SoCal Theologica: Musings from the West Coast

Anthony Calzia is one of my students at California Baptist University. Being a single Christian guy, he took great interest in one of our newer faculty members, Alex Chediak, and some of the rich advice he has to offer to single Christian folks. A shorter version of the interview appears in CBU’s campus newspaper.

As a single Christian “twenty-something” I have, like my fellow loners, given much thought to how to please God with my singleness while also wrestling with deep and at times painful questions. Like Adam in the garden some wonder, “I see two of everything else, where’s mine?” And then there are others who do not struggle but go from one relationship to the next trying to meet emotional and physical needs. If they were honest, the process is exhausting. Many girls and guys can testify to the hurt and pain that the cultural norms of casual dating have brought. Having given themselves emotionally or physically to someone unworthy, they now feel worthless yet still the pattern continues. What can be done? Jesus came to restore a broken world and broken people. Praise the Lord Jesus for forgiveness and restoration and a glorious future. There is hope for both the broken and the lonely in the Gospel. Jesus was crushed by God for sinners that they might come into a right relationship with God and a consequence of that is that our relationships with others are radically changed, even those with the opposite sex. So how should we deal with being single, dating, and marriage?

A Proverb says “one who walks with the wise will himself/herself become wise”. With this in mind I invite you to hear the answers to some questions I posed to someone who I consider to be very wise. Dr. Chediak is an Associate Professor of Engineering at California Baptist University in Riverside California. His book was very helpful in providing a framework from which to see these real and important issues.

Dr. Chediak’s blog, www.alexchediak.com/blog/ has helpful article and reviews and posts on everything from engineering, theology and current social issues, it would be wise to bookmark this site. With that said, here is what I asked Dr. Chediak:

1. Who are you? How did you come to write your book? How and when did you come to date and marry?

I came to Christ as a high schooler, and saw the aimless dating patterns of many high school Christians in my youth group and elsewhere. Later, I was involved in college ministry, and, being single in my twenties, I naturally gave these issues significant consideration. I first worked on Five Paths to The Love of Your Life for NavPress; the idea for that book came from all those helpful “multi-views” books that IVP and Zondervan publish on theological issues. I was finishing it when, in the summer of 2004, I was interning at Grace Community Church in Gardnerville, NV and was asked to teach a six-part series on Christian dating. The audience was the entire church, not one age demographic. So I began to think about how to prepare a series for all ages (high school students, college students, junior highers, parents and grandparents). The six messages I gave became the six chapters in With One Voice.

I met Marni on November 1, 2003 and married her on December 18, 2004 (yes, I’ve got all the anniversaries down!). I was in Berkeley, CA finishing graduate school, and she was living in Oakland and working for SBC (the CA phone company, now AT&T). We were both almost 30, and I guess you could say that we were both “ready for marriage” in that we each knew what we were looking for and were at an age/life-stage to marry. With the guidance, support, and community of her family and a lot of our close friends living nearby, we were able to get to know each other pretty well in a variety of contexts quite quickly. Over the period of a few months it was clear that we both met the criteria on our “lists,” and over the next few months we were delighted to discover how much we enjoyed each other and wanted to spend our lives together. God’s leading seemed clear by mid-summer 2004, when I proposed to her on a walk at sunset on the beach at Lake Tahoe.

2. In your book you explain where the structure and value of dating and marriage used to be and where they are now? Can you briefly summarize that?

Societal expectations on the part of men and women used to be clearer with regards to the pre-marital process. A man could expect certain things from a woman (e.g., restraint, discretion, and the need to earn her trust), and vice versa (e.g., that a man would work to earn a woman’s favor and would take the initiative to pursue her). This doesn’t mean that men and women were necessarily better; human depravity transcends social mores (Jer. 17:9; Ecc. 1:9). But it does mean that a guy who was known as a “player” could expect scorn. And a woman that was wildly flirtatious with guys could likewise expect public shame. Premarital sex, for example, was taboo for Christians and non-Christians alike. Not that it never happened, but it happened less often, and with public consequence (which was more likely to include pregnancy, since modern birth control was developed at about the same time as these structures were breaking down).

By contrast, today both men and women can be very uncertain as to how they should go about finding a life partner. For example, it’s no longer a given that a man will take the initiative, or that they’ll even go on “dates” to get to know each other. A man can’t be certain that a woman he meets is even interested in marriage, or whether she’s planning on pursuing only a career for the next decade and just wants a boyfriend.

There has also been a huge shift in the role of marriage in the life of an adult. Marriage used to be normative, and was closely associated with being a “grown up.” But now, marriage is not at all assumed. Many people feel that they should not only complete their education, but also be well established in a career before even thinking about marriage. With extra-marital sex and birth control being the norm, fewer feel an urgency to be married. These factors, along with the caution many feel given higher divorce rates, have caused a sharp increase in the average age of marriage and the percentage of adults who have never married.

3. To the single people out there who love Christ and who desire marriage, and who may look around and feel like Adam counting the animals and going, “Where’s mine?”, what advice would you give as to how they should honor God in this period, and how should they prepare themselves for the next stage?

The main thing is to focus on where God has you, and on being a faithful, conscientious, responsible steward of both the work and the opportunities God lays in your path. For example, being a college student is, for a season, an occupation—laboring hard at your studies, perhaps working a part-time job, making plans for your future (seeking full-time employment or a graduate degree of some sort). Then there are the unparalleled opportunities available as a single person: mission trips, service in a local church, connecting with a wide array of Christian friends (particularly at a fine Christian college like Cal Baptist). These provide the occasion for spiritual growth and, as a byproduct, a plethora of chances to observe and get to know many Christians of the opposite sex.

God works through means (our circumstances and choices). It is possible to over-emphasize our role in the process at the expense of trust in God. For example, some Christians are too eager to pursue relationships because they lack the contentment that comes with finding their identity in Christ. They tend to get too intimate too quickly and the relationship crashes and burns, or they get heavily entangled with someone who is not a good life mate.

Other Christians overlook the significance of their romantic inclinations and responsibility for their actions (or lack thereof), only to wonder why they never meet anyone. Perhaps under the guise of “being content in Christ,” they neglect opportunities for opposite-sex friendships that God puts in their path. Many stay single far longer than necessary because of this over-emphasis on “contentment” (or, in my opinion, a false understanding of the gift of celibacy in I Cor. 7). Another twist on this error is that the single will avoid a relationship until they are certain that the person is “God’s will” for them. This can be a misapplication or misunderstanding of how God calls us to obey Him. God’s moral will for us is revealed in His word, but His sovereign will is not disclosed in advance (Deut. 29:29). We discover it one day at a time as we walk by the Spirit (Eph. 4:20-32).

4. What are the qualities that guys should look for in a young woman before even considering her as a potential wife? What should men possess before a girl should give him the time of day?

A pattern of interest in spiritual things, a commitment to growth in a local church, private Bible reading, a prayer life, and a commitment to integrity in her work and personal life. If these things are absent, move along. Your presence in their life won’t change things, and if it does, it is probably artificial.

5. If a guy/girl meets these qualities what is the next step? How should he/she move forward in pursuing the glory of God in a relationship?

Next steps depend on a number of factors. For example, age, maturity, and what natural associations they may have. If he has plenty of chances to see her, he has time to “view her from a distance” as it were, without making his intentions known. This has a number of advantages. If he can delay making his interest known, he can get to know her as she really is, rather than taking a risk that the woman he is falling for is a figment of his imagination. (Infatuation often involves seeing the other person through rose-colored glasses.) That said, he must certainly express his interest in a reasonable amount of time. But all this applies only to a guy who is no more than a couple years away from being able to realistically marry someone. This is controversial, but I would suggest those who are younger avoid committed, exclusive, marriage-oriented relationships. The dangers tend to outweigh the benefits.

There are all kinds of “what ifs” here. What should the girl do if a guy doesn’t know she is interested in him? What if they’re not in the same community and unless he “makes a move” when he first meets her he’ll never see her again? I try to address these types of real-world concerns a bit in the book.

6. Explain the theological significance of dating? If we are to “eat and drink and WHATEVER, we do do to the glory of God” how does that apply to dating?

The implications are manifold. We are to trust God in the process, even as we step out and act in faith (knowing that God works through means). We must treat others with integrity, knowing that we will have to answer to God for hurting others through unmet expectations (declaring undying affection when just getting to know someone, “fishing” for their feelings before declaring your own, etc.). While there is “one person” out there for us to marry (if we’re called to marry), the only way to be completely certain we’ve found “the one” is after we’ve made our vows and tied the knot. And this is liberating – we don’t have to wait for some magical moment when we know with mathematical certainty that Jen (or Jake) is “the one.” There is some Christian liberty in terms of choosing whom to marry. The person should be a growing Christian, and someone whose presence in your life helps rather than hinders your walk with God. But it should also be someone whose presence you generally enjoy, and to whom (for a myriad of reasons, physical and non-physical) you find so attractive that life without them is unimaginable.