Yesterday’s sermon was really difficult for me. Divorce is such a painful thing, and preaching about it is painful as well. The very public nature of divorce only adds to the shame and suffering as everyone around you is able to see the fruit of your marital problems.
We in the church are sometimes not very helpful either. We can be just as gossipy and nosy as the rest of the world. Nothing creates headlines in the news like a celebrity divorce, and nothing becomes the talk of the church faster than a couple who marriage is falling apart.
There certainly two ways for us in the church to approach this issue of divorce. One, we need to do a better job of ministering to those who have been affected by divorce, not only the formerly married couple, but also their children, friends and other family members. Two, we need to regain a solid biblical understanding of divorce and what exactly is prohibited and permitted by Scripture.
With all of our enlightenment and cultural development, in the church we still love to brand people with a scarlet letter like Hester Prynne. The stigma of divorce seems to short circuit our conduit of grace for some reason. It is not like we go out of our way to avoid those who have suffered through a divorce, but we don’t know how to relate to them in constructive, helpful ways.
The church is supposed to be a place where recovering sinners saved by God’s grace are nurtured and cared for as the Spirit heals their spiritual wounds. But we are often times like a hospital whose doctors and nurses refuse to treat their patients. Instead we enter their rooms and talk about the weather, our hobbies, etc. and never once pick up their chart, talk to them about what hurts, and prescribe the life-giving balm of Scripture. Oh sure we will carry our Bibles to church on Sundays but we rarely open them or use them to minister to people elsewhere.
We pastors are no better. It is easy to proclaim truth from a pulpit. It is much harder to sit face to face with someone and truly minister to them. That takes time, energy, and drains you emotionally. I need to spend more time actually ministering to people 1-on-1.
What all of this means is that the church needs to cultivate a biblical sense of community. I don’t mean ‘community’ in the popular, emergent sense of the word where we all just sit around and have a conversation about life that does not lead us to the cross of Christ. I mean that we need to regain a biblical understanding of our connectedness in Christ as the children of God.
I just can’t get away from the straightforward, simple commands of Galatians 6:1-2
Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
There are two commands given. One, restore those who are caught in sin. The condition, of course, is that we must take care of our own spirit first, but the command still stands. We are supposed to help people who are caught in sin to get out and return to Christ. The modern day notion of tolerance and/or privacy do not apply to the Christian. We do not ‘tolerate’ sin. Nor do we stay out of other people’s business. God calls us to hold each other accountable for sin and to restore each other when we do son. “Just mind your own business” does not belong in the people of God. Those who seek to restore a brother caught in sin MUST do this gently and lovingly, but do this they must.
The second command is a little vague, and I think that is by design. “Bear one another’s burdens.” What burdens? Does that mean helping your neighbor with a project around the house? Does that mean counseling a troubled teen? Yes to both. This is a broad command designed to call us to community. To help one another with whatever we need help with. And frankly, we need help with a lot! Specifically to this blog post, we need to help those whose lives have been torn apart by divorce to be healed. Only Christ can do this, so that means that we must bear one another up into the presence of Christ. Like the four friends who lowered their lame companion through the roof into a crowded room so that Jesus could heal him, so too should we come alongside our hurting church members and bring them to Jesus.
God’s grace is rich, and He lavishes it upon us. He forgives ALL our sins. He restores us fully to himself. The church should continue to facilitate that restoration for all sinners saved by grace. This should not be an afterthought or something that happens by accident. We need to be very intentional about administering God’s grace in its varied forms for the purpose of growing God’s children into mature Christlikeness.
I hope you will join me in praying for our churches, and more specifically, I hope you will join me in being an instrument of righteousness in your church.
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