Missionary dating

A Match Made on Earth: When Christians date outside the fold.

I could be considered the beneficiary of "missionary dating". Back in 1969 I met and dated Brenda, later attended her church, and in the Fall of that year was saved.

In retrospective, it was not a healthy relationship. It was not a Christ honoring relationship. My conclusion: "missionary dating" is an oxymoron!

Excerpt from the article:

For evangelicals who want to pair up with others of the same faith but don't manage to do so in their early 20s, trouble lies ahead, particularly for women. Evangelical churches now typically have a 60-40 split between women and men, which means that there are many more single evangelical women out there than their male counterparts. As Ms. Cockrel explains, "I have friends who wanted to marry a Christian guy, are still single, and are more and more open to dating non-Christians as they get older. They're tired of waiting."

Margaret Nagib, a 35-year-old single psychologist who lives outside of Chicago, sympathizes. "Sometimes it's just nice to go out on a date." Ms. Nagib was seeing a non-Christian for three months earlier this year. She talked with him very early on about her faith and even told him that she would "never consider being serious with someone who wasn't Christian." Ms. Nagib says that when he told her he was agnostic, she could have ended it right then, but the two "clicked really well." He went to church with her and read a book on Christianity that she recommended, but ultimately the two broke up. He asked how her faith would affect their relationship if they got married. "When I think of our wedding ceremony, I want it to glorify God. And when I think of marriage and obviously children, they should glorify God."

------
But pastors regularly remind their flocks to avoid dating outside the faith. Lee Strobel, formerly a teaching pastor at Saddleback Church in Southern California and the author of "Surviving a Spiritual Mismatch in Marriage," tells people that "conjugal evangelism" doesn't work. "If you're feeling like if I just marry this person, I'll be able to influence him toward God, it's self-deception." He notes that "the nonbeliever is more likely to pull the Christian away from his faith." This is a contention, by the way, that sociologists, like Brad Wilcox at the University of Virginia, generally support. Mr. Wilcox explains: "Evangelicals who marry nonevangelicals are typically less likely to remain as or become as devout as those who marry within the fold."

Friends will lift you up or drag you down

Artist's depiction of Solomon's court (Ingobertus, c. 880)

Kathee and I are reading in 1 Kings and last week we came across this familiar passage:

1 Kings 11:1 & 4 "But king Solomon loved many strange women ... his wives turned away his heart after other gods: and his heart was not perfect with the LORD his God, as was the heart of David his father"

This passage illustrates the truth that friends can either lift one up spiritually or drag one down. Solomon's multiple pagan wives "turned away [Solomon's] heart after other gods". Since God desires our fellowship and commands us to be wholehearted, it is incumbent upon every believer to carefully evaluate one's relationships: friendships and dating relationships (a 'more than friendship').

I am blessed to have my spouse of 32 years as my sole-mate and best friend. Kathee is a deeply spiritual person who loves the Lord. She encourages me in my Christian walk, and I endeavor to encourage her as well.

Obviously we cannot move to a commune or live alone in the desert. God wants us to interact with all kinds of people, even some who are ungodly. I see this in the great commission (Matthew 28:19, "in your going, make disciples").

Note the phrase "since then you would need to go out of the world" in the following passage:

1 Corinthians 5:9-11, "I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother, who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner—not even to eat with such a person."

God does not want his children to be hermits!

There are some relationships that are more entangling than others. Dating and marriage would fall into this category. The one whom one marries will be first one whom one dates. Marriage is a committed relationship ('til death do us part') that should not be entered into lightly or parted without death or the scriptural cause (eg. abandonment, abuse, or adultery). I believe that God's warning of 2 Corinthians 6:14 ("Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness?") addresses at the very least, the marriage relationship. Thus it is important that the Christian who is contemplating marriage be careful about the dating relationship.

The Apostle Paul has addition instructions about friendships:

1 Corinthians 15:33 "Do not be deceived: “Evil company corrupts good habits.”"

Back to my original premise: "Friends will lift you up or drag you down". In evaluating relationships, these questions may be helpful:

1. Does ______ evidence personal faith in Christ?
   
2. Does ______ encourage me in my walk with Christ?
   
3. Does ______ encourage me in my Church attendance?
   
4. Does ______ encourage me in my devotional time with God (Scripture reading and prayer)?
   

Hopefully this is helpful. As always, I invite comments!

Comment: The graphic is from Solomon

---

More on Christian friendship

1. I have coffee about once a month with Larry N - a fellow Wells Fargo employee. Larry works in a completely different department. I only see him when we have coffee. He is a member of Berean Baptist Ch in Lakeville, MN. He ministers to me and I appreciate him.
   
2. Saturday I had coffee with Terry Lange of Thoughts and Opinions fame (fellow member of 4th Baptist & seminarian)
   
3. Saturday night we had a family by for dinner - Ralph & Karla H. What a ministry they had to us: sharing about the mission field, God's provision for them when their daughter was dying of cancer. We also had a fun time playing pool (with their two daughters .. one is very good (at pool) and the other ... NOT!))
   
4. I share these comments because my experience is that one must purpose to have Christian fellowship. It just does not happen. It does not happen lined up horizontally in pews!