Let My People Go: Divorce, Domestic Violence, Biblical Law, and the Identity of God

Greystone Conversations

What does the Exodus event have to do with contemporary concerns with divorce, domestic violence, biblical law, and the identity of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob--the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ? And are these purely contemporary concerns?

Precisely because there is so much heated rhetoric--culturally and ecclesiastically--over the issues of gender, domestic violence, abuse, and Church power, this is not a good time for serious work to be done on these issues. To plead now for patient attention to be given to these topics and for reconsideration of various assumed principles and conclusions inevitably suggests to some that we are simply riding the cultural wave and hoping to be relevant in doing so. However, our fear of being confused with "issue people" must not deter us from what has long been and continues to be an area where further reformation is needed as part of the ongoing reformation of the church by Word and Spirit. To do so effectively, and to avoid merely parroting the cultural emptiness of so much outrage and rebellion, we must be willing again to hear the voice of God in Scripture ordering our reflections to Himself and His gospel to the end of our greater faithfulness to Him for His glory.

For today's Conversation episode, we feature a public lecture given at Greystone's second Lydia Center Symposium. The 2018 symposium, My Sister’s Keeper: The Gospel, Domestic Violence, and Pastoral Practice, featured talks from scholars and church leaders regarding the nature and use of Church power and the law in relation to the challenging yet critically important reality of domestic violence within the visible Church.
In the course of this lecture, Dr. Mark A. Garcia, Greystone's president and fellow of Scripture and Theology and Director of Greystone's Lydia Center for Women and Families, explores the issues of divorce and domestic violence within the biblical world. In doing so, Dr. Garcia shows how we may come at this question, not with the lenses provided by liberation theology or its contemporary form, critical theory, but by way of
1) how Scripture works, especially in terms of biblical law;
2) how the Exodus as an event serves as the infrastructure of the gospel for all who are oppressed and enslaved by sin and sinners; and
3) how the questions of disordered and misused power, when biblical considered, belong to the identity of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob--the God of the Exodus who did indeed demand, "Let My people go."

Those who find this lecture valuable might consider listening to the other talks given at the 2018 Lydia Center Symposium available at Greystone Connect, or becoming a Greystone Member to gain access to this lecture and the growing Greystone Connect library, which includes all full course lectures, special lectures, study day and weekend lecture series, postgraduate seminars, and many other symposia and lecture events held by Greystone and our Lydia Center for Women and Families.