Tag: Adultery

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Gambling with your eyes.

Reading Time: 3 minutes

“You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’ But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Matthew‬ ‭5‬:‭27‬-‭28‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Jesus sets a moral standard that not only captures the core of a commandment, it goes above and beyond, peering into and piercing the human heart. This is something only God can do.

When Jesus says, “you’ve heard it said…” it wasn’t to remind them or us about the latest trashy trends of gossip and giggles about cheaters and their sleazy rendezvous. Jesus was referring to a hard-core law #7 in Exodus 20:14: “Thou shalt not commit adultery.”

So interesting that behaviors surrounding the deed, the act, the breach, start with the “wandering eye.” Even Psychology Today recognizes this as a major problem in relationships! “Having a wandering eye in romantic contexts can lead to feelings of inadequacy and insecurity in partners, potentially eroding trust and satisfaction in the relationship. Research suggests that those who frequently notice attractive alternatives may be more likely to cheat, as it can signal emotional disengagement and a lack of commitment.”

Lust doesn’t start with the act, it starts with a look?

Jesus was right. Behavioral problems don’t begin with the act itself, they start with a thought. The oldest book in the Bible quotes old Job saying, “I made a covenant with my eyes…” Job writes, “I made a covenant with my eyes not to look with lust at a young woman” Job 31:1. Well, we know that the actual contract was a thought and a commitment made in his heart before it ever reached his eyes.

This whole idea of acceptable levels of adultery or cheating (which makes it sound as evil as fudging on your taxes) is unbelievably awful and dangerous. No one in a serious committed relationship, who has been the recipient of broken trust, thinks it’s funny or meme worthy! Let alone a relationship that has been covenanted and consummated before God and family.

The adultery law is so wonderfully protective of men, women and children (who suffer the most in infidelity). Why in the world would anyone want to mock it or demoralize it? Jesus is not being judgey here in addressing an age-old problem of breaking trust in relationships. Jesus is being merciful, reminding men (and now women) to keep their hearts pure in commitment long before their eyes focus on adulterating a devastating future. We can read all the ancient stories or even the current headlines today; unfaithfulness destroys a marriage, a family and a healthy future for our children. Nothing has changed the outcomes, no matter how much one promotes this level of lies as personal choice and freedoms. Jesus just brilliantly says, “stop gambling with your future through your eyes!”

Prayer

​Dad,
Oh how I wish my own fathers and mothers would have heeded your wisdom! Having several generations of marital devastation would have saved me a lot of dread and fear about entering the most amazing relationship outside of the one I have with you. Seeing so much pain and heartbreak, misery and loss, certainly put a big hesitation in asking for my wife’s hand in marriage. If it had not been for your promise of proximity – “stay close to me,” you said and “you’ll stay close to her,” I would not have committed my life to the one woman I have ever loved! Thank you for your promise and power to not gamble with my eyes to the point of losing all that is precious to me. Thank you for keeping me faithful in grace and mercy.

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Is God a prude?

Reading Time: 3 minutes

“You have heard the law that says, ‘A man can divorce his wife by merely giving her a written notice of divorce.’ But I say that a man who divorces his wife, unless she has been unfaithful, causes her to commit adultery. And anyone who marries a divorced woman also commits adultery.” ‭‭Matthew‬ ‭5‬:‭31‬-‭32‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Only God would go where mortal men fear. This is Jesus, the revolutionary, speaking out on issues that were never spoken about in public. Jesus, being the light of the world, drags the deeds only done in darkness, only whispered behind closed doors, out into the open. No one exposes sin better than God. Is God a prude? Hardly.

He not only created us, but he also gave humans the free will to be and explore everything on the planet as well as everything about our own human body, soul and spirit. However, freedom doesn’t mean exploitation. Freedom doesn’t mean satisfying oneself at the expense and destruction of another. God is far more like a parent than he is catholic school teacher. He loves us.

Jesus dives into the most destructive side of our free will, exposing the dark and callous desires of our unbridled souls. Jesus just finished talking about adultery and put a hard stop on the issue of “thoughts verses physical deeds.” We all know that thoughts, good or bad, lead to behaviors. We do as we think about doing.

Here’s a thought Jesus pulled from our secret souls, “we don’t get to fantasize about destroying relationships by ‘having your way’ with whatever we set our eyes on!” Boom. That’s right. There are selfish sins against God and there’s a bunch of them against each other. The big TEN commandments were boundaries to PROTECT and preserve our relationship with God and one another. In fact four of the rules are about God, six are about each other.

These discussions in Matthew about relationship in sexual desire and covenant commitments in marriage are both about boundaries and behaviors. Yes, men were primarily called out and held responsible because, at that time, they were in power and the main offenders of these rules. God seriously and deeply cares about relationships, and Jesus highlights a couple of our major missteps in how we handle each other. No, a man or woman does not get to mentally strip, invade and exploit another human being just for fun! Neither do we get to make cheap promises.

Jesus goes after the frivolous way we treat our commitments, our covenants between a man and a woman. Moses wrote about a legal way to dissolve a marriage (Deut 24‬:‭1‬-‭2‬ ‭NLT‬‬), although we’ve got to keep in mind, God hates divorce (Malachi 2:16). He HATES everything that is destructive to our relationships! Come on, are we not smart enough to figure out the never ending cycles of pain, suffering and financial ruin of our lives that come with divorce? Have we not seen the massive, deep hurts we deposit into children’s lives by dismembering their most trusted bond between their parents? Do we not recognize an entire generation of fatherless children because our parents were so self absorbed to just do whatever they felt like doing? Why are we mad at God and blame him for being a prude when we are obviously so foolish and blind to our own destructive desires and behaviors?

I am not an expert on divorce by any means. However, I had to pick up the broken shards of fragile glass in my own soul. My family, my heritage is littered with divorce and remarriage! My own adopted mother, searching for true love, safety and belonging went shopping for a man FOUR times. With her last attempt at relationship, she just gave up on the covenant of marriage and allowed a live-in looser to suck her life and finances dry for over a decade! I believe that Jesus is not only speaking TRUTH, he is also saving us from the LIES we tell ourselves and others. Here’s the facts, adultery and divorce destroys relationships and are toxic and deadly to everyone involved.

Prayer

Dad,
Forgive us oh God for we know what we do and what harm it causes, but we want to do it anyways. Save our children from our selfish foolishness.

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Sister wives and impolite dinner conversations.

Reading Time: 3 minutes 
“During the reign of King Josiah, the Lord said to me, “Have you seen what fickle Israel has done? Like a wife who commits adultery, Israel has worshiped other gods on every hill and under every green tree. I thought, ‘After she has done all this, she will return to me.’ But she did not return, and her faithless sister Judah saw this. She saw that I divorced faithless Israel because of her adultery. But that treacherous sister Judah had no fear, and now she, too, has left me and given herself to prostitution.” Jeremiah‬ ‭3:6-8‬ ‭NLT‬‬

God speaks to Jeremiah and it sounds like an episode from Sister Wives. God uses massive marriage, family and sisterhood language to explain just how inappropriate and hurtful are His own people, His chosen people are behaving towards him.

This passage reminds me of a couple of other Bible stories where the writers use very real, very course language to describe Israel’s sin. One is in Ezekiel 23, the other is the book of Hosea. It is interesting and disturbing that God would use and had to use such vivid, x-rated imagery to communicate Israel’s complete rejection of His love and care for them.

This was NOT polite dinner conversations! Oftentimes, parents today will not let their children read these Bible stories until they are old enough to understand the true consequences of choices and real and long lasting effects of sin.

God says, Israel has been having open love affairs with idols – actual wooden poles and stone figurines. Now, they weren’t having physical sex, but they were certainly giving themselves away in every other way. These idols, although dead, inanimate objects someone had a reputation for being really needy. They needed cash, fresh fruits, veggies and meat. They needed constant attention and in extreme cases demanded a human sacrifice for time to time, normally one of their children.

God told Jeremiah he thought Israel would go off, sow some wild oats and then come home, come back to Himself. Well Israel didn’t return and God served them divorce papers – God was done with that side of the family. But worse, Judah, the “other sister,” copied Israel’s behavior and just gave up the monogamous relationship all together.

It was through this long history of heartbreak that God shows us who we really are when we have full free choice! We all, like dogs in heat, just run off to find pleasure or “freedom” anywhere we can. This is Us! Read the rest of this story and you’ll see just how tiring it was for God to continue to pursue a people who were constantly running away from Him – not towards Him. These cycles of selfish pursuit are stories of God’s own chosen group, not some Philistine, Canaanite or Assyrian folks. Those people were KNOWN violent, brutal, highly immoral people. Yet, they weren’t any worse than Israel and Judah! When there’s no clear difference in the way God’s people live from the non-believers of God, there’s a serious problem, right?

Prayer

Dad,
Wow. We are a piece of work! History certainly does repeat itself. All I can think of is this impolite dinner talk being the real picture of what Paul said to the churches in Rome, “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Oftentimes I think of the small sins and offenses and think, “I’m not that bad.” Then I read of the folks who regularly cheated on you and profaned your gifts of mercy, and remember “oh yeah, that’s in my heart as well.” I’m really humbled that I have to be reminded of how bad, how desperately wicked is my wandering soul, unchecked by your Holy Spirit! Forgive me. Forgive us as the Church.