting. I hope you’ll join me. See you next time.

What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? (Part 5)

Hi, welcome to today’s Little Lesson. Thank you once again for joining me. I hope you’ve join me on the previous four Little Lessons because we’ve laid a pretty good size foundation as we work on our way through trying to answer this question, building a context and looking at the spectrum of Christian thought and, and now getting a little bit more specific. So we found ourselves in our last Little Lesson in a verse, a passage in Proverbs, chapter 5 beginning of verse 15 where we’re, we’re told, men are told to avoid the sin of adultery and to find sexual fulfillment in their marriage. And it’s really said in a beautiful way. We got to verse number 18 of Proverbs, chapter 5 last time, and I’m reading now from the New American standard says as a loving hind and a graceful doe, let her breasts, speaking of your wife, because right above it it said, rejoice in the wife of your youth. So, you know, not encouraging any enjoyment of anyone else’s breasts other than your wife’s breasts.

Let her breasts satisfy you at all times, be exhilarated or literally intoxicated, always with her love. So this certainly is a condoning, you know, enjoyment as a component of a sex which because any thinking person realizes that’s part of what God has had in mind in creating sex. And so it is said by some, and I’m just trying to kind of present a bit of the spectrum of thought within within Christianity is I’ve studied it and read it and then you’re going to have to make up your own mind ultimately in the end. But is the writer of Proverbs, is the author here saying that the only way that your wife’s breasts should satisfy you would be visually or would there be an element of touching or could there be anything else beyond that?

Okay. And so I realized that oral sex, that question is technically talking about oral to genital sex. But this is leading into another train of thought that I want to go into because some argue that oral and anal sex are clearly unnatural. And of course that’s an opinion because the Bible doesn’t say that, but they’ll go to like Romans 1 and 2 where it talks about the sin of homosexuality and how that’s unnatural men burning in the desire for men and women burning in the desire for women. And this is unnatural. Well, you know, that’s obviously clearly unnatural because you know, men and men, their parts don’t fit and women and women, their parts don’t fit. And the general revelation of creation is that men and women get married and they have children and that’s the family unit and that’s like 99% if not more of the human experience throughout all history. Okay. So this other stuff, it certainly is in a minority category by its own, and it’s rightfully called on natural, but to make them the logical leap to say, well, oral sex then is also natural within the confines of marriage. It’s a logical leap that, you know, isn’t the strongest leap that you’ve got.

Again, within the spectrum of Christian thought, I’ve actually read, well the one guy who said that it’s wrong to touch your spouse’s genitals with your hands because that’s not what your hands are for trying to do the parts thing. The penis and the vagina go together. And so that’s what ought to be happening and there shouldn’t, you know, and so they’re preaching against any manual sexual activity, based on what, what’s natural or the obvious function of the parts. I don’t think it’s a strong argument. You know, who would ever thought that the mouth would be a sexual organ? Okay. You know, you could draw the conclusion, well, the mouth is made for talking and eating. You know, you wouldn’t be doing things sexually with your mouth, would you?

Well, I mean, the Bible is full of reference to kissing, kissing on the lips, mouth to mouth. And when you think about it, that is a little bit weird. But we do it. And I’m saying it’s okay in marriage. We do it because it’s enjoyable. But who would have ever thought, who would have ever thought. It all, it seems unnatural. You’re using what’s supposed to be there for talking and eating for something sexual, sexually stimulating. And we’re eventually in this little series going to go into the Song of Solomon and man, you know, boy, they talk about kissing, passionate kissing is mentioned in the Bible and it’s mentioned, of course, many other places too. So again, what’s the obviously natural element, you know, that argument is not so strong just because of that one example.

Okay. And remember I’m trying to share a wider spectrum of thought. So just examining the arguments on both sides. I’m going to look at some the arguments that people have used to say, look, oral sex is in the Bible and we’re going to look at that. Okay, now we just read the last Little Lesson. Proverbs 5:15 through 21 in the New American Standard. I want to read it in the New Living translation because the New Living is not a word for word translation. It’s a thought for thought translation. And I’m not one of those people that thinks that the only version that you should read the Bible is a word for word translation because anyone who’s involved in language translation, and I’ve been involved in that for years all over the world knows that the best translation is not always word for word.

Okay? If I have a translator translating a sermon for me in Indonesia, I don’t want him translating it word for word. The best translators translate thought for thought. Okay, so here’s what the New Living Translation is. “Drink water from your own well. Share your love only with your wife.” So it’s just trying to make it more clear and it’s not using the imagery that we saw in the literal of the New American Standard. “Why spill the water of your springs in the streets having sex with just anyone?” We could tell that’s what is really meant in the word for word translation of the New American Standard. But the New Living is say, let’s just say it, because that’s all obviously what he’s talking about. “You should reserve it for yourselves. Never share it with strangers. Let your wife be a fountain of blessing for you.”

Well, I actually don’t like that as much as I like the New American Standard translation because I don’t really think that’s really what he was saying. “Rejoice in the wife of your youth. She is a loving deer, a graceful doe. Let her breasts satisfy you always. May you always be captivated by her love,” and it’s just not talking about her love in her unselfish personality. This is talking about sex. You know the love that’s expressed a sexual relationship. Be captivated always by her love. “Why be captivated my son by an immoral woman and fondle the breasts of a promiscuous woman?” And so, you know, I think it’s obvious that it’d be okay to fondle the breasts of your wife. And she might like that too. And you might like that as well. Okay. So has it been wrong to kiss your wife’s breasts or in some way interact with them?

Well maybe it’s okay and maybe there could be enjoyment and an expression of love in that. And this is where reading from your Bible. Okay, so then should we conclude then that oral sex, oral to genital sex is wrong? Well, it’s not so clear, is it here when, you know, we were reading a little more of the specifics of what is involved in sex. And quite honestly, I feel so sorry for the married couples that are way over here on the right where sex is likely here’s, we’ve got a list of all these things that we cannot do. All we can do is just get together copulate and then watch TV. Oh my goodness. Okay. You’re missing out on a lot of blessing, buddy. Okay. All right, so I’ll be back the next time. Hope you join me. God bless you.

What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? (Part 6)

What does the Bible say about oral and anal sex, part six. Hi, welcome to today’s Little Lesson. I hope you’ve watched the previous five. If you haven’t, it would probably be good to stop right now and go back and find the other five and watch them first. Because we’re building on a foundation and trying to determine from the Scripture, of which on this particular subject of oral and anal sex, there’s not anything definitive. And so, we have to come to, first of all, a conclusion from that, that if it was that important to God, you think he’d say something about it, right? I mean, the Bible’s a pretty big book. It has a lot to say about sex and what displeases God and sex. Right? And I’ve already said this, but it bears repetition, when God is so specific that he says it’s wrong to have sex with animals, you’d think that if oral and anal sex where that grievous to God within the confines of marriage, of course, because we know God set that up, he’d have said something about that. Okay.

And again, if you’re watching this for the first time, of course, and you missed the first four, you might say, “Oh, but, but, but.” Well, I probably already answered some of those buts in previous Little Lessons. Okay. So God is not quite the prude that some people think he is. Sex was his idea and I think that we can trust him on this. There’s a book in the Bible called the Song of Solomon that thematically, it’s sexual. I mean, some people try to un-sexualize it. I don’t know how you could possibly do that. They try to spiritualize it by saying, “Well, this represents the love that the church has for Jesus and vice versa.”

Okay, okay, I get that. But I mean, the sexual imagery is just all over the place and it celebrates the beauty and the joy of sex within the confines of marriage. Okay? And the language that is used is intentionally vague and non-offensive but certainly gives chance for our imaginations to imagine what’s really being talked about here. So I want to read to you. This is the laying of foundation now. I mean, this book starts off with the words, “May he kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for your love is better than wine.” That’s where it starts. That’s verse one. And we don’t have time to read all the chapters of Song of Solomon, but probably the two juiciest chapters, one of them is Chapter four. Let me begin in verse number one.

This is the husband, the lover, describing the beauty of his lover. “You are beautiful, my darling, beautiful beyond words. Your eyes are like doves behind your veil. Your hair falls in waves like a flock of goats winding down the slopes of Gilead. Your teeth are as white as sheep recently shorn and freshly washed. Your smile is flawless, each tooth matched with its twin. Your lips are like a scarlet ribbon. Your mouth is inviting. Your cheeks are like rosy pomegranates behind your veil. Your neck is as beautiful as the tower of David, jeweled with shields of a thousand heroes.”

Okay, so up until now it’s neck and up. But describing all of her facial features of what is so inviting and so attractive to him. Who can explain all that? That’s how God made men to be attracted to the female face. But think about this. Think about how similar the female face is to the male face. I mean, okay, there’s differences. We all know that. But compared to the face of an elephant or a hyena or something, then there’s a lot of similarities. But in general, no man is looking at another man and thinking these thoughts. This is something that is God given. Men appreciate the beauty and the subtlety and the differences of the female face. Okay?

Now we come to verse five. “Your breasts.” So we’ve lowered ourselves down here. “Your breasts are like two fauns, twin fauns of a gazelle grazing among the lilies.” Now, quite honestly, I’m having a tough time catching the connection of that imagery of how your breasts can be compared to two fauns. Now I could look at two fauns, and these are beautiful things. So maybe that’s the only correlation. Think of two fauns. They are cute, beautiful, very attractive. Anyone would like to look at them and they go, “Ah, aren’t they just beautiful?” and so forth. And this guys only equating that to his lover’s breasts. But anyway, you look at it, he’s talking about her breasts and visually how beautiful they are to him.

Okay. “Before the dawn breezes blow and the night shadows flee, I will hurry to the mountain of myrrh and to the hill of frankincense. You are altogether beautiful. my darling, beautiful in every way. Come with me from Lebanon, my bride. Come with me from Lebanon. Come down from Mount Amanah, from the peaks of Senir and Hermon, where the lions have their dens and leopards live among the hills.” I like this next one. “You have captured my heart, my treasure, my bride. You hold it hostage with a glance of your eyes.” Isn’t that beautiful? “With a single jewel of your necklace.” I mean, if you don’t see the sexual imagery in all this, you’re not paying good attention. “Your love delights me, my treasure, my bride.” Again, he’s emphasizing the privacy. “This is my treasure. You’re my bride.” “Your love is better than wine, your perfume more fragrant than spices. Your lips are as sweet as nectar, my bride, honey and milk are under your tongue.”

So this guy is enjoying kissing, passionately, kissing, his lover. Okay. And as I said in the last lesson, the old argument that’s used about what’s natural and how we know oral sex is wrong in marriage because it’s not natural. Who would’ve ever thought that kissing on the lips was natural? You use your mouth for eating and talking and so forth. Who would’ve ever thought it was a sexual organ? But it is.

“Your clothes are scented like the cedars of Lebanon. You are my private garden, my treasure, my bride, a secluded spring, a hidden fountain.” So again, emphasizing the, the privacy of all this. It’s mine. You’re hidden. It’s just, just, just for me. I love that. Okay, now we’ve worked our way down face, torso. Guess what? We’re going lower here.

“Your thighs shelter a paradise of pomegranates with rare spices.” Now, I’m going to have to pick up here on the next Little Lesson, okay, because we’re out of time. But your thighs, that’s from your waist to your knees, okay, anatomically and they shelter a paradise of pomegranates with rare spices. So very veiled imagery here. But fruit is what’s in mind and spices are what’s in mind. And we’ll read it in more detail tomorrow. Okay?

I’m reading from the New Living Translation. Some other translations don’t say it exactly like that. In fact, in the next lesson, I’ll first read the New American Standard and we’ll all be scratching our heads saying, “What? What? What in the world are you saying there?” Okay, so thank you for joining me on these juicy Little Lessons. Hope to see you next time. God bless you.

What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? (Part 7)

Thank you so much for joining once again. I hope you’ve seen the six previous little lessons because we’ve covered a lot of ground and I’m trying to create some context and lay a foundation. And now we find ourselves as we look at the spectrum of Christian thought and answering the questions that we’re trying to answer.

We find ourselves in the Song of Solomon where some have found what they believe is an endorsement for oral sex. And we’re trying to judge that. Okay. And I’m trying to refrain from appearing to be anything, but neutral on this because I don’t want to be amongst the Christian sex police who are going beyond what the word of God explicitly and clearly states. All right, so let’s look at what we have and judge from that.

You know, these are questions that Christians have and they’re very important. I did a video about a year ago from when I’m making this video on will God, forgive me if I keep committing the same sin over and over again. And that became our most popular video. I think as I’m talking to you right now, it’s got like 150,000 views or something. As I looked at the demographics of who was watching that video mostly, and I saw it was mostly young men, I just made the assumption, “Oh it’s masturbation that they’re wrestling with. Unmarried young men.

I then made another video on what does the Bible say about masturbation? Actually, it was a series, but the very first in that series then within the last nine months became the most popular video on our YouTube channel. It received about 180,000 views in a shorter amount of time than the previous record holding YouTube video. So it just shows that these things are questions that Christians have. They’re legitimate questions and people are interested in them, and the churches ought to be talking about them.

Maybe not on Sunday mornings from the pulpit, but in classes for men and women and I get to do this privately so I feel a little bit safer not having to look anybody right in the face, and trusting that I’m able to help you. All right. So we found ourselves in our last lesson in the Song of Solomon. The two juiciest chapters in this sexually-themed laced Bible book, are Song of Solomon 4:4-7. So we’re making our way through chapter four and we came to this one verse, verse number 13 and I’m reading from the new living translation.

It says, your thighs. We know what your thighs are. He’s describing the beauty of his bride here. Your thighs and from your waist to your knees. Okay. Your thighs shelter a paradise of pomegranates with rare spices. Now these already alluded to this garden imagery. He said it in the verse above. You are my private garden, a secluded spring, a hidden fountain. So we have that imagery and now it’s becoming a little more specific.

And I love the new living translation because it’s a thought for thought translation, not a word for word translation. The new American standard here says in verse 13 your… In fact, I put it up on my laptop here. Your shoots, your shoots are an orchard of pomegranates. So your shoots, well that’s, I guess that’s your branches, in this private garden.The imagery is not so good or clear, really in one sense.

It’s very, very vague. I am not sure how the new living translation came up with this. Your thighs shelter a paradise of pomegranates, but wow. If that’s closer to what the original author had in mind, wow. So I’m not sure what’s interesting between a woman’s thighs other than her vagina and the various components.

That’s obviously where God put a lot of thought into all that and concentrated nerve endings there and so forth with the idea of a woman’s pleasure and a married woman’s pleasure. Okay. Enhancing her relationship with her husband and in her pleasure, he also finds pleasure. Okay. So again, let’s read it again. It’s purposely vague, but it’s unmistakable I think in his imagery that God is not the prude that some people think he is.

You are my private garden, my treasure, my bride, a secluded spring. A hidden fountain, your thighs shelter a paradise of pomegranates with rare spices. Henna with nard. Nard and saffron, fragrant calamus and cinnamon. With all the trees of frankincense, myrrh and aloes and every other lovely spice. You are a garden fountain, a well of fresh water. You see all this specific imagery of these different kinds of fruit.

It does seem reasonable to conclude that he’s describing if nothing else, the fact that there’s a lot going on down there in that region. Fairly complicated garden, a lot of variation there and it’s a description. Okay. Now some people say, “Well, there you go. This guy is so familiar with this part of his bride’s body. He’s obviously looking very close and then they jumped to the conclusion of course that this is an endorsement for oral sex.

Well, I’m going to have to stop right there and say, I don’t see that. Okay. But on the other hand, I am not going to be the Christian sex police. Okay? As I’ve already said. So then we come to the next juiciest chapter there within the Song of Solomon, another description by the husband of his bride. And he says, how beautiful. This is verse one, how beautiful are your sandaled feet O queenly maiden. So this time we’re working from the… Starting at the bottom.

Remember in chapter four we started the top and worked our way down face, breast, thighs. Now, we’re starting at the feet and even the feet of his bride, he sees as beautiful, but now he works his way up. Your rounded thighs are like jewels, the work of a skilled craftsmen. And ladies, if he didn’t know that men are turned on by that part of their wives’ bodies. Who can explain it? It’s just instinctive, intuitive. It’s God-given. Okay. It’s something that he likes to look at. Your rounded thighs are like jewels, the work of a skilled craftsman. So it’s something that he would admire. Your navel is perfectly formed, like a goblet filled with mixed wine. Okay.

So he’s working his way up now. He’s come to the navel. But look back down a little bit between your thighs lies a mound of wheat, bordered with lilies. Now this, goodness seems to be a description of the clitoris and it’s interesting because the new American standard always had me scratching my head when I read this because it said your belly is like a heap of wheat. And we kind of laughed at that and said, “Wow, I guess back in the day slender wasn’t in.” You imagine the heap of wheat on the belly, so that’s not describing slender.

But here in the new living translation, describing something else, between your thighs lies a mound of wheat bordered with lilies. So again, imagery is vague. We can’t come to definitive conclusions, but the guy’s familiar with something that God made, that’s the center of pleasure for the wife. Okay, out of time for today, we’ll pick up next time and in the juicy seventh chapter of Song of Solomon in our next little lesson, and we’re winding this down now. Okay. God bless you.

What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? (Part 8)

Hi. Welcome to today’s Little Lesson. Thank you for joining me. Hope you watched the seven preceding Little Lessons. We’ve been laying a foundation, building context to try to answer these two questions that started off this Little Lesson, all precipitated by a letter from a dear sister in Christ, whose marriage was saved by watching Little Lessons. But her unbelieving husband and herself, she’s a new Christian, they enjoyed, she said, oral sex prior to her making a commitment to Christ. And now she’s heard some teaching that it’s demonic and it opens up to homosexual spirits if you do have oral sex and so forth. And anal sex, this is actually sodomy. And I’ve done my best over the last few lessons to try to answer the specifics of that. And I’ll just say once again, starting off this Little Lesson, the scripture is not as clear maybe as some of us wished it was, and there’s a spectrum of Christian thought. So, I don’t want to join the Christian sex police, but I do want to look at what the Bible does have to say.

So, we’re finding ourselves in a part of the Bible that’s very sexually themed, the Song of Solomon. I believe it’s inspired by the Holy Spirit. If Solomon wrote it, you have to kind of scratch your head a little bit on Solomon on anything he writes about sex, seeing as how he had 300 wives and 700 concubines. But we won’t try to cover that right now.

So, anyways, we’re now in one of the two juiciest chapters of Song of Solomon, chapter seven, where, unlike chapter four where the husband began describing the beauty of his lover starting at the top, working all the way down to what was hidden by her thighs. And then this time, in chapter seven, it starts at the bottom with her feet, how beautiful they are, and works his way up.

So, this is Song of Solomon 7:1 “How beautiful are your sandaled feet, O queenly maiden. Your rounded thighs are like jewels, the work of a skilled craftsman.” We covered this already. “Your navel is perfectly formed, like a goblet filled with mixed wine.” And so right there, some folks are jumping on. Well, here’s a little innuendo. This is oral sex, right? Her navel is like a goblet filled with wine. So you drink the wine, your mouth would be there. Well, what’s he describing? He’s not saying here that we put wine into your navel and I drank it. That’s not what he’s saying, and that’s a stretch, okay? Nor is it saying then I worked my way down from there and put my mouth on your genitals.

But he does say, this is where we left off last time, “between your thighs,” this is the New Living Translation, “lies a mound of wheat bordered with lilies.” The New American Standard says “Your belly is like a heap of wheat,” and we always scratched our heads, saying, well, maybe they had they had a little different standards of beauty back in that day that it was attractive to have a fat belly. But seems like in our day and in cultures around the world, slender has been generally thought of as more attractive, but what do we know? Look at Rembrandt’s paintings of those naked women. They weren’t so slender. But yet here in the New Living Translation, maybe it opens it up for us. “Between your thighs,” well, you know, “lies a mound of wheat bordered with lilies.” Okay. So there’s a mound and there’s a border. Sounds like a certain part on a woman’s genitalia that is the center of her pleasure. But now working our way up, he didn’t say I’m going to put my mouth there, I’m going to drink there. That’s not there, okay? But let’s keep going.

“Your breasts are like two fawns.” So, same imagery is in chapter four. “Twin fawns of a gazelle.” Now works his way up. “Your neck is as beautiful as an ivory tower. Your eyes are like the sparkling pools of Heshbon by the gate of Bath-rabbim.” So, again, working up, neck, beautiful eyes. Back in the same region, “Your nose is as fine as the tower of Lebanon overlooking Damascus.” I’m not sure exactly specifically what about her nose was like the tower of Lebanon, but “Your head is a majestic as Mount Carmel, and the sheen of your hair radiates royalty.” So, wow, he loves it.

I love this next phrase. “The king is held captive by its tresses. Oh, how beautiful you are! How pleasing, my love, how full of delights!” So, there’s lots of specifics that I like about what you’ve got to offer. “You are slender like a palm tree, and your breasts are like its clusters of fruit.” So, imagine the slender palm tree, with the palm fruit up there hanging underneath the branches. So, that becomes a sexual image. And he says, “You are slender like the palm tree,” so, again, against the belly heap of wheat imagery and the New American Standard, I like this thin slender body that I’m seeing. And your breasts, on the upper portions of that palm tree, are like its clusters of fruit. Now, look what he says. “I will climb the palm tree and take hold of its fruit.” So, the imagery is I’m touching your breasts with my hands. And it goes on, “May your breasts be like grape clusters, and the fragrance of your breath like apples. May your kisses be as exciting as the best wine.” So, he’s working his way up her body, and breasts are like grape clusters. Once again, he’s going to take hold of its fruit. And then the fragrance of her breath, so he’s at her mouth. “And may your kisses be exciting as the best wine.”

So again, some people have found oral sex in that. I’m going to have to beg to differ on that. As far as oral to genital sex, I don’t see that there, okay? But what he described sounds great to me. And that’s one thing, I guess, from my perspective, and I’m going to share a little bit of my perspective, regular sex without oral sex, it’s got a lot to offer, right? We know within the spectrum of Christian thought, there are quite a few within the Christian world that would say something very negative about oral sex, and many couples would say it’s degrading. Come on. And then even more so against anal sex because it seems like from a standpoint of the function of a part, the anus isn’t exactly a sexual organ. It might be close by some sexual organs. It might have some feelings, but it’s where the excrement comes out and so forth, and so, you know…. But again, all the beauty of everything he describes, it’s all legitimate, it’s all clear, and there’s lots to do. Lots of variety, lots of fun, lots of excitement on many levels, okay?

I’m just about out of time, and I’m going to wind this up in one more Little Lesson tomorrow, somewhat of a summary, but a few closing thoughts. But one thing I do want to hit on, of course, are the medical implications. The question is what does the Bible say, so I’m stepping beyond the question here, but what does the Bible say. But from a medical standpoint, there are some things to consider, particularly with anal sex, all right? And also with oral sex, mouth to genital sex, that I’m not going to go into, all right? But you’ve got the internet, you can Google it and see what you find out there.

So, again, my posture is I’m trying to stick with scripture. I’ve tried to give scriptural principles and so forth, but it was all precipitated by a question, which I’m going to repeat one last time tomorrow and talk specifically to that viewer, because she’s married to someone who’s not a Christian, and so she’s got a double dilemma here. “I want to please God. I want to please my husband. Prior to my salvation, we were enjoying oral sex. What do I do now?”

Okay, hope to see if that final Little Lesson on this interesting topic. God bless you.

What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? (Part 9)

Hi, welcome to today’s little lesson and thank you once again for joining me. If you’re still with me now on the ninth little lesson as we’ve discussed this subject you’re a real trooper, and I can’t course review everything that I’ve said. I know some viewers are going to say, “Well you haven’t said anything about anal sex. Well, I haven’t specifically. I mean, let’s face it we’re not finding anything in the scripture pro or con about anal sex. But, I would say within the spectrum of Christian thought, as I’ve looked on the internet to see what everybody is saying on the subject, much more negativity about anal sex than oral sex. The reasons that are often given, of course, is the anatomical function of the anus, and so forth. Why do you want to use it for something else when it’s used for something that is so unclean?

Of course, that same exact argument, and logic, is used on oral sex, because you’re so close to something that is not the cleanest part of the body, but, again, there are [counter 00:01:26] arguments against that I’ve read. The spectrum is broad within the Christian community, far on both sides. The Bible, as we search the Bible we haven’t found anything explicitly condemning these things. Sodomy, which includes oral/anal sex, men with men in a homosexual relationship that’s obviously condemned. The word sodomy comes from Sodom, the biblical reference there.

We’ve looked at the Song of Solomon where some folks say you can find the Bible talking clearly about oral sex, and we’ve looked for it there I and the juiciest chapters and, boy, we found some juicy stuff, and definitely there is attention given to the genital areas in veiled references, but I think it’s pretty obvious what’s being talked about. I personally am not able to find oral to genital sex described even in a vague way.

So, the Bible doesn’t condemn it, but the Bible is not talking about it as something that you’d want to do. I’ve also emphasized that all the beauty of sex that’s described in the Song of Solomon, there’s plenty to do in sex without needing anything beyond standard stuff that can keep it fun and keep a marriage interesting and enjoyable. Lovers do get better as the months and years roll by, and they are more open with each other and talk about things. That is, of course, what marriage is all about. We’ve talked about that, also, in this little lesson series about whatever is done in the marriage bed needs to be done by mutual consent, from 1 Corinthians chapter 7.

Now, this whole little lesson was precipitated by a question from a viewer. Actually I got it months ago and it’s taken me this long to get around to it. A new Christian and her and her husband enjoyed, she said, oral sex prior to her coming to Christ. Her husband is not a believer and what should she do? I haven’t really specifically answered her specific question because she asked, basically, however, what does the Bible say, and she’s going to do what the Bible says. She does have a problem. As Christians we want to please the Lord but we also want to please our spouses, and if your spouse is unsaved you have a problem.

So, I’m going to speak directly to her and any woman in her shoes and, I guess, theoretically any man in her shoes, a man who would be a Christian and his wife is not. Your spouse wants to engage in a sexual practice that you don’t feel right about in your heart or that you feel is degrading. Now, in her case she had already engaged in oral sex with her husband and she said, “We enjoyed it,” so that it’s both mutual enjoyment. Whereas, again, there are plenty of Christian customers who would say it’s degrading and so forth.

She said, “We enjoy it,” so now she’s wondering whether she should stop it. It’s hard to know what to say, other than to say at least this, you need to talk to your husband, and if you really feel within your heart that this is something you don’t want to do, which actually I kind of suspect you’re not going to be saying that because you did say, “We enjoy this,” and you were involved in it before. Hopefully from what we’ve discussed you’re not going to just blindly accept the teaching of the Christian sex police who have somehow figured out that oral sex must be wrong, even though there’s not a shred of evidence for that, really, in the Bible when you get right down to it.

Let’s say that you feel a conviction that you shouldn’t do it. Well, then you have to talk to your husband, of course, and you need to do it very, very gently, and try to softly, gently explain it to him. He may not understand, and the danger that you run into then is, “Well, I’m a Christian and now I’m not as good of a wife as I was before. That’s the problem, but I’m at a loss to really … I just cannot give a definitive answer on that, and I think anyone who would give a definitive answer is overstepping their rightful bounds because it’s not an easy question to answer.

I think I would be personally myself, and you’re allowed to disagree with me. I still love you. I think if I was her pastor, I think I would say, “If you find that enjoyable, and your husband finds that enjoyable and he’s not a believer don’t put that as a stumbling block before him because the most important thing is to lead him to the Lord. Again, I know someone’s going to put in the comments, “Well, you don’t lead anyone to Lord by compromising.” I agree with you on that wholeheartedly, but this is one of those gray areas. If she was asking me, “Prior to our marriage my husband and I had another woman and we had threesomes, I would be saying, “No.” We know that’s wrong. The Bible’s full of information that leads us to conclude that, but this is a gray area that we’re talking about, as we’ve discussed for the last nine little lessons. I think that that’s going to come through loud and clear if you watch the nine little lessons. So that’s why I would give the advice try to be the best wife you can. You want to show that you’re a better wife now that you’ve come to know the Lord, and because scripture doesn’t explicitly condemn this, something that you confessed that you previously enjoyed, I would say you don’t have to be so concerned about the Christian sex police who have influenced you.

So, I’ve done my best and maybe it wasn’t good enough, but please give me credit for at least trying and addressing a subject that rarely gets addressed. I welcome your thoughts and your comments. People say, “You don’t read our comments.” Actually, I have a person on our staff who reads them and they send me the ones that they believe that I would be interested in responding to and knowing about, and so forth. So, other people read your comments so it’s great for discussion. Thank you so much. We’re going to go into a new subject for our next little lesson. God bless you.

The post What Does the Bible Say About Oral and Anal Sex? appeared first on David Servant.

If you’re a regular reader you know that in past Little Lessons, every once in a while, I have addressed what is known as the marriage permanence doctrine.

And this is a doctrine that focuses on a few verses in the New Testament that have lead some to believe and to promote the idea that if you’re married, but you’ve been previously married at any time in the past in your life, you’re in an immoral, adulterous relationship and you should divorce your current spouse. Regardless of how long you’ve been married, regardless of how many children you might have by that spouse.

And if possible, you should go back to your first spouse, because allegedly you’re still married to that person in God’s eyes. And you have no right to remarry until that first spouse is dead because this is a covenant that’s only breakable by death. And it’s easy to understand why some folks would buy into that although it is tragic. And I’ve discussed it at length on several little lessons. I’ve also written extensively about it on this website.

I do think it’s a bit ironic that they label themselves “marriage permanence” when they’re advocating that literally tens of thousands and perhaps hundreds of thousands of Christian couples get divorced because one or both of them were previously married.

Okay, so I’m not going to belabor that point and go into all of the things I’ve said in the past. But I received a question from one of our beloved viewers and thought, “Oh, I’d love to hear how the marriage permanence people would answer this question.” And so here it is, I’m going to read it to you:

“I have a question. I am new in Jesus Christ,” this is a young believer in Jesus Christ. “I was a Muslim,” Okay, well this is a Muslim background believer, “and I became a Christian. I’m living in the Netherlands, it’s another word for what we call Holland. I had several Islamic marriages…” and she then puts four in parentheses so she’s been married four times as a Muslim. “But all those men divorced me for very cheap reasons and since I’m an ex-Muslim, they would kill me and my life was in great danger.”

So what she’s saying is, of course the Quran says that anyone who apostatizes out of Islam, they deserve death and in many countries in the world, that’s carried out. So she’s saying, my life is actually in danger if people discover that I’m a former Muslim and so forth. So she’s doing her best to preserve her life. She said, “After I came to Christ, I married a Christian man.” Whoa, life is looking up now, she’s married to a guy and they both have God as their Father.

Okay now, of course, the marriage permanence folks would say, “In God’s eyes, you’re married to your very first Muslim husband and so therefore, you should divorce your Christian husband and go back to your Muslim husband.” That’s what they have to say to be consistent. God wants you married not to a Christian, but to a Muslim and these marriage permanence people, bless their hearts, they often focus on just an American context, they never think outside the little bubble world of America. That there’s all kinds of people like this who have converted from other faiths, who were married in that other faith, and that the marriage permanence doctrine requires these people to divorce their Christian spouses and go back to unsaved and even Muslim spouses.

She says, “My husband is also an ex-Muslim,” her Christian husband. “And he was divorced with his ex-wife many years ago.” So the marriage permanence people would say, “Oh my goodness, they’re both of course living in an adulterous relationship, they’re both going to go to hell, these two Christians who converted from Islam to Christianity. God’s going to cast them into hell one day, because they’re living in adultery and they should divorce and get out of their Christian marriage and they should both go back if they possibly can and get remarried to the one to whom they’re supposedly married in God’s eyes.”

Now granted there are a number of marriage permanence folks who have a little different variation of marriage permanence in saying that God doesn’t require you to go back to your former marriage but that you should just live in celibacy until your former marriage spouse is dead. So some marriage permanence people wouldn’t say that you’ve got to go back to your former spouse. But many of them would, okay. And of course, they all say, “In God’s eyes, you’re still married,” because that’s the whole premise of their theology. “You’re married until death do you part. It’s a covenant that can only be broken by death and so in God’s eyes, you’re still married.” So of course, if you had the opportunity to go back, you should go back because in God’s eyes, allegedly you’re married to that person.

In fact, if that person’s remarried, you should work to break up their marriage and try to affect a divorce in their lives so you can get back into God’s will, being married to your first partner. And regarding her husband, she said, “He was forced as a young teen to marry a woman against his will and he didn’t even love her,” so this was a forced marriage and she is a Muslim. So again, he’d have to go back to a Muslim woman that he never wanted to be married to.

“Me and my current husband have two kids now.” Listen to me marriage permanence folks, are you honestly going to tell these people to divorce as Christians in front of their two kids whom they’re trying to raise to follow Christ in obedience to Christ? “We’re going to divorce now kids.” Her question and the reason she’s asking this is because the marriage permanence people have obviously spread their influence to her. “Should we get divorced and return to our first husband and wife?”

Well my answer is, absolutely not. And any person who says you should, oh my goodness, there are no words, no words. I guess I do have some words, but I’m trying to be nice. “Remember, we received death threats since we are ex-Muslims. Leaving Islam means death penalty.” Oh my goodness. I think what she’s implying there is if we did divorce and go back to our former spouses, they’d have to kill us because we converted to Christ and we’d have to tell them that. And getting remarried, you’d have to say, “Well I’m a Christian now.” Okay well the Quran says that you should be killed because you apostatized. Marriage permanence people, are you going to tell these Christian people to divorce in front of their two kids? That this viewer should go back four husbands ago to a Muslim? That in God’s eyes, they’re still married?

All right, so I said this is a stumper. God bless you, hope to see you next time.

The post A Real Stumper for the Marriage Permanence Folks appeared first on David Servant.

What’s lacking overall in the “marriage permanence” doctrine is grace. There’s a little grace, if you’ll divorce and live a single life until your original spouse dies. You can go to heaven then, but other than that, you can’t. You’re going to go to hell because you’re living in adultery, by their definition.

I believe it’s a great misunderstanding and it certainly doesn’t fit the whole tenor of Scripture, does it? I mean, we certainly don’t find anywhere in the epistles anyone telling anyone that they need to divorce. Just the opposite. Paul writes to the Corinthians that believers should stick it out even with unbelievers, and no believers should ever divorce, etc., etc. There’s just no advocacy for divorce, and yet the marriage permanence folks want literally tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of Christian couples to divorce because one or the other or both has been previously married.

Their thesis is, in God’s eyes, you’re still married to your first spouse because it was a lifelong covenant. Well, it was a lifelong covenant, but that’s a lifelong covenant that can be broken in God’s eyes by adultery, because that’s why Jesus said a couple of times, in Matthew 5, “Anyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery.” That’s the exception. He says the same thing in Matthew 19, which we’ll read momentarily.

Of course, to whatever degree it is adultery in God’s eyes when there’s a remarriage that takes place, it’s a singular act of adultery because at that consummation of that second marriage, it severs the covenant, the first one, and that’s it, because there’s adultery. That’s the end of it, but that doesn’t mean you’re living in adultery or that God wants you to divorce and so on and so forth.

We prove that from looking at Deuteronomy 24, the law of Moses. Of course, I know the marriage permanence folks, a lot of them would say that the law is irrelevant because Jesus brought a whole new law and laid down new rules. That’s a false premise and if you want to be challenged about that, I’ve written a couple e-teachings titled “Getting the Sermon on the Mount Right.” Those articles prove beyond any shadow of a doubt that Jesus was not bringing a new law because many times when He quoted, “You have heard it was said,” He wasn’t quoting from the law. It was clear He was quoting from the scribes and Pharisees, because what He said is not found in the law of Moses, and secondly the “new standard” that Jesus espoused is also already found in the law of Moses and so it’s not a standard at all, proving that that theory is totally wrong. But I don’t have time to go into that in this teaching.

We can rely upon Deuteronomy 24 and verses one through four as Jesus Himself speaking through the law of Moses and He said the woman who’s been twice divorced cannot go back to her first husband. That’s an abomination. Why? Jesus explained it. There’s been adultery committed as far as her first husband is concerned and that would be an abomination. That covenant has been severed by the consummation of the second marriage, but she’s free to marry anyone else besides her first husband.

Okay, Jesus was an endorser of the morality that is espoused in the law of Moses. Alright, Matthew 19, there’s a key passage of Scripture, of course. “Some Pharisees,” verse number three, “came to Jesus, testing Him and asking Him, ‘Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any reason at all?'” History shows that that was widely believed by most of the spiritual leaders in Christ’s day, any reason divorce.

“He answered and said to them, ‘Have you not read that He created them from the beginning, made them male and female, and said,'” this is quoting from Genesis, “‘”For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and join his wife. The two shall become one flesh?”‘” Jesus then comments, “‘There are no longer two but one flesh. Whatever God has joined together, let no man separate.'”

God’s saying marriage is designed by God to be a lifelong union. Hey! Wow, that’s a revelation. We all know that. We all know that and God never did it for anyone to get divorced. In Jesus’ day, divorce would be so commonplace, so easy. I’m sure God was pulling His hair out, saying, “What in the world?” Now, God did make a concession for divorce, and that’s exactly what the Pharisees bring up.

They said to Him, “‘Why, then, did Moses command to give her a certificate of divorce and send her away?'” I won’t comment on that, but that is a total misquote and misrepresentation of actually what Moses said, but Jesus avoided commenting on that misquote and just addresses the gist of what they’re saying, that there’s an allowance for divorce, obviously, in the law of Moses. Well, of course there’s an allowance for divorce. People are sinners. God made some concession as to what to do if there’s a divorce and what not to do if there’s a divorce. We read one of them in Deuteronomy 24. “If she ever gets divorced from her second husband, she can’t go back to her first husband.”

Jesus says in verse number eight, “‘Because of the hardness of your heart, Moses permitted you to divorce your wives. But from the beginning, it has not been this way.'” It’s never God’s will for anyone to get divorced, but does that mean that you remedy the divorce by divorcing your current spouse and going back? That’s never said in Matthew 19 or Matthew 5 or in Mark or Luke or in any of the epistles.

You don’t read the book of Acts of all the Christians getting divorces as they repent from their second spouses. Jesus then says the same thing He says, essentially, in the Sermon on the Mount. “I say to you, whoever divorces his wife,” now don’t forget this clause, “except for immorality, and he marries another woman, he commits adultery.”

There’s an exception, immorality or adultery, of course, is the exception. If he marries another woman and he divorced his first wife because she was unfaithful to him, he’s not committing adultery. You get it? See, that’s how God sees it. Adultery severs and ends the covenant, even if nothing else does in God’s eyes. That does.

If Jesus is defining the second marriage as adultery for all the parties that are involved, well, then that’s the severance of it all. When that marriage is consummated, it is wrong, it’s grievous in God’s eyes, but what’s done is done and so now God says, “What are we going to do to try to fix this?” He’s not saying, “Go back, divorce again and go back.” He forbids them to go back in the law of Moses, and that’s the fatal blow to the “marriage permanence” folks because, ideally, they’d have you go back to your first spouse.

I read you an instance in the very first part of this four-part series about a woman who saw a man in the worship team in her church who was married and she persuaded him that he had a fake marriage. That because the woman he was married to (with which he had five kids) had been previously married and was divorced and married him, their marriage wasn’t legitimate. She talked him into divorcing that woman and then she got him. Who could say that that’s right and good? Marriage permanence people probably will.

Alright, I settled my own heart and said what I had to say to get off my chest, and so I’ve said it. God bless everybody who disagrees. I’m trying to save Christian marriages. That’s what I’m trying to do, because that’s what I believe God’s trying to do. You don’t fix sin by sin, folks. Amen. Okay, that’s all for this little lesson. Thank you so much for joining me. God bless you.

The post What Is Wrong With “Marriage Permanence Doctrine?” – Part Four appeared first on David Servant.

Today we continue talking about the “marriage permanence doctrine.” I call it the “divine divorce doctrine.” It basically says anyone who is divorced and remarried is living in adultery, nonstop adultery, and that they should divorce again, and they should, if possible, go back to their first spouse because in God’s eyes, “they’re allegedly married to that person until death do us part.”

There’s some truth to this, but it falls short. Let’s look at what Scripture has to say, and not just one verse, but let’s look at a couple of verses. One, of course, would be one the very first times apparently that Jesus even mentioned this subject, broached this subject in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus said, I’m reading from Matthew 5, verse 31, “It was said.” Now, notice he didn’t say Scripture says or God says. This is an accurate quote, “It was said, whoever sends his wife away let him give her a certificate of divorce.” I submit to you it never says that anywhere in Scripture, and I challenge anyone, show me where it says that in the Old Covenant.

Jesus is not quoting what the Old Covenant says, what the Mosaic Law says. He’s quoting what the Scribes and Pharisees are teaching about divorce. In other words, the main thing is if you send your wife away make sure you give her that certificate. That’s what they harp on, but you can divorce for any cause. Jesus says now, here’s His counterpoint to the Pharisaical teaching of his day, “but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife,” there’s one clause that’s put in here as exception, “except for the reason of unchastity makes her commit adultery. Whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.” Okay.

Now, again you can see that Jesus is not going to contradict what the law of Moses says for goodness sake. He’s the Author of the law of Moses, He’s ministering to people who are under the law of Moses. If the New Covenant changed things, the New Covenant hasn’t started. It’s not going to start for about three years yet, and basically the fundamental premise that Jesus changed basic fundamental morality under the New Covenant is wrong anyways, but I don’t have time to go into that.

Again Jesus is elaborating on the law, trying to bring clarification of what the law is really teaching. This is what He’s saying, essentially the law is teaching that in God’s eyes when a man divorces his wife, except in the case of unchastity, he makes her commit adultery. Then the man who marries his ex-wife, he’s committing adultery as well in God’s eyes. Of course other places, I think in Luke or Mark, it talks about how he commits adultery, when he gets remarried and so forth.

Does that mean Jesus wants everyone who is divorced or remarried to divorce again? No, absolutely not! Because the basic premise of the marriage permanence folks is that you’re married to that original person until they die. That’s the permanence of marriage, that’s where they get that phrase, the permanence of marriage. Therefore the only remedy for your adultery is to divorce your current wife and if possible go back to your first husband.

However, here is what Jesus said in Deuteronomy Chapter 24, starting at verse number 1: “When a man takes a wife, and he marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her. He writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house.”

It’s his wife, they’re married, he writes a certificate of divorce, so that indicates now they’re divorced, at least legally divorced. He gives her that certificate and he sends her out. They’re done. “She leaves his house,” verse 2, “and goes and becomes another man’s wife.” Now she’s married a second time.

Now by Jesus’s definition she’s now an adulteress in some sense because she made a lifelong covenant with the first husband. Now again, he divorced her, so she’s not to blame for the divorce. At least we can’t find any evidence for that. He divorced her, he gave her this certificate. She’s like the victim, but in one sense she’s an adulteress because she had a covenant with this guy. She leaves his house and goes and becomes another man’s wife.

Now verse 3, “If latter husband turns against her,” so the second husband, “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 to be his wife.” You get all that? She’s been twice married but now the second husband either divorces her or dies. Here’s what she’s prohibited from doing: “Then her former husband, who sent her away, is not allowed to take her again to be his wife.”

Oh my goodness, so they must not actually be married in God’s eyes. No, they’re not still married in God’s eyes because if she by remarrying committed adultery, that is what severs the covenant she had with her first husband. If God wasn’t recognizing it at the time of her divorce, if in God’s eyes she wasn’t actually divorced, when she remarried this other guy and consummated her marriage with him, now she’s an adulteress according to Jesus, right?

In relationship to her first husband, that’s who she committed adultery against. That relationship now is severed by adultery. That’s why Jesus said whoever divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity makes her commit adultery. If in fact she has been unfaithful to him, and he divorces her because of her unfaithfulness, that’s a legitimate divorce. Why, because adultery is the breaking of the covenant, it severs and ends the relationship. Period.

Okay, so when the marriage permanence folks say Jesus said whoever divorces and remarries commits adultery, and you’re continually committing adultery., it’s non-stop adultery, and the only way out of that is to divorce again… Oh contraire, mon soeur. When that second marriage was consummated, yes an element of adultery existed in that because of what transpired before.

At that act, that in some sense adulterous act, that ended the covenant that existed with the first husband. That’s proven by not only in Deuteronomy Chapter 24, which forbids the twice married woman from going back to her first husband, but also by what Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount. He made an exception for the man who illegitimately divorces his wife, there’s an exception to that rule if she’s been unfaithful. The covenant’s been severed, and there’s freedom to remarry.

Okay, so maybe one more time we’ll look at this. I know I’m going to get all kinds of disagreement, but hey I’m doing my best. Okay thanks for joining me, hope to see you next time. God Bless.

View part 4 here >>

The post What Is Wrong With “Marriage Permanence Doctrine?” – Part Three appeared first on David Servant.

Today we’re going to delve once again into a very controversial subject, the subject of divorce and remarriage.

We all know that there’s a lot of diversity within the body of Christ as to what’s the truth about divorce and remarriage and there’s one group in particular that’s pretty much on the extreme fringes, and they call themselves the “marriage permanence” people.

However, when you delve into their doctrine, you find out that they’re encouraging long-standing Christian families, Christian husbands and wives, to divorce if one of them has been previously married, because their thesis is that you’re still married to your original spouse. Your divorce is not recognized by God. In His eyes, you’re still married to your former spouse. If you are divorced and remarried, you need to divorce again and, if possible, go back to your original spouse because it’s a lifelong covenant, ’til death do us part.

Like all doctrine that is being promoted within the body of Christ, there’s always some truth. But just because something has some truth doesn’t mean it’s all true. I wrote some articles, some e-teachings, (I do one every single month) addressing the question of divorce and remarriage. The title of those lessons, three lessons, was “I’m Divorced and Remarried. Am I Living in Adultery?” Those teachings garnered a lot of interest and a lot of discussions. I at the same time filmed a couple of videos that didn’t go into quite the depth of those e-teachings, but touched on some of the high points. Those videos garnered a lot of interest. As I’m making this video right now, one of those videos has received over 27,000 views. That’s a lot for us. It’s not a lot for some people, but it’s a lot for us.

We got 200 people that liked that video and 100 that hated that video. It just kind of shows the division that exists. Now, we’re gonna talk about this on today’s lesson and maybe the next one or two that follow. We’ll see how long it goes.

But just to give you an idea of some of the potential fruit of the divine divorce doctrine, the marriage permanence doctrine, I wanna read you a post I read on a Facebook page of someone who’s promoting divine divorce in a big way. Okay, listen to what this woman wrote, her testimony. She said, “The Lord became my King after I was so worldly. I had lived with men,” obviously out of wedlock, “and even women.” She had homosexual lesbian relationships with women. Again, obviously a person who was far from God’s standards.

But she says, “But I was saved from all that.” Well, praise the Lord. “And I started going to church.” Oh, praise the Lord for that, too. That’s all good. But now here’s where it starts going downhill. “I saw a man playing guitar and the Lord told me right away he was my husband.” She was sitting in church, looked up to the front, the worship team or whatever, and there was a guy playing the guitar and the Lord told her, “That’s your husband.”

That’s not how it usually works! But listen to her next line. “He was fake married with five kids.” Now, let me explain to you what she means by fake married. That means he’s not really married. He thinks he’s married and even has five kids, but he’s not really married. He’s fake married.

Why was he ‘fake married’ in her estimation? Why was he fake married in her mind? She says, “But after I told him his fake marriage was adultery because his ‘wife’ had a living first husband still,” see, that defines it. She’s a divine divorce person, a marriage permanence person. This guy she’s spotted up in the choir, in the worship team playing guitar, who God says is your husband, he’s married to a woman he has five children with, but he’s not really married to her, allegedly, in God’s eyes because his marriage to his wife is not legitimate because she’s been previously married and divorced and now remarried to him.

You see the logic there? They’re not really married in God’s eyes. The woman he’s married to is actually, in God’s eyes, married to her first husband. Therefore, she can’t be married to this guy. It’s a fake marriage.

She enlightens him to that, that, “Hey, the woman you’re married to, you’re not really married to in God’s eyes, you’re not married to at all. You have not a real marriage, not a legitimate marriage. You have a fake marriage. You’re actually living in adultery. The only way to get out of that adultery is to divorce that woman who was previously married ’cause she’s not really your wife.”

“After I told him his fake marriage was adultery because his ‘wife’ had a living first husband,” now, if her first husband had been dead, then she’d have said, “Oh, no, you’re allowed to be remarried because your first husband with whom you had a lifelong covenant is dead,” “he then knew our love was from above and he left them.”

Okay, did you hear what happened? Yes, you heard rightly. She convinced this guy that his current marriage was not legitimate, that he and his wife really were not married, that she was actually married to her former husband, and when he realized that he left her. It didn’t say he divorced her, but essentially that’s what he had to do because he was legally married. If you got married to this gal, which that’s the end of the story, he had to have gotten a divorce from this first wife here. “He knew our love was from above and he left them.”

He left his wife and five children to marry this gal. Again, it was okay in her eyes for them to get married because she had never been married herself, so she was not married to anyone in God’s eyes. He, then, was no longer living in adultery and had never been married prior to that “adulterous marriage” to that woman who had been previously married and divorced. He was free to remarry, so they got married.

She convinced him to divorce his wife and they got married. He left his wife and five kids. Now, that’s not the worst part. Here’s the last part of her post. “Now we help others know true covenant marriage of God to which is,” and this is her definition, “true covenant marriage, which is any first marriage for the man and the woman.” This was her first marriage and actually it was his first marriage, because what he thought was his first marriage was an illegitimate, adulterous marriage. That’s marriage permanence doctrine, my friends. That’s the fruit of it.

Alright, I’m out of time for today’s lesson. We’ll pick up in our next Little Lesson. Hope to see you then.

View part 2 here >>

The post What Is Wrong With “Marriage Permanence Doctrine?” – Part 1 appeared first on David Servant.

No doubt you’ve heard of Mennonites. Perhaps also of the Amish. Maybe even the Brethren and Hutterites. All fall under the heading of “Anabaptists,” who trace their roots to 16^th century Germany and Switzerland. Their predecessors were part of what is known as the Radical Reformation, a response to perceived corruption in both Roman Catholicism and the expanding Magisterial (state-wedded) Protestant movement led by Martin Luther, John Calvin, and others.

The artist who painted this picture certainly didn’t “Get the Sermon on the Mount Right,” as Jesus and His Jewish followers would have had a little darker skin!

The early Anabaptists, like the early Christians, were pejoratively named by their persecutors, but in their case because of their distinct doctrine of re-baptizing adults who had already been baptized as babies. The word anabaptist means “one who baptizes again.” Anabaptists noticed that infant baptism, practiced by both Roman Catholics and the Protestants of their day, wasn’t found in the New Testament, and that the apostles seemed to baptize only those who were old enough to understand the gospel, repent of their sins and follow Christ.

Anabaptists also believed that authentic moral transformation was the mark of the true Christian, recognizing that “faith without works is dead” (Jas. 2:26) and that Jesus and the apostles espoused certain standards of righteousness upon which salvation hinged. For example, Jesus said in His most famous sermon, “Unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:20), and then He continued by elaborating on specific standards that were certainly not being attained by the average scribe or Pharisee.

The original Anabaptist leaders were highly-educated, Spirit-filled, courageous men full of missionary zeal. Some expressions of early Anabaptism were characterized by charismatic gifts such as prophecy, speaking in other tongues, and healings.

Early Anabaptists often suffered greatly for their faith. While Protestants were persecuted by Catholics, Anabaptists were persecuted by both Catholics and Protestants acting in conjunction with the state. Thousands were imprisoned, tortured, drowned, beheaded, or burnt at the stake. One, Michael Sattler, tried and convicted as a heretic in 1527 by Roman Catholic authorities, first had his tongue cut out, after which red-hot tongs were used to tear twelve pieces of flesh from his body en route to his execution—where he then was burnt alive.

Suffering violently for so many years at the hands of professing Christians, it is not difficult to understand why Anabaptists have been committed to nonviolence from their earliest days, even apart from their convictions about the application of Jesus’ words regarding “turning the other cheek.” They will not serve as police or in the military, but during times of war have distinguished themselves in public service as conscientious objectors.

Nor is it difficult to understand why modern Anabaptists have strong convictions about the separation of church and state. There are two very separate and distinct kingdoms in Anabaptist thinking, one that belongs to “Caesar,” and one that belongs to Christ. There is no overlap. Unlike most Christians who would endeavor to serve Christ through their God-given opportunities to participate in governments (that Scripture says are established by God; Rom. 13:1-7), Anabaptists don’t participate in civil government, either by holding office or voting. Yet they do obey civil authorities so far as those authorities do not demand allegiance that requires disobedience to Christ.

European persecutions ultimately led to the mass emigrations by Mennonites, Amish and Hutterites to North and Latin America in subsequent centuries. Many settled in my home state of Pennsylvania under the original invitation of William Penn, and some of their descendants, fine Amish people, are personal friends of mine.

It is impossible not to respect the legacy of the Anabaptist movement, but it hasn’t been without its flaws. Like just about all other Christian groups, Anabaptists have a history of splitting among themselves over doctrinal and lifestyle disagreements. For example, the Amish, who split from the Mennonites over the issue of shunning wayward members, have split themselves many times. One of the most conservative splits of Old Order Amish, known as the Swartzentruber Amish, split into three new groups in the 1990s.

Anabaptist Doctrinal Pillars

While Martin Luther believed Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount was impossible to obey, and some modern theologians think it is a moral code only for the future Millennium, Anabaptists view it as the blueprint for everyday Christian life. They take it as literal as possible. (They aren’t ripping out an eye or cutting off a hand when they stumble, however.)

Anabaptist groups do differ on the application of Jesus’ most famous sermon. For example, regarding Jesus’ forbidding the laying up of earthly treasures, some, like the Hutterites and Bruderhof (who split from each other), literally share all their possessions and live communally in an attempt to imitate Acts 2:44-45. In contrast, the Amish don’t live communally, but they look out for each other, and they shun many modern conveniences. They don’t own automobiles, for example, although they regularly ride as paying passengers in automobiles driven by non-Amish people when their horse-drawn buggies are inadequate for their transportation needs. On the other hand, most Mennonites do own automobiles, yet one group restricts the color to black. Legalism always lurks in the shadows of those who are trying to live in the light.

“ Legalism always lurks in the shadows of those who are trying to walk in the light. —DAVID SERVANT

Before I begin to offer any doctrinal critique of Anabapist theology, I should tell you that I think I have just as much respect for Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount as any Anabaptist. It is a blueprint for daily life. I also believe that faith without works is dead, and I’ve written several books that would make many Anabaptists squirm with conviction, such as, The Great Gospel Deception: Exposing the False Promise of Heaven Without Holiness, and Through the Needle’s Eye: An Impossible Journey Made Possible Through God. Moreover, I’ve been trying to practice what I preach. I founded and direct a ministry called Heaven’s Family that, through a devoted staff of 37 saints and thousands of financial partners, has invested millions of dollars in advancing Jesus’ kingdom and serving people whom He labeled the “least of these” in more than 40 of the world’s poorest nations. And I have laid up some treasure in heaven myself. And for those reasons, when some Anabaptists condescendingly tell me that I “just don’t want to pay the price to truly follow Jesus,” which is why I’ve “reasoned away His commandments,” or that they don’t want to waste their time on “foolish and ignorant speculations” (2 Tim. 2:23), I turn the other cheek.

Anabaptists generally believe that, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus introduced new laws for the new covenant, laws that uphold a higher moral standard than what is found in the Law of Moses. The primary basis of that premise is Jesus’ six statements that begin with either, “You have heard that it was said,” or “You have heard that the ancients were told” (Matt. 5:21, 27, 31, 33, 38, 43), after which Jesus mentions a law or teaching derived from the Mosaic Law that is followed by His words, “But I say to you” (Matt. 5:22, 28, 32, 34, 39, 44). For brevity’s sake, from now on I will refer to them as “Jesus’ six statements.”

The purpose of this teaching (as well as next month’s) is to examine the premise that Jesus introduced new laws for the new covenant that reflect a higher moral standard than what is found in the Mosaic Law. It is not only Anabaptists who hold to this premise, but also others within certain “holiness” circles who disclaim the Anabaptist label.

The Examination

First, we should not automatically assume—just because Jesus referenced a law or teaching derived from the Mosaic Law that was followed by the words, “But I say to you”—that He was altering or upgrading part of the Mosaic Law. It is possible that Jesus could have been explaining that what His disciples had heard was incorrect or incomplete, and thus He was about to correct or complete their misunderstanding. For example, imagine a police officer saying to you, “You have heard that robbing a bank is illegal, but I say to you that stealing anything that belongs to another person is illegal.” You would not assume the officer was informing you about recently-enacted laws that conveyed a higher moral standard. Rather, you would understand that he was elaborating on the theme of theft, helping you to understand that robbing a bank is not the only example.

Here is an example, taken from later in Matthew’s Gospel, of Jesus’ using the phrase “but I say to you” to communicate to His disciples that their understanding regarding a certain topic was correct, yet incomplete:

And His disciples asked Him, “Why then do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?” And He answered and said, “Elijah is coming and will restore all things; but I say to you that Elijah already came, and they did not recognize him, but did to him whatever they wished.” (Matt. 17:10-12, emphasis added).

We see that Jesus fully affirmed what His disciples had heard the scribes teach about the coming of Elijah, but He then revealed something the scribes had missed, namely that Malachi’s prophecy that God would send “Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord” (Mal. 4:5) was partially fulfilled in the ministry of John the Baptist.

As we read Jesus’ six statements, we would be foolish to rule out the possibility that He was, in fact, not introducing new laws with higher standards, but rather elaborating on old laws found in the Mosaic Law. And that is especially true since Jesus introduced His six statements with these words:

Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 5:17-20, emphasis added).

Although those introductory words don’t preclude the possibility that Jesus established standards that exceeded those found in the Law and Prophets, we should certainly reject outright any interpretation of Jesus’ six statements that has Him contradicting the Law of Moses or any of the Prophets. To contradict what is found in the Law and Prophets is equivalent to abolishing what Jesus said He would not abolish. Beyond that, if Jesus contradicted anything found in the Law and Prophets, He contradicted Himself, as He, being God, was the divine author behind both. Additionally, for God to contradict Himself or change His view on fundamental moral principles would require that God’s essential character change, which is impossible. Allow me to illustrate:

Let’s imagine someone suggesting that, during the old covenant, God wanted His people to always tell the truth, but that under the new covenant, He only expects them to tell the truth when they swear on a Bible. In all other instances, lying is acceptable. Such a suggestion would obviously amount to a divine moral downgrade. Of course, no one would accept such a suggestion as being valid, as it would imply a fundamental moral character change in God Himself. God cannot lie (Tit. 1:2; Heb. 6:18). Thus lying (and particularly when used to gain advantage over or harm someone) can not be morally acceptable to Him.

The same would be true if anyone suggested a reversal of the above example, such as teaching that under the old covenant God only expected His people to tell the truth when they swore on the Bible, but that under the new covenant, He expects them to always tell the truth, a divine moral upgrade. Such a teaching would imply that, at one time, some lying was acceptable to God, which would imply that God Himself has undergone moral improvement, now that lying, unlike previously, is always unacceptable to Him. For the same reason that we would reject the suggestion of a divine moral downgrade, we should also reject the suggestion of a divine moral upgrade.

Understanding this, Steve Gregg writes regarding Jesus’ six statements:

Since all morality is merely a reflection of the character of God, which cannot change, it is impossible for morality to change. The unchanging God cannot abhor today what He found respectable in the past. Jesus came to shed light on aspects and dimensions of the law which had been obscured by rabbinic tradition. Therefore, when Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said to those of old time, ‘You shall not murder,'” He did not finish the statement by saying, “but I say to you, ‘Murder!'” Rather, he explained that there are other ways by which one may become a “murderer” in God’s sight without actually killing someone. He did not say, “You have heard that it was said to those of old time, ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ but I say to you, ‘Commit adultery!'” Rather, He explained that there are ways to become guilty of this sin without actually touching a woman, but by merely looking at a woman to lust after her. In saying these things, he was not creating a new ethic (Job had known this truth thousands of years earlier—Job 31:1). Jesus never changed one moral issue from the law. He merely expounded on the deeper implications of the law that had been neglected by His hearers and their teachers.[1]

As we consider Jesus’ six statements with these thoughts in mind—thoughts which are based on what is revealed in the entirety of Scripture—we are better able to correctly interpret them. We should be highly suspicious of any interpretation that has Jesus altering fundamental morality, effectively pitting Him against the Mosaic Law, His Father, and Himself.

Regarding each of the six statements, we will ask two questions.

First, when Jesus’ referenced something from the Law of Moses, did He accurately quote a specific commandment, or was He referencing what the scribes and Pharisees taught? Take note that in none of the six cases do we find Jesus saying, “The Law of Moses says…” Rather, we find Jesus saying, “You have heard…” So what His audience had heard may or may not have been an accurate reflection of what was taught in the Mosaic Law. Thus the reason for our question. And obviously, if Jesus was “raising the standard,” we would expect that He would correctly reference the old standard before revealing the contrasting “new standard.”

The second question we will ask concerning each of Jesus’ six statements is this: Was the alleged “new standard” Jesus introduced actually a new standard that cannot be found in the Mosaic Law? If a standard Jesus advocated can be found in the Mosaic Law, then it was not a new standard.

Jesus’ First Statement

Let’s begin with the first of Jesus’ six statements:

You have heard that the ancients were told, “You shall not commit murder” and “Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.” But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, “You good-for-nothing,” shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, “You fool,” shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell. Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering (Matt. 5:21-24).

Did Jesus accurately cite the the Law of Moses?

Yes and no. “You shall not commit murder” is found in the Ten Commandments, but “Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court” is not found in the Mosaic Law anywhere. It must have been something Jesus’ audience heard from the scribes and Pharisees, and in light of Jesus’ counterpoint, it seems their teaching focused only on deterring murder while ignoring those things that lead to murder and that are, in themselves, lesser forms of murder. Jesus contrasted the appraisal of a human court with the appraisal of God’s court, a much stricter court that sometimes sentences the guilty to hell.

Was the standard Jesus prescribed a new standard that cannot be found in the Mosaic Law?

Consider this: No one would ever think God’s original prohibition in the Mosaic Law against murder was a divine allowance to strangle someone, as long as one released his chokehold in just enough time for his victim to gasp for air and just barely survive. And if that chain of logic is traced to its logical beginning, we realize God’s prohibition of murder included a prohibition of the anger and hatred that can lead to murder, as well as venomous words that often precede murder. God doesn’t want anyone in the “murder groove.” His original prohibition against murder was a prohibition of hatred.

Moreover, God has never wanted anyone to be in the murder groove because He has not changed and neither have His fundamental moral standards. There was never a time prior to the Sermon on the Mount when God would have approved of an Israelite bringing an offering to the temple who had a broken relationship that could be repaired. The second greatest commandment was to love one’s neighbor as oneself (Lev. 19:18), so it obviously superseded any obligation regarding temple offerings.

To claim that in Matthew 5:21-24 Jesus was raising the standard is to claim that the commandment to love one’s neighbor as oneself is not found in the Mosaic Law and that during the old covenant, hating one’s neighbor was acceptable to God. Yet we specifically read in the Law of Moses: “You shall not hate your fellow countryman in your heart; you may surely reprove your neighbor, but shall not incur sin because of him” (Lev. 19:17).

Thus it is safe to conclude that Jesus was not, in His first of six statements, raising the moral standard. He was simply elaborating on the existing standard, something any honest person will have to admit.

Jesus’ Second Statement

You have heard that it was said, “You shall not commit adultery”; but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. If your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell (Matt. 5:27-30).

Did Jesus accurately cite the Mosaic Law’s standard?

Yes. However, as was the case with the first statement, He elaborated on the implications of that standard. No one would ever think that God’s prohibition against adultery was a divine allowance to engage in a sexual relationship with your neighbor’s wife just as long as it didn’t go as far as intercourse. And if we trace that logic to its beginning, it is obvious that God’s prohibition of adultery included a prohibition of what always precedes adultery, namely, lust.

God does not want anyone in the “adultery groove,” and He has never wanted anyone in that groove because He has not changed and neither have His fundamental moral standards. There was never a time prior to the Sermon on the Mount when God would have approved of an Israelite man lusting after a woman. In fact, lust was prohibited in the Tenth Commandment: “You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife” (Ex. 20:17). And Job, who it is thought lived long before the Mosaic Law and who thus lived only under the law of his God-given conscience said, “I have made a covenant with my eyes; how then could I gaze at a virgin?” (Job 31:1).

Lust, like murder, is also a violation of the commandment to love one’s neighbor as oneself, a commandment found in the Mosaic Law. Lust was a sin under the old covenant.

To claim that Jesus was raising the standard in Matthew 5:27-30 is to claim that lust was acceptable to God under the Mosaic Law, an absurd idea. Thus it is safe to conclude that Jesus was not, in the second of His six statements, raising the moral standard, as any honest person will admit.

Jesus’ Third Statement

It was said, “Whoever sends his wife away, let him give her a certificate of divorce”; but I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery (Matt. 5:31-32).

Of course, the topic of divorce and remarriage is hotly debated within Christian circles. But my purpose in this teaching is to determine if the standards Jesus set in His six statements were a moral upgrade to the Mosaic Law. So we will simply ask our two questions regarding Jesus’ third statement.

Did Jesus accurately cite the Law of Moses?

No. “Whoever sends his wife away, let him give her a certificate of divorce” cannot be found anywhere in the Mosaic Law. Jesus’ counterpoint leads us to think that He was actually citing the lax teaching of the scribes and Pharisees, who apparently emphasized the importance of divorce certificates while ignoring the sin of illegitimate divorce. We know for a fact that the majority of Pharisees in Jesus’ time believed that a man could divorce his wife for any reason at all, as indicated by their questioning Jesus over that very issue (Matt. 19:3), as well as by the historical evidence for the rabbinic debate at the time regarding what constituted an “indecency” for which the Mosaic Law allowed divorce (Deut. 24:1-4).

Was the standard Jesus prescribed a new standard?

If we conclude that it was, we must assume that Jesus’ decree— “Everyone who divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery” —would not have been true under the Law of Moses. That is, under the old covenant, God allegedly found no fault with the man who divorced his wife for reasons other than unchastity, and in no way was such a man guilty of making his ex-wife “commit adultery” when she remarried.

Such a view obviously raises questions about the alleged new view of fundamental morality by God, whom the Bible says “does not change” (Mal. 3:6) and “with whom [there] is no variableness, neither shadow of turning” (Jas 1:17).

Of course, we know that under the Mosaic Law, God did find fault with the man who divorced his wife for reasons other than unchastity. We read in Malachi:

“This is another thing you do: you cover the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping and with groaning, because He no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. Yet you say, ‘For what reason?’ Because the Lord has been a witness between you and the wife of your youth, against whom you have dealt treacherously, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. But not one has done so who has a remnant of the Spirit…. Take heed then to your spirit, and let no one deal treacherously against the wife of your youth. For I hate divorce,” says the Lord, the God of Israel, “and him who covers his garment with wrong,” says the Lord of hosts. “So take heed to your spirit, that you do not deal treacherously” (Mal. 2:13-16).

In this case, God referred to divorce as “treachery,” due to the fact that Israelite men were breaking their marriage vows when they divorced “the wives of their youth,” apparently to marry younger women. To claim that Jesus was establishing a new, higher standard, now making divorce lawful only for unchastity whereas it was formerly lawful for any reason, is to claim that God did not speak through the prophet Malachi.

All of this is to say that Jesus was not establishing a new standard regarding lawful divorce, but was rather elaborating on the existing standard established in the Mosaic Law (not to mention the Law of Conscience). This is further proven by the fact that, in every other instance when Jesus equated divorce and remarriage to adultery, the Law of Moses was clearly in view, just as it is in the Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5:17-20).

For example, when the Pharisees questioned Jesus about the lawfulness of divorcing one’s wife for any cause (Matt. 19:3-9), they were asking if, according to the Mosaic Law, it was lawful to divorce for any cause. They even cited the Mosaic Law’s provision for divorce in their later argument. The entire conversation was framed within the Mosaic Law, and took place during the era of the old covenant when the Mosaic Law was still in force. When Jesus said to them, “And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery,” none of them thought to themselves that He was establishing a new, higher standard. Rather, they all naturally assumed He was elaborating on the true standard of the Mosaic Law.

This is perhaps even more obvious in Luke’s record of one of the incidents when Jesus equated divorce and remarriage to adultery:

The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John; since that time the gospel of the kingdom of God has been preached, and everyone is forcing his way into it. But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one stroke of a letter of the Law to fail. Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries one who is divorced from a husband commits adultery (Luke 16:16-18, emphasis added).

Clearly, the third sentence in that passage is an illustration of the concept presented in the first two sentences. Prior to John’s preaching the good news that the kingdom of God was at hand, anyone who was preaching was preaching from the Law and Prophets. John, however, had an exciting new message that became very popular, so much so that it overshadowed the Law and Prophets in many peoples’ minds, making the Law and Prophets irrelevant. Jesus experienced the same misconception regarding His own preaching (Matt. 5:17), one that is analogous to what happens in modern evangelical circles when people excitedly “accept Jesus as their personal Savior” but then ignore Jesus’ commandments.

Jesus, however, strongly condemned such a view, saying that, in spite of what anyone might think, it was easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one stroke of a letter of the Law to fail. The Law and Prophets were still very relevant. Adultery was still a sin. So is breaking a marriage covenant. Thus, “Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries one who is divorced from a husband commits adultery.”

This is just one more proof that Jesus’ third statement in the Sermon on the Mount was not the establishing of a new, upgraded moral standard, but a simple elaboration on the old standard found in the Law of Moses.

I’m sure you are taking note of the trend of my analysis. Next month, we’ll cover the remaining three of Jesus’ six statements, clearly showing how they too, do not reflect a divine moral upgrade, but rather an attempt by Jesus to help His audience understand the full depth of a few of God’s fundamental commandments, commandments that the scribes and Pharisees had so distorted. — David

[1] http://www.thenarrowpath.com/ta_divorce.php

The post Getting the Sermon on the Mount Right (The Anabaptist Challenge), Part 1 appeared first on David Servant.

A final brief summary of what Jesus taught about marriage, divorce and remarriage.

Hi, welcome to today’s Little Lesson. We have been treading in dangerous waters, talking about marriage, divorce and remarriage. In, I think, four or five Little Lessons so far we’ve delved into a couple of angles that I just hope will provoke your thinking.

If you want to look more deeply into some things that I have written about the subject, looking at some objections, and so forth, go to davidservant.com, type in ‘divorce’ or ‘remarriage’, it’ll come up with a number of articles, and I’ve made my case there.

I’ll just say right off the bat, I love those who disagree with me, but I’m afraid there are some people on the fringes who are trying to put a lot of folks into terrible bondage, particularly those people that are trying to tell Christian couples who have been married for years and have children to divorce, supposedly because one of them or both of them have been previously married, they’re actually still married in God’s eyes to their former spouses, and they can’t actually marry again unless their former spouses die, and all that teaching.

I’ve talked about that before in Little Lessons. I’ve got a lot of teaching on that on our website. But still, there’s others who are putting people under lesser forms of bondage, and I’m just convinced that God is a good God, God’s a forgiving God, God forgives those who repent, you can’t unscramble eggs, and we can find some truth about divorce and remarriage and how God feels about it in the Old Testament. Those who say that Jesus raised the standard under the new covenant are dead wrong. We’ve proven that in all five of the other six “You have heard, but I say to you …” statements, in Matthew chapter 5, okay?

So this one’s no different. Divorce and remarriage were institutions under the old covenant. God never intended anyone to be divorced, but he made allowance for divorce under certain extreme circumstances, only unrepentant major offenses like adultery, you have a legitimate reason for divorce then. Of course, women today ask, “What if my husband’s physically abusive?” That’s a major offense. Of course that’s a reason to separate for a time if he doesn’t repent, of course you can divorce him. You know, oh my goodness, the people that say you can’t, I just wonder about them. You’re like a Pharisees, putting burdens upon people that you yourself would never bear, when you start telling abused women that they have to stay with their abusive husbands, because that’s what Jesus taught; oh my goodness, no words, no words.

All right, so Paul, of course, answered some questions the Corinthians had on all this. Again, we’re not going any further than today in depth on these things. I hope I just said some things that will provoke your thinking, and you might have already written me off, but nevertheless, I’ve tried my best. I love you and I respect your opinion as well. I’m not divorced and I’m never going to be divorced; I’ve been married for a long time, been married 39 years, okay? So don’t think I’m trying to make excuses for myself.

But Paul gave some instructions, and he said, in 1 Corinthians 7 verse number 10, “To the married I give instructions, not I, but the Lord, that the wife should not leave her husband.” Hey, basic stuff, right? I mean, who doesn’t know that? Don’t divorce. “But if she does leave,” he said, “she must remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband, and the husband should not divorce his wife.” How, if we read this on context, we see he’s talking about believers married to believers. No legitimate reason for a believer to divorce a believer. Now, if one does leave, you remain separate, you don’t get remarried to somebody else, you remain single, or you reconcile.

Now, you say, “What if my Christian wife commits adultery?” Well, your Christian wife is not a Christian. “What if my husband commits adultery?” Your Christian husband is not a Christian. No adulterer will inherit the kingdom of God. What if they slip into it and they’re repentant? Okay, all right, then you’d better forgive them and don’t divorce them. But if they’re unrepentant, then they’re not a Christian, they don’t believe in Jesus. So that’s an easy one.

1 Corinthians 7:12, “But to the rest I say, not the Lord …” He’s not saying that I’m speaking on my behalf and I’m just guessing here, no, he’s making reference to what Jesus taught, this is what the Lord taught about what his followers should do, his followers should not be divorcing and remarrying. No big revelation there, right?

But now Paul’s going to say, “I’m going to deal with something that Jesus didn’t address, I’m going to deal with if you’re married to an unbeliever.” “If a brother has a wife who’s an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he must not divorce her. And if a women has an unbelieving husband and he consents to live with her, she must not send her husband away.” So even if you’re married to an unbeliever, don’t be divorcing them for that reason, okay? “For the unbelieving husband is sanctified through the wife, the unbelieving wife is sanctified through her believing husband. For otherwise your children are unclean, and now they are holy.” So there’s a special blessing that God puts upon your family because you’re a believer, and even the unbelievers get blessed in all that.

“Yet, if the unbelieving one leaves, let them leave. The brother or the sister is under no bondage in such cases, for God has called us to peace. How do you know, a wife, whether you’ll save your husband? How do you know, a husband, whether you’ll save your wife? Only as the Lord has assigned each one, as God has called each one. In this manner, let him walk.” So if your unbelieving husband or wife wants a divorce, you let them have a divorce, you don’t fight them, let them have it. You know, turn the other cheek, I guess you could call that. “Okay, you want to divorce me, divorce me. You’re going to miss out on a blessing because I’m a great husband, I’m a great wife, now that I’m a follower of Jesus. But if that’s how you want it, guess that’s how you get it.”

Of course, I know some people say, “Well, of course you’re not free to remarry then, because marriage is for life and you’re still married in God’s eyes to that person.” Contrary to a number of Scriptures that would say otherwise. Jesus said to the woman at the well, “You’ve had five husbands.” Jesus said, “You’ve had five husbands.” That is, you’ve been married five times, and divorced, by the way, five times. So he didn’t say, “You’re married to your original husband in God’s eyes.” No. Get that out of your brain, just get that out of your brain.

Okay, again, I don’t know who these Christians are who supposedly want a divorce for any cause at all, you’re not a Christian, if you’re looking for an excuse to get out of your marriage, your Christian marriage, come on, wise up, wake up, repent, and love the one that God has joined you to, and quit thinking about divorce. Unless they’ve committed a major offense, of which they are unrepentant, a covenant offense type offense, you confront them, you try to motivate them to see their wrongdoing and ask you for forgiveness. Most Christian couples that I know, including the one that you’re looking at right now have done that a few times over the years of our marriages, we’ve actually had disagreements, we’ve had times of dissension, but we’re together, and so we have to work it out, and so we have to sit down and talk things through and try to see it from the other person’s perspective, and then somebody says, “Forgive me.” Usually both people say, “Forgive me.” And it’s back to blessing again, all right?

All right, a lot more that could be said, but as I’ve already said, just going to introduce a few concepts and ideas here that you might not have heard before, for you to think about them, because God gave you a brain and God gave you the Bible. Okay, God bless you.

The post A Final, Brief Summary of What Jesus Taught About Marriage, Divorce and Remarriage appeared first on David Servant.

So, what did the Scribes and Pharisees believe about divorce and remarriage? Stay tuned.

Welcome to today’s Little Lesson, one more special Cuba edition. We’re looking at the sixth of Jesus’s six “You have heard but I say to you” statements found in the Gospel of Matthew in the Sermon on the Mount. We’ve covered five already. In every case Jesus was clearly not changing moral standards; He was reiterating what could easily be found in the Old Testament, the Law of Moses, which, I’ve said all this over and over again, so I’m not going to say it again.

When we read Jesus’s statement here about “You have heard but I say to you” regarding divorce and remarriage, it helps to realize that there’s a very good chance he’s not going to be raising the standard here, as so many people seem to think that he did, like under the New Covenant, everything changed. Can I ask you a question? When did the New Covenant start? Well most people believe that the New Covenant was not inaugurated until Jesus’s death, and burial, and resurrection, because all that had to take place, right? To finish out the Old Covenant, to get the New Covenant started, there had to be a sacrifice for sins that fulfilled al the sacrifices of the Old Testament, and so on and so forth.

Jesus, at the Last Supper, said, “This is the New Covenant in my blood,” and so it’s obviously … It wasn’t starting at the Sermon on the Mount. So let me ask you the next logical question: If, as some people say, this is now the New Covenant law, how come it’s being introduced years prior to the inauguration of the New Covenant? Is he expecting Old Covenant people now to start living under the New Covenant law before the New Covenant has even been inaugurated? There’s a lot of questions like that that this kind of teaching raises, and so I just believe that God is consistent when it comes to basic morality. Because God doesn’t change and his fundamental moral commandments emanate from his character. Okay?

God divorced Israel, right? Actually he’s planning on taking them back again, okay? That shows us something about his character and his nature. Obviously there are times when divorce is legitimate. Even Jesus said … You know? He gave one reason where divorce is legitimate in Matthew 5:22. He never divorces his wife, except for the reason of unchastity. If she breaks her marriage vow, and is unfaithful, and has sex with another man, that is a lawful reason to divorce her.

Now I actually would even go a step further than that and add that there’s other scriptures that come into play here. If his wife will listen to him, and he confront her, and she will confess and ask for forgiveness, then I would think he’d be obligated not to divorce her but to give her another chance. I think that’s contained in the teaching of Jesus, and I think that’s contained in the teaching of the Law of Moses as well. You know? Because we’re supposed to be merciful. God’s been teaching everybody that. Ever since the sun started rising on the good and the evil, and the rain started falling on the righteous and unrighteous, God has been teaching people to be merciful, to give them a second chance, to be patient with them, sure, and to be forgiving, because God’s so forgiving and he expects us to be. This is not new stuff. This old, old, old stuff.

All right. So rather than just taking one verse and saying, “Oh, Jesus changed everything …” You know? Another question this raises: If Jesus changed everything, there were people who at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount were innocent before God on some levels who, as they were standing there listening to him, as he, allegedly, “changed morality, and changed the law, and changed the expectations that God has for everybody now,” there are people who were innocent and suddenly became guilty. We have people who actually believe that actually occurred. They believe that Jesus expected everyone in his audience who had been remarried to get another divorce. Hard to find that in the New Testament, isn’t it? Very hard, in fact, impossible to find that.

But when your whole focus is on this one verse, and you have the false premise that morality was changing and the standard is going up, well you could come to those kind of crazy conclusions. You’re telling Christian couples with children, who are teenagers, who are serving the Lord, you’re telling them to get a divorce because they’re supposedly in an adulterous marriage.

Oh my goodness. Your wonder if these people know anything at all about God’s goodness, mercy, grace, and forgiveness. It is … I mean, legalists, they don’t get it. They don’t get the love and the mercy of God. Anyway, none of them are listening to this right now, so I don’t have to worry about them getting mad because they’ve already turned me off.

All right. So the standard hasn’t changed; Jesus is just reiterating what was always true. Now let’s get a little more context here. Who was he speaking to? Speaking to his followers, but what kind of teaching have his followers been listening to all their lives? They’re Jews. They’re living in Israel. They’re in Galilee. They’ve been going to the synagogues all their lives. Scribes and Pharisees have been up there teaching. All their perversion, all their lives, these people have been sitting under false hell bound teachers all of their lives. And Jesus has said”

“Now you’ve become my followers, I want you to know what I expect, what I’ve always expected, what God has always expected. And it’s not what the scribes and Pharisees have been telling you, that it’s okay to divorce your wife for any cause at all. Oh, no, no, no. I said love your neighbor as yourself. Treat others like you want to be treated.”

And so there’s the overriding moral law that comes into play in the whole question of marriage, and divorce, and remarriage. So here’s some context. We just jump ahead in Matthew to Matthew 19:3:

“Some Pharisees came to Jesus, testing him and asking ‘Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any reason at all'”

And the historical records show us, from the teaching of that day, that there were two schools of thought regarding the lawfulness of divorce, and what constituted a lawful reason to divorce one’s wife; and there were the conservatives and there were the liberals.

The conservatives, naturally, held a very high standard. Essentially you could only lawfully divorce your wife if she left you for another man, or was unrepentant in her unchastity, her unfaithfulness to you. That was it.

The other school believed that you could divorce your wife for any reason at all. That’s the question they ask: “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any reason at all?”

That’s very similar to a question that’s asked today about abortion: Is abortion wrong? You think, “Why are we even asking that question? Why is there even a debate about this? It’s so obvious.” This is in the same category. “Is it lawful to divorce your wife for any cause?” These people don’t get it. They are amoral, without morals.

Okay, we’re out of time. We’ll pick up right here in our next little lesson. God bless you.

The post What Did the Scribes and Pharisees Believe About Divorce and Remarriage? appeared first on David Servant.

How do you get yourself a good woman, or a good man? Today’s questions are very practical and important. If you’re single and you desire to be married, the person that you do marry has got to be one of the most important decisions of your life.

Marriage is not something that you’ll want to enter into without a lot of forethought and some counsel when so many marriages wind up in divorce. Think about it. All those people start off with the best intentions, believing that they were going to enjoy the rest of their lives together. But they were blindsided by something they didn’t anticipate. Those who are single and who would like to get married need to proceed with caution.

The Best Way to Attract the Right Person

Now, how do you find yourself a good person, a good woman or a good man, who would make a great lifelong partner? Well, that’s a great question. And I think that I’d like to first say that rather than looking for the right person, I would suggest being the right person. Because if you want to attract somebody who’s a great potential spouse, the best bait that you could put out there to attract that kind of person is being a great person yourself.

You should ask yourself, how are you doing in your other relationships? We all have relationships. If you don’t have any relationships with other people on any level and you’re like a hermit, well, maybe you should postpone thinking about getting married if you’re not getting along too well with other people.

All the relationships that you have prior to marriage could be considered as training ground for the ultimate relationship of having a husband or having a wife or being a husband or being wife.

You’re not getting along with your college roommate, and you’re at each other’s throats? Well, see what you can learn and see what you can do to fix and repair and make that relationship work.

Preparing for the Challenge of Marriage

I can assure you, as a person who’s been married for 38 years, as a former pastor who’s counseled all kinds of people who are having trouble in their marriage, that every marriage is challenged. Because when you put two people together and one’s a male and one’s a female, oh my goodness, there are going to be some times of stretching, some times of potential conflict, and some times of potential growth as people.

In fact, I just feel like marriage is almost one of those divine conspiracies by the Lord to help us to grow spiritually. Anytime someone says “I do” in holy matrimony, it’s almost like God is up in heaven rubbing His hands together saying, “Now, it’s going to get good! Because I’m going to bring out Christ in these people because they’re going to have to deny themselves. They’re going to have to grow up spiritually. Then I’m going to give them kids, and that’s going to really add to the mix, and we’ll work on their patience and everything else. They’ll learn all kinds of things about each other, and they’ll learn things about Me.”

Marriage is just a wonderful lifetime experience that has a lot of blessings, but it doesn’t mean that the road doesn’t get bumpy at times.

Developing Your Character

To find the right person, start by working on being the right person and making yourself attractive in every way that you can. Of course, most importantly would be your character that you have.

I’m speaking to Christians now who want to find a godly spouse. You need to be what you hope your spouse will be and work on your own relationship with the Lord and your own character so that you’ll attract someone of similar godliness and character.

Then once you feel like you’re mature enough and ready enough because of your success in other relationships.

Seeking and Finding

Scripture says, “He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord” (Proverbs 18:22). And Jesus said, “Seek, and you shall find” (Matthew 7:7).

I would encourage you to, yes, pray, to ask the Lord, but also to put some legs on those prayers, as I heard an old Pentecostal preacher say once.

Seek, and you shall find. He that finds a wife finds a good thing. That implies that you have to get out there and look.

You’ve got to put your periscope up and utilize the means to go and be where the fish are biting. Pardon my expression, but you’re not going to find a good wife in a dark and dirty place! You need to look in the right places, and you need to go where there is more likelihood that there’s going to be good women and good men. Naturally, good women and good men aren’t found in bad places, so look in good places.

Taking Advantage of Modern Technology

One of the wonderful things about modern technology are these matchmaking sites where you can put in all these things about yourself and what you’re looking for, and they try to match you up with people of some degree of compatibility. It gives you a low-risk way to weed through a lot of people that otherwise aren’t worth your time to find those gems.

I have seen lots of people who have used that technology, those websites. It costs a little bit of money, but it pays off. For example, I know some people who, in their questionnaire, when they’re filling out the web forms, they’re asked a question. “What’s the one thing that you cannot possibly live without?” Those folks put in there, “I don’t want you to match me with anybody who doesn’t put Jesus in that line right there.”

Well, that just weeds out all kinds of people right off the bat. “I’m looking for a solid follower of Jesus Christ,” and you can weed them out a lot quicker that way than by going to church and dating people and finally getting around to asking them those important questions.

Closing Advice

Then once you think you found that special person, get counsel and read some of those books that are out there on things to talk about before you get married. It’s a lot easier to break up before you get married than after you get married. In fact, you just don’t want that to happen at all, because it’s harmful and hurtful on a lot of levels, and it’s sin.

This is a Little Lesson. Hope I helped you. Thanks so much! God bless.

The post How Do You Get Yourself a Good Woman, or a Good Man? appeared first on David Servant.

You might be wondering why I would write on the subject of polygamy. Let me assure you it is not because I’m advocating it for anyone or considering it myself. I think polygamists—whether they be ancient biblical characters or their modern counterparts—generally err on a grand scale. I also think, however, there are some good reasons to study what Scripture has to say on the subject. One is because it can teach us something about our own relationship with God. I hope to provoke your thinking, as always. But first, some trivia:

You may be surprised to know that, although polygamy has been outlawed in many nations for centuries, about one-third of the world’s population lives in societies where it is acceptable and legal, mostly in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Polygamy is most prevalent in Muslim-majority countries and communities that tend to be traditional and agrarian. I’ve met many pastors in various parts of Africa who told me their fathers had multiple wives. But most tell me that polygamy is becoming less common.

Polygamy is illegal in all 50 U.S. states. Yet rough estimates place the polygamous population in the U.S. somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 people, chiefly among Muslim and fundamentalist Mormon sects. Polygamist men circumvent secular laws by being legally married to only one woman. If you are interested in adding another wife or being another wife, there are polygamous match-making websites waiting for you, such as Polygamy.com and SisterWives.com.

My closest encounter with polygamy in the U.S. was when I drove, with my wife and some friends, through the twin towns of Colorado City and Hildale that straddle the Arizona-Utah border, where about 7,000 people live. Most belong to fundamentalist Mormon sects that practice polygamy. (The Merry Wives Café in Hildale gets rave reviews on TripAdvisor.com. Unfortunately, they closed early on the day we stopped by, hoping to try the acclaimed Shadrack sandwich.)

At least half of the population of Colorado City/Hildale are descended from two of the towns’ founders, Joseph Smith Jessop and John Yates Barlow, and that is the reason those towns suffer the world’s highest incidence of Fumarase deficiency, a very rare genetic condition that causes severe intellectual disability.

The Old Testament mentions at least 30 polygamists, including such notable figures as Abraham (2 wives), Jacob (4 wives), Esau (3 wives), Moses (2 wives, but perhaps he married the second after the death of the first), Caleb (2 simultaneous wives, 3 wives total, and 2 concubines), Gideon (“many” wives), and David (at least 8 wives plus 10 concubines). Taking the prize was Solomon (700 wives and 300 concubines).[1]

God obviously used such men, in spite of their polygamy, for His good purposes. Although monogamy was the ideal[2] and the norm for most marriages in the Old Testament, it seems safe to say that, if God was opposed to polygamy like He is opposed, for example, to murder, He would simply have prohibited it. But He didn’t. Rather, He permitted it, and within the Mosaic Law He regulated it to a degree. Let’s briefly consider three of those regulations.

The First Regulation

You shall not marry a woman in addition to her sister as a rival while she is alive, to uncover her nakedness (Lev. 18:18).

You may remember that, before the Mosaic Law was given, Jacob married sisters Leah and Rachel, although that was not his original intention. And you may recall the problems he suffered because of their rivalry (incidentally, both were his cousins through his mother). From reading this particular law in Leviticus 18:18, it seems God was trying to prevent potential rivalry between sisters that could destroy their relationship. Of course, rivalry between multiple wives could easily occur in any polygamous marriage, and the Bible contains examples of that very thing. Worse, a polygamous man could exploit that potential rivalry to serve his own selfish ends. Perceptive readers of this particular law—both ancient and modern—are apt to consider these things and thus be motivated to avoid engaging in polygamy.

Interestingly, and understandably, God did not consider polygamy to be a form of adultery, something He condemns just two chapters later in Leviticus: “If there is a man who commits adultery with another man’s wife, one who commits adultery with his friend’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death” (Lev. 20:10). Adultery is committed when a married person has sex outside of their marriage. A polygamist could commit adultery, of course, but he would not be committing adultery just by virtue of having multiple wives.

A Second Regulation

Here’s a second regulation concerning polygamy that is somewhat heartbreaking to read and which also implies the superiority of monogamy:

If a man has two wives, the one loved and the other unloved, and both the loved and the unloved have borne him sons, if the first-born son belongs to the unloved, then it shall be in the day he wills what he has to his sons, he cannot make the son of the loved the first-born before the son of the unloved, who is the first-born. But he shall acknowledge the first-born, the son of the unloved, by giving him a double portion of all that he has, for he is the beginning of his strength; to him belongs the right of the first-born (Deut. 21:15-17).

Naturally, a man with multiple wives might be comparing them in his mind, and one might likely take the “top slot.” How tragic it is to read about the “unloved” wife in this passage. Regardless, once again, God was trying to prevent a potential problem in polygamous marriages regarding inheritances left to offspring. And again, perceptive readers of this law—both ancient and modern—would be saying to themselves, “The obvious way to avoid this potential problem is simply to have one wife.”

A Third Regulation

And here is a third regulation in the Mosaic Law concerning polygamous marriage that will likely also evoke some sympathy. I’ve added my own comments, contained in brackets within the text, in an attempt to clarify it:

If a man sells his daughter as a female slave [In ancient times and in current primitive places, daughters are considered to be their fathers’ possessions, and to relinquish such a possession demands a price (remember Jacob served Laban seven years twice as the “bride price” for Leah and Rachel). The only reason I can imagine that such a father would sell his daughter as a servant would be because he couldn’t sell her as a bride, which could command a higher price.], she is not to go free as the male slaves do [that is, go free after six years of service as did Hebrew male slaves; see Ex. 21:2]. If she is displeasing in the eyes of her master [the man who bought her from her father] who designated her for himself [that is, he bought her as a slave but at some point took her as his wife, perhaps a shrewd way to buy a wife more cheaply], then he shall let her be redeemed [that is, he can sell her back to her father for a refund of the original price, which obviously also indicates that he is divorcing her]. He does not have authority to sell her to a foreign people because of his unfairness to her [take note that God finds fault with this divorcing man, calling him “unfair”]. If he designates her for his son [that is, if he purchases her as a servant and at some point gives her to his son as a wife], he shall deal with her according to the custom of daughters. If he takes to himself another woman [that is, if he takes another wife while the woman he originally bought is still his wife, so this is polygamy], he may not reduce her [that is, his original wife’s] food, her clothing, or her conjugal rights. If he will not do these three things for her, then she shall go out for nothing, without payment of money [that is, her father is not required to refund the slave/bride price to the divorcing husband as he would have in the previous case when she was redeemed] (Ex. 21:7-11).

By this collection of related laws, God was clearly trying to mitigate some of the evils associated with the buying and selling of daughters as well as with polygamous marriage. Although the “women’s rights” enumerated in this passage are a far cry from where women’s rights stand today in many progressive cultures, they were perhaps somewhat revolutionary for the ancient world, and would be revolutionary in some less-civilized parts of the world today.

Again we see that polygamy was obviously permitted by God, and thus it was not considered by Him to be adultery. Just 20 verses prior to this passage in Exodus, God said in the Ten Commandments, “You shall not commit adultery” (Ex. 20:14 – 21:8).

Take note that God required the man who took a second wife not to reduce the original wife’s food, clothing or conjugal rights (concerning that third requirement, one can’t help but wonder how Solomon complied). If he didn’t do these things, she had the right to divorce him—a refreshing “women’s right” to find in Scripture that makes perfect sense—and presumably return to her father, who was not obligated to refund the original “slave/bride price.”

Not only does this passage reveal something about God’s toleration and regulation of polygamy, but also something about His toleration and regulation of divorce (including divorce within polygamy), something Jesus said was permitted within the Mosaic Law because of the “hardness of men’s hearts” (Matt. 19:8). In this particular passage, we read two versions of failed marriage that certainly indicate “hardness of heart”: (1) a man finds something displeasing about his wife and consequently sells her back to her father (“redeems her”), something that is characterized in this passage as “unfairness to her” or literally, as a marginal note in my NASB reads, “dealing treacherously” with her and (2), a woman whose husband takes a second wife and consequently neglects her by denying her basic needs, which frees her to divorce him.

Regarding the first revelation of hard-heartedness, the divorcing of a woman who isn’t pleasing to him for some reason, God mitigates the evil by forbidding him from selling her to foreigners and requiring him to sell her back to her father. Regarding the second revelation of hard-heartedness, the neglect of his first wife as he favors his second wife, God mitigates the evil by allowing the first wife to escape the abusive marriage.

What’s Wrong with Polygamy?

I think it can be safely said that, generally speaking, polygamy is not and never has been God’s perfect will for anyone, based purely on the fact that God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Eve and Ethel and Emily.[3] Moreover, it seems to me the average polygamist violates the second greatest commandment on two counts. First, when he takes a second wife, he does not “love his neighbor as himself” because he doesn’t love his original wife as he loves himself. That is, if he wouldn’t want his wife to have two simultaneous husbands, he should not have two simultaneous wives. Second, he potentially robs another man of a wife, as there are generally an equal number of females as males (except when a lot of males are killed during times of war). Solomon, it could be said, robbed 999 other men of wives.

Beyond these offenses, the married man who takes another wife is somewhat comparable to the man who divorces his wife. The polygamist “semi-divorces” his original wife when he marries another. Although he may still relate to his original wife on some level, her 100% claim on him has been reduced to a 50% share. He cannot avoid sending a message to her that she is insufficient. She can’t help but feel hurt by his second marriage, realizing she is now in competition for her husband with another woman. The polygamist is akin to the employer who thinks he is smart by hiring a new employee whom he gives the identical job title and job description as one of his current employees. Good luck with that!

In fact, the polygamist could be considered to be even more selfish than the man who divorces his wife and marries another. The polygamist insults his first wife at the deepest level when he takes his second wife, and in one sense (though not technically in the biblical sense as we have seen) commits adultery against her continuously, yet he expects her to remain faithful to him, an arrangement he would never allow for her. At least the man who divorces his wife does not expect her to remain faithful to him as he lives unfaithfully to her. He at least gives her a chance to find a decent man who will love her exclusively (if remarriage is permitted in her context).

If you are a woman, which would you rather your husband do: divorce you, or bring home a second wife? I asked my wife, Becky, that hypothetical question, and without hesitation she said, “Divorce me! If you brought home another wife, I’d divorce you, right after I killed you!” (Now that is true love!)

I can imagine God looking down from heaven any time a man added a second (or third, or fourth…) wife and thinking to Himself, “You knucklehead! You think you are solving a problem or gaining an advantage, but actually you are setting yourself up for heartache. You deeply wound a woman who loves you and now put her in competition for your affections. You imagine you are gaining something of value, namely, another wife, but actually you are losing something that is much more valuable, namely, the wonderful blessing of a monogamous relationship.”

Polygamy in the Church

Those of us who live in nations and cultures where polygamy has been socially condemned and illegal for a long time are generally not aware of the challenges faced by the church in cultures where polygamy is acceptable. What do you do with a man who comes to faith in Christ and has multiple wives? What if his wives also come to faith? God tolerated polygamy under the Mosaic Law. Has that changed under the New Covenant? Is there now a higher standard?

It seems safe to assert that polygamists are disqualified from being church leaders. Paul wrote:

An overseer, then, must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, prudent, respectable, hospitable, able to teach…. Deacons must be husbands of only one wife, and good managers of their children and their own households (1 Tim. 3:2, 12, emphasis added).

For this reason I left you in Crete, that you would set in order what remains and appoint elders in every city as I directed you, namely, if any man is above reproach, the husband of one wife, having children who believe, not accused of dissipation or rebellion (Titus 1:5-6, emphasis added).

But the requirement that leaders be monogamous is not completely unique to the new covenant. In the Law of Moses, long before Israel had any kings, God said:

When you enter the land which the Lord your God gives you, and you possess it and live in it, and you say, “I will set a king over me like all the nations who are around me,” you shall surely set a king over you whom the Lord your God chooses…. He shall not multiply wives for himself, or else his heart will turn away; nor shall he greatly increase silver and gold for himself (Deut. 17:14-17).

Surely King Solomon, who like every other polygamist began as a monogamist, transgressed this commandment with his 700 wives. Was not his father, King David, also guilty with his eight wives and ten concubines? Although some point out that God prohibited “multiplying” rather than “adding” wives, at what point did Solomon, or David, cross that undefined line? And in all honesty, if it is inappropriate to have ten wives, what makes it OK to have five, or two?

Regardless, we should be careful when we claim that God was OK with leaders being polygamous under the Law of Moses, unlike under the new covenant. (And I can’t resist pointing out to “Divine Divorce” proponents that, even though Solomon and David had surely exceeded their limit, God never instructed any polygamist to divorce any of their wives.)

But let’s return to Paul’s marital restrictions for overseers, elders and deacons. Such restrictions would not have been necessary if there were no polygamists in the church, or if Paul had, for example, required polygamist converts to divorce all but their original wives.

It is interesting that some good folks—who read these passages through the lens of Western, modern culture and Christianity—try to force meaning into them that simply isn’t there, claiming that Paul was disqualifying anyone from leadership who had been previously divorced and remarried, because such people have had “two wives.” They imagine Timothy interviewing candidates and asking them, “Can you tell me your complete marital history, because if you’ve ever been previously married and divorced, even if it occurred 30 years ago, and in spite of the fact that Jesus died for all your sins and you are now a new creation in Christ, you are simply unqualified to be a deacon.” And that is why some denominations will not ordain or allow in ministry those who have been divorced and remarried.

Why did polygamy disqualify a man from church leadership? Paul doesn’t say, but he clearly believed polygamy was not something to be modeled by leaders and imitated by others. The creation story, the three relevant Old Testament passages we’ve read, the prohibition against Israel’s kings from multiplying wives, and the numerous troubles polygamous men experienced in the Old Testament contain enough wisdom to help anyone considering polygamy to think more intelligently. Paul believed, as God has always believed, that monogamous marriage is the ideal. To the Corinthians he wrote, “Because of immoralities, each man is to have his own wife, and each woman is to have her own husband” (1 Cor. 7:2).

Again, however, just as is the case today in various places around the world, there were men in the church in Paul’s day who had more than one wife, and they were surely in a minority. Most likely, they became polygamists before their salvation, rather than after. Historically, there is some surviving evidence that polygamy was practiced in the New Testament period among both Jews and Gentiles, even though polygamy was forbidden for Roman citizens by Roman law. (And it isn’t safe to claim that Paul was actually speaking to the polygamists in the church when he wrote in Ephesians 5:25, “Husbands, love your wives“…)

I’ve been asked quite a few times by African pastors what they should do with polygamous men who give their lives to the Lord. Some pastors would advise such men, “Divorce all but your first wife.” But that hardly considers the plight of the newly-divorced wives and their children, who may well be new believers themselves. And should those newly-divorced wives be told they can’t remarry, lest they commit adultery? African leaders have been debating these things for many years.

I always answered the question by recommending what it seems Paul allowed, that is, for polygamous men who come to faith to remain “in the state in which they were called,” yet informing them that they should not consider taking any additional wives, and they should abandon any aspirations to leadership within the church. In my humble opinion, this not only reflects the attitude of Paul, who allowed polygamists in the church even though he promoted monogamy as the ideal, but also what is taught in the Law of Moses, a Law which Paul said was “holy, just and good” (Rom.7:12). Besides, you can’t unscramble scrambled eggs.

 A Final Parallel

Studying God’s toleration of polygamy certainly reveals something about the depth of His great mercy. Even if you believe that God’s toleration of polygamy has changed under the new covenant (which would seem to require that His essential character has changed, as He is now less tolerant than previously), you have to be amazed at how tolerant He was at one time.

And if we are going to pass judgment on biblical polygamists like Abraham (who was willing to sacrifice his only son in obedience to God), Caleb (who trusted God when virtually no else in Israel did), and David (a man after God’s own heart), we might look in the mirror and wonder if God is similarly demonstrating some toleration for that person.

Statistics indicate, for example, that “mental polygamy” (porn/lust) is rampant among professing Christian men, a huge problem in the church that is not often addressed. God’s former or current toleration of polygamy certainly does not give “mental polygamists” license to “remained married” to their “mental wives”; rather, there is no doubt He calls them to “divorce” those kinds of “wives.” How much happier such men would be if they were truly monogamous. How much happier their actual wives would be if they could be certain they weren’t sharing their husbands with other women. And how ironic it is that the church condemns actual polygamists while ignoring the fact that its pews are literally filled, every Sunday, with mental polygamists. — David

[1] See Gen. 16:1-3; 26:34; 28:9; 29:20-23, 28; 30:4, 9; Exodus 2:21; 18:1-6; Num. 12:1; Judges 8:30; 1 Sam. 18:27; 19:11-18; 25:39-44, 2 Sam. 3:2-5, 13-14; 5:13; 6:2-23; 12:24; 15:16; 16:21-23; 1 Kings 11:3; 1 Chron. 2:18-19, 46, 48; 14:3).

[2] Ps.128:3; Prov. 5:18; 18:22; 19:14; 31:10-29; Eccl. 9:9

[3] The only case I can think of where polygamy could be considered virtuous would be when an already-married man takes the widow of his deceased brother as a second wife, something that the Mosaic Law stipulated (but did not require), although it could be questioned if that particular law applied to a man who was already married, and it seems it only applied when the brothers were living together and the deceased brother had no son (see Deut. 25:5-10).

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