In marriage, we’re not supposed to be unequally yoked.
We tend to think of that as meaning that we shouldn’t marry unbelievers. But what if it’s more than that?
In today’s podcast we do a little hip hop across different topics, because we had numerous small things we wanted to cover–including an old article from Brio that made us laugh and an interview with an amazing counselor on how to find a counselor if you need one!
So listen in!
Or, as always, you can watch on YouTube!
Timeline of the Podcast
0:13 Announcements
3:00 When your marriage is equally yoked, you are affected by one another!
10:45 What equally yoked ‘doesn’t mean’!
12:50 How to get your marriage into a good place
19:30 How we view marriage can set us up to not be equally yoked
22:20 An interview with Micah Morgan on healthy counseling
44:30 A great RQ discussion on being single and the dating scene
57:30 Finishing with encouragement!
Main Segment: Don’t Be Unequally Yoked!
Rebecca and I look at how in marriage, we’re supposed to be equally yoked, which means more than just that you’re married to a Christian. It means that you’re a team. A yoke was a wooden apparatus that linked two oxen so they could plow together. They’d each pull in the same direction.
When you’re equally yoked, you’re both working. You’re both aiming for the same thing. You notice if someone else falters or falls down, and it matters to you. That’s what marriage should be, and it’s okay to call it out if it’s not like that!
How to Find a Counselor with Micah Morgan
I also interviewed the wonderful Micah Morgan, a licensed counselor, about how to find a counselor if you need some counseling, and what to look for to know if they’re going to be a good fit.
And I showed you what a good counselor’s bio should look like–their education; the fact that they know evidence based therapies; the fact that they have specialties, like this:
Micah Morgan earned her master’s in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from CACREP accredited Ashland Theological Seminary. She uses cognitive behavioral, trauma-informed, Family Systems-informed, and attachment-based counseling techniques. She specializes in treating mood disorders, anxiety disorders, stressor-related disorders, couples issues, and family issues. She is skilled in integrating cultural issues like insight concerning the stage of life, family of origin insights, and issues stemming from the Black cultural experience into the treatment process.
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We read a really weird article from Brio magazine from a guy who thought he was in a relationship–but wasn’t
We’re writing a mother-daughter book right now, which means we’ve been reading a ton of materials that millennial moms would have read growing up. And Rebecca found this gem of an article written by a guy who was surprised when his high school girlfriend called him a few years after graduation to tell him that she was engaged.
He had thought they were going to marry each other, even though:
- He wanted to go to a different college and made no effort to go to the same college she went to
- They agreed that they wouldn’t continue dating
- He only called her every few months to catch up
- He had never told her he loved her or that he wanted to marry her
But when she got engaged, he was shocked and disappointed, and somehow it was this girl’s fault.
Anyway, we had fun with that one! (And you can read the article for yourself here!)
Things Mentioned in This Podcast
- Sign up for our email list to be entered to win an Orgasm course or a parent/child puberty course (your choice)
- Become a Patreon and get access to our exclusive, active Facebook group and other perks, while supporting our research
- Our Marriage on Hard Mode series
- Micah Morgan’s counseling
- New Research: Connectedness helps ward off dementia
- Our articles about dating: Elisabeth Elliot’s courtship, the problem with friendationships, and 14 ways to date well online
- The Great Sex Rescue
Do you have any tips for finding a good counselor? And what do you think of that Brio article? Let’s talk in the comments!
Posts in the Marriage on Hard Mode Series
- Podcast: Are We Making Marriage Harder Than It Needs To Be?
- 6 Ways You May Be Doing Marriage on Hard Mode
- Identifying the One Thing that’s holding back your marriage
- Are We Doing Sex on Hard Mode?
- 10 Red Flags about Marriage and Sex
- Why Downsizing Can Be Worth It
- How Gender Roles Can Make Marriage Harder than it Needs to be
- Dealing with the Primary Breadwinner Stereotype so it doesn’t hurt your marriage
And SIGN UP for my emails to get our end-of-the-series activity to work through this with your spouse!
Sheila Wray Gregoire
Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
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This podcast is a great example of why I will never recommend a pastor as the end-all be-all of a singles premarital counseling sessions. A pastor is trained in the spiritual sphere, and while that is extremely helpful, a licensed Christian counselor is my first choice. They will talk about things like finances, in-laws, sex, children, etc. A pastor has great insight, but is not trained in these areas. Furthermore, a licensed counselor could probably role-play all the scenarios that you and your potential spouse might have coming up in your futures. This would be beneficial for conflict resolution, communication skills, etc. Just my four cents worth.
Totally agree, Jes! I think pastors play a really important role, but most are not trained in this, and that does need to be recognized.
For UK based people, British Association of Counsellors and Psychotherapists (BACP) have a really useful directory of therapists with appropriate bios. Qualifications are variable but are listed in the bios. All in one place, probably because the UK is smaller than Canada or the US.
“But when she got engaged, he was shocked and disappointed, and somehow it was this girl’s fault.”
Haven’t listened to the podcast yet so I don’t know if you addressed this: it sounds like the result of expecting women to wait around for men to make their move. He may have honestly thought that she was passively waiting for him and not, I dunno, finding someone who wanted to be with her. Godly women wait patiently and it all works out, right?
Jane Eyre, I was thinking the same thing, especially when Sheila brought up Elisabeth Elliot again in the end. Like everyone else in his Brio generation, that guy read Passion and Purity and expected the girl to pine and wait and pray like Elisabeth Elliot did. Good on her for not doing that!
When it comes to emotional bonds and broken hearts, what I remember from my 20s is that I got more hurt by the friendationships than the actual relationships because the latter had closure, with an ending that was as definitive as the beginning. But friendationships resulted in what I’ve recently discovered is called ambiguous grief — you don’t know exactly what you’re grieving and you’re not even sure you ought to be since no promises were made, but that doesn’t prevent you from feeling the inexplicable pain.
Very true! Friendationships are so painful.
Yep. pretty much.
Well… how does that work in a world in which women have limited time to find someone if they want a family? I’m not one to endorse marrying your high school sweetheart at age 18, but once a woman is in her 20s, she shouldn’t really be putting up with a man who wants to wait for years to decide where this is going.
Absolutely!
So basically I think these trends have taught us to remember: just because they’re famously known christians, it doesn’t make them perfect. They probably passionately served God, but like all of us, made mistakes, that likely caused unnecessary suffering. Its easy to forget, not all suffering is “holy and of God”, and should be avoided.
Intentionally marrying a serial killer doesn’t give you automatic sainthood status. It just makes you stupid in choice.
Exactly! And, yes, don’t marry a serial killer.
A thought about “friendationships.” Have you ever heard the saying “If you didn’t both agree that it is date, then it’s not”? It’s for when a man and a woman have lunch (or dinner) together. How do they know if they are dating or just hanging out?
A good rule is that if you want it to be a date you need to ask for a date instead of saying “Hey, let’s get lunch.” And if you are the one being asked, don’t assume that what they really meant was “let’s go on a date” when all they asked about is having lunch together. (And by date I mean the romantic kind.)
Back to friendationships. Did you both agree to become boyfriend and girlfriend? No? Then you are not boyfriend and girlfriend.
Maria Bernadette,
Spot on correct! The only way for two people to know that they’re in a relationship is to discuss it, not make assumptions like the guy in the article (which I just read and it made me mad). From what I read, he did not do anything to make known to his high school girlfriend that he wanted something serious; he just assumed things and blamed her when she ended up engaged several years later. It seemed like the tables turned and he was the one who passively waited while she moved on. It comes down to direct communication which there didn’t seem to be any with these high school sweethearts.
Michael’s attitude to Stacy is just the logical outworking of so much flawed Christian teaching on marriage. If post-marriage, your wife is your ‘property’, who has no rights, no voice, no personality of her own, why would you regard single women any differently? And I totally agree with Rebecca – it is incredibly objectifying, and very dangerous.
As a single young woman, part of my job working for a Christian charity involved running display stands at conferences and Church events. I met many ‘Michaels’ during this time. I met one ‘Michael’ 2-3 times a year at these events – he’d always come up to our stand and spend maybe 5-10 minutes in casual conversation before moving on, and I wouldn’t have any contact with him until the next event. I didn’t even think of him as a friend, never mind a ‘boyfriend’ – he was just a guy who went to a lot of conferences. Then one time, he asked me what my job involved when I wasn’t at the conferences. When I responded, he replied with “I don’t mind you working in the office after we’re married, but I don’t want you travelling to conferences any more. Of course, you’ll have to give up work completely once we have our first baby.” This was literally the FIRST indication that he viewed me as anything other than a casual acquaintance. But he was furious when I told him I had no intention of marrying him. In his mind, once the man had decided, the woman had no choice but to accept.
I think that was the scariest one, but I had another couple of guys who mentioned casually in conversation about what would happen ‘when we’re married’, and one who told me that he’d decided I was ‘The One’ as soon as he heard I was single and worked for a Christian charity! And another guy who handed me a piece of paper and told me to write down my contact details ‘so I can get in touch with you once I’ve decided if you’re the right wife for me’. ALL these guys were from churches which believed in ‘courtship’ rather than dating, that the first kiss had to be on the wedding day, that the woman had to play a purely passive role in the relationship and that once married, all women stayed at home, caring for the house and the children. None of them felt the need to EVER ask me what I thought, because in their minds, I had no say in the matter. As a ‘good Christian woman’ my duty was to accept when I was ‘asked’.
Oh, isn’t that all so creepy and gross? I’m so glad you didn’t believe you had to give in to any of that!
Another thing that was weird was that most churches over here have far more women than men (I think the ratio is something like 2.4:1), but the churches these guys were at were skewed the opposite way (like 1:5). Obviously, that was one of the reasons they were so predatory, because there were few or no single women in their congregations, but it always puzzled me why the ratio was so different compared to ‘normal’ churches.
Looking back on it now, I reckon it was because churches which teach women are just ‘there for the taking’ are extremely unsafe environments for young women, but very attractive environments for men who think women should have no autonomy. It’s sad, but since then, I’ve always been wary of churches that seem to have a lot of men in them compared to women. I’m sure there ARE churches out there that have a high proportion of men due to good, relevant teaching & discipleship, but all too often, it seems men are attracted to those churches which teach them they can treat women as ‘property’ not people.