Dating & Courtship, Stephen Picklesimer [e textbook reader TXT] 📗

brought from practicing it in a previous marriage) of your proper role as husband or wife in the new marriage.
(To further understand both roles in marriage, you may read our booklets You Can Build a Happy Marriage and The Purpose of Marriage – Ever Obsolete? We also offer any number of sermons on the subject of marriage.)
Understanding the Sheer Size of This Decision
An enormous decision lies before you. Beyond baptism, the decision to marry is almost certainly the most important you will ever make. You are responsible for evaluating the entire picture! No one can do this for you. It is also vital and necessary to counsel with a minister before you make the decision to marry, but beyond that, recognize that, ultimately, counselors do not know you as well as you know yourself!
Those considering marriage are standing at a fork in the road. So very much depends on which road you choose. Each represents an almost completely different path for the rest of your life—either marriage to this person or waiting for another.
This is not a decision that you can afford to “get wrong.” Too much is at stake. Yet, so many just waltz after the first person who strikes their fancy, giving virtually no thought whatsoever to the fact that there even is a choice.
But there is!
You are the captain of your own ship. It will go in the direction you choose to steer it. Understand that you are facing a titanic decision that will, either way, forever change the remainder of your life on planet earth. (Momentarily, we will talk about those who have “cold feet,” but this is not our purpose at this point.) You could start down the path to the most marvelous, continual experience in your life, one that could literally change you in ways you can now scarcely begin to imagine—enjoying wonderful companionship and building a life together with the one who will become the dearest person in your life.
This is no time to let your emotions rule. Fight against this, continuously seeking God’s will: “For it is God which works in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13). Ask God to show you if you are courting or planning marriage for the wrong reasons—or with the wrong person.
The Wrong Reasons
Over the years, I have observed people marrying for many reasons. This has meant watching so many go forward with the wrong framework in mind. I have learned that once “smitten” few will turn back, and most will not even consider that their reasons for marrying might be on less than solid ground.
On the other hand, like baptism and conversion, if someone can be easily talked out of marriage, by hollow arguments, then either this person is not the right one, or it is certainly not the right time.
Many marry out of plain LONELINESS. The first person who will help it go away “gets the nod.” Naturally, if you are past your early twenties and still single, you could be experiencing at least some loneliness. This is certainly not wrong. God Himself said, “It is not good that the man [or the woman] should be ALONE. I will make a help meet [suitable] for him [or her]” (Gen. 2:18). Solomon added, “Two are better than one” (Ecc. 4:9-12). Of course, this is true for many reasons.
But loneliness should never be the sole reason for getting married. If this becomes the main motivation, you are, in effect, telling God that you cannot make it on your own and you need to depend on another human being. This is not true, because many of God’s greatest servants either never married or lost mates after they did. While continuing unmarried is not desirable, it can be done (Matt. 19:12).
Others get married at a young age to ESCAPE HOME. Some states permit marriage at the ridiculous age of sixteen. Because many family situations and environments are not ideal—and some are far from it—there may be huge difficulties between a teen or young adult and his or her parents. If this is the case, do not be foolishly led to move out, using marriage as the vehicle. If there are unresolved family difficulties, try to seek wise counsel, and with one of God’s ministers if possible. The age of responsible adulthood may lie just ahead. Never just catapult yourself into another potentially more miserable situation—and this time for life!—by leaping headlong out of difficulty that may have lasted only a short while longer.
Here is another wrong reason to marry: While there are specific roles of a husband and a wife, some blur these to an extreme, looking for ANOTHER PARENT. For instance, some men feel they must marry to have someone look after them—and such reasoning is often translated “feed and pick up after them.” The more immature men in particular carry this thinking, in some cases seeking someone who will take the place of a mother. Do not ever get married to be looked after, viewing a wife as merely a housekeeper, replacing your mother.
This wrong approach also applies to women who may be unconsciously seeking a “father figure,” sometimes because they had a wonderful father, and other times because they had an absolutely terrible father. The latter are trying to fill a void that can only ultimately be filled by their spiritual Father in heaven. Your husband should never be “daddy” to anyone but your children, just as you should never be “mommy” to any but the same.
Others marry due to INSECURITY. Similar to the previous point, this is somewhat more common in women than men. A certain amount of security comes from being part of a family unit. When one grows up and moves out on his or her own, that security is often lost. Those who depend on it sometimes look to marriage as an opportunity to become secure again. Of course, it is natural to desire this. But, like so many other points, it should not be a primary reason for marriage, to the exclusion of sound examination and logic, overriding the multitude of other points throughout this book.
We are living in what the Bible calls “the last days.” God’s Church is not prophesied to grow large in number at the end of the age. Because of this, or because of passing the “prime” singles’ age, a person might meet someone of similar age and automatically think that this is “the one.” He thinks to himself, “Will I ever get another chance? I have been praying for a spouse, and this is the one—because this has to be the one.” This view lacks faith and is desperation thinking (Heb. 11:6). It leaves God out of the picture. Do not confuse asking God to provide you with a mate, with believing His answer is automatically the next person you will meet. In this regard, be careful of instructing—and LIMITING—God that He must fulfill some kind of strange “sign” that you have defined for Him as what you will base your course of action on. I have yet to see a successful marriage born of such humanly-devised “signs.”
I will offer a tragic example. I once knew two otherwise very reasonable people who married this way. The man had told God that whoever was the first woman to “take off her shoes” at an upcoming dance was to be his wife. Of course, God did not intervene and block him from carrying out such a silly notion. A woman did take off her shoes at the dance. He approached this much younger woman and eventually pursued her all the way to marriage. He felt driven by God’s “fulfillment” of his predetermined “sign” of who was to be his wife. After children came and several years passed, the marriage crashed. The woman had never known of his plan. But later, she did know that she was miserable in the marriage. Upon learning his plan—he revealed it when trouble appeared in the marriage—she could not get over the basis upon which she had been selected for lifelong partnership. Sadly, this woman had succumbed to this man’s unrelenting advances—and a horrible mess resulted.
Habits and Hygiene
Every individual has both good and bad habits, exclusive to him or her. What are the habits of your potential mate? Do any of them call undue attention to the person? Do any of them annoy you? Will you be able to accept the bad habits with the good? You may wish to talk about any that are particularly troubling with your potential mate.
Scrutinize your own habits now! They can be changed. Various studies show that habits can be changed or overcome in about 21 days. Of course, addictions (actually sins) such as gluttony, smoking and overdrinking can be much harder to change because they are more intrinsic to a person’s character than are habits such as biting fingernails, cracking knuckles, twirling of the hair, etc. While these latter habits can be very irritating, they obviously carry far less weight in seriousness. The fewer bad habits you have when the marrying age arrives, the less you have to “hide” or hope that the other person is willing to overlook.
Hygiene is also very important throughout marriage. Few things are worse than dealing with people who do not wash, brush teeth, clip nails, shave, comb hair, pick up after themselves, leave the bathroom clean, use deodorant and much more. Remember, if you have dated and courted properly, you will not have lived together prior to marriage. This means that there is a side of the person that you will not see until starting the day after the wedding.
What you see now may not be what you get later. How does your prospective mate live? Have you ever visited his or her home, apartment or room UNANNOUNCED? What did you see? Was it neat and tidy—or did it look like one or more hand grenades went off in the room?
Let’s look at the other side of the coin. Are you considering marriage to a “neat freak” who demands a spotless, “germ-free” environment? Taken to the extreme, this could rival the other ditch. Such people are no fun to live with, and some come from mothers who demanded this kind of environment all day, everyday, throughout the home.
Be realistic when addressing the issues of habits and hygiene. Be adaptable, understanding and patient—if issues in either of these areas trouble you, thoroughly discuss them until you are either satisfied or have reached an impasse.
Interests
Most everyone has one or more interests. (Only a few seem to have none.) By the time one reaches adulthood, probably a number of interests have emerged.
Interests can involve a wide range of general kinds of things. For example, they can have to do with SPORTS: tennis, swimming, golf, hiking, ping pong, horseback riding, rock climbing, etc.—or with MUSIC: dancing, singing, playing one or more instruments, attending the opera, etc.—or with COLLECTING: coins, stamps, butterflies, ancient books, autographs, bottle caps?!, etc.—or with GAMES: cards, boardgames, croquet, etc.—or with PETS: dogs, cats, hamsters, birds, fish, guinea pigs, reptiles?!, etc. Take a careful look.
The above list is only the beginning of things that may interest people. Some people read books voraciously, others like to travel and see the world, while still others enjoy model-making or kite-flying. And, of course, some women may like to sew, crochet, knit, etc.
Virtually no two people have the exact same range of interests. Considering all the different kinds of interests that exist, and that as people grow, their interests change, there is no such thing as a couple who will always want to do the exact same thing, at the exact same time, in the exact same way, let alone for the exact same reasons. Hopefully, the point is made.
Keep your focus on this: Are your