Some advice about dating and relationships...

This week, we have looked at a timeless truth that is often minimized and ignored when it comes to lasting relationships and discovered that lasting relationships require preparation. In order to experience lasting relationships, we must prepare ourselves to become the right person. In order to experience lasting relationships, we must prepare ourselves so that the course, conduct, and consequences of our lives produce committed and lasting relationships.

Yet, while it is easy to make a commitment, it is much more difficult to keep that commitment. And if we do not take the time to prepare for the commitment to lasting relationships, the harsh reality is that we will not be able to keep our commitment to lasting relationships. 

Wednesday, we answered two common questions surrounding dating and relationships. Today, here is piece of advice when it comes to lasting relationships: Deal with your single person problems before you get married. As we talked about earlier, no one on the planet has marriage problems. Married people have single people problems and now they are married.

You see, the reason why people have marriage problems is because marriage only enhances the strengths and weaknesses that you had when you were single. You will have a problem being honest or being faithful in your marriage because you had a problem with honesty or faithfulness when you were single. You will not have marriage problems; you will have single people problems and now you are married. So, deal with your single people problems before you get married.

In addition, deal with your debt so that you are debt free. The number one cause of stress in marriage and divorce stems from financial problems. That is why we spend an entire session in premarital counseling on finances. That is why couples have a budget as part of their premarital counseling process. And this is another single people problem. If you dating a person who has significant debt issues, do not marry them until they deal with their debt problem. If they say to you, well we need to get married because you will help me be a better person and get out of debt, two things are going to happen. A, your credit score will be destroyed, and B, you will be a babysitter instead of a spouse. If you tell the person who wants to marry you that you will not marry them until they deal with their debt problem, one of two things will happen. Either they will do whatever it takes, even if it means moving back in with their parents in order to get out of debt because they love you and are committed to being with you. Or they will blow it off, which reveals a great deal about their commitment and lack of preparation to make a commitment.

Delay the physical aspect of your relationship as long as possible. Now I am not simply talking about sex. I am talking about any of the physical aspects of the relationship. Do not allow the physical to cloud the preparation. Delay the physical to the point that the person would even wonder if you are interested. Then you can so “Oh yeah, I am interested, but I am waiting for the right time and the right place.” 

In addition, do not live together. Now for some of you, you are thinking “well of course he is going to say that, he is a pastor. So, do not take my word for it. Instead you can go ahead and Google all of the research, both secular and religious and see for yourself what the results say, which is that living together does not result in lasting relationships. In fact, the research shows that living together does the opposite. You see, men and women tend to view living together from two totally different perspectives. While women often view living together a step toward commitment, men often view living together as an opportunity to try it out so they can get out of the commitment, if necessary.

And finally, I would like to say something to non-Christians.. Non-Christians, do not date a Christian unless you want to become one. If you are not a Christian, here is the thing, your boyfriend or girlfriend has an agenda. And that agenda is that they want you to become a Christian. And if you are a non-Christian and your Christian boyfriend and girlfriend is sleeping with you, you should definitely not date them, because they are a hypocrite, and you do not like Christians because they are hypocrites, so you should not be dating him or her.

Because. lasting relationships require preparation...