Is It OK to Leave My Church If I Break Up with Another Church Member?

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01:30

Welcome to Bible Bash, where we aim to equip the saints for the work of ministry by answering the questions you're not allowed to ask.

01:36

We're your hosts, Harrison Kering and Pastor Tim Mullett, and today we'll answer the age -old question, Is it okay to leave my church if I break up with another church member?

01:47

Now Tim, as we kick this episode off, what Bible verse do you have to read for us related to breaking up with another church member and whether or not you should stay there?

01:58

Sure, so 1 Timothy 5, 1 -2 says, Do not rebuke an older man, but encourage him as you would a father, younger men as brothers, and older women as mothers, younger women as sisters in all purity.

02:12

Okay, so explain the relevance, you know, with that Bible verse to breaking up with another church member.

02:24

Yeah, I mean, your current relationship status really isn't a thing. I mean,

02:30

Paul basically views single people. I mean, there's only a few categories in the Bible. There's married and there's single.

02:38

So there's no, you know, Facebook interrelationship status or whatever else.

02:43

That isn't really real. So whatever you're doing as a church member when you're trying to pursue a member of the opposite sex, you know, your dating relationship, quote -unquote, is not conferring upon you any rights or privileges, essentially.

02:59

It's all make -believe. It's all pretend that you're doing. So then what you're doing is you're basically saying, am

03:05

I allowed to leave my church because this pretend relationship that I entered into ended?

03:12

So it's kind of a silly question. Well, yeah, and that's something

03:18

I was going to ask you about to try and kick off the episode was, you know, how much of this kind of conversation is actually a conversation surrounding the modern approach to dating in general?

03:33

Because it would have been very different back then, presumably. But for us, you know, it's basically like a, in a lot of ways it's almost like a, hey, you're kind of married without actually really being married.

03:46

At least that's how people view it. And so, you know, the question is,

03:52

I mean, when you're looking at, hey, you know, I just broke up with this girl or I just broke up with this guy.

04:01

I feel like I need to leave. How much of that is actually a conversation about, well, you probably approached trying to find a spouse in an inappropriate way, you know, versus just, hey, you should or you shouldn't leave the church.

04:18

Yeah. So, I mean, people are inescapably made, they're made in the image of God.

04:23

They know that it's not good for a man to be alone. And so they know that they're made for marriage, whether or not they're actually pursuing marriage.

04:30

And for many people be like dating, whatever that is, is essentially for them.

04:37

I mean, it's a mechanism that they're using to get some of the benefits of marriage without the commitment of marriage.

04:45

So, I mean, almost in the best case scenario, I mean, even in almost the best case scenario, most people are viewing it as if there are some rights or benefits that are conferred upon them by virtue of their changed relationship status.

05:04

So, they're trying to get something that they're supposed to be getting out of marriage and that, as you're saying, that's leading them to this conclusion that when they break up,

05:12

I mean, it's almost like a divorce for them, basically. So, it's almost like a divorce for them. And I think that is an indictment on the way that they're thinking about whatever it is that they're doing.

05:26

So, in different social arrangements, you would not play pretend marriage for a period of time before you decide whether or not you're going to commit to it, if that makes sense, like totally in the context of marriage.

05:41

Right, yeah. And so, you're basically saying, yeah, so you are basically saying, hey, there is a very inappropriate, you know, there is a very inappropriate approach to dating, or, well, approach to finding a spouse that's happening here, right?

06:01

Yeah, I'm not invested in what people call it, so to speak. You know, I'm not invested in what the name that people use to describe what they're doing is, but then it's very obvious that in modern dating, most people, they don't view this person as being a sister in Christ solely.

06:24

They view them as something else. So, they're viewing them basically as a quasi -spouse. And then when you break up with a quasi -spouse, they're viewing it as a quasi -divorce.

06:34

When you have a divorce, then you don't want to see the person, you know, week in and week out.

06:40

So, they're not approaching this as a sister in Christ relationship purely. That's not what they're doing.

06:46

So then, because they're not approaching it that way, then what's happening is if it ends, then they were something more than a sister in Christ to them, and that gave them some kind of benefits or something along those lines.

07:03

So, that basically means that, yeah, it would be way too awkward, and, you know, my emotions are so tied up into this relationship now that, you know, basically

07:13

I have to depart, leave. It would just be too awkward, man. So, yeah, yeah.

07:20

It's an indictment in the modern way that they're thinking about it, for sure. So then, you know, when you're talking about a situation where someone is breaking up with someone else, and then they're saying, hey, because of this breakup,

07:36

I've got to leave. I've got to go. There's no way I can stay. Would you view that?

07:42

I mean, it feels like, you know, the answer to this is maybe obvious, but just so we can kind of, you know, try to tie this back to Scripture as much as possible and try to point this to as many commands as possible given to the local church, would you say that that kind of approach to church membership and to this kind of courting process or whatever you want to call it is a violation of, you know, various passages of Scripture that call us to unity?

08:11

So, for example, like Ephesians chapter 4, verses 4 through 6, they say, you know, there is one body and one spirit, just as you also were called in one hope of your calling, one

08:24

Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all.

08:32

So you have a verse where he was basically saying, hey, you're one, you're one, you're one, not because of anything other than what

08:39

God has done on your behalf. And then, you know, later on in verse 13, it says, let's see, until we all attain the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the

08:52

Son of God to a mature man to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.

08:58

So we're seeking to, you know, the Bible says that we're seeking to obtain unity with one another in all ways.

09:06

And so, and there's some, you know, there's other verses too, like 1 Corinthians chapter 12, verses 12 through 13, 1

09:13

Peter chapter 3, verse 8 that are all similarly calling us to have unity with one another.

09:20

So then if we're, if we're approaching dating as essentially a, hey, look, I've got to go because, you know, because I was dating this girl and now we've broken up and I just can't be here anymore.

09:31

In your mind, is that like a clear violation of like, well, you're not pursuing unity anymore at that point.

09:39

Is that fair to say? Yeah, I think it's definitely a violation of the unity of the body for sure.

09:45

I mean, I think it's a violation of the principle of family, right? So the body is meant to be one family. So, I mean, you can, it's very difficult to imagine a situation where, you know, you and your biological sister decide that you have unreconcilable differences.

10:03

You can no longer attend church together or something like that. I mean, unless they sinned against you in some very significant way, but the problem is that the church has a church discipline process that would presumably take care of that, right?

10:17

So in a real marriage, a real marriage in the Bible is till death do you part, right?

10:24

Real marriage is till death do you part. So in that kind of arrangement, then, if there's going to be like a lawful divorce, that means that one person has sinned in such a way that they need to be church disciplined and excommunicated, right?

10:41

So there wouldn't be a situation where two faithful church members who are married have an amicable disagreement, and then they get divorced, and then they stay in the same church.

10:54

You know, if you have a divorce that happens, it's because one of them needs to be church disciplined, presumably, right?

10:59

And that's in most cases. Now, maybe you could conceive of a situation where a man, you know, one of them commits adultery or whatever, and then there's some kind of disciplinary process.

11:14

They come back on the other side repentant, but then, I mean, if that all happens, you know, maybe there's not an obligation to take them back, but basically what

11:23

I'm saying is in most situations, I mean, there could be some conceivable situation where that could happen where they're still members of the same church, but in most situations, you're probably going to deal with it through church discipline, and it's going to resolve itself.

11:37

But then, I mean, these are family relationships, and you should be thinking about your brothers and sisters in Christ as family members with all purity.

11:47

Like that's the status that you have. Now, you know, if you have romantic intentions towards them, you shouldn't be putting those out there in such a way that if it doesn't work, you fundamentally, like you're just so devastated to the point where you can never see the person again.

12:04

I mean, you should be pursuing dating or whatever you're doing in such a way that it would be perfectly fine to go to the same church with them if it doesn't work out.

12:12

No, like you shouldn't. If you are at a point where if they say no, someone has to leave, then either you have a sinful level of insecurity, right, which is fueled by pride.

12:27

So there's some kind of sinful level of insecurity that basically means that you can no longer face them anymore because you're so deeply ashamed because they rejected you or something like that.

12:37

That's a problem, right? Either there's some kind of sinful insecurity or you're looking at this relationship in such a way that you are getting something from it that you shouldn't be.

12:48

But I mean, everyone should approach dating, whatever you want to call it, they should be approaching that in such a way that it acknowledges the sovereignty of God and acknowledges like the purpose of what you're doing is to find out if they're worth marrying, right, like if you're a good fit.

13:03

So I mean, if you're approaching marriage in that way, not as a desperate person who's looking for validation or something like that.

13:10

If you're approaching it with the knowledge that God is sovereign and I'm trying to discern what his will is for this situation and if I find out that his will is that we don't get married because they don't want to marry me, then that's fine.

13:23

Like I learned something valuable. Like I'm glad I figured that out. So you should have

13:30

Christians who are mature enough to be pursuing these kind of relationships with the goal of trying to find out if this is worth, like if this is going to lead to marriage.

13:41

And it should be okay, like yes or no. If it's not okay, yes or no, then you've obviously made this person a monstrous idol, right, to where you've made marriage itself an idol.

13:55

And so something significant has gone wrong there. There's no good way that you can conceive of such a situation where this thing ends and you're both, like it's just too painful to go to church.

14:11

I mean, unless they sinned against you in some significant way, but if they sinned against you in some significant way and not just the sin of saying no in marriage to you, but if they really sinned against you in a significant way, then that would be a church discipline case.

14:26

I mean, maybe you can imagine some kind of scenario where they sinned against you in a big way and the church is refusing your church discipline, and then you feel like you have to go, okay, but that's different.

14:35

That's an additional complication on the kind of question we're asking. We're not asking the question, if someone sins against you in a big way and they refuse to discipline them, should you leave?

14:46

Maybe in that situation, depending on what the sin is, like we're asking the question, if you break up, does that mean it's okay to leave because you're too embarrassed, presumably, or too heartbroken to face the reality of being in a church where you're not pretending like you belong to each other anymore?

15:06

So that's kind of absurd for sure. So what advice would you give to people who are in that kind of stage where they're looking for a spouse?

15:17

What advice would you give them to essentially protect themselves from that kind of situation where all of a sudden, hey, if we do break up or whatever you want to call it, we don't feel like we can just never be around each other anymore.

15:40

What advice would you give to the person asking that kind of question? Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of biblical passage related to that.

15:47

I mean, there's the guard your heart with all diligence from it, flow of streams of life. Now, I mean, there's an entire movement of people who have taken that verse and basically used it as a license to be completely unapproachable to members of the opposite sex or something like that because you're trying to guard your heart and you don't want to do anything to communicate interest whatsoever.

16:08

So you just standoffish and basically just playing this, I'm waiting for my future

16:15

Prince Charming kind of game while I'm sending all the signals of unavailability to everyone around me.

16:21

Yeah, you may be waiting for a long time if that's the case. I don't think that's what guarding your heart means.

16:26

But I mean, certainly, yeah, you should guard your heart with all diligence from it, flow of springs of life.

16:32

I mean, that is directed towards a man, right? From your heart, flow of springs of life. So that's making biological reference there.

16:41

I mean, certainly you should, Solomon says to my son, don't give your strength to women.

16:46

You should be like a desperate person who is just needy and developing some sort of codependent relationship where you need some woman to come along and validate you and affirm you.

16:59

I mean, you should be confident in the Lord. You should be trusting in him. You should be trusting in the sovereignty of God.

17:05

You should be approaching dating in such a way that you're, not that you're trying to have someone validate you as a person or gain approval from society because you're no longer single or something like that.

17:18

I mean, you should be approaching dating in such a way that says, God's sovereign if he wants. Like I want to fulfill his purposes in the world.

17:25

He says it's not good for man to be alone, right? He says it's not good for man to be alone. He tells me to be fruitful and multiply.

17:31

I want to obey that. I want to do what he says. So I'm going to trust him to give me an opportunity to obey him.

17:38

I'm not going to be so desperate for this for self -centered reasons.

17:44

I want to be faithful to God, right? So I think if you're approaching dating in such a way where you're thinking,

17:50

I'm trying to be faithful to God. I'm going to trust him to give me what I need in his timing, if that's what you're doing, then you're not going to be approaching dating as some kind of needy person who is looking for validation, who is desperate to find some member of the opposite sex.

18:08

What you're going to be doing is you're going to look at this relationship, like look at a potential relationship, and your objective is going to be more,

18:16

I'm trying to find out whether or not this person is worth marrying, and I'm willing to accept the answer yes or no.

18:23

So that's what you're doing. I'm going to try to figure out if they're worth marrying. I'm okay with either answer, but until I get married to them, then

18:32

I'm going to treat them as a sister in Christ with all purity. And that doesn't mean I'm just like,

18:39

I'm not going to try to awaken or stir up love to what pleases in the language of the song of songs.

18:45

That means I'm going to actually, I'm going to view this as a brother -sister relationship.

18:52

And if I want it to be more than that, I have to put a ring on it and go commit and get married, right?

18:59

That's the thing. And so if people were to view dating like that, like we're still brothers and sisters in Christ, I don't get exclusive access to them.

19:09

I don't get the rights or exclusive access to them. I don't get any physical affection kind of benefits that other people don't get, right?

19:18

I don't get anything from this until I'm willing to commit to it. That would drive them to commit faster because they're not trying to leech off of this relationship and have some kind of pretend marriage, this giving them emotional security, giving them relational security, worst case scenario, giving them physical gratification, whatever.

19:41

Like that's not what you're doing with it. So, I mean, I would recommend people, this may be shocking to most people, but I would recommend that people approach dating in more of a casual way and less of a serious way.

19:57

Meaning I would recommend them, most people think that the way you approach dating, whatever that is, is to be just completely serious, like fully emotionally committed to an outcome at the very beginning, almost with blinders on your eyes, unwilling to conceive of the possibility that it could work.

20:17

So most people describe dating as, well, the purpose of dating is marriage. It's like, well, no, the purpose of dating is to figure out whether or not you want to marry someone.

20:26

So whatever you call it, whatever you call this mechanism, and I mean, I think there's wiser ways to do it and there's poorer ways to do it.

20:33

I mean, I think having an isolated, one -on -one, very unaccountable romantic way of pursuing it is not wise.

20:41

I think involving parents and family members and more people is better. Certainly, I mean, you may want to have some conversations.

20:51

I mean, a lot of people almost rule out the possibility of ever having one -on -one conversations that are not chaperoned with another human being before you marry them.

21:03

I would say that you might want to have a few of those, however you go about doing that, but certainly it shouldn't be an attempting environment, whatever.

21:12

But yeah, I think you should be approaching dating in such a way that you're trying to figure out whether or not you want to marry them.

21:18

I think it's okay for it to be fun. It doesn't have to be just this depressing, kind of overly serious kind of thing, and I think casual dating is better than really formal dating, meaning you should be, like the idea of you're just making some kind of exclusive commitment to an individual that you don't even know does not lend itself to good outcomes in most cases.

21:53

So, I mean, most of the time, like you just know a few things about them, and they're probably a fantasy that you've worked up in your mind, and they're very different in reality than what you realize that they are.

22:02

And so, I mean, I think just low pressure, low commitment interactions designed to, you know, see if they're worth marrying or helpful at that point over and against these extended, long -term, committed pretend marriage way that most people are approaching it.

22:20

So, I mean, like if a guy were to say, hey, I'd like to take out, I mean, the pickings are pretty slim nowadays, so I don't even know that these kind of scenarios really happen apart from hookup culture anymore because the options are just not there.

22:33

But, I mean, in a former generation, you may go out with one girl a week, you know? I think two girls a week, you know?

22:40

For a long period of time, just to figure out what members of the opposite sex are about,

22:46

I mean, I think that's a lot better than what we're doing now, you know? If you're not attaching to that hookup culture expectations or something like that,

22:54

I think that's a lot more realistic and reasonable. That's really interesting.

23:00

That's really interesting that you would say that because I think, you know, I think if you were to have a guy in a situation where he is, you know, dating, you know, taking a girl, you know, a different girl out each week for like two or three weeks in a row,

23:19

I think he'd probably have three to four women who are all pretty upset in that scenario, you know, or vice versa.

23:30

Like, if you have a girl who's, she goes out with a date or on a date with this guy and then the next week she goes out.

23:36

There are girls who do that now. They do that so they can eat. Just to make sure they're getting a square meal.

23:43

I saw some girl who did that for a year or something like that and never paid for her food, you know? She would just leech off of these guys.

23:51

So, I mean, that's scandalous, right? Sure, yeah. That's scandalous because that's deceptive. Yeah. But anyways, what were you saying?

23:58

But then, you know, yeah, I was just saying it's funny that you would say that because I think if someone were to try and follow that, you know, that approach, they'd probably end up with a bunch of girls or guys mad at them just because of the way the landscape kind of is and the sort of agreed upon, you know, method to finding a spouse these days.

24:25

Well, that's, I mean, that's why it's so messed up. That's why everything is so messed up. It's so messed up because people have, like, they're just, they're expecting some ridiculous and extreme level of commitment to the other person.

24:40

Right off the bat. As a prerequisite for even doing business. Does that make sense? Yeah. I mean, that's crazy.

24:46

Like, I mean, you don't even know this person. And so, if people would chill out a little bit and say,

24:52

I would like to get to know you. I'm not emotionally committing to you for life. It may be that they can, you know, figure out how to get married a little quicker.

25:01

But what people are doing right now is they're making the standard in order to just have a cup of coffee so ridiculously high to the point where they're ruling out.

25:11

I mean, you know, if you're not, if you're more realistic about these things, like you might realize that, like you may need a little bit more information to know about a person than just your initial 10 second impression of them from a distance or something.

25:29

You know, they may, you may, if you give them a little bit of an opportunity to see what they're like, it may be that they're very different than your original impression.

25:37

So, I mean, if you have some, you know, perspective of romance or something that it's all about love at first sight, and, you know, my chemical romance and all that, you know, like raw physical attraction and everything else.

25:49

I mean, yeah, people are just dismissing any possibility of interacting with this member of the opposite sex and seeing some very good things in them.

25:58

You know, so what they want is they want to be persuaded that this person is the one before they ever talk to them, you know, and then, and then when they talk to them, it's almost like they're both expecting like a commitment for life.

26:12

You know, so as a prerequisite, I'm going on a first date. They almost have to be like, like persuaded that they're making a commitment for life.

26:22

It's like, well, why would you go on a date with that? I mean, you don't really have any information at the very beginning, you know. You don't have the information you need to know to commit, you know.

26:29

So if you're demanding that you feel committed permanently forever before you do that, then you may be waiting for a long time.

26:36

I mean, there may be some situations where you can do that. Like if you have regular interaction with this person over an extended period of time, you know, like if you're two church members or something like that, and you can get to know them gradually over,

26:50

I mean, yeah, that would be ideal. But then in the real world, most people are, I mean, there's not an abundance of options at your own church.

26:58

And, you know, so you're, it's very difficult to meet people. So, yeah,

27:04

I mean, I would encourage people to shut off all these crazy notions of, you know, instantaneous emotional commitment, you know, in perpetuity forever and just approach it much more casually than what they're approaching it.

27:19

Much more low key, low commitment. This is just fun, you know, it should be just fun.

27:26

Yeah. You know, I don't think that you're leading a person on by giving them a chance to shake you on a date or something like that.

27:34

You know what I'm saying? Yeah, I mean, like if you're that girl who is using guys to fund her food habits with no intention of ever committing to them whatsoever, she just wants to eat, then, well, that's crazy.

27:45

But, yeah, I mean, in normal situations, I think it should be a lot more low key than what it is for sure.

27:52

So speaking of being limited in options, what if you have a situation where, you know, you break up with someone and then you're looking around and you're saying, hey, there are no more options here.

28:06

You know, there are no more viable options in terms of finding a spouse. In your mind, is that a reason to say, hey, it's time to start looking for churches elsewhere where there's, you know, essentially more fish in the sea?

28:23

I mean, yeah, I don't think that there's more fish in the sea.

28:31

I mean, obviously, I mean, obviously, these things don't simply reduce to probability.

28:39

And so, I mean, if you're only considering that as an axis for, I mean, that's a bad, like, exclusive consideration.

28:52

I wouldn't be willing to say that it has no merit whatsoever, you know, in terms of a consideration at all.

29:00

I mean, there are some situations that I can imagine that people would be in where there really aren't any options and there never will be.

29:12

For instance, I mean, I went to a church in Louisville when

29:18

I was in seminary, and it was a church full of people that were basically one step away from a nursing home, right?

29:25

So it was kind of a nursing home church that I went to for a little bit. And, you know,

29:32

God's hand is not limited. His arm's not shortened, right? He could have sent a single young person to this church, and he's more than capable of doing that.

29:45

But, you know, if you have other options, you may want to think about going. Again, that's on the radar for you.

29:52

You may want to think about other faithful options. You know, so Ruth put herself in Boaz's field.

30:00

You may want to think, like, where are the people at? Like, that's a pretty normal way of thinking, all other things being equal.

30:07

You don't have to commit to, like, you don't have to commit to a situation that in a natural way seems pretty impossible just to demonstrate the power of God or something in your situation.

30:21

Like, you can, like, use your brain. I mean, now, you know, on the other end of things, yeah,

30:27

I mean, if you want to go to a mega church where there's more people at and everything else, you're going to get all the theology that comes with that, right?

30:34

So, yeah, they have a lot more people. There's a lot bigger pool of fish, you know, in the pond and all that.

30:40

But the problem is you're making some very significant doctrinal compromise.

30:48

I mean, so a lot of people do that. They go to churches where people are at, and they're shocked and scandalized by the fact that all the people there are so superficial and shallow, and they wouldn't want to marry them anyway.

30:58

So you didn't really do yourself any favors. You just put yourself around a bunch of people who you, like a godly person, should be repelled by, right?

31:06

Right, yeah. Essentially, you've put yourself around more people, but you haven't put yourself around more viable options in terms of the spouse, right?

31:14

Yeah, if you're a guy in that situation and all the girls dress like they're going to the club or something, it's like, well, do you really want to marry one of them, right?

31:22

You know, and then if you're a girl in that situation and you're looking at all these, like, you know, frat boy kind of guys or whatever who are trashy and, you know, have never read a theology book in their life, then,

31:35

I mean, what do you expect? You know, what do you think you're going to get here? You know, you're not going to get... This may on one axis look like a better field, but it may not be.

31:44

So, I mean, I don't typically... I would not encourage people just to make a decision like that hastily and just out of a moment of desperation.

31:59

You know, I think there's more to it than that. I think if godly people would commit to a place, you know, over time, god brings people in, you know, people come and go and everything else.

32:13

So, I would try to put yourself in a place where you... In general,

32:19

I would try to put yourself in the kind of place where the kind of person that you would want to marry would want to go, right?

32:25

I would be more thinking about it that way. Like, where would the kind of person that you would want to marry go, right?

32:34

So, go to that kind of place, and that should be the main priority for sure. Okay. Yeah, I mean, if you're in a small village somewhere, you know, where all the age ratios are off and you happen to be the only young person there and, you know, you have a faithful church there, but, you know, you're the last of the young people there and all that.

33:00

I mean, you may want to consider relocating for the sake of, you know, prioritizing marriage.

33:06

So, that's certainly something to think about for sure. So, what about, you know, speaking about the, you know, kind of going back to the unity aspect of this, we read a couple verses about, you know, we're supposed to be prioritizing that and reference some more.

33:24

What about a situation where there... It's not just you broke up because, you know, and it was a completely normal relationship outside of the breakup.

33:37

What if that breakup involved some sort of sin on both people's part?

33:44

So, probably the most common thing would, you know, would probably be some sort of sexual sin.

33:52

You know, so for example, you have a guy and a girl dating in a church. They break up, but then they were, you know, they were sexually intimate with one another while they were dating.

34:05

And so, you know, you're essentially, you know, you're taking that kind of what you were talking about earlier where people, they just get far too attached to one another and then you're turning that dial all the way up as far as it goes when you're talking about that level of intimacy.

34:23

So what do you do in that situation? How do you counsel someone or, you know, the two people that are in that situation where they're kind of looking at each other and saying, hey, we were that close and now we're not anymore.

34:37

I feel like I can't be around you anymore. How do you counsel that kind of person?

34:45

Yeah, I mean, it's difficult to give a one -size -fits -all kind of answer to that kind of question particularly when you're living in the kind of society that we're living in because there are some factors that are probably relevant for that topic in general.

35:05

Like meaning, you know, under the old covenant, one of the relevant verses related to that topic is, you know, if a man seduces a virgin and lies with her, there's an expectation that you get married, right?

35:21

Sure, yeah. There's an expectation that you get married and that kind of thing because you have changed the virgin's status, right?

35:29

So you're not really living in a society right now that values virginity anymore and there's almost an expectation that everyone is going to fornicate before marriage.

35:38

And, I mean, that expectation is based on the reality that almost everyone does, right? So in that kind of way, you know, is the woman a virgin or not, right?

35:47

Is she, you know, so what kind of sexual is this? Is this like the, you know, his 10th person that he has fornicated with and her 20th person, or, you know, his 20th person, her 10th person, whatever.

35:59

I mean, that would change the nature of what the right thing to do in that moment might be, for sure, right?

36:07

And then, you know, you're not really living under, living in a society that really has that as part of its, you know, civil code or moral code or anything else.

36:19

So, you know, there's no bride price that has been made for virgins and, you know, all that.

36:26

And so, yeah, I think you're, it's just, it's a more complicated kind of arrangement than what you might imagine, you know, pregnancy might introduce certain complications into it as well.

36:42

I mean, there should obviously be some kind of church discipline process initiated.

36:47

I'm not trying to say that, I mean, you know, presumably they could be repentant and it may not go to the third step or something.

36:55

So I'm not trying to say that fornication should instantaneously go to the third step without, you know, with no hope of restoration or whatever else.

37:03

But I mean, there should be some kind of oversight. Elders, you know, are the elders dealing with it in a godly way?

37:09

Are they not dealing with it in a godly way, right? Is there a church that's going to practice church discipline? Is there a church that isn't going to practice church discipline?

37:17

Who's responsible for this encounter? You know, so I think you can multiply complications at that point.

37:27

So sin obviously complicates everything. And depending on how the situation is handled and the status of everyone involved and how willing everyone is to follow the

37:40

Bible, it may be that, yeah, there's a departure that is unnecessary that has occurred as a result of sin, if that makes sense.

37:52

But, I mean, yeah, I think in a normal world, you're going, like there's, you know, in normal,

37:59

I don't know, it's probably more the normal situation than the opposite situation, you know, of a breakup or whatever, which is why everything is so difficult, you know, at that point.

38:10

But I mean, you should be, like the main point is you should be pursuing marriage in such a way that it's okay to stay at the same church, for sure.

38:18

Do you think, like, so imagine, you know, you're dealing with that kind of situation, and it's kind of like the, whatever the, obviously it's not an ideal situation to be in, but whatever the ideal scenario is in terms of, you know, everyone's response to that situation, so meaning the, you know, the two people that we're dating, they recognize that they are both in sin, you know, they recognize that there needs to be repentance, they're, you know, the church leaders are willing to follow the discipline, the church discipline process, they're willing to submit themselves to the church discipline process, you know, whatever that ideal situation looks like in terms of the response to it, do you think in that scenario it's possible to still, for those two people who were dating, who were intimately involved, to still have, you know, come out of the situation having some sort of unity where they say, hey, look, we don't have to, we don't have to, you know, one of us go, the other one stays, or we both go, something like that.

39:32

I mean, we can both stay here, you know, and we've repented of whatever was going on, you know, we've moved on from one another maybe, but we can still be a part of the same church.

39:43

Do you think that's possible, or do you think that you've kind of gotten to a point where it's basically, you know, there's no, there's just no fixing, there's no fixing it at this point?

39:58

Yeah, I mean, I think part of the way that you answer a question like this is to consider the nature of the severity of what fornication actually is.

40:08

You know, so Exodus 22, 16, if a man seduces a virgin who is not betrothed and lies with her, he shall give the bride price for her and make her his wife.

40:16

Like, the idea is that, you know, what is marriage? It's a man leaving father and mother, holding fast to his wife to become one flesh, right?

40:23

So marriage is two becoming one flesh, so what you have in a scenario where two people are fornicating is you have a, basically, you're people who are performing the act of consummation of a marriage, right?

40:38

Yeah. So, yeah, I mean, obviously that's going to tie them together in a, you know, physical, tangible way.

40:45

Like it's, like when you, you know, when a man lies with a prostitute, the

40:51

New Testament says, right, he's making, he's becoming one flesh with her. That's using the language of marriage, right?

40:58

So this is not a, I would say that this really isn't a trivial act. So I don't necessarily have the expectation with that act that it's just like, you know, a handshake or something like that.

41:13

Let's go separate ways and pretend like it never happened. Like it really is, it's, this is, you are unifying yourself with another person in a way that's profoundly physical, you know, spiritual, right?

41:26

So there's like a unity that has happened there that, yeah, like when you rip those two things apart, it's indistinguishable from ripping two married people apart.

41:39

Yeah. The only difference is one of time, right? Does that make sense? Yeah, it does.

41:45

Yeah. So people treat it as like a very casual act, you know, where you can just say, okay, we were wrong.

41:51

Can we just move on? You know, kind of thing that would say, well, no, it's not, this isn't a casual act.

41:56

This is a, you know, a profound act that does unify two people.

42:03

Because, I mean, this is an act that's intended to happen in the context of marriage. So, yeah,

42:09

I mean, it's like the idea of casual sex is an oxymoron, right?

42:15

It's not casual. It's not casual and there are entailments to it and everything else.

42:21

So I wouldn't say that the, you know, if you're, let's say that woman's not a virgin, whatever, man, has seduced her, like you still have marry whom you will, marry in the

42:34

Lord kind of stuff. I wouldn't say that instantaneously, therefore, then, like if there's not a marriage that happens as a result of it, they decide that this was a sinful relationship, they don't want to go down this road, whatever.

42:53

Like, I don't think that there's some demand that they must leave, one of them must leave, or else it would be too awkward or something like that.

43:05

At the same time, I do understand that this is like the divorce in a lot of ways due to the nature of what they've done.

43:13

And so, yeah, I could imagine how one of them would have, through that act, so tied their emotions to this other person that it may be difficult to be around them all day long.

43:29

But, I mean, that's, you know, every single week, week in and week out. So, you know, the idea that they would come away from that encounter just having completely separated emotions is, you know, would probably indicate a different kind of family.

43:46

Yeah. Where they're so desensitized to what they've done that, you know, I mean, like if this is the 20th person in the line, you know, for both of them or something, then

43:55

I imagine at that point, then it really wasn't all that meaningful and they can maybe stick around, you know, that kind of thing.

44:02

But I would imagine that if it wasn't that, it may be very difficult. Yeah. So, now that's to their utter failure that they need to leave, right?

44:12

Does that make sense? Mm -hmm. But it's more understandable in that situation, for sure.

44:18

But, I mean, you should not be approaching marriage in such a way that you are getting yourself into those kind of messes.

44:24

You know, so, like you're leaving your church because you were so sinful to the point where, like, you could no longer, like you put such a stumbling block in your way of faithfulness that now you have to leave or something.

44:39

Like, that's not ideal and that would be, you know, a sad outcome, for sure.

44:46

Yeah. Okay. Well, fair enough. I think that's a good place for us to wrap up the conversation on.

44:53

So, thank you, Tim, for answering all my questions related to that. Yeah, certainly a difficult topic to talk about from a lot of different angles, especially once you start involving, you know, sin in the relationship and especially when it's, you know, sexual sin for all the reasons that you've spelled out.

45:15

And probably even more that we haven't even had time to really touch on, you know, in a significant way.

45:22

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45:29

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46:36

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47:23

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