Latest / The Mark Driscoll Show / Pastor Mark Answers Your Top Questions of the Week (May 29th, 2025)

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Pastor Mark Answers Your Top Questions of the Week (May 29th, 2025) · The Mark Driscoll Show

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  Getting married is very easy. Staying married is very hard.
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  Staying happily married is very, very hard.
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  And even people that have Jesus find it to be very hard.
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  And if you don't have Jesus, it's impossible.
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  All right, little Q&A. What do you look for in a new
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  church? Home?
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  Number one, Bible teaching. Are they Bible teaching?
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  Bible believing church and are they clear on the issues that
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  are being compromised in our day?
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  Like there's only two genders, male and female.
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  Marriage is for one man, one woman.
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  Sex is only for marriage. Some of those things will tell
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  you whether or not they're soft woke, hard woke, or Bible
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  believing conservative, which is exactly where you want to be.
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  In addition, I would ask yourself how are the people?
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  So if the Bible is taught, praise God.
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  Are the people warm, loving. Do they seem healthy, joyful.
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  Are you seeing the fruit of the Spirit, you know, in the life of
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  the community and the church family?
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  Cause church is really largely about connecting with God and
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  his people. And if they're people, you're
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  like, I, I enjoy these people and these, these feel like my
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  people praise God, then that could be a great place for you.
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  In addition, then getting to know a little bit about the
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  senior leader and their marriage and like, is this a joyful,
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  happy, healthy, holy marriage? Are are they together?
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  Are they strong and intact? Cause a lot of the times what
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  creates the crisis in the church is there's a problem in the
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  marriage, that there's infidelity in the marriage and
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  then that breaks everything. And then I would go to secondary
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  issues. If you've got kids, you know, is
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  it a good place for your kids? If you're married, is it a good
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  church that supports and strengthens marriage?
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  What I would tell you is go for a while and give it the benefit
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  of the doubt. Don't come in with a critical
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  spirit, especially if you've got some church hurt and no church
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  is perfect. And be careful because there's
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  an old theologian in America named Jonathan Edwards, and he
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  says if you idolize, you'll demonize.
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  And so if you go into a church and like this is the best church
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  ever, well, every church has got its faults and flaws and at some
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  point you're going to find them. And you could go from idolizing
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  to demonizing. So just go in and say the
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  leaders are sinners, the people are sinners, and I'm a Sinner.
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  And we're all doing the best we can under the grace of God and
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  put some grace on it and give some time to it.
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  But I would go for a couple of months.
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  And I would say if you're a man, when we moved to Arizona and we
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  were first looking for a church, I would go to churches before I
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  brought my wife and kids and I would go check it out.
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  And if it wasn't good, I would get up and leave.
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  And then I didn't have to have my wife and kids be part of that
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  process. And then when we found it, you
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  know, when we'd find a church that we liked, then I'd be like,
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  hey, babe, let's load up the kids.
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  Let's go, 'cause it's my job as head of household and, and
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  husband and father to sort of lead the charge.
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  And if we're in a church that we don't like and we got to get up
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  and leave and go check the kids out, it's all kind of awkward.
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  And I just didn't want to do that to my family.
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  And so, yeah, Bible teaching, good marriage and leadership,
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  evidence of the fruit of the Spirit in the lives of the
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  people. And, and then secondarily, you
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  know, if you have some particular needs for family or
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  marriage or whatever, does it meet those needs?
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  And then and then, yeah, lastly, the husband, the father should
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  be the one to do the homework, to do the research.
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  Of course he does it with his wife, but don't just make your
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  wife do all the research. You go there and say, I don't
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  like this one. It's your responsibility to do
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  the homework and to lead the family.
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  OK, how important? Here's a question.
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  How important is baptism for a new believer?
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  Is it mandatory? Yes.
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  So the Bible says repent and be baptized, right?
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  Repent, turn from sin, trust in Jesus, be baptized.
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  That is going public with your faith and it is declaring your
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  allegiance publicly. And it, it used to be in the
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  early church when they would baptize someone, they would ask
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  them, do you renounce the devil and all his works?
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  It, it is really a public declaration of a complete shift
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  in allegiance. And now Jesus is my God, my
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  Lord, my Savior. I am 100% devoted to him and I
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  publicly align myself with him. I I'm convinced that baptism is
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  also a means of grace. And so like communion, those are
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  sacraments. It's a means of grace.
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  It's where the Holy Spirit is present in a powerful present,
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  anointing, empowering, encouraging way because you're
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  walking in obedience. Jesus said to, you know, we're
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  supposed to go and baptize people in the name of the
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  Father, Son and the Holy Spirit, which of course is the Trinity.
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  So this is obedience and it is commanded, but it's commanded in
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  part so that you can receive the blessing of the grace that comes
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  through the obedience. And so, yeah, the, the, the, the
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  Bible shows people getting saved and then baptized immediately.
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  And so you should get baptized. If you are a Christian, you
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  should get baptized in a public way.
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  And baptism shows the death, burial, resurrection of Jesus
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  and how water cleanses us from filth.
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  Jesus cleanses us from sin. And so baptism, it looks back to
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  Jesus resurrection, it looks forward to our resurrection.
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  And it also reminds us that in Christ our old life is buried
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  and dead and our new life with Christ is begun.
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  And so there's a lot that is happening in baptism.
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  And I'll just be honest, it is one of those really remarkable
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  days in your life. It's like your wedding day.
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  There's a few days in your life that are sort of historic
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  moments and they're mile markers in your walk with Christ.
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  Baptism is just that. And so that would be my strong
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  encouragement. Yes, repent and be baptized in
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  the name of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit as soon as
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  possible after you become a believer in Jesus Christ.
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  How about this one? Here's a question, is it OK to
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  date a non believer not yet saved but attends church?
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  Well, you shouldn't date a non believer because you can't marry
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  a non believer. You got to ask yourself what is
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  the point of dating? A Christian should believe in
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  intentional dating, and that means that the intent of dating
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  is to find a spouse and get married.
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  Intentional dating means you don't.
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  You're not dating multiple people, just one, and that
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  you're not dating without a clear objective.
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  You're dating with the objective of coming to the conclusion is
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  this my spouse? Is this going to be my husband,
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  my wife? So the point of dating is to get
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  married. Well, if you can't marry an
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  unbeliever, don't date an unbeliever because dating,
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  intentional dating is the process that leads to marriage.
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  And what can happen is if you start dating an unbeliever,
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  maybe they go to church with you, but you're, you're never
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  really sure. Like are they, are they doing
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  the Jesus thing because they want to be with me?
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  Or even if we weren't together, would they be with Jesus?
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  And so you want them to have Christian friends, other people
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  that are helping evangelize them, walk the process with
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  them, you know, bring them to church and and you can be
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  friends with them, but you can't have a romantic relationship.
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  And other people should be tagged in.
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  Let's say it's a guy dating a girl.
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  Introduce her to great girls at the church.
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  Encourage those relationships. Let those girls be friends of
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  hers. Let those girls evangelize her.
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  You're still a friend of hers. But until she comes to her own
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  faith, until she's walking with Jesus on her own, you can't walk
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  with her because if she's not walking with Jesus, you can't be
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  walking with her. And if you start dating someone,
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  what happens is usually you end up sort of compromising your
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  values, sleeping together and or what happens is you start
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  drifting in your faith and and then you're not actually strong
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  in your relationship with God. And that's a terrible foundation
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  for a marriage. The highest rate of divorce are
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  two people that practice different faiths.
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  The lowest rates of divorce are people who are Bible believing,
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  church attending, Jesus loving Christians.
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  They actually have the the best odds of, you know, a successful
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  marriage. So yeah.
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  And the other thing is too is like if if they don't know
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  Jesus, they don't really understand you.
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  If they're not under the authority of the Bible, you're
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  not going to be able to come to agreement.
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  If they don't have the Holy Spirit, the two of you are going
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  to have an impossible time sort of walking the same Rd.
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  together. And if they don't know Jesus,
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  they don't really understand you.
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  Because if you are a Christian, the most important person in
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  your whole life is Jesus. And if, if that's true and they
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  don't know Jesus, they don't really even understand you.
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  I couldn't imagine Grace and I when we're married, You know,
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  we're coming up on 35 years married next August, a year from
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  August. But we're under the authority of
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  God's word. So we don't have to argue.
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  We need to study and obey. We pray together.
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  My wife held me and I've got a long day and prayed over me
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  today and I prayed over her last night.
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  I couldn't imagine a marriage where we weren't praying over
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  each other and under the authority of God's word together
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  and church, we worship together, we hold hands and we worship God
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  together and we show unity in the, in the, in the, in the
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  worship of our God. And so all that to say, getting
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  married is very easy. Staying married is very hard.
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  Staying happily married is very, very hard.
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  And even people that have Jesus find it to be very hard.
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  And if you don't have Jesus, it's impossible.
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  So hopefully you know if they are to be your spouse, they will
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  get saved, come to their own convictions, and then you'll be
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  able to date as Christians go through a premarital process,
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  see if you should be married, and if wise counsel and maybe
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  parents or church members speak into it, then you move toward
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  marriage. So it's friendship, intentional
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  dating, engagement, marriage. If that's the direction you're
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  going and they don't know Jesus, you should not be dating them.