Dating is made better when its focus is clarity of character and compatibility, not intimacy. And clarity can be found through TLC.
No, not that TLC. What I’m talking about is Time for Learning and Community.
Let me break that apart: First, time for learning. It takes time to reveal someone’s character, to see them navigate different seasons and relationships. When you first start dating, it’s like you’re both used car salespeople, trying to hide any defects or potential deal breakers. The engine rattles, so you just turn up the stereo.
During this stage, it’s important to ask questions and observe how the person you’re dating interacts with the world and those around them. How do they treat their family? Their friends? The staff at a restaurant? Do they keep their word? Do they speak kindly about others when they aren’t around? Can they keep their hands off of you?
Listen: If the person you’re dating isn’t a person of honesty, integrity, or self-control now, those traits won’t magically appear later.
Seeing all of this takes time. You need time to see the real them, beyond the haze of romantic intoxication. Yes, yes, I know there are people who meet and get engaged two weeks later and everything turns out fine. But there are also people who smoke for 50 years without developing lung cancer. Just because it happens, doesn’t mean it’s common—or wise. Moving too fast in a relationship simply isn’t wise, especially if you’re young.
Why do so many people rush things when dating? It’s because for many of us, romantic love is all we’ve ever dreamed about, and we don’t see how we could ever have a full and complete life without it. But the Apostle Paul, a single man, made clear that romantic love, as awesome as it is, was only a signpost to a greater love, the love we’re created for, the love we’ve always been missing, whether we recognize it or not. The arms we long for in romance aren’t ultimately that of a lover; they are those of Jesus, the lover of our souls.
Far too many people approach dating like a man in the ocean, drowning in a sea of loneliness and despair, when along floats a 5’4” brunette “life preserver.” So what does he do? He desperately grabs for her, suffocating both of them. People aren’t life preservers. As hard as it is for single people to believe, it is fundamentally true that lonely, insecure single people become lonely, insecure married people. Why? Because problems like loneliness and insecurity aren’t cured by another human being; they are only cured by the love of God. Marriage doesn’t solve emptiness; it just exposes it.
If you’re tempted to rush things in your relationship, consider this: You’re not ready to date until you’re ready not to date, because until you know that you can be a happy and complete person even if you’re single, you’ll try to turn any marriage partner into something they were never designed to be. You’ll crush them.
This might sound dismal, but it should actually take the pressure off. Rather than feeling like we’re on this desperate, obsessive search for “the right person” (whatever that means) who is the key to a happy life, we can find our completeness in Jesus and trust him to meet our companionship needs in whatever way he sees fit. We can take our foot off the gas, trusting that he’ll take us where he wants when he wants, with whom he wants.
Which brings me to the other element of TLC—community.
In our culture, dating has become a highly privatized thing between just you and the person you are dating. This has been true for decades, but the invention of the online dimension only amplifies that. It’s become more and more common to start dating someone that literally no one else in your life knows.
I don’t have any specific grievance with online dating apps. At their best, they provide a way to connect, much like going to the gym or going to church. The trouble isn’t the apps, but our tendency to bifurcate our dating life from the rest of our life. Because so much of dating is evaluating someone’s character, dating should happen in the context of community. Far too often, it doesn’t.
In what is arguably the most monumental decision of your life, it’s too easy to isolate and tell yourself that your heart knows best, precisely when your heart is in the worst possible condition to even know north from south. Your body and mind are literally drugged with chemicals that blind you to the other person’s flaws. So you need people who love you, who can see potential problems with this person that you can’t see. Matt Chandler says, “One sure way to walk in foolishness in a romantic relationship is to date someone who troubles the godly counselors in your life.” It might sting now, but it’s a word of life.
Which brings to mind one last point: Community is valuable whether you’re dating or not. Many of you reading this are single, wondering if or when you’ll get married. Obviously, I don’t have that answer for you. But I can say this: You will never regret leaning into true Christian community. Plug into the church. Get to know people in various life stages, and ask them to speak into your life. Invite others into your life. Learn from each other. Life is better lived in community. If you end up dating and eventually marrying, that community will enrich the entire process. But even if you never marry, you’ll still experience the richness and depth of love that God designed you for.
In fact, the Apostle Paul (a single man!) tells us that the companionship people experience in marriage is just a pointer to the unity in the body of Christ, the church. That’s where the real relationships flourish—not just now, but for eternity.
