Christian Dating

Dating and discovering a great relationship is both exciting and worrying at the same time. After all, you're not just meeting someone new on each date, you're potentially getting to know the person who will be your life-long spouse. Wow. If that isn't exciting then I don't know what is. However, the excitement is balanced by a person's more serious side--the side that tends to understand that it's good to take things slowly despite the feeling of euphoria that is often felt early on in a dating relationship. To find a good dating partner is to find someone with whom you share a high degree of compatibility. However, worry can set in if you find yourself already in a relationship and then you discover that there is a major compatibility issue such as a major religious difference. But, that's one of the things we'll discuss here. By listening to a few of the Christian dating tips and advice that are presented here, you can hopefully avoid such pitfalls.

Without question, your first priority should be to determine very clearly what you are looking for. Are you looking for a brief relationship just for the fun of it? If so, then perhaps Christian dating is not for you. Are you looking to date so that you can find someone to "shack up" with so that you can try to enjoy some of the benefits of marriage without actually getting married? If so then perhaps Christian dating is not for you. But, if you are looking for a more serious relationship--one that could lead to a life-long marriage--then Christian dating may be just what the doctor ordered. The end goal of most stable Christian dating relationships is marriage. Consequently, it often takes some time in order to get to know the other person well enough for both parties to be able to make an informed decision before getting married. This time that is required to get to know the other person is what is so often overlooked and pushed aside by so many people when they get caught up in the fast-paced and loose dating habits of the non-Christian world. That's why it's so important to go into a relationship knowing who you are, what you stand for, and what it is you are looking for.

You also need to practice being a good communicator. Be quick to listen and slow to speak as it says in the Bible. Getting good and sharing your ideas, your feelings, your hopes, and your dreams with your Christian dating partner will be excellent practice for the possible time in your future when you are actually married. When you are married, good communcation skills are no longer simply a fun, cute little excercise--it's a matter of survival. You must learn the skill of communication in order to maintain a healthy marriage. If you lack the ability to communicate effectively with you dating partner, how will you know what his/her needs are? The truth is, you won't.

In addition, it's important to make a list, either mentally or on paper, of the top ten qualities that your future dating partner must possess before you'd consider engaging in a long-term serious relationship. Similarly, you need to make a list of the top ten qualities that if your future dating partner does posses would be enough of a reason to end the relationship immediately. Once you have these two lists in your mind it will be that much easier to discern a healthy relationship from an unhealthy relationship. Now, you need to understand that nobody is perfect. Thus, the beauty of this list is that you can make your decisions based on whether or not your dating partner possesses 100% of the items on your top-ten list, as opposed to a more unrealistic, arbitrarily large list of unlimited idealized qualities that no human on the face of the earth could ever live up to. It's much easier to find someone who meets 100% of your search criteria if your list only has 20 items on it. But, if your list is so big that it never ends (i.e. you've never made a list) then nobody will ever measure up because nobody is perfect in every single area.

For example, you could decide that your partner must be somebody that likes to go mountain climbing in Europe every single year and that your future partner must not be somebody that loves to smoke. Well, by having these two items on your list you could easily find out within the first few hours of a first date whether or not the other person likes to smoke cancer sticks for a living or if they hate mountain climbing and think it's the worst thing in the world. That'd be the last date with that person--end of story. You would have just saved yourself a potentially nasty breakup in the future or even a miserable marriage to the wrong person.

Next, you should learn to follow your heart, not your emotions. There is a difference. Often, people will stay far too long in an unhealthy relationship because their dating partner appears to have 80% of what they are looking for on their list. But, what about the other 20% of their list? It gets ignored--at least for a while. But, deep down the person's heart is telling them that they should move on and look for someone that has 100% of the items on the two lists of what their future dating partner must and must not possess. Emotions play a tug of war with the heart. They are a reminder of how beatiful, handsome, rich, funny, talented, etc the other partner is. But, they sometimes get in the way of our brains when making good decisions. You need to quit making excuses as to why it's okay for your partner not to possess all of the things on your list. After all, that's what you made the list for--to help you make decisions. Either you're in denial or you weren't truthful when making your two lists. You must figure this out for yourself.

A marriage is a relationship centered around giving to each other. Thus, as a Christian, you will want to seek out someone who shares that same mentality. If a very giving person is in a relationship with someone who is in the habit of taking and never giving, the relationship becomes strained as the very giving person becomes drained and eventually is left with very little to give. The relationship is doomed from the beginning. Learn to spot these people early on.

While there is a normal amount of disagreement in every relationship, it is important to understand that a relationship in which there is constant fighting will put a strain on your lives. But, by following the Christian-based tips outlined in this article, you can avoid much of the unnecessary strife that plagues so many other relationships.

Christian dating is the first step toward a marriage that is blessed by God.