Christian relationship advice on interracial relationships. Is right or wrong to marry or date outside your race? Do interracial relationships work?

I was giving some Christian relationship advice recently about interracial relationships. The following was the conversation I was having with one of my readers who wanted to know my opinions on interracial relationships, whether they work or not and whether I'd advice people to start relationships with people outside their race and culture. I know it will help others who have questions on this same issue so I decided to post it.

Reader:

When I see that a person's opinions, advices, and their way of life is solely supported and derived from the Word of God then I'm always interested in their opinion, which brings me to my question. What do you think and where do you stand when it comes to dating or even marriages between two people with different cultures, backgrounds, upbringing, races, etc. I'm a Christian and I know we can't marry a non-Christian but what about the list I mentioned above? please give me some Christian relationship advice on this.

Paul:

My Christian relationship advice on this is that there is absolutely nothing wrong with dating or marrying someone from a different culture, background, or race from you. As long as they have given their life to Christ that’s all that counts. Technically when we give our lives to Christ and become Christians we all belong to one race, the race of the kingdom of God and its perfectly ok to marry anyone in the kingdom of God regardless of their culture, race, skin color etc. God doesn’t see race and color, he see's people, he doesn’t look at the outward appearance, he looks at the heart and that’s what we are supposed to do.

From a Christian relationship advice perspective, one race isn’t better than another, neither is one culture better than another, take away our skin and we are all the same on the inside. Once we give our lives to Christ there is no more Jews or Gentiles, no more discriminating against other races, no more trying to segregate yourself from other races, we are all one and therefore can marry and date people who are not brought up in the same culture as us.

A black Christian can marry or date a white Christians, an Asian Christian can marry or date a South American Christian, as long as they are a child of God, God isn’t looking at the color of their skin; he is looking at the content of their heart.

However, for this Christian relationship advice to be complete, I must highlight one other point. if you do decide to date or marry someone from a different culture as you, be prepared to accommodate the differences and challenges that arise from coming from different backgrounds.

What’s acceptable in one culture might not be acceptable in another, what's okay in one culture might be offensive to another and you have to learn these differences and manage them well in order for the relationship to work. And even when the two of you understand these differences, your family members will also have to be educated about these differences especially if there is the prospect of marriage so that they don’t end up misinterpreting the actions of your partner and seeing them as disrespectful not realizing that it’s just a difference in culture.

We have to learn to put away prejudices in the body of Christ, although we may have our cultural differences, we are all still Gods children and are all the same in his eyes.

Reader:

I appreciate your Christian relationship advice on interracial relationships so far, I hope it is ok that I reply.

I understand how it works and that of course it is ok from Christian relationship advice point of view. But what I actually wanted to talk about is what you mentioned in the last paragraph. I myself believe that it is very hard to nearly impossible for two different races to make it happily together. Yes they maybe both Christians and both understand the Bible the same, but nonetheless even if they understand both their differences they still will have an extremely hard time living together. For example: I am from Europe, Bulgaria and I've been living in the States for over 11 years. To this day it is still difficult for me to understand fully the American people. I am not judgmental nor racist. God created me and the rest of the world equally and I know I am no better than the rest, I'm actually worse. But that’s not the issue.

My sister decided to marry an American guy, he is Christian, good morals, comes from a great family, but yet they have been together for 6 years and still do not get along as well as they should be. There is a lot of arguments, fights, yelling, silent treatments; they just do not understand eachother. She grew up and was raised absolutely differently from him, and even though they understand that they still can't get along. I know if they relied more on God they would have a better and easier life, but still two different cultures are so hard that they result in separation most of the time, and why put a permanent scar on your life? And I have countless examples of tragedies such as this one.

I discourage people from all races not to make the mistake of going for a different race. I think it is a mistake not from a Christian point of view or because God does not allow it, but because it is too dangerous. Just like apostle Paul said, "it is better to be single and that is an advice from me not God" (not a direct quote from the Bible, I just put it in my own words) but u know what I meant. And it is the same here; I give an advice from me because I know how dangerous it is. In the Old Testament God forbid for the Israelites to marry anyone from another tribe. I believe that it was not only for God's law that they were not allowed but also for their own good. If Paul encouraged people to be single, let alone different races, do you think he would encourage that, if not forbid?

Do you think I am wrong for telling people to stay within their race? Interracial dating and marriages may be ok but it is so dangerous, I don't tell them not to do it because it offends me or because I think it's wrong. I tell them because I feel sorry and sad when good young people dive into life of sorrow; I just want to give them a hand from drowning. Do you think I'm wrong for doing what I do?

By the way, as I am writing this to you, I am also trying to comfort a girl who had her heart broken to pieces from a guy from different race. I did warn her but I did not help. I know a person from your own race can break a heart just as easy, but in that case we just have to look at the probability of what is most likely to happen, and pick the better choice. Please give some more interracial Christian relationship advice on this.

Keep up God's work, your prize is great. Hope to hear from you soon.

Paul:

I understand why you hold your opinion and why you believe that people should marry within their own race, but I have to say that I disagree with you. I have friends that are married to people outside of their own race and they are doing just fine.

The problem is that a lot of people go into relationships not mentally prepared and they have unrealistic expectations, in most cases they are not even ready for relationships, they don’t understand love and the concept of selflessness and sacrifice, they don’t understand what it takes for relationships to work, they don’t understand how men and women differ, how men and women respond to things differently, they don’t understand the different fundamental needs of the opposite sex, I could go on and on.. .and most importantly, most people no longer truly seek God in their relationship decisions and they end up making bad choices.

Even though my wife and I are from the same country, we belong to different tribes and we have so many cultural differences, we don’t even speak the same native language, but we make it work, because God is the centre of the relationship and God is the one that brought us together and he gives us the patience and wisdom to live with eachother, we have our differences but we learn to put them aside and we learn to put aside pride and learn to be vulnerable and selfless with eachother.

When people understand the concepts that make relationships and love work then they will be okay, yes there will be challenges and there might be friction as a result of racial and cultural differences, but if God is truly the centre of your relationship then you will be okay because he will give you the wisdom to make it work, this is something I always stress when giving Christian relationship advice.

The problem is not with racial difference, the problem is with peoples lack of understanding of the principles that make relationships work especially the principle of keeping God the focus of the relationship as well as other biblical principles like love, long suffering, patience, forgiveness, kindness, selflessness, etc

Like you rightly said, even if you marry someone of the same culture and race as you, there is no guarantee that it will work out, before I got married I dated ladies that were the same culture and tribe as me but it didn’t work out with them because I didn’t really make God the centre of the relationship. When I decided to let God lead me, he lead me to someone from a different tribe and culture from me and she is my wife today and we have a wonderful relationship.

We must be careful to give Christian relationship advice to people based on what God says and not our opinion. In Christ there is no Jew or Gentile, God just see’s his children. It’s dangerous when we start teaching our own opinion instead of God’s word. God’s word is the final authority and not our own opinion, not matter how good or logical our opinions may seem.

So that is my perspective.

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