It struck me this morning how hard fast we tend to follow and enforce the Old Testament, much of it founded upon the writings of Moses, along with what custom and culture over time has added to it.
Yet when the Pharisees, the teachers of the Law attempted to throw Jesus off base by way of questions about the Law, he often used their prompts to expose the margin for grace that remained within the law.
"Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?"
"He answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder."
"They say unto him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put her away? "
"He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so."
Mat.19.3.KJV
In my opinion, multiple things happened here:
Jesus was re-establishing that there were ideals in place for humanity long before Moses, before scripture, likely even "before the foundations of the earth."
Marriage had a purpose beyond a covenant between two lovers, representing as well the love of God for Creation.
It would become a multi-generational model of unity for the Body of Christ, as reflected between a husband and a wife, then extended by way of family.
The Body of Christ, the Ecclesia would soon become known as the Bride of Christ, thus the full intent behind protecting the design.
Here Jesus also reinforces grace over Law, as it was "from the beginning", before Moses.
Even divorce was an act of grace, given the "hardness of (our) hearts."
Jesus seldom spoke without parables and layers that required spiritual discernment, most always disappointing those who by trickery and religious sham sought to defy grace or worse yet expose him as an imposter.
Is there any wonder that we still struggle with the scriptures given all the cultural shifts through the ages, and yet, "where sin abounds grace does much more abound!"
To me, that's just church speak...by that I mean that we too often speak of the day of grace, yet offer grace by threat of law.
The Law was a strategy to "frustrate us to grace" as spoken once a murderous pharisee whom grace redeemed. Paul was deserving of the full brunt of the law, yet grace found him.
When grace came, the Law was fulfilled, it's only benefit is a shadowing of what was to come.
Immutability is also a church doctrine, God will not change. Can't have it both ways...so the law was never the nature of God, yet when we pull people toward grace by threat of the law, thats not grace, at least the full grac…
You’re living in the period of grace