QUESTION:
Must both be of equal character for courtship?
ANSWER:
“And I will make thee swear by the LORD, the God of heaven, and the God of the earth, that thou shalt not take a wife unto my son of the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I dwell: But thou shalt go unto my country, and to my kindred, and take a wife unto my son Isaac.” [Genesis 24:3-4]
"Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?” [II Corinthians 6:14]
“Some of you women look around at some little old guy with his hair slicked down, enough Vaseline on it to open his mouth. And then you... Some little old girl here not long ago... This ain't a joke, 'cause I don't mean to tell it as a joke. But the people knows that this is no place to joke. But a little old girl here, she was... There's fine boys here, Christian boys. A long time ago, when I was pastor here, we used to have a--just young men's classes. And I'd speak to the young women on Sunday afternoon about sex and things, then the next Sunday afternoon speak to the young men, and try to get those things curbed out. Some little old girl started going with some little old shrimp downtown here, smoked cigarettes, and had a flask in his pocket, and he drove a little roadster car around town. I couldn't see what she seen in that boy. He wouldn't come to church. He'd set out there, put her in church out here, and then he'd set out there on the outside in his car and wait, wouldn't come in church. I said to her one day... She lived in New Albany. I said, "I want to ask you something, girlie. What in the world do you see in that boy?" I said, "The first place, he hates the very religion that you--you have. He despises your Christ. He'd never make you a husband; he'd make you miserable all your life." And I said, "Why, there's fine little Christian boys here that you could go with, and they're... Your daddy and mother despises the thoughts of you going out. But you go anyhow, and you think, 'I'm sweet sixteen.'" She started wearing makeup and running out, and first thing she was in roadhouses. She's gone on to eternity now. But then, she stood here and... You know what the excuse that girl give me back there that she loved that boy? She said, "He's got such cute little feet and he smells so good." Could you imagine that? Perfuming hisself up, that's a sissy, not a man. "Look," I said, "Sister, I'd rather go with a Christian boy that had feet like gravel cars and smelled like a polecat, if he was absolutely a Christian." That's right. True. Yeah, that's excuse, "Such cute little feet and smells so good." The little roadhouse runner finally ruined the life of the girl. It's a shame, disgraceful. Marriage is honorable, but it should be entered prayerfully and reverently. And genuine love for that woman will bind you together forever. "What you bind on the earth, I'll bind in heaven." When you walk down the street yonder, she may get old, and gray, and wrinkled, but that same love you had for her when she was a young beautiful woman, you'll still have it. You may get stoop-shouldered, baldheaded, and wrinkled-faced, and everything else, but she'll love you just like you did when you stand with wide shoulders and curly hair, if it's really God. For you're looking to the time when you've crossed the river yonder, when you'll spring back again to young men and women to live together forever. That's God's eternal promise. He said He would do it. He... Not only that, we'll get to it in a minute, He swore He'd do it.” [Hebrews, Chapter 7, Part 2, Jeffersonville IN 57-0922]
“Your boy goes with a Catholic girl. When they go to get married, they have to promise to raise the children Catholic, see, vice versa. See, it's to break the power of the other. But what is it? The Bible claims the whole thing's a prostitute. Now, what are you going to do? That's right. And how the sins of the people would be visited!” [Serpent's Seed, Jeffersonville IN 58-0928E]
“A few days ago I was listening to a program on the radio, coming to Sunday school, and it was a round table discussion with teen-agers in Louisville. A--what was one of the most important things, was a girl to find the boy with the curly hair, or the boy, the girl with the pretty blue or brown eyes? Did that make the difference? It seems like that that would be the great thing to a teen-ager. But that isn't the greatest thing. The greatest thing is find your God, your Maker. Don't mix marry. Marry a boy that believes just exactly like you do, for after all, God is the main important thing that we are in the earth to do, is to serve Him. And if you do marry or anything contrary to that, you'll pay for it in the days that lays ahead of you. You must always remember, by faith and not by sight. The just shall live by faith. And we look at the Unseen. It's grace that'll take me on.” [Looking At The Unseen, Jeffersonville IN 58-1003]
“This time came, and Abraham was determined that he did not want his son to marry an unbeliever. That would be good decision for a Christians today, who are sons and daughters of Abraham, to make the same decision about their children. Now, it didn't make any difference how pretty those unbelieving girls were, and how nice a women they were, but Abraham did not want his son connected with that kind of stuff. And so he had to make a time of decision on who he should marry.” [Time Of Decision, Chicago IL 59-0611]
“The hot winds of judgment was blowing upon a nation that had forgotten God. That was during the reign of Ahab, Israel's most cruel and wicked king. And he'd married a sinner, Jezebel, which was an idolater. And a mixed wedding like that never is successful; it just can't be; either the woman will come the man's way or the man will go the woman's way.” [Elijah And The Meal Offering, Phoenix AZ 60-0310]
“I said, "It's not for me to say. The boss, government, said, 'Let it be what it is, permit them to marry, and so forth.'" I said, "That's--that's up to them. As an American, I abide by the laws." To me, you ought to leave it the way God had it. He made white men, black men, brown men. He's a God of variety. Let them stay the way God made them. That's what I think. If I was a black man, I'd--I'd want--I'd want to stay in my class of people. If I was a Chinese, yellow, I'd want to stay that way. Being that I'm Anglo-Saxon, white, let me marry amongst the white, teach my children the same, and just stay the kind of a flower and the color that God made us at the beginning. After all, He's the One that made it.” [Life, Salem OR 62-0719B]
“Notice the great masterpiece of the family. The husband and wife cannot be truly a family unless they're one. They have to be. If they're not, they're not a good family. Wife pulling one way and the husband another, that'll make an awful family. But in agreement with love one to the other, that's a family. And now, that was God's masterpiece; and all the true family here portrays that. See? And now, the masterpiece family has come again: Christ and His Bride ready to come. The Second Adam, Second Eve, ready now to return back to their home. The whole picture's been redemption, from where it was, bringing it back, see, just exactly, bringing it back again.” [The Masterpiece, Jeffersonville IN 64-0705]
Bible References: Genesis 24:3-4; II Corinthians 6:14
[Answer provided by Bro. Ken Andes, Minister, Lynden, Washington]