I'm a new Christian and DH very much isnt.... help.

[pinkpip100]

I have very recently become a Christian (i.e. 3 weeks ago!), I would previously have described myself as an agnostic, with DH being an agnostic bordering on atheism, if that makes sense. We are now both very worried about what this means for us, and how on earth we can incoporate our very differing views on God and Jesus into a loving marriage (with 2 DS). DH is trying to be understanding, but in all honesty he just can't understand - and feels as though there is now a huge part of my life he can't share.

Does anyone have any advice or experience of this?

Thanks x

Hmmm a tough one. I'd say make sure you pray about your day to day lives together and ensure those at your church are praying very specifically for your marriage too.

On a practical level what issues are you having? There will be some need to compromise I should think.

Is it the practicalities that are bothering you, or the change in your view of the world?

Thanks CarGirl - don't think I'm brave enough to ask anyone at the church to pray for me, but I will carry on praying about it myself. AMum...its both really, the practicalities like me wanting to go to Church on sundays (and how the kids fit into that), wanting quiet time to read the bible and pray etc, but also the general faith issues, my change in outlook, and the fact that I now believe in something that he cannot ever see himself believing in. I also think he's scared that I'll change beyond recognition, or expect things of him that he's not willing or able to give.

Who do you know in the church, do they have smaller groups to attend during the week? It's "normal" to ask people to pray for you, it's a big thing for your marriage and God is 100% behind marriage and wants your marriage to work - he invented it for our benefit!

Quiet time with young children is hard!!! I manage it by getting up before anyone else, have my cup of coffee make packed lunches and then 10 minutes peace. Praying is something you can do anytime anywhere - doesn't have to be formal. Just chatting to God even if it's in your head IYSWIM.

How old are you DC does the church have children groups would your dc like to go? DH cleans the house whilst I take the mob with me

One of the best bit of advice I can give you is to not go on about it, this comes from experience . I was 'ahem' very evangelical about it when i first became a Christian.

Practically, its like any other hobby - not sharing things in relationships is not always a bad thing, its not good to be in each others pockets, so pretend its just a hobby that you do on a Sunday (hopefully dh has another hobby at another time like football or something that you 'allow' each other to do independant of each other). I think this is what makes a very healthy relationship anyway.

As for the children - this is where its good to have a conversation about values - hopefully you both agree on values anyway in general - most people are not actively anti-christian philosophically - they are quite happy for their children to paint eggs at Easter, listen to stories about 'doing unto others how you would be done by' etc etc

My friend is married to a non-christian (who's lovely obviously) and he is happy for her to take them to church/bumblebees sunday school and he even goes to the bland services like carol services/nativity etc.

I used to be married to a non-christian and me believing in God is not why we broke up but we did break up over how we lived our lives - he wanted to make a ton of money and hoard and never do any voluntary work or give a fuck about anyone else. I disagreed fundamentally with that.

This happened to a friend of ours, and the husband was soo impressed by the overall changes in his wife that he started coming to church to see what it was all about - and they were both baptised last year.

Milliways I obviously haven'nt changed enough yet

Best advice I ever heard was just concentrate on living your faith. Don't clobber him over the head with it, but don't pretend nothing has happened. Hopefully he'll be reassured that you're still you, and maybe as he sees you perhaps more at peace, it will help soothe any worries he may have.

praying for you! (In the real sense, not in the platitude sense!)

My dh is Christian and very involved in the church, when we met he was non-practising. I am an atheist. We manage quite well. DH takes DS to church most Sundays, but sometimes DS stays with me and we go to the park or something. DH says prayers with him at night, if DS asks me to say prayers I say "Mummy doesn't say prayers" and he's fine with that.

DS is finding that he gets different answers from each of us to the same questions, but DH and I would never say that the other is wrong, just that it's a different interpretation. For example, DS asks things like "Who put the moon in the sky?", DH will answer "God did" and I will say that it was probably once an asteroid that was captured by earth's gravity.

I think it's OK for a child to have differing philosophies within the family, provided that everyone respects each other's right to their own opinion.

IME of friends who have had one of a couple become religious/change religion there is often an adjustment period. The religious one is often a slight pain in the neck because they feel positive about what the religion is doing for them and can tend to be a little evangelical because they want everyone else to feel the same benefits. But that wears off after a while and the couple usually settle into a new routine, doing things together where they both have and interest and separately where they don't. I don't know of any couples who have split up or had really serious problems because of a new religion.

I must speed up my post writing - I see Lauriefairycake has already said it all, and better too.

Wow - in the middle of feeding time at the zoo so can't write much but thanks so much for these replies - some really sound advice and positive stories here. I'll reply properly once DCs are in bed

I'm not a very good Christian I fear but I'm quite a keen church goer and very much a believer in God. DD (9) sings in the church choir and I'm as involved as time allows in youth activities of the church. I very much liek and appreciate the church community.

DH on the other hand, doesn't "do" church services or really have much in the way of faith at all. It doesn't cause problems. The church know and are interested in all of us as a family and DH gets in involved in social events and often bakes cakes (he likes to bake!) when situations arise where cakes are needed - as they often seem to.

A church friend recently lost her husband very suddenly and he has never attended services either, although was well known and liked. The whole church has mourned his loss held a service of thanksgiving for him (even DH came to that, as he like and respected this man.) DH also cooked/froze a lot of meals for our friend and her children as the church arranged a rota to fill a neighbours chest freezer in the weeks following the death of the lady's husband.

What I'm waffling about is (I think!).. both half of the couple does not need to be activiely involved in the faith aspect for the relationship to continue working. As long as your DH is happy to support you in your faith journey and you are happy not to force him to particpate then all can be fine. Is he happy for the children to be involved, where they show interest? Would he agree to yattending any social events in future that might come up?

The bible says:

1Cr 7:13 And the woman which hath an husband that believeth not, and if he be pleased to dwell with her, let her not leave him.

1Cr 7:14 For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband: else were your children unclean; but now are they holy.

1Cr 7:15 But if the unbelieving depart, let him depart. A brother or a sister is not under bondage in such [cases]: but God hath called us to peace.

1Cr 7:16 For what knowest thou, O wife, whether thou shalt save [thy] husband? or how knowest thou, O man, whether thou shalt save [thy] wife?

The fact that you have been born again is a massive blessing for you and your family.

My own husband was born again four weeks after myself, 6 years on we are still committed christians.

I know lots of women who are with husbands who dont believe, most just quietly respect their wifes beliefs and things can be difficult sometimes, but as you come to grow in the Lord and more of his love comes through you to your family, and as they see the change in you, your confidence and joy should make them want to seek what you have.

You dont have to bash people over the head with it, just live out your faith in a everyday manner, read, read your Bible.

A word of warning, seek out those at church who you observe to be discreet and ask them to pray, but most of all your own prayers are the best.

Welcome to Gods holy family.

Shalom In Jesus.

pink, I am a Catholic and my dh doesn't like organised religion - lol! However, he is agnostic and as such said he was willing to "go along" with my religious beliefs in the absence of his own. We were married in the church and our ds was baptised and goes to church with me. As some other posters have said, dha nd I may not share religious views, but we do share a lot of moral views which helps. Also, I don't talk about God stuff with him - that's for when i'm with my god-squad pals. We are respectful of each other's beliefs and he feels that it will do our child no harm to be brought up in a caring community...and it gives him something to rebel against too!

welcome welcome welcome try not to worry God will honour you if you honour him.

Right, now that calm has ensued, I'll try to answer some of the questions here...
Cargirl, the church do have small groups, bible groups, women's groups etc - I'm coming to the end of an Alpha Course, and was planning to join one of the above at that point. I've got one very close friend in the church and few others who I don't know as well. I'm sure they'd all be happy to pray for my marriage so I will ask them. DS1 is 3 and DS2 is 1 - the church has children's groups and a creche, DH has no problem with them going - I suppose my concern is that as I work on Saturdays, going to church every week would cut a big hole in our one day together as a family...

Lauriefairycake, Bran, SueBaroo and GillianMcPoo, thanks for very sound advice all round - on the positive side DH is very reasonable and has plenty of respect for the Christian Faith, we share the same set of values in terms of bringing up our children, and he already knows (and occasionally socialises with) some of the guys that go to the church. I don't feel as though my personality is undergoing a radical change and its not as though there are huge chunks of our lives that have to be given up or massively altered. I guess the idea of a period of adjustment is spot on - it is scary when anything changes, but I'm hoping (and praying) that we can work through it all and reach a happy balance.

Thank you all - I feel so much better about it all than I did earlier today. Now I just have to pass this reassurance on to DH x

Do they have evening services, sometimes the balance can be spending family time together on a Sunday because yes it will cut a big chunk in your family life. Pray for a change of job/finances perhaps

And thanks also to beeper, nicky and nowwearefour - our posts crossed x

Yes CarGirl funnily enough I just said to DH that maybe I'll have, for example, 2 Sundays when I take DCs to the family service and 2 each month when I attend the evening service on my own...which seems a reasonable compromise. Yes a change of finances would help too!!

Hello pinkpip100 - fabulous news about your new found Christianity. There is an exceptionally lovely Christian prayer thread on here which you would be most welcome to join. Have a look at our lovely thread

Many ladies on here of all backgrounds, some who are new Christians, some lifelongers and a whole mish mash inbetween. Very nice and supportive of one another - lovely fellowship really, plus lots of us have dh's who don't share our beliefs.

Btw, I am a Christian and my dh is hmm, not sure really. Not religious at the moment would be how best to describe him! We get along just fine - he knows I pray for him but I don't try to change his point of view. I do ask him every now and then if he'd like to join us at church but no joy yet. I'll keep praying for him!

Hello, just found this thread. My DH is not a Christian and I am but as many other posters have said he's very respectful of my views and I attend church with our DD. Co-incidentally I bought a book today on this very subjuect - haven't read much but so far it seems very useful and practical. 'Surviving a spiritual mismatch by Lee and Leslie Strobel' - might be worth a look.

I'm another one who's DH is not a Christian. The biggest thing for him I think was to still allow time for him, to not actively try to convert him (at least in his eyes) and to give lots of reassurance that you still love him. I think one of the biggest worries is about putting God before him.

He's now become so accepting of my faith that he joins in with church activities like BBQs, goes to the men's group down the pub, we've even had the vicar round for dinner. But most of all, I've been training for lay ministry the 18 months and he's been supportive of that too, doing things like cleaning/ironing so that I've got time to study.

I won't say its been rosy all of the time, but I do believe it has brought us closer together and we appreciate each other more.

Thanks again to you all. MaryBS, my DH admitted last night that one of his biggest worries is about me putting God before him just as you said. Lots of reassurance that I love him just as much as I did before is in order I guess. And I'll definitely look for that book Intravenouscoffee.

There is 'Loving God, but still loving you' but I can't recall who wrote it...

Found it Sue:

"Loving God But Still Loving You: Keeping Your Faith Without Losing Your Marriage"
Author M. Stroud
Publisher: SP Trust
Publication Date: 1995-10-31
ISBN: 1898938180