Pam Padgett ... teacher
During the last months of college, I rented a room in a house owned
by a woman I met in the singles group of the church group I attended at
the time. This woman had been divorced twice and had a young daughter.
At first she seemed content to remain unmarried and raise her
daughter. But then she started looking for another husband. I
shared with her scripture that tell us that a divorced woman commits
adultery if she remarries, such as
Matthew 5:31 It hath been said, Whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement: 32 But I (Jesus)
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.
Mark 10:11 And he (Jesus) saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her. 12 And if a woman shall put away her husband, and be married to another, she committeth adultery.
Romans 7:2 For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the
law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she
is loosed from the law of her husband. 3 So then if, while her husband
liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an
adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so
that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man.
After sharing these scriptures, I was shocked when she told me that
she didn't care what the Bible says, she knew what she believed. I moved
from her house shortly after this.
The place I moved was quite a distance from where this church group
met. Although I continued to attend the Sunday services and would sit
in the area of the auditorium where the singles group sat, I no longer
attended the singles meetings. I heard this divorced woman was
engaged to a man I also knew from the singles group. I went and spoke
with him, sharing scriptures such as Matthew 5:31-32 showing that they would commit adultery if
he married her since she was divorced. He said he would consider these things, but he did not stop the engagement.
Then I heard that the maid of honor at the wedding was to be a woman I
also knew. I went and spoke with her, sharing scripture about the
adultery that would be committed by this marriage. She said she knew it was wrong for them to marry but they
would get married whether or not she was the maid of honor, so she was
going to do it.
About this time, I went to one of the Sunday morning services. I
arrived before any of the other singles, and sat in the area where we
usually sat. But no other singles came to sit there. Right before the service
began, I looked around and saw that the singles were sitting a few pews
behind me. I thought this strange, but didn't think a lot about it.
The next Sunday I sat in the "new" singles area, but they sat in the
"old" singles area. The following week, I got there shortly before the
service began, and went to where the singles were sitting. Without
saying a word, those I sat next to got up and moved away from me.
It
was obvious they wanted nothing to do with me, but I had no idea why. I
cried out to God asking what was going on? Had I done something
wrong? For a few weeks I didn't hear anything, and didn't know why I had become an outcast from the singles.
Then after the service one Sunday morning, a woman I didn't know very
well stopped me and said she had a message from God for me. The
message she delivered was that God knew how I was being treated by those
in the singles group, and that I needed to know it was because of what I
had spoken about this divorced woman remarrying and that this was what
HE had wanted me to do. I was so helped by this message, now knowing
why I was being shunned and that it was for doing good in the sight of
God. It was also very helpful to realize so strongly that God was
watching over me, and the mercy and kindness God had shown to me in
having this woman deliver this message to me.