To Court or not to Date, That is the Question.

If only it were that easy!  Before you arrive at the conclusion that I am completely against dating and only for courtship in relationships between young men and young women and decide to tune me out, please know that my desire is to be obedient to God above all.  This includes knowing what He has to say about this topic and making individual choices based upon that knowledge.  Certainly there is no easy one-size-fits-all plan for getting our young people married off.  For that reason we must consult as much scripture as we possibly can and spend much time at the throne of grace to find out what God wants for us and for our young people.  In other words this takes a lot of work.  To make sure you understand my meaning allow me to re-phrase; parents, and especially fathers, who our young people will marry has more implications for the rest of their lives than any other decision in life with one exception-the decision to follow Christ.  For the sake of this conversation, I am assuming that you and your young people have made this decision and that it is evident in your life by the daily decisions you make. 

So, what method, plan, or program should a follower of Christ adopt for shepherding our children into adulthood, into being ready for marriage?  Christ’s program is a great answer!  Since salvation is a perfect picture of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, His plan is best.  From Ephesians 1:4 we understand His plan and know full well that our salvation, Christ’s marriage proposal to us, began long ago.  The Father chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world.  So the plan for our marriage to Him began that long ago.  The goal of the choosing of a bride for Christ was to save and redeem us to a state of holiness and blamelessness which will be a glorious thing for the Father to do considering our blame and lack of holiness.  

Since marriage is a picture of salvation, we would do very well to put as much thought as possible into our own marriages and especially the eventual marriage of our young people.  The holiness and blamelessness of our young people, is exactly what is at stake.  Will we be fathers and parents who shepherd our children along toward a holy and blameless marriage, or will we approach this pinnacle of life moment with a haphazard and lazy attitude?  Will we enable and teach the next generation of marriages to be more able to picture Christ and the church to those around them?  How much are we willing to sacrifice for the holiness, purity and blamelessness of our young people?  Are we at all willing to put ourselves in uncomfortable and difficult positions that go against the grain of culture or friends for the sake of salvation?  It is my passionate contention that we as fathers and as parents are failing to make the issue of who our kids will marry as big as it ought to be.  This is my heart; to have us all understand that the marriage of the next generation is a big deal!  Again, there is only one bigger deal, and that is or can or should be greatly influenced by the marriages we live in today and tomorrow.

Marriage has never been more under attack than it is now.  This is no coincidence nor is it just a sign of the times.  It is a deadly plan designed by the father of lies to destroy or at least invalidate the most perfect picture of Christ’s plan for the salvation of mankind.  We cannot, we must not let this happen.  So before you write me off as being a crazy-courtship only kind of guy, consider the eternal implications of not making a careful premeditated plan for marriage could and will do.