Look, I’m not a fool. I know that there are times when divorce is the only option, but I believe they are actually few and far between. I know that about 50 percent of those who marry will be divorced. I still contend, “DIVORCE IS NO OPTION!
To know physical, mental and spiritual abuse in a marriage is horrible. I make no judgments of any marriage that fails and divorce is granted. I am well aware that numbers who read my column have been divorced, but again I state my case, “DIVORCE IS NO OPTION!
A backward view on most cases would confirm the four word title of this column. No one gets married with divorce in mind. So, up front, on the table, what would happen to the divorce rate if everyone adopted the simple statement that divorce-separation-living apart is no option?
Differences are allowed, arguments are permitted, raising your voice at times is within boundaries, but DIVORCE will never be a word used or considered in marriage. The ideal is simple: one man-one woman – one lifetime. Just say it out loud right now – DIVORCE IS NOT AN OPTION. It’s outside the pail for our marriage. It will never be spoken, brought up, threatened, because it is not the Answer. Differences, yes, we’ll work them out or allow space for them in our life. Conversations can be heated but divorce is a word that is NEVER used.
When the hubby gets angry and stalked out the door, he’s not going to a lawyer, just a coke to cool down. When anger flared and words do not come and tension prevails, breaking the marriage will never be an option. Many divorces occur when children are involved. One little ten year old asked me a very poignant question, “How do you divorce a ten year old?” Where do kids go when Mama and Daddy break up? Remember, no general judgments can be offered by this scribe. Each marriage is uniquely different. Breaking the marriage vows is just inherently wrong. Wrong for the husband, wrong for the wife and wrong for the kids.
Jesus said, “Have you not read, that he that made them at the beginning made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they two shall be one flesh. Wherefore they are no more two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder” (Matthew 19:4-6). The “JOINING” is made clear by what the apostle Paul writes: “Know you not that your bodies are the members of Christ? Shall I take the members of Christ and make them the members of a prostitute. God forbid. What? Know you not that he which is joined to a prostitute is one body? for two, said he, shall become one flesh” (I Corinthians 6:15-17).
Are you ‘making eyes at another person? – STOP. Don’t start the little conversations and the writing of notes and the secret phone calls. STOP” James says, “Every man (person) is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust has conceived, it brings forth sin, when it is finished, it brings forth death” (James 1:14-15).
Let me offer a time old remedy. Begin writing. Uncover one of the rare jewels of life that is all too seldom seen. Fear not to put on paper how you really feel, knowing that verbal discussion has not worked too well. The spoken word goes into ears, the written word remains. I am convinced that the fear element prevents us from “picking up the pen”. Break that fear and reach for the pen and dip it firmly in the inkwell of your heart. Give freedom to the hand to write, for one time and put it on paper just as it is. When husbands and wives are able to write “truth letters” to each other, DIVORCE WILL NEVER BE AN OPTION!
“O yes, I have hopes and dreams and plans, but in them no journey to foreign lands. Within my dreams there is no yacht, no mansion, summer villa, nor expensive car; my dreams are simple, as is my lot.”
“Soon, as from a mist, they will emerge and become me. Thus far, they are but whispering, elusive shadows of my mind. For like a breath, seen in the calm of a cold winter’s storm, to capture a dream, a hope, takes time.”
“My dream of happiness is to those I hold dear, for in the joy of their hearts, mine will be of good cheer. Then there will be time, if the Lord so decrees, for sitting by the hearth of some faded memories.”
“I dream of fishing in the cool swift streams of my youth, maybe for trout, but mostly for memories.”
(Bob Exum – 1989)
Our middle son Bob and his lovely wife Sceta live here in Lake City. He is certified to teach full time but health problems limits him. He has been wheel chair bound since the age of two from the effects of Polio. Sceta teaches middle school here in the city.
