Recently we held a seminar on the topic of Biblical Courtship, for our church and those interested in the surrounding area.  I will be posting component parts of the seminar on this blog over the next few weeks.  If you would like to listen to the seminar online, just follow this courtship link. 

 In today’s culture the word courtship has very little meaning and if anything it conveys a prudish, stodgy, and anachronistic alternative to the normal accepted practice of dating.  But the issue that we are dealing with as a culture is not primarily about dating versus courtship, but rather preparing for God glorifying marriages built on Christ and biblical wisdom versus following the normal worldly system of marital preparation, which has led to destruction of marriages and families in the past few generations.

 CONSIDER THE STATE OF OUR CULTURE

Statistics are not everything, but they can give us a glimpse of the health of a society.  Approximately 40% of our children are born out of wedlock in the United States today.  The divorce rate for professing Christians is almost the same as the divorce rate of the rest of the culture.  In a Barna study in 2008, out of 4,000 interviews:

• 33% of those who have been married responded that they have been divorced.
• 32% of all born again Christians responded that they have been divorced.
• 28% of Catholics responded that they have been divorced.
• 26% of Evangelical born again Christians responded that they have been divorced.[1]

Notice that there is only a 1% difference between all respondents (33%) and born again respondents (32%).  One-third of the people who were married also experienced divorce.  It is slightly encouraging to see that the percentage of professing “Evangelical born again Christians” is lower.  But still, the numbers are quite alarming.  The Americans For Divorce Reform have stated, “Probably, 40 or possibly up to 50 percent of marriages will end in divorce if current trends continue.”[2]  This means that approximately half our children live in single parent or blended families.

The United States Welfare System and Tax Code seems to reward out of wedlock births, rather than discourage them.  It appears that our government is trying to take over for Dads.  Women can get welfare help, such as Government Housing, Food Stamps, etc…as long as there is no responsible male figure in the household.  This has created an endemic of fatherlessness in our culture.

Broken families have consequential effects on the children.  Studies in the early 1980’s indicated that children in repeat divorces earned lower grades and their peers rated them as less pleasant to be around.   Teenagers in single-parent families and blended families are three times more likely to need psychological help within a given year.  Compared to children from homes disrupted by death, children from divorced homes have more psychological problems.  Did you catch that?  Children have adjusted better to the loss of a parent in death than they have to divorce.  A study of children six years after a parental marriage breakup revealed that even after all that time, these children tended to be “lonely, unhappy, anxious, and insecure.”  Seventy percent of long-term prison inmates grew up in broken homes.[3]  In short, marriage and family are in a free-fall in our culture.  The bedrock of a thriving civilization is cracked and failing.  Something needs to be done.  We have to ask ourselves why?  We have to reestablish what the goal is in raising children and preparing for marriage.

OUR GOAL

Part of the problem in the debate over courtship and dating is that the wrong goal has been in view.  All of our effort has been in abstinence education, maintaining purity, and the need to protect our children from Cassanova.  Well, purity is vital, as we will see later.  Abstinence is essential.  But our goals are more far-reaching than that.  Our goal should be: Marriages that glorify God and yield a righteous generation! This should be the goal of parents for their children and young men and women for themselves.

For parents, your responsibility is not just to get them married and out of the house!  We laugh, but this appears to be the attitude of far too many parents.  Some believe that there is something magical about the age of 18, which releases parents from any further responsibility in the direction their children head.  That may be true legally, but as we will see, it is not true biblically. Parents need to have a vision that extends beyond being comfortable in our empty nest years, seeking fruit that abounds long after we leave this earth.  It is the fertile environment of God glorifying marriages that will produce such rich and enduring fruit in the generations to come.

For young men and women, your responsibility is not merely to find someone attractive that is fun to be around and makes your heart go pitter patter.  It is not merely to find a professing Christian.  It is to prepare for a God glorifying marriage that will yield a righteous generation.

Our goal will be dependent on our view of marriage.  Marriage is a sacred institution!   In Matthew 19:6, Jesus affirms the sanctity of marriage, “So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”  So often the emphasis on this passage is placed on the so-called “exceptions,” when the overwhelming emphasis of Christ is on the sanctity and covenantal nature of the institution of marriage.

Marriage depicts the relationship of Christ and His Bride, the Church (Eph 5:22-33).  Marriage depicts the oneness of the Triune Godhead (Gen 1:26; 2:24; Deut 6:4; John 17:20-21).  Marriage even  depicts our future glorification (Rev 19:9).  Marriage is a picture of a future marriage, a future reality, and a future blessedness.  It demands our careful attention and preparation, so that the image is not so marred that it reflects nothing of the reality.

It is crucial that we do all in our power to get this right!  Our children’s future is at stake.  Our grandchildren, great grandchildren, and so on…will be affected.  The Church will be affected by it.  Society will be affected by it. 

We prepare for many things.  Above all, let us be prepared for this.  We prepare for tests, research papers, college and career.  How much more, for that which will have far reaching generational repercussions, either for God’s glory or for worldly ill. This is why we must evaluate the modern practices that lead to marriage.  In our day, it is called dating.  Is it biblical?  Is it helpful or harmful?  We’ll look into these as we study further.

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[1] Barna Group, March 31, 2008: http://www.barna.org/barna-update/article/15-familykids/42-new-marriage-and-divorce-statistics-released

[2] The Americans for Divorce Reform: http://www.divorcereform.org/results.html

[3] 18 Shocking Statistics About Children and Divorce: http://www.marriage-success-secrets.com/statistics-about-children-and-divorce.html