Ask Pastor Mike Live

Focal Point Ministries: My fiancé lost his home, and I housed him when no one else could. He became mean and angry, and I got kicked out and we broke up. He claims God brought us together in a relationship, and now he says he wants to work it out, but he keeps delaying the meeting with our pastor and he keeps saying he's no longer marriage material or marriageable. How do I resolve this in my life?

That sounds really bad to me. If those are the starting blocks of a potential relationship, I’d say it is time to rethink this completely. In fact, I have to think there are people in your life who are thinking this isn't the right relationship for you. This is a great thing about before stepping into a covenant marriage relationship: you have the opportunity to walk away. Even if you're engaged, I don't care what was going on in the past. If you haven't walked that aisle and said "I do" before God and these witnesses, you're as free as if you just passed each other at the mall.

Whatever you have to untangle to start completely over and rethink this from scratch, it doesn't matter what you've done or how many times you've dated. It doesn't even matter what kind of sins you may have committed together. If you're not married, you have to start from scratch. If you've broken up and you're looking at this and it's all about anger and being mean, and you can't even get him to meet with you and your pastor, I think there may be a lot of emotions that act like glue. Particularly if there's sin in the past—and by that, without being too explicit, the kinds of romantic sins that happen premaritally—that can blind our logical thinking about relationships.

I would slow down, and I would not only slow down, I would step out. If this is something that makes sense biblically and spiritually, you're going to get plenty of good, wise counsel that will bring you right back to where you are now, if that's wise. Stepping back, stepping out, starting over, and hitting the reset button sounds really wise to me. I don't know the situation other than what you're telling me, but it doesn't sound good based on the three sentences you gave me here. I deal with this kind of stuff all the time, and I would say take a big step backwards.