My dad told me the story of a couple who got born again in his former church. They became vibrant especially the second wife whom the man loved. They told this man to send his second wife away. That was where his problem started.
His second wife who was very vibrant became suicidal upon hearing what the church told her husband. This woman had invested a large chunk of her life in this man's house. She wanted to jump into the well. That matter became messy. I am not sure they proceeded with the restitution.
I heard a similar story about a polygamist who got born again and was told to put away his second wife. As I was told, the man simply left the church and went back into the world outrightly. The outcome of both cases are not God's will.
Marital restitution is about the toughest restitutions people do. Among evangelicals, when a polygamist gets converted, some churches mandate him to stick to one wife( the first) while he put others away.
When establishing a practice especially in the church, we must search the scriptures extensively to establish or debunk it. Let's start with God's ideal plan for marriage before we examine If marital restitution has a place in orthodoxy.
Is polygamy God's plan for marriage?
The answer is NO. Despite the numerous polygamists in scriptures, how did I know it is not God's plan? Let's examine some scriptures before sin entered creation. Pre fall scriptures shows us the perfect will of God from the beginning.
Genesis 2:18
[18] And the Lord God said, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him A HELPER comparable to him”.
The helper God promised the first man refers to a wife. God did not promise him helpers( wives). If God wanted Adam to be a polygamist, God would have given him helpers but he gave him a helper( wife).
[24] Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, and they shall become one flesh.
This is another scripture that corroborate God's stance on monogamy. A man is to be joined to his wife not wives. In the beginning, God did not plan a man to be joined to wives.
Polygamy (whether serial or simultaneous) is a perversion of God's plan and it is till date. This is the first truth we must establish If we'll make a headway in this series of teaching.
