{"id":49580,"date":"2016-12-06T10:12:00","date_gmt":"2016-12-06T16:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/?p=49580"},"modified":"2022-07-09T10:15:28","modified_gmt":"2022-07-09T15:15:28","slug":"are-we-married-when-he-never-divorced-his-wife","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/are-we-married-when-he-never-divorced-his-wife\/","title":{"rendered":"Are we married when he never divorced his wife?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\t<h2>Question:<\/h2>\n<p>Hi,<\/p>\n<p>I have a question. My boyfriend and I were in love, we loved God and wanted to be married, but he was married before. He married this woman, she cheated on him, he wanted a divorce but could not find her. They had been separated for seven years, so we sat in our room, prayed to God to separate them, break the bond they had, and asked God to bless us with a marriage. We prayed to God that He would bond us together. We made vows to one another, but we did not sign a paper or get married by law. It&#8217;s been several years later and we have children together, but I wonder: did God join us together? Are we married?<\/p>\n\t<h2>Answer:<\/h2>\n<p>There are no witnesses to the promise. There is no record of it existing. There is no reminder witness. In many ways, there is no covenant. See:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/covenants\/\">Covenants<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/marriage-covenants\/\">Marriage Covenants<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In addition, he never divorced his first wife, though he says he has cause. Thus, he is committing adultery with you.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Question: Hi, I have a question. My boyfriend and I were in love, we loved God and wanted to be married, but he was married before. He married this woman, she cheated on him, he wanted a divorce but could not find her. They had been separated for seven years, so we sat in our&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[20],"tags":[66,64],"class_list":["post-49580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-adultery","tag-marriage"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":20146,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/weve-been-living-together-for-five-years-and-dont-need-a-paper-to-prove-our-love-but-i-want-to-make-it-right-with-god-what-should-i-do\/","url_meta":{"origin":49580,"position":0},"title":"We&#8217;ve been living together for five years and don&#8217;t need a paper to prove our love, but I want to make it right with God. What should I do?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 12, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: My boyfriend and I have been together for almost 7 years. We have lived together for 5. We are not ready for marriage. He and I think we don't need a piece of paper to prove our love, but I want to make it right with God. Is there\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Answer&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":43066,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/did-the-paper-we-signed-make-us-married\/","url_meta":{"origin":49580,"position":1},"title":"Did the paper we signed make us married?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 29, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hi there, Firstly, I have enjoyed the past hour reading through your well-balanced, Bible-based answers. You are providing a great service, and I pray that God continues to bless your ministry and your family. I have been engaged with a woman for over five years. Shortly after we met,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Answer&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":30722,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/we-prayed-together-and-made-vows-to-god-but-our-wedding-is-not-until-next-year-are-we-committing-fornication-as-we-have-sex\/","url_meta":{"origin":49580,"position":2},"title":"We prayed together and made vows to God, but our wedding is not until next year. Are we committing fornication as we have sex?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 23, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I would like to ask you a question: I have read\u00a0your responses\u00a0to other people. I\u00a0am in a relationship. Both of us are Christians and we love God. We prayed together and vowed to God about our lives for our marriage. We are preparing for our wedding next year. We\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Answer&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":44548,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-a-shotgun-wedding-or-a-wedding-involving-a-lie-valid\/","url_meta":{"origin":49580,"position":3},"title":"Is a shotgun wedding or a wedding involving a lie valid?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 12, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: God bless brother. I have questions about marriage. If someone lies in order to get married does God acknowledges that marriage? A young man married a woman after three weeks of knowing each other. He has a severe ambivalent attachment disorder. She lied to him about her child from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Answer&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":39618,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-do-we-handle-getting-married-when-we-are-from-two-different-countries\/","url_meta":{"origin":49580,"position":4},"title":"How do we handle getting married when we are from two different countries?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 6, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hi, God bless you! My girlfriend and I are Christians. We have been together for two years now, and everything is going great so far. We have never had any time of sexual intercourse or anything related to it. We are planning on getting married right after graduating from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Answer&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":23910,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/i-married-a-man-who-was-divorced-because-of-his-adultery-is-our-marriage-ok\/","url_meta":{"origin":49580,"position":5},"title":"I married a man who was divorced because of his adultery. Is our marriage ok?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 30, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: What do you do if you are a Christian, have a second marriage, and realize only too late that it was not the will of God?\u00a0 My spouse was a called man of God, but he committed adultery in his first marriage.\u00a0He is no longer preaching, and I am\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Answer&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49580"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49580\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}