I was sitting at school today and I had a thought cross my mind. As God would have it, Sam, my Methodist friend, came up and I brought this thought to him and it got his mind working as well.

My question has 2 parts.

First, where did the teaching come from (or when did it start being heavily taught) that we each have to individually come to "have a personal relationship with Jesus" (to use typical evangelical terminology) come from? Second, how does that idea fit with this passage of Scripture:

Also, if any woman has an unbelieving husband, and he is willing to live with her, she must not leave her husband. For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the Christian husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but now they are holy. (1 Corinthians 7:13-14 HCSB)

My issue is that this passage and the common evangelical belief don't seem to go together. Am I missing something or misinterpreting this passage or what? Am I over-complicating the matter? I am just kinda confused [Linked Image]