Courtship and Dating Q & A

Typically Steve does the Sunday School classes. He's been working through different theological points.

Last week I said to Steve, there's a few things I didn't get to say in last week's sermon, but I didn't really have enough to do a full sermon.

So I said, why don't I take Sunday School? He's preaching tonight anyway, so it's a good exchange. So today is basically an overview of last

Sunday's dating, singleness, courtship section of the sermon. And then we'll open it up to some questions and some answers.

I have to say that I got a lot of responses from the last, not just last Sunday's sermon, but the last probably five or six weeks, or the last 47 weeks, depending on how you count.

And so let's pray. We'll give an overview of singleness, dating, courtship. And then if you have questions, by the way, the junior high school class will be in here today.

They're invited, and the high school class as well. And so I want you younger folks, if you have questions, to just keep your mouth shut.

No, just kidding. If you have questions, seriously, and you're younger, now you're awake. And the visitors are going, oh, great.

If you're younger and you have a question, I'd like you to be able to ask those questions too, okay? Because I think we could all learn from one another.

You know what I really like? When you're first a pastor, you don't really know the people you're preaching to. And then as the years go by, we get to know each other, and I really think you guys are my family, and I'm part of your family too.

And so it'll be good to just have kind of a family hour. If it gets too spicy, we won't put it up on the

Internet. If it's too dull, we won't put it up on the Internet either. Okay, let's pray first.

Father, thank you for this day today. Your mercies are new every day, and your faithfulness is great.

And we're just very thankful that we have guidance from you, that you've given us faithful teachers throughout the years.

Think about the wisdom of some of the Puritans, the wisdom of some of the Reformers, of course, divine wisdom that you've given

Solomon, Old Testament writers, the apostles. And then we're very thankful that we have

Christ Jesus as our king and our master and our great teacher. So I pray for Bethlehem Bible Church today.

I pray for the young people as they desire to have a godly spouse and desire to get married and to have children.

I pray that you'd grant them their wishes. I pray that you'd give them a wonderful life, godly spouses, and just a life that would shine forth

Christ Jesus as a good king to serve. And for others, I pray that you would help them as parents, as grandparents.

And as we look back upon your good providence in our life, we're very thankful that you brought us this far. And today we set up this

Ebenezer that God has been faithful thus far, and we'd ask that you'd be faithful in our church in the years to come.

In Jesus' name, amen. All right, so just quickly in review, courtship, dating, singleness.

Here's the thing. I think I'm better at teaching through a passage than I am kind of spilling my gizzard just on philosophical ideas.

And so this topic, courtship, dating, singleness, we have singleness in the

Bible, but there's not a whole lot on courtship. There's not a whole lot on dating. So much of it comes from wisdom.

Much of it comes from leadership that a father or the church has in this sense.

Let me just do it this way, I think. You guys can't see that, can you? I don't know if anybody can.

If I had to boil down the essentials of courtship and dating and all that from a Christian perspective, the first word that I'd want to remind you of is the father.

Now, when I say father, of course, I'm not belittling mothers. I'm not saying that women should be seen but not heard.

If you know my wife, you know that, well, thankfully, by the grace of God, I don't treat her like a

Neanderthal man dragging Kim's hair along the way, and I try not to treat her in any way disrespectfully.

She's an image bearer. She's equal in Christ. But we just have different functions. And so when it comes to dating and courtship or courtship and dating,

I first want to remind you that the father has a key role. You can look at the Proverbs, right?

Proverbs 2, my son. Proverbs 5, my son. Proverbs 6, my son. Proverbs 7, any guesses on how that might start?

And the list goes on and on and on. Ephesians 6, 4, fathers. You raise your children with instruction and discipline, and so it's the key to remember who the father is.

And so I saw a couple 15 -year -old kids walking down the street the other day holding hands, and maybe it was a pure relationship, maybe it was fine and dandy, but I say to myself, where is the father?

So we'll review that in just a second, but that's the first key word. The second key word when you want to work through this,

I think, with biblical wisdom is it's public versus, I should say, father versus,

I'm going to say kids, but just because young people and adolescents, it's too hard to write. Father versus kids, public versus private.

When it comes to courtship and dating, your parents trying to work through the issues, this is done in a public fashion, not a private fashion.

So with the father involved, if someone would like to get to know your daughter a little bit or someone would like to, you know, you're giving advice to your son, then you want it to be done in a public forum.

That is to say, come on over to my house, we'd love to get you to know the family, we'd love to get to know you, versus, why don't you pick my daughter up at 7 o 'clock and have fun at the drive -in, we'll see you at midnight, right?

Private, dark, away, versus public in church settings, in public settings, in home settings.

So we've got father as the first key word, public as the second key word. By the way, if you're visiting today and you want biblical exposition, you just have to wait until about 10 .30

and you'll be set. This is kind of a family hour here, a special Sunday school. And the third one is, let's say, a view towards marriage.

I'm just going to say view to marriage just for the sake of this. View to marriage. Let's just say toward, okay.

View toward marriage that we tried to stress, or I tried to stress last week, that if you're going to allow your young people to court or to date, courtship.

I hate to be a pop culture guy, but you know when I think of courtship, the first thing that comes to my mind, I have to be honest with you, the courtship of Eddie's father.

That's what I think of. Pat knew what

I was going to say. Because that's the first time he ever heard the word, the courtship of Eddie's father. You can

Google that if you don't know what that is. So the fathers are involved.

You go through the father. Someone says, I'd like to get to know your daughter. The daughter says, would you please,

I'd like to get to know you too. Would you please talk to my father? And by the way, that really helps out because men, especially when it comes to dating, young boys, especially when it comes to courtship, are very persistent.

And it's hard for them to take no for an answer. Their best sales skills come to light when they're trying to get the girl.

And so this way, if the daughter says, I'm sorry, you know, you'll have to ask my dad, then the dad can feel the pressure of, well, why won't you let her go out with me?

Why can't we date? Why is this inappropriate? And the list of questions that are given to the father, it's much easier for him to handle those than the young girl.

So we go through the father first. We have everything's done in public. You can date us.

You can't date the family, but you can date us. You get to know all of us. And by the way, as this young man earns your respect, dads, is it okay to ever let them go out on their own?

Go out and have a cup of coffee? Go have dinner? I think the answer is yes.

I think you can go on a date in the courtship process once the father's ready. And then lastly, for the view towards marriage.

If you are not ready to get married, you're not ready to date. You're not ready for romance.

You're not ready for courtship. And so if you're not ready to support a family, if you're not ready for marriage, then you're not ready for courtship.

And so many times the suitors will come for the girls, and they'll realize I've got to go through the father.

I've got to do everything in public, and I've got to do this with a view towards marriage. This liaison that I'd like, maybe even a sexual liaison, isn't worth it because I'd rather go find a girl, sadly, that has no father that cares, that we can be in private, and marriage, that's later.

That's 28, that's 30, that's 35. So these are really the three key things that I think about when it comes to courtship.

There's 100 different definitions, but the father plays the key role, of course, with the mother's inside.

And many, many times I'll say to Kim late at night, or we'll talk, what do you think of this and what do you think of that?

I'm not trying to demean ladies at all, but the father is the leader. Things are done in public, and it's a view towards marriage.

Now I have a question. Someone emailed me and said, could our kids, could our young people have friends that are the opposite sex?

What's the answer to that? Yes, of course. If you want to have friends of the opposite sex, that's fine.

I think Kim said at the homeschool conference that she went to, the person that did the courtship session, said something to this effect that once the friends, guy and girl, begin to talk about us, then it's over because they've moved it from friends to a relationship.

You know, Facebook status in a relationship. Well, by the way,

Facebook just kills me. I only get into Facebook through Haley's porthole because I like to see what she's doing.

And by the way, parents, if your kids have Facebook and you don't know the access codes to get in, I don't know what planet you're living on because I think it even helps the young people to say, you know, someone else is watching me.

Someone else is there. It's good for all areas of life. Harrington now is attending the church, and he's been a pastor for many years.

I don't usually say to myself, what will Harrington say as I preach this message, but I look out, and when

I see pastors in the congregation and Dave and others, it's a good check for me.

It's a good accountability for me. No one is an island. And so, for me,

Facebook, e -mail, I think parents, you need to know your kids' passwords, and you ought to check regularly, and you ought to say to your kids,

I check regularly, because then that helps them not to say something so stupid that's in Facebook forever.

How long does Facebook last? Forever. How about employers later on in life that go look at your

Facebook? Do you know employers go look at your Facebook to see if you're a dope or not? Again, the visitors today are going, this pastor's language is a little tough.

So, with a view towards marriage, and then when I said something about friendship, it's okay to have friends.

But I still think the father's involved, and friendship is done in a public setting.

And maybe some of those friends that your daughter or son have will actually be their husband -to -be.

Would that be fine? I think that would be great. So I'm not after friends. I'm not against friends.

I think that would be fine. So that's kind of just an overview, a recap, and I have some other things I want to say.

But you know what? Before I ask questions, you're not supposed to say this before you preach because then you're trying to make an excuse.

But I just could not sleep last night. And so my mind, it's, you know what I feel like today?

I feel like a shotgun versus some kind of 45.

I think last week I said I saw it off 45. I don't know what that would do. When I said it, I know it was wrong. But I'm kind of the scattered approach today.

Something we've been trying to tell our kids lately, maybe this will help you. If your young people always hang around other young people at church, is that okay?

Well, I don't think it's okay. If they do hang out with other young people at church, I think that's okay.

But always hang out with other young people, I don't think that's okay. Here's why. If they're always hanging out with other 15 -year -old boys because they're a 15 -year -old boy, are they always hanging out with 15 -year -old girls because they're a 15 -year -old boy?

I want the youth group to like each other and to be friends, and there will probably be marriages that come out of that. But if you only hang out with 15 -year -old young men or boys, then you miss out on the older people.

So we try to tell our daughters, we want you to have friends in the church, but don't forget

Dottie sitting over there. I don't know how old Dottie is, but she's at least 50,

I know that. Here sits Dottie and all this wisdom that she has.

Instead of running around crazy all the time, why don't you run around crazy for a few minutes and then talk to Dottie?

Sit and learn from Dottie. And it doesn't necessarily have to be older folks, although they have a lot of wisdom.

We say to our son, son, it's okay to play and run around, hang out with Asher and the guys, but then what about Linton?

What about going to hang out with Linton? We've mentioned Vincent before. Why don't you hang out with Vincent or with Josh or somebody who, as a young man who knows

I'm sold out for Christ and I want to follow him, don't you want your young sons to hang out sometimes with other men who are following Christ?

And I think the answer is yes. So if you always let your young people hang out only with other young people, they never get the body life.

Now I'm not against youth groups per se, because our particular youth group, we have lots of, I think we have almost more leaders than we do young people.

But I am against youth groups if they would only intersect with themselves, only and forever, because younger people can help motivate older people.

Older people can give wisdom to younger people. It's the body life there. So if you've got young people, encourage them to be around older godly people that they can look towards, not just one another.

Because if you've got a 15 -year -old kid, they're not ready for marriage yet. And if you're not ready for marriage, mark this down,

I could write this as another point, you're not ready for romance. You're just not ready to be romantically involved.

Okay, so that's just kind of an overview, 9 -15. What kind of questions do you have as a church when these things come up?

I think I'll talk a little bit about older singles, divorce singles in a minute. But right now, just with younger people, with kids, do you have any questions?

When I taught the youth group, I said, if you look down when I ask you a question, I'm calling on you. So if you look down,

Steve Cooley's looking up in the sky. I don't know if you've ever noticed, but look, there's a cross right there within the ventilation system.

I think we have extra godliness at this church. Look at that. Who knew? Who did not ever see that before in their life?

Well, I guess you're always looking up. It is hard, and if you think about what

I'm saying today, it sounds kind of kooky, doesn't it, from the world's perspective?

How many people grew up with this model for dating courtship? The cranes, that's it.

Nobody else. This just sounds weird. This does sound like, you know, the homeschool family.

Have you seen it? You know. You know what

I'm talking about. Type in the homeschool family, and you'll get it.

It's very difficult, and that's why fathers and mothers are so important, and that's why the local church is so important, because no one else is going to be saying, fathers, like I said last week, it is your job to protect the virginity of your daughter.

Nobody else is going to be saying that. No one is going to be saying, it's the father's responsibility to lead the family.

They're going to be saying, you know, basically every time you turn on a TV show, what do you see?

The dad's the dope. The dad's the oaf. The dad doesn't have any idea whether that's leading a family or in a relationship with a husband and wife.

It's the dad who doesn't know how to buy the right gifts. He doesn't remember the wife's anniversary. He's just the complete loser.

That's what the world is always selling. And by the way, sometimes men are the losers, but not all the time men are losers.

So when the world is always selling this, get young, have some experience. Marriage, I'm going to talk about this in the service.

It seems to be kind of a dying thing. Remember Cameron Diaz even this week. It's an old -fashioned institution that doesn't even work.

So the world's going to be saying exactly the opposite. And so we're going to be saying something that is unique and different.

Here's what I want you to be reminded of. In spite of your unbelieving spouse, in spite of the world system, we believe that there's a

God who's more powerful than any of these other systems or people. And so we entrust our kids into the care of God while we try to do our best in light of the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ.

Right? That's exactly what we do. We do our best in light of the cross, with godly sanctification, and then we have to believe there's a

God. I'll never forget when MacArthur was asked the question, you're raising four young children, this was 30 years ago, in Los Angeles, what do you do?

You're raising them in Los Angeles. You know what John said? I've never forgotten it. He said, I walk by faith, not by sight.

And so we're not perfect parents. The church isn't perfect. Our kids aren't perfect. But we serve this perfect God.

And so we entrust our kids into the faithful care of the God who does right, as 1 Peter chapter 4 talks about.

And so I don't want you to forget that in the middle of, yes, but my spouse isn't saved, my kid's not saved, my kid goes to a public school and has all kinds of influence, the world is selling all these things, you know, in one sense,

Kim and I were talking about it the other day, too bad this topic isn't going to come up again for a long time, because when am

I going to teach this in 1 Corinthians again? How can we teach this to the church on a regular basis? Because some of these topics just need to be taught more regularly, because now we're going to be off to divorce and remarriage.

Someone said, I'm kind of tired of that series you've done, five weeks on sex in 1 Corinthians 6 and 7.

I said, well, I don't know what to do, but I like that topic a lot better than I do divorce and remarriage that's up next.

That's up next, and so that's what we teach. So we just keep instilling in the kids the right way of thinking, and we say, you know what?

God gave me these young people. Imagine the day those kids were born. Remember those days? The babies were born, and you just think, a gift from God, Psalm 139.

And then you say, Lord, I'm going to have to entrust these kids. It's like Hannah. Hannah just entrusting her son to say, you know what?

Lord, he's all yours. Okay, Steve. I'm trying to think of something funny to say.

I think probably a lot of people want to say to me, just ease up a little bit, but they never do. So you can always call me and tell me that if you want.

Proms, interaction with others. You know, let me do it this way, Steve, because I know you're thinking this way, and you can help me.

What do you say? I won't ask this to everybody, but it's Steve's class. What are some of the things that you say?

Yeah, yeah. What did you say? Uh -huh.

I think I know where the ease off buddy came from. Uh -huh. I think that's so key.

I don't want my kids to be tempted to steal, to be tempted to have idols. I also don't want them to be tempted sexually.

And our kids grow up. God has given them hormones. Romance is good. It's given by God. The desire for sex is even good.

It's given by God. Sex is good. It's given by God. But all in the right time and in the right place.

And so why would I want to tempt them to say, here, go off alone to prom, where basically, you know, in the old days, prom was the night that, you know, the girls and the guys lose their virginity.

But now that's happened at age 13 and 14 and other times. Now it's just some kind of who knows what.

But why would I set them up for that, to be alone and all the pressure and the peer pressure? I wouldn't want to do that.

So Kim and I have come up with a new concept. And when we had our dog get hit by a car, the dog's leg was bruised.

It wasn't broken, but the leg was bruised. And so you don't want the dog to lick the leg because it doesn't heal that well.

And so what they do is they put a plastic cone on the dog's head. And the cone comes out like this, and then the dog tries to lick the bruise, and it can't lick the bruise.

So Kim and I are going to be going into the ABC Shark Tank in the next couple of months. And we're going to be presenting our teen dog cone for humans.

And so when they like to go out the door and go out to eat or something, and then when they get too close and they disobey

Elizabeth Elliott's rule, keep the men at arm's length and nothing will ever happen. When their heads become too close with the cone thing, they won't be able to get there.

And so we figured you could make a lot of money with that. Okay, Mark.

Dave, are we saying that? Well, see, here's the one thing. For those of you that know me,

I think you know that I'm not a legalist, and so I don't want to impose rules on people as a pastor to say, this is what you must do.

So I'd rather impose biblical wisdom to say, Mark, you're the leader, and what if it was a prom and, you know, these days you don't need to have a date to go to the prom.

You can go with another girl. You can go with another guy, just platonic friends, and you go and you get the experience.

But I just think about the prom with the music and with the money and everything else, and I just think wisdom says, let's just go pick something else.

And so if you'd like to let the, you know, what if it's some special prom and it's classical music, ballroom dancing, and it's platonic, and, you know,

I don't know, there could be something. I like to do ballroom dancing. And so, you know, people are like, dancing's bad, prom's dad, prom's dad.

So I wouldn't say that as a board we have that policy. I'd rather have a policy on justification by faith alone and then just say dads be involved and get to, you know.

See, prom is a rite of passage for so many people. And so just try to teach your kids it's not necessarily a rite of passage.

You're not less of a girl if some guy doesn't ask you to prom, and you're not more of a guy if you can get a girl to go.

And so here's what we'll do instead. And, you know, I think sometimes as parents if you do substitution -like things, it's better.

So you don't get to go to prom, so let's go do this instead. So no to this, but yes to that. I don't want the parents to say no to everything because then watch what happens.

Then the second that kid gets out of your sight, they're going to go overboard. I know people and they're so constrictive, so restrictive, so anti -Danny

Aiken who says, you know, have some fun with your kids. Let your kids have some good, clean, wholesome fun.

They're so constrictive that once the kids get out of their sight, it's just chaos. So because legalism breeds in the heart of a rebellious child and adult, it breeds licentiousness.

So we have to be careful. And so I don't have a policy. I'm not really big on proms.

Just because they're so secular and the music and the slow dances and everything else. And so, you know, if somebody wants to have dancing at a wedding and they want to dance to some nice music,

I'm not against that. If they want to dance to, I don't know, I can think of band names, but I don't want to say them to sully your mind.

So I'd probably say no to that. Okay, other questions?

Yes, Mark? Good. Well, you know what

I appreciate, Mark? I appreciate your just straightforward question. Instead of, I have a friend who has a really smart daughter.

She travels the country and wins all kinds of awards. She's got a free ride to all these schools.

And he's a nice friend of mine. What do you think of that hypothetical? So I appreciate your honesty. Good for you.

What do we do about kids going to college? Let's start there and maybe work our way down. I'm not against kids going to college.

I don't think it's the end all for everybody, though. Both men are women. I don't think sending your kids far away to college, if they're immature, is a good idea.

Now, last week for the sermon, I only talked about young ladies, but I'd say the same thing for young men as well, that if my son isn't ready to go to college at 18 and move 3 ,000 miles away, even though I'm not his head, per se, as I would be my wife or my daughters,

I'm still the parent, and I still want to be involved in making great choices for the young people when their bodies, no disrespect for the younger folks sitting here, but your bodies are adult, but you have zero adult wisdom.

Adult wisdom comes by living as an adult, as an older person, and you don't have any.

It's like no life experience. And so what do you say? Your kid's got a tooth abscess, and you say to your kid,

I hope you get a good dentist. Let me know how it worked out. Who would do that?

You know, the kid is using the hacksaw to cut the skateboard things for their hands, and they cut their finger off, and you go,

I think the hospital's over there. I mean, who would do that kind of thing? But that's exactly what we do when it comes to young people, 18 -year -olds.

I'm not going to say teenagers, adolescents. It's kind of a weird category. It's not really a biblical category.

But just, I could say this, inexperienced adults, inexperienced by definition.

You have no experience as an adult because you just turned an adult. So then to say an immature young man or an immature young lady, immature meaning they're just newly adults, then to send them away from the family,

I think it's risky. Now, I'm not saying you can't do it. My next step would be this.

No matter what the culture says, it could be free ride. It could be prestigious institution.

It could be this is the one school that allows me to be this veterinarian that I want to be.

Those things all to me are secondary to, is this best for my children? And I'm the dad, and I have to make the best decisions.

Now, the wife and the kids can be saying, you know, Lord, direct my father's heart.

But at the end of the day, what the dad says, basically, God says. It's the will of God.

And so the dad has to be careful not to micromanage and not to be legalist. But he has to be careful not to send away people who are not ready to live in the world when that's exactly the pitfall that they'll have is trying to live in the world as an inexperienced adult.

And here's what happens in school. For those of you that have forgotten, school is not necessarily about school.

School is get as much studying done as you can and then party, party, party all the rest of the day and night.

Let's just be honest. It's sex, drugs, and rock and roll. And what we do is we think, yeah, but that'll never happen to me.

I'll never marry an unbeliever. I'll never marry before it's time. I'll never have premarital sex.

I'll never do this. I'll never do that. I'll never do the other. And without the father around, doing things in private and then spending time together, one -on -one, you will have romantic feelings and then people that don't have control, either self -control or external control.

After romantic feelings come, guess what follows? It's God -ordained what follows. After romance comes what?

Sex. You become romantically involved and then the desire is to have sex.

Now, there's nothing wrong with romance and sex. There's not everything wrong with it if it's before marriage.

And so, for me, sending a son off to the master's college, if he's not ready to go,

I would say that I'm not involved in my son's life enough. Why would I send him to go? A, he's not a

Christian. He doesn't profess Christ. I'm not talking about Luke now. He doesn't profess Christ. He hasn't been baptized.

He has no local church experience. He has no ministry.

He's not acting like a mature Christian now. So, why would I think if I send him across the country, he'll magically and deliciously turn into a

Christian? Now, master's college might be different because there are some rules for co -ed dorms.

It's not like sending kids to University of Michigan now where you can have a girl roommate if you want. How about that?

I mean, it was scandalous at the University of Nebraska. Second floor was girls. Third floor was guys.

That was a scandal. And now it's just whatever. So, what do we do?

I think we tell our young people, listen, God's will for you is through me.

And I'll make mistakes, and I'm not going to do everything right. But you can trust the Lord because of his goodness and what his word says.

And if you can trust him, then you can trust me. And I want what's best for you, daughter. I want what's best for you, son.

And therefore, let's work on having you mature some before I send you off someplace where I'm telling you what's the influence going to be.

The influence, you're going to have to make up your own mind on that with you and your wife. But what is the influence when I send a kid 50 miles or 5 ,000 miles away?

I think the influence is sketchy. Now, if somebody's really fired up and really serving, and we have like a

Linton who's 18 years old, and we think, you know what, that kid is ready. Some kids are. That kid is ready for me to send from Kuwait.

Is Linton here, by the way? Oh, there he is. Wow. When did your parents allow you to move to the

States? How old are you? 27. Okay, 23.

Well, you've messed me up. I was going to say at 18, we allowed Linton to move across the world. He looks 18.

What? He looks 18, I know. But he doesn't act 18. I'm going to put you on the spot,

Linton, since I said some good things about you, and I'll get back to Mark. If your parents said don't go to the States and go to education, what would you have done?

How about that? I have a free ride to the United States and college at 18, and his parents said, no, you're not ready, and what'd you do?

Would somebody give Linton one of those dog cones? Oh, your parents wanted you to go to India.

Okay, well, I'm just kidding anyway.

So there's a good illustration of a young man as a young man, not even a young lady.

And so the world sells academia, achievement, scholarships, everything else.

And so I don't say for sure, and you know me better than this, Mark. I don't say that's a sign. My kid just got a free ride to the army.

That's a sign he has to go. That's a sign she has to go. Once in a lifetime opportunity. I say it isn't a once in a lifetime opportunity because God is sovereign.

And I just don't say, well, God, the way to training up godly young people that I've been given by you as a steward is through I'm just going to do whatever.

And by the way, this is dating. The father just is told at last and he just kind of has to sign off on it.

I mean, I don't know how many times there are young people who want to marry someone who is an unbeliever and the father doesn't like the choice.

But then the young girl wants the father to show up at the wedding and give her away.

I think that is a complete disaster. Giving the daughter away says, I endorse this suitor.

I love this suitor. I've helped you choose the suitor. By the way, I hope you tell your kids this. Mom and Dad will help you with dentists.

We'll help you with schools. We'll help you with life. We'll help you with a good church. And we're going to help you pick a godly spouse.

You go to O 'Connor's and what do you do? You open up the menu and you have apoplexy because you don't know what to pick.

You know, when the kids are little, you can either get the hot dog or the corn dog. Well, Daddy, there are other things on the menu.

You can either get the hot dog or you can get the corn dog. Okay, that makes it easier. Mom and Dad want you to have a great life.

We want you to have romance. We want you to have kids. We want you to have sex. We want you to have all these things. We want you to have a great life.

And we'll help you pick your spouse. Mom and Dad will make sure. We tell our kids this all the time.

We're not going to let you pick some louse. We're not going to let you pick some loser. We're not going to let you pick an unbeliever because love is blind.

And if you get romantically involved, then it's like, you know, honey, bar the doors.

If anybody's saying, no, I love this person. Well, I don't know if you know what really biblical love is, but I know the romantic feelings.

But we want to help you pick the right person. God is sovereign. He's even sovereign over a couple parents that aren't perfect, but we really want your best.

This other guy that you're involved with, he hasn't prayed for you. He hasn't loved you. He hasn't done things for you.

He hasn't provided for you. You've known him for five months, and you want to toss it all in for this guy?

So, does that kind of answer the question, Mark? What I would say is, when your kids are ready, if your daughter is ready and your son are ready to move away, then they're ready.

But I still would be involved in terms of, if a guy's interested, then he calls me.

Right? And then we work through it. And if you're far away, then you're far away, and we're going to have to figure that out.

If you're not ready to go to college, then you're simply not ready to go to college. And I think God honors obedience. And when we look at Linton, and Linton's parents say, at 18 you can't go, and he's a guy, that should tell us something.

But the problem is, we don't live under Eastern culture anymore, with an Eastern society where the parents would be respected and honored.

Right? It's all about the kids and what we can do and the career path and everything else. Mark's like, just, okay, that's enough.

Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Steve. Okay, great question.

KC is looking in Texas, you know, property, and they live there, etc., etc.

And what have you spent more time maybe than anything else doing? Finding a church. It's not

God's will for you to move away, short of being in the military where you're forced to. It's not God's will for you to move away to a place that doesn't have a good

Bible teaching church. Oh, they've got a bunch of Baptist churches. We're fine. We've got a bunch of Seventh -day

Adventist churches. We're good. It's not God's will. So, why would it be

God's will for you to send your young one off, even if mature and ready, to a place that doesn't have a good

Bible teaching church? That you particularly know about. That you particularly met the pastor. That you particularly understand all those issues.

I'm not going to send my kids off and just go, okay, here you go. Now, it's way easier because we can listen to things now on the

Internet. We can do almost all our investigations before we even get there. And we show up for the first week and we go, oh,

I know these people. And I understand where they're coming from, the background and education and everything else. And so, you've got to have a good local church for the

WPI students are able to come to a church and be ministered to. And then have the people involved.

The church needs to be involved. We meet people here and they'll say, well, I've got a girl.

I want to marry her. Really? I don't know anything about her. And if you are older and you don't have a father who's a

Christian, and you don't have a father at all, then what you do is you get the local church involved.

The elders don't want to, if you're a single lady and you're older, the elders don't want you to be in a convent for their whole life.

You know what we'd like? We'd like you to get married if you'd like to get married. We'd like you to have kids. We'd like you to have a great romantic honeymoon and the rest of your life in Never Neverland.

We'd like that. That sounds weird. Far away from us in a galaxy far, far away from Bethlehem Bible Church.

No, we want you to have a wonderful life, but you can't trust your own heart. Let's get right back to the basics.

Now, theologically, you can't trust your heart. Why is there a plurality of elders?

You should say to yourself, Mike alone, I can't trust. Mike Abendroth alone,

I can't trust. Why? Because my heart still has a sinful hangover.

I'm a sinner saved by grace, but there's remnants of the false. So we have remnants of sin. So we have, uh, what do

I want to say? We have a plurality of elders. That's what I want to say. Father and mother helping one another.

Church body. So if someone comes along and says, you know, I've got this great girl, and I really like her, and I'd like you to get to know her a little bit as an elder board.

We'd love that. This is the kind of girl I'm interested in, and she believes in baptismal regeneration, but she's really pretty.

Oh, okay. So this is going to turn into part two,

I think. That's what it's going to turn into. Hold on just a second, Pam. Did you already ask me a question? Hold that thought.

Peggy, you have a question. Yeah, that's right.

I mean, think about it. My kid has a scholarship to go to such and such, but these are my theological convictions.

But I'll let her go anyway. I'll let him go anyway. Well, then, basically, you know what you are? You can be bought for money.

Your theological convictions can be bought for money because you've got a once -in -a -lifetime experience for the child.

They've got a scholarship. They've got all this other stuff. And so you go, you know what? I'll compromise on that because I'm a pragmatist and it's free.

I don't think that's the way you want to live your life. That's never the way you want to live your life. I don't think that's a

God -honoring way. Dave, then we'll go to Pam. I'd just like to be on the receiving end of that phone call.

Hi, this is Pastor Dave Jeffries. And you know what?

The parents are happy. If you're a young person, don't you want your parents to be excited about this guy that you're going to bring home and marry?

He's going to be part of the family. Of course. And so some of us might be thinking, yeah, but I didn't do it that way and I turned out pretty well.

That's what you say of yourself. Well, maybe you turned out pretty well, but it wasn't because of your unwise decisions about courtship, dating, romance.

It was because of the grace of God. So it would be presumptuous to say, well, we'll do that anyway. And we turned out okay.

It's fine to date. This gets back to the parenting thing. Was that an easy phone call to make, Dave? Okay.

Dads, we're lazy. Left to ourselves in our own flesh, we're lazy. And courtship and friendship and romance and all that requires parents who aren't lazy.

We think the kid doesn't need to, you know, I don't have to cut their meat anymore. I don't have to strap them in the car.

I don't have to brush their teeth. I don't have to do any of this other stuff. I don't even have to set their alarm clock.

They can get up and do stuff. They must be ready, but they're not. And if we let our kids' romance get involved too soon, do you know what people have done because they've loved somebody and they don't want to be broken up?

They've lied, cheated, committed murder. Once the heart of a person gets wrapped up in love, and you can hear all this in the secular songs, nobody else thought it was right, but we've got to go with it anyway.

We know. Our parents don't like it, but, you know, we know these kind of things. So, you know,

I want the young suitors initially for my daughters to be afraid of me, really afraid.

But then I'm going to soften up as I see the guy is the right guy, and they're going to be good friends. You know,

I have four, I have three daughters and one son. I really hope that I live long enough to see four sons and four daughters.

That's exactly how I'm going to treat my daughter's husbands and my son's wife as family members.

But the most important decision that your young people have short of following Christ Jesus, and by the way, which you can do nothing about in terms of saving them.

You can teach them, you can preach to them, means to the end, I get all that, but you can't save your kid, but you can help them pick a godly spouse.

That's the most important thing you can do with your kids. And we just say, well, I'll let him go.

Well, I've got an unbelieving spouse and they won't let me do it. Well, as I'm resolved to do this very thing, everything in my power,

I will help with this child to pick the right spouse. And I don't have to say

I will sin in order to do it. I'm going to do the right thing. No options.

Because I'm not a pragmatist and I want to honor God. And when you read biographies, the people that you love to read about have done that very thing, haven't they?

Who are your superstars in the Christian faith? Loyalty, courage, duty. When you pull off a

Hudson Taylor, Mary Schleser, John and Betty Stan, when you pull that off, what do you see?

Faithfulness, courage, duty. Not a bunch of excuses. Well, you don't understand them. This, that, and the other.

Friends, I understand life is sinful and a mess. But I understand that God can cause great things to happen, even through sin and evil and unbelieving kids or unbelieving spouses.

We better be like MacArthur, walking by faith, not by sight. I'm resolved by the grace that you've given me,

God, to be an involved parent in my kid's life. And if my spouse doesn't like it, my kids don't like it, the people don't like it,

I answer to you. And let me be gracious. Let me be generous. Let me be lovable. Let me be amiable.

But I'm resolved that I'm not going to let my kids have 40 years of misery for marrying an unbeliever.

You want to know how many people said to me on the way out of the door? If I would have just had this message 40 years ago, 30 years ago.

Grown men walking out last Sunday, crying because of how

I parented to let my daughter marry an unbeliever. And for decades, they have paid the price.

So dads, why don't you say, my child's not going to like this temporarily.

My wife might not even like it temporarily. But I'm willing to suffer persecution. I'm willing to suffer difficulty.

I'm willing to suffer family problems for doing the right thing because I love my kids enough for me to personally suffer.

So they don't suffer for 35 years. I'm very serious about that.

Well, it's 10 till. Casey, go ahead. And I haven't even got to older singles.

And what if you're divorced and all that? Okay. Okay, yes,

I'm not after if we've got an unbelieving kid to marry another believer. Because that would be wrong, and I couldn't do that.

So if I said that, that's not what I meant. But let me just say this now. If you've got a child that's not a believer, that still doesn't let us off the hook from helping them marry somebody who's not necessarily a believer.

I couldn't marry them to a believer. But somebody who is as good as you can get without being an unbeliever.

There are moral people. There are good people. You know, I look around, and I see unbelievers who can have great marriages, right, who have lives not full of cocaine and heroin and theft and all that.

They contribute to society, and they're nurses and doctors. And so if my kids aren't saved, I'm still going to try to influence them to marry the right person for them, which would never be a believer, right?

Because I wouldn't want to be unloving to the believer to say, why don't you marry my daughter? That'd be wrong, and that'd be sinful.

But I could help them pick the right kind of guy. That's almost even a bigger challenge. The most moral pagan who likes shooting guns that I could find.

Sawed -off 45s included. Who loves the Lakers. It's okay then. After that, red

R back. No, I'm just kidding. Okay. Stan Till.

By the way, congregation, if you see visitors come in today, would you greet them? Would you say hello to them?

Would you go out of your way not to just talk to your friends? And if I'm trying to tell your young people, talk to other folks that could lend their godliness to you through example and speech.

Then maybe you should visit and say hi to some visitors. I don't know if you've ever walked into a church and nobody has said hello. I'd hate that.

I've walked into churches before and not one person has said hello. Why don't you be the one who says hello today? Because all kinds of visitors are coming and no -compromise people are coming.

And just say hello, because if I'm tough from the pulpit, you need to be soft from behind the scenes. Right? This is a team effort.

So I'll talk to Steve, but I think next week we'll try to do part two to this because I think it's good for the church.

And there are some who have been divorced. They don't know what to do. Some who have been single for a long time. They don't know what to do.

And this is not necessarily a biblical exposition, but it's just, I think, shepherding the flock with biblical wisdom.

So let's pray, and we'll see you back here at 10 .15. Father, we do thank you that you're a God who does great things and to imagine that you can create the world with a word.

You certainly can give us wisdom as parents, give the fathers leadership, and give the young people, give the young adults submissive hearts.

Father, we would love to see our young people grow up, get married to godly people, and then just be used by you to turn the world right side up.

We're very thankful, many of us here, older people, maybe most of us, that you were very gracious and we did everything the wrong way.

Things were done in private. Things were done without the father. Things were done without a view to marriage, but God.

We thank you for your overriding providential care. In Jesus' name, amen.