If God Gives Us the Desires of Our Hearts, Why Am I Still Single?

If God gives us the desires of our hearts, then why am I still single? That's just one of the questions we'll be answering on today's edition of CORE Christianity. Well, hi there and happy Valentine's Day. I'm Bill Meyer, along with Pastor Adriel Sanchez, and this is the radio program where we answer your questions about the Bible and the Christian life every day. We would love to hear from you. Here's our phone number.

That's 1-833-843-2673. We'll be taking calls for the next 25 minutes or so. So now is the time to jump on the phone and give us a call. You can also post your question on one of our social media sites. You can watch Adriel live in the studio on YouTube and send us a message through our YouTube channel. And of course, you can always email us your question at questionsatcorechristianity.com.

First up today, here's a voicemail from one of our listeners named Henry. I had two kids with someone, and we're not married, and I've been a prodigal son pretty much, and I'm trying to get back into the faith, but she's not a believer. We've been broken up, and I wonder, can I try to stay with her because of the kids? I feel like I'll fall off the faith. I'm not strong enough to stay in it, wondering what to do about that.

I don't want to leave my kids, but in a sense I already have, but it bothers me, so if you guys could help me out with that, I would appreciate your answers. I've been dealing with it for a while. I've heard, get married to her, and then I've heard not to be married and try to find a Christian woman. So I'd appreciate your help. Thank you. Henry, God bless you. Thank you for giving us a call here at Core Christianity.

So a couple of things. I think the first thing is you have to prioritize your relationship with Jesus Christ, following him and doing whatever that means, following after the Lord, and then number two, still caring for your children. I mean, Paul tells Timothy, if a man doesn't provide for those of his own household, he's denied the faith.

He's worse than an unbeliever. So now I don't know that that means that you are obligated. In fact, I don't think that that means that you're obligated to marry this woman.

You are obligated to care for these children, but does that mean that you have to get married? She's not a believer. Paul in 1 Corinthians 7 verse 39 says that when it comes to Christians marrying, we're free to marry so long as it's someone who is in the Lord. That is, someone who believes in Jesus, is united to him by faith, has been baptized. And so if this woman wants nothing to do with Christ, and it sounds to me also like you've said she actually would drag you away from the Lord, that it would be something that would keep you from following Jesus. Then I would say you have to set your eyes on Christ, pursue him as a godly man, and that will actually make you the kind of father that you need to be as well. Now you said you've been a prodigal for some time now, and of course that language comes from Jesus. You think of the Gospel of Luke in Luke chapter 15 where we read the parable of the prodigal son, and I know that you're not alone in this. I know that there are people right now who are listening who have drifted away from their relationship with God, and they've begun doing things that they know are not pleasing to the Lord. And for some people it's just like, I don't know if I could ever get back. It sounds to me like that's part of your question. I don't know if I could ever get back.

I feel like I'm being dragged down. I just want to read from some of that parable that Jesus gives there. He says, There was a man, this is Luke 15 verse 11, who had two sons, and the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me, and he divided his property between them. Not many days later the younger son gathered all that he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country who sent him into the fields to feed pigs. And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything. Here's a guy who has turned his back on his father, on the generosity of his father, on the love of his father. He squandered his inheritance. He's living now with the pigs. He has nothing.

No one cares for him. And when he came to himself, he said, How many of my father's hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger. I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before you I am no longer worthy to be called your son.

Treat me as one of your hired servants. And he arose and came to his father, but while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion and ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to his father, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before you I am no longer worthy to be called your son. But the father said to his servants, Bring quickly the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet, and bring a fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this son was dead and is alive again.

He was lost and is found, and they began to celebrate. I just want to say to you, Henry, that the father, when you come to your senses, when we come to our senses, we realize, Man, what have I been doing living like a prodigal? We say, I'm going to go back to the Lord. I'm going to confess. I've sinned against heaven. I've sinned against you, gracious father. I'm not even worthy to be called your son, right?

None of us are. God greets you with love and with compassion. He welcomes you in, and I think that needs to be the priority in your life right now is turning your eyes upon Jesus, running back to the Lord, and ordering your life in such a way that's going to help you to grow in your relationship with Christ. And as you draw near to God and are filled with the Holy Spirit, getting into good community, Christian community where you can be supported, what you're going to do is you're going to continue to seek to be the best father that you can be for those children. Maybe this woman comes to faith.

Maybe you share the gospel with her and she believes and things change and you guys can get married, but if she's not a Christian, she denies the Lord and actually would turn you away from the Lord, then I would say that's not the right decision for you. And so may the Lord be with you and bless you and grant you wisdom, and thank you for giving us a call, Henry. Great counsel, Adriel, and I love the fact that you shared the parable of the prodigal son. So powerful for every one of us and just appreciate that. This is Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. Our phone lines are open. If you have a question about the Bible, the Christian life, doctrine, theology, or what's going on in today's culture and how your faith intersects with that, we would love to hear from you. Here's the phone number. It's 833-843-2673.

If you want to spell it out, it's 833 The Core. By the way, on this Valentine's Day, this is a day and age when a lot of young people and even not so young people are choosing to live together rather than get married. What does the Bible have to say about marriage? Well, we have an excellent new resource that tackles that topic.

That's right. You know, Bill, marriage is one of those topics that everyone assumes they know so well. They forget to think through it, you know, to ask, you know, what's the design, the purpose behind marriage? And it is important to ask, why did God create marriage in the first place? Is marriage just a vehicle for meeting our individual needs and desires? Is it waiting to get married to have sex and have a family just sort of outdated teaching?

Is the biblical view of marriage itself outdated? I mean, that's something that a lot of people around us are saying, and we seek to answer those questions and many other questions in this booklet. Why would anyone get married? Now, more than ever, Christians should be able to answer difficult questions like these and to share about the beauty and wonder of God's design for marriage. And so we create resources just like this to help you in your walk with the Lord, to give you insight to these questions.

And so get a hold of this resource. Again, it's called Why Would Anyone Get Married? You know, when you purchase resources from Core Christianity, you support us in doing the work to create the Bible studies and more resources and do this radio program to help Christians everywhere answer those tough questions about important topics. You can get a copy of Why Would Anyone Get Married? for a donation of any amount by going to corechristianity.com forward slash offers again corechristianity.com forward slash offers and look for Why Would Anyone Get Married? What a perfect resource on this Valentine's Day.

Well, speaking of Valentine's Day, here's an email we received. Adriel, this is from Titus, and he says, James 4-3 says, You ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions. I've been praying to God to give me a godly wife to curb my passions in light of 1 Corinthians 7-9, which says, But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion. But James 4-3 seems to imply that God won't answer my prayer because I seek to fulfill my passion.

Is that right? Yeah, so let me just begin in verse 1 of James 4. What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask.

You ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your own passions. You adulterous people, do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? And so it seems like the request here is for something that actually is not honoring to the Lord. It's the desire to fulfill these sinful passions. Now we know that sexual desires aren't necessarily sinful. That is a part of how God made us, and he made those desires to be fulfilled in the context of marriage. That's actually one of the things that's talked about in this booklet that we just offered right there on why anyone should get married. But a couple of things that I would just want to say to you, brother, as to your question first, marriage does not solve the issue of lust.

I think that this is really important because there are a lot of young men and young women out there who think, oh, if only I were married, this wouldn't be a problem. No, we begin to mortify those sins now. Years ago I was talking, actually it wasn't, it was just a year ago now, I was talking to a friend of mine who's a church planter, and he was saying, he was talking to another individual who was interested in church planting, and he asked this guy, you know, why is it that you want to plant a church? And the guy responded to him and said, I want to plant a church because I want to preach every Sunday. I just love preaching. And my friend sort of wisely responded, you know, wanting to plant a church so that you can preach is sort of like wanting to get married just so that you can have sex. I mean, it's a part of what happens in marriage, but this is not everything, and so we have to have a sort of right understanding of these things, and be careful that we're not thinking of this other person as just the way to solve this issue of lust. Yes, the apostle Paul does say in 1 Corinthians chapter 7 that if we have these desires, it's an indication that we're probably not called to celibacy, that God has not given us that gift, that we should be married, and so I would say continue to pray for that because that is a good desire, and in the meantime to practice contentment, to trust in the Lord, to draw near to the Lord, to not try to take matters into your own hands in terms of forcing something, you know, dating someone who maybe isn't a Christian, or who doesn't have the same values that you have.

I think you have to prioritize your relationship with God, continue to pray, and to trust in the Lord, and to trust that the Lord hears these prayers as he's placed these desires in your heart, and know that the Lord is going to answer those prayers in his timing, and in the meantime just continuing to exercise that contentment that I think we're all called to in whatever stage of life that we're in. God bless. This is Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. We'd love to hear from you. If you have a question about the Bible or the Christian life, our phone lines will be open for the next 10 minutes or so. Let's go to Gail calling in from Tennessee. Gail, what's your question for Pastor Adriel?

Yes, yes. I have lost my 14-year-old daughter to suicide in 2019, and since then, my two older children that are married, I've refused to have anything to do with me, and I've been battling cancer, and I just know it's important to have a relationship with your children. I've reached out several times, had them on prayer lines, prayer requests, and nothing ever happens, and I just don't know what else to do. Dear sister, I am so sorry to hear about these circumstances, the loss of your child as well, your 14-year-old daughter. I think it sounds to me like you're doing the right thing in terms of praying, and I want to pray for you in this situation and also with your cancer right now as well. Gracious Father, we come before you and we lift our sister Gail up to you, Lord, who has this just immense burden on her shoulders, Lord, the pain of division in the family and hurt and just so many things, Lord, there, and then also just bodily sickness, Lord, cancer that she's wrestling with, Lord God. We know that this is more than she can bear in her own strength, so I lift her up to you, Lord Jesus, and I ask that you would grant her your strength, that you would help her to lean upon you, to cast her burdens upon you, to look to you, and God, that you would bring forgiveness, reconciliation, healing in my sister's family and also in her body. Would you grant that healing as well? So would you please, Jesus, our good shepherd, would you be with her? I ask these things, dear Father, in Jesus' name, amen. Sister, I think that you continue to pray.

I don't know everything going on in terms of the family dynamic with the older siblings. I would say continuing to reach out and to open the doors of communication and to ask the Lord to soften hearts, just like I prayed there, that the Lord would bring healing and peace and a softening there. And as you do that, continuing to cling to the cross, continuing to cling to Jesus, to his mercy, to his grace, not losing sight of that, because when we're struck by these kinds of circumstances, it's just so easy to think, I can't, I've got nothing in me anymore. I'm fighting with my body. I'm fighting in these tensions within family. I just don't have the strength, and you don't have the strength, and that's why you need the strength of the Holy Spirit. And so may God be with you in this and fill you with his Spirit, and may he bring healing in this situation, sister. Gail, thank you so much for calling. We'll continue to pray for you in that whole situation. This is Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. We have Sam on the line calling in from Oklahoma. Sam, what's your question for Adriel?

Hello. Yes, my question is a conflict I'm dealing with, specifically how Christian core concepts deal with self-defense, defending my family, and using weapons to do so, knowing what the end result can be. Yeah, great question.

So I mean, I guess it just depends on the context. I think about the disciples in the New Testament, and when they were persecuted for their faith in Jesus Christ, they didn't pull out swords. It was, you know, they praised God for having granted them the grace, the privilege of suffering for the sake of the Gospel. And so I think in the context of the advancement of the Gospel, the proclamation of the Gospel as Christians, is never up to us to fight back in a way that would harm another person who's persecuting us for our faith in Jesus.

But if somebody breaks into your home, right, and they're trying to harm you or your family, this is sort of a random act of violence, I do think that it is permissible for a Christian to exercise self-defense. One passage of scripture that I think of is in Exodus chapter 22. You begin to have these various laws that are given by God through Moses to the people.

It begins in verse 1, if a man steals an ox or a sheep and kills it or sells it, he shall repay five oxen for an ox and four sheep for a sheep. If a thief is found breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there shall be no blood guilt for him. There's this idea of self-defense there. And so I think even in Israel's civil laws, if you will, they talk about these kinds of things. And so I think if your question is, you know, should Christians take up arms to defend themselves with the advancement of the gospel, if we're preaching the gospel, somebody persecutes us, well, the answer is no.

But if somebody's breaking into your home, this sort of random act of violence seeking to do you harm, I think you can and should protect your family. And so thank you, Sam, for your question. Thanks, Sam. Appreciate you being a regular listener to Core Christianity.

Great question. By the way, just a reminder, we have that great booklet available. What a perfect booklet for this week with Valentine's Day. And if you are single considering getting married or maybe you have a child who's considering marriage or is wondering about the whole idea of getting married, should I live together before I get married? We have this wonderful booklet, Why Would Anyone Get Married? It's a biblical view of marriage, God's design, God's purpose for marriage.

And it's available to you for a gift of any amount. Just go to CoreChristianity.com forward slash offers. Again, CoreChristianity.com forward slash offers and look for that new booklet, Why Would Anyone Get Married? Let's go back to the phones. Raymond on the line from Memphis, Tennessee.

Raymond, what's your question for Adriel? Yes, Pastor, I've had a conversation in Sunday school and we were talking about David and they were saying how brave he was to go against Goliath when everybody else was scared. I said, of course, he was brave because he knew he couldn't die because God had promised him he would be king. And my pastor said, no, that's wrong. I was like, he knew he had faith in God because God said he'd be quick king.

I just want to know where you stood on that. Thank you, Pastor. Hey, God bless you, brother. I love that you're having conversations with your pastor about the scriptures that you're in Sunday school.

I mean, that's what we want for all of our listeners. Each of you would be plugged into good churches where you're studying the word together. Well, you can have these conversations with your own pastor. If you don't have a pastor, you don't have a church, you need one.

And you need to have a pastor that you can go to for some of these things and to have conversations like these. Now, with regard to this question about David and his bravery there, especially exhibited in places like 1 Samuel chapter 17, what was it? What was the root cause of his bravery? Well, I think it certainly was his faith in God, his faith in the Lord. Now, I don't know that I would say he just knew he was invincible, that kind of a thing, because of the promise of God. I mean, he knows he's a mortal man, but he trusts in the Lord.

And so you have the classic, the original David and Goliath, this matchup where ordinarily we would think, boy, David, he's this young boy going up against this, you know, warrior, this enormous warrior. And yet David's confidence is in the Lord. His faith, his trust is in the Lord. And so I would say that's what we attribute his bravery to. It's towards, you know, what the Lord had done and who the Lord was. And so I think that you're on the right track.

Again, I don't think it's that he believed he was invincible, per se, invincible, per se, but there is this confidence that he has in God as he enters into the battlefield. And so thanks for giving us a call. You're listening to Core Christianity.

Michael is on the line from Henrietta, Oklahoma. Michael, what is your question for Pastor Adriel? Yeah, Pastor, I was calling because I had noticed that jumping back and forth between CNN and Fox and I-24, trying to stay caught up on what's going on over at Ukraine and stuff, it don't matter what side of the pole you're on, I mean, aisle you're on, no matter if you're a Democrat or a Republican, for God's sake.

And, you know, the thing is, it just needs to stop with just knowing this. I was compelled to write this down, and I did, and compelled to call y'all to tell you, and that was that our Lord Jesus Christ isn't left-wing or right-wing. He doesn't have wings. Angels have wings. And one-third plus one failed him.

Hey, Michael, thank you so much for giving us a call. What I appreciate about what you're saying here is, you're right, things can be so politicized in the Church today, and people begin to hate each other as a result of the fact that this person has a different view than me on this issue. And sometimes the issues aren't even really issues that Scripture speaks to. Now, there are issues, I think, that the Bible is really clear on that we hold fast to, but we have to be careful that our Christian faith is the number one thing about it, is that our identity and union with Jesus Christ is what has the priority in our lives. And I think what you're onto is that for many people, I think in the United States, the priority is politics even over religion.

It's interesting to me, I mean, every election cycle, how passionate people will get, and again, there's nothing wrong with that, but they just devote hours and hours reading and reading and studying and looking at blogs and watching clips on CNN or on YouTube or on Fox News, as you said, and yet how so often, you know, many of us, many of those same people, are not willing to dig into the Scriptures, to draw near to God through His Word, to spend time in prayer. I think, you know, we should challenge ourselves here, to ask ourselves, you know, what's the most important thing for me in life? Where am I putting my hope? Am I putting my hope in civil leaders, or am I putting my hope in God and His Word? Psalm 118, verse 8 says it's better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in men. Now, that doesn't mean that we don't engage with broader society and have conversations about politics and seek to pursue those things in society, in just the world in which we live that are going to be good and honoring to God, good for our neighbors as well, caring for them.

Absolutely we should. It's one of the things that God calls us to. But my concern, it sounds like it's your concern as well, Michael, is are we fixed on Christ and on His Gospel? Is that what we're the most passionate about, or is it these other things?

And oftentimes when it's these other things, whether it's politics or something else, we can begin to despise one another, even within the Church, and it leads to schism, division, all sorts of other unhealthy things. And so we need to be wise here, and I appreciate the fact that you're wanting to be wise in this area, and may the Lord bless you. A lot of wonderful questions that we received today, and a lot of difficult ones, friends. Just remember, as you hear some of these questions, especially for those who are suffering, remember these brothers and sisters in your prayers, and let's continue to support each other even throughout the week. God bless you all. Thanks for listening to CORE Christianity. To request your copy of today's special offer, visit us at corechristianity.com and click on offers in the menu bar, or call us at 1-833-843-2673. That's 833-The-CORE. When you contact us, please let us know how you've been encouraged by this program. And be sure to join us next time as we explore the truth of God's Word together.