The Biblical Approach to Finding a Mate (Part 3)
I don't know about y'all but I was SO excited for the service on Wednesday night and to hear the next message in the series! I hope you are just as excited as I am :)
I just wanted to stop and say really quickly that the reason for me posting this series is not to glorify myself or the man who preached it. Yes, God has used my brother in an awesome way and has given him a great message that needs to be shared. But the purpose for my writing these posts is to stand for the truth and hopefully to help and encourage others. I want God to be glorified in everything I do. And that includes relationships. God has a plan for finding "the One". Although, sad to say, so many people don't know what His plan is and end up doing it the world's way. My purpose for writing these posts is to show that there is an alternative! There is a Biblical way!
So back to the series ;) This part is going to be about Dating Vs. Courting.
Of course, everyone knows what dating is, right? Oh yes....every young girl dreams about when she will be old enough to start dating a guy and how dreamy their dates will be. But! As we said in our first part of this series, dating is the world's way...and the world's way of doing things is wrong. (I gave some stats in my first post for this series....so if you haven't already....go check it out!)
I'm sure many of you are sitting there, staring at your screen, and thinking, "So if dating isn't good, then what's the alternative??" Here it is.............Courtship!!
Sounds kind of old-fashioned, right? When some people think of courtship, they think of the couple sitting 32 feet apart in the living room with everybody and their brother sitting there staring at them (it makes me think of the lady from Monsters Inc..."always watching...always watching..." creepy ). But, I'm not referring to this courtship (although some of the standards back then we should still use today), I am referring to the Biblical courtship. In the next couple of posts, we are going to look at The 7 Laws of Biblical Courtship.
But before we start on those 7 laws, we are going to look at Satan's desires and goals for your wedding day. Satan does not want you to do things God's way. If Satan can achieve these goals of his....then he has won.
1) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to marry someone whom God never intended for you to marry.
2) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to have already experimented with premarital "intimacy".
3) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to be unprepared to make your marriage a success.
4) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to break your parents' heart and grieve your pastor.
5) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to have ruined your testimony and to have brought shame to the name of Christ becasue of unwise practices leading to the marriage altar.
6) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to have no idea how to define or practice agape love.
7) On your wedding day, Satan wants your choice of a spouse to cause you to sacrifice the chance to fulfill God's calling for your life.
Wow...I don't know about you, but these are some goals that I definitely do not want for my wedding day. As I said earlier, if Satan can accomplish these in your life, then he has won. And you know what his main way in accomplishing these goals is? Yes...that's right....it's through dating.
Now let's look at the 7 Laws for Biblical Courtship (I'm so excited!!) I definitely won't be able to get through all of them in this post...so let's see how far we can get ;)
1) By the grace of Almighty God, I will marry the person God created for me.
We talked about this in one of my last posts....but it is such a great truth that we need to bring up again! God has created ONE SPECIFIC PERSON for you! And you know what? God will bring that person to you. You won't have to go searching for him/her. As Joshua said last night in the service, "God did not tell Adam, "I have a wife for you, but she is somewhere in the garden...go find her..and good luck!"" Definitely not. God will bring the right one at the right time. And! That person can only be found in the will of God. You need to get in the very center of the will of God!
On a side note, you will never feel complete without anyone but God's Will. How true is that, right!
So what are some key things that we should be looking for in a future spouse? Well, a list of key things could go on forever, so I am only going to point out two right now.
1) No unsaved person should be considered. This is a definite. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 6:14, "Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers...." You can't get more clear than that.
2) No one who is saved but not living a Christian life should be considered. If you see someone who is not living a Christ-like life should definitely never be considered. If they are not willing to dedicate themselves to God, then why will they dedicate themselves to you? God should be the utmost priority in their lives. If they are not living a Christ-like life then they should not be considered as a future spouse.
Ok, so I was right....we definitley cannot finish all 7 points in one post :) And the next law of courtship is going to be a really long one....so I'll stop here for now and continue the next point at another time.
On another side note (I seem to be doing that a lot in this post), I hope you are planning on taking each of these points and applying them to your life. Because you do not want to end up in a relationship that you will later regret. But, that will be talked about in a later post too. I am just giddy with excitement about this whole series!
Thanks for reading! See you in my next post!
I just wanted to stop and say really quickly that the reason for me posting this series is not to glorify myself or the man who preached it. Yes, God has used my brother in an awesome way and has given him a great message that needs to be shared. But the purpose for my writing these posts is to stand for the truth and hopefully to help and encourage others. I want God to be glorified in everything I do. And that includes relationships. God has a plan for finding "the One". Although, sad to say, so many people don't know what His plan is and end up doing it the world's way. My purpose for writing these posts is to show that there is an alternative! There is a Biblical way!
So back to the series ;) This part is going to be about Dating Vs. Courting.
Of course, everyone knows what dating is, right? Oh yes....every young girl dreams about when she will be old enough to start dating a guy and how dreamy their dates will be. But! As we said in our first part of this series, dating is the world's way...and the world's way of doing things is wrong. (I gave some stats in my first post for this series....so if you haven't already....go check it out!)
I'm sure many of you are sitting there, staring at your screen, and thinking, "So if dating isn't good, then what's the alternative??" Here it is.............Courtship!!
Sounds kind of old-fashioned, right? When some people think of courtship, they think of the couple sitting 32 feet apart in the living room with everybody and their brother sitting there staring at them (it makes me think of the lady from Monsters Inc..."always watching...always watching..." creepy ). But, I'm not referring to this courtship (although some of the standards back then we should still use today), I am referring to the Biblical courtship. In the next couple of posts, we are going to look at The 7 Laws of Biblical Courtship.
But before we start on those 7 laws, we are going to look at Satan's desires and goals for your wedding day. Satan does not want you to do things God's way. If Satan can achieve these goals of his....then he has won.
1) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to marry someone whom God never intended for you to marry.
2) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to have already experimented with premarital "intimacy".
3) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to be unprepared to make your marriage a success.
4) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to break your parents' heart and grieve your pastor.
5) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to have ruined your testimony and to have brought shame to the name of Christ becasue of unwise practices leading to the marriage altar.
6) On your wedding day, Satan wants you to have no idea how to define or practice agape love.
7) On your wedding day, Satan wants your choice of a spouse to cause you to sacrifice the chance to fulfill God's calling for your life.
Wow...I don't know about you, but these are some goals that I definitely do not want for my wedding day. As I said earlier, if Satan can accomplish these in your life, then he has won. And you know what his main way in accomplishing these goals is? Yes...that's right....it's through dating.
Now let's look at the 7 Laws for Biblical Courtship (I'm so excited!!) I definitely won't be able to get through all of them in this post...so let's see how far we can get ;)
1) By the grace of Almighty God, I will marry the person God created for me.
We talked about this in one of my last posts....but it is such a great truth that we need to bring up again! God has created ONE SPECIFIC PERSON for you! And you know what? God will bring that person to you. You won't have to go searching for him/her. As Joshua said last night in the service, "God did not tell Adam, "I have a wife for you, but she is somewhere in the garden...go find her..and good luck!"" Definitely not. God will bring the right one at the right time. And! That person can only be found in the will of God. You need to get in the very center of the will of God!
On a side note, you will never feel complete without anyone but God's Will. How true is that, right!
So what are some key things that we should be looking for in a future spouse? Well, a list of key things could go on forever, so I am only going to point out two right now.
1) No unsaved person should be considered. This is a definite. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 6:14, "Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers...." You can't get more clear than that.
2) No one who is saved but not living a Christian life should be considered. If you see someone who is not living a Christ-like life should definitely never be considered. If they are not willing to dedicate themselves to God, then why will they dedicate themselves to you? God should be the utmost priority in their lives. If they are not living a Christ-like life then they should not be considered as a future spouse.
Ok, so I was right....we definitley cannot finish all 7 points in one post :) And the next law of courtship is going to be a really long one....so I'll stop here for now and continue the next point at another time.
On another side note (I seem to be doing that a lot in this post), I hope you are planning on taking each of these points and applying them to your life. Because you do not want to end up in a relationship that you will later regret. But, that will be talked about in a later post too. I am just giddy with excitement about this whole series!
Thanks for reading! See you in my next post!
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