A podcast listener named Nora writes in to ask of this,

Pastor John, I am originally from Ghana, and currently living in Dubai, and I listened

to APJ.

In most parts of Africa and even in Ghana, the traditional marriage right where the family

formally acknowledges the marriage is held above the legal or church rights.

Is it okay for a Christian couple to decide to not also have a church ceremony?

Does God recognize this as marriage if we don't?

What do you say, Pastor John?

I don't know the cultural tradition she's talking about, so it's dangerous for me to comment

on with any specificity, but there are principles that might help.

The same question has arisen here in the States, when I was in school 40 years ago, there

were people who said who needs a piece of paper, marriage license, who needs a ring

and who needs a ceremony, God's the only one that matters, not man, and I suppose in

every culture, there are forms and customs and traditions that have been developed to

signify publicly who's married and who's not.

So virtually all cultures, it seems to me, there may be some exceptions that I don't know

about, virtually all cultures have thought it important for the functioning of the family

life and the protection of women and children and the civic order and the social stability

that there be public ways of confirming the difference between marriage and serial sexual

liaisons that some people have.

The Bible doesn't dictate what those cultural forms and customs and traditions are that

establish public recognition that two people have entered a lifelong marriage covenant

...