dating and marriage

[Daymon]

OK, hold the phone here just a second. I saw several threads here stating dating is somehow bad or a bad idea. That is just absurd. You have to go through the dating process in order to be married. The real issue here is what is the right way to go about dating as a Christian, which I believe was also the information the person who posted this topic was looking for.

And for which I have no good advice by the way...LOL

[tah]

a friend of mine an myself starting a bit f a confusing conversation yesterday, its been keeping my mind busy ever since, but im nto getting anywhere.

as a christian..is dating necesary? i mean, we are called to give evrything up for God, and all our relationships, of whatever kind, should be betering us with God and in out faith, so why, when we date, do we always end up putting that relationship 1st, its a natural reaction, but...how do we overcome it, and how do we know when we've got that relationship. or who it shall be with? The bible talks of marriage, but not of dating. and yet it is supposed to be (and is) transferable to the lifestyle of today, to help us seek out the right from wrong.

And the other issue of marriage. It says in the bible that in heaven, all the bad stuff from earth does not exist, and yet nither does marriage. why has God blessed us with marriage, if it does not have a place in heaven? why is it needed here on earth, if not in heaven?

I don't know what to make of this.

Kay-Gurl

1...is dating necessary...

2...Why date...

3...Is God first...

4...why is Scripture silent on dating?

5...Why are we blessed with marriage when in Heaven there is no more marriage?

Did I get the questions correct???

All good questons...

[Daymon]

1...is dating necessary...

2...Why date...

3...Is God first...

4...why is Scripture silent on dating?

5...Why are we blessed with marriage when in Heaven there is no more marriage?

Did I get the questions correct???

All good questons...

Yep, I'm pretty sure that's where it was heading

[Guest LadyC]

scripture refers to the wedding feast between Christ and His church... someone can probably give more information about this. i'm thinking it's following the rapture when all believers are together in heaven.

on earth, we are intricately and beautifully designed by God to have physical and emotional needs that are to be met by our "helpmate"... our spouse. intimacy is supposed to be a 2-diminsional reflection of the 3-diminsional nature of God... in marriage, our intimate relations with our spouse is not just a physical connection, it's an emotional and spiritual one as well.

once we are in heaven, we will have no need that is not fulfilled by being in the presence of our heavenly Father. (please don't read any sexual connotations into that statement!) our emotional and physical needs will be met completely, and we will have no physical needs in the sexual sense. our entire attention and focus will be on glorifying and worshipping God.

[Guest Bart777]

well i believe that dating in and of itself is not a bad thing... but that everything we as christians must be with the bounds of Gods word

[Marnie]

well i believe that dating in and of itself is not a bad thing... but that everything we as christians must be with the bounds of Gods word

Good one Bart. Who are you? You're new?

[kittyjo]

I'm 35 and single.

And I agree with Leonard.

I've watched too many people get hurt from "dating."

First of all, we need to clarify the difference between "going on a date" and a "dating relationship".

The "dating relationship" these days more often than not means boyfriend+girlfriend who engage in as much physical contact (if not more) as anything else. Dating means you are holding hands, holding shoulders and waists, sucking face (c'mon, name me one teenage dating couple who aren't!), and some form of contact on more private areas.

That's what "dating" means on the minimal scale among the youth. (Stress the "minimal"!)

Yes, being alone is more romantic, but if you don't have safeguards in place, it can lead to falling into temptation - and often does.

So, before you get up in arms over the idea that datin gis a bad idea - you need to clarify what your idea of "dating" is.

I agree with Neb and Leonard.... What is dating for? Just socializing or is it meant to find a mate? What happened to courting? Here is something that defines dating: Dating vs. Courting

[Kabowd]

Just because something won't exist in heaven, doesn't mean it isn't beneficial for us here on earth now. God designed relationships, from the beginning. There's no need to fear them or neglect them. On the other hand, I agree with Leonard that dating as we know it is not only unnecessary it's not beneficial. In my opinion it prepares people for divorce, not marriage, because all it is is a series of relationships one right after another (typically).

[LadyRaven]

a friend of mine an myself starting a bit f a confusing conversation yesterday, its been keeping my mind busy ever since, but im nto getting anywhere.

as a christian..is dating necesary? i mean, we are called to give evrything up for God, and all our relationships, of whatever kind, should be betering us with God and in out faith, so why, when we date, do we always end up putting that relationship 1st, its a natural reaction, but...how do we overcome it, and how do we know when we've got that relationship. or who it shall be with? The bible talks of marriage, but not of dating. and yet it is supposed to be (and is) transferable to the lifestyle of today, to help us seek out the right from wrong.

And the other issue of marriage. It says in the bible that in heaven, all the bad stuff from earth does not exist, and yet nither does marriage. why has God blessed us with marriage, if it does not have a place in heaven? why is it needed here on earth, if not in heaven?

I don't know what to make of this.

Kay-Gurl

Dating as we know it is not necessary and IMO a bad idea.

1. We are out to IMPRESS our dates so that they LIKE us so that we will marry them. This gives them a false opinion of who we are. And of course we have no idea who they are either cause they are busy impressing us.

2. If we "think" we might be attracted to someone, we go after them with no care as to whether they are a good or worthy match for us. We find a few months out that this person is not to our liking and we ditch them to find someone else, and the man is busy doing the same thing (I'm a dudette so I'm speaking from the fem). Now the best predictor of future behaviour is the past...so what does this teach us about marriage? We have no precedent for commitment, we have no idea what it is, we're not in practice...so our instinct is to run away when things get bad. maybe we won't actually divorce but...maybe retreat into something else...it's the precedent we've set for ourselves.

3. The process we use to find our mate is based on superficial things, like looks and social activities. Some couples are wise enough to compensate for these faults by making sure to do worthwhile things together like mission trips and bible studies and things like this, and some do premarital counseling...but we have to understand that two years of skating and movie watching and going out to eat is insufficient as far as trying to see if this person is a suitable match.

I don't think any of this stuff is bad per se (except the serial dating aspect) but I think there is too big of a emphasis on this stuff and too little emphasis on the stuff that lasts, like spiritual growth and friendship. I believe you should find a like minded person from amongst your friends. This might be hard and this is an ideal, but if you keep the idea that they should be like minded and a friend before anything romantic starts things can be adjusted as needed.

I don't believe your parents should arrange marriages, but I would include my parents feelings (and in my case since I'm divorced and my father doesn't want much imput) or the feelings of my spiritual elders. I would take a long time to get to know a prospective spouse and spend time working together on large projects like Habitat or missions, I would build friendship rather than lust and when I thought this person was a possible spouse and we decided to pair off, I would also want to cultivate a mutual spiritual life. While I wouldn't be legalistic about not spending time alone, I would concentrate more on other things than trying to BE alone.

I'm not going to make it a rule for anyone else, that's legalism and I won't do it. But I do think that the current way people date is flawed in a major way, esp for believers. We should at the very least be aware of these problems and approach a relationship with our eyes open.

[KeilanS]

Dating as we know it is not necessary and IMO a bad idea.

1. We are out to IMPRESS our dates so that they LIKE us so that we will marry them. This gives them a false opinion of who we are. And of course we have no idea who they are either cause they are busy impressing us.

2. If we "think" we might be attracted to someone, we go after them with no care as to whether they are a good or worthy match for us. We find a few months out that this person is not to our liking and we ditch them to find someone else, and the man is busy doing the same thing (I'm a dudette so I'm speaking from the fem). Now the best predictor of future behaviour is the past...so what does this teach us about marriage? We have no precedent for commitment, we have no idea what it is, we're not in practice...so our instinct is to run away when things get bad. maybe we won't actually divorce but...maybe retreat into something else...it's the precedent we've set for ourselves.

3. The process we use to find our mate is based on superficial things, like looks and social activities. Some couples are wise enough to compensate for these faults by making sure to do worthwhile things together like mission trips and bible studies and things like this, and some do premarital counseling...but we have to understand that two years of skating and movie watching and going out to eat is insufficient as far as trying to see if this person is a suitable match.

I don't think any of this stuff is bad per se (except the serial dating aspect) but I think there is too big of a emphasis on this stuff and too little emphasis on the stuff that lasts, like spiritual growth and friendship. I believe you should find a like minded person from amongst your friends. This might be hard and this is an ideal, but if you keep the idea that they should be like minded and a friend before anything romantic starts things can be adjusted as needed.

I don't believe your parents should arrange marriages, but I would include my parents feelings (and in my case since I'm divorced and my father doesn't want much imput) or the feelings of my spiritual elders. I would take a long time to get to know a prospective spouse and spend time working together on large projects like Habitat or missions, I would build friendship rather than lust and when I thought this person was a possible spouse and we decided to pair off, I would also want to cultivate a mutual spiritual life. While I wouldn't be legalistic about not spending time alone, I would concentrate more on other things than trying to BE alone.

I'm not going to make it a rule for anyone else, that's legalism and I won't do it. But I don't think that the current way people date is flawed in a major way, esp for believers. We should at the very least be aware of these problems and approach a relationship with our eyes open.