Expert: Rev. Stuart Woodward - 12/4/2003

Question
I am a baptist man married to a nondenom.girl she is the best thing ever to happen to me outside of the gift of salvation!I feel that I am called to be of service as a leader.She has some doctrinal   issues with (baptist)denom.I do not feel as spiritual leader of our household that; I   should push her on these issues .she is a fine  christian wife who is ablessing in my life   I feel that some things are between her an the Lord.am I  wrong in this?

Answer
Dear Glen,
Thank you for the question. I am glad that you are happily married and encourage you to praise God for such a blessing. You do not state what the doctrinal differences are but she is obviously a Christian who loves the Lord. I certainly would suggest that you ought not to push any such matters to an extent that they cause any hurt or ill feeling between you. Sensible conversation at appropriate times is of course right as can be a little good natured banter. Your job is to love you wife, not convince her that here theology is wrong.
With regard to your sense of call to be a leader in the church, assuming your wife worships regularly with you I do not see a problem. If she actually attends a different church then you probably ought both to invest your energies into finding some kind of compromise so that you can worship together. Marriages in which the partners worship separately will inevitably face huge strains from time to time.
I am a Baptist minister in England. I am a Baptist by conviction and feel strongly about believer's baptism by immersion. I do recognise, however, that genuine Christians disagree with me. On this issue I am very confident that I am right. However, on some other issues (like church government for example) I am much less sure of my cause! A gracious understanding that we might all be in for a few surprises in heaven is a very sensible quality to have.
I hope my comments have been of some help to you and I wish you both God's blessing.
Stuart Woodward