This post is in continuation of The Problem with the Dating Scene, Part 1
They say that old habits die hard, and its true. I often get approached by the people I counsel who try to negotiate and express their wanting to go back to dating. The problems in dating are but numerous, here are but a few of them. No matter how good the intentions are upon getting into the relationship, and how convinced the couple will be to “date right.” Even Christians who can steer clear of the major pitfalls like premarital sex and great pains of breaking up, energies tend to be spent on struggling with temptations. As I always mention to the people I counsel, they are in the relationship primarily because they are attracted to each other and relationships’ normal course is — the couple gets close to each other, then closer and then intimate. There’s just no regressing or even a plateau stage that they say there’s nothing going on. It’s just non-existent. The wisest thing to do is date to marry, and that’s that. The majority of the effort should be at getting on one’s knees and praying for the right person to come along. This might just be the most infamous line on dating only the minority has probably heard about. When the Lord has put in your heart who you should marry, there’s no second guessing.
Allow me to share with you some snippets from Joshua Harris’ book, I Kissed Dating Goodbye, on The Seven Habits of Highly Defective Dating:
1. Dating tends to skip the friendship stage of a relationship.
2. Dating often mistakes a physical relationship for love.
3. Dating often isolates a couple from other vital relationships.
4. Dating can distract young adults from their primary responsibility of preparing for the future.
5. Dating can cause discontentment with God’s gift of singleness.
6. Dating can create an artificial environment for evaluating another person’s character.
7. Dating often becomes an end in itself.”
