Divorce and little children. Matthew 19 | Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

The great Galilean ministry has now ended, and Jesus and his followers begin the momentous journey towards Jerusalem.

Matthew 19

Divorce

¹ When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went into the region of Judea to the other side of the Jordan. ² Large crowds followed him, and he healed them there.
His fame quickly spread because of his healing ministry in Galilee.

³ Some Pharisees came to him to test him.
They attempted to get Jesus to incriminate himself through misinterpreting the law.
I am amazed he answered, but he did, and as in the Sermon on the Mount, his standards were more exacting than those of Moses

They asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?”

⁴ “Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’^[a] ⁵ and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’^[b]? ⁶ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”

⁷ “Why then,” they asked, “did Moses command that a man give his wife a certificate of divorce and send her away?”

⁸ Jesus replied, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning. ⁹ I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”
Marriage is a physical and emotional knitting, a knitting of spirits, not to casually unraveled.
People change, marriages change. Many marriages go through unhappy patches, but over time, hearts change, love grows, and one may land up not wanting to trade that once-annoying (perhaps still annoying!) spouse for the world.
Because of Christ’s release of the Holy Spirit, we need despair of no man or woman. And because divorce is generally a traumatic unravelling of what has been knit together, it should be a last resort.
Scripture does provides grounds for divorce. Violence is mentioned in Malachi.”I hate divorce,” says the Lord, “and I hate a man covering his wife with violence.”

¹⁰ The disciples said to him, “If this is the situation between a husband and wife, it is better not to marry.”
Rather than have a life-long unhappy marriage.

¹¹ Jesus replied, “Not everyone can accept this word, but only those to whom it has been given. ¹² For there are eunuchs who were born that way, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others—and there are those who choose to live like eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven.

Those who have voluntarily accepted celibacy to give themselves more fully to God’s work.

The one who can accept this should accept it.”

The Little Children and Jesus

¹³ Then people brought little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked them. ¹⁴ Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” ¹⁵ When he had placed his hands on them, he went on from there.