1. Welcome to Baptist Board, a friendly forum to discuss the Baptist Faith in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to all the features that our community has to offer.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon and God Bless!

Do We Have Differeing Standards regarding Divorce IF laity/Clergy?

Discussion in 'General Baptist Discussions' started by JesusFan, Sep 19, 2011.

  1. John Toppass

    John Toppass Active Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Aug 12, 2008
    Messages:
    1,080
    Likes Received:
    8
    I have looked and looked and I can not find anywhere is the scripture describing a biblical divorce. I can not find where God approves of divorce of any kind.

    I can not find anywhere that says divorce disqualifies a man from being a pastor, elder or deacon,

    I do find the circumstance of divorcing one and marrying another or remarrying the first wife after she has remarried and divorced another as being disqualifing.

    Divorce does not disqualify a man from being a pastor, elder or deacon however, the reasons for divorce probably disqualifies this man for at least a season or more.

    A man who divorced at a young age before he was saved and remarried a wonderful woman later and they had the best family the world has ever seen is still not the husband of one wife and is disqualified from being a pastor, elder or deacon. There are many other areas God can and will call him to serve in.

    Some say that the a one woman man applies to polygamy. That is like saying that it is the same as the "flavor of the month coupon" as long as you only have the same flavor all month. WRONG!!!!!

    God can and will bless marriages 1st, 2nd and on and on. The couple only needs to give that marriage to God.
     
  2. JesusFan

    JesusFan Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 4, 2011
    Messages:
    8,913
    Likes Received:
    240
    Are you saying that ALL are in adultry than IF they had more than a wife in their whole life?

    had some sexual realtionships before marriage, maybe some after, or a divorce/remarriage...

    ALL of them in sight of God adulterers, all of them having more than 1 "partner" in your understanding?
     
  3. revmwc

    revmwc Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Mar 28, 2011
    Messages:
    4,139
    Likes Received:
    86
    The whole premise is what I am getting at. When you delve into what a wife is what qualifies a marriage in God's eyes. To say that since the man was divorced and remarried means he has two wives and would disqualify him as a pastor. Yet to say the man who had pre-marital relations without a marriage is qualified is a double standard. The act constitutes the marriage in God's eyes, yet he also calls it sin. If as a believer the man co-habited with someone for say a year and they split he being a christian then he gets his life straightened out marries and wants to pastor would he be qualified? Most people have no problem with that because they don't recognize the co-habiting as a marriage, yet a man who married and divorced is seen as a divorced man, I see both in the same light. The standard needs to be the same. So again to disqualify one for divorce and the other to allow him to pastor is placing two different standards in the qualification. God has one standard that standard is a one woman man, a man dedicated to one woman as his wife, that is what the scriptures say.
     
  4. JesusFan

    JesusFan Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 4, 2011
    Messages:
    8,913
    Likes Received:
    240
     
  5. Iconoclast

    Iconoclast Well-Known Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Mar 25, 2010
    Messages:
    21,242
    Likes Received:
    2,305
    Faith:
    Non Baptist Christian
    John .......it does not look like this is so according to this.




    2For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband.

    3So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man.
     
  6. righteousdude2

    righteousdude2 Well-Known Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Oct 14, 2007
    Messages:
    11,154
    Likes Received:
    242
    Faith:
    Baptist
    Remember, When it Comes to Divorce...

    .......We've not been called to be judge and jury, just witnesses to His Gospel message.

    I've shared this testimony before, and will share it again, (and again if necessary) because it deserves to be shared with those who think God has different standards when it comes to a pastor (or any believer) who is stung by the bite of marital divorce!

    In my early years of ministry and marriage, I was EXTREMELY judgmental of those who went through divorce (regardless of the reason). I refused to accept that they were forgiven for the sin of divorce, and preached total loss of His love when they remarried. I was the Saul of my time in regard to divorce and remarriage.

    In regard to marriage, divorce and remarriage, I had my Damascus Road experience, and it took me 15 years to resolve my theology and issues.

    As a young, immature pastor, I went through a divorce after ten years of marriage. More than half of those ten years were rocky to say the least. We even attempted marriage counseling on three different occasions, only to have my soon-to-be ex-wife quit the sessions for every reason from the counselor was taking my side, to the counselor, and I was flirting with each other. When we tried pastoral counseling, she quit because she didn't agree with the pastor and the Scriptures he used in the sessions. After the third failure, she refused any more counseling sessions!

    The marriage also went through numerous trial separations where she went to Texas for weeks at a time (leaving her job and the kids) to be with her parents. I never knew if, and when she'd return, plus, each trip was put on credit cards (for the airfare), and after we finally split up, I was left with three huge credit-card balances to pay off!

    The last year was filled with many arguments and fights, upsetting the children (more-and-more) with each one. When she finally asked me to leave, it wasn't a week before she was living with someone she had met at a local night club.

    After our divorce became public, the well meaning people in the church (where I was an associate pastor and school administrator) started to come to me and tell me about seeing my ex and her girl friend from the bank (where they both worked) at the bar sides of local restaurants throughout the area, dancing with men.

    Because I worked Friday and Saturday nights at a local boy's home to make extra income to help with our growing credit card debts, I was not home on those nights, and it seemed that when "Daddy's away, the ex-wife would play!"

    To put the cherry on the sundae (so-to-speak) the church treasurer who was married and had six children of his own, came up to me a few months after our divorce and asked if I'd mind if he dated my ex. I said sure, go ahead, as long as you don't mind if I share this request with your wife and the pastor. That put an end to that, but it didn't stop the growing pain in my heart.

    Out of anger, and "spiritual immaturity," I turned from God, and strove to drive a wedge between Him and me by involving myself in sexual sin, porn and promiscuity. I knew this wrong, but I was angry at God and my ex, and didn't care any longer about my relationship with Him.

    I refer to my 15 year hiatus as a prodigal daze. It took me hitting rock bottom and a failed attempt to end my misery at the end of a .22 LR rifle barrel to make me realize how far my life had sunk into the pit of a personal mire, and how badly I needed to return to the Father.

    I know there are those who disagree that I could have been His during this tumultuous period in my life, but I believe I was saved, and in a spiritual exile only God understood. When I returned to Him, it was, as if I had never been gone. With my head hung low, and my heart filled with shame, embarrassment and humility. I was surprised to find the Father lovingly waiting for me at the end of my long road back to Him. There was never a day, in the fifteen years of exile, that I didn't think about the father I had left, and wished I could have done things differently.

    However, like most of us, human nature is filled with pride, and it keeps us from seeking forgiveness, shoving us deeper into the mire of the deep pit we are hopelessly drowning in!

    I honestly expected Him to take out some kind of wrath (and punishment) on me for my anger and sin, but instead, I found, like the Prodigal Son, a loving father, waiting with His arms wide open to receive me back into the family. Before I even reached the outer limits of His property, he was there to place the family rode over my filthy rags, and a brass ring upon my sin-weathered hands! The only consternation I felt was from a jealous brother who felt I should have been spurned, punished, banished, or turn away by the father.

    In many ways, those who theologically disagree with my testimony are kin to the jealous brother. Thinking they knew better than the patient father, he judged me and believed I was never a part of the family in the first place. And similar to the story of Nicodemus, the jealous brother believed I needed to re-enter my mother's womb and be born anew!

    I found out that the Father was true to His word, in that I was saved and nothing I did can cause Him to remove my name from the Lamb's Book of life. I discovered that my Father did write my name in pencil (lead) nor did He have a bottle of spiritual white out to remove my name from the book. The blood that was used to write my name in that book on December 24, 1966 was of the Son, and it was not something that could be erased by my stupidity, ignorance and rebellion!

    His love truly withstood the worst times in my life and that unconditional love served as a GPS beacon/system to lead me back home to Him once my heart was truly ready! :flower:

    So to answer your question, I don't believe God rejects those who He truly calls just because they were unable to keep their marriage together. Especially when it is by no fault of their own!

    Of course, there are always going to be mitigating circumstances, and had it been me that caused the marriage to fail and lead me off into sexual exile, I may have a different story to share. However, I still believe that one's salvation is secure, in the good as well as the bad times. It would be hypocritical for me not to believe anything else when it comes to eternal security.

    For those who may be wondering, I have been married for close to 32 years now, and this relationship is everything and more than I had hoped for in the first one that failed! Like Paul says, "what the devil meant for our ruin, was turned into something for His good, glory and edification!"

    Shalom,

    Pastor Paul :type:
     
    #46 righteousdude2, Sep 21, 2011
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 21, 2011
  7. JesusFan

    JesusFan Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 4, 2011
    Messages:
    8,913
    Likes Received:
    240
    NO longer under the LAW, but are under the Grace of the Cross...

    IF the other spouse departs, freed to remarry, but in the Lord...
    IF adultery, God wants to try to reconcile, if Not possible, than offended party free to remarry in the Lord...

    IF "just" divorcing, not on biblical grounds, should stay unmarried until/unless other party remarries, that closes off remarriage, than freed to remarry in the Lord...

    Even IF person divorces and "just" remarries, IF they confess/repent of the sin for new marriage, God can and does forgive/rrestores, and will bless the new marriage if BOTH trying to follow the lord as a couple!
     
  8. Salty

    Salty 20,000 Posts Club
    Administrator

    Joined:
    Apr 8, 2003
    Messages:
    38,982
    Likes Received:
    2,615
    Faith:
    Baptist
    RD, I usually do not read extremely long posts that often, but yours was an execption.

    There really isnt anything you could have left out.

    You sure have been thru the fire, and I am thankful that you are back serving the Lord.

    Salty
     
    #48 Salty, Sep 21, 2011
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 21, 2011
  9. Jim1999

    Jim1999 <img src =/Jim1999.jpg>

    Joined:
    Aug 10, 2002
    Messages:
    15,460
    Likes Received:
    1
    Joseph was essentially "married" to Mary under Old Testament law. When she disclosed that she was with child, he was about to "divorce" her. The bible didn't think anything about this divorcement, but God did.

    Just a thought. Do we fall under Old Testament law, or do we fall under civil law in these days?

    Cheers,

    Jim
     
  10. JesusFan

    JesusFan Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 4, 2011
    Messages:
    8,913
    Likes Received:
    240
    Since law given by God to isreal ONLY, would say fall under each society civil law regarding a valid marriage!
     
  11. righteousdude2

    righteousdude2 Well-Known Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Oct 14, 2007
    Messages:
    11,154
    Likes Received:
    242
    Faith:
    Baptist
    I Appreciate Your Kind Words....

    .....Very few folks (on the BB) seem to see what you have seen, and that is appreciated. I've been through the fires for sure, but a lot of it was at my own doing and immaturity. A day does not go by that I don't thank Him for causing a perfectly kept weapon from firing on that near fateful night.

    I am just grateful that I am being judged by a loving God and not biased men.

    God has restored my fiath in marriage, and restored to me a productive ministry. That is all a person who went "prodigal" could hope or ask for.

    Pastor Paul
     
  12. John Toppass

    John Toppass Active Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Aug 12, 2008
    Messages:
    1,080
    Likes Received:
    8
    Whether it is a 1st, 2nd or so on marriage, if that marriage is turned over to God then there will not be another marriage for that couple as long as both are alive.
     
  13. JesusFan

    JesusFan Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 4, 2011
    Messages:
    8,913
    Likes Received:
    240
    That is why Paul said the pastor canidate MUST be the husband of the wife that he is currently married to!

    And that he is NOT to have multiple wives, as Muslims/Mormons say!
     
  14. John Toppass

    John Toppass Active Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Aug 12, 2008
    Messages:
    1,080
    Likes Received:
    8
    The scriptures do not cater to what the Muslims or Mormons say.

    Paul was right and he also intended that wife be his first unless his first died during the first marriage.

    After all we are not playing the "flavor of the month" game.

    Paul was the scribe, the Holy Spirit was the author that told Paul what to write in order that God's Church would be set up the way God wanted and not what men thought was fair to them.
     
    #54 John Toppass, Sep 22, 2011
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 22, 2011
  15. Squidward

    Squidward Member

    Joined:
    Jan 19, 2012
    Messages:
    186
    Likes Received:
    0
    Digging up an old thread here, I'd like to reply if it's OK. Here's my story, Please bear with me because it's a mini novel

    My ex and I got married when we were 21 and 19. Our relationship started out as sex, and more sex. We first had sex about 4-5 days after we met and that's what our relationship was built on. When we were alone, we were having sex so we really spent very little time getting to know each other. I really did not comeback to Christ until a couple years into our marriage.

    She was always very hard to get along with the whole marriage once we actually had to spend time alone just talking. She loved picking fights just for the sake of. Her family told me she had always been this way with them. From what I understand, she still is. By about two years into the marriage, when we started attending church, she also liked spending Friday and Saturday nights club-hopping with friends and coming home in the middle of the night. I had to leave for work on both weekend days at work and had to leave for work at 5:30 am and there were two days where she came in the door about the time I had to leave. Never once would she tell me everything she did. She admitted that one of those times she went to a 24 food joint with a dude she met at a club, but claims nothing happened.

    After she was done with college (married 3 years at this point) she pretty much resigned to staying up all night, sleeping all day, and doing nothing. I pretty much had to cook dinner because she wouldn't cook, and I had to clean the house for the same reasons. After all of this I'd fall in the bed at 11pm with a 4:30 wake up time soon to follow. I was usually wound down enough to go to sleep just before midnight and it was predictable. about 2-3 nights a week(usually on work nights) she would sneak into the bed, scoot up close to me and say her favorite line "you are such a selfish (b-word)." I think you can figure out the censored word. She would refuse to let me sleep and want to fight with me, by the time the fight was over it would be between 1:30-2:00am and I had no idea what the fight was about. It involved an hour or two of her yelling at me about random things(many things I had no idea what she was talking about) and me apologizing for whatever I did wrong just to get her to leave me alone so I could get some sleep. Then I had to wake up and drive 50 miles one way to work on two hours of sleep only to go home and repeat.

    A couple different times I arrived home from work with my clothes on the front porch and I'd have to beg her to let me stay. Her issues with me had little merit and again I was left apologizing for a lot of thing I had no idea what she was talking about. A third time I found my stuff on the front porch was when I came home from a two day youth outing where I was assigned as a chaperone in a hotel room with two other kids. We had friends who had their home burn down. They moved in with the husband's brother. My ex told them that she thought I should cancel my outing because they needed us. The husband said, "no we are OK and don't need emotional support as bad as your church needs you to not back out of your assigned chaperone job with the youth trip at the last second." When I came home from that trip, as I said, clothes out on the porch and another huge argument to beg my way back in the house.

    Fast forward to 1997 (we were 26 and 24) and she was doing heavy doctor shopping online to find a doctor who would prescribe some heavy meds for back pain. She was able to find a doctor 200 miles away that was a big advocate of using morphine. When she got her prescription she told me to leave. I told her I wasn't leaving. She again told me to leave and this time she said if I didn't then she'd get a restraining order against me and I wouldn't be able to clear my personal items out of the house so I packed and left. A couple of weeks later we started trying counseling, but when the counseling was over we'd go back to the house and fight so I just decided to forget it. I was so sick of the fighting, completely exhausted that I filed for divorce a few months later.

    A few months after I filed, I felt like I would be Biblically wrong for not trying to work it out so I went to her and tried to reconcile. Everything was OK for a couple of weeks and when I started spending the night with her the fighting and old routines returned. We had a real blow up one night and I decided it was best for me to leave and I basically told her "I'm sick of this, I'm leaving."

    Within a couple of weeks after this fight she calls me and tells me that she met a guy in church and that she was no longer interested in us getting back together. I was stunned by this as I never expected this to happen, not that quick. When she told me this I decided I was really done. Her and this gentleman went to Florida together a month later and she started having the same fights with him, but he had some backbone and he loaded his car and left her stranded in Florida. As I said, I was done for good at this point.

    She denied having sexual relations with him but the man admitted, yes, they had sexual relations. Not only that, but he tried to call me and warn me that she was planning to financially ruin me. She basically financed their whole vacation to Florida with credit cards in my name that she applied for in my name without me knowing. Since we were still legally married I had no recourse. She racked up $30k in credit card debt and I had to file chapter 7. She started racking up these credit cards even before I tried to reconcile but she kept it quiet. I knew nothing of these cards until she gave them my phone number to reach me.

    Months after all of this I discussed with leaders in my church about me being cleared or not of dating again. The pastor was very familiar with this situation, and knew the gentleman who went with her to Florida, and he said that God had released me because of the sexual relations she had with this man who admitted to local COG leaders that he had this relationship with my ex. The Church of God leadership was familiar with this situation as this man was a pastor who had been removed from his church just a year before for adultery with another woman and he had to go before a local council again about the adultery with my ex wife.

    I met my current wife and started dating her. We were both born again Christians at the time. We made a vow to each other to not have sexual relations until marriage and we upheld our vow. We got married in 2000. I am happy as can be right now in my marriage and we have two beautiful children together. My oldest daughter from the previous marriage moved in with me nearly three years ago because of a fourth Children and Family Services violation (her own mom called DCFS all four times) against her mother (threw a chair at my daughter) which resulted in an injury to my daughter. My dauther is very happy here and her grades came up from Cs and Ds at her mother's home to Bs with a few As in high school. Her mother has a bachelor's degree and has never worked and has had two other children to two other men she never married and lives on welfare. She is a mess.

    Currently, I am feeling a calling from God. It is truly burning inside me to the point that I can't help but to share Jesus with others. I have immersed my life into the Word and prayers and I still feel this burning to go into the ministry thus my decision to go to seminary school following my undergrad studies.

    I do believe that God had since forgiven me from the previous marriage and I have repented for divorcing(yes, I repented even though she committed the adultery). Our marriage was based on sex, but that is no excuse for getting out of the marriage. That woman drove me to the point that I was miserable, even thought about how suicide would be an out, but I felt released when she had that relationship even though it hurt.

    I guess I'm saying that each marriage story is VERY complicated. Mine ended with an adultery by my ex, but it was a crazy build up to that. That was four years of absolute misery I endured because I did not believe in leaving over simply being unhappy.

    Thank you for letting me share my story exhaustively. :)
     
  16. John Toppass

    John Toppass Active Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Aug 12, 2008
    Messages:
    1,080
    Likes Received:
    8
    I truly feel for you. I would tell you to read what the Bible has to say about it and not what someone twists the word to say what they want it to say. There are many ways God uses people in ministry. Being a Pastor is not the only one that counts.

    You can never give a good enough explaination for not following the Word of God. Others may justify it but they are not God. Someone spoke of the pastor who's second marriage has lasted 20+ years and the first was so long ago. That person has justified things that God does not. If they follow the Word, then they know that and are just fooling themselves.

    God can use you and will use you, listen to what God says to you, not what you want Him to say to you.
     
  17. jaigner

    jaigner Active Member

    Joined:
    Nov 19, 2009
    Messages:
    2,274
    Likes Received:
    0
    Divorce isn't ever God's best, but sometimes it's the best choice for a particular spouse. I know a few wives who I really wish would protect themselves and their children and leave their abusive husbands.
     
  18. gb93433

    gb93433 Active Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Jun 26, 2003
    Messages:
    15,549
    Likes Received:
    15
    During that time they were betrothed and to break that required a legal divorce.
     
  19. gb93433

    gb93433 Active Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Jun 26, 2003
    Messages:
    15,549
    Likes Received:
    15
    I would say that there is so much more that should be looked at with a pastor. Is he not the chief servant? If he not to be an example? A man can be emotionally divorced living in the same home with his legal wife. He can have a terrible marriage and they can put on a good image and yet not filed for a legal divorce.
     
Loading...