Dear Christian, I will go trigger-happy on that ‘like’ button if you change your relationship status to ‘engaged’ or ‘married’ on Facebook. However I won’t touch that button if you change it to ‘in a relationship’. Here’s why:
We are called as Christians to honour marriage: Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral (Hebrews 13:4). In the last decade the church has been vigorously defending the institution of marriage. However, the institution of marriage (more…)
We were discussing one evening how many of us don’t really think of marriage as the Bible portrays it: as a covenant, binding, contractual commitment (Mal 2:14). However, we do understand that when we buy a house we enter into such a commitment. This understanding of how house buying works, leads many of us to act very wisely when house hunting. (more…)
As Christians in a courtship, we want to avoid hurting one another and dishonoring Christ by “defrauding” (see NASB translation of 1 Thessalonians 4:6) our brothers and sisters in Christ by implying — through word or action — a higher level of commitment to that person than we have made before God. (more…)
Ladies, do you think it’s biblical for us Christian women to have boyfriends? Those who answer, ‘yes’ to that question will often provide the following reason: ‘Just because the Bible doesn’t talk about boyfriends, it doesn’t mean it’s wrong to have one. After all, the Bible doesn’t talk about driving, the internet (more…)
The first step in the process of moving toward marriage through the initiation of or participation in a godly relationship is to evaluate yourself spiritually. Remember, one of our guiding principles here is that we are trying to be (or prepare to be) a godly spouse even as we try to find a godly spouse. (more…)
If you’re reading this, you’re interested in courtship/dating. You’ve done it, you’re doing it, you’d like to do it, or you need to teach somebody else how to do it. Don’t worry. You’re not alone. In our society, dating has become something of an obsession. It is expected to be a universal phenomenon. It’s just something you do if you’re single and of age (and that age is quickly dropping) in America. (more…)
Have you ever thought about the belief system that underpins our girlfriend/boyfriend culture? There are many different ways people define and “do” boyfriend/girlfriend relationships but there seem to be at least 2 common beliefs that characterise what most women would mean if they said they had a boyfriend: (more…)