If I committed adultery in the past, does that mean I can never marry?
Question:
Hello brother,
After studying the Bible more, I look back on my life and feel ashamed of the sinful acts I've committed. I'm now at the point where I'm ready to marry, but I wonder if I scripturally can. I've never been married, but in my past, I have been unpure as a single man. I committed sexual acts with a woman who I know had a child, but I am not sure if she was married. I speculate that she was because of her child. If that was the case, I committed adultery, and that person did too. I know scripturally adulterous couples cannot remarry. But for someone like me, who has done this years ago and who never was married, am I permitted to even try and find a spouse?
I am trying to find guidance, so I don't live in a covenant of sin.
Thank you.
Answer:
"And He said to them, "Whoever divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her; and if she herself divorces her husband and marries another man, she is committing adultery"" (Mark 10:11-12).
While it is not a necessary assumption that a woman with a child was once married, let's just assume that you had in your past committed adultery. Since the woman you were having sex with was married or still under the terms of a marriage covenant, you could not marry her. What was adultery remains adultery, even if you got married to her.
This doesn't mean you cannot repent of your sins and then marry a woman who is free to marry you because she was never married, is a widow, or was divorced because her husband was committing adultery.
