Don’t Bother Praying About Whom You Should Marry

In a 1973 BYU Devo­tional address, Elder Bruce McConkie shared how he decided whom to marry:

How do you choose a wife? I’ve heard a lot of young peo­ple from Brigham Young Uni­ver­sity and else­where say, “I’ve got to get a feel­ing of inspi­ra­tion. I’ve got to get some rev­e­la­tion. I’ve got to fast and pray and get the Lord to man­i­fest to me whom I should marry.” Well, maybe it will be a lit­tle shock to you, but never in my life did I ever ask the Lord whom I ought to marry. It never occurred to me to ask him. I went out and found the girl I wanted; she suited me; I eval­u­ated and weighed the propo­si­tion, and it just seemed a hun­dred per­cent to me as though this ought to be.

He points out that it would have been good to coun­sel with the Lord after he had made his deci­sion, but admits that he didn’t do so. Decid­ing who to marry is eas­ily one of the most impor­tant deci­sions a per­son will ever have to make, so on one hand, Elder McConkie is right that it’s some­what shock­ing that it never occurred to him to ask God dur­ing the process.