Baptizing a cohabitating Christian???

A couple further thoughts on this situation.

Help the lady see that:
1) Baptism is a public act of obedience to the Lord, but
2) Living together is a public act of disobedience against the Lord.

To the witnesses, which act will define her? Which will negate the other?
To the Lord, which truly demonstrates her heart?
Why does she really want to be baptized?
In your church, does a baptized new convert become a member of your church? If so, does the process of church discipline kick in once she's baptized & become a member?

This is a valid question. Many people (esp. from former Catholic backgrounds) somehow feel that baptism is something they "have" to do in order to get more grace or something.

I think it's good advice.

But usually getting out of a cohabitation situation isn't quite as quick as working on your temper or bad language. Face it. It takes a while to arrange living quarters. If there are children involved, schooling, etc. there are a lot of issues at stake. Depending on jobs, finances, etc. it can be quite complicated. Of course, going to the justice of the peace and getting married might just be the easiest, cheapest and most convenient thing to do.

It's not an excuse, but for people who don't compartmentalize the sins as being "big" (immorality) and "small" (anger, bitterness, jealousy) their cohabitation hasn't been a big deal, so in their minds, it's not such a bad thing (probably).

i know believers' baptism has evolved to be more like a confirmation of belief, but i wonder how much evidence of repentance peter required when 3000 were baptized at pentecost.

i also wonder about your quote from luke 3. is john speaking to those he has already baptized? or is he giving a reason for refusing to baptize? he doesn't tell the people to do xyz and then come back to be baptized. and the things he tells them to do involve general social justice, mercy, kindness and contentment without any specific calls to a more comprehensive moral code.

Then there's the question of whether you should encourage a Christian to marry an unsaved guy.....

Our church faced this situation last year. The couple both came for baptism. They had a wedding planned for Spring this year.

Our pastor made the decision to go ahead and baptise them. As in most independent Baptist churches, baptism is the final threshold to membership. In the case of this couple, they were baptised, but not allowed to be members while they cohabited in an unmarried state.

(I am not saying I agreed with what he did: I am just relating what was done.)

Another observation on this thread is valid. Cohabitation is quickly becoming a non-issue in our society, even among lifelong, saved-at-a-young-age believers. It is presented as the norm in every medium. There is negligible social stigma associated with it anymore. In a very real sense, it's kind of like telling someone they can't drink root beer because the name of the drink contains the word "beer". It sounds like a silly analogy, but in a very real sense, it seems that most adults today give as much serious thought to sexual immorality as they do to choosing a soft drink.

Things like this are never simple. I have known people to baptize and not to baptize in this situation. If baptism were necessary for salvation, that would be different. But waiting is the best approach, IMO.

In no way do I want to minimize the complexity of this situation or the difficulty that we as pastors have in discerning how to counsel people. The lesson you've learned in this situation you will run into time and again over the years of pastoral ministry. But be careful in your thought process. There's a significant difference between God's expression of His "heart" regarding divorce and a clear injunction from Scripture. [By the way, there are other ways of interpreting the Mosaic "accommodation"]. As a pastor, I cannot in good conscience suggest someone take a course of action that I know clearly violates God's Word.

No matter how you cut it, for this new convert to follow Christ in discipleship is going to demand that she make hard, tough decisions, primarily as a consequence of sin. But this isn't new or unique. Christ told the rich, young ruler to give away his wealth to follow Him. He told another would-be disciple to let the dead bury their dead. Surely you read of the teen girl in Ohio (?) who recently converted from Islam to Christianity, but had to flee her home and the state under a death threat from her family. Many new converts in our world end up being completely abandoned by family and friends when they determine to follow Christ. Many a wife has come to Christ and had to live with a sarcastic, cruel, unbelieving husband--and vice versa, I might add. A woman in VT came to Christ...she had "married" (via Civil Union in VT) her lesbian lover and gave birth to a child for the 2 of them to raise. After coming to Christ, though, she had to abandon the partner, disolve the "Union," and move out of state. It is yet unclear whether the courts will give joint custody/visitation rights to the former partner. These were all hard things demanded of discipleship.

So I would encourage you to uphold the clear mandates of Scripture and not gloss over them or merely treat them as "ideals, but in the real world...." If this new believer is committed to following Christ, present the biblical directives that apply to her options. You might be surprised by some of the creative ways she comes up with in order to obey God's Word and solve some of the complexities of the mess.

Sorry for coming into this conversation late. However, what seems to be missing here is a discussion late. Many here point out our need to uphold the Biblical mandates, true. However, there are cultural interpretations to these mandates. Marriage customs and laws change from country to country, ethnic group to ethnic group and even time era to time era in a given country.
Being an active author in the 1632 series from Baen Books, one of the problems we have is the need to realize seventeenth century Germany is not 20th century America nor seventeenth century England. We need to realize that 2009 is not 1959 or 1939 America.
What to do? In this case, recognize this as an irregular marriage. (I hesitate to use the term common law as only Alabama, Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Montana, New Hampshire (posthumously), Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Utah and the District of Columbia currently allow CL marriages.) It's not a place to go gasping and hyperventilating over a couple living "in sin". Eight years, two children and a situation that left on its own would continue for years to come is better than many statute marriage I've seen. So, the intent is to "regularize" the situation.
If the relationship can not be regularized, then we face another situation. But I concur with the sentiments below.

I understand the distinction you're making here re. ideal/real.

Coupled with the previous post re. "irregular marriage," one could argue that the "yoke" was already established by the couple's previous verbal & practical commitments to one another, expressed especially through their sons; however, the "yoke" just wasn't formalized in a wedding ceremony. In other words, though lacking a marriage license, she already is "unequally yoked" by virtue of having come to Christ while her partner remains unsaved. With that established, you may encourage a formalization of the "yoke" (that already exists) through a Justice of the Peace. By doing so, she/they are merely making official and public that which already exists. That removes the "living in sin" stigma, allows the church to baptize her, keeps the family intact, and enables her to fulfill the role of a 1 Peter 3:1-6 wife.

In this solution, the hard things may be 1) convincing her partner to formalize their relationship, and 2) giving up the dreams (if she even had them) of a grand wedding with all the trimmings.

This is a solution I as a pastor could be comfortable with. What think you?

It's one I'd be comfortable with.

This is somewhat off topic, but applies to this situation.

If a couple co-habitates, has children, and otherwise lives as a married couple, are they acutally married in God's eyes? They have not had an official wedding ceremony, but have otherwise, "leaved, cleaved, and became one flesh". Put another way, is a formal wedding ceremony required for a bibical marriage?

Just some thoughts for which I don't have a clear understanding.

Just because she gets a civil marriage does not mean they could not have a religious ceremony, or a more formal wedding with all the pomp and circumstance.

I agree with you here. I don't think that a 'ceremony' does anything other than give external validation to an already existing fact...but it also seems like I'm in the minority here.

My opinion on the question is that based on what we know from Jonathan's observations, that the young lady needs to leave her boyfriend and the church has to step up to the plate and help her out, in keeping with I Timothy 5.

--edit--
Yes, I know she's not a widow. But I think that the church is supposed to help in a situation like this where she wants to do the right thing and the unbelieving boyfriend won't permit it. It's important that she do the right thing and possibly lose the physical/earthly relationship than continue to live in a pattern of sin.

I know I am replying to a post over a year old but I just had to put my .02 cents in. Since when does co-habitating with someone require them to be married? Since when does having a child with someone out of wedlock require them to get married? These are horrible reasons for a couple to be married! I have seen countless couples fall into sexual sin and end up being married because their parents/pastoral leadership told them too only to end up being divorced because their relationship was initially built only upon lust and then outside influences. I agree with Chip's post that a marriage is based on a covenant relationship between the husband and wife. Someone made the comment that this young mother should marry the unsaved father so the two son's would have a father! What kind of nonesense is this? How about her being obedient to Scripture, walk away from the relationship and allow God to work those things out. God expects obedience! When a child of God obey's, God provides for the needs. Yes, she will definely have some troubles because of past failures. Did David have hardship after he repented of his sin of adultry and murder? YES! For the rest of his life! There are always consequences to sin whether those sins were committed before or after salvation. Let us never downplay the severity of our sin.

I do have a question about this. How quickly do you baptize people? Do you baptize them with a week or two of profession of faith? What are your requirements for baptism? Will you baptize a smoker?
Sister, your questions got me to think about the nature and purpose of baptism. Did the Philippian Jailer smoke? Who knows. I will say this he was not perfect when he was baptized. All he had going for him was his newfound faith in Jesus as his Savior. Paul and Silas shared the Gospel and this man plus his family came to the Lord. To think that they hadn't even attended church yet and were baptized should cause us to think about the biblical nature of baptism. What are we doing when we bring people's family and friends together to watch someone get baptized? We are publicly stating the faith these people has embraced. We are not saying these people are perfect, nor are we saying they have their lives all cleaned up.All we are saying is that they have been saved by the blood of Jesus because they placed their faith in it.
Now, I do believe in church membership. If a person joins the church they should be baptized before joining. I just can't think of any reason to keep a true believer from being baptized. Some here would say their refusal to stop living together would prove their salvation to be unreal. I am not so sure. If a person has lived their whole life in sin it takes some time before they understand God's will and have the conviction to adhere to it. Some believers take years before they really start growing. Others grow immediately. The reasons for these are various. Our only question when doing a baptism should be, "did this person understand the Gospel and have they placed their eternal destiny in the hands of Jesus by accepting Him as Savior?" Baptism should be a right to all people who have trusted in Christ.
Now church membership is a different subject in my view. As pastors we can decide if a person's life shows at least some evidence of being saved so these people can become members of the church. I would never want a cohabitating couple to become members of the church if they had not repented of that sin because as members they are going to get involved in ministry and how can you have unrepentant people being involved with or heading up ministries in the church? You can't. We all know the Lord's position on church's who put up wtih sexual immorality. He takes away their lampstand, their witness because they have forsaken a love for holiness.
Marrying people who are in different situations is very tricky. I have appreciated the advice of many on this forum. I did a marriage for a couple who was living together. They'd been together for nine years, living together for five of those. They had the prettiest little five year old daughter named Skye. She had blue eyes and blonde hair. I did the marriage only if they would do counseling. We talked about ways in which their marriage could be successful while others fail. I shared the gospel with them,but both of them didn't receive the Lord. I hate when that happens by the way. Normally I would not do a marriage for a couple who is living together, but in this case I wanted Skye to have a stable home. Most living together situtations do not last that long. Men usually love the convenience of this arrangement because it doesn't cost them anything. They can walk away at anytime without a price tag. Children are the most hurt in this situation because poverty is usually the consequence of such action. If Skye had not been in the situation I would have asked the couple to separate and stay chaste until the time of the wedding. But since she was in the picture I wanted to get them married as fast as possible so she would have at least a chance at a stable and happy home. I believe this couple is still married today. These are some of my thoughts on the issues brought up here and I do appreciate being able to talk about them from my biblical perspective. Thanks to all who have participated.