What Does It Mean To Be Unequally Yoked?

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The phrase “ unequally yoked ” comes from 2 Corinthians 6:14 in the King James Version: “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?”

The New American Standard Version says, “Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness?”

A yoke is a wooden bar that joins two oxen to each other and to the burden they pull. An “unequally yoked” team has one stronger ox and one weaker, or one taller and one shorter. The weaker or shorter ox would walk more slowly than the taller, stronger one, causing the load to go around in circles. When oxen are unequally yoked, they cannot perform the task set before them. Instead of working together, they are at odds with one another.

Paul’s admonition in 2 Corinthians 6:14 is part of a larger discourse to the church at Corinth on the Christian life. He discouraged them from being in an unequal partnership with unbelievers because believers and unbelievers are opposites, just as light and darkness are opposites.

Attempting to live a Christian life with a non-Christian for our close friend and ally will only cause us to go around in circles.

The “unequal yoke” is often applied to business relationships. For a Christian to enter into a partnership with an unbeliever is to court disaster. Unbelievers have opposite worldviews and morals, and business decisions made daily will reflect the worldview of one partner or the other. For the relationship to work, one or the other must abandon his moral center and move toward that of the other. More often than not, it is the believer who finds himself pressured to leave his Christian principles behind for the sake of profit and the growth of the business.

Of course, the closest alliance one person can have with another is found in marriage, and this is how the passage is usually interpreted. God’s plan is for a man and a woman to become “one flesh” ( Genesis 2:24 ), a relationship so intimate that one literally and figuratively becomes part of the other. Uniting a believer with an unbeliever is essentially uniting opposites, which makes for a very difficult marriage relationship.

Whether in business or relationships Christians are not to be unequally yoked with unbelievers. Starting a business with an unbeliever can put Christians in a terrible situation. It can cause Christians to compromise their relationship with Christ, there will be disagreements, etc.

Don’t think that you will get married and you will change them because that rarely happens and it will most likely cause more problems.

We must deny ourselves and take up the cross daily. Sometimes you have to drop relationships for Christ. Don’t think you know what’s best. Trust in God alone not yourself. There are so many reasons not to marry an unbeliever. Wait on God’s timing and trust in His ways...