Generally speaking, Christians are great people in a lot of ways. But sometimes, for some reason, they end up being less Christ-like and more crazy-like. The realm of dating and male-female relationships is one of these areas. It seems that when conversations concerning the opposite sex come into the picture, Christians immediately make things more complicated than they should be and thus bring undue tension, drama, and stress into the picture.
1. Everything is about marriage. You can’t express any kind of interest in anyone without people immediately jumping to the “they’re going to get married” conclusion. Can we just take it one step at a time? I asked her if she’d like to have coffee, not if she wants to spend the rest of her life with me — I don’t even know her like that. You’ve got to take the time to get to know people first before you can accurately gauge whether or not they’re even marriage material, but too often, Christians seem to think that expressed interest implies that the research is already done. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t. But let’s be on the safe side and not assume anything. A meal doesn’t always lead to marriage so enjoy your dessert.
2. There’s always more than meets the eye. There seem to always be ulterior motives. Can we just have fun hanging out and enjoying each other’s company without the pressure of adding titles and timelines to the relationship? Now, I understand that you don’t want to lead people on, but we don’t need to define the relationship before we’ve finished out coffee. It’s really not that serious. Why do I feel like we have to interrogate each other in order to make sure that they fulfill all the qualifications (see #4) that we think we need to have in order to obtain this perfect spouse.
