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A Sermon for the Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 22, Year B)
October 6, 2024

Text: Mark 10:2-16

Now, O Lord, take my lips, and speak through them. Take our minds, and think through them. Take our hearts, and set them on fire. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

At the parish where I served before coming to St. Mary’s, there was a member of the church who was well-loved by everyone there. He was very faithful—the kind of parishioner who showed up to everything and was always willing to volunteer and serve.

You could count on him to be at worship almost every Sunday. He attended Sunday school regularly. He always showed up to special events, and he also served as the treasurer, making sure the church was in good financial order.

And, if I ever had to be out of town on Sundays, I could always count on him to lead Morning Prayer if I wasn’t able to find a supply priest to lead worship.

He loved God, and he loved his church very much.

Not long after I arrived, one thing I learned about this parishioner was that he was recently divorced and remarried.

In our time together, we didn’t talk a lot about what happened in his first marriage, but from the limited conversations we did have, I could tell that it wasn’t a good situation.

There was a lot of pain in his first marriage, and any time he talked about his divorce, his demeanor changed, almost as if there was this cloud of disappointment and failure that hung over his head.

And then, he would talk about his new wife and the life they shared together. She was also an active and beloved member of the parish.

And, when he shared the story of how they met and how quickly they fell in love and got married, he would light up again.

It was almost as if this life that he shared with his new wife had filled him with an overwhelming sense of joy and peace.

He and I became friends during my time there. We worked well together, and he was always supportive of me and my ministry.

One Sunday morning, about three years ago, the Gospel lesson for the day was the same passage we heard just a few moments ago from the Gospel of Mark.

Which included Jesus’ teaching on divorce.

Everything in the service that day went according to plan.

As usual, the lessons were read. The hymns were sung. I proclaimed the Gospel and preached a sermon, and we gathered around the Table for Holy Communion.

And, after the service was over, as I was greeting people at the door, my friend walked over to where I was standing with his head hung low and a look of sadness and disappointment on his face.

I could tell he was very upset about something.

So, I asked him, “What’s wrong? Is everything okay?”

He looked at me and shook his and said, “I guess I’m just living in adultery.”

At first, I was surprised by what he said.

I had hoped that, even though it was a difficult Gospel reading, he might’ve been at least a little comforted by my sermon that day.

But, then I thought about it for a moment and realized, “Of course he feels this way.”

How could anyone who was divorced and remarried hear today’s Gospel lesson and not immediately jump to the conclusion that they’re living in sin?

I didn’t know how to respond to my friend’s comment at the time, and, to be honest, I’m not sure if there was anything I could’ve said in that moment that would’ve made him feel any better.

So, he just kept walking, and he never mentioned it again.

But, my heart broke for him because I knew how upset he was.

As a preacher, today’s Gospel lesson is one that I dread every time it comes up in the readings, mostly because I know how painful it can be for those who hear it, especially those of us who’ve been personally affected by divorce, either in our own relationships or in the relationships of those closest to us.

It would be easy for us to simply gloss over today’s reading and disregard it altogether.

But, I think that would be a missed opportunity.

Because, behind Jesus’ teaching, there’s something very important for us to learn about the love of God and what God wants for us in our lives.

So, let’s talk about it.

If we look at the beginning of today’s passage, we learn that the Pharisees come to test Jesus. They want to expose him as a false teacher.

So, they ask him a challenging question. “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?”

In the time of Jesus, the issue of divorce was hotly debated among religious leaders—including the Pharisees—and there were various ways of interpreting the law in Deuteronomy, which permitted men to issue certificates of divorce to their wives.

One school of thought—the more conservative view—was that men could divorce their wives but only in cases of adultery.

Another school of thought—the one most people agreed with—was that this law in Deuteronomy allowed men to divorce their wives for any reason at all, even trivial ones like burning a meal.

So, the predominant view of divorce at the time was that a man could dismiss his wife for any reason, leaving her vulnerable, ostracized from the rest of the community, and sometimes even poor and homeless.

Jesus was firmly against this teaching.

He says to the Pharisees, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses wrote this commandment for you.”

In other words, Moses wrote this law because of your stubbornness and refusal to live as God has commanded you to live.

Then, he goes on to quote the Book of Genesis, saying, “But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’

‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”

For Jesus, the Pharisees’ question about divorce really isn’t all that important. He doesn’t even take the time to answer their question.

Instead, he uses this moment as an opportunity to remind the Pharisees—and us—about the purpose for which God established the covenant of marriage.

Marriage is an outward and visible sign of God’s self-giving, sacrificial love.

When two people make the choice to live in the covenant of marriage, they make the choice to live no longer for themselves alone but also for each other.

And by continuing to live into this covenant, they become a visible sign for the world of the kind of love that God calls us to share with each other.

A love that is patient and kind.
A love that isn’t envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.
A love that isn’t irritable or resentful.
A love that doesn’t rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth.
A love that bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 

Friends, this is the Good News of our Gospel lesson for today.

When we make the choice to turn from our own selfish ways, when we choose to live not only for ourselves but also for others, we’re released from the weight of our own sinfulness and made free to live and love as God intended.

Marriage—when it works—is a gift of God’s grace, not only for the married couple, but for everyone who sees their love for each other in action.

Later, in the Gospel passage, Jesus is alone with his disciples.

And, they ask him to be clear about his teaching on the issue of divorce.

And this is where things get difficult. It’s probably the most difficult part of today’s lesson.

He says to his disciples that anyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and any wife that divorces her husband and remarries also commits adultery.

This can be a hard teaching for many of us to accept, especially those of us who’ve remarried and now have a relationship that’s much more healthy and life-giving.

I want to acknowledge that because when we talk about divorce in the church, we have to do so with compassion and understanding, realizing that it’s not always an easy, “black or white” decision.

We know, through our own knowledge and understanding, that marriages come to an end for lots of different reasons.

Some marriages come to an end because of mistrust and fractured relationships that are beyond repair.

Some come to an end because of a history of violence or abuse.

Some come to an end after years of desperately trying to fix whatever’s broken, only to realize that the relationship that once existed is no longer there.

And the list goes on.

What we’ve also come to know and understand is that making painful decisions—like the decision to end a marriage—can actually lead to healing and restoration.

Letting go of things that are destructive in our lives, including failed marriages and broken relationships, can lead to new and abundant life, which is what God wants for all of us.

Now, don’t get me wrong.

I’m not saying that Jesus is an advocate for divorce.

On the contrary, Jesus takes marriage and divorce very seriously, and I believe he wants us to work hard to try and mend broken relationships.

God grieves right along with us when marriages fall apart.

But, I’m also convinced that God wants us to live full and healthy lives, which sometimes means letting go and moving on.

Contrary to what many people have been led to believe, this teaching of Jesus in today’s Gospel isn’t his way of condemning those who’ve been divorced and remarried.

It’s his way of saying that the covenant of marriage is sacred and should be protected, if at all possible, because it serves as a sign of something so much greater than ourselves.

If two people can make a marriage work and last—if two people can look past their own differences and live in peace and unity together and find joy in sharing their lives with one another—then maybe there’s hope in believing that God’s love can transcend our own differences and that we can live in peace and unity together and find joy in sharing our lives with one another.

But, to do so requires a softening of the heart, a willingness to open our hearts and share them with each other, even at the risk of being hurt in the process.

As C.S. Lewis once put it, to do otherwise—to keep our hearts to ourselves and protect ourselves from the possibility of being hurt—is the same as cutting ourselves off from God.

As Christians, our call is to live with open hearts because we’ve been empowered by the Holy Spirit in Baptism and given the responsibility of serving as instruments of God’s love in the world.

What you’ll eventually come to realize in the process—if you haven’t already—is that, by living with an open heart for others, we come to experience a joy and peace far greater than anything we could ever hope for or imagine.

A peace that surpasses all understanding.

A peace that can only be described as God’s grace.

Amen.