Even if it's a hassle, listening to [God] is super smart and super loving, both for yourself and for that other person.

This article is for my young friends who are considering living together as if they are married even before that blessed event and for those who are already living together. I'm worried about you!

I know that many couples are living together before marriage these days. You see a lot of your friends doing it, and they don't seem to be having major problems—at least not today. But you will also admit that we don't determine morality by majority vote, right? In other words, something could be wrong or harmful even though a lot of people are doing it.

I'll get right to the main thing that makes me worried. You have learned and have even confessed in public that faith in Jesus as your Savior is the only way to heaven. I'm worried about you because I have learned from the Bible and from experience that the quickest way to destroy that faith is to know something's wrong, do it anyway, and keep on doing it. You know that enjoying the benefits of marriage without being married is wrong. Living together says that you will do that anyway, keep on doing it, and not turn back to the way God wants. Repentance is turning from what leads us away from God to his forgiveness and love. What happens when we don't turn from what displeases God? I am afraid that continuing to live together is destroying your faith, if it hasn't done that already. That's the difference between heaven and hell!

Your faith is more important to me than the statistics from all of the studies that make it clear: People who live together before marriage are more likely to get divorced after marriage than those who don't live together before marriage.

Your faith is more important to me than the fact that your friends are unlikely to worship with you because they see the hypocrisy of your position. I don't like it that people your age are not interested in the church, but I understand their confusion when they see church members living together.

Your faith is more important to me than the reputation of your family, the distress of your parents or grandparents, and the way that your younger siblings are having their own faith challenged by your actions. Well, I guess that I am equally worried about the faith of your younger siblings.

I am thinking that you love the person you want to be your spouse. Let me assure you that God loves you even more completely than you love that person. And when God says that it would be bad for you to do something, he says that out of love, knowing how life will turn out for you. God is super smart and super loving, as proven by how he has handled your salvation with Jesus. Even if it's a hassle, listening to him is super smart and super loving, both for yourself and for that other person.