Tag Archive for: Dating

Podcast 87: Soulmate or Family-First?

A biblical view of marriage recently appeared in, of all places, the Wall Street Journal! What a nice surprise! This week, we examine the soulmate myth and explain the better alternative for thinking about marriage.

[The article we talk about so much can be found here—again, in the Wall Street Journal, not the New York Times!]

Podcast 75: Why Counsel Before Getting Engaged?

When you hear “pre-engagement counseling,” you might ask yourself, “Why would I want to counsel with a minister before I get engaged?” Yet, if you’re thinking biblically, it makes perfect sense. Join us as we talk about it on this week’s episode.

Men and Modesty

One of the biggest complaints I ever heard from my students was about the school’s dress code, and these complaints sometimes caused me to think about the relationship between female modesty and male thoughts. The students had been told that boys were easily distracted by female dress—hence, at least one of the reasons to have a dress code. While the students did not like to acknowledge that connection, the Bible also points out in 1 Timothy 2:9 that women should “adorn themselves in modest apparel” and focus more on “the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit” (1 Peter 3:1-6). Young ladies in the Church are taught this principle and given instructions on how to put it into practice, and if you’re one of them, a great place to start is the companion to this post, Mrs. Jeanine Smith’s “Women and Modesty.”

But this post is for young men: When you think of modesty, do you think it only applies to the ladies? That can be a dangerous trap, for two reasons. 

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Women and Modesty

In Muslim nations and communities, women dress in burkas or long-sleeved abaya in order to be considered appropriate in their culture. Yet in Indian culture, an exposed belly is not considered revealing—whether it is 20 years old or 80, and whether its size is 2 or 32. Meanwhile, in the United States, Amish women dress only in dresses comprised of a simple scoop-neck bodice attached to a loosely gathered straight skirt, and perhaps only pinned together, because pleats and buttons are considered too ostentatious.

Depending on where you live, culture does play into how one should dress. However, with a few exceptions here and there, most Western nations have a lot of leeway in what is considered appropriate or inappropriate for women to wear. But do we have that much latitude in God’s view?

Biblically, women should not be ashamed of their bodies. When God created Eve, He made her beautiful, and women are designed to want to be that way. Peter acknowledges that women want to be beautiful, and he extends that to beauty that is more than skin deep (1 Peter 3:3). Our character needs to be beautiful, and every godly woman wants to be beautiful on both the outside and the inside.

So, if God meant for women to be beautiful, why must Christian women be concerned with what they wear in public? Does God care if we wear yoga pants and a cropped sweatshirt to the mall? Does God care if we wear a low-cut blouse with a keyhole opening? Does God mind if, when we sit down and cross our legs, anyone in front of us can see halfway up our thighs? Although it is godly for women to desire to be beautiful, is that the same as being sexy—by definition, “sexually suggestive or stimulating”—in public?

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TW Article: “Should We Kiss Dating Hello?”

Here is the July-August 2020 Tomorrow’s World article by Mr. Jonathan McNair that was referenced on this week’s podcast: “Should We Kiss Dating Hello?” Though it was written to parents, it is really instructive for anyone wanting to understand what we should be focusing on in different stages of our development, versus the priorities pressed on us by a world that sees us as “walking wallets” instead of growing human beings with an eternal future who are seeking to live a good life.

Just click here to go straight to it!

Podcast: What We Wish We’d Known

In this week’s Living Youth Podcast, with guest co-host Mr. Mark Sandor, we reflect on our own “unchurched” youth and consider what we know now that we wish we’d known then. We hope you find it profitable! The Spotify link will be added as soon as it is available.

P.S. When I posted this earlier today, I forgot that we had mentioned some articles we wanted to link to. Here are those links! Click away!

Thinking Biblically: Definitions

When I think about what it means to “think biblically,” I usually think, “How do I look at situations with the Bible as my guide?” And that’s fine! Most of the content on this website takes that approach: “How do we think biblically about entertainment? About dating? About current events?” 

But sometimes we also have to think biblically about something much more basic, like the definition of words. This might seem too simple, but you would be surprised by how many contentions spring from people not even agreeing on how words are defined. 

“Come on, Mr. Sandor,” you might think, “we know what dictionaries are. They give the same words and definitions to all of us.” Well, you have a point—to a degree. While dictionaries give us the opportunity to uniformly define words, it’s still not uncommon for people to just ignore dictionaries and use whatever definitions they have in their heads. 

But there’s a bigger problem: Dictionaries don’t use the Bible to define words. The Bible provides definitions for sin (1 John 3:4), righteousness, (Psalm 119:172), faith (Hebrews 11:1, 6), and a host of other words—and these definitions are different from what you’ll find when you google a word (or dig out a hardcopy dictionary). 

For this post, let’s briefly consider the word love. How should we define that? Well, if you’re still reading, you’re about to get some answers. 

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