Good morning and trust you had a restful weekend. Sincere apologies for not broadcasting last week, but it helped to get a lot of views on the last case study.
Some opined that David and Fatima should not continue with the relationship because they are from different faith and not necessarily because the parents are not in consent. While some believe if they have the parents consent, they should go ahead.
Here is my view, marriage needs more than love to succeed. Marriage requires love, support from both families, sometimes harmonious religious affiliations, financial stability, stable health and maturity among other things to succeed.
Specifically on religion, there are cases of people from different faith marrying and enjoying their marriages, while there are same faith marriages that have hit the rock. So affinity of faith alone does not guarantee success in marriage.
I am aware that Christians often quote 2 Corinthians 6:14 to support argument against marrying anyone outside the faith. This text needs to be read in context of Apostle Paul discussion. I will also encourage you to read the write up by a brother below. He succinctly explained this.
”
Hmmmmm, matters of the heart are very delicate and sensitive and must be dealt with or attended to with some serious caution, and especially when they have religious colourations.
I will approach this topic rather systematically with the intent of bringing about a balance in the end.
As a Christian, and a minister of the Gospel of Christ, it would be easily thought that I will give a blanket “disagreement” to the young friends deciding to marry themselves and living their lives together, for better or for the worse.
My considerations will surely come from my understanding of the diversities of the religious influences from both backgrounds of the would be couple.
There are strong spiritual implications when “Marriage” is the case in point. This is not a business relationship or contract that has expiration dates or duration. It also involves an intertwining of the two to become “One flesh”, meaning that the bond in the union is beyond the physical realms, it is much more than the eyes can see.
Bearing the depth of this spiritual implication in mind, it is believed or expected that one of the two persons involved will or should be able to win the other over to sharing in his or her beliefs or faith. The reason here is, as a Kingdom (Family), you can not be divided and be expected to stand. Also, you cannot serve two Altars of worship, while you be declared to be bounded in love (Spirit, Soul and Body).
These concerns predominantly arouse all the sentiments from both ends of the divide, when young people from different religious sects seek to marry and live together for the rest of their lives.
One of the critical factors that also influences these situations is, the position of the Male gender in the relationship. The faith or religion of the male is mostly considered and the leading spirit or influence over the household, since the male is the priest over his household.
It is most and generally believed that the man’s Priesthood and spiritual influence will dominate his house, therefore setting the direction in which the home affairs are being run.
It is on this note that most parents insist that their children keep the faith that they were brought up under, believing that by this they have succeeded in raising a godly heritage.
Most Christians will often quote the Bible from 2Cor. 6:14, which says “Be ye not unequally yoked with unbelievers”, as a meaning, do not have anything to do with people who are not of the same faith as you.
This interpretation is so wrong because we fail to rightly appropriate the word “unequally”. We can “equally” be yoked with unbelievers, but not unequally. When we think about the era in which the Bible was written, which was in the agrarian age, most of its illustrations and explanations were done with agrarian terms. If you had to plow the ground for planting, you needed to yoke two Oxens of equal strength and capacity, in order to deliver the effectiveness of your plow. Should one Ox be stronger that the other, the yoke would break the weaker one’s neck and kill it.
In deploying this to our lives, it simply means that when we bond with people of a faith other than what we believe, we must be equally strong to ensure we are not pulled off our faith and belief in God and Christ.
Having said all these, I believe that the one thing that cannot be counterfeited or adulterated by any faith is LOVE. If Love be the reason why the two have decided to come together to express their God nature and mandate as co-creators with God and to be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth, then the God of Love, who is love Himself will reveal Himself to them and bring them to the place of fulfillment in purpose and destiny.
I have seen several cases of such inter faith marriages and God has showed Himself strong and Mighty on behalf of the couples involved, as much as the love professed was genuine.
We do also understand that when people profess “love” most of the time, it is simply a state of emotion, and a view point influenced by several objects or subjects about the time of connection or coming together of the two. Since Love is the same as Hate, both only varying in degree of viewpoint as stated by the law of polarity, it is lickly that two people who professed love for each other and swore never to let anyone or anything come between them, could turn around and endup as sworn enemies. What happened here would be a drift in their views towards each other, and the truth is, couples often come to realise that as the years go by, what drove them at the instance of their relationship is totally different from what sustains the relationship down the line.
My summation here then is, let everyone who finds themselves in situations as this, take some time and think through all the consequences, implications and the future of the home they seek to build. Bible says, “let he who seeks to build a house, first count the cost, and be sure that he will finish it, before he starts, lest he abandons the project after that he has started, then realises he has not enough capacity to complete it”.
I in my opinion then do not object to these faiths inter marrying, I however am concerned that Christ be the Lord of their lives in the end. So my prayer would be that they find Christ, the Rock of their salvation, if they never really did.
Let love rule and reign over all that we do, in Jesus Name. Amen.” – Kelvin Otung.
This position above summarises my view on this case study. I trust this helps someone out there. God bless.
Have a productive week.
Adewumi Oni
08028395824
09095321147
wumioni@yahoo.com
http://www.adewumioni.com
Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/adewumi.oni
Twitter: onadol2010
adewumioni 