Marriage
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2. Why can’t I marry a girl who is of this world (that is, an
unbelieving girl)? |
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Because if
you marry a girl who is not a believer, you will put a yoke on your neck which
will harm you, for Paul says to the saints of |
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In other
words, if you, who are a believer, marry an unbelieving woman, it will come
to pass that you will fill yourself with troubles and afflictions because
your wife will make every effort to dissuade you from loving and serving the
Lord and thus this situation will eventually result either in a separation –
because you will decide to remain faithful to the Lord at all costs and she will
decide to leave you in order to go to live with somebody who doesn’t set his
mind on things above – or, as it happens in most cases, in your backsliding
because you will decide to please your unbelieving wife and thus you will go
back to your wallowing in the worldly lusts (which are lusts of uncleanness)
from which you were delivered by the grace of God. I would like to dwell upon
this eventuality, because, as I said before, it is the one which occurs most
of the times. You must bear in mind that it is very dangerous for a son of
God to marry a woman who despises the Lord or serves the Lord only with her
lips but her heart is far from God, instead of a woman who believes in the
Lord and loves Him, because such a woman, being under the power of the devil,
sets her mind on earthly things, and since the devil is her master and
deceives her by his craftiness, she will be induced – even if unwittingly –
to deceive her husband and to make him sin, and experience teaches us that she
succeeds in deceiving him. The woman knows how to deceive man, she has been
deceiving man for thousands of years. She began to deceive man in the Garden
of Eden, and she has succeeded in deceiving man countless times ever since.
That the woman is able to led astray a man, is demonstrated by the example of
Solomon, who was wiser than any other man in his days, yet when Solomon was
old his wives, who worshiped other gods, turned his heart after their gods
and his heart was not loyal to the Lord as was the heart of his father David,
and thus God became angry with Solomon (1 Kings 11:1-9). Therefore, don’t be
deceived into thinking that you will eventually manage to win your wife to
Christ, because it will happen just the opposite, that is, you will be led astray. |
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Therefore,
if you are looking for a wife, I exhort you to look for her among the
daughters of God, praying to the Lord (and even accompanying prayer with
fasting) so that He might cause you to meet your bride. Instead, if you are
engaged to a girl who belongs to the world, and you are still waiting for her
conversion but you see that she is not interested in the Lord at all because
she has told you or made you understand that you must choose between her and
the Lord, then leave her immediately without thinking twice. You will never
regret this decision; obviously, it will be painful, but God will eventually
turn your pain to joy, this will happen when He causes you to meet the woman
God has appointed for you. |