By: Chris and Juliana
Our Story...
12 / 31 / 2016
He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord. Proverbs 18:22 (ESV) Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. Genesis 2:24 (KJV)
(Chris) How does a person honor the Lord while pursuing marriage? In the world we live in today, the idea of honoring God in a dating relationship (I prefer the term courtship) seems completely foreign. People look at you like honoring God and dating are two completely separate things. Why is this? First off, neither of us claims to be any kind of expert on relationships or any type of brilliant theologians, we are just two Christians who desire to honor the Lord. Much of our motivation stems from the fact that we have seen our families, friends and colleagues fail to honor the Lord in their relationships/marriages and have witnessed the ensuing hurts, heart aches and worse.
Before we talk more about honoring the Lord while pursuing marriage, I would like to introduce us. I met Juliana in July through some inadvertent collusion between Nick (our pastor) and our friends, Roger and Michelle. Roger knew I needed a person to do some writing for my business so between Roger, Michelle and I we decided to get together over dinner at their place and Juliana joined us. While this was happening, Nick was also at work trying to encourage both of us to get to know each other with an eye towards pursuing courtship. Fast forward about 3 weeks and a couple of successful work projects and Juliana left for a short mission’s trip. I was not anticipating communicating with her over that time period but around hundred emails and two weeks later we wanted to meet and talk about what the steps would look like to pursue a courtship. After talking in person a couple of times, we had a game plan (with some input from family, friends and mentors). The game plan is to tackle every difficult or challenging question we can come up with, from views on raising kids, finances, theological topics like rapture and predestination, business goals, personal preferences, and much more! Our promise to each other was no matter what we thought the other person might think, we had to answer honestly. I am not sure how many hours of phone conversation occurred over the next three to four weeks but I am pretty sure it would be measured in days and not hours. I was stunned how uplifting the conversation was and how compatible we were on so many levels. The thing that stood out the most to me about Juliana was her heart for the Lord, I knew she would always love the Lord more than me and that was so important to me!
(Juliana) There were so many questions back and forth! It was so fun to think of questions to ask throughout the day and then have the opportunity to ask them that evening. After a couple weeks of asking questions and finding very few differences, and minor ones at that (he likes mushrooms…), we tried to find things that we disagreed on. We started talking about theological viewpoints and other heavier topics. Chris is right, the conversation was uplifting and challenging in a way that encouraged me in my walk with the Lord. During these conversations, and the time since, I’ve been struck by the leader that Chris strives to be. He doesn’t shirk that responsibility as the man in this relationship. Neither does he override my opinions or feelings on any given topic. (Chris) One of the main topics of conversation was the idea of honoring the Lord with the relationship. Regardless of whether or not the end result is marriage, we both desire for it to be honoring to the Lord and also for it to be an outward testimony of our faith. Wearing a ring can be an outward declaration of something (Marriage, Engagement, purity, etc.) and in our case we wanted something tangible to go with our commitment to each other to honor the Lord with our relationship. The rings that you will find on the left ring finger of both our hands represents a promise to honor the Lord with our relationship. The ring does not simply represent a commitment to abstinence, or a commitment to each other but a complete surrender of the relationship to the Lord. Our commitment to honoring the Lord with our relationship includes Surrendering to the Lord, being very purposeful, protecting purity and complete transparency. J (Juliana) When Chris first suggested wearing rings in the courtship phase of our relationship, I thought that it was a sweet idea. But, the longer that I thought about it, the more I realized what a good idea it really was. Every time I see it, or tell someone about it, I’m reminded of the blessing that God has brought into my life. When I’m being impatient, I’m reminded to relax and enjoy each moment of the relationship. Each time that I see it, or talk about it, I’m reminded of the commitment that we made to each other and God.
(Chris) “Being painfully purposeful in pursuing our relationship knowing that the end goal is marriage”, this is scary because it requires letting go of control and surrendering to the Lord. I have a very difficult time letting go of trying to control the results. Yet when you are purposeful about addressing hard things, you have to give control to the Lord because there is no way to sugar coat a purposeful question. Being purposeful is so much easier said than done and I am the first person to admit that I do fall short on a daily basis and start to slide into complacency. What is amazing to me is that this does not sound romantic or fun at all but to be honest with you, being purposeful has been the most freeing and rewarding thing I have ever experienced. Especially asking hard questions and sharing even when it will be challenging! The best example that comes to mind is debt. This was a tough one to work through but the amazing thing that resulted was that the solution reached is, in my opinion, a better place to be than if we continued on our own paths. (Juliana) We have definitely discussed some hard things. There have been times that I asked a question and then cringed when I remembered that I had to answer it, too. As we started trying to find things that we might disagree on, it was amazing to see God work in both of our hearts. We all have ideas of how things should be done. From something as simple as doing the dishes to how to raise a family. When we found a topic that we actually had differing views on, it was a really neat, uplifting experience to discuss it and come to a mutual agreement. I never felt that I was compromising. I felt that my opinions really mattered and were valued.
But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband. 1 Corinthians 7:2 (ESV) Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin[a] a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. 1 Corinthians 6:18 (ESV) (Chris) Protecting purity! This is challenging in a whole other way…. It can be so gray and confusing when talking about how much touch is too much touch. One thing that we discussed early on is how much of desire each of us has for touch and based on this we decided to play things on the conservative side even with innocent things like hugging and holding hands. Our purity commitment looks like this: kissing and everything beyond that will be saved for marriage. Yes, if the Lord blesses us and we are fortunate enough to get married, then our first kiss will be at the wedding. Crazy? Well not if I think of it like this, if I kiss a girl and do not marry her, then that means I just kissed another man’s wife. Kissing is the simple part, the area that is complicated though is simple touch and knowing what is too much. We do not claim to have this figured out at all but our commitment is to not even hold hands, hug or say “I love you” until being formally engaged and even at that stage hugging/embracing will be conservative. (Juliana) I know this sounds insane. I have even thought, “What was I thinking when I said this was a good idea?” But, that didn’t last long. We both know that physical touch is the icing on the cake. The core of a relationship, the part that you deal in for the majority of your life together, is the heart of a person. Their beliefs, their character, who they are when no one is watching. Adding physical touch before you’ve decided if you want to spend the rest of your life with someone can create confusion and uncertainty.
(Chris) Lastly, total transparency is without a doubt the most challenging aspect in which to know if you are doing a good job. There are so many things that I may not even think to share that may be important to Juliana. To safe guard total transparency, we have invited our families to be an essential part of the relationship to help give us guidance, provide insight that neither of us would think of and to observe to be sure we are being real with each other. I often refer to dating as marketing and what do we all know about marketing? Marketing always focuses on the positive attributes of a product/service and carefully down plays any potential negative attributes! Guess what, marketing ends the same day you sign for a lifetime and the real person is all that is left. Transparency is so incredibly important to us! In everything set them an example by doing what is good. In your teaching show integrity, seriousness. Titus 2:7 (NIV) Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. Romans 12:10 (NIV) Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered. 1 Peter 3:7 (ESV)
MORE TO COME SOON.........