Am I Going to Hell for Getting Divorced?

The Short Answer

Divorce cannot be judged responsibly from the fact that a marriage ended. Jesus condemns wrongful divorce and treats marriage as a serious covenant. Scripture also recognises abandonment, while Christian traditions have reached different conclusions about other forms of covenant breaking.

A spouse who abandons a faithful partner occupies a different moral position from the partner who is left. A person who leaves an abusive situation for safety also requires careful moral treatment. The legal act of filing for divorce does not tell the whole story.

Your final judgment belongs to God. Where you recognise genuine wrongdoing in the end of a marriage, repentance remains open. A complicated or painful divorce does not place a repentant person beyond Christ’s mercy.

Why the Circumstances of Divorce Matter

Matthew 19 directs Christians back to the seriousness of the one-flesh marriage covenant. First Corinthians 7 then addresses a believer whose unbelieving spouse chooses to leave.

Those passages require attention to responsibility. They also explain why Christians disagree about the precise grounds for divorce and remarriage.

Christian traditions differ most sharply when the discussion moves from divorce itself to remarriage. That disagreement deserves honest treatment. The first task for someone afraid of hell is usually simpler: identify their own responsibility, repent where needed and live faithfully within the responsibilities that exist now.

Related free study: Is Divorce a Sin According to the Bible?.

Study This Question in More Depth

For a complete study connected with Am I Going to Hell for Getting Divorced?, see AM I GOING TO HELL? What the Bible Really Says About Sin, Judgment and Eternal Destiny (available to our members also).

The Extra Study below examines Jesus’ teaching, abandonment, abuse and the question of what repentance looks like after a marriage has ended.