“Marrying A Non-Christian”

I try not to talk too much about faith-related stuff because of my fear that I will do “more harm than good”/ my Bible knowledge is not sound enough/ I’m too outspoken and might offend…

Ms Rockstar demonstrates the only way foot-in-mouth should be done - dis is Art

But this one I hoped would be useful to someone, somehow. So here goes:

You must’ve heard that old nugget of wisdom about thinking twice before marrying someone who doesn’t share your faith/ belief system. I’ve been:

1) the non-Christian in a relationship with a Christian. Boy’s family has asked me “So, Aileen, when are you accepting Jesus?” Boy’s church friends have asked him, “So, you’re dating an unbeliever?”

2) the non-Christian a guy wanted to convert because “everything else about (me) would be perfect (as a girlfriend for him I guess he meant).” Then my beloved grandmother died, and the first thing he asked, a little eagerly (at the opportunity I guess), was “So, was she a Christian?” (Yes, by all means flinch at impending car wreck.)

(In my grief, I told him to leave me alone – no curse words or anything, but years later (yes we managed to stay fairly civil in the market. Even I am surprised.) he told me he had really wanted “to slap (me),” for shutting him down that day. I think I retorted I had really wanted to punch him. Except I don’t know if the Kukkiwon association will still strip you of your belt if you start a fight. My Korean girlfriend loves that my black belt from donkey’s years ago was also Kukkiwon-certified and would have liked me to mention. So go, Kukkiwon.)

Anyway. I know what I thought, before I believed.

How I felt, as a non-Christian with things said to me by Christians, will therefore forever temper how I speak to non-Christians. Because I know what a giant minefield it is, how well-meaning things spoken in all sincerity can be horribly misconstrued and cause far more damage than good. I even hope I’m not doing it now. I prayed this wouldn’t make it to posting if I wasn’t doing it right.

3) the non-Christian dating a fellow non-Christian who, like me, could simply not be talked into accepting Jesus. We broke up, lost contact for some years, then one day caught up and discovered we had both come to the faith the same way – at the end of an altar call at the end of a service we were attending (simply to oblige a Christian we respected), when a light just went on in our minds. No, I wasn’t at a low point in my life. No, I wasn’t “searching”. I was only obliging someone. Boy did that not work out the way I expected.

That light changes everything. That light and warmth, even if I never feel them again for as long as I live, is why I will always believe there is a God.

4) the Christian who dated a non-Christian. (Guess who?)

For countless altar calls my heart would skip a beat, my hopes rise, then fall in disappointment. Don’t do this to yourself, it does no good. One day during just such a fervent prayer, desperate for Kings to feel what I had felt not too long ago, I finally cracked an eye open to glance over – and saw his eyes (and thoughts) wandering, but not seeing, the congregation with all the bowed heads. If you could caricature a thought whooshing right over someone’s head, that would be your moment.

The lesson was a powerful one: It was not for me to choose when. If you choose to be with a non-Christian, you have to really accept (while nonetheless praying fervently) that God has his own timing. You have to be prepared that it might never happen. Because you cannot “push,” in the sense that he cannot do it for you. He has to do it for Him.

It is not easy to accept. (“God’s timing” for anything, really.) And the more you want it, the harder the not being able to accept is gonna be. (Yeah d-uh.)

Among Kings’ baptism class last Sunday were two couples being baptized together. Theirs is an experience, a closeness and sharing of the ultimate journey that grows and changes and completes you, that Kings and I would never have. Spiritually, our relationship was ever “one-sided,” the journey of discovery together was not part of the “package” I agreed to spend the rest of my life with when I said “I do.” I knew. I was “young.” I didn’t really know.

I think that is what mature Christians really mean, when they recommend to “youngsters” to date or marry within their faith. I did not. And so for years I could only hope and pray, not knowing when. Not knowing if ever. When you want to grow in the faith, it’s not easy to grow alone, knowing you may leave your life partner behind. 

Do you stay behind and wait, knowing you are forgoing growth and fulfillment, ever hoping it is temporary, never really knowing, or do you go?

When I met Kings and we began our whirlwind courtship/ engagement/ marriage, I had been Christian I think, less than 6 months. I had been raised fairly staunch Buddhist/ Taoist. I knew and understood very little of the Christian faith beyond the aversion I had often felt as a non-Christian, for “over-zealous,” even “hypocritical” Christians. But that light and warmth was unmistakeable – and so I had accepted with all my heart – and then figured I would simply have to learn the rest of the belief system and accept that.)

What I figured was you love the faith first. The faith is perfect, but you have to accept that no one practicing it ever is. (Oklah fine one person was, you might have heard of him – he goes by the name of Jesus – and even he was sorely tempted. Walking the talk is just so many levels of Not Easy.) But loving the faith helps with loving the rest.

The first fervent prayer I had made as a new Christian was to meet the person God intended for me, or not meet anyone. That was from seeing some of those I loved choose to remain in bad relationships, then allow it to change who they were. That hurt others. It hurt me. On many levels, because someone I had admired and loved very much did that. And so I prayed that prayer because I didn’t want to flaff about with the wrong person, figured may as well spend the time on work instead.

Yup, you guessed it – Kings was the person I met shortly after said fervent first prayer as new Christian. Had I understood better the challenges of dating someone who did not share my belief system, I would have thought twice. Sometimes I think that is why I didn’t get the chance to think twice.

As we strive to serve Him, I believe He really does have countless ways in which we are to do so. And you do not get to choose. He does. Just before I was unexpectedly pregnant with Rockstar, I’d signed up and attended an information session for a mission trip to Vietnam (figured social work is very good for “detox”ing – I had been getting ready to start a new job – nothing like social work to make you feel bad about all the little 1st world things you bitch about on a regular basis.)

Obviously that was not how He meant for me to serve, because I got pregnant despite being on the Pill 5 years (prescribed by gynea due to health problem), being heavily rundown, and waiting for my period to resume so I could get back on the Pill – which never happened because Boom – pregnant. And now looking back I would probably have sucked at Vietnam mission trip anyway, regardless of willingness to try. So hopefully I don’t suck too bad at the family-rearing instead.

But it is not easy to want and want, yet be unable to share, that part of your growth, spiritual growth. It can be incredibly lonely. How do you make Christian friends? Do you go to cell group/ services alone? At a work cell (I’ve attended a few at different banks), I once met a woman who had been married to a non-Christian about 15 years. She walked the talk at work, she loved to attend services and cell, she was one of the most “sincere” Christians I had ever met.

When she finally shyly told me she attended service alone, Kings had been a very young Christian. I had “only” been married to a non-Christian maybe less than 5 years, and I had felt lonely, him being a “young-er,” infinitely shy-er Christian than I was. 15 years of attending service without your spouse. You are determined, so strong. You are not alone, I wanted to tell her. 

Instead, I have this post. Because I didn’t know how to tell her without it maybe coming out the wrong way. Because I didn’t know how to put it, without risking offending others, that I knew at least partly why she was shy: Sometimes you are already so lonely, afraid of being judged, and trying to reach out by yourself and other Christians will not know what to say. Just like me. Or will judge. (We all judge, right before we catch ourselves and stop.)

Kings and I married in Vegas, because I wanted to be married before God, but didn’t know if any church in Singapore who would have married Kings and I, the non-Christian and the very young Christian, without some albeit well-meaning things being said in counseling/ interview which I feared would put Kings further off the faith. If not for that light and warmth that night, it would’ve put me off the faith.

I do not “fear” the faith. I “fear” some of my fellow practitioners. (And yes possibly some “fear” me, Bull in the China Shop that I am when it comes to testimonials 😛) Some have said to me the marriage “couldn’t possibly count” because we did it in Vegas (?! “Because what happens in Vegas……..” maybe? the pastor who married us, reading 1 Corinthians 13, was for the record not ordained on the internet like Joey Tribiani of Friends))

It can be incredibly lonely. And so I write because I know I wasn’t the only one who “married a non-Christian” and I doubt I was the only one who felt lonely.

For that reason more than any other, I would not wish that on The Rockstars.

Yet He has infinitely different ways in which we may serve His purpose.

You can only offer heartfelt prayer, and then take a leap of faith and trust that how you land is also part of His plan. Pray for an alignment of what you want with what He plans……

In his best efforts to “go along with it,” Kings would still attend church with me. But he felt very strongly about not joining communion. Then one communion, years later, my husband quietly, shyly took the cup and bread. I had stopped watching him for some time, having learnt my lesson at altar call.

……..Even after the dye is cast, there is a moment before the paint hits the canvas. Breathe right and you may still change the painting.