1 He left that place and went to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan. And crowds again gathered around him, and, as was his custom, he again taught them. 2 Some, testing him, asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” 3 He answered them, “What did Moses command you?” 4 They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her.” 5 But Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote this commandment for you. 6 But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ 7 ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, 8 and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. 9 Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate. 10 Then in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. 11 He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her, 12 and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”
Prayer Focus: As we have seen throughout the gospel of Mark, in these verses the Pharisees are testing Jesus again, and today the topic is divorce and remarriage. Notice that they speak of marriage in legal terms, yet Jesus speaks of it in spiritual terms. They want to know what is lawful, while Jesus affirming the theological meaning. They are trying to catch Jesus getting the law wrong, and Jesus is trying to demonstrate that they are not even speaking the same language. Too often our cultural assumptions and legalistic language keep us from recognizing the inbreaking of God’s kingdom into our world. Pray today that you might be able to recognize your assumptions, and be able to unpack them so that you don’t miss what Christ is trying to say to you.
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