 Good afternoon, Pastor David. How are you doing, John? Welcome everybody to Unfiltered. Pastor, this is something I really don't hear from the pulpit taught about, but I wanted to get your thoughts on those who may have gotten pregnant out of wedlock. They've engaged in fornication. They get pregnant to have a baby. Is that a reason to get married? No. Next? No, of course not. I've shared with this fellowship before that there are actually worse things than having committed the sin of fornication and becoming pregnant. Something that would magnify that or bring even more difficult, produce a more difficult situation would be to, on the basis of being made pregnant or becoming a pregnant couple, getting married because you already have made one of the biggest mistakes as well as sin to great sin. You've already done that and it can very often magnify beyond that. So I don't believe that becoming pregnant is the reason somebody should get married. If they're a Christian couple, they need to understand that they have committed a sin in the act of fornication. They need to understand that. They need to really understand and repent from that and it doesn't make it right or erase it just because you got married. It's still a sin and unless it's repented of, it can have different kinds of produce different kinds of things in your marriage that you don't necessarily need. I've had people, young people who have approached me John over the years who have used that as the reason for marriage and I've never been the pastor who will say to them, well let's get you married and then we'll fix the problem because whatever it is that led them to that kind of intimacy needs to be understood to some degree and whatever the circumstances were that produced the environment that allowed them to involve themselves very often without any sense of shame or guilt over that those things have to be addressed and so I have on a few occasions over the years been asked to perform a ceremony but I always will say no. What you need first is you need to have some premarital counseling. You need to learn what the foundations of marriage are, how to have a successful marriage and things of that nature. You need to have those things discussed in order that you can grow in your understanding of these things and then when you go through the counseling and get married you're going to have a foundation that you can build on and so there are times that people the only thing that has made them stay together has been because of their sex that they were having with one another. They didn't have anything else in common they just had you know a mutual attraction in that way for one another and that certainly isn't the basis of why a person should get married. Is it often times pastor the mentality is quote-unquote two wrongs will make a right in that sense where they're well we'll just fix it by getting married. That's not really the ultimate answer. You know sometimes someone will become pregnant they become aware that they are and they to save face or to do their best to not hurt their family they may have their marriage they may get married because of those things but I would counsel against that I would I would say you know you you've made your decision you've entered into this and you really need to be prepared and you really need to learn some of the reasons why you went into that why you did that and things like that. I mean you're building on the wrong foundation so pregnancy in and of itself is not the the the right reason to get married. Well pastor thank you so much for sharing on that that's a a topic that somebody had actually wrote in about in in response to the love and lust and and said well we've I'm already pregnant we've gotten married and not quite sure if this was the right thing that we and and sometimes the the children will suffer in all they will and so so I thought that was a good question that was actually written in and wanted to get your perspective on it and so well you guys I hope you enjoyed that pastor David thank you so much excuse me guys I have church services coming up Wednesday evening at 7 p.m. yep and may I share what book we're getting into. Yeah we're going into Romans I'll do it we're gonna go into Romans we're in chapter one and we're gonna look at the first 15 verses of the book of Romans it's Romans is called the gospel according to Paul it's a fantastic book and I I haven't taught it to our fellowship in many years and so I look forward to it. It's going to be a good study very fruitful and I want to invite you guys to invite your friends and family come out and join us and then again to join us on Sundays at 8 30 and 10 45 as you're taking us through almost done with Mark. Well it's going to take a while to get through it but yeah this upcoming Sunday we continue our series through Mark we're in chapter 15 and we're going to continue looking at a few of the verses that relate to the crucifixion of Jesus and I begin to introduce what have been called the seven last sayings of Christ and I've already caused myself to tear up just by reading and and considering those last words. It's a great it's a great it's a great study. Invite you guys to come out and join us and then one final reminder anybody that serves within our ministry on Saturday February 25th we're going to have at 9 a.m. a servants servants meeting where we get together and we hear from you pastor Q&A if they're serving actively serving. It's not an open meeting is for those who are actively serving and so come join us it's going to be in the mini chapel it's a great time of Q&A and worship and pastor gives us a devotion and so hope for those that serve can come and join us. Pastor thank you again so much God bless you guys we'll see you soon.