{"id":68803,"date":"2024-07-14T14:36:18","date_gmt":"2024-07-14T19:36:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/?p=68803"},"modified":"2024-07-14T14:36:18","modified_gmt":"2024-07-14T19:36:18","slug":"was-she-married","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/was-she-married\/","title":{"rendered":"Was she married?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\t<h2>Question:<\/h2>\n<p>Greetings in Jesus&#8217; name,<\/p>\n<p>I was searching for an answer to a particular question that affected me, and I came across a similar question and answer on your website.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m not yet married. I fell in love with a girl in my locality. I was born and raised there before immigrating to another country and acquiring citizenship. I met her on Facebook, and we got to know and understand each other. I love the girl, and she also loves me.<\/p>\n<p>The problem is that she was once married to a man during her teenage years. The marriage lasted for six months. Out of the six months, she spent two months in her husband&#8217;s house and the remaining four months in her parent&#8217;s house as she attended a college close to her family&#8217;s house. During the two months at her husband&#8217;s home, he was at his duty post in another part of the country. He visited home one week.<\/p>\n<p>She was given money for school fees but lost it. She explained the loss to her husband, and the husband came and abused and beat her mercilessly. Her sister heard of it and paid back the lost money. But the girl and her sister decided she was not returning and ended everything.<\/p>\n<p>She kept on building herself, and now she is 24 years old. The marriage was never legalized. No court marriage, no church marriage, and no traditional marriage was done. I didn&#8217;t ask if the husband was a Christian or Muslim because her family is mixed up in terms of religion, but she attended a Catholic church. She explained all these things to me. I inquired and found it to be true.<\/p>\n<p>Now, I&#8217;m confused. Is she a divorcee or not? Am I allowed to marry her as a Christian or not? Her first husband remarried and didn&#8217;t try to reconcile things. I truly love her, and she loves me right now. Despite this, my father did not oppose my marrying her, but he told me so many things. At first, he refused, but when I explained everything to him and told him that I didn&#8217;t mind her past, he said he could not stop me from what I wanted. I need guidance to help me make a decision.<\/p>\n<p>Thank you.<\/p>\n\t<h2>Question:<\/h2>\n<p>The core question is whether this woman was married. Marriage is done through covenant vows (Malachi 2:14). A claim of being married does not create a marriage. Even legally, I checked her country&#8217;s laws, and common-law marriages are not recognized.<\/p>\n<p>I would recommend checking the courthouse in her area to double-check her story. I assume you talked to her family and friends and verified that she was not legally married.\u00a0 If she divorced him, there would have been a legal record of it. The reason for records is to handle the distribution of property when one of the couples dies. Simply moving out and saying you don&#8217;t want to be married anymore is insufficient evidence in a court. Given that, she lived with a man for several months, committing fornication with him, and then broke up.<\/p>\n<p>Thus, there is no legal reason that you cannot marry her.<\/p>\n<p>However, this isn&#8217;t the only criterion that should be used when considering marrying a woman. It would be best to consider whether she will help you grow stronger as a Christian. You mentioned that she and her family are mixed when it comes to religion, so you need to talk about religion with her in depth. Your wife will be involved in your family finances, so I would strongly suggest that you find out how she lost a large sum of money she needed for her education. There may be a good reason, but the question should be asked. Finally, you should find out if there are any children involved. After all, she was having sex with a guy for a while. Pregnancy would be an expected result.<\/p>\n<p>Check <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/bible-studies\/preparation-for-a-lifetime\/getting-to-know-each-other\/\">Getting to\u00a0Know Each Other<\/a> for a more extensive list of things to discuss before marriage.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Question: Greetings in Jesus&#8217; name, I was searching for an answer to a particular question that affected me, and I came across a similar question and answer on your website. I&#8217;m not yet married. I fell in love with a girl in my locality. I was born and raised there before immigrating to another country&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":[1118,64],"class_list":["post-68803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-common-law-marriages","tag-marriage"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":16840,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-pornography-a-just-cause-for-divorce-that-allows-remarriage\/","url_meta":{"origin":68803,"position":0},"title":"Is pornography a just cause for divorce that allows remarriage?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 13, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hello, I have recently begun a wonderful relationship with a lady friend.\u00a0 Over the last four months or so we have developed a wonderful friendship which has recently blossomed into a budding romance.\u00a0 However, she has, within the last six months or so, filed for divorce from her husband\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":29499,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/we-just-found-out-that-my-wifes-first-marriage-was-never-dissolved-what-do-we-do\/","url_meta":{"origin":68803,"position":1},"title":"We just found out that my wife&#8217;s first marriage was never dissolved. What do we do?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 12, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I have just recently married a beautiful godly woman who totally fills my heart with love every day that we share together in holy matrimony.\u00a0 But recently we have found out that she is still married to another.\u00a0 Several years ago my wife was to be wed to another\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":2172,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-girl-i-love-is-being-given-in-marriage-to-someone-else-by-her-family\/","url_meta":{"origin":68803,"position":2},"title":"The girl I love is being given in marriage to someone else by her family","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 3, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: There's this Muslim girl I love so much. While I was dating her, her parents found out and gave in her marriage to her cousin, who lives in another country. I don't know what to do now because we still love each other so much. She has accepted Jesus\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":27773,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-my-marriage-valid\/","url_meta":{"origin":68803,"position":3},"title":"Is my marriage valid?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 15, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: First off, I appreciate you spreading the word on what people need to hear, not what they want to hear.\u00a0 I thank you for that, not many people in the pulpit do that anymore and cower to men.\u00a0 You recently wrote to my mother about her remarriage scenario, and\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":28696,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/did-my-fiance-have-a-right-to-divorce-his-first-wife\/","url_meta":{"origin":68803,"position":4},"title":"Did my fiance have a right to divorce his first wife?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 18, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hello! I really appreciate your question and answer site. I use it regularly when studying a specific subject. I have a question, and I believe I already know the answer, but I wondered what your response to my question would be. So here it goes ... I divorced a\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":17140,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/my-girlfriend-isnt-a-christian-and-i-dont-know-what-to-do\/","url_meta":{"origin":68803,"position":5},"title":"My girlfriend isn&#8217;t a Christian and I don&#8217;t know what to do","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 1, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I have been dating my girlfriend for almost two months. We have now run into some problems with each other. I will admit that she is not a Christian. I wanted to try and bring her to Christ. Her parents are divorced and her mom has a man living\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\/68803","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=68803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68803\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}