Issue 211
This is part of a six-month series looking at the Sermon on the Mount from a workplace angle: enjoy the ride
Why address such an issue in a work-related email? Because it appears in the Sermon on the Mount and we are trying to take the teachings of Jesus into our working weeks.
Anyone who has had marital problems – which probably includes anyone who has been married – will know how difficult it is to concentrate on work when all is not well at home.
Anyone who has been through a divorce will know how painful and unwelcome it is for many more than the two separating individuals.
It would be presumptuous in such a short piece to lay out teaching on marriage and divorce, but it is worth capturing a few lessons from the short reference to it in the Sermon on the Mount. Here are a few:
Because of the pain, heartache and sorrow of divorce, work hard at your marriage when you are at work. Keep in touch, keep mementoes of your partner visible where you work – speak during the working day and go home early enough and ready enough to give kindness to your partner.
In keeping with Jesus’ teaching on faithfulness , don’t let your eye wander at work – especially when all is not well at home. Seek support not solace and keep trying to grow.
Speak well, often and fondly of your partner at work so that when your colleagues meet him or her they will know by reputation how important your partner is to you. Jesus is pro-marriage and anti-divorce. This is not just a statement of principle but the promise of support. He will make himself available to support you and strengthen your marriage.
Divorce, apart from in relation to unfaithfulness is seen as failure – anyone who has been through it will need no persuading of that – but just because Jesus is anti-divorce it doesn’t mean His grace runs out when you fail. Divorce is not the unforgivable sin. The unforgivable sin is rejection of Christ. So when you go to work take your marriage with you. Work on it all you can and in the real world where marriages do fail, remember that Jesus is also a bridegroom and will not leave you.
Matthew 5:31-32
31 “It has been said, ‘Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.’ 32 But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, causes her to become an adulteress, and anyone who marries the divorced woman commits adultery.
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Work well
Geoff Shattock
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