Is It Ever Ok for a Believer to Divorce – Part 2
(October 6, 2025)
We learned last week that the only reason Jesus allowed for divorce was adultery.
We discovered that traditions of men had perverted God’s instructions through
Moses in Deuteronomy 24:1 to mean that a man could divorce his wife for any
reason she became “displeasing to him.” This misinterpretation put the woman in
a very vulnerable position because in that culture a divorced woman had very few
ways to support herself. Usually, she either remarried or became a prostitute.
But there is another circumstance in which Scripture allows for divorce and that is
found in 1 Corinthians 7:15, where Paul says, “But if the unbeliever leaves, let it be
so. The brother or sister is not bound in such circumstances; God has called us to
live in peace.” Jesus did not address this situation directly, however, Paul was
inspired to write this passage by the Holy Spirit and so I believe it is valid.
In this case, the spouse who is not a believer leaves the marriage and the Holy
Spirit, through Paul, states that the believer is not bound in such a circumstance. I
believe that this means that the believer does not have to remain married to the
spouse who left the marriage.
This passage does not imply that there is adultery involved, though it is a
possibility. It simply declares that the believer is not obligated to remain married
to someone who abandons the marriage. This situation occurs when a person
becomes a believer after the marriage has been consummated. Scripture is clear
that a believer should not marry an unbeliever under any circumstances (2
Corinthians 6:14).
The question then becomes, “Does a believer, in the case of abandonment, have
the right to remarry? I believe they do, but only to another believer. Since the
unbeliever left the marriage and broke the covenant they made before God, the
believer is then free to marry, but only in the faith. I hope this helps anyone who
has been abandoned by their spouse and has been told they are forced to remain
single for the rest of their life. God said, “It is not good for a person to be alone.”