THE PARABLE OF
GOD'S DIVORCE FROM
HIS UNFAITHFUL WIFE
The parables and courtship of the bride cannot be told without first establishing the heartbreak God has endured as the often rejected suitor of Man. He has endured rejection from those He loved, far more than He has enjoyed submission or love requited. No one could endure the slightest fraction of the heartache which the Son of Man has endured in His quest for a true Bride. We all know that He was despised and rejected, mocked, beaten and killed by those who claimed they loved God. Even in this age of Grace, the age of the Bride, the time for her to come to Him, the Christ has suffered rejection a thousand times more often than he has received whole-hearted love. But the espoused husband endures and believes and hopes and bears all things for love's sake that he might present unto Himself a perfect, spotless and holy Bride.
He has even endured the devastating heartache of divorce. It is clearly stated in a parable given to Ezekiel (the classic Son of Man representative among the prophets) how God divorced His Bride for infidelity and the most miserable form of adultery, idolatry. In spite of the modern day Christian who says God would never do or allow such a thing, His divorce is neither debatable or nor questionable. Yet He has never thought that celibacy and being alone was the ultimate aim or the ultimate in holiness for man. The great mystery of Christ and the Church declares that Christ will have a holy Bride, one without spot or wrinkle. He will divorce the unfaithful woman and marry only one which is holy. It is simply not good for man to be alone; thus, the Bride is the only good thing for the Christ, but she must be pure and holy, without blemish. God declared that he would not stop at divorcing a wife who was committing fornication against Him.
Jeremiah 3:8
And I saw, when for all the causes whereby backsliding Israel committed adultery I had put her away, and given her a bill of DIVORCE; yet her treacherous sister Judah feared not, but went and played the harlot also.
When decrying divorce among God’s people, Jesus Himself even recognized that fornication of any sort was one thing worthy of severing even sacred ties. “But I say unto you, That whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery: and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced committeth adultery.” Matt. 5:32 In His unrelenting quest for a worthy wife, God will not settle for anything but ‘perfection’. The perfection of the Bride of Christ will be brought by His own hand. Only God has the power to change a person through and through, only He is able to convert the soul and perfect us by giving us a new Spirit and a new heart that can have love’s truth written upon it in indelible ink. Because a perfect Bride could be raised up from sin’s darkness and ignorance, from an idolatrous heritage and from prostitution, God would not, and will not, accept anything less than a virtuous woman who would be a devoted and faithful wife. God opens His heart with emotion concerning His feelings for the Bride. In an extremely heart-wrenching parable God pours out His heart to the prophet Ezekiel concerning the betrayal and disappointment of His unfaithful espoused wife. It not only tells the pain which God is willing to endure in order to find a faithful wife, it shows that He will only accept a faithful and devoted wife, the only acceptable standards of a worthy wife which He recognizes as the ‘Perfect’ wife.
In the parable of the divorced wife God declares that He had found her alone and abandoned in the gutter, covered in her own blood, unwashed, wallowing in filth. He picked her up, washed her and saved her from enslavement and a lonely death. He turned her into the most beautiful of young ladies. He had lavished every beautiful gift upon her so she could become His beautiful Bride. He loved her with passion and purity. But she had turned on Him, despised Him for no reason other than to fuel her own lust, went looking for other lovers, and shamed Him with her open lewdness. She one continuous stream of adulteries, prostituting herself with every neighbor she could woo. In the parable God reveals His heartbreak to Ezekiel.
The prophet could understand the pain of losing the love of His life, for Ezekiel too had been required by God to suffer the loss of ‘the desire of his eyes’. The pain which Ezekiel was required to suffer (as a prophet must identify with some part or parts of the sufferings of Christ) was to show God’s willingness to cut off even the apple of His eye, the desire of His eyes, if she was discovered to be a harlot without true love for Him. His divorce of an inferior Bride of infidelities proves in an antithetical way that God’s true intentions have always been to create a Bride for His Son Jesus Christ, but it must be a faithful and perfect Bride.
ESTHER BECAME QUEEN BY A DIVORCE
The testimony of Esther also speaks of God's determination to accept only a faithful wife. The king (obviously representing Christ) dismissed the outwardly beautiful Queen Vashti, banished her from his intimate presence, and sought for another bride that would be perfect. Esther, an orphan, stole his heart and was given the honor above all concubines and wives as being his special love. God is willing, His quest for the perfect wife even demands, that He suffer divorce from the fornicators of infidelity to marry a Bride of honor, a 'virgin' in spirit who is not an idolator of any sort, who refuses to 'sleep around' with other gods, who enthusiastically desires to be carefully prepared by the seven-fold ministers of the king (the seven-fold Holy Spirit of God) to enter His presence and have Him desire her continual companionship. The testimony of Esther reveals all this.
Why would God put himself through a divorce if He were not intent on the prime importance of not being alone but having a beautiful, perfect Bride for the Son of Man.
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