When Love Says It's Over: Why Sometimes Divorce Is the Righteous Choice

The silence in the room was deafening. I had just suggested to a group of Christian leaders that sometimes divorce might actually be the righteous response to a situation. You could have heard a pin drop. Then came the pushback—swift, certain, and sprinkled with scripture references about what God thinks of divorce.

I understand that reaction. For years, I lived under the crushing weight of believing that God would rather see me suffer indefinitely than leave an unhealthy marriage. I stayed in a destructive relationship for many years, partly because of the idea that God would want me to suffer rather than leave. The religious messaging was clear: divorce was always wrong, endurance was always right, and love meant staying no matter what.

But what I discovered on my journey changed everything. Sometimes love doesn't just permit us to walk away—sometimes love demands it.

The Difference Between Legalistic Endurance and Kingdom Love

There's a vast difference between staying in a marriage because the law tells you to and staying because love leads you to. One comes from external pressure and fear; the other flows from internal wisdom and genuine care for everyone involved.

I remember hearing Holy Spirit say to me so clearly during my first marriage, "Tell her to get a divorce." This wasn't about a counseling session—this was about my own situation. How do you reconcile that with what you think the Bible teaches? I had to walk my way through that, and that's when my thinking began to shift.

Legalistic endurance says, "I must stay because it's the rule." Kingdom love asks, "What does genuine love require in this situation?" Sometimes the answer is fighting for restoration. Sometimes it's creating space for healing through separation. And sometimes it's releasing someone with grace because love refuses to enable destructive patterns.

When we're operating from legalism, we produce what Paul called "the administration of death" (2 Corinthians 3:7, NKJV). We become so focused on following rules that we miss the heart of God entirely. We sacrifice people on the altar of institutional preservation.

Why Enabling Isn't Loving

One of the most difficult truths I've learned is that sometimes the most loving thing you can do is stop enabling someone's destructive behavior. When we stay in relationships where abuse, addiction, or chronic patterns of harm continue unchecked, we may be providing the very environment that allows these behaviors to flourish.

Love demands that I stop propping you up when my support allows you to continue patterns that are destroying both of us. This isn't cruelty—it's the kind of tough love that says, "I care about you too much to make this easy for you to continue hurting yourself and others."

I've watched too many people, especially women, sacrifice their wellbeing and that of their children on the altar of "biblical submission." They stay in homes that have become war zones, convinced that enduring abuse demonstrates spiritual maturity. But there's nothing spiritual about enabling someone to continue sinning against you.

Biblical Examples of Love Requiring Separation

Scripture is full of examples where love required boundaries, distance, or even complete separation:

• Jesus himself withdrew from people when their responses became unhealthy or dangerous (Luke 4:28-30, NKJV)

• Paul refused to take Mark on a missionary journey and separated from Barnabas over it (Acts 15:36-40, NKJV)

• Paul instructed the Corinthians to remove the unrepentant man from fellowship (1 Corinthians 5:1-5, NKJV)

Even God himself models this principle. He allows people to walk away from relationship with him rather than forcing them to stay. Love that requires freedom isn't love at all—it's control masquerading as care.

Discerning When to Fight vs. When to Let Go

So how do we know when to keep fighting for a relationship and when love says it's time to let go? Here are some key indicators I've learned through both personal experience and years of counseling others:

Keep fighting when:

• Both people acknowledge problems and are willing to work on themselves

• There's genuine repentance (change of mind and behavior), not just remorse

• Professional help is being sought and applied

• Safety isn't compromised

• Hope is based on actual progress, not wishful thinking

Consider letting go when:

• Patterns of abuse (physical, emotional, financial, spiritual) continue despite intervention

• Addiction controls behavior and treatment is consistently refused

• Manipulation and blame-shifting replace accountability

• Your physical or emotional safety is threatened

• Children are being damaged by the environment

• Years of genuine effort produce no lasting change

The key is learning to distinguish between temporary struggles that can be overcome through commitment and work, versus entrenched patterns that require consequences to change.

The Freedom Essential for Authentic Relationship

Here's what transformed my understanding: until you're willing to lay a relationship down and let it die, it doesn't actually have the opportunity to truly live. Freedom is a major ingredient for true success in any relationship—even our relationship with God.

When someone stays in a marriage only because they feel trapped by religious obligation, that's not a testament to God's design—it's a tragic distortion of it. Authentic love can only exist where authentic choice exists. Forced submission isn't submission at all; it's slavery.

In my current marriage with Gregory, we don't stay together because we have to. We choose each other every day because we want to. That freedom creates the space for genuine intimacy and mutual honor. When I honor Gregory, it's not because some authority structure demands it—it's because his character inspires it.

A Different Kind of Righteousness

Sometimes the righteous decision, the decision of love, is actually to end a relationship. And that can even be what's best for the other person who doesn't want it to end.

This isn't about giving petty people permission to walk away because they didn't get their way. Divorce isn't throwing a fit or manipulation. Most people considering this step have worked very hard, tried very hard, and cried a lot of tears. They're brokenhearted and just need someone to look them in the eye and tell them they have permission to do what love says to do—not what legalism demands.

I'm not suggesting divorce should be easy or entered into lightly. It destroys lives, finances, and families. It's not a small matter, and no one should divorce for trivial reasons. But neither should people remain in situations where love has died and destruction reigns simply because religious systems have made an idol out of marriage preservation.

The Story Isn't Over

If you're walking through hell right now, I want you to know that God is with you in the middle of your hell. He's not waiting for you to clean up all your mess and get out of hell before he'll meet you. He's Emmanuel—God with us—right in the midst of your breakdown.

Whether your marriage is healed and restored or whether you find yourself walking a different path, this isn't the end of your story. You can still have your dream of a healthy, whole family—maybe within your current marriage through miraculous transformation, or maybe in a future season as you apply everything you've learned.

My Gregory is my reward for walking in honor through difficult circumstances. I can tell you the difference between a marriage sustained by legalism and one built on authentic love. We're happy even in the midst of conflict because there's a core where we're so knit together that we trust each other's hearts completely.

Don't live a lie. Fake marriages don't release God's Kingdom—they distort it. Sometimes love says it's time to fight. Sometimes love says it's time to let go. But love never says it's time to pretend everything is fine when your home has become your prison.

The most loving thing you can do—for yourself, your spouse, your children, and the watching world—is to insist that relationships be built on the solid foundation of mutual honor, safety, and genuine care. Anything less isn't marriage as God designed it.

You have permission to choose love, even when love requires the courage to walk away.

Blessings,
Susan 😊