I have yet to see someone who seeks a divorce based on adultery who's heart is to please Christ first and foremost.
You need to look more carefully. Moreover, you really don't have a way of seeing someone's heart, so your assertion is opinion at best.
Speaking as someone who has been through this personally, the church (and the self-appointed experts on the 'situation' in another person's marriage) often respond to this very difficult and traumatic situation in ways that are destructive and profoundly unhelpful.
I used to be a self-appointed expert on how to handle adultery in marriage. Although my heart was in the right place and I was sincere, I didn't know what I was talking about.
Most who approach it that way, while they may consider divorce, end up staying with their spouse and forgiving them.
You also need to realize that spouses sometimes abandon the legal marriage (for all practical purposes), long after they have abandoned the marriage bed for the bed of another.
After I caught my ex-wife (in the act) cheating on me, I tried to work it out with her for well over a year - living in the same home and treating her with grace and love. She refused all attempts to get counseling and instead took advantage of my willingness to take on a second job so she could go back to school and get a masters degree in order to change careers. (She had claimed that she was unhappy with her life and wanted to change careers, so I agreed to help her make that happen.) During that time, she would disappear for days at a time without calling and refuse to tell me where she had been. She also apparently had male visitors to our home when I was working at those two jobs (which wasn't hard since I was working more than 70 hours a week). She also refused to go to church or associate with any of our longtime friends.
As soon as she had finished her degree, found a job and received her first paycheck, she cleaned out our bank accounts (nearly $20,000) except for $200, racked up $13,000 in credit card charges, and took off without a word. Days later I found out she had moved in with a guy that she had previously worked with (not the one I had caught her with) and I was left to figure out what to do.
I confided in a Christian friend about my situation and he insisted that it would be ungodly for me to file for divorce since the Bible "says its wrong" and only "hardhearted people" do that sort of thing. Plus, there had been a lot of divorce in her family, so I had solemnly promised her that I would not divorce her when I had proposed.
For three more months, I endured the limbo of a broken marriage where she was racking up even more charges on our credit - she was getting new cards and accounts (we're a community property state, so I'm responsible for her debts), buying things like a new washer and dryer and all kinds of major purchases for a new home, so it didn't sound like she was planning to come back.
After that three months, I sat down with a very wise pastor who knew me well and knew my story, and he told me that filing for divorce would simply be informing the state that the marriage had ended. The real marriage had ended long before. Furthermore, my promise not to divorce her was a well-intended promise, but a foolish one. I simply gave her confidence she could do anything she wanted without consequences. Moreover, filing for divorce protects others when they are trying to make decisions about extending her credit. I was barely able to feed myself because of the costs of trying to repay all of the debt she had racked up. It was getting to the point that I wouldn't be able to pay and others were going to lose money.
I finally filed for divorce and received instant and vicious condemnation from members of my church, seminary students I worked with, and other religious people.
I was accused of having a girlfriend waiting in the wings, of being physically abusive, of being "hard-hearted", of not having faith and rushing into divorce, of being incredibly selfish and not considering the fact that my ex-wife is going to face a "stigma", etc.
I faced such a barrage of criticism and condemnation, I checked out of church for more than a year for my spiritual health. I didn't want to be bitter against well-meaning but incredibly misinformed church people.
Nearly 18 months later, I found a church that didn't treat me as a second-class member. I also met a woman a couple of years later and proposed marriage after dating eight years. I now have a happy marriage where we support each other's walk with God and can minister together.
And for those who think I shouldn't have remarried, here's two things to consider:
1.) My ex-wife has remarried (at least once) and there's a biblical prohibition against remarriage in that situation.
2.) In biblical times, my ex-wife would have been stoned to death for her behavior and I would have been widowed, not divorced.
There's much more to this story, but I think that expresses the basics.
When you do your arm-chair theology about what people should and shouldn't do in an adulterous marriage, remember that there are real people involved in very complex situations, trying to exercise grace and mercy at the expense of their own happiness and desires. I wanted desperately to stay married to my ex-wife, but she would not allow it.
