A friend once told me about a new believer in his small group. It seemed to be going okay for him, but one difficulty was the fact that he seemed to insist on continuing a relationship with a woman who was not a believer. My friend asked me what I would say to a new believer who didn’t think that was a big deal? I tried to assume the best of this new believer and responded, “how does she feel about him loving Jesus more than her?”

I doubt such a conversation had to that point taken place. And even if she would be okay with it, it would not change that fact that if you think you are a serious Christian who wants to date a non-Christian, you are in fact not as serious as you think you are.

I’m sure this specific foolishness could be articulated and exposed in a variety of ways but one of my favorites was how Marshall Segal pointed out how this type of thinking seems to suffer from a lack of imagination. Hard times come and the two of you can’t pray together. Sweet devotional times with God can’t be shared with each other. Kids who find different values and practices to be very disorienting. It’s likely that any Christian trying to justify dating a non-believer hasn’t thought about what real married life might actually look like for more than two seconds.