Daily Devotions
Luke
Luke 16 : 14-18 (Cf. Deuteronomy 24:1-4; Matthew 5:31-32; 19:1-12; 1 Corinthians 7:15) "COMING ACROSS DIFFICULT PASSAGES"
Day 201 – Luke 16
Text: Luke 16 : 14-18 (Cf. Deuteronomy 24:1-4; Matthew 5:31-32; 19:1-12; 1 Corinthians 7:15)
COMING ACROSS DIFFICULT PASSAGES
There will be times when we come across difficult passages, as we read the Scriptures. One of those difficult passages could be said to be the verse that we are reading right here.
“Whoever divorces his wife and marries another
commits adultery;
and whoever marries her who is divorced from
her husband commits adultery.”
Luke 16:18
Wherein lies the difficulty? Let’s consider the following:-
1. This is an isolated verse.
2. The immediate context does not give us too many clues as to why Jesus uttered this statement.
INTERPRETING DFFICULT PASSAGES
It is most challenging to interpret difficult passages. The following principles would be helpful to bear in mind whenever we attempt to interpret difficult passages.
1. We need to read other passages related to the subject under study. In this case here, the obvious subject is “divorce”.
2. It is important that we gather together other statements that Jesus made on the subject of “divorce”.
3. We need to study the subject on an even wider basis, in order to get a full picture of the Biblical doctrine under investigation. This means that we would need to search the following…
a) The Old Testament
b) The Epistles in the New Testament
4. We then need to put the Biblical facts together, till they make a cogent whole.
5. Only when we do the above (and sometimes we need to do even more work) could we say that we have done our part properly in the interpretation of a difficult Bible passage.
THE QUESTION OF DIVORCE IN LUKE 16:18
It is obvious that we cannot build a whole doctrine on just one single statement, especially when Jesus had taught on this subject recorded in other Gospels. Let us consider a possible interpretation of the text.
Let us try and understand how we can interpret this difficult passage.
1. It would not be inconceivable to think that Jesus was rebuking the rich Pharisees, who were lovers of money, for their blatant violation of the Scriptures with reference to the issue of divorce.
2. It was not an unknown practice for divorce to take place where money is involved. Some were obviously wealthy enough to divorce their wives on the basis of one or more technical or legalistic points of the Mosaic Law! They seemed to have gotten away with it too, until they were confronted by Jesus.
Jesus had already strongly stated…
“It is easier for heaven and earth to pass away
than for one tittle of the law to fall.”
Luke 16:17
What was the reference in Jesus’ mind when He uttered these words? Obviously, it had to do with the Word of God. In the immediate context, it must have something to do with divorce also. We must go back all the way to an old Mosaic law that dealt with the subject of divorce. Moses did give a law on the question of divorce.
THE LAW OF MOSES ON THE SUBJECT OF DIVOURCE
The Mosaic Law did make provision for the possibility of a valid divorce. Let us consider the following passage carefully,
“When a man takes a wife and marries her,
and it happens that she finds no favour in his eyes
because he has found some uncleanness in her,
and he writes her a certificate of divorce,
puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house…”
Deuteronomy 24:1
The big question was what Moses meant when he wrote “He found some uncleanness in her”? There were two major schools of thought in the days of Jesus. There was a stricter school of thought that restricted the application of this Mosaic Law to a situation when the wife was guilty of adultery. However there was another school of thought, lots more liberal in its approach, which taught that a man may divorce his wife for a variety of reasons. If a woman burnt her husband’s dinner, she could be divorced! If the wife was rude to her mother-in-law, she could also be rightly divorced!
Obviously Jesus did not go along with the liberal school of thought. His teaching was clear-cut. Only under exceptional circumstances would a divorce be allowed. That exception was when one party was guilty of adultery.
APOSTOLIC TEACHING ON THIS SUBJECT
The Apostle Paul wrote a little on this subject of divorce as well. In 1 Corinthians 7, he also recommended that as far as possible, when people are married they should not consider divorce as the first option.
However, he did contemplate the possibility of one partner walking out of a marriage, in his context, he wrote about an unbeliever doing that. He wrote,
“If the unbeliever departs, let him depart;
a brother or a sister is not under bondage
in such cases…” 1 Corinthians 7:15
Difficult passages were meant to be thought through. Read prayerfully.