We open the week with a question from Vincent, a podcast listener, he writes in with a very

good question.

Pastor John can a person who doubts his salvation seek to be married or should he wait until

his assurance is more settled before pursuing a wife?

What would you say, Pastor John, to Vincent about assurance and the desire to be married?

Learning to be married in and of itself is a good desire.

It can be bad, it can be a bad desire if the motives that are controlling it are bad.

For example, if the desire to be married is not controlled by the good of the other

person and the glory of Christ.

If a person says it's not about the good of the other person, it's not about the glory

of Christ, it's just about me and my desire for sex or companionship, then the desire

is bad.

So there are always big issues to settle before one can pursue a desire for marriage that

pleases God.

Do I love the glory of God more than my own earthly pleasures?

The crucial question, it is the glory of God, a greater pleasure to me than the pleasures

that marriage offers.

And do I love the other person, this fiance, more than I love my own earthly pleasures?

I mean, horrible things can happen in marriage, you're just going to walk away from her if

she doesn't quite give the same pleasure she once did.

Do I find it more blessed to give to her than to use her for my own private good?

Now those are the big preliminary questions Vincent must ask.

...