This is a question I get asked often, and I have had a lot of trouble answering, but here is the story so far.
When I became a Christian I was already deeply involved with and committed to Dean. In my initial struggles with what it meant to be a Christian, I agonized over our relationship and sought advice from many people and received many opinions. I realize now I may have been asking the wrong question. I asked my minister at the time "Is it forbidden by God to marry a non-Christian?" He showed me a variety of verses which I summed up to mean "God advises against it. It has happened in the past and will happen again." (This is still what I believe to be the biblical comment on the issue.)
Being a young, immature Christian, all I wanted was to know where the "line" was and if I wasn't crossing it, then everything must be OK. I thought that since I lived with non-Christian parents I knew what it was to be a Christian on my own. So we went ahead and the minister mentioned above married us.
I was deeply shocked some time later to hear this same minister preaching on this exact topic, and saying that it was bad for a Christian to choose to marry a non-Christian. I did some research on the issue, and discovered that he was right. I was very angry with him, and it took quite some time to get over it (if I have).
Still more Bible study and prayer later, I have come to understand several things.
1) It is not God's best for a Christian to marry a non-Christian. If I had been asking what is the *wise* thing to do, clearly it would not have been to marry a non-Christian. If I had been a more mature Christian, I might have understood this. Since I was only concerned about the bottom line, I ignored the advice of God. I don't deny that ignoring the advice of God is sin. I have been told that I married in sin, and to this extent it is true. I do deny that other people have the right to call me to account on this. (I probably sound defensive - in my experiences to date I have found this to be sadly necessary.)
2) A marriage partner is quite different from parents or any other family members. I can tolerate differences from my parents in areas in quite a wide range of opinions. Disagreeing with my husband is another kind of fish altogether. Being on different pages spiritually in marriage is (I hope) the deepest wound my soul will ever have to endure. It is a little death every day to think that he won't be there for eternity with God and with me. It is a cut to the heart to know that some of the most important things I am learning in my life he doesn't know about, and doesn't care about. The most important Person and my most important person aren't on speaking terms.
3) A Christian wife is called to love and help her husband. In a marriage between two Christians there is a call to mutual submission and to desire God's best for one another. Dean and I do this to the best of our ability, but there is a kind of imbalance. I am aware that in everything I am the voice and actions of Jesus, every word is potentially my witness - so the calling to love and forgive and serve takes on even larger proportions. When I first realized the level of submission required from me, I was shocked and overwhelmed (yes, and angry - How could God put this kind of responsibility on me? How could he require this much self-sacrifice of me?) I have since realized that I am not responsible for Dean's salvation. (Whew!) The call to minister to him remains, but without the crushing burden of responsibility for his soul. For this reason I believe that a Christian wife with a non-Christian husband has a higher call to submission than a Christian wife. A Christian wife can expect her husband to understand, to forgive, to do his best for her. A non-Christian husband cannot be held to any such expectations.
4) For better or worse, I am married to Dean. There is no point going back, second guessing that decision. It is made and I have to go on from here. Yes, I would and do advise young Christian women to choose above all else a Christian to marry. There is inherent conflict in doing anything else. For myself, I am to witness and minister where I am. For this reason, I use term "unequally yoked". This is a little bilingual joke, because the Greek word for "marry" is "yoke". Truly, we are yoked together and sometimes it feels like we are pulling in opposite directions! I dislike the term "unbeliever" - everyone believes something, and it seems particularly disrespectful to apply to those of other religions. I also use the term "non-Christian" rather than agnostic or atheist, because it is much more factual and less perjorative. Also, I can not really be sure where another person stands, so it is much safer and avoids any pre-judgment on my part.
5) I truly despise the term "spiritually single". I am married! I am not single in any sense, and it is dangerous to even think otherwise. I recognize in myself, and I have seen in other unequally yoked women, a tendency to feel more comforted, more understood, more spiritually at home with Christian men, especially leaders. Danger! Danger! I guard my heart very carefully in these waters - I know I will idolize and fall half in love with any man I see as a strong Christian leader and role model. I am lucky enough to have a woman minister, so this avoids the strongest temptation. In other situations I am careful to make friends with the wives of the Christian men I know - this both takes the idealization out of the picture (their wives soon take the polish off any attempt to idolize on my part!) and creates a backstop for any emotional intimacy - I am much more likely to confide in a woman than in a man I know equally well.
6) I realize every day that God has blessed me: generously, abundantly, joyfully! He has blessed my marriage and brought me much good and spiritual growth out of it. I don't have to be repenting in sackcloth and ashes every day to redeem my situation, and I don't have to feel guilty because I am often happy with my husband. I don't have to wait for him to come to know God in order to be a joyful Christian myself: God's peace surpasses my understanding and is not dependent on my circumstances. This is my latest, most precious revelation from God. Sometimes I can't believe how grace-ful and generous He is!
As the woman who has been forgiven much, it is incumbent on me to be forgiving and generous to others. As I hope not to be judged, so I must not judge others. As I wish to be prayed for, so I pray. As I wish my husband understood, loved and served me, so I seek to understand, love and serve. These lessons have taught me at a heart level what it is to live the Christian life, and I so I see and once again marvel at how God is able to work all things for our good and His glory!
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