Therapy and Theology

Shae Hill: Hi, friends. Welcome back to the Therapy and Theology Podcast brought to you by Proverbs 31 Ministries. We're here to help you work through what you walk through, and I'm so glad that you're back listening today. I'm your host, Shae Hill, and I'm super excited about today's conversation. If you listen to episode one, this season, we're diving into honest conversations about the painful reality of divorce.

And each conversation is inspired by an upcoming book releasing in November called Surviving an Unwanted Divorce written by Lysa, Dr. Joel Muddamalle, and Jim Cress.

Whether you've experienced divorce yourself, been impacted by it in your family, or you're a Christian with a lot of questions, I hope today's conversation will give you truth to hold on to and a lot to think about.

Dr. Joel is gonna help us dive into the New Testament today as we look at some commonly debated misunderstood scriptures from Jesus on marriage and divorce. So this may be an episode that you want to take notes on. Also, if you'd like to receive new episodes delivered straight to your inbox, there's a link in our show notes where you can subscribe. Alright. Let's get into today's conversation.

Lysa TerKeurst: I remember the first time that I had a doctor's appointment after my divorce.I was filling out the intake form, and it got to the part where they were asking for an emergency contact. And got there in that doctor's office, and wept. It was a moment that to everyone else filling out an intake form was so completely normal, but for me it was the first time I realized this divorce meant I'd lost my person, like really, really lost my person, and I didn't know who to put down as my emergency contact. Today's subject is hard. Just like the first episode in the series we're tackling divorce again. And this these are not just for those of you who are walking, or who have walked through a divorce. It's also for any Christian, or anyone that knows someone that has gone through a divorce. So, I want us to lean in because in the last episode we tackled an Old Testament verse from Malachi. In this episode, I wanna go to the New Testament verses that can also be confusing around the subject matter of divorce. And of course, joining me is my family friend, Jim Cress, and Dr. Joel Muddamalle.

Joel Muddamalle: That's right. Well, I'm really excited for, this one. And, honestly, I feel a little bit of the weight of this conversation because, today, we're looking at Matthew chapter 19. And, the last episode, we looked at some Old Testament passages. We'll do that a little bit as well this time, but the reason why it's a little more weighty for me on this is because we're talking about Jesus's words here. This is an actual encounter that Jesus has where Jesus talks about this topic. And in some of your bibles, you might have the red letters kinda scenario happening. And so this is like the red letter Jesus that we've got going on. Before we jump into this, I just wanna give a disclaimer from our hearts, from Jim's heart, from least from mine. I just wanna read something that, we've kinda put together.

I just wanna make sure that, these conversations, that you're hearing, that you know that they come from a place of deep humility. You see, the three of us coauthored a book together, Surviving an Unwanted Divorce, and it's not meant to glorify divorce in any way. We love healthy marriages. We believe in the sacredness of marriage. We believe in God's ideal for marriage, but we also feel a responsibility. Those who find themselves on the other side of a divorce or maybe even walking through it because of the devastation of the heartbreak that it causes both for the individuals and for the families. And so the enemy absolutely wants to tear families apart in every way that he can, and he uses this through shame and through loneliness.

But, what we wanna do is to bring light to the truth of the scriptures and to show that there is absolutely hope in the gospel and there's hope for your life as well. Before we get started today, I want to invite you all to a theology study day with Joel, Lysa, and Jim. And typically, Lysa and Jim, when we do this, I kind of have, you know, our friends from Proverbs or Lysa, your personal friends or some of my friends that will come. And I wanna ask kind of three things of them, and I wanna ask these three things of all of you that are joining us today. So two of them are gonna be super simple. The third one is gonna be simple, but as my friend Jim Cress often says, it is far from being simplistic.

So here's the first one. We just wanna approach this with open bibles. And so if this, keep listening, but you might wanna come back to it and have a Bible open. And if you're in a place where you can actually open your Bibles and and take some notes, I would highly encourage you because we want to have, the Bible open to go to it as our source of truth. The second thing is we need honest hearts. We need to approach the text with honesty. God can handle our honesty. And then the third thing is connected to the first two, and so I'm gonna say it this way, for a moment, not forever, for a moment, I'm going to ask you to intentionally put aside all the things that you think you know about the Bible. You're panicking at this moment.

Wait a minute, Joel. I've been following Jesus for so many years, or maybe you're a brand new Christian, or maybe you're not a Christian at all, and you're like, what is going on with the Bible and Jesus and this topic of divorce for a moment, not forever, I'd love for you to put aside what you think you know just so that we can deal honestly with the scriptures.
And then when we get done, then, bring all the things that you brought and hold it against what we're talking about today, and pray and ask the holy spirit to give you some conviction and, some guidance in this area.

Go to your local pastor and some, friends that, I'm gonna say this way, it's very important, that love Jesus more than they love you. That's right. You wanna go to some friends that love Jesus more than they love you for some godly wisdom.

So let's jump to Matthew chapter 19.

And, once again, Lysa, you've always taught me to, bring the humanity of the text into it, and I'm excited because there's a little bit of humor I think that's going on here.

So in Matthew chapter 19 says this, when Jesus had finished saying these things, he departed from Galilee and went to the region of Judea across large crowds followed him. In other words, Jesus has kind of gone viral in the in the area, and people are just following him. Large crowds follow him, and he healed them. Some Pharisees approached him to test him. If we had music going on right now, it'd be like the dun dun dun, and you'd feel that. Okay. And they asked, is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife on any grounds? I don't know about you, but if I'm Jesus, and I'm on a long walk, I just got done healing a whole bunch of people. I've got messed up deal, I've got different figuring out. And now all of a sudden, I've got the religious rulers, the elites, like these guys came from Princeton and Harvard, and and they are the top notch, intellectuals, and I'm getting stuck with this question, I'm a little frustrated.

Lysa TerKeurst: And also being Jesus, he knew the motivation of their heart.

Joel Muddamalle: Yes.

Lysa TerKeurst: So which would then complicate his frustration.

Joel Muddamalle: 100%. And and it says that, like, the text lets us know, the goal is to test Jesus. Now, Lysa, one of the things that I just, over we've known each other for almost twelve years and ministered for almost ten years, together, and you often say that you have the curse of the

Lysa TerKeurst: Comeback.

Joel Muddamalle: Listen, y'all. If you have not heard an LT comeback, it's wild. It's amazing. Lysa could probably be full time comedian someday and just do all kinds of, comebacks. And and, Lysa, I just want you to know, do you have something in common with Jesus? Because I think that Jesus is so funny and so hilarious. And if you're like, Joel, I need you to prove it. Watch this. This is the first thing that Jesus says to this question. He says, haven't you read?

Jim Cress: Stop. It's like full stop, isn't it?

Joel Muddamalle: Well, think about who he's talking to.

Lysa TerKeurst: He’s talking to the people that of course, they've read it. They’ve memorized it.

Joel Muddamalle: That's what I'm saying. This is, like, the most well read, learned people of all time. And Jesus is like, by the way, have you read? Which is like this passive aggressive jab, I think, at them. You know?

Lysa TerKeurst: And so except the holy one.

Joel Muddamalle: Except A holy passive aggressive jab because it's Jesus. And he goes, haven't you read? And he replied that he who created them in the beginning made them male and female. Okay.

Somewhere you're like, Jesus, Are you doing like a Jesus juke over here? They're asking one question, you're going to do, no -- everything Jesus does is incredibly intentional. And and Jesus is about to give us a master class in biblical theology. So Jesus is gonna pull from the old testament, and then he's going to bring clarification to a modern situation. In a sense, this is exactly what we're trying to do today. We're doing a biblical theology.

We're gonna pull from the principles of the old testament, so we can understand what the new testament is trying to say, so we can apply it appropriately to our context today.

Lysa TerKeurts: Because that's part of the beauty of God's word, you know. It's like scripture affirms scripture, and so we can toggle between the Old Testament and the New Testament, and Jesus quotes the Old Testament so much, and the people at the time would have had an understanding. The Pharisees asking this definitely would have had an understanding, not only an understanding, but they would have memorized exactly what Jesus is referring to here.

Joel Muddamalle: 100%.

Jim Cress: Is it safe to say, seriously, I know it's a Jim-ism thing. It's my mind live listening to this. I'm going, for every gotcha question, Jesus is gonna get you.

Joel Muddamalle: A 100.

Jim Cress: I mean, it's just like he gets in and there are these gotcha questions. I'm on the edge of my seat following you, and he's like, no.

Joel Muddamalle: Yeah. It feels a little bit like Houdini.

Jim Cress: Yeah. You know?

Joel Muddamalle: Like, he you'd think that he's, like, wrapped up, can't get out.

Jim Cress: That's the Pharisees and others going, we're not we weren't talking

Joel Muddamalle: 100%.

Jim Cress: And they're probably a little annoyed with him.

Joel Muddamalle: Right? So here here's what happens. He says, in the beginning, which is like, wait a minute, Genesis, God made them male and female. And now in their context, because they're so learned, they're going Genesis 1:26-27. Wait a minute. Didn't we just previous episode, we just talked about this.

Lysa TerKeurst: Mhmm. Saying that they're image bearers of Christ.

Joel Muddamalle: Okay. So you just did at least this is why this is so brilliant, and I love doing theology within the context of community. By the way, we should always do theology in the context of community. That's the ideal place for theology to be what is theology? Thinking God's thoughts after him. You just did it. So let's just do a thought experiment. Okay? Lysa, you and I have been friends for a long time. Jim, you and I now have been friends for a long time. Jimbo, you know that I'm a fantasy football guy.

Jim Cress: Mhmm.

Joel Muddamalle: Right?

Jim Cress: You are indeed.

Joel Muddamalle: Fantasy season is coming right right on I am deep in research. I've got my mock drafts, so, like, we're ready. Okay? So, Lysa, I I text you, right, you and Chaz and I say, hey Lys, I really hope the Jags are okay.

Lysa TerKeurst: Mhmm.

Joel Muddamalle: So when I say that, how do you receive that?

Lysa TerKeurst: Think about the football team Jaguars.

Joel Muddamalle: That's right. Now, how would you how would you make that connection? How would you know that I'm talking about that?

Lysa TerKeurst: Because I know the context of what you're referring to because you're in fantasy football season, but also because I live in Jacksonville.

Joel Muddamalle: That's right. And your husband just happens to be?

Lysa TerKeurst: A jaguar fan.

Joel Muddamalle: Right. Okay. So often what ends up happening is in season, I'll watch the Jacksonville Jaguars. I will try to pick a player on the just because there's a relational connection, you know. And when they play really well, I'll text Chaz, man that was a great game. And if they're not playing so great, I'll text Chaz. Oof, that was tough. Right? So there's context around this, and you can pull from that modern context. Now what's fascinating is imagine that, you're actually in a in a different scenario. You're actually a zoo keeper.

Lysa TerKeurst: Mhmm.

Joel Muddamalle: K? You're a zoo keeper. Alright? And I say, Lysa, how are the Jags doing?

Lysa TerKeurst: Then I would say, you know what? I'm gonna have to go over and look where the jaguar animals are and make sure they're okay.

Joel Muddamalle: Okay. Look at the context.

Jim Cress: What if you were a dealership owner?

Joel Muddamalle: That's right.

Jim Cress: You have a third understanding.

Joel Muddamalle: Yeah.

Lysa TerKeurst: And you would probably say what what year? What model?

Joel Muddamalle: That -- okay. So I just wanna point this out to all of you that we actually do all of this in real time consistently. We do it really, really well. And so what we're trying to do is we're trying to retrieve what Jesus and the people who are listening to Jesus at that time, what they're doing. And so when Jesus starts with, haven't you read, and then he goes, in the beginning they created the male and female. Notice Jesus doesn't have to say in the likeness of God. Of course, their brain is going right to that. They're understanding the entire context of it. And he also said, for this reason, a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no one separate. And then, it's really interesting, verse seven.

Why then, so this is the Pharisees, they asked him, did Moses command us to give divorce papers and to send her away? So notice the first thing that Jesus is very technical, very important. He elevates the ideal of marriage. But even as he elevates the ideal of marriage, and if you haven't watched episode one, I'd highly encourage you to watch episode one, that in marriage, you've got two image bearers of God that were given that image prior to they even came together. That was what they had individually, and these two image bearers come together to honor the Lord in a covenant marriage.

And then, what the Pharisees and Sadducees the Pharisees are doing here is they then question, well, did Moses command us to give divorce papers and to send and then verse eight says, he told them Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because of the hardness of your hearts, but it was not like that from the beginning.

It's really interesting here that, when Jesus is kind of cornered, and essentially what the Pharisees are trying to do is they're trying to trap Jesus, Jesus actually responds by saying your initial interpretation is actually already off base.

You see, they are actually stepping into an already known and heavily debated conversation that comes from Deuteronomy 24:1-4, and it's the issue of the the Hebrew word is ervat devar, which just means indecency. Right? And so around this time, there are these two schools of thoughts. You've got the Halal school of thought, and then you've got the Shammai school of thought. The --

Lysa TerKeurst: And Joel, when you say school of thought, you're talking about, like, a group of people. Right?

Joel Muddamalle: Yes.

Lysa TerKeurst: So there's this group that has one perspective of the text and a group that has another perspective.

Joel Muddamalle: And there's there's some legitimacy to it. They're pulling from I mean, it's kinda like doctrines today. Like, you we've got, secondary and tertiary things that we would look at and say, well, I kinda have a compass in terms of the nature of God and salvation, or, maybe somebody else has a different view. Now we would all believe in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus, but we've got different views of the interpretation of that, and this is nothing new. This is happening at the time of Jesus. Now this matter actually is significant because it plays into the question of divorce and how Jesus understands it. So basically what the Pharisees want is the Pharisees want to kinda corner Jesus and to make him pick between one of the camps.

Depending on how Jesus respond kind of, like, show his hand on where he is. So, I think this is important. I'm gonna read it to you just because,

Lysa TerKeurst: And also because they wanna know who's right.

Joel Muddamalle: Yeah.

Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah. That's such a human thing.

Joel Muddamalle: Such a human thing.

So the Hillel school of thought recognized that the Hebrew phrase, ervat davar, could refer to either a matter or an indecency. So they came up with an understanding that for any matter of indecency, a divorce could take place. So an extreme example found in rabbinic writing is that a husband could get a divorce if his wife spoiled that's it. That's what? That's what okay. That's it.

Jim Cress: Wow.

Joel Muddamalle: As we can imagine, there's an issue here. The Shammai school of thought, on the other hand, viewed divorce as viable only as a result of indecency displayed in adultery.

So Jesus actually, he recognizes the trap that's set in front of him, and he realizes that the Pharisees really want him to make a choice between one of these two. And the Pharisees are trying to test him. But notice the first thing that Jesus just does, and he corrects them. He goes, well, actually, Moses did not command for you to get a divorce. He permitted it.

So what he's actually starting with is saying, by the way, divorce doesn't have to be mandatory. There is this sense that you should pursue reconciliation if possible, if there's repentance. I mean, all those things would be playing in the back of the mind of these individuals.
The other thing that's actually happening here is that Jesus is raising the level of responsibility of the man. This is actually kind of a wild so again, I just because I don't want the details wrong, the Pharisees approach him to test him. This is Matthew 19:3.

Jesus starts the discussion about marriage and divorce, and he gives a side tangent.

He says, you know, haven't you read? And then he goes to God's ideal for marriage. So the concept of marriage at the time of Jesus, was intended to be monogamous, not polygamous. Right? So married to one woman. But there's an important clarifier. In the ancient world, polygamy was acceptable, but it was going out of favor. But in this society, adultery, so wild, y'all. Adultery was always an offense against the husband. That's it. So adultery would not be an offense against the woman. So it referred to the sexual unfaithfulness of a married woman. A man could have sex with an unmarried woman, and in doing so, technically, did not commit adultery. Committed fornication, but not adultery.

Notice what Jesus does. Jesus won't stand Yeah. The implication in his reply is the widening of the context of adultery, meaning that if a man sleeps with someone other than his wife, it's adultery. In the same way, if a woman commits sexual infidelity against her husband, it's adultery. So once again, Jesus is actually pulling back to Genesis and raising the level of of responsibility. Sometimes you read this and it's like, well, what Jesus, what are you doing? When if you're in the ancient world and you're a dude, you're like, did he just say that? Did he just call me the carpet? Like, would I have an expectation? And and that's what's happening. And then he goes to this idea that, you know, I tell you verse nine, whoever divorces his wife except for sexual morality and marries another commits adultery.

The phrases that Jesus is quoting and using here come from a couple old testament passages. Deuteronomy 24:1, which says that he may write her a divorce certificate and hand it to her and send her away from his house. And what's super fascinating about the divorce certificate is in the ancient world, all of the nations around, the people of Israel, the think about the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Philistines, you know, all the ites that lived in that area.

There was not found a thing called the certificate of divorce. This was something unique that God establishes

Lysa TerKeurst: For his people.

Joel Muddamalle: In Israel.

Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah.

Joel Muddamalle: And the reason why he establishes it is to protect women. He does it to aid a safety net for them in the situation of real desperation and despair. And so what Jesus is doing is once again, he's echoing back, he's calling back to, this passage in Deuteronomy. And not only there, but Jesus also is pulling from Exodus 21:10. And so this is one of those things that from a cultural kind of context standpoint, I think it's really important that we have. So let's just take a quick look at Exodus 21:10, message about how a husband should treat a wife.

And, in this situation, there are three categories that, are stated in Exodus 21 starting in verse 10. It says this, if he takes an additional wife, he must not reduce look at the three things, the food, the clothing, or the marital rights of the wife of the first wife. And if he does not do these three things for her, she may leave free of charge without any payment. So you have these three categories, food, clothing, and marital rights all underneath the context of abandonment.

And this was well known of the time period. How do we know this is well known in the time period? There are archaeological now from Masada and the Dead Sea Scrolls, the caves where they're found. And guess what fascinating, they found marriage certificates. And guess what verse is quoted on all of the marriage certificates?

That verse right there.

Lysa TerKeurst: Wow.

Joel Muddamalle: So much so that the rabbis take this idea and they kind of extrapolate and they make it the basis by which the society is supposed to be run. The expectation of the husband and the wife is that each would have a part to play, and the husband's role is to provide food, to provide clothing, and marital rights. This could, the intimacy of sex. It could also be just love, the emotional presence that is required in a marriage. And this is the context

Lysa TerKeurst: And the emotional safety.

Joel Muddamalle: And the emotional safety of a marriage. And so, again, you know, some of you might now think, well, it's clear, Joel, that Jesus clarifies and he says that the only reason for divorce is in the context of adultery. But I think we need to really think about this for a second and remember Jesus is intentionally pulling from an old testament context in the same way that he did with Genesis 1:25-26 he's also doing here.

And so, the people who are listening and, receiving these words, they would, in their mind, when they hear this phrase, they would instantly think, oh, yeah, adultery, which is the trigger word to say, also we've got emotional, material, and physical neglect.

The original hearer would not put this as a saying divorce is restricted only to cases of adultery. They would have filled in the gaps and recognized that Jesus, of course, had in mind other categories of valid grounds.

Now, again, I wanna just be honest here that this is the position and the view that, you know, after a lot of research and study, and I'm pulling a lot from, an ancient Near Eastern scholar, Dr. Instone Brewer, who I'm gonna quote here.

Instone Brewer, who is the one who actually went through all the records and the manuscripts and everything, he says this, contemporary Jews would have mentally added something like this whether it was present or not. They would have either added except for valid grounds, if they were thinking of divorce in general, or except for indecency, if they were just thinking about Deuteronomy 24:1.

Now there are other views, and there's other scholars that might debate this, but I think once again with Therapy and Theology, we don't wanna tell you what to think. We wanna give you a lot to think about. And I'm really hopeful that as you consider the cultural context of this, you would actually see a couple very important things about Jesus, regardless of where you land on the details. And here's the thing, Jesus elevates women. He loves women. He wants to protect women. Jesus cares deeply about the ideal of marriage.

But he wants marriage to be presented in a way that honors him, that honors the church, and is not destructive to the two image bearers that come into that marriage.

And then finally, I think the third thing is that Jesus wants, and we're pulling from that first episode, Jesus really does want you and I to live up to that, that status that we've been given as image bearers of God. And that is how we love one another within the context of marriage, because it's actually directly pointing to Jesus and his love for the church.

Lysa TerKeurst: You know, there's so much shame that can happen sometimes, Jim, around divorce, and especially if someone has gone through a lot of experienced a lot of destructive realities within the context of their marriage, and just for the point of our discussion, I'll say a woman, but I do understand sometimes men are on the receiving and destructive behaviors of their wife. So this includes both going back and forth.

But just for the sake of clarity and conversation, what is it like to sit across from a woman and you know the destructive behaviors of her husband more than, like like, it's it's just over, There's so much evidence

Jim Cress: No doubt.

Lysa TerKeurst: That she has biblical grounds for divorce or that she, according to the scriptures, should not carry shame on her divorce. And yet she still has shame because other people say, well, like, with abuse, did did you have a bruise?

Jim Cress: Yeah. Really?

Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah.

Jim Cress: Go ahead.

Lysa TerKeurst: Or, okay. Well, did he have an affair? You know? And that can be extremely, hurtful and heat shame on the woman who has experienced some really horrific things, and she's experienced emotional abandonment. She's experienced verbal abuse. She's experienced sexual abuse. She's experienced emotional, abandonment. All of those things. And so what is it like to sit across from her and and just care tenderly for her heart? Like, what do you say to a woman who's filled with shame like that?

Jim Cress: Great question. Before I say anything, I listen. Listen and silent have the exact same letters. And when she would be at a pause or be done by some of the narrative, I'm gonna say lean in instead of leaning back. Is there more? But you all can do that. You can do that with people in your conversation. Often, it's like, no one hardly ever listens to me. Right? I my little hub, Prince Fu's there, is, H, I hear you. It's not meant to be clever.

I hear you, you I understand you or I really want to understand you, and B, I believe you, which we've said too many times that when you looked at me one time and and have said here on the podcast that one of the most helpful things I did was to say, I believe you. That was not a technique.

So in that with the shame, I talk to people often. I'm not worried about knowing someone's motive, but their modus operandi, the method of op and I find Joel and Lysa right back into that New Testament context you just took us through. The whether it's their motive or not, they are coming with an operating system, the modus operandi of a Pharisee. It doesn't mean that's their motive, but they will be coming your people are down on what they're not up on. So people outside, I do shame primarily, which I've said here, and it's in the divorce book, self hatred at my expense. I literally can not just what others are doing, but myself, I will almost condemn.

Well, there's no condemnation in Christ Jesus.I I hate myself at one level. We gotta explore. That's one of the things I'll explore. Self hatred at my expense. Self hatred at my expense because with that, I I want to explore at my expense what's it costing me. I also do social hatred, s h a m e, at my expense. I just feel and sometimes it's accurate that there are people out there even in the church or people close to me or, yes, even family or friends feel like they they have hatred or condemnation, and then, of course, great accuser of people Satan satanic hatred at my expense.

So with that, I want to explore the narratives of shame, we've said often.

If it's hysterical, it can be historical and say, where else has shame been in your life? And I will try to help them with shame eradication, but far more, I wanna see shame resiliency. My word of an intentional resiliency. It's not just regular resiliency. It's intentional that I see this in the midst of the shame or this is where many, like the woman in the the text taken in in in adultery.

Of course, the dude's not there. Right? And it kinda ties into what you were saying. But to look and say, how do I rise strong in the midst of these internal accusations or external ones and really help them walk through it. But the big thing to start with is just tell me the story. Jesus was so good with that. Tell me the narrative.

Lysa TerKeurst: Joel, there's another important aspect of this that is around the dowry. And we come at it in here, because that's another important distinctive, if you will, when we're looking at scripture that most people don't know, but because you know it, I'd love for you to educate us a little bit about that.

Joel Muddamalle: Yeah. So this is directly connected to the certificate of divorce. And so once again, the ancient Near Eastern world, very unique, actually exclusive for the Israelites to have this as a protection for the woman. The other interesting thing is that when a woman came into a marriage, she brought with her, typically her dad, her family would bring a dowry payment of a sort as part of, an exchange of vows. I mean, actually, we do this in modern day scenarios. When we get married, we do an exchange of rings, you know, so this is my wedding ring.

And you do an exchange of rings, as a way to show, like, your love and your, connection point. In the Old Testament, what's so fascinating is this diary, I think the Hebrew is called Ketubah, this was something that was not handed over to the husband. Fascinating.

It was something that was actually held typically because it was a patriarchal system. So it was supposed to be held by the husband on behalf of the wife, and it served as a fiscal, a financial safety net for the wife in the case that the husband would have died or in worst case scenario, where a divorce takes place. Right. So in the scenario where the husband hands a certificate of divorce to the wife, the wife is now able to do two things. One, she's actually able to remarry.

That's the whole purpose of a certificate of divorce. It's so that another man might come in and say, oh, this is a woman. That person is not committing adultery. Right? And it's like, okay, we can get married. But then the second thing is that that woman has a safety net, a financial safety net to survive in case that there is no other husband. Another interesting detail is, let's say, that the woman goes and then gets married to the second husband. Second husband is, like, an amazing dude. They have a beautiful marriage, and the second husband dies. Right?

Now the second husband is extremely wealthy, and the and and so she has accumulated some wealth as a result of that.

First husband, knucklehead, he's still around, and he looks and he's like, wait a minute. My ex wife got some money now. I know what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna go back and marry her and claim her as my own. So written into the marriage contract marriage law is that you could not remarry.

Jim Cress: Jeremiah talks about that.

Joel Muddamalle: That's exactly right.

Lysa TerKeurst: And and this is not -- committing it's not, banning remarriage for all women.

Joel Muddamalle: No.

Lysa TerKeurst: It's it's banning the husband, the first husband, from coming back.

Joel Muddamalle: Coming back and claiming her, and then because it's a fiscal opportunity, a financial opportunity, take all her money as well as a result of it. So you've got this, like, certificate of divorce that's actually a really important detail because it once again, it's a situation, of God, with women, and it's contrasting it in the ancient world where you didn't have this type of thing. And once again, it's framed in these three major categories of food, clothing, and marital rights. And another detail that I'm a Bible nerd, so I'll just give it to you.

In Ezekiel 16, if you just go through Ezekiel 16, the indictment that God gives against the people of Israel and really the justification for why God divorces Israel, that's the language that's used in Jeremiah and elsewhere, is he says that, God gave them food.

When he gave them food, the people give the food to idols. God is the one who clothed them, but when he gave them clothes, the people adorned the idols. God is the one who loved them, but would they in return loved idols. And so notice what's happening in Ezekiel 16, God himself is actually employing the categories that are present in Exodus 21, Deuteronomy 24 as the basis behind the divorce that he has, you know, with, Israel.

We know that God reclaims Israel. He create reclaims Judah, and he brings in the gentiles, but there's this principle that's at play that would be important for us to pay attention to because it's painting kind of, a picture for how we should understand the possibility, of the worst case scenario and how God truly does wanna create a safety net, to protect his daughters.

Lysa TerKeurst: That's amazing.

Jim Cress: Love that.

Lysa TerKeurst: Well, I know today has been a lot of theology, and we are very, very grateful, Dr. Joel Muddamalle, for all that you have put into this.

Joel Muddamalle: Can I just give a little disclaimer once again? Because I just feel like I need to.
I recognize that these are really difficult passages of scripture. And the last thing that I would want for any of you to hear or for if you're a pastor or another bible scholar to hear is to presume that from a place of pride that I've just like, thus sayeth the Lord, this is exactly what it is. That's not what we're trying to say or what I'm trying to say.

I am trying to present the very best evidence and scholarship in these areas, And once again, there is in a place of humility and kind of vulnerability here that you would really take this into consideration and, and know that this is an ongoing conversation, but one that we believe and I personally believe is so important because, the cost is, the daughters of God, and definitely the sons of God, but we've seen exponentially, at least in our ministry, the impact this is having on women, and so I just wanna present that as well.

Lysa TerKeurst: Thank you for your your humility. Thank you for all the education that you have sought, and the deep research that you have done. I hope today was helpful. I think this is one of those episodes that you'll probably want to, go back and listen to, especially if you're on the go right now, that's where I like to listen to my podcast is out walking, or just running errands, or whatever, and if that's the case I encourage you go back and do what Joel said. Open up your Bible, have some time to review, and replay this episode, and take notes because I do think this stuff is important.

And like we very beginning of the show, this is in no way shape or form meant to glorify divorce. We are very very much wanting to protect the sanctity of marriage and the beauty of marriage as God intended it, but we also want at the very same time to be honest about what so many people are walking through right now. So if that's you or you know someone who's walking through a divorce, I pray that this information will be something that you really do pray through, think through, and study yourself.

Shae Hill: Thanks for tuning in to today's conversation. Here's a few things I don't want you to miss. First, we want to hear from you and would be so honored if you took the survey you can find by accessing the link in our show notes. Your feedback is crucial for shaping future therapy and theology conversations and experiences. Also, make sure you secure your copy of Surviving an Unwanted Divorce, co written by Lysa, Dr. Joel, and Jim. You can find that link by visiting the show notes as well. Therapy and Theology is by Proverbs 31 Ministries where we believe if you know the truth and live the truth, it changes everything. We'll see you next time.