Should Christians Approach Dating Casually?

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Welcome to Bible Bash, where we aim to equip the saints for the work of ministry by answering the questions you're not allowed to ask.

We're your hosts, Harrison Kerrig and Pastor Tim Mullett, and today we'll answer the age -old question, is it okay to leave my church if I break up with another church member?

Now Tim, as we kick this episode off, what Bible verse do you have to read for us related to breaking up with another church member and whether or not you should stay there?

Yeah, sure. So 1 Timothy 5, 1 -2 says, Do not rebuke an older man, but encourage him as you would a father, younger men as brothers, and older women as mothers, younger women as sisters in all purity.

Okay, so explain the relevance with that Bible verse to breaking up with another church member.

Yeah, I mean, your current relationship status really isn't a thing. I mean, Paul basically views single people.

There's only a few categories in the Bible. There's married, and there's single. So there's no

Facebook in a relationship status or whatever else. That isn't really real. So whatever you're doing as a church member, when you're trying to pursue a member of the opposite sex, your dating relationship, quote -unquote, is not conferring upon you any rights or privileges, essentially.

It's all make -believe. It's all pretend that you're doing. So then what you're doing is you're basically saying, am I allowed to leave my church because this pretend relationship that I entered into ended?

So it's kind of a silly question. Well, yeah, and that's something I was going to ask you about to try and kick off the episode was, how much of this kind of conversation is actually a conversation surrounding the modern approach to dating in general?

Because it would have been very different back then, presumably. But for us, in a lot of ways, it's almost like a, hey, you're kind of married without actually really being married.

At least that's how people view it. And so the question is, when you're looking at,

I just broke up with this girl or I just broke up with this guy. I feel like I need to leave.

How much of that is actually a conversation about, well, you probably approached trying to find a spouse in an inappropriate way versus just, hey, you should or you shouldn't leave the church.

Yeah. So I mean, people are inescapably made, they're made in the image of God.

They know that it's not good for a man to be alone. And so they know that they're made for marriage, whether or not they're actually pursuing marriage.

And for many people, like dating, whatever that is, is essentially for them.

I mean, it's a mechanism that they're using to get some of the benefits of marriage without the commitment of marriage.

I mean, in the best case scenario, I mean, even in almost the best case scenario, most people are viewing it as if there are some rights or benefits that are conferred upon them by virtue of their changed relationship status.

So they're trying to get something that they're supposed to be getting out of marriage. And that, as you're saying, that's leading them to this conclusion that when they break up,

I mean, it's almost like a divorce for them, basically. So it's almost like a divorce for them. And I think that is an indictment on the way that they're thinking about whatever it is that they're doing.

So in different social arrangements, you would not play, pretend marriage for a period of time before you decide whether or not you're going to commit to it, if that makes sense, like totally in the context of marriage.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. And so, so you're basically saying, yeah, so you are basically saying, Hey, it's a, there is a very inappropriate, um, you know, there is a very inappropriate approach to dating or, well, approach to finding a spouse that's happening here.

Right. Yeah. I'm not invested in what people call it, so to speak. You know, I don't really invested in what the name that people use to describe what they're doing is, but then it's very obvious that in modern dating, most people, they don't view this person as being a sister in Christ solely.

They view them as something else. So they're viewing them basically as a quasi spouse, break up with a quasi spouse.

They're viewing it as a quasi divorce, right? So when you have a divorce, then you don't want to see the person, you know, week in and week out.

So they're not approaching this as a sister in Christ relationship purely. That's not what they're doing.

So then because they're not approaching it that way, then what's happening is if it ends, then they were something more than a sister in Christ to them that gave them some kind of benefits or something along those lines.

So that basically means that, yeah, it would be way too awkward. And my emotions are so tied up in the tied up into this relationship now that basically

I have to depart or leave. It'd just be too awkward, man. So yeah, yeah.