Sending Daughters to College to Find Husbands

Sending Daughters to College to Find Husbands

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Today’s culture insists that young women go to college and pursue a career “just in case” and some parents send their daughters there to find a husband. I found Ken (well, he found me) at college, however, our  Christian college only cost $3500 per year back then which included tuition, room, and board. My best friend even paid her own way by being a waitress in the summers and cleaning bathrooms during the school year. That same college costs $55,570 a year now. My friend could have never just cleaned bathrooms and been a waitress during the summers to pay off this kind of debt. Since colleges are so expensive now, should young godly women have their parents go into debt in hopes of finding a husband? NO!

Out of all my friends that attended Westmont College, only a handful found their husbands there. God doesn’t need parents to spend thousands of dollars that they don’t have to help their daughters maybe find a spouse, especially if their daughters’ greatest desire is to get married, bear children, and be the one home to raise them. Debt is a negative thing according to the Word. Owe no man any thing, but to love one another (Romans 13:8). Many young women who go to college and gain a lot of debt have to continue to work even after they have children to pay it off. It’s ridiculous, especially since the Lord doesn’t care about higher education, careers, and debt is a bad thing.

I took a poll in the chat room to see how the women found their husbands. Most of them found them at church. This is a wonderful place to go and be involved in for daughters who are looking for a husband. Having a marriage based upon the Lord is the most important thing in a marriage. Christ needs to be the foundation. The second most popular place they found their husband is the workplace. Working side-by-side all day long five days a week with members of the opposite sex is a recipe for relationships to begin. (This is dangerous for those who are married for the same reason.) The third place was “none of the above”: a party, youth camp, conference, square dance lessons, wedding reception, and at a bar (which I don’t recommend)! They just randomly met their husbands somewhere. God can do this, you know. The fourth place was they were introduced by a friend. I introduced my best friend to her husband! Fifth place goes to the Internet. Then way down in sixth place was college.

As you can see from this unscientific poll, parents don’t have to spend a ton of money and go into debt hoping their children will find a spouse. Most Universities are cesspools any ways in what they are being taught, what they hear, and what they see, especially if they live on campus. “But shun profane and vain babblings: for they will increase unto more ungodliness” (2 Timothy 2:16).  None of the Duggar children found their spouses this way. They found them on mission’s trips, from childhood, from church, etc. We don’t have to put God into a box and think He only works through expensive colleges (which is this culture’s corrupt norm) because He does not.

God doesn’t need college to find spouses for our children. Most people in the history of the world found spouses without expensive colleges. If your daughter has nothing she wants to do with a college education but wants to go for the fun of it and possibly to find a husband, I would strongly recommend against it. Find a strong Bible teaching church around your area and have her get involved ministering there instead. This is a much better place to find a husband.

Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness
with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?

2 Corinthians 6:14

30 thoughts on “Sending Daughters to College to Find Husbands

  1. I agree with you to a point. I definitely believe that God does care about higher education for those He has called to do so. I have some single friends who are in their late 40’s and 50’s who have never been pursued by a man. A couple of these women are missionaries and meet many men but none that have pursued them. One of my friends went to college to be an engineer and works for an amazing ministry that travels to 3rd world countries to assist the people there in what they need. These are women who desire to be married but the Lord has shown them the path that He has for them. His ways are definitely higher than our ways.
    I understand the gist of this post was to encourage young women that you don’t need to go to college in order to meet your future husband. And how true this is. The young ladies I know who desire to go to college (and have no men pursuing them) I advise to seek out a school that is Bible based or a tech school. I myself went to a tech school for veterinary medicine. The Lord showed me early on that He would not send my husband to me till I was 30. In the mean time I went to this school, became a horse trainer and traveled to many countries as a missionary. My sweet niece after high school took 2 years to work. During this time she sought God, volunteered at the orphanage she was adopted from (in another country) and now is attending a wonderful school called Bethel where God has led her to study art therapy. The things God leads us in and to are such an adventure.

  2. I met my husband at college. He was dating my roommate and attending another college nearby. I lost touch with both of them after that school year. Then, ran into him about a year and a half later. I asked about her, and he told me they had broken up. He said she was too clingy and dependent. Neither of us ever heard from her since.
    I was able to finish college without any debt because I moved back home and took a class or two at a time as I could pay for it, and my parents helped pay for my books. It took a while longer, but it all worked out.

  3. Met my hubby on match.com and a very ‘important’ woman at church disagreed and shamed me and said God doesn’t work like that. Well I’ve been happily married for several years and we both love Jesus and are raising our children in the Lord. I’m also a SAHM.

  4. I met my precious Hubby 37 years ago at a church picnic he courted me for 1 week and proposed at the end of that week; we were married 3 ½ months later. I love that I married my best friend and love of my heart. God has been so good to me.
    Jilly oxo

  5. Young women do not have to go to an expensive college to get advanced training or job skills. Most states have community colleges or tech schools that provide excellent training at very affordable prices that would not leave a young woman in much or any debt. The idea that parents send their daughters to college to find a husband is ludicrous. They want their sons and daughters to have a decent life and be able to support themselves and a family and that is why they help them get an education. Even if a girl ends up being a SAHM
    or home schooler advanced education would help her to be a better teacher. Any man, Christian or not, might find an uneducated girl poor marriage material. She would not bring much to the marriage in case she needed to work at some point to help out the family. You cannot narrowly put all young women in one little box. As the writer above stated the things God leads us in and to is such a great adventure. Unto whom much is given, much is expected. I think God wants us to use our talents.

  6. Jeez, Lori! What’s the deal with you removing the link I shared?
    Haha! If anyone in Georgia is trying to find their spouse, this place is a really great one to do just that.
    Praise god!

  7. This must be an American thing because I have never heard of it here in Australia. People go to university to gain an education here and not to find a husband or wife. Its a very quaint idea.

    The cost of higher education (and contains a range of options from short to long courses) is also cheaper in Australia and our payment system is very different, and whilst there is still a cost, there are many great courses women can do to broaden their education if they so wish.

    PS Relationships at work are not that common, certainly not were I have worked – most people work at a professional level and wouldn’t consider it.

  8. I’ve often said that college was a joke, overall, and simply a meal ticket that was a waste of time and money, having said that my business degree from a major university was a 95% waste of time. And that was 40 years ago. After a career in commercial banking I have not changed my mind.

    Now I see college not as simply a substantial waste* but as a death mill with: 1) ridiculous costs; the burden on families and government, 2) as an anti-biblical bastion pushing a PC cram-down without freedom of thought, 3) teaching young adults to waste time and become a burden, disengaging them from the real work-a-day world, 4) it delays marriage and the seriousness of family, 5) it is an incubator of immoral sexual behavior, 6) it trains all to get used to women leaving the care for the household. Phrased another [and frank] way: it trains up lazy, self-serving, sexually immoral, thoughtless, non-contributory, a-biblical leaches on life that have just left everyone [parents, students, government] in big debt.

    While colleges started with proper motives, it all started to unravel when it originated women’s colleges in the mid 1800s, taking women from the home, selling all that they should be ‘in the gates of the city’ conducting business alongside men. It helped make a mockery of marriage.

    *there are a handful of disciplines where college is helpful/ necessary [maybe for 20% who attend college] but ’on the job’ education is the way, and much less costly.

  9. Dennis Prager, my favorite radio personality, agrees 100% with you. He believe universities along with the Hollywood and the media are what have caused our nation to become so evil. He thinks only those who want to become doctors or something along this line should go to college since they actually need it and can pay back the debt.

  10. Where I live (Finland), universities are free (at least for now). So you do not have to go into debt to study.

    I met my husband while studying for my Master’s degree in energy technology. Now I am a sahm to a one-year-old son and two-year-old daughter. I also work from home in the evenings.

    But of course I agree – college/university is not mandatory to meeting a husband.

  11. I would also like to add that the idea of going to university to find a husband seems foreign to me. I have never heard anyone say it here. You go to university if you wish to get a higher education and thus further your career.

    Sure, I found my husband there but that was not my reason for going. And we only started dating a few years after graduating, having been acquaintances before that.

    I would also like to add that of course I know our universities are not truly free either. They are paid for by taxes and thus a (female) graduate is left feeling they must work outside the home to sort of pay society back for their degree. But no actual debt is incurred for the student or parents since our taxes are high (example: if your salary is 40k a year, taxes can be somewhere around 35 percent of that).

  12. My nephew is at Vet school (USA) and working very hard, there is simply no time for laziness, sexually immorality, parties etc.. His course is incredibly difficult and demanding and certainly not a waste of time. I am so impressed with the effort he is putting into this course and we are all behind him. There are many excellent courses that one can do – but it depends on the university and country one lives in.

  13. Born in America! I don’t understand this mentality as well. Weird. Maybe okay for homeschooling ?

  14. Where do people find their spouses if not at work or college? It’s probably because feminism has such a hold there that most women are not interested in marriage until they are in the 30s. They much prefer a career. All I ever wanted was to be married and have children. I believe this is what God wants for the majority of women and it is good.

  15. I am sure there is a lot of laziness, sexual immorality, and parties at the universities in Australia too, Jo, unless Australia has converted to the Lord and His ways.

  16. I agree with Saint Paul-and you! It is better to be single and fully glorify the Lord. But if you choose to have a family-that is fine as well-:)

  17. Lori,

    I think Jo’s nephew is studying abroad here in the US..That’s what I glean from her statement

  18. Yes Ruth, my nephew is an American/Australian and studying at one of the US colleges and no, there is simply no time for parties. His course is so full and then they are required to do volunteer vet work as well. I pray that he can make it through as it is so demanding, I couldn’t do it. He only day off is Sundays when he attends church with an elderly family.

  19. I did meet my wonderful husband at college but in no way would I send my girls to college for that purpose. I have always thought it a bit silly when I would hear of parents purposely doing that. That’s an expensive attempt at match making if it’s not the place the person is supposed to be. 🙂 I believe God’s will should be sought diligently and He will bring the right one along at the right time and place.

  20. Not everyone is destined for marriage. Same-sex attraction aside, there are women who grew up witnessing unhappy, incompatible, or abusive relationships that simply don’t want a relationship. There are also women who, through no fault of their own, NEVER find anyone. There are also women who are called to serve God and mankind through religious orders.

    What practical recourse do you feel they have? Should they remain with their parents? Should they take any offer they get? Should they let their parents arrange something for them? I’m honestly curious what you would advise if say a niece or a close friend’s daughter came to you and asked. Parents don’t live forever and that widower really just wants a maid and a nanny.

    I’m now 43 long past being Christmas cake (25) or even New Year’s noodles (31) as my cultural saying goes. Marriage is likely not going to happen. So I’m grateful that God gave me the ability to work with my NICU babies.

  21. Different strokes for different folks?
    I’m now at a point in my life that I’m fine with the old maid hat, and I’m determined to wear it well. My siblings have children, so I focus on being an auntie.

  22. This is exactly what I believe is true, but my parents fully believe that I NEED to go to the same conservative Christian college they met at, and that I’m going no matter what. They tell me I need an education “just in case” and that I have the best chances meeting my husband there. And I can’t get married until we’ve both gotten degrees. What can I do? I’m 16. My dad is a very highstrung man of extremes, and if he is the same man he is today, a year and a half from now, there is no way I’ll be able to stay home and learn skills to keep a home after I graduate like I want to. Of course God can change his and my mother’s minds, but what can I do if he doesn’t relent??
    I have no desire to go to college, and I don’t want the debt from paying for a degree I won’t even use if I married right after I graduated college. I want to learn the skills I need that I haven’t been taught yet. I don’t want to ruin my future family by working; I want to live a simple and quiet life and raise lots of children. At what point do I stop submitting?? My dad won’t listen to me when I ask the question of “What if college is not what God has for me?”. Also, please don’t think I won’t go to college if that’s where God wants me to go after highschool, because of course I would. I just know what I desire, and what God’s Word says, and that God won’t put me somewhere that I have no desire to be; if I’m following after Him, I’ll also be in His will and want what He wants. Psalm 37:4 ‘Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.’

  23. also haha THANK YOU for this website Ms. Lori, as a teen it is so great to be able to read these conservative, biblical posts. It has been an encouragement to me, and I’ve learned a lot from you and the godly women that comment. I’ve been convicted in different areas of my life, and I’m gaining so much knowledge on how to prepare for marriage, how to be a woman of God, and what biblical marriage and child-raising looks like, as I did not know much of anything about any of this prior to coming here.

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