Few doctrines are as widely avoided in modern churches as this one — and few are more pastorally necessary. Divorce and remarriage are realities in nearly every congregation, and the silence has not helped. At Grace Fellowship Church in Sarasota, we will not soften what Scripture says, and we will not weaponize it either. We hold this teaching with one hand on the Bible and the other on the wounded.
“What God has joined together, let not man separate.” — Matthew 19:6
Before we say a single word about divorce, the bedrock has to be set. Marriage is designed by God to last for life, as a covenant between one man and one woman. The breaking of that covenant is always a tragedy, never a neutral life event. “I hate divorce, says the LORD” (Malachi 2:16). Jesus said the same in plainer language: divorce was permitted in the law of Moses “because of the hardness of your hearts,” but “from the beginning it was not so” (Matthew 19:8).
This means the church must always preach the goodness of marriage, the priority of reconciliation, the seriousness of vows, and the patient work of forgiveness within imperfect unions. Whatever exceptions Scripture permits, none of them displace the rule. Marriage is for keeps.
And yet — the New Testament does not pretend that every marriage will hold. It speaks honestly about adultery, abandonment, hardness of heart, and the wreckage left behind. The Bible does not avoid this conversation, and neither will we.
Jesus said, “Whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery” (Matthew 19:9). Persistent, unrepented sexual unfaithfulness — adultery — is a covenant-breaking sin. The faithful spouse may, with grief, separate. Reconciliation is always to be pursued first, but Scripture does not bind the innocent to a covenant the other has destroyed.
Paul teaches: “If the unbeliever departs, let him depart; a brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases. But God has called us to peace” (1 Corinthians 7:15). When an unbelieving spouse walks away from the marriage, the believing spouse is not held in bondage to a covenant the other has abandoned.
Scripture does not name physical or sustained emotional abuse as a separate category in the way it names adultery and abandonment. But it absolutely does not require a husband or wife to remain in physical danger. The same God who established marriage also established the civil authorities to restrain evil (Romans 13) and the church to protect the vulnerable (James 1:27). Many faithful, sound churches throughout history have understood sustained abuse as a form of covenant abandonment by the abusing party — and we do not disagree.
If you are in danger from a spouse, get to safety first. Tell the police. Tell a trusted friend. Tell an elder. The church is your ally in protecting your body, your children, and your soul. We will not send you back into harm with a verse and a smile. We will help you, and we will hold the abusing spouse accountable to the standards Scripture itself sets for husbands and wives.
This is not a loophole in the doctrine. It is the doctrine — applied with the same seriousness Jesus brought to it.
“But to the married I command, yet not I but the Lord: A wife is not to depart from her husband. But even if she does depart, let her remain unmarried or be reconciled to her husband. And a husband is not to divorce his wife.” — 1 Corinthians 7:10–11
“A wife is bound by law as long as her husband lives; but if her husband dies, she is at liberty to be married to whom she wishes, only in the Lord” (1 Corinthians 7:39). When a marriage ends through the death of a spouse, or through divorce on the biblical grounds above, the freed spouse is at liberty to marry “only in the Lord” — that is, to a fellow believer.
Many believers carry divorces from before they knew Christ, or from situations where biblical grounds were absent or where their own sin was real. Paul’s instruction is to be at peace where you are: “Let each one remain in the same calling in which he was called” (1 Corinthians 7:20). The cross is enough for past failure, and the present marriage — entered in good faith — is to be honored as a real marriage going forward.
If you are reading this and you carry the weight of a divorce — yours, your parents’, a friend’s — please hear the gospel before you hear another rule. The blood of Jesus Christ is enough for sins committed in marriage, sins committed in divorce, and sins committed in the seasons of confusion that often follow. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). There is no category of believer for whom the cross runs out.
God does not measure people by their best moments or their worst. He measures them by Jesus Christ. The Christian who has come through divorce in any way — innocent party, guilty party, both, neither — is welcome at the table, welcome in the body, welcome to serve, welcome to be loved. The pain of a broken marriage is real. The grace of the gospel is more real.
And if your present situation is complicated, do not let shame keep you from speaking. Bring it into the light. Talk with an elder. The church is for sinners on the way home, not for people pretending they were never lost.
At Grace Fellowship Church in Sarasota, we hold a high view of marriage and a high view of grace, and we refuse to set them against each other. We will preach what Jesus preached. We will fight for marriages that are alive but struggling. We will protect spouses and children in danger. We will not pretend that every divorce in the church was a sin, and we will not pretend that none of them were. We will preach the cross to every situation, and we will trust the Holy Spirit to apply it.
If you are walking through a hard marriage, considering whether divorce is biblical in your case, processing a past divorce, or weighing whether to remarry, do not navigate this alone. The elders here are available to listen, pray, study Scripture with you, and walk through whatever decision lies in front of you. There are no quick answers in this territory — but there is a faithful Shepherd, and He has a real church to walk you through it.
Marriage is one of God’s deepest tools for sanctifying two stubborn hearts, which is why the enemy fights hardest there. When a marriage breaks, it is always a wound — even where the Lord permits a way forward. The church does not hand out paperwork; it shepherds the whole person, because the believer on the other side of heartbreak still has a life to live and a Christ to grow up into.
— Sundays at 10:00 AM · 4350 17th Street, Sarasota, FL.