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One Gospel, Common Ground — Unity from the Very Beginning of Romans

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Romans, Scripture

In the previous posts in this series, we’ve worked carefully through Paul’s argument that the Roman church shares one story and belongs to one family. Jew and Gentile alike have been grafted into God’s covenant faithfulness through Jesus Christ. There is no “better group,” no privileged side of the aisle—only mercy received and grace extended.

That foundational truth leads us to a necessary conclusion:

Our shared story and our shared righteousness in Christ give us no right to divide from other brothers and sisters in Christ.

We are all made righteous by Christ.
We are all sinners and broken.
And none of us get to impose our will on others.

Paul is not promoting uniformity. He is promoting unity.

What’s remarkable is that Paul does not wait until the middle of Romans to make this case. He embeds it directly into the opening of the letter. Long before he addresses food laws, holy days, or the “weak and strong,” Paul establishes an understanding that makes division seem ridiculous from the very beginning.

The Gospel That Levels the Playing Field

As we saw in earlier posts, Romans is not a generic theological treatise. It is a pastoral letter written to a divided church. That context matters as we read Paul’s opening words.

Paul introduces himself as a servant of Christ Jesus, set apart for the gospel of God—a gospel promised beforehand through Israel’s Scriptures and fulfilled in Jesus (Romans 1:1–3). From the outset, Paul connects Jewish hope and Gentile inclusion into a single story.

Jesus is described as a descendant of David and, through the Spirit of Holiness, appointed Son of God in power by the resurrection. That phrase—Spirit of Holiness—would have resonated deeply with Jewish hearers. But “Son of God” would have rung loudly in Roman ears as well.

Caesar claimed that title.

Paul is quietly but unmistakably declaring that Jesus—not the emperor, not ethnic identity, not cultural authority—has been enthroned as Lord. And He was crowned not by military conquest, but by resurrection.

No emperor has risen from the dead.

That matters because once Jesus is confessed as Lord, no subgroup within the church gets to claim dominance. We all have a future resurrection awaiting us, thus we stand together under Christ’s Lordship.

Allegiance to Christ removes every other claim to authority.

Obedience That Comes from Faith

Paul explains that his apostleship exists to call all nations—Gentiles included—to “the obedience that comes from faith” (Romans 1:5). As we’ve seen repeatedly throughout this series, this phrase is central to Paul’s vision.

Obedience does not produce righteousness.
Faith produces obedience.

This places every believer on equal footing. Jew and Gentile. Slave and free. Torah-observant and non-observant. No one earns justification. Everyone receives it by faith.

Even Paul’s greeting reflects this unity. He blends charis (grace), a common Greek greeting, with shalom (peace), the traditional Jewish greeting. Grace and peace are not competing values—they belong together. The same is true of those who use those greetings in the church.

Before Paul corrects the church, he greets them as one people.

Mutual Encouragement, Not Spiritual Hierarchy

Paul’s desire to visit Rome is not about asserting authority. He wants to visit for the sake of mutual encouragement—shared faith strengthening one another (Romans 1:11–12).

This reinforces what we’ve already seen in earlier posts: spiritual gifts exist for mutual edification, not leverage (see Paul’s comments on 1 Corinthians 12-14 for more on this). The gospel dismantles hierarchy inside the church.

Paul even binds himself to both sides of the Roman divide, describing his obligation to Greeks and non-Greeks, the wise and the foolish (Romans 1:14). He refuses to sort the church into spiritual classes of winners and losers—right verses wrong.

That’s why Paul insists on preaching the gospel to people who already believe. Because the gospel does not merely save—it reshapes communities into the likeness of Christ.

Righteousness Revealed, Boasting Removed

Romans 1:16–17 introduces the thesis of the entire letter: the gospel reveals God’s righteousness, a righteousness received by faith from beginning to end.

As we’ve already explored in previous posts, this righteousness is not something we achieve—it is something God gives. And once righteousness is received rather than earned, boasting has nowhere to stand.

Which brings us to humanity’s shared problem.

Paul’s discussion of sin in Romans 1 is not aimed at outsiders alone. The list of sins—envy, strife, deceit, gossip, arrogance, lack of mercy—mirrors the very behavior dividing the Roman church.

The warning is clear: when believers fail to recognize what God is doing through the gospel—when unity is suppressed in favor of judgment—people experience the consequences of their own sinful divisions.

That leads directly into Paul’s confrontation in Romans 2.

This blog post is part of a series of posts on Paul’s letter to the Roman Church. You can see the rest of the posts here.

  1. When the Gospel Replaces Power with Peace
  2. Strong, Weak, and the Call to Build One Another Up
  3. Shared Story, Shared Family—Romans 9 and the People of God
  4. Grafted Together — Romans 10-11 and the Gospel of Unity
  5. One Gospel, Common Ground — Unity from the Very Beginning of Romans
  6. Same Problem, Same Grace — How Faith Makes Us One
  7. No Advantage, No Boasting — Faith That Levels the Church
  8. Dead Together, Alive Together — Life in the Spirit and the “We” of Romans 8

Grafted Together — Romans 10–11 and the Gospel of Unity

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Church health, Romans, Scripture

Romans 9–11 speaks powerfully to both sides of the Roman church’s divide—but Paul is intentional in how he addresses each group.

In Romans 9–10, Paul speaks primarily to the weak—mostly Jewish believers who felt both privileged by their heritage and threatened by the Gentiles’ freedom.

Paul begins with deep sorrow and love for his people. He acknowledges Israel’s immense advantage: adoption, covenants, law, worship, promises, and the Messiah Himself. But then he draws a painful line.

Heritage does not equal righteousness.

Being descended from Abraham does not automatically make someone part of what Paul means by “Israel.” True belonging has always been rooted in promise, not genealogy, and in faith, not accomplishment.

Romans 10 drives the point home: Israel was zealous—but sought righteousness in the wrong place. They tried to establish their own righteousness rather than submitting to God’s righteousness revealed in Christ.

That’s the warning.

The comfort is this: God has not abandoned Israel. He is keeping His promises—but He is keeping them through Jesus, not Torah observance.

Righteousness comes by faith.
For Jews.
For Gentiles.
For the weak.
For the strong.

And only by faith in Jesus can we be considered righteous before God.

A Word to the Strong

Then Paul turns to the strong—the Gentiles who had remained in Rome, gained influence, and were tempted toward arrogance.

To make his point, Paul uses one of the most vivid metaphors in Scripture: the olive tree.

Gentiles are wild branches grafted into Israel’s cultivated root. They share in the nourishment—but they do not support the root. The root supports them.

Paul’s warning is sharp:
Do not be arrogant.
Do not bully the weak.
Do not mistake grace for entitlement.

God grafted you in by kindness—and He can cut you off if you aren’t bearing Christlike fruit.

Love for one another is our responsibility.
Judgment is God’s responsibility.

The strong do not get to weaponize God’s judgment against the weak. They do not get to impose their will, erase conscience, or rewrite the story to center themselves.

Unity is not optional in the church because it is the gospel lived out for the world to see.

Living the Story We Proclaim

Paul insists that divisions within the body of Christ contradict the message of reconciliation we claim to believe.

Strong looking down on weak is sinful.
Weak imposing control over strong is sinful.

Why?

Because neither reflects the story God is telling—the story of two becoming one, of branches grafted together, of enemies reconciled into family.

We are called not only to believe the gospel of unity—but to embody it through the way we live and worship together.

Our relationships preach to the world around us.

They preach to Gentiles.
They preach to Jews.
They preach to a watching world desperate for something better than power struggles and tribalism.

And Paul’s conclusion is clear:

God is faithful—to Israel, to the Gentiles, to the weak, and to the strong. Our God is always faithful.

Therefore, the strong must embrace the weak.
The weak must welcome the strong.
And together, they must live as one family in Christ Jesus.

Because anything less distorts the gospel we claim to proclaim.

This blog post is part of a series of posts on Paul’s letter to the Roman Church. You can see the rest of the posts here.

  1. When the Gospel Replaces Power with Peace
  2. Strong, Weak, and the Call to Build One Another Up
  3. Shared Story, Shared Family—Romans 9 and the People of God
  4. Grafted Together — Romans 10-11 and the Gospel of Unity
  5. One Gospel, Common Ground — Unity from the Very Beginning of Romans
  6. Same Problem, Same Grace — How Faith Makes Us One
  7. No Advantage, No Boasting — Faith That Levels the Church
  8. Dead Together, Alive Together — Life in the Spirit and the “We” of Romans 8

Shared Story, Shared Family — Romans 9 and the People of God

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Church health, Romans, Scripture

In my last two blog posts, we’ve worked to establish the context of Paul’s letter to the Romans. This was not a calm, unified church receiving abstract theology. It was a deeply divided community—primarily along ethnic lines—trying to follow Jesus in the heart of the Roman Empire.

Emperor Claudius had expelled Jewish Christians from Rome, leaving Gentiles to shape the church’s life and leadership. When Jewish believers eventually returned, the church they came back to no longer felt like home. Customs had changed. Power had shifted. And before long, the church found itself divided into two camps Paul famously calls “the weak” and “the strong.”

The strong could tolerate more.
The weak could not.

And the strong interpreted the weak’s convictions as a sign of inferior faith.

If that sounds distant or theoretical, it shouldn’t.

During the COVID pandemic, I watched churches fracture along similar lines. I got to see this personally in two congregations. One congregations had many members who worked in medical professions. The other half were mostly farmers and oil field workers. They were working with different data, different risks, and different lived realities—and some began accusing the other side of having weak faith based on the decisions they made in good conscience.

One church leader proudly proclaimed to me, “Not one thing has changed in my life since this nonsense started. I don’t know what everyone’s problem is.”

And at the same time, I buried dear friends who died of COVID and from suicide during the pandemic. I also buried my grandmother whose funeral would normally have exceeded capacity of the church building. Instead, it was only a few family members in attendance due to regulations.

Everything in my life changed.

This is not an ancient problem. It is a human one.

And so Paul writes Romans to show the church how to replace power and privilege with the peace that comes from the gospel, so they can become a truly righteous community.

Righteousness Begins with Relationships

Here’s a main theme in Romans—one that’s easy to miss:

If we do not allow the gospel of Jesus Christ to shape how we relate to one another, we are not a righteous community.

If we do not allow the gospel to shape our understanding of peace, we are not righteous.

And if we insist on defining righteousness on our own terms rather than God’s, we will never stand righteous before Him.

That is why Romans 9–11 matters so much.

Paul does something unexpected here. Instead of focusing on individual salvation, he zooms out to tell a story—a shared story—reminding the church who they are together.

A Shared Story, Not Competing Stories

Romans 9–11 is packed with names and narratives.

Abraham and Sarah
Isaac and Rebecca
Jacob and Esau
Moses and Pharaoh
David
Elijah
Hosea
Isaiah
Exile and return
Failure and mercy

These are not random references. Paul is reminding the church that they belong to a long, unfolding story of God’s covenant faithfulness.

And here’s the key:
Paul is not asking, “Which individuals will be saved?”
He is asking, “Who are the people of God?”

That distinction changes everything.

Romans 9:4–5 lists Israel’s privileges—covenants, law, worship, promises, patriarchs, and the Messiah Himself. And Paul emphasizes something shocking:

God accomplished all of this through the weak.

Paul’s argument is not about superiority…about who’s right and who is wrong. It’s about faith. God has always worked through unlikely people, flawed families, and broken systems to accomplish His purposes. And the people he chose to work through were chosen because of faith.

One Family, One Promise

What Paul reveals is that God’s plan was never ethnic exclusivity. It was always inclusion of the other.

God has been faithful to Abraham’s family in order to include the nations in his salvation.

This one family—Jew and Gentile together—is what Paul elsewhere calls “the Israel of God” (Galatians 6:15–16). Not defined by circumcision or uncircumcision, but by living the new creation reality in Christ.

This means Romans is not telling their story.

It’s telling our story.

When our story culminates in Christ—when righteousness comes not from heritage, law, or effort, but from Jesus—blame dissolves. Superiority collapses. Division loses its footing.

You are not the problem.
I am not the solution.
We are the people God is redeeming.
Together we are the Israel of God.

And that changes how we see one another.

This blog post is part of a series of posts on Paul’s letter to the Roman Church. You can see the rest of the posts here.

  1. When the Gospel Replaces Power with Peace
  2. Strong, Weak, and the Call to Build One Another Up
  3. Shared Story, Shared Family—Romans 9 and the People of God
  4. Grafted Together — Romans 10-11 and the Gospel of Unity
  5. One Gospel, Common Ground — Unity from the Very Beginning of Romans
  6. Same Problem, Same Grace — How Faith Makes Us One
  7. No Advantage, No Boasting — Faith That Levels the Church
  8. Dead Together, Alive Together — Life in the Spirit and the “We” of Romans 8

Strong, Weak, and the Call to Build One Another Up

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Church health, Romans

One of the most misunderstood sections of Romans is Paul’s discussion of “the strong” and “the weak.”

The issue appears simple—food laws, holy days, personal convictions—but Paul reveals something much deeper: the danger of confusing personal conviction with spiritual superiority.

The “strong” were likely mostly Gentiles, confident in their freedom.

They felt they were superior knowing food sacrificed to idols was a farce, and they had no qualms eating it and praising the Lord for it.

The “weak” were likely mostly Jewish believers, shaped by Torah and conscience.

For them, such actions offended their sensibilities, and they felt victimized that others in the church wouldn’t adopt their practices on such issues.

The two groups hold polar opposite views.

And Paul does something surprising.

He refuses to tell us who is right.

Instead, he tells us who is responsible.

Acceptance Without Agreement

Paul opens Romans 14 with a radical command:

“Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters.”

Acceptance is not based on agreement with each other—it is based on our mutual standing before God.

The strong must not despise.
The weak must not judge.

Why?

Because God has accepted both.

Paul reinforces this by introducing a parallel issue—holy days.

Some observe them. Some ignore them.

Again, Paul refuses to pick sides.

Each must be fully convinced in their own mind. Each one’s beliefs and actions on these matters are done “to the Lord.”

Uniformity is not Paul’s goal. Unity is.

Living Before God, Not Each Other

Paul reminds the church that none of us live—or die—for ourselves.

Every decision we make is lived before God.

When we judge motives, we place ourselves in God’s seat. When we prioritize our rights and our desires over love, we forget who the church belongs to.

Paul’s warning is sobering:

“Why do you judge your brother or sister? … We will all stand before God’s judgment seat.”

Unity breaks down when we stop asking, “Does this honor God?” and start asking, “Do I like this?”

Rights, Love, and the Kingdom of God

Paul acknowledges freedom—but he reframes it.

The kingdom of God is not about eating and drinking.
It is about righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.

The question is not, “Am I allowed?”
The question is, “Am I building up my brothers and sisters in Christ, or am I tearing down members of Christ’s body?”

True gospel freedom expresses itself through self-limiting love.

Paul’s call is not to abandon conviction—but to consider it less important than loving one another.

Christ, the Ultimate Example

Paul closes this section by pointing us to Jesus.

Christ did not please himself.
Christ bore insults.
Christ became a servant for Jews and Gentiles alike so that with one voice, God might be glorified.

This is what righteousness looks like in community.

Not power.
Not privilege.
Not control.

But peace.

And when the church lives this way, the gospel is no longer just proclaimed—it is visible.

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him.”

That is Paul’s prayer.
And it remains God’s invitation to the church today.

This blog post is part of a series of posts on Paul’s letter to the Roman Church. You can see the rest of the posts here.

  1. When the Gospel Replaces Power with Peace
  2. Strong, Weak, and the Call to Build One Another Up
  3. Shared Story, Shared Family—Romans 9 and the People of God
  4. Grafted Together — Romans 10-11 and the Gospel of Unity
  5. One Gospel, Common Ground — Unity from the Very Beginning of Romans
  6. Same Problem, Same Grace — How Faith Makes Us One
  7. No Advantage, No Boasting — Faith That Levels the Church
  8. Dead Together, Alive Together — Life in the Spirit and the “We” of Romans 8
Unity in Diversity in Romans

When the Gospel Replaces Power with Peace

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Church health, Romans

Romans can be a complicated read.

It’s is not a letter you rush through. It is dense, pastoral, theological, and deeply practical. Trying to distill its message into a handful of lessons (in the way Romans is often taught) is a tall order…one I had to accomplish recently at an adult retreat for another church in our area.

In my experience, Romans is usually referenced, but not studied. It’s venerated for being “theological,” but never really wrestled with by church Bible studies.

But Romans was never written to be admired from a distance. It’s not supposed to be a theology textbook. It was written to shape a community.

And the struggle the Roman church faced is not all that different from the struggles our churches in the United States face today.

Before Paul ever gets into the weeds of doctrine, justification, or the Spirit, he is addressing a church fractured by power, privilege, and competing visions of righteousness. His aim is nothing less than replacing those things with the peace that comes from the gospel of Jesus Christ.

That purpose is captured succinctly in Romans 1:17:

“For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed—a righteousness that is by faith from first to last.”

If the righteousness of God is revealed in the gospel, then the gospel must transform us. God’s righteousness is not meant to be added onto our existing assumptions—it is meant to replace them.

Put simply:
If I want to be among “the righteous who live by faith,” I must adopt God’s definition of righteousness, not my own. And that only happens through faith in Jesus Christ, revealed through the gospel.

When “Righteous Community” Gets Complicated

Early in my ministry, I experienced firsthand what happens when a church says it wants to be righteous—but hasn’t fully allowed the gospel to redefine what righteousness looks like.

A church I was working for had been stagnant for a while. Leadership was dwindling. The preacher was nearing retirement. Elders were ill or passing away. Deacon was largely a title, not the description of “service” one would expect. Growth had long since plateaued.

A few months after being hired as a youth minister fresh out of college, I unexpectedly became the preaching minister.

We wanted to be a righteous community—followers of Jesus committed to growing the kingdom and reaching the lost. And once we started doing that, people showed up.

New residents. Longtime locals turning their lives around. Newlyweds. Newly remarried. Newly re-remarried.

People were being baptized, and attendance grew.

Then one Sunday afternoon, the phone started ringing.

One tearful call after another. People telling me they would never step foot in our church again—maybe any church ever again.

A longtime member had taken it upon herself to call these new people and tell them they were not welcome at “her church.”

That same day, an elder resigned after receiving threats from the same person—because, in her mind, leadership was letting “ruining” her church.

That story still haunts me. Not because it’s unique—but because it’s far too familiar.

When the church we know starts to look different, we can begin acting in profoundly un-Christlike ways. If we are not intentionally shaped by the gospel, we will default to protecting our preferences, our comfort, and our sense of control—and we will destroy our witness about Christ in the process.

The Problem in Rome

The Roman church faced its own version of this crisis.

The gospel had taken root in Rome, but history complicated everything. Emperor Claudius expelled Jews from the city, forcing Jewish Christians to leave (see Acts 18:2). Gentile believers became the majority. Leadership shifted. Customs changed.

Eventually, Jewish believers returned.

And when they did, the church looked different. Bacon was being served at the potluck, so to speak.

What they experienced felt like a loss of power, influence, and identity. And that perceived loss produced division.

Rome itself reinforced hierarchy:
– Citizens over non-citizens.
– Men over women.
– Free people over slaves.

And yet, when Paul lists the members of the Roman churches in Romans 16, the picture is stunning.

Women in leadership. Gentiles entrusted with Scripture. Slaves named alongside free people. House churches filled with diversity.

Phoebe—a Gentile woman—is the deacon letter carrier, interpreter, and likely the one who performed Romans before the congregations.

Paul could have solved the tension by sorting people into separate churches. Jews meet with Jews, and Gentiles meet with Gentiles. That’s the easy solution.

But Paul didn’t do that.

Instead, he wrote Romans pleading with both groups to be unified.

Because unity in diversity is not a problem to fix—it is the gospel on display.

The righteousness of God is revealed not just in what the church believes, but in how it lives together.

And therein lies the lesson for American churches. Instead of constantly attacking each other over minor differences in understanding, instead of separating along racial lines, instead of maintaining the “us versus them” identity wars in the pulpits, we should be united.

We serve one Lord.

We share one baptism.

The same Spirit points us to the same Savior.

Our likeness far outweighs our differences. And that’s what Paul emphasizes to the Roman church.

“There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”

Maybe if we will focus on Paul’s message in Romans, then our churches can begin to embrace the unity in diversity that proclaims the Gospel rather than our divided communities that preach against it.

This blog post is part of a series of posts on Paul’s letter to the Roman Church. You can see the rest of the posts here.

  1. When the Gospel Replaces Power with Peace
  2. Strong, Weak, and the Call to Build One Another Up
  3. Shared Story, Shared Family—Romans 9 and the People of God
  4. Grafted Together — Romans 10-11 and the Gospel of Unity
  5. One Gospel, Common Ground — Unity from the Very Beginning of Romans
  6. Same Problem, Same Grace — How Faith Makes Us One
  7. No Advantage, No Boasting — Faith That Levels the Church
  8. Dead Together, Alive Together — Life in the Spirit and the “We” of Romans 8

Divorce and Remarriage in the Church

The Apostle Paul and Divorce

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Marriage and Divorce, Scripture

Previously, we’ve looked at divorce thoroughly from the beginning of Scripture, up well into the New Testament. Those previous writings were God’s Divorce, Divorce in Israel – Part 1, Divorce in Israel – Part 2, Divorce in Israel – Part 3, Biblical Divorce and Jesus – Part 1, and Biblical Divorce and Jesus Part 2. If you haven’t read those entries, then you may find yourself lost as we navigate this next section that covers the Apostle Paul’s understanding of divorce.

Words Matter

In 1 Corinthians 7, we come across an important word that needs clarification. The Greek word ἄγαμος (pronounced “hog-a-moss”) is only found in the New Testament four times. All four of those uses are by Paul, and all four occur here 1 Corinthians 7. What this means for us is Paul’s usage of ἄγαμος should define its meaning for purposes of Biblical disucssion.

The woman of 1 Corinthians 7:10-11 has walked out on her husband for an unspecified reason, and their marriage has ended. The NIV here uses the word “separate” for this marriage, which is the same word Jesus uses in Matthew 19:6. This marriage is over, and the now divorced woman is said to be ἄγαμος, which the NIV translates as “unmarried.” Now that she is divorced, she is in a status of not having a spouse. She is unmarried.

In 1 Corinthians 7:8, Paul makes the same argument that Jesus does for being unmarried (ἄγαμος) as being a good idea.

8 Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do. 9 But if they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion. 
The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 1 Co 7:8–9.

Now what’s interesting here is that very few people seem to have any issues with single people getting married, nor widows. I recently performed a wedding of two widows coming together in the years after their respective spouses did. Nobody protested that wedding. Nobody argued they were not supposed to remarry, and I have a feeling that’s because Paul is very clear here…it’s perfectly find for widows to remarry. Verse 9 makes that clear. In verse 8 Paul states his preference…it’s good to stay unmarried, but nobody tried to talk these widows out of getting married because Paul wanted them to remain single. It simply isn’t an argument people make.

Yet when it comes to divorced people, this argument is often made. People exclaim that a divorced person can never remarry, and claim their statement as being Biblical.

But did you notice what Paul actually said?

8 Now to the unmarried (ἄγαμος)…It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do. 9 But if they cannot control themselves, they should marry….
The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 1 Co 7:8–9, emphasis added.

Did you catch that? Paul just indicated that the unmarried (ἄγαμος), regardless of how they are without a spouse, are able to remarry…they should marry if they find themselves longing for a spouse. This includes the divorced.

ἄγαμος refers to anyone who is in the status of not having a spouse. This would include the single who never married, those who are not quite marrying age yet, and the divorced. It doesn’t matter why you are unmarried. You are simply ἄγαμος if you have no spouse. And to this group, Paul says they should marry if they want.

“She must remain unmarried”

Now, back to a provision that Paul made in verse 11. It seems Paul is dealing with a specific issue—a real couple—in Corinth. After all, this entire discourse of Paul was because of “the matters [they] wrote about” to him (1 Cor 7:1). In the instance of verses 10 and 11, we have a woman who has walked out on her husband for no good cause it seems (listen to Dr. Michael Heiser and David Instone-Brewer for more detail). To that woman who has just up and left her spouse, Paul says her divorce is not legitimate, and her husband here should not divorce her either. They need to try to reconcile that marriage if at all possible.

And that’s the point, reconcile if at all possible. Marriage isn’t something we enter into lightly, and should never exit from lightly. And if the woman of verse 10 and 11 remarries, then she can no longer reconcile with her husband. Paul is encouraging this woman to not give up on this marriage because they did not have legitimate grounds for divorce. This is sin on the part of this woman, and Paul wants them to try to reconcile. And let’s be clear, they may not be able to reconcile. But if she remarries, then Deuteronomy 24 would clearly condemn them from being able to reconcile.

What About Previous Illegitimate Divorces?

As I recounted elsewhere, I know a couple that is happily married, and had been so for decades at the time this story took place. They had been out of the church for a very long time, and had finally come back to a church and began to worship and get plugged in. After some time had passed, some of the church leaders came to visit this couple. The church leaders told this happily married couple they should divorce even though their marriage was healthy because they had both been married previously. The church leaders never asked about their previous marriages, or details about why they were divorced. They had simply been married before, and been divorced. And while they were unmarried (ἄγαμος), they met each other, fell in love, and formed a God-honoring marriage that had lasted for decades (and still remains today). Apparently in the minds of that church, two divorces were better than one. That couple left that church and never went back, and rightly so in my opinion.

Let’s consider what else Paul has to say in 1 Corinthians 7 in addition to the fact that the unmarried (ἄγαμος), divorced or otherwise, are able to remarry.

17 Nevertheless, each person should live as a believer in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to them, just as God has called them. This is the rule I lay down in all the churches.

 The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 1 Co 7:17.

Paul’s indication is regardless of your marital status, regardless of your past, stay where you are. If you’re single, stay that way. If you’re married, stay that way. If you were divorced and are now remarried, stay that way. If you’re recently divorced, stay that way. If you’re widowed stay that way. And just in case that statement wasn’t clear, Paul stresses it again.

20 Each person should remain in the situation they were in when God called them. 

 The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 1 Co 7:20.

And again…

24 Brothers and sisters, each person, as responsible to God, should remain in the situation they were in when God called them. 

 The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 1 Co 7:24.

And again…

26 Because of the present crisis, I think that it is good for a man to remain as he is. 27 Are you pledged to a woman? Do not seek to be released. Are you free from such a commitment? Do not look for a wife. 28 But if you do marry, you have not sinned; and if a virgin marries, she has not sinned. But those who marry will face many troubles in this life, and I want to spare you this. 

 The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 1 Co 7:26–28, emphasis added.

Paul gives advice throughout this entire passage to stay in the situation you’re in, including the divorced among the church in Corinth. And Paul is clear that if they choose to marry, including the divorced in Corinth, they have not sinned.

Summary of Biblical Divorce thus far in 1 Corinthians 7

  • Paul speaks of the divorced as ἄγαμος, a Greek term that simply is the state of being unmarried. Within this group, Paul includes all people who are unmarried, regardless of the cause.
  • Paul says the unmarried (ἄγαμος) can, and should get remarried if they long for a spouse (1 Cor 7:8-9)
  • Paul cautions a particular married couple (see 1 Cor 7:1, and 1 Cor 7:10-11) that they should try to reconcile because their marriage was not legitimate. This is an attempt to keep Deuteronomy 24 from coming into play, and causing the marriage to not be able to be reconciled.
  • The wronged party here is the husband, and seemingly it would be up to him to decide if he is willing to take back his wife who has wronged him.
  • Specific couple aside, if someone is divorced and remarries, that in and of itself is not a sin (1 Cor 7:28, 36, etc.).
  • Current marriages should never be broken up due to previous divorces, because Paul commands everyone to stay in the situation (marital state) they are in when they come to Christ, and this should be the rule in all churches (1 Cor 7:17).
  • This does not disagree with Paul, or Jesus because both of them were tracking with the Old Testament rules surrounding divorce and remarriage.

Biblical Divorce Series

  1. God’s Divorce
  2. Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 1
  3. Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 2
  4. Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 3
  5. Biblical Divorce and Jesus – Part 1
  6. Biblical Divorce and Jesus – Part 2
  7. The Apostle Paul and Divorce

Divorce and Remarriage in the Church

Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 3

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Christianity, Marriage and Divorce, Scripture

In my previous post, we looked at Deuteronomy 24:1-4 and learned about the debate surrounding this text in Jesus’ time (again, more on that later.) If you are new to this series, my encouragement to you before reading this post is to familiarize yourself with the previous posts in this series, starting with God’s Divorce. God is divorced, and is still perfect and sinless, therefore divorce itself is not sinful. That does not mean, however, that every reason for divorce is valid. The previous posts will help orient you to the purpose, and interpretive lens I’m using for this series. In this post, I’d like for us to consider texts in Ezra/Nehemiah and Malachi. But first a little background.

Ezra/Nehemiah Background: Cautionary tale, or blueprint?

Israel has been completely destroyed, and Judah has been in captivity for years. In Ezra/Nehemiah, God moves and enables a resettling of Jerusalem by those in exile. Though God is clearly behind the resettling, this does not mean every action taken by humans in this text is a representation of God’s will. If it is, then this text would serve as a blueprint for us to follow in our own societies. If you read the final chapter of Nehemiah, the reform is a failure. Nobody seems faithful, God’s Word is not honored, and violence seems to be the solution. Not exactly a picture perfect example of God’s ways being lived out.

Biblical texts sometimes serve as cautionary tales rather than blueprints to follow. We understand this with Jonah, but for some reason we struggle to see this possibility in other texts. Let me suggest that Ezra/Nehemiah is better read as a warning against trying to impose moral change through external behavior, than as a method we should seek to duplicate. For more on this, Carmen Imes has a wonderful article on the subject. The team at Bible Project also does well in illustrating the failed moral reform of these zealous individuals. Their hearts are in the right place, but their actions fall short of God’s ideal ways.

Malachi the prophet is a contemporary of the Ezra/Nehemiah story. Malachi clearly disagrees with the Ezra/Nehemiah approach on several points (one of which we will discuss here). This seems to validate the idea that Ezra/Nehemiah should be considered a cautionary tale. Let’s now look at the Ezra/Nehemiah text as it applies to marriage and divorce, and then we will explore Malachi’s scathing rebuke of Ezra/Nehemiah’s theology.

Ezra 10:1-5, 10

1 While Ezra was praying and confessing, weeping and throwing himself to the ground before the temple of God, a very large crowd of Israelites—men, women, and children alike—gathered around him. The people wept loudly. 2 Then Shecaniah son of Jehiel, from the descendants of Elam, addressed Ezra:
“We have been unfaithful to our God by marrying foreign women from the local peoples. Nonetheless, there is still hope for Israel in this regard. 3 Therefore let us enact a covenant with our God to send away all these women and their offspring, in keeping with your counsel, my lord, and that of those who respect the commandments of our God. And let it be done according to the law. 4 Get up, for this matter concerns you. We are with you, so be strong and act decisively!”
5 So Ezra got up and made the leading priests and Levites and all Israel take an oath to carry out this plan…

10 Then Ezra the priest stood up and said to them, “You have behaved in an unfaithful manner by taking foreign wives! This has contributed to the guilt of Israel. 11 Now give praise to the LORD God of your fathers, and do his will. Separate yourselves from the local residents and from these foreign wives.”

Ezr 10:1–5, 10-11, Biblical Studies Press, The NET Bible, Second Edition (Denmark: Thomas Nelson, 2019).

Again, I highly recommend Carmen’s article to understand what’s going on here. The problem with Judah in this text is not their marriages, but idolatry. Like Solomon before them, they have taken foreign wives and adopted their religious idolatry instead of being the “kingdom of priests” they have been called to be. Ezra has taught the people the Torah, and they have misapplied it to their situation. Even the Messianic line is full of foreign wives, including Ruth. (For more on Ruth, read Ruth: A Story of Hesed, and Looking at Ruth And Seeing God.) The problem is not foreign wives per se, the problem is how these foreign wives are bringing their idolatry into Israel, instead of being transformed into the likeness of Yahweh by Israel.

Notice that the suggestion of divorce comes not from Ezra, but from one of the men in the group. Notice also how the blame is shifted to the foreign wives. The suggestion is if the women and children were not around, then there would be no sin. It’s always convenient to blame someone else for our sins. Ezra goes along with this plan, and indeed calls these Israelite men to divorce their wives and send them and their children away. Ezra’s plan now creates a massive refugee crisis where there is no provision for these “widows and orphans,” as they now have to fend for themselves. And while Ezra’s plan is being carried out, Ezra and all of Israel has forgotten that the very God they serve “loves the orphan and widow, and [he] loves resident foreigners, giving them food and clothing. So you must love the resident foreigner because you were foreigners in the land of Egypt.” (See Dt 10:15-19)

The point I’m making is the sinfulness in the rationale of Ezra’s generation in regards to divorce. This same sinful rationale exists in our generation as well. When we want to do something, we find a verse or passage of Scripture, ignore the context, ignore other verses that conflict with our theology, and act in the way we want to. This is what the people suggest, this is what Ezra blesses, and this is what Malachi denounces.

Malachi 2:10-16

10 Do we not all have one Father? Did not one God create us? Why do we profane the covenant of our ancestors by being unfaithful to one another?
11 Judah has been unfaithful. A detestable thing has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem: Judah has desecrated the sanctuary the LORD loves by marrying women who worship a foreign god. 12 As for the man who does this, whoever he may be, may the LORD remove him from the tents of Jacob—even though he brings an offering to the LORD Almighty.
13 Another thing you do: You flood the LORD’s altar with tears. You weep and wail because he no longer looks with favor on your offerings or accepts them with pleasure from your hands. 14 You ask, “Why?” It is because the LORD is the witness between you and the wife of your youth. You have been unfaithful to her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant.
15 Has not the one God made you? You belong to him in body and spirit. And what does the one God seek? Godly offspring. So be on your guard, and do not be unfaithful to the wife of your youth.
16 “The man who hates and divorces his wife,” says the LORD, the God of Israel, “does violence to the one he should protect,” says the LORD Almighty.
So be on your guard, and do not be unfaithful.

Mal, 2:10-16, The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011).

Notice the problem is that the women “worship a foreign god” (v. 11). Compare that to Ruth’s famous “your God will be my God” (Ruth 1:16) and you see the problem. It’s not foreign wives per se, but their idolatry. Ezra’s solution is to promote divorce. The logic is “if you sinned before by entering an idolatrous marriage, then violate your marriage covenant now to make things right. Don’t address the problem, just get rid of it!” Malachi’s rebuttal is to honor your commitments in marriage while being faithful to Yahweh. Malachi’s clear statement on the actions of Ezra and the men of Israel is that they have done “violence to the one [they] should protect.”

Malachi Influences Paul?

It would be easy to just dismiss this text as having to do with a situation that’s almost impossible to recreate today, and therefore of little significance to this study. However, I believe this is the wisdom that Paul draws upon on 1 Corinthians 7, which we will study in depth in future posts. Malachi’s reasoning on the matter would indicate that a divorce that is not founded upon Exodus 21 or Deuteronomy 24 is an invalid divorce. The goal may have been noble (to right a past wrong), but this is clearly not what the Torah instructed about divorce, and therefore the divorce is not valid.

Paul borrows this same logic when he tells the Corinthian church that “each person should live as a believer in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to them, just as God has called them. This is the rule I lay down in all the churches” (1 Corinthians 7:17 NIV). Prior to this, Paul encourages both men and women that if they are married to an nonbeliever, and the nonbeliever is willing to stay with them, then they should not divorce. However, if the nonbeliever no longer wants to be part of the marriage because of the faith of the other spouse, then Paul says “let it be so. The brother or the sister is not bound in such circumstances” (1 Corinthians 7:15 NIV).

Much more on 1 Corinthians 7 later, but understand that Paul does not want to break apart marriages because the couple is what some would refer to as “unequally yoked.” Their marriage should remain, just as Malachi instructed Israel. And in the case of abandonment (1 Cor 7:15, one party wants to leave), there is no shame attached to the other party, and they are free to marry again.

Summary of Biblical Divorce in Ezra/Nehemiah and Malachi

  • Ezra/Nehemiah promotes divorce in order to undo a previous wrong. Both Malachi and Paul show this to be faulty theology and sinful practice (Mal 2:14-16; 1 Cor 7:12-14).
  • Malachi shows that the reason for a divorce matters. With the case of Israel in Ezra/Nehemiah, divorce was not the correct answer. Divorcing someone in an effort to undo a past wrong is not a valid reason for divorce.
  • Though valid reasons for divorce do exist (Exod 21, Deut 24, 1 Cor 7:15, etc.), dissolving a current marriage due to a past sin is not a valid reason.
  • Paul uses this same logic to encourage believers in Christ to stay in the marriage they have if at all possible, because this honors the commitment they made and honors Christ. “Each person should remain in the situation they were in when God called them” (1 Cor 7:20 NIV).
  • If the marriage ends, however, due to legitimate reasons, or one spouse giving up on the marriage, “let it be so” (1 Cor 7:15).

Next time, we will explore the words of Jesus about divorce in their context, and in the larger Biblical context.

Biblical Divorce Series

  1. God’s Divorce
  2. Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 1
  3. Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 2
  4. Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 3
  5. Biblical Divorce and Jesus – Part 1
  6. Biblical Divorce and Jesus – Part 2
  7. The Apostle Paul and Divorce
Divorce and Remarriage in the Church

Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 2

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Christianity, Marriage and Divorce, Scripture

Last time, we discussed the significance of Exodus 21:9-11 on the discussion of a Biblical view of divorce. We noticed that the text provides the bare minimum standards for a marriage for the lowest level of citizenry in Israel. If those standards were not upheld, the woman had the right to end the marriage and go free. Today we take a look at the next text in our Old Testaments that deals with divorce. This time, we turn to Deuteronomy to look at an extremely important case law which Jesus was later questioned about specifically.

Deuteronomy 24:1-4

In Deuteronomy 24 we are presented with the unfortunate case of a woman who will be divorced multiple times, and a former husband that might seek to gain from this situation. To understand the complexity of this marriage, we need to abandon our cultural norms and embrace the norms of ancient the Ancient Near East (ANE for short), and ancient Israel in order to properly understand this text.

In most of the ANE, woman had no property rights at all. The famous Code of Hammurabi is a great example of the standard laws of the ANE, and shows pretty clearly that women in that culture were often considered as property of a man, with almost no discussion of them actually owning property themselves.

Now let’s consider the ramifications of such a worldview, setting aside for a moment the obvious lack of value this places on half of God’s image. Suppose a man goes away to war and isn’t seen again for quite a long time…years even. If his wife remarries another man, and later the original husband returns, his wife would still be considered his property. All the man would have to do is claim her back, claim any children she’s had in the meantime, and resume life as he sees fit. This is obviously a horrible situation for everyone involved to even have to consider, and yet it was the standard ANE situation when it came to marriage. Some unscrupulous men even manipulated this system for their advantage. This is why Deuteronomy 24 is so drastically different in ancient Israel. Let’s look at the text.

24:1 If a man marries a woman and she does not please him because he has found something offensive in her, then he may draw up a divorce document, give it to her, and evict her from his house. 24:2 When she has left him she may go and become someone else’s wife. 24:3 If the second husband rejects her and then divorces her, gives her the papers, and evicts her from his house, or if the second husband who married her dies, 24:4 her first husband who divorced her is not permitted to remarry her after she has become ritually impure, for that is offensive to the LORD. You must not bring guilt on the land which the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance.

Dt 24:1–4, Biblical Studies Press, The NET Bible First Edition; Bible. English. NET Bible.; The NET Bible (Biblical Studies Press, 2005).

The “why” and “How” of divorce and Remarriage

The first thing we need to consider here is the “why” of this divorce. This has often been interpreted as being some sort of adulterous situation, however that’s not directly what the text states. The punishment for adultery was death in Israel, so there would be no need to figure out a divorce as the death penalty would obviously end the marriage. The Hebrew phrase is ערות דבר (ʿervat davar), with a literal translation of “nakedness of a matter.” The phrase has caused much debate in Jewish circles, both in ancient times and today. What everyone seems to agree on, however, is this phrase would certainly describe some sort of sexual impropriety, without necessarily being adultery. This could be a situation like Jesus and the woman at the well, which was completely innocent but could have caused people to talk and make accusations (note the call for the husband in John 4:16). In other cases, it could be dressing in appropriately, or having non-sexual yet still emotional relationships with other men. The point is, there is something in the woman’s actions that a husband would have reasonable grounds to protest. If these actions persisted, the husband would have a legitimate reason to end the marriage.

Pay careful attention to verse 2, because it is clear that remarriage of divorced persons was perfectly acceptable in ancient Israel. The verse does not qualify this statement, nor does it put provisions on what caused the divorce, or who was at fault, or any of the other stipulations many Christians like to add to conversations about remarriage after divorce. The text simply says that once the divorce is complete (she has left him), then she is free to go and marry again. Even when the woman is at fault, she is free to marry again, plain and simple. So simple in fact that there’s the possibility/expectation of her to marry a third time after her second divorce or being widowed (24:4).

There’s also information to be gathered from the way the divorce is carried out. 24:3 above uses the phrase “gives her the papers”, but I much prefer NIV’s clear rendering of “certificate of divorce.” This practice was highly unusual in the ANE, so much so that it seems this practice of providing a certificate of divorce for a woman was unique to Israel. In every Israelite marriage, a certificate was part of the ceremony (much like today), but this certificate spelled out what was required in the marriage. Examples of these certificates were found along with the Scriptures known as the Dead Sea Scrolls, and they contained the language of Exodus 21. These stipulations were written on a certificate, and given to the bride who kept it safe because this was her freedom if the marriage should go poorly. If her husband mistreated her, she would petition the husband or the town elders and give witness to the neglect. If it was clear that the accusations were valid, and the woman wanted to leave the marriage, then she was issued a certificate of divorce, a right that very few women in the ancient world could claim. The language would read “you are free to marry any man you wish,” and provided safety for the woman and any future husband, knowing a former husband could not reclaim them at some point in the future after abandoning them.

Why Not Remarry Here?

So why can the first husband not remarry his former wife here? After all, the woman is “free to marry any man” she would wish, except for her first husband in the example. Wouldn’t we hope they could patch things up and get back together? It seems like the Lord has a different view of the situation, calling it “offensive” and citing that guilt will be brought on the land. Notice this is not said about remarriage in general, but only in reference to remarriage to the original spouse (something that a number of churches teach as exactly what should happen, but I digress).

So why not remarry the first husband? A couple of suggestions have been put forward as to why, but in honesty the text isn’t clear on this matter. What is clear is this particular remarriage should not happen. One ANE law scholar, Raymond Westbrook, believed this situation has to do with the dowry, or bride-price. The theory is that if the original husband knew there was “something offensive” about this woman, remarrying her would be under false pretenses just to claim a second dowry from her before sending her away again. The point of Westbrook’s theory is that this law protects the rights of the woman.

Another scholar, Dr. David Instone-Brewer, cites the Shiite practice of mut’ah marriage. It does seem that there was at least some version of this practice carried out in the ANE, and seems to me to be a reasonable possibility of what Deuteronomy 24 seeks to forbid. If this is the case, once again this law would be designed to protect the rights of the woman. Here’s a description from the Wikipedia article linked above.

According to Shia Muslims, Muhammad sanctioned nikah mut’ah (fixed-term marriage, called muta’a in Iraq and sigheh in Iran), which has instead been used as a legitimizing cover for sex workers in a culture where prostitution is otherwise forbidden. Some Western writers have argued that mut’ah approximates prostitution.

Wikipedia entry for “nikah mut’ah,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikah_mut%27ah

Several other suggestions have been put forth, but what is clear in every theory is that this law that forbids remarrying the original husband seeks to protect the woman. In a sense, this law reminds Israel that marriage is a serious endeavor and to treat it flippantly as a possible on again/off again affair is an offense to the Lord.

Marriage is fine. Divorce is fine. Jumping back and forth between the two and degrading the value of marriage is not fine.

Jesus and Deuteronomy 24

For now I’d like to return to the debate over the phrase ערות דבר (ʿervat davar). The NIV’s translation of “something indecent” is helpful here to understand the debate among rabbi’s in Jesus’ day. Both those who followed Hillel and Shammai accepted Exodus 21:10, and taught their disciples exactly what an appropriate amount of clothing, food, and marital rights would constitute a legitimate marriage. When we come to Deuteronomy 24, however, these two famed teachers of Scripture disagreed greatly. The Shammaites believed that Deuteronomy 24 dealt with a case of sexual indiscretion on the part of the woman as discussed above.

The Hillelites viewed this passage differently, separating the phrase ‘ervat davar into two separate items. To borrow the NIV again, Hillelites believed the text provided two valid reasons for the divorce—”something indecent” was interpreted to allow divorce for “indecent” actions, and “something.” What this would mean was if the woman acted indecently, then you could divorce her. Additionally, if she did “something” you didn’t like, such as forgetting to add onions to your scrambled eggs, then you could divorce her. Essentially, the Hillelites championed the “any cause divorce” from this passage, and by the time of Jesus’ ministry, this was the most prevalent cause of divorce in Israel.

Matthew 19 as Commentary on Deuteronomy 24

We will cover Matthew 19 in depth in a later post, but it is important to note the context of a Jesus’ comments there as a discussion about what Deuteronomy 24 allows. Consider the question Jesus is asked by the Pharisees.

Then some Pharisees came to him in order to test him. They asked, “Is it lawful to divorce a wife for any cause?”

Mt 19:3, Biblical Studies Press, The NET Bible First Edition; Bible. English. NET Bible.; The NET Bible (Biblical Studies Press, 2005).

The reason this discussion of “any cause” divorce would be interesting to the Pharisees is because it was the most common form of divorce in the Roman world of the first century. It was common among Gentiles, and even among the Hillelite followers in Judea. Because the question is a direct quote of the Hillelite interpretation of Deuteronomy 24, Jesus’ remarks need to be interpreted in light of his response to their question. In other words, Jesus is not offering commentary on Exodus 21, or Deuteronomy 21 or 22, or Malachi 2, or Jeremiah 3, or any other discussion of divorce in the Old Testament. He’s being asked about the Deuteronomy 24 interpretation of allowing divorce for “any cause”, and Jesus’ response is a resounding “no.” In Jesus’ interpretation, Deuteronomy 24 does not permit divorce for “any and every reason.”

Summary of Biblical Divorce in Deuteronomy 24

  • Deuteronomy 24 assumes legitimate reasons for the divorces mentioned.
  • Marriages in Israel could end based upon ערות דבר (ʿervat davar), with a literal translation of “nakedness of a matter.”
  • Jesus interpreted this text to refer to sexual indecency, and not “any cause” like the Hillelite school. According to Jesus, Deuteronomy 24 does not provide grounds for “any and every reason” or “any cause” divorces. There are legitimate reasons for divorce, but a divorce is not valid unless one of these Biblical standards are met (more on this in future posts).
  • In the case of divorce, the party at fault (in this case the woman) as well as the wronged party (in this case the man) could both marry again without qualification once the divorce was completed (24:2, 4).
  • The woman must be given a certificate of divorce in order to protect her rights to marry again. This was a right that was unique to Israel. Even if the woman was at fault in the original marriage, she was free to remarry another man.
  • Deuteronomy 24 places no limits on remarriage (three potential marriages are illustrated).
  • The only restriction on remarriage is for the original husband remarrying his ex wife. This is strictly forbidden, and is done most likely to protect the rights of the woman.

Next time, we will look at Ezra/Nehemiah in light of Malachi 2.

Biblical Divorce Series

  1. God’s Divorce
  2. Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 1
  3. Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 2
  4. Biblical Divorce: Divorce in Israel – Part 3
  5. Biblical Divorce and Jesus – Part 1
  6. Biblical Divorce and Jesus – Part 2
  7. The Apostle Paul and Divorce

What’s In A Name?

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Exodus, How to Read the Bible, Life, Scripture

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose/ By any other name would smell as sweet.”

William Shakespeare, Romeo & Juliet

Juliet tried hard to convince Romeo that names don’t matter. To put it another way, for Juliet, who we are is not dependent upon a name, nor are we defined by a name. While I admire Shakespeare on many levels, on this point he’s wrong.

I think the real question is “Do any names matter?” And the Biblical answer to that is a resounding “YES!” What we learn as we read the Bible is that who we are is precisely dependent upon a name—the only name that matters.

The Name

For an ancient Israelite, one name in particular mattered more than any other name.

Exodus is the retelling of God’s powerful rescue of Israel out of the bondage of slavery and oppression in Egypt. God uses a human, Moses, to be his representative before Pharaoh during this miraculous rescue. To Pharaoh, in essence, it is as if Moses is God, performing signs and wonders, and delivering the Divine message to Pharaoh, with Aaron as his helper (Exod 4:15-16).

This is an awesome task! To represent the God of the universe to someone who does not know God is a frightening endeavor, especially if you don’t really know the God you are representing!

Moses instantly feels inferior to the task, asking “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh?” (Exod 3:11) God never answers the question directly, but indicates that God’s presence will be sufficient. Simply put to Moses, “I will be with you.” (Exod 3:12)

The second, and possibly the most informative question that Moses asks is how to acknowledge God before the people. Here is God’s reply:

God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ ”
God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you.’
“This is my name forever,
the name you shall call me
from generation to generation.”

Exodus 3:14-15 NIV

The Meaning

There is a long rabbit trail here concerning the name(s) God chooses in this revelation to Moses. Without going too far down that trail, we need some clarification here. The Hebrew phrase “Ehyeh asher ehyeh” is what the NIV translates as “I AM WHO I AM.” Without totally nerding out on Hebrew, we should know that depending on how one views this phrase, it can mean variously “I AM WHO I AM,” or “I AM WHAT I AM,” or “I WILL BE WHO I WILL BE,” or any combination of these options. God’s revelation of being in this name shows that God is not dependent on anything, and everything else in all creation has its dependence upon God. You and I are human, we are tired, we are in a particular location at a particular time, etc. Simply put, we are finite. God simply IS.

And that’s the second name. What most English language Bibles translate as “LORD” in all capital letters, is the actually the 3rd person version of Ehyeh. Instead of “I AM”, the Hebrew name Yahweh (LORD) is means “HE IS.” (For more information on why the English translation does this, Bible Project has this great video.)

This name, Yahweh (LORD/HE IS), is the name of Israel’s God (Exod 20:2), the only god Israel is to worship (Exod 20:3), and the one whom his people are to represent well through bearing this name (Exod 20:7).

Bearing the Name

That last part, bearing or misusing the name of Yahweh, might be one of the most misunderstood commands of the Bible, and one that I intend to unpack a bit in my sermons over the next few weeks. But here’s the short take on what this command means:

  • Humans have always been designed to bear the image of their Creator (Gen 1:27).
  • Instead of bearing the image/name of their Creator, sinful humans decided to make a name for themselves (Gen 3:5; 11:4).
  • The Creator then decides to create a new people to bear his image/name in the world, thus growing his reputation/name as well as theirs, in the process of bringing blessing to all humans (Gen 12:1-3).
  • This new family commits to bearing the Creator’s name, Yahweh, and being representatives of the name/reputation of the Creator in the earth (Exod 19:5-6).
  • This is not a light responsibility, and must be taken seriously. Bearing the name of Yahweh in a careless way brings guilt upon the people (Exod 20:7).
  • (This point needs more unpacking, but…) That name/reputation has been transferred to Jesus, the name we must now represent, respect, and honor (Phil 2:6-11).
  • This Jesus (which means “Yahweh Saves”) is the physical representation of Yahweh (John 8:58 – I AM), and the name of Jesus is the only name that brings us salvation (Acts 4:12).
  • When we place our allegiance in the name of Jesus, coming to God through Jesus, we become chosen people, that priesthood of representatives in the world (1 Peter 2:4-10).

What’s in a name? EVERYTHING! And the name we need for salvation, the name we must bear carefully, the name we must represent to others is the name of Jesus.

Click here to view Matt’s sermons on Bearing God’s Name.

Gossip – the sin we’re ok with?

by Matthew Stidham, posted in Church health, Life, Politics, Romans, Scripture

I made the mistake of watching the “news” recently. As a rule I refuse to do this, but I was lured into watching the “news.” What I saw was a bunch of unfounded, unverified hearsay passed along in order to convince the viewer that they should be outraged about these same unfounded, unverified rumors. The Biblical term for such talk is “gossip.”

28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them. 

 The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), Ro 1:28–32.

Did you notice “gossips” appear in that list? I think most followers of Christ are really comfortable with calling most of those sins exactly what they are: sin. Yet it seems very comfortable for most people to be ok with gossip. And when the gossip is packaged and sold to us as “news” or “the real truth,” it becomes more palatable.

Still, if the message is intriguing or scandalous enough, we just might listen. And then we are happy to pass it on. Don’t believe me? Just look on Facebook, or Twitter, or any other social media platform. Americans love to “share” those shocking “articles” about politics, or some celebrity. We convince ourselves that others need to know this “truth,” but did we stop to check the validity of the claims? Have we actually done the research, or simply passed along what we were told?

We can rationalize it away, or try to find some reason to justify doing these things, but the Bible is very clear. Gossip is sin.

The most common area I encounter gossip is around actions that one deems inappropriate. Those actions may or may not in actuality be inappropriate, but the assumption of inappropriate behavior usually sparks gossip. From there the assumption is told to another, and then to another in hopes of building a consensus that this assumed inappropriate behavior is wrong. It gets even easier to do this sort of thing when dealing with a celebrity or politician. But acting this way is absolutely not acting like Jesus. I really like Bruce Waltke’s take on this.

“Now we come [to] ‘Do not bear false witness,’ in which we spare—we bestow on the other—the right to a reputation. We guard the other person’s reputation. We guard it against false testimony. I suspect all of us have violated this; we’ve gossiped about somebody. I think sometimes we hold court in living rooms, drinking cups of coffee. We talk evil of another person, with no due process at all. They’re not there to defend themselves. There may not even be witnesses, but they should not gossip about another person unless the other person is there to defend himself or herself. We’ve got to protect the other person’s reputation. Christians should never gossip.”

 Bruce K. Waltke, OT300 Old Testament Theology, Logos Mobile Education (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2018).

How about we consider what Jesus suggests?

15 “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over.

 The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), Mt 18:15.

When it comes to friends, family, or other Christians, this should be fairly easy. You make it a point to go directly to the person.

Not to the minister. Not to the elders. Not to your friends.

You go directly to the person you have an issue with. You just might learn that an assumption on your part was incorrect, or it’s possible your concerns might be validated. If there actually is a legitimate problem, then the two of you can address it without everyone else getting involved. This is how Jesus tells us to handle this situation.

So the next time you’re a part of the conversation that steers toward talking about people who aren’t there, remember the wise words of a former First Lady.

Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.

Eleanor Roosevelt