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Look what Christ taught. Did I have you turn to Matthew 19? Let's see what Christ taught. And by the way, this is the consistent teaching of the New Testament all throughout. Matthew 19, beginning in verse number three, the Pharisees also came in him, tempting him and saying unto him, is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause? So can you just divorce your wife for any reason? And he answered and said to them, have you not read Ezra chapter 10? Is that what he said? He said, have you 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, there are no more twain but one flesh. What God therefore had joined together, let not man put us under. That's what you should have read and understood from the Bible. Genesis chapter 2, second chapter of the law of Moses, where man and woman are created, and therefore shall a man leave his father and mother, cleave unto his wife, they too shall be one flesh. That is God's original intent. That is what marriage is supposed to be. So what God has joined together, let not man put us under. They said unto him, well, 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, which means allowed you to put away your wives. But from the beginning it was not so. And I say unto you, and is this not authoritative? This is Jesus. This is the author of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy speaking to us. The author is speaking to us. I say unto you, whosoever shall put away his wife, except to be for fornication and shall marry another, committeth adultery. And whosoever marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery. Now what's the exception here? What's the exception? If you marry the heathen, is that the exception? Is that what Christ said? No, he said except to be for fornication. And by the way, that's the same exception in Deuteronomy 24. Go to Deuteronomy 24. The exception given is fornication, OK? That is the provision of divorce found in Deuteronomy 24. But of course, divorce over the years was abused by people like the Pharisees who just want to divorce their wife for every cause, right? What does the Bible say in Deuteronomy 24? When? When? When? When? Does everybody see the first word? I'm about to tell you when, all right? When a man hath taken a wife. Is this five years later, 10 years later, 20 years later, or is this when a man has taken a wife? Get the when here. When a man has taken a wife and married her and it come to pass that she find no favor in his eyes, well, because of this, that, or the other. Wrong. When he takes her and she finds no favor in his eyes because he hath found some uncleanness in her, then let him write her a bill of divorcement and give it in her hand and send her out of his house. And when she's departed out of his house, she may go and be another man's wife. Folks, this is the same type of thing in Deuteronomy 22 where a man goes in and finds his wife not to be a maid. He finds her not to be a virgin, and he basically says, hey, I expected this to be a virgin, and she's not. This is a lie. Folks, we have an exact example of this, again, in Matthew chapter 1. What does Matthew chapter 1 say? Joseph was espoused to marry his wife. They're married, but before they came together. So they've not consummated the marriage. They've been betrothed to one another. They have basically been promised to one another. They are married. It calls it his wife. He's the husband. She's the wife. But before they came together, before they consummated the marriage, she's found with child of the Holy Ghost, then Joseph, her husband, being a just man. So is he doing the wrong thing? Being a just man and not willing to make her a public example was minded to put her away privily. Let me ask you this, was Joseph sinful to want to put away and marry his wife? Why? Because Joseph is within the provision of Deuteronomy 24. Joseph is within the provision of Matthew 19. Joseph is within the provision of Matthew chapter 5. Joseph is within what God has always taught here. That basically, the time, and we would call this an annulment, the time for divorce is basically he marries her. He finds her not to be a maid. Or he finds some uncleanness in her. That could be an STD or whatever, where he decides, I changed my mind. This isn't years later, we're not compatible. Or 20 years later, one cheated on the other. Or, oh, I know it's years later, and we already have kids together, but oops, I wasn't supposed to marry this heathen, so I'm going to divorce her. Where did Jesus teach that? Where did the law of Moses teach that? Where did God say that? You won't find it in scripture. Therefore, if we're going to use a consistent interpretation method of the Bible, we let the statement interpret the story. We let Jesus interpret the story. We let the Lord interpret the story. We let clear scripture from the mouth of God explain a historical book to us. Folks, rightly dividing the word of truth. What do we have? We have the law of Moses, and then what do we have? The historical books. Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther. That section's called the historical books. Why? Because it's telling us what happened, and it's filled with people doing good things and bad things. It's a mixed bag because it's a historical book. And unless the narrator is commenting and telling us this is right, this is wrong, we have to use the rest of the Bible to interpret it. We use the clear teaching of the New Testament. What did 1 Corinthians 7 teach about if you're married to a heathen? You stay with your heathen spouse. That's what 1 Corinthians 7 taught. Stay with them. Do not forsake them. Do not put them away. Stay married. Okay.