A long time reader of Desiring God Content and a podcast listener who lives in Africa writes

in with an honest question, Pastor John, I am a married man with four children and recently

I met another woman.

I love her and have told my wife about her.

What I would like to know from you is whether or not it is wrong to have two wives as a

Christian.

Before you answer this question, Pastor John, of course we should keep in mind that a number

of African countries do allow polygamous civil marriage, as of course is true in the Middle

East in certain countries, as was true in the Old Testament in the Bible and so and even closer

to home in the state of Utah, polygamy is technically illegal but not enforced as I understand it.

More broadly, this was interesting to me.

A Gallup survey has been tracking opinions on key moral issues in America since the early 2000s

and in 2001 they said 7% of Americans said polygamy was morally acceptable and today that number

is 16%. Say the polygamy is morally acceptable. Popular American TV shows are spotlighting

polygamy and perhaps pushing this acceptance of the practice in America and of course the

SCOTUS decision opens the door for all types of so-called marriages now as we talked about

yesterday. So what are we to make a polygamy from a Christian perspective?

Let's cut to the chase. I don't believe that the will of God today as revealed in the New

Testament and rightly read the Old Testament is to give permission or promotion to polygamy.

That's the statement. Here are my six biblical reasons. Number one, in the beginning God created

man, male and female with the purpose that they would marry and the two would become one flesh.

So the Lord made woman from the side of man and then it says in Genesis 2.23, this at last

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