Catching up on some Youth Group blog summaries! This
particular week was the topic of courtship, “dating”, and God’s idea of what
relationships should be. It’s a tricky topic because the World’s idea of
relationships and dating is so very different from God’s idea for
relationships. At a glance, the World’s concept of dating relationships is
centered around sex, status, feelings of love, and self-fulfillment. On the
other hand, God’s idea of relationships is centered around commitment,
sacrifice, humility servant-hood, and waiting.
In our Matthew series, we came across Matthew 19:1-9[1]
when the Pharisees, or the religious leaders of Israel, came to test Jesus with
a question about divorce. Unfortunately divorce is a common thing in out
culture, and it was common in Jesus’ culture as well, but divorce is something
that breaks the heart of God. When the Pharisees asked Jesus, “Is it lawful for
a man to divorce his wife?” Jesus answered by pointed their attention somewhere
deeper than their law-making self-righteousness would let them see; He quotes
what God first said when romance began at the beginning of time. When God with
love made man, male and female, He said,
“Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and
hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”
This original quotation, found in Genesis 2:24[2],
is significant because it is said at the moment when the first man and the
first woman ever created were brought together in marriage. God’s idea of relationships
(e.g. marriage) is between one man and one woman. I know there are lots of
people today who are drawn towards homosexual relationships, but homosexuality
simply isn’t a part of God’s design. In other words, those who partake in a
homosexual lifestyle pervert the natural beauty of what God has designed. People
who do this are still loved by God and by Christians, but the lifestyle of
homosexuality is on that displeases God and ruins the beauty of His design.
Genesis 2:24, which was given to the first two human beings ever, is also a guideline
to all subsequent generations of human beings. Relationally, God’s design is
for men to leave their fathers and mothers in order to commit to one woman as
their wife in a new kind of family unit. In this new family unity the husband
and wife are no longer two individuals but they are counted in God’s eyes as
one. While both husband and wife have individual traits, desires, and needs,
their physical, spiritual, and emotional unity represents something that is
very special to the heart of God and very much like who God is.
Having seen that marriage between a husband and a wife is something
that represents a much bigger truth in God’s eyes, Ephesians 5:22-23[3]
is also a key passage that talks about marriage representing God’s relationship
with those who believe in Him. Here god calls wives to submit to their husbands
in respect and honor for them because they have been placed in leadership by
God’s design. God also calls husbands to love, cherish, honor, and serve their
wives as if they were their own bodies. The example for this self-sacrificial
love is set by God Himself, who through Jesus died for the sake of those who
would believe. (e.g. The church) To paraphrase John 15:13[4],
there is no greater love than dying to self for the sake of other people, and
nothing more godly. God loved us so much that He was willing to die for us in
the person of Jesus Christ. In the same way husbands and wives can die for each
other by loving their spouse and serving them first above their own wants and
desires.
The Bible compares our present “waiting” relationship with
God as to a betrothed woman waiting for her bridegroom and the upcoming date of
the marriage ceremony. Those who believe in Jesus are all collectively compared
to as the Bride, and Jesus is our Bridegroom. One day our God and King Jesus
Christ will come back to us bodily and will reign forever, restoring and making
all things new. He is committed to us, “engaged” if you will, and He has given
us His own Holy Spirit as a guarantee for our future with Him as a Helper while
we wait. Because our God dwells with us in this way we are not forsaken, and He
has committed to bring us safely home. We can see from God’s example that
relationships and marriage is all about commitment, which unfortunately is not
a value that our world holds dear when it things about dating. The world things
that dating is just supposed to be a fun, carefree, pleasure-filled time period
that determines whether or not someone can fulfill your desires; but Jesus has
made courtship to be a faith-filled adventure that allows two people to learn
whether He is leading them to committedly serve and sacrifice for the other
person. See the difference?
So when it comes to that special someone that you find
yourself attracted to, ask yourself, why am I wanting to pursue a relationship?
And why with this person? Is it because you want relationship for your own
happiness? If that’s the case, then you’re not at all ready to love someone
selflessly. Is it because you feel a desire to love them committedly for who
they are and you think they might be able to love you just as selflessly? If
not, then I’d say you’re also not ready for relationship, because relationships
are really all about marriage, and marriage is really all about dying. But if
you find that you’re not quite ready for relationship because you’re short in
one of these categories, don’t freak out. Waiting on relationships allows you
to have time to prepare, grow, and align yourself with God’s purpose for your
life. Believe me, you want to be where God wants you to be, because it’s only
then that all your desires and needs can truly be satisfied, especially when it
comes to relationships. For the sake of true satisfaction in God (instead of
empty satisfaction in a ‘significant other’ before you’re ready) many decide to
wait from pursuing romantic relationships, which allows for more satisfaction,
growth, and joy, in a relationship with Jesus that takes first priority, as
opposed to the disappointment, hurt, and emptiness that comes from broken relationships
without Jesus.
So are you waiting, or dying?
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