Lisa Barry: Today Elisabeth Elliot brings the series on divorce to a close, but it's going out with a bang. I hope you'll be able to stay with us for our final installment of our series entitled "Divorce" right here on Gateway To Joy. Here's Elisabeth.

Elisabeth Elliot: "You are loved with an everlasting love." That's what the Bible says. "And underneath are the everlasting arms." This is your friend Elisabeth Elliot, continuing my talks today on the subject of divorce. If there's any way in the world that by the grace of God I can persuade one couple not to do it, I would consider all the toils and prayers well worth while.

What do you think you're getting when you divorce this spouse and go for another? Now very often, of course, a divorce takes place because one party has discovered another person that they think they would be much happier with. But often divorces happen when there is no third party involved.

In either case, are you absolutely sure that that person is much closer to perfection than the one that you're dumping? I don't think any of us can be sure about that. All of us married folks can tell the unmarried folks, the young people who have never been married, there's a change in the dynamics of a marriage after the wedding.

The engagement period is full of wonderful rosy sunsets and flowers and nice dinners out and all sorts of lovely, delightful things. As my daughter said to me, she never saw her fiancé sin. But once she was married to him, she realized that it was true that there isn't anything else to marry except a sinner, and he's going to sin.

I ended yesterday's talk by remind you that obedience to God leads to some unimagined solution. We so often think we know what will happen if we obey God and it will be a disaster. So we choose instead something which really is a disaster-disobedience. Remember when Jesus told the man with the withered hand to stretch forth his hand. Jesus was telling him the one absolutely impossible thing, but the man stretched forth his hand. It was in his will to obey that he was given the strength to obey.

Will you will to obey Jesus Christ today? If you will will that, God will give you the strength to carry it through.

Now I've been telling you about a certain couple named Dick and Sally, not their real names. I knew how fearsome the choice was in Sally's case. God knew it, too. But God is the One who takes responsibility for the results when the choice is made in obedience. This is always the thing we can count on. Human relations present "impossible" difficulties. Isn't that true in your workplace? Isn't it true in the church? Isn't it true in the neighborhood? Of course, it's true in the family. There are always what seem to be impossible difficulties.

Sin seems to tie us into hopeless knots and we seek desperate solutions: divorce, abortion, lawsuits, switching churches and every other kind of deliberate disobedience and wickedness. Of course, people understand. People sympathize. Some might criticize. Some may judge you, as though they themselves would never be tempted. This is wrong. For me to say it is wrong is a judgment. It is not my opinion. When I say this is wrong, I mean this divorce-this matter of divorce. Because God hates it, we know it is a wrong.

Undoubtedly, if you've been listening during this week, you're going to say, "Are you never going to allow a divorce for any reason whatsoever? Does God not allow a divorce if there's been unfaithfulness in the marriage?" I'm sorry I haven't thought of mentioning that sooner, because I know we will get floods of letters about that. It does appear to me that there may be some exceptions to this rule of no divorce. Those are not my business. I'm just earnestly striving to change the minds of those who only think that they have a reason that God would accept. I hope I've made myself clear on that.

Human relations do seem to present impossible difficulties. The Bible tells us it is wrong to judge. Not wrong to use our critical faculties, but wrong to set ourselves up as righteous and immune to the sin we are judging. I'll read that again. The Bible tells us it is wrong to judge. It says, "Judge not, that ye be not judged." But some commentators make it very clear that Jesus is not suggesting that it is wrong to use our critical faculties. It is, rather, wrong to set ourselves up as righteous and immune to the sin that we are judging in others.

We have laid many traps for ourselves by forgetting how sinful we are and how badly we need the Script. We get into a mess and we declare ourselves bankrupt. Nobody can make any moral claims against us anymore. We are, spiritually speaking, out of business. Closed. We're doing our thing, defying those who judge us, telling them it is always wrong to judge, which in itself is a judgment, but not one based on the Script.

A correspondent told me that we should remember that we've all broken vows, that Dick was doing the best he could and that I shouldn't make matters worse by making him feel bad-that I should love and care about him, instead of criticizing so harshly. He said divorce was common in Bible times. It's better to separate than to live in hatred, and why don't we all just try to support the good and stop condemning the bad?

Well, I think that correspondent was a bit muddled. He was trying to be humble and sensible and loving, I'm sure. But muddled, nevertheless. Let's try to be clear. When sinful people live in the same world, and especially when they work in the same office or sleep in the same bed, they sin against each other. Troubles arise. Some of those troubles are very serious and not subject to easy solutions.

God knows all about them, and He knew about them long before they happened. He made provision for them. His Son bore all of them. All grief, all sorrow, all disease, all sin for us. By why on earth or on heaven should He have done that? Why should He? He shouldn't, but He did. I mean by that He didn't have to, but He did it. Why? Because of love-the love that is stronger than sin and stronger than death.

Here is the profound lesson for us in the midst of our troubles: To rescue us out of them, Christ relinquished His rights. Are we His followers? Then let's take a hard look at what we have a right to expect from others.

What does Sally rightfully expect from Dick? Love, of course. The Bible says, "Husbands, love your wives." What does Dick rightfully expect from Sally? Submission and respect. "Wives, be subject to your husbands as to the Lord" and "The woman must see to it that she pays her husband all respect." Those verses are in Ephesians 5:25,22,33.

Now what if the husband doesn't do what he is supposed to? What if the wife doesn't? Face up to it. In the world, nobody gets what he is reasonably entitled to. There is the world's solution to this problem: Fight. There is the Christian's solution: Relinquish your rights.

God did not get what He had a right to expect-the love and obedience of the creature He had made. Instead, He got rebellion and disobedience. Adam and Eve made a general mess of everything, and we carry on making new messes every day.

But we have a Script. "Let your bearing toward one another arise out of your life in Christ Jesus, for the divine nature was His from the first, yet He did not think to snatch at equality with God, but made Himself nothing, assuming the nature of a slave." This is Jesus we're talking about. He did not snatch at equality with His Father, but made Himself nothing and took on Himself the nature of a slave.

What Christ gave up was not His divine nature-people are always worried about losing their personhood-but the glory that nature entitled Him to. He was God by nature and He voluntarily became a slave so that the Father could give back to Him in boundless measure the glory He had given up.

What a Script. What a lesson. Christianity insists always on the rights of others. A Christian lays down his own life to obtain them. He asks, "Have I no rights?" The answer is "The servant is not greater than his lord."

So I would ask the Sallys and the Dicks out there who are thinking about divorce, ponder it. Search the Scriptures. May God help me, Elisabeth, when the next test comes. It probably won't be more than maybe an hour from now. May God help you to do what is right.

Lisa Barry: We can all use that prayer, can't we? And as God leads you to apply the things you've heard today, let me offer a few tools that may help solidify that leading. First, it's the weekly tape entitled DIVORCE. I also mentioned Elisabeth's booklet called WHAT GOD HAS JOINED and the book LET ME BE A WOMAN.

For information on any of those resources, you can call us at this number: 1-800-759-4JOY. That's 1-800-759-4569. Or write to us at Gateway To Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, Nebraska, 68501. Our Internet ministry address is gatewaytojoy.org. Gateway To Joy has been a production of Back to the Bible.

Monday Elisabeth begins a brand-new series, so be sure and tune in to find out more next time on Gateway To Joy.