Participants:
Series Code: IC
Program Code: IC180112A
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00:01 The following program discusses sensitive issues
00:03 related to sexuality. 00:05 Parents are cautioned 00:06 this presentation may be too candid 00:08 for younger audiences. 00:31 Welcome to Intimate Clarity. 00:33 I'm Jason Bradley, and I'm here with Jennifer Jill Schwirzer, 00:36 and she's a licensed professional counselor. 00:38 And today, we are going to discuss a sensitive topic, 00:42 but it's a conversation we need to have. 00:44 You know, Jen, the Bible says that God hates divorce. 00:48 What are your thoughts on that? 00:50 I think He hates divorce. 00:53 As pertains to divorce in a marriage, 00:55 He hates divorce of any kind, you know, 00:57 relationships becoming estranged 00:59 or fragmented, He doesn't like that. 01:01 But He particularly hates in a marriage context 01:04 because He loves marriage, 01:06 and He designed marriage for our good, 01:08 for our happiness, for our benefit. 01:10 So God's ideal for human sexuality, 01:12 we always like to put that ideal in place 01:15 and show God's design, 01:16 was that we would be in a lifelong partnership, 01:18 in a committed, consensual, 01:21 loving relationship for our entire life, 01:23 that's His ideal. 01:24 And that's the context in which He designed sexuality 01:28 should be experienced and expressed. 01:30 So that's a good thing. 01:33 The Bible says that, 01:34 "A man will leave his father and mother 01:37 and cling to his wife or cleave to his wife." 01:40 That's how it describes marriage. 01:42 So what happens in marriage 01:44 is a new entity is really created, and it says. 01:48 "The two shall be one." 01:49 So there's a new entity created and what happens in divorce 01:54 is you're really basically pronouncing that entity dead. 01:59 It's over, and it's really like a family. 02:01 You're kind of pronouncing a family dead. 02:04 It's a tragic thing, 02:05 and it comes at a very high cost, 02:06 emotionally, and spiritually, and psychologically too, 02:10 and sometimes financially, and physically. 02:11 I was going to say. A lot of other ways, yes. 02:15 So typically, when we discuss divorce in church, 02:19 we refer back to Jesus' teaching in Matthew 19. 02:21 I'd like to go through that for a moment here. 02:23 Okay. 02:24 So a group of teachers asked Jesus, 02:27 if a woman essentially married several different brothers 02:31 and each brother subsequently died 02:33 and she married the next brother, 02:35 then which one would she be married to in heaven 02:38 is what they were essentially asking. 02:40 And Jesus went on to say, "Well, in heaven, 02:42 there are neither male nor female, 02:44 they're like the angels." 02:45 So in other words, there's no marriage in heaven, 02:47 and that's not going to be an issue 02:48 I think is what He was saying. 02:50 And then He went on and jumped into His teaching 02:53 about divorce. 02:55 Actually, they asked Him a question, they said, 02:57 "Can a man divorce his wife for any cause?" 03:00 So pay attention to that phrase, "Any cause." 03:03 That's referring to a type of divorce 03:05 that was prevalent in Judaism at the time 03:09 where a man who wanted 03:11 to get rid of his wife essentially 03:13 could divorce her for a trivial offense 03:17 provided that he was willing to pay out 03:19 what was essentially like an alimony. 03:21 So like she burned the tofu? 03:24 That's right, like, 03:25 I don't think they had tofu in those days, 03:27 but she burned the toast or she burned the falafels, 03:30 you know, and he was ready to divorce her for that, 03:33 he really wanted to be rid of her, 03:34 it's like a bad headache, 03:35 send her on her way 03:37 as long as he was willing to pay out that money, 03:39 he could hand her a bill of divorcement, 03:42 and she would have to leave. 03:44 Whereas, if he wanted to prove 03:45 that she had broken her marriage vows or something, 03:48 he'd have to go through a court process 03:49 and that if he won that case, he wouldn't have to pay out. 03:52 So it kind of depended on how much money the guy had. 03:55 And that payout is like alimony today? 03:57 Essentially, yeah. Correct, yeah. 03:59 So a lot of these men had money 04:02 and they probably didn't honestly pay their women 04:04 very much to send them away. 04:06 So that would happen rather routinely 04:08 and men would then pursue another relationship. 04:11 So what happens is Jesus is talking 04:14 to a group of Pharisees and religious leaders 04:18 who are divorcing their wives 04:20 for trivial offenses and doing it 04:23 in a very unethical, very immoral, sloppy way, 04:28 and people take that counsel that He gave them 04:31 where He said that, 04:32 "Only in the case of adultery could you divorce 04:36 in God's plan." 04:38 And they apply that to women 04:41 that are suffering physical abuse 04:43 in their marriages, 04:45 and we've seen this happen over and over again. 04:46 And I would just submit 04:50 that we have to consider the intended audience 04:54 when we interpret a passage of Scripture. 04:58 So Jesus is talking to these men 05:00 that are dismissing their wives for nothing, 05:03 and we apply it to the woman 05:04 that's getting beaten black and blue. 05:07 Yeah, it doesn't... 05:08 It definitely doesn't apply to that. 05:10 Jesus wouldn't want you in a situation 05:12 where you are one step away from losing your life 05:17 or you're going through abuse and torment, 05:19 we serve a God of love. 05:20 That's right. 05:21 You know, He's not going to want that. 05:23 In addition to preventing divorce 05:24 in the case of abuse, 05:25 a lot of the same religious leaders 05:27 were against separation. 05:28 So there was no way 05:30 the woman could ever under any circumstances separate 05:33 from an abusive husband, 05:34 and women have lost their lives over that. 05:37 Wow. It's true. 05:38 A lot of the same religious leaders 05:40 that taught this also 05:41 really, really discouraged separation, 05:43 and this is one of the reasons that we have a whole program 05:48 on what we call structured separation 05:50 or how to deal. 05:52 When you need to get away from a marriage, 05:53 you're not quite ready to divorce yet, 05:55 but you need to get away, what do you do? 05:57 I was going to ask you to break down 05:58 structured separation. 06:00 Well, just to give a recap 06:01 'cause we have a whole program on it, 06:03 but basically, we give a recap is you tell the person, 06:05 "I love you. I'm committed to the relationship. 06:07 This is what's going wrong. 06:09 This is what I need to repair the situation, 06:11 and I will come back when you're ready, 06:13 if you show me evidence that you've changed." 06:15 And you call that an affirmation sandwich. 06:16 It's like an affirmation sandwich, 06:18 that's absolutely correct. 06:19 We love those affirmation sandwiches, don't we? 06:23 So the pressure should be on the one 06:26 who made the marriage intolerable in the first place 06:30 when it comes to divorce. 06:32 So what we see 06:33 and you and I were chatting about this before is, 06:36 you know, someone will endure abuse, 06:39 financial abuse, physical abuse even, 06:43 emotional, psychological abuse, 06:45 a pattern of abuse year after year after year 06:48 with absolutely no incentive to change on the abuser's part, 06:53 and the victim will finally, in exasperation, 06:56 file for divorce and end the marriage, 06:59 something like shooting a horse with the broken leg, 07:01 you know, it's going to die anyway, 07:02 might as well shorten the misery of it, 07:05 and they'll do that, 07:06 and then they will get accused 07:08 of being the one that broke up the marriage. 07:10 Which is crazy. 07:11 Not true, and I always ask like, 07:13 "Who really did the divorcing here?" 07:15 I'm not saying it's always the right decision to file, 07:17 but when people do it out of that kind of exasperation, 07:20 I put a lot less pressure on them 07:22 than I'm going to put on the person 07:23 that made the relationship 07:25 an intolerable situation to begin with. 07:27 Yeah, yeah. 07:28 And I'm going to go to them, and I'm going to confront them, 07:30 and I'm not going to coddle them 07:31 as they often want. 07:33 Now I have the privilege as a counselor of kind of 07:35 knowing the inside of these situations 07:38 and I see these abuse situations unfold. 07:41 And, you know, for that reason, 07:44 I don't take a hard stand against divorce 07:46 when there's abuse involved 07:48 because sometimes people do all they can 07:50 to end the abuse. 07:51 Yeah, absolutely. 07:52 I'm not saying I would divorce on those grounds, 07:54 but I'm saying I'm not hard on other people. 07:56 I give them, you know, freedom to choose, 07:59 and I don't shame people that have already been through 08:01 a very, very difficult situation. 08:04 Yeah, well, you know, 08:06 we've seen those situations escalate... 08:08 That's right. 08:10 To where the individual that was being abused 08:12 ended up getting killed, you know. 08:14 It happens. 08:16 And a lot of times, 08:17 they have received advice from religious leaders, 08:20 "No, you stay in the marriage. 08:21 You stay, you stay, you stay." 08:23 A lot of times, I'm sorry to say this, 08:25 but the configuration looks like this, 08:27 the husband is abusive, the wife is enabling. 08:30 She takes it year after year, 08:33 she even covers up for him abusing her. 08:36 I've seen so many marriage situations 08:38 where one spouse is basically covering 08:40 for the other's abuse of them. 08:42 Wow. 08:43 And I just want to take them by their shoulders and say, 08:46 "Don't you see what's going on here?" 08:47 Yeah. 08:49 Well, you know, they might tell you, 08:50 "Oh, I tripped, I fell." 08:52 Right? 08:53 Yeah, and they'll cover up for them. 08:55 Yeah. That's right. 08:56 Or even emotional abuse, you know, a case where, 08:59 you know, an individual is cheating on the spouse, 09:02 and the spouse... 09:03 And then they come home and blame the spouse, 09:05 and they say, "The reason I'm doing this 09:06 is because of everything that's wrong with you." 09:09 And the spouse believes them. Yeah. 09:11 And keeps trying to fix themselves. 09:12 Yeah. 09:13 You know, I'll be honest, 09:15 early in my counseling experience, 09:16 I had a couple that I was counseling 09:20 and one of the two was, 09:23 let's just say, a little disorganized. 09:25 Okay. 09:26 And the other spouse was very angry about that. 09:29 And they pressured the disorganized spouse a lot. 09:33 And so the disorganized spouse came to me for counseling, 09:36 "Fix me, I need help. I need to be fixed." 09:38 Yeah. 09:40 And what I didn't see that was going on 09:42 was that the real problem was that the other spouse 09:44 was just far too critical. 09:47 And they needed to learn, 09:48 sometimes when it's not a moral 09:49 or ethical issue or a safety issue, 09:52 you just need to accept people for who they are. 09:54 Yeah, I mean there has be... 09:55 You signed on for that. 09:56 Yeah, there has to be some form of individuality, 09:58 yes two become one, 09:59 but there still has to be 10:01 some kind of individuality in there, you know. 10:05 And I'm sorry, as a clinician, I was new to it all, 10:08 but I didn't pick up that really the spouse 10:11 that was complaining about the other spouse 10:13 was the spouse that had the bigger problem. 10:15 Yes, everything's a pet peeve. Exactly. 10:18 And the thing that made it difficult was the spouse 10:20 that they were criticizing all the time agreed with them. 10:22 Yeah. 10:24 And they were like, "Yeah, I am the problem. 10:25 Let's fix me." 10:27 And so it was just... 10:28 The whole system was sold over to that narrative, 10:30 and I really didn't get through. 10:31 It wasn't wise enough to get through it, 10:33 but if I had it to do over, I'd say, 10:35 "You know what the real problem is here? 10:37 Is you have far too much criticism 10:39 and not enough acceptance." 10:40 And, you know, constant criticism of a person 10:43 you're living with can constitute abuse. 10:46 It can constitute abuse. 10:48 And I would say, there's one thing I've seen 10:51 that's present in almost every family, 10:55 almost every person's childhood, 10:57 and so generally speaking, 10:59 people criticize too much and they don't affirm enough. 11:04 The criticism to affirmation ratio, 11:07 some clinicians say it should be 6:1, 11:09 but now they're saying 20:1 11:11 Wow, 20:1. 11:12 You affirm and build up the people around you 20 times 11:15 to the 1 time you point out something wrong. 11:16 Yes. 11:18 And you kind of have to point out things wrong 11:19 'cause when you're in a family, 11:21 it's kind of like you're in a phone booth together, 11:22 you know, sooner or later you have to say, 11:23 "Can you move your leg over there? 11:25 I can't breathe." 11:26 You know? Yeah. 11:27 So you're going to have to criticize, 11:29 it's not that you never criticize. 11:30 And there's always room for improvement, 11:31 but at the same time, 11:33 it's like you don't just dwell on 11:34 and focus on someone's faults, you know. 11:38 And then it looks also like, in that situation, like, 11:42 well, what's wrong with the person, 11:43 the person that doesn't like anything, 11:47 has pet peeves, everything's a pet peeve, 11:49 what does it say about... 11:51 Like they're not happy with themselves, 11:52 that sounds like. 11:53 Well, I'll tell you one possibility is that 11:55 they have a personality disorder. 11:56 There's a couple of them that come to mind, 11:57 one is called obsessive compulsive personality disorder 11:59 or, you know? 12:01 OCD. 12:02 Micro-manager, yeah, it's not the same as OCD. 12:04 OCD is when a person does it to themselves, 12:06 but obsessive compulsive personality disorder 12:08 is when you control other people. 12:10 Okay. 12:11 Yeah, basically, 12:12 and then there's narcissistic personality disorder 12:14 where a person is just extremely selfish 12:17 and extremely self-centered, 12:19 and it's all about them and never about you. 12:21 They lack the capacity for empathy. 12:25 They lack the capacity for caring 12:26 about the people around them. 12:28 Wow. Yeah. 12:29 And they also have an unusual ability 12:32 to manipulate the way people perceive them. 12:35 So oftentimes, in a marriage situation, 12:37 they'll, you know, 12:38 perpetrate a lot of abuse on their spouse, 12:40 really harm their spouse, 12:41 make life intolerable for their spouse, 12:44 and their spouse will eventually 12:45 throw up their arms and seek a divorce. 12:48 And then the narcissistic personality 12:50 will be able to kind of commandeer the narrative 12:54 and control the narrative and make themselves look 12:56 like the martyr. 12:58 Wow. It's extremely frustrating. 12:59 Yeah. 13:01 Human psychology is... 13:03 Complex. Yes, very complex. 13:05 Yes, very much so. 13:06 That's a lot. 13:09 I mean, it's a lot to go over. 13:11 What would you say would be like the primary takeaway? 13:15 Of this segment? 13:17 I would say that God designed for marriage to be a school 13:23 where we learn how to love and be loved 13:25 our whole life long 13:27 and that sometimes it turns into the opposite 13:30 and that when these ungodly principles take over, 13:35 this hatefulness, this selfishness, 13:38 this self-centeredness that makes life miserable, 13:40 the criticism, 13:42 failing to affirm the people around you, 13:45 engaging in verbal, emotional, financial, 13:48 or even physical abuse, 13:50 we need to look carefully at that situation 13:52 before we tag the person who filed for divorce. 13:56 Yeah, before we just start labeling people. 13:58 Divorce is bigger than just a legal transaction. 14:01 Absolutely, absolutely. 14:03 Man, our time just always goes by so fast, Jen. 14:06 Thank you for sharing that information. 14:08 You're welcome. Yeah. 14:09 My pleasure. 14:11 And if you need more information, 14:12 if you need resources, 14:14 please go to IntimateClarity.tv 14:17 and make sure that you join us 14:18 on the next episode of Intimate Clarity. |
Revised 2018-09-24