You want me to pay attention?

     I'm not sure why each week I am surprised that the lessons are in some way abrasive, or that they are controversial, potentially offensive to some.  But I still am.  So you won't be surprised when I say that this week's lessons are abrasive, controversial, and potentially offensive.  Jesus teaches on marriage and divorce from Mark 10, we hear from Genesis about the time in creation when God created people and marriage (and about the 'first sin'), and then this seemingly unrelated passage from Hebrews where the writer goes into a section on Christ's divinity and humanity.

photo from weddinginvitationideasblog.com

     In the Mark lesson, and from what we know of commonly quoted Biblical values (which, believe me, isn't all people think it might be), we know that the Bible teaches divorce is wrong and that whoever remarries after being divorced is committing adultery.  And this abrasive.  Offensive.  Particularly if you yourself are divorced and remarried.  So what are we to do?  In a culture where some 40% of the population has been divorced, this seems as if it could be one of those 'stumbling blocks' Jesus talked about last week.  This teaching is indeed something that might get in the way of people hearing the message of God's love and forgiveness.
     So perhaps we can gain some insight as to what Jesus means by starting with the reading from Genesis.  God is creating the world, and has created the first human being.  This human (human, not 'man' because the Hebrew words are different at this point) needs a partner so God begins experimenting.  Animals of all sorts are brought before this human who rejects them all.  So God does something drastic.  God creates the second human being, and it is at this point that we have the distinction of male and female.  And they are a perfect pair - complementing, partnering, and living together in perfect relationship, with God at the center.
     And then they separate.  Not divorce, but separate: from God and each other.  Their own needs, desires, and wishes have gotten in the way and caused a rift.  You don't have to have been divorced to know that this happens in all relationships.  Broken relationships between God and others is, unfortunately, the way of life for us human beings.
     So, it is as Jesus says, that Moses allowed for divorces.  However, this was not as God intended.  What God intended was right relationship.  And, sometimes, because relationships can be so badly damaged, the way to right relationship is through divorce.  As much as God doesn't intend for divorce, God also doesn't intend for people to remain in abusive, harmful, or toxic marriages. 
     Which is why it is important to note our last reading from Hebrews where it says,

Therefore we must pay greater attention to what we have heard, 

so that we do not drift away from it.

What we have heard is the message of God's desire for right relationship, wholeness, reconciliation, and forgiveness.  In any relationship, not just marriage, sometimes wholeness, reconciliation, and forgiveness can come only through a parting.  Sometimes the wholeness, reconciliation, and forgiveness comes through a new relationship, or new marriage. 
     And, if we focus on God's reconciliation, forgiveness, and right relationship with us, it becomes all the more easy to focus on these things in our relationships with others.  Paying attention to God's unending, unconditional love for us allows us to view others in the same lens.  Once again, it is looking first at ourselves, then at the other.  Because, unless we are narcissistic (which I admit I can sometimes be), we see that we are no more perfect than the next, and that if God can love and heal me, surely God can love and heal others, and God can heal our relationships. 
     Thinking about marriage and relationships in this light, I wonder to what I am supposed to pay greater attention.  How do I let my own wishes, desires, and needs get in the way of my relationship with others? 
    What follows is a hymn by Fred Kaan, God When Human Bonds Are Broken, that I believe helps us to ponder these words:
God, when human bonds are broken
and we lack the love or skill
to restore the hope of healing,
give us grace and make us still.

Through that stillness, with your Spirit
come into our world of stress,
for the sake of Christ forgiving
all the failure we confess.

You in us are bruised and broken:
hear us as we seek release
from the pain of earlier living;
set us free and grant us peace.

Send us, God of new beginnings,
humbly hopeful into life.
Use us as a means of blessing:
make us stronger, give us faith.

Give us faith to be more faithful,
give us hope to be more true,
give us love to go on learning:
God, encourage and renew!