i kissed courting goodbye

this post is going to be comprised mostly of complaints, observations, and opinionated rants. don't wear your feelings on your sleeve and get all offended on me, because i'm really gonna keep it pretty inoffensive.

ok. sam and i were talking the other day and the subject of dating came up (hardly a rare occurance) and we both pretty much agreed that the "courtship" movement did more harm than good. i consider my own personal history evidence supporting this opinion. sam jokingly said "i'm gonna write a blog sometime called "i kissed courtship goodbye" as a play on the popular courtship book "I Kissed Dating Goodbye". well, i beat him to it. now don't get me wrong, i approve of courtship. there are people who know that they know that they know that God has intended them for said person without ever dating them or whatever whatever. there are also those people who are set apart for eachother and know it from a very young age and dont ever date but court from that time till engagement. that's a beautiful thing, and kudos to them for being patient and obedient to God. I know a handful of people for whom that was the case. and i'm very very happy for them, and i have no doubt in my mind that that was the proper course for them. that being said, i also feel the need to point out that that situation is the exception, not the rule. not everyone meets their soulmate when they're 12, and not everyone gets a word from the Lord the moment they lay eyes on their future spouse. so bearing these things in mind, i'm going to point out a couple of things that "courtship" advocates generally are content to leave out.

1. IT IS OKAY TO DATE. going out with someone who is mutually interested in you, with whom you see potential for a relationship of the romantic nature (courtship) is not a sin, it is not wrong, it will not cause you to stumble into physical and/or spiritual impurity, and it does not mean you should be convinced that you are going to marry this person. no, i'm not saying that i approve of "dating around," or in other words casually dating just anyone you find attractive without giving it actual thought or "trying on" lots of different people or going out with someone you know from the beginning you're not going to end up with. that's foolishness and that's how feelings get hurt. and i also think it takes a significant level of maturity to date maturely. if two people can honestly and openly say to eachother "i enjoy spending time with you, i respect you, and i see potential for a future between us. i'd like to get to know you and safely and properly, without pressure, give this a chance to go somewhere. if it works out i know it will be wonderful. if it doesnt, for either of us, we'll maturely talk about it, and decide that our relationship is best kept at a friendship level." for alot of people, that is a pretty big stretch. if you are one of those people, i would say that it's in your best interest not to date OR court. and if you can't have dinner with someone without falling into physical lust or temptation, then either that is NOT someone you should be going out with or you're not ready to date. just like if you can't hug someone with both arms because you'll fall into lust or physical temptation, there is a deeper issue here than this hug that is going to need to be dealt with anyway. frontal hugs and hugs using more than just the one arm are not sexual guys. it's just a hug. yes, they can be made sexual or enticing or whatever, but thats not the general nature among friends. use your discretion people, but don't throw out the baby with the bathwater.

2. FRONTAL HUGS ARE NOT BAD (see end of previous paragraph). on this same note, neither is kissing and holding hands. really guys? lets not be 13, okay? i understand the point of view that kissing is "dangerous" because it leads to other things etc. etc. kindof like marajuana is the "gateway drug"(except i wouldnt really compare kissing and marajuana any further than that because kissing is not a foreign chemical substance that affects the body's nervous system nor is it illegal in america). but i wold hope that if that were the problem and you begin to struggle with lust or "going farther" because of kissing than you ought to trust and feel you can depend on the person you're doing said kissing with enough to bring it up and if theyre a man/woman of God then they'll do what they can to help you with that rather than judge you for it or pressure you further etc. etc. if theyre not, then what the heck are you doing with them in the first place? and if you dont care that theyre not, then i wonder that you've gotten this far since none of this will affect you in any case. and if YOU'RE not, then policies and opinions on Godly dating don't really pertain to you, do they? so feel free to read or not read, detachedly.
now, if you're one of those people who has made the commitment not to kiss anybody until your wedding day because that is your conviction, rock on. more power to you. who am i to question your convictions concerning your body and your purity or cause you to break a commitment. shame on me if ever i tried. however. i don't think you have the right to project your personal convictions onto other people without a biblical basis for doing so. which, on the subject of kissing, you dont have. guess what guys? solomon and his love kissed before they were married. gasp! yeah, they did. and there relationship was still pure! in fact, it's the model that we use for biblical, Godly relationships. imagine that.

3. "NONDATING" IS NOT OKAY. alright. obviously no one who is presently engaged in nondating will call it nondating. i did during my last little stretch of it because i was just so darn tired of it. this activity/status is known by multiple aliases, such as "not dating" "special friends" "homeschool dating" and my personal local favorite, "lakeshore dating". as far as i know this isnt really all that common at lakeshore anymore, but it ws rampant during my generation. this is where the two people (usually teenagers) like eachother. they have mutual interest in eachother, they spend precarious amounts of time with eachother, they go out of their way to be sweet to eachother, they flirt with eachother, they would be perfectly willing to date/court eachother if they didn't have this concept from who-the-heck-knows-where that they shouldn't, and they hold these affections exclusively for eachother. they're not looking/interested in/ open to the possibility of another person. so here's the deal: theyre dating. i don't care if they call it dating or not, i dont care if they swear up and down and on things that they shouldnt that theyre "just friends". theyre dating. and you know what? that shouldn't be a big deal! (unless things are going on that shouldnt be going on, such as physical boundaries being crossed that shouldnt be, or one is pressuring the other, or they know that nothing's going to come of it in which case theyre wasting their time and their "special friend"s time. see point number 1.) the problem is theyre convinced that there is something wrong with dating or it's Godly not to date so they pretend it's something it's not or worse they dont talk about it, and all that brings is confusion. and in some cases it perpetuates a relationship that, had they openly acknowledged it and put a little time into it they would have seen harmlessly enough that it wasnt going to work out, but simply because they overthink it so much without putting it out in the open that they talk themselves into being so sure that it must be right whether it is or not. we're very good at rationalizing, and even fooling ourselves, when we want to. i've been guilty in the past of being interested in someone, but we believed in courtship, we didnt believe in dating, but nonetheless i liked the guy and i wanted it to happen so bad that i convinced myself that he was the one which sustained me through the long period of "nondating" before courtship. when we started courting it didnt take long for our personalities to clash and if we had openly dated in the first place we probably would have found this out alot sooner. as it happened, things were alot deeper and alot mroe serious when we finally broke it off than they would have been if we had simply investigated these things in the first place. this is why nondating is dangerous.
long story short: call it what it is people. two people pursuing eachother exclusively, whether they want to admit it or not (and honestly it's a bit immature not to. it's like the six-year-old who won't admit he likes his sister) they're dating. that doesnt mean theyre going to get married, and it doesnt mean theyre going to have sex. it means theyre dating. it means (if theyre doing it right) that they see qualities in that person that they would like to have in the partner of their life and they see some possibility that that person could in fact be their intended partner.
i was nondating a guy once. we were seeking God about the relationship (which i believe everyone should do, whether you're dating or not) and i believe that God had given me the "yes" to pursue a relationship with this person. as far as i know (and we had talked about it) he felt the same, but he felt he didnt have the "green light" to go ahead with the relationship. so we were somewhere between friends and dating and courtship.. etc. we were something but who knows what. my feelings and intentions for him were plain at the very least, but we were agreed on the whole "lets wait to date" decision. one day the topic came up in conversation with pastor jermaine and deanna stewart of my taste in men and this paticular guy who held my interest. i said "but we're no together yet" and pastor j said "well why not" and i said "we're waiting.." and he said "waiting? waiting for what?"
...i didn't have an answer for him. and to be honest, i still don't.
the other flaw with nondating is that you don't get to know the person with open romantic intentions. (now, when i use the word romantic, please don't mistake that for sexual. theyre not at all the same thing. i mean romantic, as in a very particular kind of love and/or interest.) the very simple fact of the matter is that you treat and act differently toward someone when you're pursuing a relationship with them than you would if your intentions didnt extend beyond friendship. and when you take it a step further and you're seriously considering spending the rest of your life with a person, that's different too. and it's foolish and dangerous to make the decision that you're going to make a relationship work with someone and spend the rest of your lives together and make them your partner in life, your other half, when you've never given yourself (or them for that matter) time to work out or at least get used to how you act in that sort of relationship, etc. there's a reason dating comes before courting. you act differently with someone when you're dating (or courting) them than you do when you're just friends, or "just friends" and the dating or courting relationship, because it's more open, is going to be the more accurate assessment.

4. FEELINGS ARE NOT EVIL. alright guys. i know we've all heard a thousand times not to go by our feelings, not to make decisions based on feelings, not to be looking for a feeling. that emotions are fickle, and deceptive, etc. etc. this is all true, and good advice. HOWEVER. emotions are not bad. emotions should not be utterly ignored. emotions are a God-given part of the soul-- not the flesh-- and are a part of life. you're not gonna get rid of them. you should never make decisions based solely on emotions, but neither should you cut them out entirely, or you'll be cheating yourself. there are aspects of life best experienced through emotion. some things are even best expressed with emotion. that's why we have them!! God didn't just stick that little aspect of humanity in there so we'd have something to hang us up all the time, and so we could spend our days beating back our natural reactions and never saying what we mean and think and feel. it is not wrong or bad to feel and express emotions! now, the confusion here comes with the whole "crucifying of the flesh, beating my flesh into submission, not giving life to things that don't line up with the Word" etc. this is all true and biblical and healthy and necessary for the growth and maturity of every Christian. but once again--don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. there are certain natures, tendencies, desires that are of the flesh, certainly. emotions and feelings (feelings is such a flexible word). anger, for example? not an unbiblical emotion. ok? ok. jealousy? also not unbiblical. fear? unnecessary and ungodly, but not something that is beaten by reppression. excitement? not unbiblical!! so seriously. stop bashing feelings and telling people not to be emotional. and if you must censor yourself because you refuse to acknowledge anything emotional, i reserve the right to be frustrated with you and point out to you that you're doing absolutely nothing to assist or further communication which is key to ANY relationships, platonic, romantic, or otherwise.

5. IF YOU'RE AFRAID OF LOVE OR MARRIAGE, YOU SHOULD NOT BE DATING OR COURTING. i think there are way more of us that are afraid to fall in love than are willing to admit it. be honest with yourself. if you have no intentions of falling in love, don't waste someone else's time pretending that you might. thats how hopes get dashed and hearts get broken. there's nothing worse than one-sided love, whichever side you're on. both sides suck. and i know you're secretly thinking, "but maybe love will come and sweep me of my feet despite my fears and reservations." that's very possible. not likely, but possible. i know hitch is a great movie and everything, but its still a movie. and everybody's story is different so a word of advice: don't keep your fingers crossed for somebody else's fairy tale. you've got your own to be living.
also, if you know very well that you're not anywhere close to being ready for marriage, what are you doing dating? are you gonna meet your future spouse, fall in love, and then have them waiting around for you to be "ready" to get married? not cool. i'm talking spiritually, emotionally, and intellectually here, not economically. i understand that especially men want to be in a position to support their family before they get married. as well they should. and alot of people want to finish school or something of that nature before getting married as well. that one i dont agree with so much, but i understand. personally i'm of the opinion that a husband and wife should work together for the success of their family. yes, the man is the head and provider of the household, but i have no qualms about working just as hard as my husband and helping him get us to where we want to be financially. and i'm also of the opinion that there is nothing wrong with getting married when you're still in school, or you're still in an apartment, or you still have some debt to pay off from school or whatever. but that's between each person and their partner and God. situations and convictions vary.

now, again, i am not in any way advocating "casual dating", or "dating around" or being with someone "just having fun". if there's obviously no future, you're wasting your time and theirs. if you're just having fun, you should be able to do that as friends. if you cant as friends that probably means theres something physical involved that shouldnt be going on anyway. own up to it, suck it up, and cut it off. there's not a gentle way to deal with that. and dating around is simply unnecessary. why on earth do you need to date more than one person at a time? if you're investigating the possibility of a relationship with this person, then you should be investigating that person and only that person. if you're not giving them your full attention in that department then you're not being serious, and you shouldn't be dating at all. if you have feelings for someone other than the someone you're dating, then what the heck are you doing dating them? that's called being divided, and it's a very dangerous and unbiblical way to be. and if you're going to be that way that's one thing, but staying involved with someone whilst you're divided, especially if you havent talked to them about it? you don't have the right to do that to someone. be respectful people. or at the very least be considerate.

alright. i'm done ranting. thoughts, comments, debates welcome. i'm not opposed to being proven wrong. thank you. *steps down from soapbox*
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