Living Towards The Day: Jesus on Lust, Divorce, and Oaths

We live in a world that often looks for the quick fix or the easiest exit strategy. Whether it is navigating our daily commitments or managing our most intimate relationships, the temptation to take a shortcut is always present.

In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus moves past the surface-level mechanics of the Old Testament law to expose the true intentions of our hearts. After laying down the framework of the Beatitudes, He introduces a series of six “You have heard it was said… but I say to you” statements. He sets His focus on the core of what it means to live out a transformed, authentic human life.

By looking closely at Matthew 5:27–37, we can see how Jesus directly links three deeply personal issues: lust, divorce, and truth-telling (oaths).

The Root of the Issue: Lust and Lies

It is no accident of geography that Jesus places His teaching on divorce right between the issues of bodily lust and total integrity. When we examine the anatomy of a broken relationship, it rarely shatters overnight. Rather, divorce normally happens when lust and lies are allowed to grow up like weeds, eventually choking out the fragile, beautiful plant that marriage is intended to be.

1. Guarding the Heart Against Lust

Jesus commands His followers to deal ruthlessly with the very first signs of lust. He uses intentional, forceful exaggerations—like plucking out an eye or cutting off a hand—to show just how decisive we must be.

Jesus is not saying that we will never notice or feel an initial impulse of attraction toward someone. Sexual desire itself is a good, God-given, wonderful thing. However, it requires boundaries. What He commands us to avoid is the lingering gaze and the lustful imagination that transform an impulse into adultery of the heart. Saying no to inappropriate desire is not harmful repression; it is like pruning a rosebush—cutting away certain buds so the whole plant can grow stronger and more beautiful.

2. Radical Integrity in Speech

Turning to oaths, Jesus addresses our basic truthfulness. In His day, people regularly swore elaborate oaths by heaven or the throne of God to convince others they were telling the truth.

Jesus cuts through this manipulation: Let your “Yes” be “Yes,” and your “No,” “No.” If you constantly need to add extra words or swear by sacred things to back up your claims, it calls your basic character into question. When we practice straightforward truth-telling with ourselves and our spouses, we protect our relationships from the corrosive power of deception.

Understanding Jesus’ Heart on Marriage and Divorce

When Jesus addresses divorce, He explicitly pushes back against the cultural norms of His time. The religious leaders of the day were sharply divided into two main camps over Deuteronomy 24, which mentioned writing a certificate of divorce if a husband found “something indecent” in his wife:

• The School of Shammai: Interpreted “something indecent” strictly as adultery or a serious sexual offense.
• The School of Hillel: Interpreted the phrase incredibly broadly—allowing a man to divorce his wife for falling out of love, finding someone else, or even burning the food.

Because Hillel’s casual view was the popular majority perspective, quick and easy divorces were rampant. A husband could simply say “I divorce you” three times, hand over a paper, and abandon his wife to destitution.

Jesus firmly sides with the stricter view of Shammai, declaring that divorcing a spouse for “any and every reason” completely misses God’s heart. Going back to Genesis 2, Jesus reminds them that marriage is God fusing two people together into “one flesh”. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human should separate.

Two Essential Truths: Amputation and Necessity

To capture the gravity of breaking this covenant, we have to look at marriage through two balanced biblical principles:

1. Divorce is an Amputation

Because marriage fuses body and soul into one entity, divorce is not like simply changing your clothes; it is like cutting off an arm or a leg. While an amputation can be survived, it is radical, deeply traumatic, and represents a final, life-altering resort. Any society or community that recommends or treats divorce lightly is acting as irresponsibly as a doctor who quickly rushes to amputate a limb over a minor ailment.

2. Divorce is Sometimes Necessary to Preserve Life

While permanence is God’s beautiful design for marriage, Jesus explicitly acknowledges that sin has entered the world. Because of the “hardness of human hearts,” there are tragic conditions where separation or divorce becomes the only way for a victim to survive.

Scripture and church history recognize serious “covenant-breaking” betrayals that undermine the core content of the vows:

• Sexual Immorality (Porneia): Infidelity and sexual sin break the marital bond.
• Desertion: The willful abandonment of the marriage by an unbelieving spouse.
• Abuse and Severe Neglect: Drawing from Exodus 21:10–11, a systemic failure to provide basic support, safety, and care constitutes a profound betrayal. This includes domestic violence, controlling behavior, verbal abuse, and destructive addictions that tear a family apart.

Historically, Protestant reformers like Martin Luther and John Calvin carefully wrestled with these principles, recognizing that malicious cruelty, extreme religious persecution, and permanent abandonment were valid scriptural grounds to free an innocent party to remarry.

Grace for the Broken

Tragically, some couples fight for their marriages for years, yet the relationship cannot be saved. In cases of abuse, forcing a victim to return to a dangerous environment in the name of “preserving vows” represents a dangerously low view of sin. While reconciliation is a beautiful picture of the gospel, it requires genuine, deep repentance from the perpetrator and must never be forced upon a victim by the church.

And for those who carry the pain of a wrongful or messy divorce from their past, the gospel offers profound hope. Wrongful divorce is not an unforgivable sin. God specializes in redeeming our worst failures. When we come to Him in honest repentance and faith, He wipes the slate clean and surprises us with new life, fresh blessings, and true restoration.