Am I Ready for Marriage? – Toby Sumpter | Collegiate Reformed Fellowship

so i was given the task of coming to talk to you about the question am i ready for marriage and i was tempted to just say i have no idea and then ask if you have any questions um or or how should i know more of you are probably ready than you think and some of you who think you are probably aren't um i the uh i thought of this verse i'm not really going to exegete this verse that i just read to you but um the reason why it came to mind as i was thinking about this question is that um i think there are some concrete and practical things that we can consider and think about and talk about tonight we're going to get to those things i also think that uh there's something very profound about um i guess this is this augers i think this is mr uh mr auger who wrote proverbs 30. um there's something profoundly true about what he's saying in this verse when he says that the way of a man with a maid is too wonderful for him it's uh sort of like you kind of imagined him just sort of shrugging his shoulders and said you know i don't know how how does this happen you know and and you know and and frequently you know who thought that was a good idea and sometimes it really isn't and and lots of times it is um there's so there's a again there's practical wisdom i don't want um i i don't think we should at all think who's to say and at the same time i do um believe that this like many of the most significant decisions you'll make in your life um rely um in in so many ways upon providence put up upon details that are out of your control um and um and rely on on god his goodness his grace um his weaving together of of your story um it's uh really uh too wonderful um uh the the funny thing too about this i don't know if aaron or i don't know if it was aaron who assigned this to where'd aaron go he's gone oh he's right there oh i thought you left i thought he like assigned this to me and then just left no i don't know if if you knew this or or um know this about my story but of course i got married when i was 19. that's why i asked you yeah okay that's what i wondered and so i also feel like it's really funny like i don't know if i should be talking about this your parents might not approve i don't you know i remember um well i remember getting married um i um and um but i also remember i got married um young enough where um i i don't think that maybe this is just me maybe i'm um just odd but uh as a as an 18 year old um uh asking my my future father-in-law if i could marry his daughter um there wasn't really a whole lot of like i didn't have any like long dark knights searching my soul about whether she was the one i i was it was actually really quite simple for me i was like well i want to be with her and uh so can i and he said at first he said let's pray about it for a while and then i kind of kept on asking and about six months later he said okay and um and i remember getting married and then a few few years later um as um some rest of my friends most of them were further along took longer and then remember you know and the older they got um the more they would come to me and be like but how do you know like how do you know i don't know like you just know and they're like but you know i mean like she's nice and all but i just was like how do you know and how do you know you're really ready and i mean like i like her and i want to but i'm just not sure i just wanted to like slap them a lot of times and the older they get i mean the older they got frequently just the worse it got it's like just stop it um can you stand her okay then marry her not really not really not really but um but it kind of felt like wanting to say that sometimes but not really um so i'm gonna i'll tell you a little bit more about my story as i walk through some of these practical things um i thought one thing i wanted to mention too is i think there are certain cultural expectations and norms that i want to encourage you to in general um submit to uh cultural expectations and norms they're not it's not the same thing as the word of god um our culture does things in certain ways um you know think i'm just thinking of practical things like you know um generally people finish at least high school before they get married i was like it's not the word of god it doesn't say you have to be 18. it doesn't say you have to have your ged or you have to have a high school diploma but um i think it's generally a good it's sort of along the lines of don't remove the ancient landmark now you know again in other cultures they might do things slightly differently but think of think of these in some respects kind of like our manners um it's it's not in the word of god that says um you know you have to stand when a lady enters the room or you have to you know wait for everybody to be served before you eat and there's not a verse that says that the the bible says be kind to one another the bible says honor one another show respect to one another and to elders and to women in particular and then each culture has to sort of figure out a language for that and i think there's something similar going on in and sort of our customs of um preparing for marriage how do you know you're ready for marriage well i mean ultimately we would say the word of god you know within the word of god and and if your parents say it's okay then okay um but i i want to generally encourage you to think in terms of am i ready for marriage i think it's a gift to be um to know sort of just the way our culture normally does it and like again you don't have to think of that as being the word of god absolute but nevertheless i think it's a it's a helpful way to start going through the normal things that we do so you know finish finish school often again this is not even fixed in our culture but often you're going to college as expected having a job in your career field you know these kind of things again while recognizing they're not absolutes but i would say in general we ought to think in terms of this is the culture that god's i was born into i didn't ask to be born in the 21st century but god put me here and in america and um in general um think of those as helpful things respect these norms and think of them as real preparation it can be fine to skip a step or two but be thoughtful about it be careful be careful about it okay here's some you're just um i've got four four things uh four practical things uh number one am i ready for marriage um well to answer that question i would say um let's start big and obvious honor your father and mother the fifth commandment honor your father and mother it's the first command with the promise that it may go well with you in the land and presumably it going well with you in the land would include things like getting married being having a blessed family of your own do you want it to go well with you in the land on your father and mother so what have your parents told you what have they taught you um what are their expectations are they are they expecting you to finish college before getting married are they expecting you to be well on your way through college before getting married are they those things should matter to you what are their hopes what are their preferences again preference is not a law but a preference but don't you want to honor them our inclination should be to lean into that it's not absolute and if they're wise parents they know oh this is a preference but i see where you are yeah go for it right that's that's very possible but nevertheless you ought to know what are their preferences do you know what they think do they think you're ready for marriage um and there's obviously some difference here between sons and daughters same command but there is some asymmetry in its application for sons and daughters a son who's leaving his father and mother to start a new household should seek wisdom and counsel from his parents but it is a different position to be in from a daughter who is either still under her parent's roof literally or even a daughter who's moved out should want the protection and guidance of her father and mother and it takes wisdom to navigate this obviously have conversations and it can have take even more wisdom to navigate when maybe you have parents who are not particularly interested in being very involved or maybe are not even believers that that happens but the principle still stands i would say when you go to answer the question am i ready for marriage start with honoring your father and mother lean into that we need to focus on that give some time and prayer and thought to that talk to them seek to honor them so that it will go well with you in the land that'd be number number number one um this is a kind of funny uh anecdote illustration um one time um in another place um when i was pastoring a young man um i think he read um her hand in marriage uh he and um and uh was very very excited about courtship and very excited about you know doing um this the right way and um so but he didn't go to my church but he came he came to me and and he was and he's just like read her hand in marriage i want to do the courtship thing you know and um i was like great and he says you'll you'll help me with that i said sure and um as i said yeah so he said well i'm gonna i'm gonna go there's a there's in a bigger city and he said i'm there's a christian swing dance night downtown on sunday nights and i'm going to go down there and i'm going to try to meet some girls and and see if i can you know i can meet one and get to know her so that's great and just let me know how it goes and um and a couple of months later he came back and he met with me he says his boy it's been rough i said well what happened and uh he said uh well one of the first times went down there i met this great girl she was fantastic we danced all night it was great at the end of the night i said i said you know um i i don't want to just date around i'm not i'm not just um i'm not into that i want to be serious and so i would i would like to know if i could you know meet your dad and ask him for permission to pursue you for marriage and and and she said something like you're a weirdo leave me alone go away and he says so you know i kind of you know like okay yeah and this is a few weeks later whatever a month later something he said i was out dancing again met a great girl she was fantastic great time great evening and you know danced the night away at the end of the evening he said i said you know hey i've had a great time i'd love to get to know you better but i don't want to just date around i want to be serious um so could it be okay for me to meet your your dad and ask him you know if i can pursue um for marriage and she said oh that would be so wonderful and she's here's my dad's number and so he on his way home he called called her dad up and said hey i was at the dance thing tonight with your daughter and i i had a great time i just and i wanted to ask you permission to pursue her for marriage and he says what kind of weirdo are you stay away from my daughter so the guy says so what do i do i said you know you could probably go on a few dates before you you know start working that angle it'll be okay it'll be okay i'll i'll hold you accountable it'll be okay um and he did and the third third was the charm he he he married he married mary and uh he also took her um their first date was um a hot air balloon ride so that might have had something to do with it i don't know but uh anyways um it takes wisdom though it's not a cookie-cutter thing um but nevertheless the principal stands seek to honor your father and mother as you think about whether you're ready and then i'm going to get to this in a minute but the same thing of course applies as you begin to ask as you begin or if you receive an invitation someone asks you out you want to as you think about would this be wise this is a good idea am i ready for this um honor your father and mother um number two um is um uh spiritual maturity um maybe this would be another kind of obvious one but the point here is not sinless perfection no one would be ready to get married if that were the standard but the question is do you have a track record of spiritual stability spiritual health are you a roller coaster of emotions are you inconsistent in obedience you know are you are you crashing regularly and then you know back up crash back up um do you have really bad weeks um why would you do that to someone else what i mean you know if that's what your life is like crash burn crash burn happy sad happy sad really down week terrible week off a week horrible week why would you do that to someone if you've if there have been sinful habits do you have a track record of repentance you have a track record of repentance again think of your spiritual maturity as in a certain respect um whether you're safe to be around and now you know and i mean obviously you can think about in general like are you being a good friend but i mean when you talk about marriage i mean you're talking about becoming one with someone so you're talking about inviting them into the spiritual your spiritual greenhouse what's growing in there is it healthy is it is it thriving are you pulling the weeds regularly and again so like the question is you know would this be good for anyone else am i ready are you you know what are you bringing to the table again not perfection but is it stable it may be the you know everything in the in the greenhouse maybe it's little but is it is it green i mean is it is it good is it good plants i mean it can be a you know very small crop but it's healthy you pull the weeds are you quick to apologize or do you take days are you quick to forgive or do you hold on to things you have a list of your roommate's wrongs what makes you think you won't do that to your husband or your wife spiritual maturity regularly confessing your sins quick to confess your sins quick to get right quick to get back into fellowship quick to forgive there's a lot of ways in which i look back and think as a 19 year old i don't know how my father-in-law gave me permission in fact six months later when i turned 20 he said what he's turning 20. i don't know how that worked but i would just say god was really kind um but there but there were lots of ways in which um i mean i i was i wasn't i was 19. i mean i mean they're not a really mature person at 19. uh but but i think you know if i if i look back and think i know that probably the the one place where um god had been kind to me was particularly just in the area of of being learning to be quick to apologize quick to confess quick to forgive i didn't know much but i was like that was sort of one of the basic things that my parents had given me and um and that's been just part of our marriage since jump some of you have heard me give my testimony before which basically consists of the re the way that i know that i belong to jesus is because from as long as i can remember uh he's never let me get away with sin i don't remember the moment i first trusted in him but i can't remember a time when he would ever let me get away with sin i always always felt awful always felt guilty and ashamed and knew i had to go make it right and sometimes i was stubborn and you know it took me a few hours maybe a few days but that was that's that's how i know i belong to jesus and it's but it's one of those things where again um i think um that's at least part of how god was kind to us when i was a very young husband and barely knew what i was doing three there's wisdom in the multitude of counselors some of this can certainly be your friends but it should also definitely include your family back to what we already mentioned parents siblings even elders pastors professors other older mentors but insist on them telling you the truth insist on it tell me the truth um do they ever tell you anything you don't want to hear don't surround yourself with flatterers oh yes oh yes that would be great that would be great do they ever tell you anything you don't want to hear do they give you honest advice there's wisdom in the multitude of counselors ask them am i ready and it and it may be also very specific to um um you know so and so asked me am i ready for that am i ready for him am i ready for her is now a good time all right four some more some practical things other practical things practical provision men are you ready to provide for a wife and any children um this does not have to mean that you have arrived at your career but it does require at minimum basic provision ephesians 5 says that husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies and i think that paul means actually really practically like can you clothe them can you keep them warm can you keep the heat on can you pay rent no man ever hated his own flesh but nourishes and cherishes it just as christ does the church so that's that's the bare minimum standard and literally um nourish and cherish means feed and keep warm that's what nourish means feed food and cherish literally means keep them warm and in idaho you have to provide more heat than other places um so can you do that and and i asked that and say at the same time that doesn't mean like paul doesn't say you know in a in a you know in a mansion you know a 5 000 square foot condo but but can you um and and again you must be able to do this and um and at the same time um different families will require different thresholds and this is the way um the world works that people are different um some may require college to be complete or at least with the completion within shouting distance same some may not mind a mid-college marriage i got married halfway through others may want you to have landed your first real job with a steady income uh if you want to marry that woman and you don't have that yet then you aren't ready to marry her right are you ready no you are not ready for her and that's why one of your friends or one of your roommates might be ready for her or him but that's a different question um or if the man you're interested in has determined to meet certain goals before asking you out then if you're the one intended for him you aren't ready for him other you know practical things here would be you know are you are you paying your bills regularly you know like your cell phone bill are you paying it or the creditors after you how many credit cards do you have are you making payments how much debt do you have do you have a budget of any sort i started writing my my future father-in-law in i think it was january or february which was um that was the um uh courtship term of lordship is it still that way i don't know you know i don't know that's how it was when i was in nsa this is my freshman year and and third term was the family term we read all of pastor wilson's books and that's why i started writing my father-in-law because i liked this girl been seeing her and then i read all the books and i said oh no i haven't done this right so i started writing him and then and that's when he he wrote me back initially and said well let's pray about it my father-in-law was 31 when he got married so it was a little bit like you know i had four heads initially um and uh but when i got went home that summer um one of the things he asked me to do was put together a budget um and uh he's he said well if you got married halfway through college you'd have two years left of college put together an excel spreadsheet and show me two years of income and expenses and um i'd never used an excel spreadsheet before i think jenny had to show me how um and uh and so i did i put it i put it together and estimated rent and food and clothes and um and he specifically said that he um he was very concerned that um we have health insurance for her and so i had to do a little bit of research on that and but i sent it to him emailed it to him and that was that was part of our conversation but um even if you don't have an excel spreadsheet you have some notion of um how you're handling your finances you have a budget of some sort how are you with debt um what about your grades grades are you know not everything but they are a reflection of your ability to follow instructions follow through with your commitments um meet deadlines be responsible these are things that are important in marriage you keep your word do you show up on time or are you a flake do that do people say oh yeah he's on his own time that's how she always is she's always on her own time ladies are you ready to be a mother the thought of holding a little baby is wonderful to you um and and on the one hand comparing the glory of motherhood uh to you know sort of the the feminist career babe or whatever um should be a pretty easy you know choice but but i still want to underline being a mother though is hard work um good things are difficult um no need to put off um marriage and motherhood indefinitely again that's not not my point at all but some years of preparation for motherhood is a real gift and you know education life experience can be real gifts to the mission of raising godly children being a blessing to your husband some christian communities swerve into the opposite ditch from the feminist careerists uh to a sort of i don't know maybe we call it prairie muffin gnosticism and what i mean is you know sort of like i don't need any education i'm going to be a mom which is which is a which is real slander a motherhood no no no no no you don't understand like you're going to be raising immortal souls you're going to be raising human beings that will live forever i mean don't you think you should put a little time and energy into preparing for that i mean the careers you know comparison like like you know if you make clothes like fine great yay for clothes but you know clothes don't live forever people live forever um so again am i ready you know i don't know there's not like you know there's this like you know ding you know you're ready but are you giving that thought and and in terms of being ready are you thinking i'm getting ready i'm pouring myself into being prepared um what about birth control i'm just going to bring it up because because here's why because sometimes in the calculations about whether or not you're ready for marriage people think that birth control is kind of this thing that allows you to be ready before you're ready because you can kind of you can get married before starting a family right which is i think a misnomer now you're starting a family um and and the bible does not absolutely prohibit taking steps to prevent pregnancy the bible doesn't the bible addresses all kinds of things and if it wanted to it could say thou shalt not ever prevent pregnancy in any way shape or form it doesn't say that but let me encourage you to consider two things when you think about this element of whether that plays into you're thinking about whether you're ready to get married or not okay the first would be um i want to caution you that not all birth control is created equal some forms of birth control are actually abortifacients so some things that are advertised as birth control um actually cause abortions um so be very very careful with that talk to your doctor do your research carefully think there are some things that are advertised as abortion as um birth control that are actually that actually cause abortions um so that'd be number one and and some of the most commonly prescribed pills do that is i'll just throw that out there um other in other forms specifically those that involve chemicals and this sort of thing often have long-term consequences for fertility or other health side effects and just recognize that we live in a culture that i mean remember margaret sanger invented birth control and that doesn't mean again that every single last form of it has to be evil wicked but it should be highly suspect the founder of planned parenthood is the one you know is the one that invented it um we don't exactly live in a world inclined to give us good medical information right right have we learned nothing in the last couple of years and and especially when it comes to things like sex we we live in a world where the margaret sang sanger on down but i mean it goes all the way back but um fallen culture is not inclined to tell us the truth and and and one of the driving forces behind the whole birth control thing was look you can have sex and no consequences right you don't have to be married there won't be kids what's the chances that people who are telling that kind of lie wouldn't tell you everything about what birth control does to you probably pretty decent again i'm not a doctor i'm not saying every last thing is evil wicked or will hurt you or harm a baby but i would say be very very careful be leery um you know what are the what are the chances that um i mean if certain forms of birth control for example were actually associated with breast cancer or birth defects do you think we would be hearing anything about it i don't because that would mess up all the free sex um so again do your research very very very carefully second related to this question of whether or not you should think of birth control as factoring into whether you're ready to be married or not is the bible encourages us strongly to welcome children and welcoming children should ordinarily con coincide with marriage it's a strange modern notion that suggests that you should spend a few years getting to know your spouse before having children says who says the world that hates kids well why do you think you can get to know your spouse better without kids right i mean god didn't you know make adam and eve and say now take a couple of years because when the kids come it's going to be really hard to get to know each other no he didn't no okay pressed you know if i'm pressed and he's and he'll say absolutely you can't do it no well i'd say no we take dominion and taking dominion means you can you can try to have some say into this but nevertheless i'm just encouraging you to think we're getting married why to start a family and i think it's i think it's unbiblical sub-biblical to think i'm prepared to get married but man if i had to have kids right away that would be a bummer okay no no like like i'm not ready for that well then why are you thinking you're ready for marriage that's my point um when i um we got married in the middle of college um i took so we got married um right between my sophomore our sophomore and junior years and i um so i decided to take an extra class i took one of the class i took an extra class my junior year thinking well if um if jenny gets pregnant then um i'll front loaded it and my senior year will be lighter and i can work more and that was that was just one small way of me trying to be prepared um and then god's providence he didn't give us any children for a couple of years in some ways i don't think you know if you're ready for marriage um i mean there's there may be some obvious things here in place but i don't know if you know if you're ready for marriage until you ask or you're asked and if the answer is no even if everything else seems to be ready god has said no the bible teaches that people are generally made for marriage and we should generally pursue it and be preparing for it and in general that should be our inclination headed that way but fundamentally we're ready for marriage when god says we are that's that's when we are he knows our frame and he knows what we need exactly when we need it and so my philosophy is generally that all things being equal you are moderately spiritually mature you're not in crazy debt um you're not wanted by the police you know just sort of like kind of the basic general checklist i go over with young men when they come into my office my general philosophy of those things are in place is that you should try try go ask sometimes i say well you know get a little bit more of this down and then go ask go ask aim for it ask maybe ask again if he's asked you twice it might be my fault or generally be ready to be asked but the but let the answer be good news either way let the answer be good news either way because god's good and i think this is really good practice for lots of things in life you may get married and believe you're ready to have children right away you're ready to welcome them just like pastor toby said but god may have you wait a few months or a few years or it could be the same with a health challenge lord i'm ready for you to heal me now and the lord says not yet how about now not yet now not yet or a job opportunity or maybe someone in your family who doesn't know the lord lord would you would you save them how about now no not yet not yet you think you're ready but god says not yet and um for those of you who feel like you've been waiting around already or you have been trying and asking and you're getting a lot of not yets let me encourage you to be thanking god for not giving you a spouse yet and then ask him to give you one learn to pray that prayer all in the same prayer thank you lord that i'm not married yet father would you please prepare me for marriage would you please grant me a spouse all right i'm probably way over my time i'll stop there amen

Channel: Christ Church

Views: 6,768

Keywords: Christ Church, ChristKirk, Doug Wilson, Douglas Wilson, Canon Press, CrossPolitic, Toby Sumpter, Moscow Idaho, Moscow, Psalm Singing, Reformed, Calvinist, Reformed theology, CREC, Blog and Mablog

Id: nVVAkYJlM8E

Length: 40min 16sec (2416 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 07 2022