Landry Brewer
The home has fallen on hard times in America. One out of two marriages ends in divorce. Children used to grow up with a mother and father at home. This isn’t the case anymore. Friends, this isn’t what God had in mind when He instituted marriage.
The home is the foundation of society. But as the home fractures, society’s foundation cracks. How long can a society last without a solid foundation?
Genesis 2:18 says God saw that it wasn’t good for man to be alone. So He created a helper for Adam named Eve. That’s when marriage was instituted, and the home as God intended it began. According to verse 24, God desires husband and wife to cleave to each other and be one flesh. God wants a husband and wife to be joined, thinking and acting as one. And this is for life.
That’s why Jesus says in Matthew 5:32 and 19:9 that whoever gets a divorce and remarries commits adultery. A lot of preachers don’t preach these words of Jesus, but they’re in the New Testament for the world to see. A marriage is not to be taken lightly, but today many approach it with the attitude that if it doesn’t work out, a divorce will take care of things. But Jesus says that can cost you your soul, and there’s only one exception. In Matthew 19:9, Jesus says that if one spouse commits fornication, the innocent party may remarry. That’s the only exception to the rule of marriage for lifetime.
How many people today are on their second, third or even fourth marriage? Yet, Jesus says that remarriage for a reason other than fornication results in adultery. Paul lists adultery among sins he calls “works of the flesh” in First Corinthians 6:9-10 and Galatians 5:19-21. In both places Paul says that those who do these things won’t inherit the kingdom of God. That means they won’t go to heaven. Divorce and remarriage is an American pandemic more serious than the Coronavirus. It can cost you your soul.
And divorce has a negative spiritual effect on children. Fathers are given the responsibility of bringing up their children “in the nurture and admonition of the Lord” (Eph. 6:4.) That means fathers are supposed to teach their children the word of God and how to obey it so they can go to heaven. But fathers who don’t live with their children can’t do that. It’s no wonder that the news is filled with stories of teenagers who’ve shot up a school or committed some other crime. The home is falling apart, and kids get little or no spiritual guidance from their parents. Mom and Dad set a bad example by tossing aside the God-given institution of marriage, and they don’t teach their children to obey God.
The home God intends has one man married to one woman for life. Paul says in Ephesians 5:25 that husbands are supposed to love their wives just as Christ loved the church, and He died for it. Husbands, are you showing your wives that kind of love? Wives, you’re supposed to submit yourselves to your husbands. Are you doing that? When a man and woman work together to make their marriage what God wants it to be, the home functions as it should, and society is stable. So make your first marriage your only marriage, and raise your children in a loving home where God’s word is taught.
