It amazes me how God can use a commandment or precept that He previously established to reveal to mankind a glimpse of the depth of His love. "Deuterogamy" addresses a law that was provided to govern unrighteousness. Centuries later, God uses this same law to show an inconceivable Grace. God speaks through the prophet Jeremiah, directly referencing the law from Deuteronomy 24.
Jeremiah 3:1,8,14-15:
They say, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man's, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted? but thou hast played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, saith the Lord.
And I saw, when for all the causes whereby backsliding Israel committed adultery I had put her away, and given her a bill of divorce; yet her treacherous sister Judah feared not, but went and played the harlot also.
Turn, O backsliding children, saith the Lord; for I am married unto you: and I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion.
God has divorced his people, but if they will turn, he will accept them back: the divorce does not end the covenant - "I am married unto you."
So why does God call the return of the wife after the second marriage "abomination" (a disgusting thing). It's clear in Deuteronomy that when a woman has been defiled by marriage outside of the original covenant, she is defiled. The second marriage is not holy or God-sanctioned. Therefore, God sees her returning to her original husband as an abomination (because of the pollution caused by the second marriage). Now for some Scriptural evidence to show why the law was written the way it was. Romans 5:20-21:
Moreover the law entered, that the offense might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.
So the law, in showing that God called the return of the adulteress abominable, allows the offense in His eyes to be seen by men. And in Jeremiah 3, the Father gives grace, and that more abundantly than the offense. God doesn't say there was just one idol whereby His nation was defiled. "Thou hast played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, saith the Lord." What Grace! God offers forgiveness for abomination prior to the repentance of the offending party! Now there are conditions to be met for the reconciliation to be complete. Namely, turning from all other gods, and serving the Lord faithfully. And within the Grace of the offer lies the power for the conditions to be met by the offending party.
Is it any wonder that Paul in II Corinthians 5 besought the believers to be reconciled to God? This reconciliation is also directly referenced in I Corinthians 7, when Paul confirmed Christ's own teaching that if the wife depart she should remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband. Why is this important? This is the Gospel at its very core: Christ and the church. Covenant marriage represents Christ and the church (see Ephesians 5). But this revelation and great mystery was not a new concept from God's perspective. He wanted His church to return after adultery long before Paul revealed the purpose of marriage to Ephesus.
The defilement of adultery is the abomination. It disgusts God. God proclaimed in the beginning that if man disobeyed His commands, he would die. Purity (void of sinful actions) can be restored through faith in the sacrifice of the Lamb of God, which takes away the sin of the world. If the sin is taken away, there is no more defilement, and therefore nothing causing abomination. For marriage is honorable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.
There are a few examples of this grace of reconciling husband and wife after a second marriage or adultery in the Old Testament. One is found in II Samuel 3:12-16. Short version: Saul allowed David to marry his daughter Michal (I Samuel 18:27). When David fell out of Saul's good graces, Saul tried to kill him, and David ran, rather than raise his hand against God's anointed. When David was gone, Saul took his daughter Michal, David's wife (women didn't have much say back in the day), and gave her to Phalti to be his wife (I Samuel 25:44). II Samuel 3 gives a quick recap of why Phalti had David's wife, even though Michal was considered by the late king's commandment Phalti's wife now. Saul died, so David commanded that his wife be returned to himself, even though she was married to another by this time. This is the example of a second marriage being broken-up, so that the wife can be return to her original husband.
The prophet Hosea was commanded by God to take a wife who was a prostitute, so that he could understand how God felt about his people Israel and their spiritual adultery against Him. Hosea showed the grace of God in the face of the abomination of adultery in taking his wife back to himself time and again. God used his circumstance to show His grace to us, should we accept the terms and conditions of surrender to His perfect will - Hosea 14:1-2,4:
O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. Take with you words, and turn to the Lord: say unto him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously: so will we render the calves of our lips.
I will heal their backslidings, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from him.
Grace overcomes abomination by offering forgiveness, which is contingent upon repentance of (turning from) the abominable practice (adultery).
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