Dating With A Purpose
by Pastor Jack Schaap
Pastor of the First Baptist Church of Hammond, Indiana
Chapter Nineteen
To Those Engaged
A wise man once said that the mark of maturity in a young couple was their ability to keep their head while they were in love. The stereotyped image we have of engaged couples is two people running in slow-motion toward each other in a field of wind-blown wildflowers, with their concentration solely on one another with absolutely no cares or concerns: pretty, but not totally accurate.
Engagement is often a trying time of emotional highs and lows, insecure feelings, second guessing God's will, and testy relationships with Parents.
Allow me to offer some practical help.
1. Don't neglect your family and friends. Sure, the only thing that matters is each other, but long before you two ever knew the other one existed your family and friends loved you and cared for you. They deserve to have a significant part in this wonderful time of your life. Include them in your dating, your planning, your dreams, and your schedule.
Parents especially need extra reminders of your love and affection. They are happy for you, but there is absolutely no way for you to know how much they love you and hurt at the thought of "losing" you. They will feel quite unneeded, unwanted, unloved, unappreciated, and unnecessary unless you make a double effort to convince them otherwise.
2. Schedule your wedding plans over the entire engagement Decide what plans you must make, and then do a few items on your list each month, rather than racing to accomplish everything during the first few weeks.
3. Take on some new outside interests personally. It is very easy for the engagement to become stale. You have talked about everything, planned your life together, tried every dating idea a dozen times; now it is time to work at being fresh and positive. Read a good book, try a new sport or hobby, meet some new friends, take on a new soul-winning ministry, but don't get in a rut of boredom.
During the last half of my engagement, I felt I needed a fresh activity to keep my mind stimulated and my time full. I was already a private airplane pilot, but I decided to take aerobatic flight instruction. This was new and exciting, and it gave me a diversion from the pressure of planning a wedding.
4. Don't get engaged more than nine months before your wedding date. Six months might be even wiser. You don't need to take eighteen months to plan your wedding. The preparations are not that time-consuming.
The engagement stage of dating is very temporary. For instance, you will never leave the "I like you" stage or the "I love you" stage of dating, or at least you shouldn't. But, the engagement stage is only temporary. You will always like and love your mate, but you will only be engaged for a little while.
It is easy; therefore, to get fussy, irritable, and overly anxious for the wedding day. This leads to serious problems which could have been avoided if you don't allow for a lengthy engagement.
5. Don't become too introspective during engagement. You have made your choice, now live with it. Certainly you sought the wise advice from both your parents and your pastor. Certainly you sought the Lord with prayer and fasting. Certainly you dated your fiancé (or fiancée) over a long time and in a variety of situations to become well acquainted with him/her. Now is not the time to reevaluate your choice. Never undo in doubt what you decided in faith. Now certainly, if you failed to follow the principles of counsel and prayer, then by all means get the matter settled before you many.
Far too many couples come to engagement confident that the Lord led them to each other only to break up out of fear and too much reconsidering after they got engaged. That is tragic!
6. Don't discuss the physical aspect of marriage more than a few weeks before the wedding. Certainly this is an important part of marriage, and one which, for a pure couple, holds a mystique. Questions regarding birth control methods, expectations for the honeymoon, and a few other basic topics might be discussed.
7. Read several good books on marriage during the engagement. Your pastor could recommend a list of books.
8. Decide what your belief and practice regarding birth control will be before the wedding day. Seek the good advice of your pastor and a good Christian doctor.
9. Decide how much you can afford for the wedding and honeymoon and don't go in debt. Your marriage will only suffer if you start off in debt.
10. Be extra-careful to keep yourselves pure. There is a strong temptation to justify impure behavior by saying you are getting married, and it won't matter if you sneak a little preview of marriage. But it will. Just decide to be pure all the way through to the wedding altar!
11. If at all possible, men, give your fiancée an engagement ring. A general rule of thumb is to spend approximately one month's salary on the ring.
12. Don't weigh your relationship every day. He asked you to marry him and gave you an expensive ring to show it. Now, don't make him prove it again every time you're together. She said "yes" to your offer; don't insist she bow and scrape for you. She's not your wife yet; don't treat her as such. She's not required to obey you as though she were your wife.
13. Have fun! The Lord willing, you will only be engaged once. Enjoy every day to the fullest. Let each day bring its own special flavor to your engagement. Have as your goal to live each day one at a time.
