What's That?
This Week's Theme: Building Solid Marriages
Steve Farrar
Sunday, January 14, 2001
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Key Bible Verse: "I hate divorce," says the Lord God of Israel (Malachi 2:16a).
Bonus Reading:Malachi 2:13-16
It's 1956. I'm seven years old and in second grade in Bakersfield, California. I'm across the street at Craig's house. As we're playing basketball in his driveway, I say, "Hey, Craig, where's your dad? I never see him around."
Craig replies, "My dad doesn't live here. My mom and dad are divorced."
I say, "What's that?"
I'd never heard of divorce. No one in my family, none of our friends at church had been divorced; and out of about 20 kids in our class at school, Craig was the only one from a divorced home.
Today, just 45 years later, things have completely reversed. We've gone from a culture of marriage to a culture of divorce. Parents didn't divorce in 1956. But society began changing its mind. In 1969, California introduced the first "no-fault" divorce law; over the next five years 45 other states joined in. By 1985 all 50 states had established no-fault divorce. In 1996, nearly 23 million children didn't live with their biological fathers.
Today there isn't a second grader in America who isn't familiar with the word divorce. In many second-grade classrooms, if a child is still living with his original parents, he's in the minority.
—Steve Farrar in Anchor Man Prayer for the Week:
Jesus, you are the great healer and restorer. Bind my family together. If I have suffered because of divorce, I ask you to heal our family from its pain and destruction. Please renew our hope.
Adapted from Anchor Man (Nelson, 1998).
NOTE: For your convenience, Anchor Man is available in the ChristianityToday.com Shopping Channel. 1 of 1
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Jesus, you are the great healer and restorer. Bind my family together. If I have suffered because of divorce, I ask you to heal our family from its pain and destruction. Please renew our hope.
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