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It is not us that you need to agree or disagree with: it is the Word of God (2 Timothy 3:16-17). And what does it say? "And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery; and whoever marries her who is divorced commits adultery." (Matthew 19:9). Divorce is always a legal process, even in the days of Jesus. You could not mentally put someone away and it be so, you had to present them with a certificate containing the reason for the divorce. Such is also true today. Now, mankind today has changed laws in order to make divorce easier through the invention of 'no fault' divorces. In Canada however 'for fault' divorces have not been outlawed, even if they have made them harder to obtain (or more expensive). I don't know about the laws in your country, but most countries still allow 'for fault' divorces. And if you live in a place that does, we personally don't understand if your wife was willing to admit to an affair, why you couldn't have obtained a 'for fault' divorce because the proof is in your wife's statement. Regardless though, Jesus said in Matthew 5:33-37 that our 'yeses' are to mean 'yes' and our 'no's' are to mean no. In other words: we're to tell the truth. If you sign a document that says that you divorced your spouse for 'irreconcilable differences' (or anything but adultery', then that's what you're attesting to. That's what you're saying you're accepting as true. And there are consequences for that. It is not God's fault we divorced our spouse for another cause. And neither was it the government's fault. It's our fault in that we chose to take a quicker (or cheaper) way out. And what's more, we didn't have to divorce in the first place, we could have forgiven them and try to repair the marriage. If it is true that man has so messed up the law around divorce so that we can't divorce 'for fault', then we have to obey the laws of the land we're under (Romans 13:1-7) because 1. We don't have to divorce, and 2. We don't have to remarry. We understand that this is a hard teaching, but we can find no other passage that says otherwise. We work in the legal system we live under, and so the papers we sign will bear consequences in our lives. There is a cost to serving God. The question is: will we pay it and reap the reward of eternal life? We hope this better explains the situation and thanks for commenting.

Sorry this response took a couple of days, we are currently away on a preaching trip. In response to this comment, we refer you to the following which we have answered in other videos on this topic: 1. Even though the language used in Matthew tends towards an original Jewish audience, the Gospel doesn't claim to be written only for the Jews (just as Mark doesn't claim to be written only for the Romans, etc.). The closest you can get to any Gospel being written for a specific audience is Luke (for Theophilus is Greek), but even that Gospel didn't have an exclusive Greek audience after that (for we have this Gospel today). Thus, if we're going to be talking about Jewish tradition, and an implied Jewish tradition at that, Matthew would have made such clear, so as not to confuse his wider audience. He did so in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7 concerning the law. It is not our burden to prove a wider audience, it is the burden of the person claiming a narrower audience to prove such. 2. The Gospel of Matthew was written after the resurrection of Jesus, as were the other Gospels. Thus, when the Gospel was written, the New Covenant of Christ was in force, and the Law of Moses nailed to the cross (Colossians 2:14). This means that in the eyes of God, both Jews and Gentiles were under the same law. There was not one law for the Jews and one law for the Gentiles. Knowing this, Matthew would be muddying the waters by mentioning a Jewish only marriage custom in which Jesus' divorce rule applied, without ever saying that that's what Jesus was talking about. He could have very easily made it clear we're talking about betrothal, but he didn't. And Matthew would have known his book would be read by Gentiles, so I am a firm believer that the Holy Spirit would have made such a distinction clear if that's what he meant, since we know of God's hatred of divorce. He could have also just as easily given Jesus' complete prohibition of divorce and remarriage given in Mark, but Matthew didn't, he gave us verse 9. Why? 3. Because if you notice closely, the audience in Matthew 19:9 and Mark 10:11 are different. Jesus' teaching in Matthew 19:9 is before the Pharisees, in direct answer to their question. It is not simply a restating of and a proper interpretation of Deuteronomy 24:1-4, for the only restriction on remarriage there is a divorced wife couldn't reconcile with her husband once she remarried. Other than that, the divorce was to be for uncleanness and apart from that, there was no restriction on remarriage. Jesus was changing the law from that point forward (which coincidently occurred likely within weeks of his death) and it would be God's expectation for marriage from that point forward. Why did Jesus give a stricter teaching in front of the disciples? Because as we know: God hates divorce. Jesus wanted to hammer home that marriage was to be for life. But hammering that point home didn't undo Jesus' one and only exception: adultery. 4. Matthew 19:9 is not at odds with Mark 10:11, Luke 16:18, Romans 7:1-3 or I Corinthians 7:10-11 unless you just force it to be so. People make the same argument about baptism saying that it's not in Acts 16:31, therefore it must not be required, when baptism is found in verse 33-34 of the same chapter (something that believers did) and it is commanded of believers in Acts 2:38 and Acts 22:16. The accounts in Mark, Luke, Romans and I Corinthians are talking to different internal audiences and each are making their own nuanced arguments. Scriptures only need to mention something once for it to be true, and it being omitted from other passages on the same topic doesn't make a previous passage untrue. Matthew through Revelation is part of the New Testament, and while Matthew through John take place under the old law, they contain teachings for Jesus' followers under the new covenant to follow. And so, unless something plainly belongs to the old law (like tithes, and animal sacrifices etc.), we should consider something that Jesus taught to be for us to follow.

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Genesis chapters 40-50 tell us how Israel wound up in Egypt. It was quite small at the time and went to Egypt during a famine and dwelt there. While there, they grew in size and were later enslaved, before Exodus says they were released. We hope this answers your question, and hope you'll continue watching the podcasts to learn more.

Concerning who received the Law at Mount Sinai, we completely agree with your comment, and are usually careful in making that distinction, however, when talking about the Jews all the way through the text, it's very easy to misspeak and say Jews instead of Hebrews or Israelites (which is what we usually say when referring to the nation of Israel in the Old Testament). Thanks for clarifying what was said in the podcast, though the overall point remains the same concerning the Law of Moses and the Gentiles. Thanks for commenting.

We thank you for watching our videos, and hope you'll continue to do so. We have to disagree with you however when you say that salvation is by faith alone through grace alone. If you said salvation is by grace and salvation is by faith, then there would be no argument, because Ephesians 2:8 says that salvation is by grace through faith. What it doesn't say is it is by any of those things 'alone'. This is what the scriptures say as it relates to the relationship between grace, faith and works as it concerns salvation (justification) 1. We're saved by grace: Titus 3:7: "that having been justified by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.": this is the 'how' of salvation 2. We're saved by faith: Galatians 3:24: "Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith.": this 'what is necessary' of salvation 3. We're saved by works: James 2:24: "You see then that a man is justified by works, and not by faith only.": The works spoken of here are the works that 'complete' our faith, not works of merit, or works that show that we already have 'living faith': these are works of obedience to the will of God: this is the 'when' of salvation. None of those things 'alone' save us at all. All three must be present. And by God's grace, he has given us his word that will produce the faith required to obey Him. This is what the scriptures actually teach on the topic of salvation. If you would like a longer explanation, please watch our recent sermon titled: The Question of 'When' (czcams.com/video/RRcDFOENR1c/video.html). Thanks again for commenting.

Thanks for commenting. Could you elaborate on what you found confusing? Perhaps there's some room to clarify what was in the lesson.