Sermon Tone Analysis

Matthew 19

The following material is adopted from John MacArthur’s commentary on Matthew and his Study guide.

Additional material taken from sources listed at the end

Read and summarize

Look for

— Prayers ( Blue )

— Promises ( Green )

— Warnings ( Red )

— Commands ( Purple )

Jesus’ Teaching on Divorce ( 19:1-12 )

( 19:1-12 ) Now it came to pass, when Jesus had finished these sayings, that He departed from Galilee and came to the region of Judea beyond the Jordan. 2 And great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them there.

3 The Pharisees also came to Him, testing Him, and saying to Him, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for just any reason?” 4 And He answered and said to them, “Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’ 5 and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?

6 So then, they are no longer two but one flesh.

Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.”

7 They said to Him, “Why then did Moses command to give a certificate of divorce, and to put her away?”

8 He said to them, “Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, permitted you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.

9 And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery; and whoever marries her who is divorced commits adultery.”

10 His disciples said to Him, “If such is the case of the man with his wife, it is better not to marry.”

11 But He said to them, “All cannot accept this saying, but only those to whom it has been given: 12 For there are eunuchs who were born thus from their mother’s womb, and there are eunuchs who were made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven’s sake.

He who is able to accept it, let him accept it.”

The Attack ( 19:3 )

— Almost from the beginning of His ministry ( 9:11 ), Jesus has been criticized by the Pharisees

— Even before this time they had become His arch-enemies and planned to kill Him ( 12:14 )

— They wanted to test Him and discredit Him before the multitudes

— This time their test was well thought out, carefully calculated to place Him at odds with Moses

Q: When the Pharisees appealed to Moses with respect to divorce, how did Jesus respond ( 19:4-6 )?

The Answer ( 19:4-6 )

( 19:4-6 ) 4 And He answered and said to them, “Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’ 5 and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?

6 So then, they are no longer two but one flesh.

Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.”

— Instead of giving a yes or no answer, Jesus goes back to Genesis

— Jesus gives four reasons why divorce was never part of God’s plan

( 1 ) God created one man and one women

— God did not create a group of males and females

— There was no provision, or even possibility, for multiple or alternate spouses

— There was only one man and one women and for that obvious reason, divorce and remarriage was not an option

( 2 ) They were to leave their parents and cleave to each other

— Marriage always involves total commitment and consecration of husbands and wives to each other

( 3 ) The two become one flesh

— They are indivisible and inseparable, except through death

( 4 ) God has joined them together

— Every marriage is made in heaven

— It is God’s institution and His doing

— Marriage is the work of God; divorce is the work of man

— Man has no right to separate what God has joined together

Going Deeper

— Have you not read?

as if to say, “You people who are always boasting about your knowledge of the law, have you not even read Gen 1:27 and 2:24?”

Q: What is wrong with the Pharisee’s argument that Moses commanded divorce ( Deut 24:1-4 )?

The Argument ( 19:7 )

( 19:7 ) They said to Him, “Why then did Moses command to give a certificate of divorce, and to put her away?”

— The Pharisees were not interested in the divine standard for marriage God had established but in defending their own low, self-centered standards

— It is the classic example of the natural man looking for moral and spiritual loopholes to accommodate his sin

— The Pharisees pitted Jesus against Moses the great law giver

— The only place in the OT in the Pentateuch that speaks of divorce is Deut 24:1-4, but it clearly does not command divorce as the Pharisees claimed

READ Deut 24:1-4

— The Deuteronomy 24 passage does not teach or command divorce at all

— Moses was giving a command with regard to a particular case of remarriage

— The only command in the passage relates to the issue of remarriage not divorce

— There is no command or explicit permission given to divorce anywhere in this passage

— The command is simply that, if a divorced women remarries and the second husband divorces her, her first “former husband who sent her away is not allowed to take her again to be his wife, since she has been defiled” (v.4)

— And it was because such indecency, vile as it might have been, was not sufficient grounds for divorce that the divorced wife was defiled by remarriage and could not be taken back by her first husband

— Because her divorce from her first husband had no sufficient grounds, she became an adulteress

Q: The Mosaic law permitted divorce for what reason ( 19:8-9 )?

The Affirmation ( 19:8-9 )

( 19:8-9 ) He said to them, “Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, permitted you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.

9 And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery; and whoever marries her who is divorced commits adultery.”

— Jesus clarified that the Mosaic law did not commend divorce

— He affirmed that it permitted divorce under certain circumstances because of the hardness of our hearts

— In no OT passage is specific permission for divorce given

— Because of God’s loving kindness He did not always exact the death penalty for adultery under the Mosaic Covenant

— David and Bathsheba were not put to death

— Solomon lived in virtual unremitting adultery on the basis of one-man, one-women standard of Genesis 102

— When the Jewish exiles returned, Ezra had them put away their unbelieving wives and children “according to the law” ( Ezra 10:3 )

Moses and the Certificate of Divorce

—Jesus answered why Moses allowed a certificate of divorce ( cf. 5:31 )

— Because of the hardness of your heart — it was not a command for divorce but a limitation on remarriage ( Matt 19:7-9 )

— Moses did not encourage divorce, he did not completely forbid it, but discouraged it

— You might marry again but not your first wife

— The passage in Deut 24:1-4

could be summed up as: “Husband, you better think twice before you reject your wife.

Remember that once you have put her away and she has become the wife of another you cannot afterward take her back; not even if that other husband should also have rejected her or should have died”

— Moses did mention the certificate of divorce;

Certificate of Divorce

— A common theme in the OT Law

— Protected the women and improved her condition

— But the Scribes and Pharisees placed all the emphasis on that certificate

— Jesus placed the emphasis were it properly belonged

— They greatly exaggerated the importance of the exception, that which made divorce possible

— Jesus stressed the principle, namely, that husband and wife are and must remain one

— Jesus also attacked those who purposely abuse the marriage contract, using divorce to satisfy their lustful desires to marry someone else

— People should never consider divorce as an option for solving problems

Winger

The Debate about Deut 24

— Two schools: Hillel, Shammai

— The rabbi Hillel was liberal and died twenty years before Jesus began His ministry

— He taught that a man could divorce his wife for the most trivial of reasons, “any cause”, for such things as

— taking her hair down in public

— talking to other men

— burning the bread