Brandon Hatmaker Speaks Out Re: Divorce from Jen Hatmaker - Divorce Minister
(Video as context for the written response from Jen Hatmaker’s ex-husband, Brandon Hatmaker.)
He wrote, “We are all bigger than our lowest moment: Here are five things I’d like to offer perspective on…” on September 22, 2025. In this, Brandon Hatmaker claims to be simply giving “context” and not making excuses for his cheating.
He writes,
“Let me be clear about something, I understand what it means to sit in the consequences of my actions. In no way do my circumstances excuse my actions. The purpose of this article is not to make excuses or rationalize anything, The purpose is to simply add context to a handful of areas where the vast majority, and nearly every new follower, is missing.”
Next follows a whole lot of doublespeak regarding not excusing his behavior. It’s just “context,” folks!
It is typical Cheater behavior to try to protect their image. If he truly is willing to sit in the consequences, he would never present information that makes it sound like his wife was at fault for the marriage ending.
For example, he writes about his work to save the marriage:
I have lists still on my phone of things I tried to do daily, I initiated conversations but we just couldn’t find a common language, I went to counseling (alone) for three years prior to my affair, I felt invisible in my marriage, and I kept spiraling until there was no lower place to go. Jen and I eventually went to a handful of therapy sessions together – but to be honest – it was too late.
That sounds an awful lot like blaming your ex-wife for the marriage ending to me. It certainly paints Brandon as the tragic martyr of the marriage as opposed to the cheating aggressor who bludgeoned the marriage to death through lies, treachery, and infidelity.
Cheaters that understand the gravity of what they have done do not go on to tell people about the “context” of their cheating AS IF THAT MATTERED!
Finally, I write this post today as both Brandon and Jen Hatmaker are Christian leaders. They are–or were–pastors (he tries to convince his readers that he wasn’t a pastor anymore when he started cheating). Standards need to be higher for leaders in the Church.
He writes,
It’s hard to admit this after growing up in the southern baptist world, but I see now that it was right for Jen and I to divorce. But you can do the right thing the wrong way. And that’s what I did. We grew into two different people and we changed so much over the years. I think we both just needed something that the other couldn’t provide.
That paragraph really bothered me.
He is a former pastor at least. Yet he is teaching divorce as the right thing to do for people who grew apart or had different needs. That’s not a godly option for a faithful follower of Christ.
Plus, if he was truly remorseful for cheating, he would have wrote something like:
“Jen had every right to divorce me for harming her so grievously by lying and cheating on her. The Bible gives the innocent party to the cheating this right–which was hers–because of how evil it was for me to cheat on her. I am not going to blame the ending of our marriage on anything other than my sin.”
That is what taking responsibility for one’s actions looks like. It is what really owning the consequences of one’s sins looks like when infidelity is involved.
Yet he does not do that. Instead, he shifts blame to his devolving marriage–and by extension, to his now ex-wife. He implies divorce was right for them due to their marriage issues outside of the cheating. That is not biblical counsel and it, again, is a minimization of his sin.
When considering divorce, Scripture does not ask whether there is sin in a marriage. There’s always sin in a marriage–even the best ones. Rather, only certain sins constitute such a breach where divorce is the remedy. Adultery is one of those breaches (see Mt. 1:19, 19:9, etc.)
