Introduction
LIVE FROM THE MOM
Salt Lake City, Utah
This is HOTM
Where together we are learning how to live in the Age of Christian Fulfillment.
And I’m your host Shawn McCraney.
Show 11: A Divorce
Taped February 25th 2020
Aired March 9th 2020
I want to begin by saying all these topical subjects of late have weighed heavily on me and addressing them has not been easy. So I beg for your compassion – and mercy.
Divorce in the Age of Christian Fulfillment
Last week we talked about adultery in the age of fulfillment. And tonight we are going to talk about one of the most natural outcomes of adultery – and that is divorce. To me divorce is a very similar topic to abortion. What I mean by this is people get pregnant, and people have abortions; people get married, and people get divorced.
These things are the unfortunate part of being human in an imperfect world full of imperfect people. Abortions are not ideal nor necessarily beneficial to the parties involved – and in some cases this can be the case with divorce as well. But with both abortion and divorce we have to admit somethings to ourselves – first is that they happen – and have happened for thousands of years – ever think of that – that abortions AND divorce have occurred for thousands of years – and yet the world keeps spinning and somehow the human race continues to thrive. Secondly, I think that even though they have occurred for thousands of years – as has adultery – all of it, abortion, adultery and divorce they are generally looked down on by people who call themselves followers of Christ.
If we are going to be honest, human beings in general, even those who are not religious place bright scarlet letters on the shoulders of most people who:
- Have had abortions
- Have committed adultery, and
- Have been divorced.
Attitudes Toward Divorce
To me, if this is the world's attitude toward people involved in such things, the Christian view ought to be one of open, welcoming arms to such, without feigning, providing them all with a refuge called Jesus Christ. Like abortion and adultery, I doubt very much that many people enter into marriage expecting to get divorced – and this is part of what makes divorce so hard on the participants – it is seen and felt as a personal failure – even in non-religious circles.
Even in cases where a spouse proves themselves worthy of getting a divorce there is always the stigma of, “what caused you to choose the guy or girl in the first place?” There are so many unknown, invisible factors at play in why we choose the spouses we choose. Subconsciously our betrothed could remind us of someone who was once nice to us, there could be biochemical factors at play, or we could simply be seduced by desire, wanting security, or hoping too much that we have found someone we can love and who can love us. But this is not always the reality is it?
A Perspective on Marriage
Before we get into the biblical facts about divorce and whether they apply to us in the age of fulfillment or not, I feel a responsibility to share a perspective I have of marriage with our present and future audiences that may help people avoid the pain of divorce. So instead of just saying divorce BAD I think it’s really important to get to the heart of the matter on the marriage and to do this by sharing an important insight with you about buying stocks (as I was a stockbroker for some thirteen years before becoming what I am today – whatever that is.)
There are a number of approaches people make when deciding to invest in equities (or stocks). I think we can apply this truth to the fact that there are also a number of ways people choose a spouse. With stocks some people look to “technical analysis” which used to be referred to as the chartists, and these sorts look at graphs, and charts and all sorts of technical information to decide if a stock is worth investing in or not. In our age of computers much of this is done automatically and all sorts of algorithms and computer programs enter into the mix to help achieve this. When it comes to marriage some dating websites have tried to include technical analysis in their matchmaking and claim great success – but who knows if it really works or not. When it comes to investing in stocks other people focus more on what are called the fundamentals of a company – its products or
Analyzing Investments and Relationships
services, its management, assets, liabilities, distribution lines, competition and the like. When it comes to looking at a prospective spouse this is the looking under the hood of a person’s upbringing, education, parents, siblings, genetic factors and the relationship history.
Finally, when it comes to owning stocks it is often done through purely emotional, even romantic, ideations. These people do very little analysis – they just like the sound of the XYZ company, and their friends like the XYZ company and they suppose that it will make for a good long-term investment. So, they buy into it. This happens in choosing a mate all the time. Love and romance blind the participants to the downsides of the prospective spouse and they venture in somewhat blind. Because they are emotionally driven and blinded by sizzle, no amount of real information is able to dissuade them of investing – they only hear information that will confirm their emotional prejudices.
This is what romantic love does to us – and most of us have fallen victim to it.
The Consequences of Emotional Investment
NOW HERE IS WHERE ALL OF THIS COMES TOGETHER IN DIVORCE.
The problem with emotionally investing in stock is when the stock purchased starts to fall apart, the people who purchase the stock on a relative whim sell on a relative whim – and once you sell a fallen stock, that is when you actually lose money. But because they have no information about the stock to convince them to stay and ride the investment back up to profitability, they do an act of finality and sell. They buy with hope at 25.00 a share, they sell in despair at 2.00 a share, and see the entire event as a terrible loss.
The same is true with impetuous marriages. When there is nothing but romantic emotionalism holding a couple together, the automatic reaction to difficulties when they arise in the marriage is to sell – to divorce – and that is when losses are incurred – especially when CHILDREN are involved. An antidote to both avoiding losing money in the stock market, and in getting divorced, is found in the initial investigative work on both potential stocks and potential spouses BEFORE the investment happens. Here’s why.
The Importance of Initial Investigation
When a person truly understands the intrinsic value of either a spouse or a stock, having gone through the pains of a thorough investigation into the character of both, then when the rough times come – and they always do in both owning stocks and taking on a spouse, the savvy investor knows that that is the time to not just hold on to the stock or marriage – but to invest even more into them both.
This is the most applicable part about all of this investing talk relative to divorce. WHEN the stock you have researched and examined goes down in price a wise investor will NOT sell, but will invest more into the company! Why? Because if a company was a good value at 25.00 bucks a share when they bought it, it becomes a great value at 20.00 bucks a share, and a flat out steal at 10.00 bucks a share – assuming none of its intrinsic values have changed.
The very same principles remain true with a spouse who possesses valuable characteristics and abilities who, as people will do, runs into a downward trend. So a wise person, when their beloved fails them, will invest MORE, not less, into the relationship because they know, having done the preliminary work, that within them – their character, their family, their potential – there lies a hopeful good future.
Opposite this approach is a mindset that is destined for disaster. It says: I will take all my savings and hopes for a solid financial future, and buy a stock I really know little about, and when it goes down sell it at a loss. It says: I will invest in an individual, with my emotions first, and will marry her or him, but when they let me down, I will sell them in divorce.
I cannot for the life of me understand the Christian attitudes that do THREE really insipid things relative to marriage – none of them are reasonable to me or of God. The first mindset says, “At the first sign of trouble – my spouse looked at porn, my spouse got involved emotionally with a man at work, my spouse has been texting an old girlfriend, my spouse can’t keep a job,” is to divorce them – especially when children are involved. The second mindset says, “You can’t divorce a faithful husband or
Divorce Views in Christianity
faithful wife who is horrible to you in a number of unconscionable ways – because they haven’t committed adultery.”
This is the biblical literalist approach and it is based on Jesus talking to Jews about the only justification THEY had for divorcing a spouse in that day/then. And Christians take that teaching and apply legalistically to their own situations. And they find themselves actually conflicted about divorcing a physically/verbally/emotionally abusive spouse because he or she has never cheated on them. Come on!
The third unconscionable view of divorce that thrives in the Christian world is one that pushes for divorce because the spouse committed adultery. That mindset also thrives in the minds of many people today and therefore we see all kinds of marriages end because of their presuppositional view when time and work could have saved the marriage and the families involved a huge amount of pain and destruction.
Age of Fulfillment
In the age of fulfillment, all these views and rationales ought to be put in the back seat and each individual, by the Spirit – whose fruit is love – ought to assess what should be done, and then do it. We are all responsible before God for the choices we make, we are all the recipients in this life for those same decisions. God writes His laws of love on our hearts and minds and He may, by His spirit tell you to remain in a marriage with a really pathetic individual or he might instruct you to walk from someone the moment they call you a rude name – like all things, and this is no surprise – in the age of fulfillment, every Christian decision is between them and God.
There are always exceptions to the things I have said here, folks. There will always be those people who marry within a week of meeting someone and live happily ever after just like there are always stock buyers who randomly pick a company out of a hat and make millions. But those are exceptions and exceptions never make a good rule. In a perfect world, two good people would meet each other, get to know each other honestly, fall in love with the real person they have each met, and remain together as one for life, working through their differences.
Acknowledging Imperfection
Just like in a perfect world every child conceived would be born, and every couple married would remain faithful. But we do not live in a perfect world and the solution to its FAILS is Jesus Christ and his approach to things, not trying to judge and perfect the failures of people around us. As believers, we all know what the Bible says about divorce. Unfortunately, we forget that culture, that day that age and the reason why this advice was given in the first place.
We forget that Jesus words about divorce was to Jews – His own – who were under the law, and who used bills of divorcement offered by Moses to rid themselves of wives like stale bread. Same goes with Paul, who most scholars concede went through a divorce himself, and who was bringing the holy bride of Christ through that age in one piece. Personally, and not that it matters, I think divorce is between the individuals involved and God – as they will have to live with the consequences of their choices whether those consequences be beneficial or detrimental. I am here to receive people as they are, faithfully married with children, or unfaithfully divorced having had abortions. This is what our FAITH is all about, not saving or rectifying or policing the world of sin via condemnation or alienation.
But I would not be transparent if I did not say this when it comes to the subject of divorce:
Impact on Children
In my experience, when children are involved in a marriage, especially children who love their parents, divorce is absolutely detrimental to their minds and hearts and does damage that often cannot be seen by the parents involved. For this reason, I have worked very hard with couples with children who are headed for divorce to get them to grow up and overcome whatever it is that is driving them apart. Often that does not work – because the parents involved actually love themselves more than their own kids. Marriage is hard. It requires a ton of work and dying to self. But when kids come into the picture, that couple, having invested into each other wisely or badly, ought to do all they can to fix whatever it
The Complex Topic of Divorce
Is that ails them rather than selling off – because it is in the selling, in the divorcing, that losses are had. I personally think it is a tragedy for couples to divorce over religion, over money, over sexual differences, and even over an affair – especially if the couple had a good marriage in the past and if they have chosen to bring children into this world. The subject of divorce is huge because there are so many stories and angles that make every situation different.
That is why in the age of fulfillment I think it's important to step away from lock-step answers given in an age and time and to follow the spirit – whose fruit is agape love – to govern ourselves in these decisions. I want to wrap up this segment on divorce with a true account from my own life.
A Personal Account
Several weeks ago I did a show on sex and opened up to you about my own shameful experiences and failures in that area, especially when it came being married and adultery. When I ultimately came forward with my sinful ways the religious rulers in our lives at the time told my wife to divorce me – that I was no good and that she would do better finding another worthy priesthood holder. Interestingly, this advice was one of the first instances where Mary knew that there was something wrong with the LDS Church and its leadership for while I was seriously messed up, and had been from a very young age relative to sexual relations with females, she also knew that I had value – especially as a father – and while I was certainly guilty of failing her, she knew I loved and adored our three daughters.
She could have taken the divorce route – the sell the stock off, it's no good route – and would have not only been justified by scripture but she had the authorization of her religious leaders to back it – but that advice was the advice of men, and not the spirit. And so she chose to dive into working with me to face my demons and let this God I professed save me – and us. Here’s the thing – when a couple, no matter how messed up one or both of them are, love and seek God and put their children’s welfare first, amazing things, wonderful things, life-altering things begin to occur.
The Journey of Repair
My actions, selfish and egotistical and proud nearly destroyed my wife and three daughters' lives. Had we divorced, I am certain that the devastation would have sunk to great depths in the hearts of all involved. But we decided to let God work – and it was very difficult. There were setbacks, there were times when we reaped what I had sown, but I thank God for Mary and my three daughters who allowed Him to step in to this fleshly heart of their husband and dad, and perform a work that would not have happened in any other way.
In many cases – not all, but in many cases, divorce is an immediate reaction that is unfortunately endorsed by the world – religious and not – but then it is a world that judges people for having been through one. In the age of fulfillment, I suggest that we get rid of all the rules about divorce, that we bring God in through Christ to every marital situation, and we let Him do His work. We’ll know if we should sell or if we should invest more. And if God tells you to hold on and invest more, do it – the returns on investment cannot be fathomed once had.
