O dearest Jesus, had only you never said that! “What God has joined together, let no one separate.”

Generations have squirmed under this law of Jesus. People have used it in different ways. It may have been taken literally, used as a weapon against one seeking divorce. Individuals have applied it to themselves, suffering shame and guilt, feeling the burden of unforgivable sin, not seldom after having left a bad, abusive marital situation. And people have plainly abandoned this law of Jesus as ethically just too high, too ambitious and unrealistic, and just swallowed the fact that they were Christians of lesser value as divorced and/or remarried people. O dearest Jesus! What shall we do?

There has always been divorce. That is a fact of life. Probably a majority of us here is affected by divorce in some way or another. Either we are divorced ourselves (I myself had a divorce about 15 years ago), or our parents are, siblings, someone we love dearly. It was there and had to be dealt with in the times of Moses and ancient Israel; it was there in Jesus’ time, and it was there in the very earliest beginnings of the church as Jesus’ second saying about adultery indicates. The saying about remarriage which constitutes adultery is addressed to the disciples inside the house which is code language for the early Christian community. Since it mentions adultery both on the part of the man and the woman, reflecting the Greco-Roman legal systems and not the Palestinian, Jewish law, we know that divorce was an issue from early on also in the church as it grew. “Adultery” is the term for the breaking of the contract between two families, and is not about one spouse having an affair outside the marriage.

Divorce is part of our human condition. The condition we also call sin. The separation of a husband and a wife is a reflection of our human condition; a symptom of our sin. Like stealing is a symptom, or lying, or using someone else’s locked computer.

We want to cry, shame on you! when it comes to stealing or lying. But our mothers’ warning still holds true: When you point with your finger, three fingers will point back at you!

The truth is: In the situation of separation, once we begin to reflect sincerely on what went to pieces in a broken marriage, the dream of unity, of betterment, of joy and love, we swiftly feel on us the full burden of vows broken, of disappointment afflicted to family and friends, of putting a hurdle in the way of children if there are children. The fact of our human condition, the state of sin in which we find ourselves does not have to be rubbed in anymore, we know it already, we are deeply aware of it, filled with shame and sorrow and fear.

So, how can we understand Jesus’ words, dear congregation?

When we hear “What God has joined together, let no one separate,” we first of all do not hear it in context. Rather we hear it as a moral judgment which may seem identical with our own judgment about such failure, also with the judgment of disappointment and disapproval by family, parents, and until not long ago of society at large.

Then, when we hear, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery,” we do not listen carefully, but hear it as a verdict of Jesus, as his command not to remarry. We do not notice that the statement he makes is a de-scriptive statement. It is not pre-scriptive: You shall not remarry.

The statement ‘One who divorces and remarries breaks the vows and the bond of marriage,’ is meant to say: when this happens, it manifests again the human condition of sin. It is another example, a reflection of the irreversible, inescapable situation of humankind.

The Pharisees ask Jesus about divorce. They want to find out what he has to say about this hotly debated issue, and they want to know which school of opinions he favors.

Jesus answers, and in his own way - are we surprised? - he lifts the whole issue to a different level.

He refuses to talk about divorce. He begins to talk about creation. He talks about man and woman, about people belonging to each other, being made for each other, attracted to each other. Made to live in companionship, to fulfill the purpose of creation, be fruitful, be given responsibility to care for God’s world.

In his answer, Jesus quotes both reports on the creation of humankind. We had the reading of the second one earlier. The image of Adam and Eve is of oneness, man and woman really being one flesh, as two people are made out of the first one. The scene has a tenderness to it, but not only that, there is also playfulness and humor in the image of God and Adam working together on finding the perfect partner for Adam and thereby creating all the animals before Eve. Trial and error, the freedom for error within the framework. That is paradise - one-ness with God, oneness with the other, with animals; and all this playfully - humor and the freedom for errors included.

O, how much do we wish paradise would be true again. Pure delight in each other, playfulness, humor, and the allowance for error.

The image of paradise is deeply is rooted in us. We long for it to be true in our relationships. Really, we do agree with Jesus who says, What God has joined together, let no one separate. Really, we agree with him making this sentence the only prescriptive, demanding statement Jesus makes on this issue. Because we wish it were so.

Yet, dear congregation, God has given us the law, the commandments exactly because we are not who we are intended to be. Jesus points out exactly the state of sin humankind is in. And while doing so, by the way, he takes sides with the weakest links in the chain, in his time women, especially divorced women, and children who in the state of childhood are not even viewed as human persons yet.

Twice Jesus has already predicted his death. He will be crucified, isolated, torn away from the relationships with loved ones and friends. He will be broken and die. Now he is on his way to Jerusalem. Because Jesus will finish his way, the kingdom has come. It has begun. It is open to us, we may enter it without merit, without betterment, but through grace. We are reconciled to our situations of loss, of grief, disappointment in ourselves and others. We recognize our shortcomings, pain, guilt. But we are now also free to enjoy the reminders of paradise again in our relationships: joy, humor, playfulness, and even understanding and love in times of error.

And now, may the peace of God which surpasses our understanding guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

Amen.