Now to the married I command, yet not I but the Lord: A wife is not to separate from her husband. (But if indeed she is separated, let her remain unmarried, or be reconciled to the husband) And a husband is not to divorce his wife.” 1 Corinthians 7:10,11

In First Corinthians, the Apostle Paul confronts sins of the Christians, the saints, at Corinth.

He begins, “I plead with you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ…”

The first sin he confronts is the division caused by a ‘spiritual’ party spirit. “I am of Paul”…”I am of Apollos”…”I am of Cephas”…”I am of Christ.”

The next sin confronted: “It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you…”

He notes that the Corinthians have become “puffed up” (4:6). That is addressed again in Chapter 13. (Link)

When he comes to marriage, the Apostle Paul clearly distinguishes between his mature advice for the unmarried, and the clear command of Christ Jesus to the married.

“Now to the married I command, yet not I but the Lord: A wife is not to separate from her husband and a husband is not to divorce his wife.”

That is the whole of the Lord’s command, no more, no less. That is the word of the Lord Jesus.

The Corinthians did not know this teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ. Paul, here, reveals it to them. Today, everyone with a Bible knows this command.

Chapter Seven begins, “Now concerning the things you wrote to me…”

Paul is addressing the situation in Corinth, and thus, in the middle of the quote of our Lord’s explicit command he gives his own command regarding a Corinthian wife who had already left her husband—Greek aorist, i.e. past tense. The New International Greek Testament Commentary notes that “unless the middle clause is placed in parenthesis, the sense becomes confusing, and even risks misleading.”

Many of today’s Christians use that situation to detract from and condone or even to counsel disobedience to our Lord Jesus Christ’s clear command to the church and to the married.

Eric Metaxas interviewed Michael Youssef who confronts the evil gender ideology of our present day while speaking the truth in love. And Metaxas makes an astute observation on the state of our church in America, today:

“Actually, where this all started in the church, I would say, is with divorce….When the church allowed that, or looked the other way, you began to see the creep…the idea that people start saying, ‘you know what, it’s sort of true, you only go around once…let’s not worry too much about right and wrong’…how can you blame somebody with same sex attraction, saying, ‘hey, I don’t want to be celibate…I want to enjoy life’ because the heterosexuals have done precisely that, and that is the failure of the church…”

Metaxas goes on to note his shock at news of friends divorcing, and asks, “Where did you get the idea that this was permissible? What church do you go to? What kind of pastor do you have…?”

Michael Youssef responds to this present day scenario in the church as “exactly the secular thinking.”

JESUS: