Christians who had pre-marital sex with the partner you did end up marrying, do you regret it?

[Up&Up]

I'm really curious to hear what you actually felt and experienced, I have a good idea of what the Bible says.

 

[NothingIsImpossible]

They often say "Better to marry and avoid sexual sin!". Problem is all too often I find these couples end up divorcing. Sure, they married and enjoy sex with each other but they weren't a good match for enjoying the rest of life together. Marrying to satisfy the urge of sex is a double edge sword. Because if it ends then you are in yet another sin of adultery.

My view is if you are in sexually sin and not married, talk with each other about how you feel about various aspects of life to see if you would actually work in a marriage. Do you believe the same as they do? What do they think qualifies as "being saved"? What do they think about the punishment of a kid? What do they think of gender roles? How many kids do you want? Do you even want kids? Do they care about looks or heart? Are the willing to make things work or just give up after a fight?

There are SOOOO many issues that need to be talked about ahead of time. Most couples just think "being in love" will get them through marriage but that's more of a "hoping for the best" thing then anything else.

All this said I lost my virginity to a woman I intended to marry. We ended up splitting because she had severe mental issues. I can see looking back we would have never worked out. But I was to blindly in love at the time to notice. I knew hands down in my heart we would work. So blind.

Now as for my wife. She was not a virgin either when we met. Sex was obviously wonderful and what not. But you at times remember how you gave up your virginity to someone you shouldn't have. But you grow past it and move on. One other thing is sex is not the same with every person. So if someone ends up splitting with someone and finding a new love and they marry, they don't realize it can be very different. "How come you don't like this?" or "When I was with my ex we had sex alot, you don't like to!".

Again, if you are going to marry. Make sure you are both ready. Sex either way can become an issue later on.

 

[SkyWriting]

I'm really curious to hear what you actually felt and experienced, I have a good idea of what the Bible says.

I am unrepentant of all aspects of my second marriage including that.
But I feel for my first wife's hardships as I always have.

 

[SkyWriting]

They often say "Better to marry and avoid sexual sin!". Problem is all too often I find these couples end up divorcing. Sure, they married and enjoy sex with each other but they weren't a good match for enjoying the rest of life together. Marrying to satisfy the urge of sex is a double edge sword. Because if it ends then you are in yet another sin of adultery.

My view is if you are in sexually sin and not married, talk with each other about how you feel about various aspects of life to see if you would actually work in a marriage. Do you believe the same as they do? What do they think qualifies as "being saved"? What do they think about the punishment of a kid? What do they think of gender roles? How many kids do you want? Do you even want kids? Do they care about looks or heart? Are the willing to make things work or just give up after a fight?

There are SOOOO many issues that need to be talked about ahead of time. Most couples just think "being in love" will get them through marriage but that's more of a "hoping for the best" thing then anything else.

All this said I lost my virginity to a woman I intended to marry. We ended up splitting because she had severe mental issues. I can see looking back we would have never worked out. But I was to blindly in love at the time to notice. I knew hands down in my heart we would work. So blind.

Now as for my wife. She was not a virgin either when we met. Sex was obviously wonderful and what not. But you at times remember how you gave up your virginity to someone you shouldn't have. But you grow past it and move on. One other thing is sex is not the same with every person. So if someone ends up splitting with someone and finding a new love and they marry, they don't realize it can be very different. "How come you don't like this?" or "When I was with my ex we had sex alot, you don't like to!".

Again, if you are going to marry. Make sure you are both ready. Sex either way can become an issue later on.

All couples are "not a good match". Growth comes from commitment.

Growth ends when you find a "shiny new object."

 

[Paulos23]

Not a Christian, so you can ignore this if you want.

I find that sex before marriage is not the deciding factor for a long lasting marriage. It is dedication, which is not something many people have when they are young. Which leads to the sex before marriage or not. There is something called virgan stupid, in which the hormones in the body override the brain and makes you ignore all the bad flaws of your partner. I have know some to use this to keep marriages going, but it doesn't last forever.

So, if you have sex before marriage, wait until you are out of the virgan stupid before deciding to marry.

In fact my advice it not to marry young at all, and to get to know your partner as much as possible.

 

[holo]

I lost faith after marriage, so I was one of those Christians who had sex before we married. Short story, it all turned out fine.

I did have sex with one woman some time before I met my wife. I'm glad I did, because that took away some of the... I dunno, excitement around it. When I got together with the girl I married (my first and only relationship btw) I wasn't dying to get to experience sex. Also, at the time I no longer believed that marriage in God's eyes really has anything to do with priests, ceremonies, other people, legal papers, etc. To me it was all about me and her. Sex or no sex had nothing to do with keeping or breaking commandments, and like Paul says, the commandment is the power of sin. It was really easy to not jump right into bed, because without the law, there was no temptation. Instead of focusing on commandments, I was free to focus on us. So we waited quite a while, and when she said she wanted to go all the way, I waited a bit longer to be sure.

We're very happy we did it this way. That way there was no pressure on the wedding night (which we only used to sleep, totally exhausted). My wife was molested as a child, so she was nervous about being a virgin bride and getting flashbacks on the wedding night. So yeah, that worked out fine for us.

 

[dayhiker]

Most of the sex I had was about caring for each other and so no regrets for the sex I've had when I wasn't married.

 

[Darkhorse]

Neither my wife nor I were virgins when we met, and we became sexually involved quickly.

I think she has had some regrets about it, but I haven't.

I do wish that my upbringing had been stable and supportive to the extent that pre-marital sex would not have been attractive, but it wasn't. Yes, I should have "risen to the challenge" and all that stuff, but I didn't.

I could say much more, but it would violate CF rules.

We are very happily married for 29 years now...

 

[charsan]

I'm really curious to hear what you actually felt and experienced, I have a good idea of what the Bible says.

We did. We also went to confession and were forgiven and no I do not regret it and we have been married for 20 years now If we did it over we would do it differently though

 

[grandvizier1006]

I’m genuinely surprised that the Christians here are all saying they’re ok with pre-marital sex. Could someone elaborate on that? Scripture, Christian ethics, life experiences, etc? (I’m a virgin who has never been in a relationship so I have nothing to say). I do, however, have some Christian friends that as far as I know waited until marriage. Did they do wrong, right, or is it an individual judgment issue? I thought pre-marital sex was a sin, but nothing in Scripture seems to explicitly say that, likely because back then people were in arranged marriages and got married earlier.

 

[dayhiker]

grand ... ya, CF doesn't allow an honest discussion of this topic ... To get people thinking you have read the question I often ask .. why has the translation from inappropriate contenteia changed from fornication of sexual immorality since I was a kid. And why did the meaning of fornication change from prostitution to per-marital sex from the time the KJV was written in 1610 and 1950s when I first started reading the Bible.
I've not really found an answer to why ... it just did.

 

[grandvizier1006]

I can understand why CF has a rule against its promotion. They don’t want to promote anything generally seen as immoral by Christians. I just don’t get why there were so many similar responses.

 

[Dave-W]

I can understand why CF has a rule against its promotion. They don’t want to promote anything generally seen as immoral by Christians. I just don’t get why there were so many similar responses.

IMO it is because almost everyone here grew up post-sexual revolution of the mid-late 1960s.

I was 12 when it became newsworthy in 1967. They dubbed it “The New Morality.”

 

[Dave-W]

I'm really curious to hear what you actually felt and experienced, I have a good idea of what the Bible says.

While I realize this all may be shut down as we are skating on thin ice here, i will answer the OP.

While DW and I never had intercourse before the “I DOs,” we did our share of fooling around after getting engaged.

Touching. Feeling. Arousal. [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse].

My wife has had a lot of regrets about it, condemning thoughts and all. I have not; and still have fond memories of some of those exploratory expeditions.

 

[zephcom]

I'm really curious to hear what you actually felt and experienced, I have a good idea of what the Bible says.

Not Christian here. But it felt really good and I liked the experience.

And I liked the experience for many, many decades. We have been married over 50 years. I think the important thing is, when you find your soul mate, a ceremony pales in comparison.

 

[ViaCrucis]

I’m genuinely surprised that the Christians here are all saying they’re ok with pre-marital sex. Could someone elaborate on that? Scripture, Christian ethics, life experiences, etc? (I’m a virgin who has never been in a relationship so I have nothing to say). I do, however, have some Christian friends that as far as I know waited until marriage. Did they do wrong, right, or is it an individual judgment issue? I thought pre-marital sex was a sin, but nothing in Scripture seems to explicitly say that, likely because back then people were in arranged marriages and got married earlier.

It's one thing to point toward devoting oneself to chastity as a good thing.

It's quite another to treat abstaining from sex as some be-all and end-all of Christian virtue and the inherent problems with modern purity culture.

Human worth is not determined by one's virginal status.

Purity culture is harmful and destructive and inherently unChristian.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Sketcher]

It's one thing to point toward devoting oneself to chastity as a good thing.

It's quite another to treat abstaining from sex as some be-all and end-all of Christian virtue and the inherent problems with modern purity culture.

Human worth is not determined by one's virginal status.

Purity culture is harmful and destructive and inherently unChristian.

-CryptoLutheran

How would you promote abstinence as obedience to God while avoiding the problems with "purity culture" as you see it?

 

[ViaCrucis]

How would you promote abstinence as obedience to God while avoiding the problems with "purity culture" as you see it?

We should abstain from lying and be devoted to the virtue of honesty.
We should abstain from anger and be devoted to the virtue of patience.

When a person lies we don't treat them as though they have become less valuable as a person; when a person succumbs to anger we don't treat them as though they have become less valuable as a person.

So why would we treat engaging in consenting sexual activity with someone as worse than lying or anger?

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Dave-W]

How would you promote abstinence as obedience to God while avoiding the problems with "purity culture" as you see it?

First off - get rid of the lies in purity culture - like it being evil to have romantic feelings and attractions, and that having a crush on someone takes away a piece of your heart that you can not recover and give to your future spouse.

And that sexual desire is not the work of a lustful mind; it is hormonal and God-given.

Ending those 2 lies would go a long way.

 

[Dave-W]

So why would we treat engaging in consenting sexual activity with someone as worse than lying or anger?

I agree. But perhaps we should treat lying and anger as things to be avoided as much as premarital sex.