Should Divorcees Be Forbidden to Teach or Lead in Local Churches?
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The constitutions and bylaws of independent Baptist churches commonly include language that forbids divorced persons from teaching Sunday School or holding church office. The restriction is so common that of the dozens of church constitutions I’ve read and filed, only one or two lack some version of it. Since many churches with these restrictions have some history of conflict over them, the topic also tends to be seen as a minefield—best to fence it off and leave it alone.
But these same church constitutions and confessions of faith also strongly emphasize the authority of Scripture, and one question should always be welcome: Is what we’re doing biblical? Is it compatible with Scripture and the revealed nature and purposes of the church?
Let’s consider some arguments pro and con.
Pro
1 Discouraging divorce
Surely we all agree that churches ought to do what they can to discourage divorce and nurture thriving marriages. I’ve frequently heard this laudable goal cited as a reason for restrictive church policy on divorcees. The desire is that the church be perceived as univocal and consistently uncompromising on this point so that the message is unmistakable: God’s design for marriage is one man, one woman, for life.
2 Prevention by shaming
Cynical readers might be quick to suggest an alternative version of argument #1: “All these churches really want to do is scare people out of getting divorced by endlessly shaming those who are divorced.” Sadly, the cynics are probably more right than wrong on that point.
At the same time, the local church discipline passages in the NT do indicate that (a) some behavior is truly disgraceful and (b) churches can fail by being too accommodating of conduct that ought to be seen as shameful (2 Cor. 5:1-2, Ephes. 5:3).
3 Rejection of social trends – “easy divorce”
It would be difficult to research, but it seems likely that many of the divorcee restrictions were added to church constitutions in a period when divorce rates were dramatically increasing in the US. Part of this trend was the relaxing of requirements for divorce proceedings, leading to the creation of family courts and culminating in no-fault divorce laws. California became the first no-fault divorce state in 1970.
Biblically-informed Christians with a high view of marriage were appalled by this trend. Many saw the principle, “be not conformed to this world,” as requiring them to stake out a counter-cultural stand in this area. “We’re not joining this mad rush toward the destruction of the family.” Who can fault them for that?
4 The “husband of one wife” passages
Constitutions with divorcee restrictions sometimes footnote supporting passages that include 1 Timothy 3:2, 12 and 5:9 along with Titus 1:6. Though most of these passages refer to qualifications for elders, 1 Timothy 3:12 does apply the standard to deacons as well.
Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well. (ESV, 1 Tim. 3:12)
How are these passages relevant for restricting Sunday School teachers and other non-deacon leadership roles? The reasoning is that these passages establish the principle that those who are leaders the church should be exemplary individuals with exemplary families.
Con
1 The value of participation
Ephesians 4, 1 Corinthians 12, and many other passages, emphasize that each member of the body has a unique contribution to the life and growth of the whole. In Ephesians 4, the language is “joints” and “parts” that must work together (Eph. 4:16). In 1 Corinthians, Paul likens individual believers to hands, feet, eyes, etc. Nobody can be what someone else has been put there to be (1 Cor. 12:14-16).
None of this adds up to, “Divorced people must be allowed to be ministry leaders,” but it does add up to a sobering principle: preventing people from serving in ways they ought to be serving is a serious injury to the body—and therefore, a serious offense against Christ who is the Head.
Whatever case we make for excluding an entire category of people from multiple categories of ministry roles had better be a strong one. Does such a case exist? If such a case does exist, the “husband of one wife” standard for pastors and deacons is not it. Not only is it less than certain that the phrase was meant to exclude all divorce-and-remarriage scenarios, but we also have no Scripture indicating that this standard was intended to extend to roles other than pastors and deacons.
2 How divorces happen now
If LegalZoom has it straight, pure no-fault divorce is the law in 17 states and the District of Columbia. In these jurisdictions, no blame for any kind of wrongdoing may be identified as the reason for divorce proceedings. In the remaining 33 states, no-fault is an option.
In practical terms, this means that if either spouse wants to end the marriage on a no-fault basis, the other spouse has no say at all in the matter. A whole lot of legal process can go into dividing up property, custody, etc., but there is no legal basis for “fighting the divorce.”
At least one conclusion should be clear: it is possible to be a divorcee and have contributed nothing, either actively or passively, to the ending of the marriage. Should individuals in this situation be excluded from ministry leadership?
3 Example of what?
The reasoning that says “let’s make sure our leaders are exemplary individuals with exemplary families” has much to commend it. But given the realities of an easy-divorce society, the question arises, “Exemplary in what ways?” In a society that exalts and empowers individualism to an extraordinary degree, it may well be that a “good example” is sometimes a man or woman who is faithfully living the Christian life in a situation beyond his or her control. Can a divorcee be exemplary at holding to biblical attitudes and obedience while making the best of a tragedy he or she was was not able to prevent?
4 The kinds of people God uses
When we look through biblical history at the kinds of men and women God has chosen to use, even in leadership roles, we don’t find that they are always “exemplary people with exemplary families”—especially in reference to past transgressions. Badly checkered histories are common, and those histories include far worse offenses than failed marriages.
In some of our churches, as far as their constitutions are concerned, you can be a former axe murderer and teach Sunday School, but you can’t be a divorcee. Can this really be the intent of the biblical teaching?
It’s past time for churches to re-examine these policies. Yes, we want to obey Scripture. Yes, we want to discourage divorce and nurture strong marriages. Yes, we want to be counter-cultural. But is a rigid ban on divorcees in leadership really helping further these goals?
Aaron Blumer 2016 Bio
Aaron Blumer is a Michigan native and graduate of Bob Jones University and Central Baptist Theological Seminary (Plymouth, MN). He and his family live in small-town western Wisconsin, not far from where he pastored for thirteen years. In his full time job, he is content manager for a law-enforcement digital library service. (Views expressed are the author's own and not his employer's, church's, etc.)
- 1972 views
[JBL]Yes, yes, yes! This is a point every pastor must carefully consider. This is something that made us think long and hard about whether we considered physical abuse to be valid grounds for divorce and subsequent remarriage. It either is or it isn’t; there’s no middle ground. There’s no middle ground of long-term separation (not a biblical concept), and you can’t take the easy way out by saying, “Well, I wouldn’t marry them personally, but if they go elsewhere and get married I won’t raise a fuss about it.” If you won’t marry them, aren’t you saying the marriage is unbiblical? And if the marriage is unbiblical, shouldn’t they be disciplined from the church?I’ve appreciated the group’s insights into the divorce/re-marriage/and wedding officiating issues.
My take on the situation is this. If we’re unsure on whether to have a church officiated ceremony, ask ourselves… Were this same proposed couple to go somewhere else and get married, would we welcome them as a couple into the church fellowship without discipline or sanction? If the answer is yes, I don’t see any reason that the church should object to the ceremony. If the answer is no, than the marriage and the officiating of the ceremony would be unbliblical.
In other words, the biblical validity of the marriage determines the willingness to perform the ceremony.
Obvious example is the case of homosexual marriage. No orthodox church would recognize the union, regardless of who performed the ceremony.
What’s interesting is to consider cases of two previously divorced people who won’t receive a church ceremony, but when they eventually do get married (by third party), they come into fellowship and are fully recognized as Mr. and Mrs. ______. In my mind, that is simply not consistent.
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Greg Long, Ed.D. (SBTS)
Pastor of Adult Ministries
Grace Church, Des Moines, IA
Adjunct Instructor
School of Divinity
Liberty University
[John E.]Out of curiosity, for those of you who have expressed reticence at allowing divorced men into ministry, is your perspective different if the divorce happened before the man became a Christian?
Thank you for your input, John. I think your attitude and actions reflect the church culture to a large degree. I commend your choices in light of how you see that it would impact the church, even though it is not a biblical requirement from a qualification standpoint.
To answer your question, I think it is harder to answer than it should be. Not speaking from a standpoint of experience but more of hearsay (other peoples’ experiences), professing Christians have abandoned their spouses, divorced, remarried, and then tried to justify things (a.k.a. reset the “conversion clock”) by getting “saved” again (so whatever I’ve done up to this point doesn’t count or matter). So a blanket statement to the before / after salvation question is also needing examination on a case-by-case basis. I have seen people use this card to explain away sin in their lives (I really wasn’t saved) or to try to “get saved” (“for real this time”) as a means to start fresh, rather than dealing with sin and sinful habits in their lives. That’s why the “when” of conversion can be problematic, at least from where I sit.
I would go back to my previous comments (and others have said it before as well) that a consistent, observable lifestyle over a long period of time (what 1 Tim 3 and Titus 1 seem to suggest) is the best indicator, not a point in time (conversion date). “And such were some of you” (1 Cor 6:9-11) is a great reminder that we all have pasts, and that we all are going through a progressive process of sanctification to align with our positional righteousness.
For the Shepherd and His sheep, Kevin Grateful husband of a Proverbs 31 wife, and the father of 15 blessings. http://captive-thinker.blogspot.com
[John E.]Out of curiosity, for those of you who have expressed reticence at allowing divorced men into ministry, is your perspective different if the divorce happened before the man became a Christian?
I haven’t been in this discussion, but tend to be known as fairly conservative on all issues as I am sure you know.
On the Timothy passage, I believe it is talking about the present quality of a preacher’s character, not necessarily his life story. I think that each circumstance is different, I don’t have a “one size fits all” solution. I say that to say first of all, in theory, I think it is possible for a divorced man to presently be a “one-woman man” and thus qualified.
The key words are in theory.
In my experience, I have known divorced men who have pursued the pastorate, but they have rarely lasted in the post. The circumstances varied, but generally it seems very hard to be in a pastoral ministry after having been divorced. The cases I am thinking of are all cases where in my personal opinion the man was 1) now a one-woman man and 2) had been a one-woman man in the prior marriage and through the divorce process — in other words, though not without faults, they had not been the cause of the divorce. There was nothing there that should have made the relationship end in divorce.
But… in these circumstances, the men just found daily pastoral ministry hampered by their history.
They have had other kinds of ministry, they have been able to have opportunities to preach and teach, but they have not been in pastoral ministry.
So I think that anyone who desires the office of pastor or deacon after having been divorced needs to be carefully evaluated, and there is a possibility that they could serve, but there are many challenges. They may find it simply impossible to function as such.
In the cases I am thinking of, the divorce happened after conversion. To me, if the divorce were prior to conversion, it would not make much difference - each situation would still have to be evaluated carefully.
It’s not an easy question to answer at any time, and certainly not with a blanket pronouncement of “this is the way it always is.”
Maranatha!
Don Johnson
Jer 33.3
For those who allow for divorced and remarried men in the ministry: Imagine a small church in a small town where the pastor’s first wife and kids start coming to the church.
"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan
First of all, regarding encouraging people to divorce, and why that is generally a really bad idea, I’ve known Jim for over a decade now, and for all the difficulties he and his wife have dealt with, I rarely see her without a little smile on her face. She’s also one—read Jim’s blog for details—who had abundant opportunities to make what most of us would consider a good life on her own. Word to the wise….even in the “best of circumstances”, divorce tends to really, really bite hard.
Regarding cases like the one that Tyler mentions, it’s certainly a judgment call, but I definitely can support separation for the spouse of an unrepentant adulterer, or even for certain crimes of abuse and violence. The judgment call comes in where we ask whether the offensive behavior on the part of one spouse is so bad that the legal and financial ties between the two must be severed. In the case Tyler describes, I think he made the right call. Single case of sin, no, but a pattern of unrepentant sin? Sometimes it’s the consequence that Jesus prescribes to bring a man to repentance.
One other thought is that this case is a LOT like the Maddi Runkles case. Statistically speaking, we KNOW a tremendous number of people are guilty of fornication, but we can see pregnancy and we can Google divorce records, so we act on the tip of the iceberg. I would dare suggest that we need to get to know each other well enough so we learn about those hidden things.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
1. The Assistant Pastor (graduate of an IFB college) left his wife of 20 years/resigned/left the church, and married another woman. Divorced her after a handful of years to marry a third woman. May now be divorced for a 3rd time.
2. 18 year-old high school senior pregnant a couple of months before her graduation (father not in the church). Kept the pregnancy a secret until after she graduated from Christian school. Shotgun wedding. It didn’t last……
3. Youth Pastor married a young woman in the church. They moved to Illinois. She divorced him after 25+ years of marriage to marry another man.
Type A IFB church. Pastor’s son graduates from a good school and comes back to be appointed assistant pastor then pastor. Divorce happens. Dad steps in in as pastor emeritus and son steps down. After a little more than a year son is getting more involved in the ministry as pastor of an extension work. People understand that he will be reappointed (anointed?) as head pastor in the near future. People are leaving in droves.
"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan
Larry and Ron seem to document a few cases of divorce among pastors, all but one of them seemingly earned (caused by the pastor’s sin), and only one of which where (Ron’s example, reminds me of David Hyles’ story) the church didn’t do the right thing. Even there, the members sensed the hypocrisy and took action. The system works in such cases.
But really, the case that comes to mind is that of the (relatively) innocent pastor, and whether a new church will accept him. John’s case comes close, except for apparently he wasn’t in Christ during his first marriage, which of course makes a difference. Anybody know of a pastor divorced for reasons not his fault, and who was eventually restored through what we’d consider a good process?
The big thing I can think of that would preclude this is that if a man knows his wife isn’t along for the ride, maybe….just maybe…it is partially his fault when his wife leaves when he’s a pastor, as he knew a priori that she wasn’t following him?
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
Not having a divorced pastor can save a church a lot of drama. Kids, step-kids, ex-wife, ex-husband, blended family, morality or lack thereof, etc. One man and one woman married for life in a loving relationship is sure a lot simpler. You’d think God would have thought of that.
A pastor has one of the few jobs where virtually everything about the pastor’s life and family situation can have a direct and large impact on the church. And for much of the pastor’s family life, the church has a right to know.
Some would say a divorce can significantly affect a man’s judgment as well. Take a group of five adults, one has been divorced. Have a man whose having marital problems come to them for help. Usually (always?) the one of five who has been divorced will be the first to either recommend or accept divorce as the solution to his problems.
Some would even say a divorced, and now happily married pastor, is a testimony to those struggling with marital problems, that hey, I can also get a divorce and things turn out great, just like the pastor. In effect, a good second or third marriage, can be a bad testimony. From every angle, divorce is a terrible thing. If you haven’t been divorced, do all in your power not to.
A pastor who does not have a divorce in the family, rules his house well, has a loving relationship with his wife, loves and properly disciplines his kids, has a strong, positive influence. A good family, over the decades, is a notable testimony
As I said before, you can make a good case on both sides of this argument, and many divorced folks are good, godly people, despite their past. But these are just some additional thoughts.
David R. Brumbelow
David, agreed that not being divorced makes a lot of things simpler, but the simple fact of the matter is that God in His sovereign will chose to have a murderer, Paul, among the apostles. That is decidedly less simple than having all the apostles being non-murderers, and it seems to indicate that “making things simpler” may not be high on the list of God’s priorities for the church. Rather, we are to actually get to know one another and think through whether the candidate is a “one woman man”, or whether he’s got habits which suggest otherwise.
Divorce is one factor, as are fornication, adultery, and the use of pornography—the last three being far harder to detect. And as we look at the other characteristics of a good pastor—not “given to wine”, not greedy for money, faithful children, not violent, hospitable, gentle, not quarrelsome, able to teach—all of these really require a person to get to know the candidate well.
Per what Greg Long noted, “fencing off” these requirements by reducing “one woman man” to “no divorce” may actually prevent us from accomplishing this task. So while I’d agree that as a rule, a history of divorce does cast into doubt whether a person is indeed a “one woman man”, to simply use it as a black/white evaluation is missing the point.
Plus, when you claim that divorcees will usually or “always” be the ones to recommend divorce….no, a great many of them have learned by experience why it’s not a good solution. If you want to minister to those hurt by divorce, you will banish such nonsense statements from your vocabulary. Trust me on this one.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
I’m sure there was a time when the men churches chose for their leadership were models of spirituality and morality (blameless?).
Have we come to the point where we have so few men of nearly impeccable character that we now have to choose men with “baggage” that put us in the unenviable position of defending our choice?
"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan
Ron, remembering that Presbyterians, Methodists, Baptists, and others split in the 1840s over the issue of slavery, it strikes me that where we have prospective deacons and elders who may have been divorced today (it was economically impractical then), they then had unapologetic backers of the peculiar institution on the deacon board and in the pulpit. After the Civil War, you found a lot of church leaders in the Klan, and during the struggle for civil rights, fundagelicals were shamefully behind the curve. Historians also point to the prevalance of adulterers, wife beaters, and the like in positions of authority. So what we have is really nothing new—it’s just new symptoms of problems in church leadership, really.
(worth noting as well is that a key figure in the development of fundagelical insistence on moral evidence of salvation, Philipp Spener, started his work in pietism in response to pastors in the state churches of Germany keeping mistresses and the like… we might argue that we’ve got it pretty good if all we need to worry about is a few deacons who have been divorced, no?)
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
My preacher was a serial murderer, before he was gloriously saved, and other follies
Let’s get this out of the way:
- Moses was a murderer - Exodus 2:14
- David was a murderer - 2 Samuel 11:15
- Saul / Paul was a murderer - Acts 8:1
Folks … we live in the NT era and we live in the Acts 29 world
So don’t go killing your wife to be a “one woman man”!
Image below = “The Preacher”
“If you want to minister to those hurt by divorce, you will banish such nonsense statements from your vocabulary. Trust me on this one.” -Bert Perry
Bert,
I have presented some views on this subject without any personal attacks.
Perhaps you could learn to do the same.
By the way, I do have a little experience in ministry.
David R. Brumbelow
[David R. Brumbelow]“If you want to minister to those hurt by divorce, you will banish such nonsense statements from your vocabulary. Trust me on this one.” -Bert Perry
Bert,
I have presented some views on this subject without any personal attacks.
Perhaps you could learn to do the same.
By the way, I do have a little experience in ministry.
David R. Brumbelow
Not a personal attack at all. Now if I said “David Brumbelow is prone to making nonsense arguments”, that would be a personal attack unrelated to your claims. I am, however, saying that your claim that “Uusually (always?) the one of five who has been divorced will be the first to either recommend or accept divorce…” is nonsense.
Since I can quite easily disprove the claim by talking to any number of divorcees in my acquaintance, or by looking up research about the matter, I consider that claim to be nonsense. It also has little to do with what a Biblical approach to divorce might be.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
Discussion