Safeguarding Your Marriage Matthew 19:7-12

Intro:

In the early 80’s Texas had a real problem with littering

The highways were strewn with garbage all over the state

The authorities did everything they could to get people to stop but people didn’t care

Exasperated someone decided to look at the problem from a different angle

They started to ask Texans what they cared about since the didn’t care about the rubbish or littering

The one thing that Texans cared about was Texas

So they started a campaign you might remember

They called it “Don’t Mess with Texas”

They got a bunch of cheaters, I mean Houston Astros and Willie Nelson to be their spokespeople

Instantaneously the littering stopped because you don’t mess with Texas

When your focus on what is wrong your motivation will always be lacking

That is especially true in marriage

Romance can be a beautiful part of marriage that lasts even through old age.

But romantic feelings cannot be the basis for a sound and enduring marriage, because they are largely composed of pleasant sensations toward the other person that are easily subject to change

A sound marriage is based on permanent, unconditional commitment to one’s spouse

Most people, including many Christians, know little of the self-giving, self-committing, and self-sacrificing love that knits two souls together for a lifetime of sharing and happiness.

Instead of the rich, deepening, meaningful, and thrilling friendship that only such love can bring, they settle for a cheap, shallow substitute that fluctuates with every mood and that is doomed from the beginning to be disappointing and short-lived

If you focus on 3 things your marriage will thrive

1. Sanctification (growing closer to Jesus)

The greatest commandment

Mark 12:30 ESV

And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’

2. Serving

Matthew 20:27–28 ESV

and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

3. Sacrifice

Ephesians 5:25 ESV

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,

Even in being proactive there are four thing Jesus shows us that we need to be aware of that can trip your marriage up

Jesus describes it as a departed heart

A Departed Heart vs. 7-9

A departed heart is someone who is physically there, but emotionally checked out

Jesus addresses the issue of divorce by showing us four issues that destroy marriages

The issue? Divorce for any cause

After Jesus shows them God’s design for marriage they come back at him with words from Moses

It was like they were waiting for this moment

Why did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce?

They were not interested in the divine standard for marriage God had established at creation but in defending their own low, self-centered standards

They were classic examples of the natural man looking for moral and spiritual loopholes to accommodate his sin

“A bad wife is like leprosy to her husband. What is the remedy? Let him divorce her and be cured of his leprosy

Jesus turns it on them and shows them their heart and what really causes divorce

Rabbi Earl Grollman, a professional divorce lecturer and author who believes divorce can be more traumatic than death, says, “The big difference is, death has closure, it’s over. With divorce, it’s never over.”

—Charles R. Swindoll, Strike the Original Match

Chuck Swindoll

vs. 7a Looking for a Way Out

The first issue that destroys marriages is that you are looking for a way out

They want Jesus to bless divorces and their choices or catch him going against God’s word

He exposes their heart and shows that they are looking for a way out

Deuteronomy 24:1 ESV

“When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, and she departs out of his house,

“She finds no favor” is another way of saying losing interest

It is important to say here that this goes for both husband and wife

The first sign of a departed heart is that eyes start to wander, hands get busy, feet stroll into areas they shouldn’t

The fool wanders: the wise man travels.

Thomas Fuller; Anonymous

There are a thousand ways this can happen but only one reason it does, selfishness

That person is trying to fulfill something in them that only Jesus and their spouse can

The Grass may look greener over there, but that only because it’s been watered and edged

When you care for your own house it looks the same way

Job 31:1 ESV

“I have made a covenant with my eyes; how then could I gaze at a virgin?

The eyes see what the heart loves. If the heart loves God and is single in this devotion, then the eyes will see God whether others see Him or not.

Warren W. Wiersbe

vs. 7b Push Them Away

The second issue that destroys marriage is that you push our spouse away

One you start to look for a way out you begin to push your spouse away

vs. 7b “send her away”

The Pharisees wrongly thought that God commanded divorce where there was uncleanness.

One rabbinic saying of that day went: “If a man has a bad wife, it is a religious duty to divorce her.”

But Jesus noted the difference between “command” and “permitted.”

God never commands divorce, but He does permit it.

The Pharisees thought that Moses was creating or promoting divorce.

In fact, he was controlling it.

Pushing away starts with finding fault and criticizing

Then it moves to looking for ways to spend time away

It gets so bad by time the divorce happens the paperwork legally recognizes what happened a long time ago

If you find it difficult to be around your spouse you need to ask yourself some questions

Why am I so unhappy? Is it them or is it me?

Why don’t I want to spend time with them?

Why am I always finding fault?

Pushing away can be subconcious or passive aggressive

What I mean by that is you can talk about how wonderful your spouse is, post pictures together, present a picture of being in love all the while undercutting the relationship

By criticizing, doing your own thing, and dreaming of being somewhere else you create that distance

Some people do this hoping the other person will do something so they won’t look like the bad person

Think I’m joking?

I once had someone accuse their spouse of abuse to cover up their affair

vs. 8 Hardness of Heart

The third issue that destroys marriages is your hardness of heart

Now by a hard heart, is plainly meant an unaffected heart, or a heart not easy to be moved with virtuous affections, like a stone, insensible, stupid, unmoved, and hard to be impressed. Hence the hard heart is called a stony heart, and is opposed to a heart of flesh, that has feeling, and is sensibly touched and moved.

Jonathan Edwards

The result of looking for a way out and pushing them away is hardness of heart

If you let your love for Jesus and your spouse wane you will find that you heart will grow hard

Ephesians 4:17–19 ESV

Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity.

The problem is that so many Christians resemble the World (Gentiles) that there is very little Jesus in them

They have become greedy, impure, and hardened to sin thus ignorant to the things of God

This causes the love to grow cold for Jesus and Spouse and the hard to grow hard

Sometimes the heart of the offending party is hard, and they will not do what must be done to reconcile the relationship.

Sometimes the heart of the offended party is hard, and they refuse to reconcile and get past the offence even when there is contrition and repentance.

Often the hardness of heart is on both sides.

Divorce is so common that some couples stay married just to be different.

Anonymous

vs. 9a Sexual Immorality

The fourth issue that destroys marriages is sexual immorality

The Greek word here is porneia

It’s where we get our word pornography

It means to commit any sexual sin

The word “immorality” (porneia) was used frequently in Judeo-Christian literature where it could refer to premarital or extramarital intercourse, prostitution, incest, and any other type of sexual impropriety.

D. Michael Martin

When the physical bond between a married man and woman is broken there is devastating results

I shared last week how a couple is fused together when they cleave

They are fused physically, emotionally, and spiritually

The woman is usually devastated, but the man usually goes dark

It has lasting impact the reverberates outside of the marriage

If there are children, they are torn apart

If the families are close a wedge is created

People are forced to choose sides even if they try to saddle the fence

vs. 9b Committing Adultery

Now we see something controversial

If you divorce your spouse except for sexual immorality commits adultery

We note that incompatibility, not loving each other anymore, brutality, and misery are not grounds for divorce, though they may be proper grounds for a separation and consequent “celibacy within marriage” as Paul indicates in 

1 Corinthians 7:11 ESV

(but if she does, she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband), and the husband should not divorce his wife.

These words of Paul show us that a Christian couple may in fact split up for reasons that do not justify a Biblical divorce.

The reason why a person who does not have a legitimate divorce commits adultery upon remarrying is because they are not divorced in the eyes of God.

Since their old marriage was never dissolved on Biblical grounds, that marriage is still valid and they are actually guilty of bigamy and adultery.

The Celibate Life vs. 10-12

vs. 10 Better not to Marry

vs. 11 Not for Everyone

vs. 12 One Who is Able