#041 - Is It Dangerous to Get Married Young?

Speaker 1 00:00:20 Hello, friends. And welcome back to unnamed Christianity, where we seek to reconcile our human experiences with God and his words so that we can love God and love others from a pure heart, a good conscience and sincere faith. It's gonna be back with you on the podcast this week. We are currently I'm, I'm recording this earlier in may, but when I plan to release this, we will be in the middle of a trip. Uh, my brother is getting married and so we are back east for the about 10 days to celebrate his wedding with him and his fiance. So last week I shared an interview that someone had done with me, Kendrick Byler had done with me on his podcast this week. I thought I would talk about marriage. Speaker 0 00:01:08 <laugh> Speaker 1 00:01:09 Just to, uh, go along with a theme of our lives, our trip right now. But somebody had sent me, I believe it was over LinkedIn. A friend had sent an article back in February and just wondered. He just said, well, maybe this would be, make a, a good podcast episode. And so I looked at the article, the article was too risky to wet in your twenties, not if you avoid cohabiting first. And so I was like, okay. Interest, interesting article. I wasn't exactly sure what he was thinking about that we could talk about. Exactly, but I just kind of said it I've had it in my, my file. And then as I thought about episodes to release, while we're on this trip, I thought, you know, I I'll, uh, pick this article back up and discuss it. So we're gonna dive into this article and just discuss marriage. Speaker 1 00:02:04 And specifically, is it dangerous to get married young and we'll have to kind of define what it, what young is as well. So anyways, before we dive in, I would love, I don't guarantee that I will do an episode on the topic that you suggest, but I love hearing your suggestions, just like this, whether it's an article, whether it's an idea, whether it's a person to interview or a book to read and review or get, try, reach out to the author about coming on the podcast, I would love to hear what, what are the kinds of things you guys would find meaningful? You guys would enjoy hearing discussed on unfun Christianity as always the best way to support this podcast is by becoming a member of unfun Christianity. And one of the perks is you get access to expanded versions of our interviews as well as two deep dive essays a month. Speaker 1 00:02:56 And so one of the recent deep dive essays that we we've published is called raising kids while struggling with depression, just kind of a fairly raw and vulnerable part of my story. And a, a bit as a couple. And just, um, how, how do you navigate? It seems like when you have young kids, it's some of the toughest seasons of life. You're less financially stable. You, you are taking on increasing responsibilities, whether in work or in ministry, in church. And, and yet, uh, kids demand a lot. They demand a lot of attention. They need a lot of energy. And I think more parents than we realize go through seasons of depression in those moments in those times. And how do you navigate that? And particularly, and one of the biggest messages that I want to communicate through this deep dive essay is that you are not messed up. Speaker 1 00:03:48 You're not alone. This isn't, you're not an anomaly like ma many people have walked through this and dealt with this and hopefully kind of normalize the conversation a little bit and, and just look at, Hey, what does it look like to walk with Jesus, to, to try to raise kids, to try to live faithfully when we're struggling with something like depression, if you would like to access that deep dive essay, go ahead and visit www.whitburn.com/member. And that gives access to the all deep dives essays, but specifically that one as well. So it's always, I'd love. If you could rate, review the podcast, how it's helpful to you or not helpful to you, uh, share it with a friend. If you find it meaningful, that's, that's one of the best ways you can support us is just to spread the podcast and share it with a friend. But on this one in just a moment, let's dive in, is it dangerous to get married young? Speaker 1 00:05:04 So this article is found in the wall street journal too risky to wet in your twenties. Not if you avoid cohabiting first, I'm not gonna read the whole article, but I did think that I would read just some quotes from it. Apparently they've done another survey or article. I, I, I did not read that read up on that, but, uh, just jumping in kind of the middle of the article here, it says when it comes to divorce research is generally backed up to belief that it's best to wait until around 30 to tie the knot. The sociologist Nicholas Wolfinger of the university of Utah found that women who got married too early, mid twenties or earlier were more likely to break up than their peers who got, who married close to the age of 30 as recently, as we recently discovered. However, there is an interesting exception to the idea that waiting until 30 is best in analyzing reports of marriage and divorce from more than 50,000 women in the United States, government national survey of family growth. Speaker 1 00:06:04 NFSG we found that there is a group of women for whom marriage before 30 is not risky women who married directly without ever cohabiting prior to marriage. In fact, women who married between 22 and 30 without first living together had some of the lowest rates of divorce in the N S FG. The idea that cohabitation is risky is surprising given that a majority of young adults believe that living together is a good way to pretest the quality of your partner and your partnership, thereby increasing the quality and stability of your marriage. But a growing body of research indicates that Americans who live together before marriage are less likely to be happily married and more likely to land in divorce court. So this, I, I found this article kind of interesting it's, it's one of those articles where it's like, yeah, it kind of it's human experience. Speaker 1 00:07:00 Sociology just kind of proving what <laugh>, what I already believe, right? What, what we as Christians believe to be the, the sexual ethic, uh, design for marriage that, that Jesus portrays. And so it's easy like this, this article doesn't interact at all with why, what has led to people, cohabiting, um, and some of the experiences with bad marriages. And so why there was a movement to, well, let's just test it out instead of just getting married right away, or even something we deal with a lot here in Los Angeles is just a culture of people where they don't generations. They they're very family oriented. They do things a lot together, but they don't necessarily get married and they may have multiple partners over a season of their life, you know, 20, 30 years. And that's kind of a, a general sweeping statement, but there's a lot of dynamics that go into why people cohabit first that need gentle interaction with we can't just draw kind of judgemental conclusions that people are just wanting, you know, to have their own, it's all about their own safety, or they want their own sexual, the sexual pleasure without responsibility of family and commitment and all that, that does play into it at times. Speaker 1 00:08:27 But it, it is a bigger conversation that at a like pastorally, like in discipling people through it, it is messier. It's, it's more complex. And one of the things that I've wrestled a lot with is how do you, so we believe, at least our church has typically believe that, you know, divorce and remarriage is wrong. Um, it's living in sin. If someone gets divorced and remarried, this is kind of I'm I'm our current church does not have like an articulated statement of belief. I'm just kind of summarizing generally like conservative an Baptist, how we, how we view divorce and remarriage. And so if somebody is married and then gets divorced, we, we think they should Rere, uh, unite. What's the word re get back together with their spouse, their official spouse. And there's, there's one brother who had been a part of our church for a while, who I'm, I'm not gonna tell his whole story. Speaker 1 00:09:30 It's his story to tell, but he, he had been a part of a group that did a lot of travel and he got married one time when he was drunk. And over the time of their wedding, he, he came home. He was home for a few weeks, was with his wife for that time, but they were mostly drinking and it was kind of just a, a marriage for status and for family ties and so forth. But then he never really spent much life with her. And later moved to another area and met a lady that he fell in love with and had a couple kids with and lived together for a significant period of time. And then eventually, like they weren't married. Uh, she may have moved on to another partner or something, but when he met us, he really wanted to try to reconcile with her and get back together with her and had more of a desire, more affection for her. Speaker 1 00:10:28 And yet, you know, we say he should, he was actually married to that other lady, even though he didn't actually live that much with her, didn't have any kids with her and doesn't have any really, it was just kind of a platonic marriage, so to speak. And, and that, that has caused me to kind of sort through like how, how, how do we handle that? Like, um, he basically lived as if he was married and raising a family with this other lady, and yet he was never legally married. What is the definition of married and how do we navigate all that? And that this episode is not gonna attempt to try to answer that because I don't, I don't even really it's stuff that I'm still sorting through. I say all that, just to point out how, when you disciple people, when you, when you get to know many people outside of our background, outside of our culture, it's not a clean cut, like easy way to delineate how this should happen or what is morally right and wrong. Speaker 1 00:11:35 And, and so I think those need to be handled gently. Having said that it is interesting to find that studies are beginning to show that those who get married before cohabiting have significantly less, less risk of divorce. And it'd be interesting to see that this article is fairly brief. It's just kind of talking about the statistics that they saw, but it'd be interesting to have conversation with people who generally believe that you should co-habit first. Um, I think it's, it is kind of interesting. There's kind of the modern feminist movement has overlap with some Christian values in that they're kind of rejecting the objectification of women as Christians would. Right. Speaker 1 00:12:34 And so there are some things that they're gonna find and they're gonna study and see results for that that are like, oh yeah. Like we, that confirms like why we believe this or why we think this, even though we may be coming at it for different purposes or from different angles. But I guess I, to me, it's, it's fairly simple, um, common sense in many ways. Like it just, the more emotionally involved, I, I'm not, I don't go down the route of purity culture and thinking that, oh, if you hold hands or even if you kiss somebody or you, you date multiple people, like you're giving part of your heart, that you'll never get back. And so you, you shouldn't do that until, you know, you're gonna get married. I think that's extremely toxic teaching, but there is something to the fact that the more emotionally involved you get with people with anything, the more it's gonna take up in your psyche and the more it's gonna cause conflict. Speaker 1 00:13:48 And so if you're getting cohabitation is intimate, but then especially sexual intimacy is extremely intimate. And if you're doing that with multiple people, especially if you're not even like taking a season to process and kind of heal from that and, and grow out of that to reflect on like, what, why didn't that work out? Um, you're gonna just compile this emotional investment upon emotional investment. And when you're with your third or fourth person, and you're things are really frustrating and you've had a couple people, sure, maybe those other ones were frustrating and you didn't enjoy living with them, but this guy is really irritating. You or this guy is really irritating you right now. There's gonna be things that you remember of the, of the past partner that is, and, and it'll come back up as like, well, they did it that way or whatever. Speaker 1 00:14:45 I, I have no clue what actually happens for people like that. I did not co-habit I know myself, I know my tendencies to compare and to contrast. And so like, to me, it, it just makes a lot of sense that I think you have the best bet, the best rate of just finding someone you love and you care about, and you know, is not perfect, but you're just gonna kind of grow together from there. And, and there's gonna be a lot of things that irritated both of you. And then there's gonna be things that you love, and there's gonna be irritations that you grow to love and you grow to love about that person. And as you continue to just invest in them, who I wholeheartedly support the idea that do not cohabit first, um, there's a lot of young, young men here in LA that talk with a lot about sex and about things. Speaker 1 00:15:42 And, and they've had experiences that are far beyond anything I had at 18 or 19. And, and, but they're really processing like, what is, what does it mean to follow Jesus in, in a setting where I didn't know anything other than, than this, that kids and that youth. And at young ages, you go out and discover for yourself, become sexually active. And, um, and so just the one recently in a Bible study recently, just they, they asked like, so when is, where is your line when you know, when is it too much? When is it too? When have you gone too far with someone? Obviously I'm married. So there's, there's, uh, I don't, <laugh> get close to someone where it feels like, man, I could maybe go too far, but my response to them was, you know, both of them have jobs, both of them work. Speaker 1 00:16:46 And so I asked them what happens if you show up late, are you fired? Like does, does your whole, the, the landscape of your life just catastrophically change because you showed up five, 10 minutes late. It's like, no, no, it doesn't. I mean, if I do it a lot, then I might get fired and then at least get talked to. But, um, one of the, one of the guys' jobs had a, they have a buffer period you're allowed to show up a little bit late. This is a grace period. Uh, I asked them, what about finances? Like, let's say you went to too many shopping sprees or whatever, and you're out. And then there's a gathering that you really want to go to with friends. And, and you say, man, I don't have the money, but I, I really wanna go with you guys and Hey, can you pay my way? Speaker 1 00:17:36 I'll pay you back later. Whatever, like, does, does that just catastrophically change the landscape of your life? If you push the envelope on, on your finances and no, it doesn't like there will be somebody people will, maybe if you do it all the time and you're always asking for money, they'll get annoyed at you. But the thing about sex is that when you push the envelope on the margin in a moment, it can catastrophically change your life forever. And so I'm not this, what I told him is I'm not that interested in figuring out where the line is because I, I don't wanna go up to the line. I don't even wanna flirt that closely with it because in one moment, in one instant, I can completely destr in, in my setting. I can completely destroy my marriage, my family, um, depending on, depending on what we're talking about, like you could, you could have lawsuits against you. Speaker 1 00:18:38 You could have a, another child to deal with or whatever. Like, there's, there's just so much that can go wrong forever and ruin, not just your life, but your family's life and the person you're you're getting involved with. And so sex and sexual relationship, intimate relationships like this, we don't really wanna like see where that line is. So that then we know we can go that far, unless we're saying, okay, there's a line. I'm gonna draw my boundary way back here. That's essentially what my message was is that's not, that's not a margin you wanna run empty. That's not something you wanna run, push the envelope up into the very line and then see, uh, if I go over it, then you know, somebody's gonna pick me up. And certainly the grace of God is real. And as far as forgiveness, when, when there's true repentance, Jesus can forgive us is forgiving us constantly right now, right? Speaker 1 00:19:36 If you're sitting here sinning, he is on, on the cross for you. Paul said, wow, we were yet sinners dead in our trespasses and sins. God and his mercy made us alive through Jesus Christ. And so absolutely there is always grace, but life isn't just about like being okay with God. Life is about how we affect others around us too. And, and that that's what justice is, is, is just walking in a way that, that relating with people, treats them in dignity as an image bearer of God. Anyways, that little spiel is just to affirm this article that, Hey, if you're not cohabiting before marriage, your chances for having a happy marriage are significantly better, but most of you listening to this, all of this is just kind of preaching to the choir, right? So let's, let's shift the conversation a little bit and let's, let's talk about, okay, what about marrying young? Speaker 1 00:20:48 Because we live in a time where the average, the median age of marriage is really old. I, I haven't looked in probably four years, but I think, uh, back in like 20 18, 20 17, the median age for men was 27. And the median age for women was 29. I should have looked that up before I started this, but I, um, I'm not sure where it's at by now, but that's pretty, that's like the middle age. That means we have a lot of people getting married in their mid thirties. I know quite a number of people personally, who got married in their forties and it's, I have family and extended family who are almost 40 and they're still not married and they're great people. And so we live in kind of this phenomenon of, of our time, I guess. And I think it's influenced largely by the culture at large. Speaker 1 00:21:38 Um, it's not just unique to Christian Christian circles, but is there, like, what are the pros or cons or is there danger in getting married young and maybe kind of with that, is there like something wrong with people who are not married by the time they're 30, by the time they're 40, that's just kind of a ugly way of putting it. But I think, I think the church could do better at like navigating some of these conversations. And I got married at 21. So I consider that young, I have several mentors who got married at like, or started dating at like 18 or 19. So, um, and I did actually have a relationship at, in my teens, older teens. Um, that is not, that was not with Theresa, but I, you know, 21 is still pretty young. We were dating 20 years old and got married 21. Speaker 1 00:22:38 I was, you know, almost 22, I guess there's year and a half older than me. So she's, she's a little, little more mature <laugh>. And so, as I reflect back, we've been married 10 years. Now, this year in November of 2022, it will be 10 years and we have four kids. We miscarried one. So we've, we've brought about, uh, five children in, in there's wo I was gonna say our wo it's not <laugh> on my womb. Um, and so, and we've been, we've lived overseas. We've lived in Los Angeles when we're not living overseas. We we've done a lot of travel. We have many friends, we have friends who got married, young, like us. We have friends who were good friends of ours who are still not married, or just now some of them are just now getting married and they're, it's, it's fun to see them, uh, finding their, their life partners and, and starting their family and having fun together. Speaker 1 00:23:41 We look at them sometimes and we're like, man, they're better off financially than we were when we started. <laugh> like, maybe we should have waited a little bit. Um, but each season, like don't compare each other's seasons of life, cuz God, yeah. It's a different story for each person. And, uh, we have friends. We, we, uh, when we first got married, we started having kids lickity split <laugh> it, it didn't take much at all to start having kids. And, uh, even, even if we were not intentionally trying to have kids, we, we had kids, we had friends who tried and tried and tried for years. And it was a long, hard road of discovering that they probably won't ever have kids, you know, eight, 10 years of infertility. We have friends who were infertile for a while and then God miraculously gave them a child and they've, they began to have kids, many kids. Speaker 1 00:24:43 And, and so there's so many different types of stories when it comes to family and marriage. And I think one of my prayers is that somehow our generation can be a part of, kind of Newing conversation about romance and about marriage and about God's purpose for our lives in a way that transcends the relational stories that we have. Um, because especially in conservative anti Baptist circles, we have kind of wrapped identity and even spiritual maturity around marriage. And when I listen to single friends and family talk about some of the things that, that they process desires in their hearts and yet reality of their life, and then the way some people talk to them or about them. Um, I, I hear a, a pain that I think we need to gently kinda lean into and, and just, um, yeah, we have a lot to learn. Speaker 1 00:25:48 And so I'm not in any way gonna try to like articulate, okay. Here's, you know, here are the dangers of getting married young and here's why you should get married young or here's what it means if you're not married young, but I just thought I have a few points here. I thought that would be good to discuss. And then I'd love to hear your thoughts, your feedback in the comments section, either on the blog or maybe shoot me a message on social media, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, whatever, or you can email me. But the first point that I wanna make is that age of marriage says nothing about one's maturity, spiritual maturity, their maturity, as a person, age of marriage says nothing. Actually, that's not true. If you get married young, you're immature. <laugh> like at 21, I was more immature than I am when I'm 28. Speaker 1 00:26:50 Whether I would've been single at 28 or whether it's me, the married 28 year old, um, now I've as a married person, I've had experiences that I would not have had as a single, but the friends of mine who are 28 and 30 and single, they have experiences that I don't have as a married person. So, so yeah, I mean, age and maturity, what I'm trying to say is that just because someone gets married young doesn't mean they're mature or doesn't mean that somehow they're more ready for marriage. I think that notion, I don't think anybody ever says that directly, but it gets kind of said in the quiet backhand of a lot of statements that we can make about, about marriage and family, good grief. There's a lot of us who are ridiculously immature and married like that. That's just, that's the, the grace of God. Speaker 1 00:27:45 We happen to just find somebody else who is immature and put up with us and like clicked <laugh>. But like there's no like Uber spiritual thing or, or significant thing that led Teresa and I, other than the fact that our personalities clicked, we enjoyed each other. Yeah. We were both following God. And, and we were praying about our lives and God seemed to be directing us to each other. And that's a part of our face story, a part of our marriage story. And it's a part of yours as well. Some of your story is not, you know, maybe having someone, seeing someone that you enjoy appreciate and would really like to get to know and to be married to, and that desire not being fulfilled. Um, some of, some of your stories are watching them get married to other people. And those are really, really hard stories. Speaker 1 00:28:47 There's I, I don't know why that happens. Why God allowed. Why, why did God allow me to get married, to therea the cocky jerk that I was, you know, when, when there are other people who are far more mature, far more ready for marriage and yet not married yet. I don't understand. I don't understand that journey. Is this a part of the fall? I don't know. I don't know. Like, I, I, I absolutely think that, um, relational challenges and brokenness is amplified by the fall. I think sometimes we, we misunderstand the fall a little bit. Um, it's interesting how, when God talks with Eve about labor pains, he didn't say you're going to have labor pains. He said, there'll be greatly increased. Um, you know, you think of, of the garden of Eden, Adam was supposed to work the garden. He was supposed to nurture the garden. Speaker 1 00:29:57 So the idea of tilling the ground, that's not inherently a result of the fall. Adam was supposed to take care of the garden, uh, even even form of death. Like the garden is an ecosystem and a part of biology and, and, and a good healthy ecosystem is death in the, in the growth and nurturing of plants, even eating fruit like that is committing a death to the fruit. You're, you're taking it, needing it. So sometimes we think about some of these things kind of narrowly and not, not holistically about everything that's going on. And so I think relationships would have always taken work. Even if Adam and Eve never fell. That's just me surmising. I think that's a pattern that we can see in Genesis one and two is that there is a good creation. It's not perfect. It's it's never said it's a perfect creation that everything like perfectly comes together fits together. Speaker 1 00:31:01 Like it's a good creation and it there's everything we need for life. And God is with us. And we have this open, transparent relationship with God, but <affirmative>, but there still took work for, for instance, Adam and Eve had to trust that God really had their best in mind. If they would've obeyed, they would've had to trust that, that you think that's easy. Like obviously it wasn't easy. They chose not to. Um, and so trust and relationship, lack of trust that that is not inherently because of the fall, like the something coming in between and, and challenging our trust and connection that is evident all in the, in the Eden story before Adam and Eve decide to eat the fruit, decide to rebel. So I think, I think relationships would've always taken work, but they they're definitely amplified. And the brokenness and our, our quickness to just kind of self-protect is most certainly amplified. Speaker 1 00:32:12 We see that immediately after the fall, they, they see their nakedness and they begin to self protect, try to wrap themselves up, try to protect themselves from God, protect their shame. Um, that is inherently a part of the fall. So I don't know why, why does God allow certain journeys for some people and certain journeys for others? That's gonna be one of the questions that I ask him when I see him face to face is God. Why? Yeah. What about desires? You say, delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. Um, you say, ask whatever you want, and I will give it to you. And I know some godly, godly people. Are they in Jesus? If you abide in me, in my words, AB it, and you ask whatever you want and it'll be given. They, oh, they most certainly are in Jesus. Speaker 1 00:33:04 And yet they ask they long for marriage and relationship and they don't have, I don't know, I don't, I don't understand that. And you know what I think the healthiest position for us is to just say everything the Bible says, and then say only what the Bible says, like the Bible doesn't answer that. What about that? Am I not in Jesus? Like maybe that's inherently there to nudge us and to challenge us to draw closer and closer to Jesus. I absolutely do not believe that just because one of my good friends, longs for marriage and is asked for marriage, but they're not getting it means, oh, you must not be in Jesus. Absolutely not. So all that to say, age of marriage, if it says anything about maturity, if you have a bigger age, you're probably more mature than the person with the littler age now, maturity isn't just by age. Um, well, I should say wisdom. Doesn't just come from by age, but wisdom doesn't just come from experience. I think it's John Maxwell says wisdom comes from evaluated experience. So when we look back and we evaluate that and learn from it, then we gain wisdom, young people. And this, some, some of the things that I'm about to share now are things that just, as I reflect on my own story, there's many different stories. My wife would even probably say it a little differently. Speaker 2 00:34:40 I am trying to get her to come on the podcast. I think she's close. Uh, she does listen to these, so she'll probably hear me whispering. So it's kind of weird, but I think she'll come on Speaker 1 00:34:53 <laugh> anyways, these are my, this is my story. My perspective, young people, I think probably have less grounding in their personal identity. And that's just kind of a personal sense of who you are, but also identity in Christ. I think some of my older siblings, well, I only have one sibling older sibling. Who's not married, but, um, but all my siblings are my wife's siblings who are not yet married. Like they they're older than I was when I got married. And so when I look at them, I think they have a, a far better are better handle on just their personal identity and who they are in Jesus. Um, I don't, I don't know if they feel it all the time, but that's something that I've, I've processed a lot, probably just in the last three or four years to a degree that I didn't, I think I was maybe just kind of ignorant before. Speaker 1 00:35:52 And then in my mid twenties woke up to the fact that I had misplaced identity. And so I had place, I placed identity in things that I did or things I was, or even, even, I don't know. I don't know if, if it's in marriage, it probably is because a lot of the places where I realized I had misplaced identity, I didn't realize it until that thing was taken away. And then I'm disoriented and processing that. And, um, and so I know it would be totally disorienting to, to lose my wife, to lose my family. And I think that just is like, I don't, I don't know that there's any way you can't have a healthy relationship without investing a part of your identity in that person and connecting with them. If you try to maintain your autonomy and be completely independent, you're gonna have some relational challenges. Speaker 1 00:36:46 That's, that's gonna be a struggle. Not not that people can't be independent, but it's not conducive to intimacy. But all that to say that I think older people know a little bit more who they are. They can probably handle conflict a little easier because it's not so disorienting. It's not like, oh, we're this conflict. And, and so, you know, are we threatening each other? Like, are we gonna be, are we gonna last? Um, but more like, they've, they've, first of all, they've probably been through many conflict when they get married older, but even more, they, they know who they are. And so they can, someone can kind of push on them a little bit and it doesn't feel destabilizing. You can just kinda have a robust back and forth and work things out. And it's not like you're shaking, it's your core. And sometimes for those of us who got married younger, like that's what a lot of our early conflicts were. Speaker 1 00:37:41 I look back at some of the conflict there I had. And honestly, I just like roll my eyes, like Asher Whitmer. Who did you think you were? Like, I remember I forget exactly what there was doing, but I just, I thought it was, you know, I was concerned that she was <laugh> here. I was saying this on a podcast and I haven't talked with her about it recently. We have talked about it, but I thought she was being controlling. And so I was con I was, I was concerned that she was gonna become controlling <laugh> and so I didn't even necessarily feel controlled, but I just didn't know, like, how was I supposed to navigate through this if she has a strong opinion on something. And, and I just look back on that now, especially now that I know there, and she's not, she's not a controlling person. Speaker 1 00:38:32 Uh, if yeah, I'm probably the controlling one. And, and so I just, just like what in the world, like I wish I would've like probably the fact that I was concerned, she was controlling was just a sign that I was controlling in insecure anything, but I didn't discover that until years into our marriage and that, and that added conflict to our marriage. And so all that to say, getting married young, one of the downsides is you, you probably are a little less secure in who you are secure in, who you are in Christ. The flip side of that though, is that when you get married young, younger, and I remember someone who actually he was dating at the time, but he was a little older when I started dating, told me this he's. And because I was kind of wrestling through like, am, am I too young to, to date and so forth? Speaker 1 00:39:24 And he said, well, he, he said, the, the positive is that you can grow together. Like your, your story begins here and you grow together. And, and so I think that's true, obviously, anybody, once you get married from that point on, you start growing together. But I do know, um, and if you're, if you're someone who's gotten married older, I'd, I'd be really curious to hear how that process was for you. Um, few of the friends that I've talked with have talked about how, you know, that it takes adjusting, you, you kinda learn to live on your own. You learned your own rhythms, your own habits. Um, and so some of those things were maybe the younger you are than maybe more adaptable you are at the same time. I know a lot of people who, who long for marriage, and I think they would be quite adaptable if, if a marriage partner came along. Speaker 1 00:40:18 And so, um, but those are just kind of some of my thoughts, I, I, uh, appreciate, and I we're 10 years into this, I'm 31, there's 32. And we are just now like discovering who we are as a couple. And in fact, just like some things in the last month have happened that we both are like, wow, like we both share that vision. And it feels like finally, like we're starting to, I don't know if you've read. Um, I think it's Larry Krabs book. The marriage builder talks about oneness. Like the goal of marriage is oneness and it's like, man, I spent 10 years trying to achieve oneness. And it just feels like just recently in the last month I've been experiencing a level of oneness that I never had before with Theresa. And I hope that continues like there's many areas we have to yet become more one. Speaker 1 00:41:20 And, um, so all that to say that even, even though you get married young, it's a process like it's gonna take a while. It's, it's a journey of, of growing together and discovering one is another, another point that I think is fairly often missed is that life can be full and meaningful in marriage with family. Um, life can be full and meaningful. One of the things that, um, I think our culture kind of pushes us towards is to like, have all these side gigs and side hustles that we're doing. It's like, you can have family can be a full and meaningful experience. Uh, we, we might react to some of the family movements, focus on the family or the purity culture movement, bill goer and stuff. And there's, there's a lot of problematic things about some of those movements, but family can be a full and meaningful experience. Speaker 1 00:42:25 It's a, it's a ministry it's I don't, I don't really like when people call it a ministry because it's, it's not like a ministry it's ju it just is like, we just are supposed to have families and to be discipling our families and discipling others with our families. And, um, and that can be full and meaningful, but life can also be full and meaningful as a single, every older, single that I know as a close friend, family members, close friends, I look at them, they're living meaningful lives. They have tremendous insight to offer the church to offer the world ministry. Um, I think that include it. Doesn't have to mean you go to college, but I think it can include college. And I think, I think, um, if there's one critique that I would have for men these days, maybe this don't be afraid of people, of women with degrees. Speaker 1 00:43:27 I mean, you can go get a degree if you want, but also having a degree, like, yeah, I guess maybe I would say, is that a level of an identity issue, a, a part of processing through identity, but it does seem like there's a lot of things that women can't do. Men can just go work, construction their lives. Right. Well, in Anabaptist settings, we've really kind of centered the purpose of women around family. And so if you don't have a family, like what else do you do? You just stay at home, make baked goods all day. And I know some women who love to make baked goods and they do tremendous job. I'm not trying to mock that. I'm just saying, that's kind of what we've centered, the, the stereotype. And so if a, if a lady wants to go live something, meaningfully sh she either has to like go into foreign missions or some ministry setting or go get a degree. Speaker 1 00:44:30 And even more and more foreign missions requires a degree certain degree, but then there are more women. And I think in general, more anti Baptist people are getting higher educations. I, I think that's a positive, a good thing, but I would say just anecdotally, it seems like women tend to get the higher degrees quicker than men. And then this is kind of a broad sweep. I I've heard some conversation about this, but I, I would just say to men, like, don't let that intimidate you. Like, you don't have to go marry someone with a degree, but I would just say if, if, look at the person, the person for who they are and reflect on what you know of them, would you like to pursue relationship with them? I mean, just be careful. They, they may not want relationship with you. I don't know. <laugh>, I'm just saying don't avoid them just because they have a degree and you don't, life can be full and meaningful in singleness. Speaker 1 00:45:35 That can include a degree. It doesn't have to include a degree, but live, if you're not married 21, 22, 23, and you're still not married, like you help your marriage best by pursuing God and finding ways to live meaningfully. Now don't wait around for marriage. Obviously, if in our culture, like if you're a guy you can do more about it. Right. So maybe if, if <laugh>, I guess, yeah. You know, man, I'm just critiquing guys a lot here, but, um, if you're gonna develop a lot of friendships with women, maybe be careful and just like, get serious about one of them at some time. <laugh> not just kind of mess with them, but I don't know if I don't know how that is. Just, don't be afraid of people with degrees. Don't be afraid of trying something that doesn't end in marriage. Um, I think that's the other thing that is like dating is, is a part of that discovery process. Speaker 1 00:46:42 And I think somehow I do think this is a largely result as the purity culture. We have idolized, marriage and idolized courtship finding out for sure if you're gonna end in marriage and baiting is, can be a healthy process and to, to date a few months. And then you're like, you know what? I don't think we're a good fit. Bless you, sister. You know, <laugh> no, don't, don't be patronizing like that. But just to, just to part ways and be like, Hey, you know what? I don't think this is a good fit. That's not a failure. That's not, that's a part of the process. And you didn't give something that you're not gonna get back. Um, you can pray through that together. I'm, I'm assuming as you're dating, you're praying together and just wanting to discern God's will. And one of the things you prayed together is, is just the releasing of each other. Speaker 1 00:47:36 If, if it doesn't feel like it is it's, it's maybe a little more difficult if there's conflict, you, you were enjoying each other, enjoying the dating, but then all of a sudden, some conflict arose, but Hey, there are some really romantic stories and God filled stories of couples who had conflict and seesawed back and forth and were upset at each other and then fell back in love with each other and then were upset at each other. Like that just is the, the dance and the flow of romance. And so, you know, it's okay to try something it's okay to it's okay to step out and, and be a little, you know, maybe you grew up in a culture church setting where guys and girls didn't interact much, like just step outta your box a little bit more and interact, do some more interacting. You might feel a little forward or something. Speaker 1 00:48:23 Don't, don't be self focused, but you know, all these things, I think. Yeah. I think just in some of our conservative churches, we've created two serious, a theology around a particular style of marriage in relationship. And it's created negative dynamics in our churches, my wife and I actually, we haven't done this a lot, but we've talked about it a little bit and I, I have prayed this. We're not actually praying for our kids, that they find marriage partners. I think sometimes we can pray. I've heard people doing this. And I remember hearing about it when Theresa and I started dating some, somebody told us about how they were doing it. And I thought that was really cool. And so if, if you're doing it, like that's not a negative thing, um, continue to do it. If, if God has laid it on your heart to pray specifically that they find marriage partners. Speaker 1 00:49:26 But I think sometimes that can frame us to think about life and the purpose of life and the purpose of an individual a as solely to get married and to do things in the context of marriage. And we instead are praying that first of all, that our children, we have three boys and a girl that they can discover God that they can get to know his story and their place in his story, and that they can find purpose and meaning and meaningful relationships beyond just friendships, meaningful relationships. And that if God's will, is for them to be married, that he would begin preparing their marriage partners. If God's will, is for them to not be married, that he would begin preparing in their hearts, this, the calling that he has on their lives and, and the, the thing he is leading them into. I'm not, I I'm just rattling all kinds of things off that I pray. Speaker 1 00:50:29 It's not like I pray that specific prayer all the time. But if our prayer is solely that that they can find a marriage partner, we have, there's a church, one, one of the churches here in LA that we interact with every now and then have in the past, they dutifully, pray for marriage, for the singles in their midst. And I like, again, I, I don't think that's wrong. I think, I think that's kind of, there's an aspect of that. That's kind of beautiful. It's like, we're, we're taking it as an ecclesia Eccles responsibility to see God's will for what our single people desire like single people desire to be married, at least pretty much all the ones I know they're also living meaningful lives outside of that. They want to be seen as having value and meaning. And so I think, I think we could tailor the way we talk about the way we pray about our children. Speaker 1 00:51:29 The singles in our midst, the problem in their life is not that they're single. Now they may be really wrestling with unmet desires. That's, that's a different story, but as we look on them, or even if you are a single and you're listening to this, the problem in your life is not that you're not married. The problem in the singles is not that they're not married. There's many problems in their lives. And let's get to know them as a human being. There's many things that they're, they're living meaningfully, they're adding value to the world. Let's get to know them as human beings. And one of their problems may be unmet desires. We have unmet desires, like all of us process, unmet desires in some degree or another. And so let's walk in gentleness. It's easy to kind of look down on other people when they're in a season of life that we're not in and may never be in. Speaker 1 00:52:22 Let's not do that. Let's walk, bear each other's burdens with each other and enter each other's stories together. And just ask God to, to draw us closer to him, give us greater clarity about his story and where, how we fit into that all. And, and if marriage is a part of that, then it's a good thing. It's a blessing, a gift from God. If it's not a part of that, Paul says it allows us to, to focus in discipleship in ways that we might not be able to, if we aren't married. So all that to say, is it dangerous to get married young? Well, apparently not. It's not, is it wrong to get married young? No, it's not wrong. Is it wrong to get very old? No, it's not wrong. And I'm not just being wishy washy, postmodernist, like whatever your story is, whatever. No I'm, I'm saying like we would do ourselves well to be more robust in a biblical understanding of family and purpose life and relationships so that we're not so centered and focused on marriage and Speaker 0 00:53:31 Family, Speaker 1 00:53:33 Marriage and family is good and beautiful and a, a fruit, a part of a meaningful life. Part of God's blessings, that there are many other aspects. Part of that experience that you can birth it, push it forward as a single. And so let's begin to interact with each other. As brothers, sisters, Speaker 1 00:54:41 Christianity is brought to you by our members at Patreon. If you would like to receive in-depth essays into various issues that Reese, Christians face and how to sort through them in a way that helps us love God and others with a pure heart, good conscience and sincere faith, then consider becoming a member at patron. Along with these deep dive essays, you will receive expanded versions of all our podcast interviews to learn more about becoming a paid subscriber to unpaid Christianity, visit www.asherwhitmer.com/member. And if you'd like to learn more about me, maybe you're not very familiar with who I am and what I do. Just go ahead and visit my website, Asher whitner.com. That has everything that has my book that has blog articles, various other resources available to check out as well, including two networks. I am currently a part of the first is called the restorative faith collective, where we have conversations around race perspectives and relationships in an anti Baptist context at restorative faith, collective.org, as well as the kingdom outpost, where we look at, how do we live as Jesus' nation in the world today, visit www dot kingdom, outpost.org. Thanks for listening.