What does the Bible say about soulmates?
Scott Perry
Soulmates & Widowhood
Chances
are you searched for the topic related to “soul mates” and are looking for the
Christian perspective. This was written in effort to help the reader understand
what the Christian view is when their “soul mate” passes away and they are left
behind.
This may be a time of great struggle for you where an answer to this
question could bring a comforting peace to an uncertainty that has followed you
regarding the death of a spouse or significant other. The reader should know
that the author is a Christian but holds no advanced degree in Christian
theology.
This writing is a result of great study and years of preparation.
There has been no overt attempt to misinterpret Scripture or mislead the
reader. If the things you are about to read also speak to you, I thank God. If
what has been written disturbs you and you believe I am wrong, please forgive
me.
It is important to note that although what is about to be said may be
helpful advice, it is not a replacement for a Christian to put their hope and
peace in the life and death of Jesus Christ.
The modern evangelical Church in America goes to great lengths to
entertain us with moral affirmations to be better people, restore a
Judeo-Christian culture, and love your neighbor as yourself. Although this is
helpful wisdom, it is not the Gospel and ultimately will not bring us a final
peace.
The Gospel is a story about how the Lord has hand-selected his
people before Creation, called them out of a state of death and eternity of
despair, redeemed them through Christ’s life and resurrection, and will never
lose a single one of them back to the enemy.
What to do with our lives after our significant other goes to be with
the Lord may be helpful information, but it will not ultimately bring us the
peace we need most and will only get with a true understanding of the Gospel.
What is Love?
The highest standard
and possibly the truest definition of love may best be summarized by 1
Corinthians 13: 4-7.
“Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not
self-seeking, it is not easily angered….. Love never fails.”
When one is truly in
love, all self-seeking desires, jealousy, pride, envy, and impatience do not
exist. There is no room in the heart
for such attributes and love to coexist. To say it another way, love is gracious, generous, patient, selfless, and above all, it never fails.
for such attributes and love to coexist. To say it another way, love is gracious, generous, patient, selfless, and above all, it never fails.
Therefore, love is
purposed to exist for a certain cause and also to be given to
a certain person. This latter argument is made by considering God’s
original intention when He created Adam and Eve.
These two individuals
represent the original purpose that God had when creating a woman for a man and
becomes fully realized with the life of Christ – only He has been able to
accomplish these attributes of love completely.
Adam and Eve,
however, the first lovers ever to be created is the paradigm that will be used
to describe the world’s first “soul mates.”
We will never know in
this lifetime what the world would have been like had it not been tarnished by
original sin. It appears evident that God created Adam and Eve to exist for
one another in selfless harmony forever.
"The Lord God took the man
and put him in the Garden of Eden... The Lord God said, "It is not good
for the man to be alone." ... Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib ...
For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his
wife, and they will become one flesh." Genesis 2: 15, 18, 22, and 24.
One must remember
that before sin entered the world, the purpose of a human being was to live
with God in our sinless bodies on this world forever.
When Our Soul Mate
Dies
The Bible is pretty
clear about divorce and the responsibilities of Christians – But what about
death? What does our God say, if anything at all, about the duties we
have as Christians when the one we were meant to be with dies?
Are we to continue honoring our soul mate with our loyalty by remaining single or does our love die with our soul mate? Therefore, does God work in giving us a new soul mate?
Whether you think of
it or not, these questions have troubled the minds of humanity for a very long
time and they deserve answers.
For the short amount
of time that we have on this earth, Scripture seems to point towards an
everlasting bond that reaches far beyond a simple verbal commitment to one
another that is made with a wedding vow. Here's how:
The Bible explicitly
points out that Eve was made FOR Adam (Genesis 2: 23-24).
Here it is shown that
God did not create this type of union to be shared with more than one person.
It is important to understand that if He wanted to make a dozen different
women for Adam to love equally, He would have done so.
Instead He made one
woman for one man and “one love” for each of them to share. It is
important we understand that this was God’s original intention. This was
the way that people were purposed to live.
However, when sin
entered the world, the topic of loving another person as equally as the first,
has become a question that would not have been asked in the garden.
The Fall has allowed
humanity to think and reason on its own behalf and explain away the true beauty
and careful attention to details that God shows when selecting soul
mates. Sin has changed everything.
The Bible numerously
reflects on the relationship between Christ and his bride. Just as surely
as Christ has promised himself to us forever and will come back to redeem his
people, we are to reflect that same loyalty to our soul mate and we do so
through marriage.
Adam and Eve were the
first to reflect the everlasting and unchangeable reality of Christ and his
bride. This is the backdrop to Jesus' claim:
"Have you not read, that He
who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, 'For
this cause a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his
wife; and the two shall become one flesh'? Consequently they are no more two,
but one flesh. What therefore God has
joined together let no man separate” Matthew 19: 4-9.
Here Jesus
specifically points out that a man and woman will not only be blessed by the
Lord by marriage, but He will solidify that bond by living
within them.
By eliminating the
existence of two individuals pursuing individual goals, Jesus is saying God is
glorified when one lives for the other. When the happiness and joy of a
soul mate become the overriding priority of the other, God is glorified.
If there ever comes a
time for one to give their own life for the life of their soul mate, God is
also glorified. This is because not only does one sacrifice his own life
for his soul mate, but with God existing within the flesh of the marriage, he
sacrifices his life for God as well.
This passage is very
clear that God takes His role in bringing soul mates together and being the
essence that holds this bond together very seriously.
So seriously that He
made it a commandment for us to honor His role. As it is laid out in the 7th commandment,
when one commits adultery, he is defying God’s position within the marriage and
committing a very discordant sin.
It is entirely
possible that none of this matters in heaven or in the coming kingdom. But
in Matthew 19:4, God is making it clear that He is involved when two decide to
live for each other and thereby, for Him as well.
When God is
intimately involved in the way that He describes here, why then do we believe
that all of this effort and energy is spent for something that will only last
for the short time that we exist on this planet, but will not hold true when
one walks into eternity?
Why do so many of us
believe that somehow, what God has so carefully woven together to the point
where man cannot separate, it is to be haphazardly broken when one passes
away? When we read Romans 7:2 the answer seems obvious.
“ . . . a married woman is bound
to her husband as long as he is alive, but if her husband dies, she is released
from the law of marriage.”
But it becomes
muddled when one turns to 1 Corinthians 7:39–40.
“If her husband dies, she is free
to marry anyone she wishes . . . In my judgment, she is happier if she stays as
she is.”
How do we deal with
this apparent contradiction? The answer is that these two verses give light to
the fact that we live in a very different place than Adam and Eve who were
supposed to live together in the garden forever.
Now we live in an
environment where God had to change the rules in order to give His children the
freedom to live accordingly in a fallen world.
The book of Romans
and Paul’s writings in Corinthians are not commandments. They
are concessions to the immutable connection that He intended when He
made Adam and Eve.
Paul is urging us to
“stay as we are” and to be loyal and strong because this pain will not last and
God will not let it be more than we can bear. Whatever loneliness and
heartache we feel in this world, we will prosper and be rewarded in
eternity.
If, however, the
solitude and the grief of being alone are too much to bear and we are tempted
beyond our ability to withstand, then Paul says we have the freedom to remarry
in order to protect ourselves.
God had to adjust the
rules for us after The Fall and these are the concessions He graciously made
for us, but we should always remember to be striving for what He intended, what
was planned, and what was original.
God's Original
Intention
Allow me to
submit this thought: When it comes to other contentious debates outside of
this one, many Christians typically fall back on the notion of the
"original intention" of God's design.
For example, when we
look to justify creationism over evolution we look at the
book of Genesis as a primary resource to tell us how the animals
of the world were created and how they got their names.
When we look at how
sin originally manifested its way into this world, do we not also look at
the beginning of the Scriptures to understand where it all came
from? Likewise, when we consider how marriage came about should we not
also look at how God originally created it?
This knowledge of the
old kingdom must therefore be used as an intellectual backdrop in the new
kingdom when referring to Paul's wisdom to “stay as we are.”
God created the world
a certain way and it would still be like that had man not sinned. Will it
be that way again? There is no way to tell, but there was a reason He
created it that way in the first place and I plead we must keep that in
consideration before making any decision to remarry.
Advice to Widows
To the widowed, Paul
offers behavioral wisdom and a comforting solution to their loneliness: place
all your hope and fear in Him. He is the one where you will draw your
energy, your power, and your will to move forward. He is your
strength.
He has saved you once
from your sin and He can save you again from your grief. But notice what is
said about the widow who forgets her commitment to God and instead finds
comfort in pleasure once the confinements of marriage are lifted.
“The widow who is really in need
and left all alone puts her hope in God for help. But the widow who lives for
pleasure is dead even while she lives.” (1 Timothy 5:5-6)
But what is meant by
pleasure? Obviously, it is no condemnation to find happiness in this world, but
one must be careful in seeking pleasures simply used to fill a void. Living
simply to satisfy one's own desire for pleasure can easily stand in the middle
of their spiritual pursuit to glorify God, which should always be the
ultimate pursuit of our existence.
"Put to
death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual
immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because
of these the wrath of God is coming." (Colossians 3:5-6).
There are many other
ways to live for pleasure that are not mentioned in this verse, but the point
is when we start to live in a manner that is only pleasing to us, then we
take the focus away from God and that is a problem.
It must be said that
although it is obvious that God’s original intention for us is to
stay loyal to our first and only soul mate, it is no sin to remarry.
But “remarriage” must
be approached very carefully and pursued only as a last resort. Paul
actually advises this decision for certain women because he is concerned that
their loneliness will harden their heart, make them do things they should not,
and eventually run to the side of the evil one. It must also be pointed out
these verses hold true for men as well.
“So I counsel younger widows to
marry, to have children, to manage their homes and give the enemy no
opportunity for slander.” (1 Timothy 5:14)
Nothing is worth
this. Nothing is worth giving the devil an opportunity to hurt you. Loneliness
is undoubtedly a weakness that must not be seen as being worse than any
other.
Just like any other
weakness, we work invariably as Christians to supplant these limitations with
reassurance that Christ has already fulfilled our earthly obligations and so we
wait in hope and faith in the kingdom that awaits us.
What is the
Alternative?
Finally, the
antithetical point of view to all of this is that love is only existent during
the short time that we are alive. You are to honor your spouse when he or
she is present in “body,” but once the body dies a person is free to love
somebody else.
The problem with this
logic is that what these people call ‘love’ is actually fleeting and
replaceable – two qualities that do not accurately portray what God had in mind,
nor Christ's relationship with his bride.
There is no doubt
that we have been given the freedom to remarry, but the Bible still advises us
to "stay as we are" and to endure the short road of loneliness and
suffering because the reward in heaven is plentiful.
We must always
remember that our hope in this life is not here – it is in Christ's merits and
therefore in heaven and the kingdom to come. Although just about
everybody gets married, not everyone is called to be married.
If you are one of the
called, however, then be confident that the Lord has created one person
specifically for you just as He did with Adam and Eve.
My advice to every
person either single or already married is to begin preparing your
heart for a celibate life once your spouse dies. There is a 50% chance you
will find yourself in this position, but God will give you the
strength you need to overcome (Psalm 28:7, Philippians 4:13).
However, if we
believe a person is able to fall in love with another person after his spouse
dies, then who is to say it is not possible to “fall out of love” at any given
moment even while his spouse lives?
A person cannot truly
be in love more than once because love involves releasing part of yourself
in order to join in the flesh of
your counterpart. One cannot give
part of his heart to the other and simply take it back when he is
widowed.
That just does
not make any sense. It does not make sense to say that you are in love
with the person on your left but be able to fall in love with the person on
your right. That is not love; that is lust. That is irresponsibility and lack
of self-control.
Because, as we know,
love is not transient. Love is permanent. Love is loyal.
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About the Author
I have written this to encourage readers to
study the Bible, to know the Bible, and most of all to love and believe the
Bible. The aforementioned words are solely my own opinion and I encourage
all who have read them to refer to their own Bibles and validate them with
God's teachings. I must be very careful of misrepresenting myself as
a religious erudite, but rather as merely a sinful human that studies the
Bible and is simply offering an opinion. Although I believe with my
whole heart that what I write is correct, I make no claim to
infallibility. It is almost certain that I am wrong in places, but
hopefully very few. That is the reality of being human and the reason why
Christ came to His cross.
Scott Perry
http://knowgodsword.webs.com/
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