Is Dating Supposed to be This Hard? Pt. 2

All right, Porch. How are we doing tonight? Are you doing okay? It's great to see you. Welcome back. If it's a return trip to you here, we're so grateful that you would be in the room. If this is your very first time at The Porch, we're so glad you are in the room.

This summer has been wild. It has gotten rowdy in this room at times. We're grateful that you would turn up and be a part of it. God is not just doing something awesome here; he's doing something great all over the place. He is moving in cities just like ours all across the nation. Particularly, we want to shout out some of our Porch.Live locations: Porch.Live Greater Lafayette, Fresno, and Scottsdale.

Tonight, we are continuing the conversation we started last week in answering the question…Is dating supposed to be this hard? It's a question that many of you are confronted with, so we wanted to step right into it and answer it with what God has to say. To set up the idea, I remember asking myself that question when I first had my initial interaction with love. I was but 12 years old.

At that time, I asked out a girl for the very first time in my young life. You see, the annual homecoming football game was coming up, and everybody was taking a date. So, not wanting to be left out or look different than everybody else, I had my eye on my grade-school crush, and I knew this was the perfect moment for me to ask her if she wanted to go with me.

Not having been in this position before, I said to some of my buddies, "Hey, you guys have done it. Help me out." So, gleaning all the 12-year-old wisdom I could get, what I learned in that moment is they would stand across the hall in the middle of passing period, they would signal to me when she came out of her class, and then all I had to do was walk up and simply say, "Hey, do you want to go to homecoming with me?"

So, we assume our positions. The bell rings. People exit their classes and begin going to their next place. Right at the time they give me the signal, "Go for it, man," I move from where I am. I turn the corner to coincidentally bump into her, and we make contact. I look at her and say, "Hey, do you want to go to the homecoming football game with me?" To which she responds, "Um, sorry. Who are you?"

Again, I was just a youth, but I remember thinking even at that time, "This is so much harder than I thought." No one had told me how to approach a girl or how to keep the stakes low or how to not come on too strong or how to express my feelings. In the same way, so many of us have been unlearned in the language and lessons of love because no one has ever told us. The way we've learned instead is by trial and error. Amen, anybody? Trial and error, after error, after error, after error, after error.

You see, you have found yourself risking the rejection of whether or not they'll leave you on read or not. You've seen within yourself this awkward burden of having to go into another first date and potentially bear the consequence of another uncomfortable conversation. You've had to guess their intent, because though they're flirtatious, they've never actually clarified their feelings for you. You don't know if you're best friends or if you're soon-to-be lovers. You have no idea.

This is the landscape of love you're a part of. It is confusing. For so many of you, you've looked at dating and found it to be less blissful than you hoped and more painful than you expected. There's a good reason for that. Your generation is facing the most complicated dating dynamic in the history of the world. You're welcome.

You did not ask for it, but it is the hand you've been dealt. You live amongst a moment where you have to learn not just dating etiquette but online dating etiquette. There are shifting gender roles. There's an ever-evolving relationship structure at play. Then, we live in an ever-increasing individualistic society where people are fine if they don't find love.

According to Dr. Michael Rosenfeld, professor of sociology at Stanford… Talking about the considerable impact our modern dating moment has had in the lives of people, he says there are 10 million more single Americans right now than at any other given moment in history, and most of them are under the age of 35, which makes sense when you think about it.

That might feel shocking, but if you look at the data, it's not surprising, because we've seen the average age of first marriage has steadily increased over the last several years. We know that women are, on average, marrying at 28. Guys are, on average, marrying at the age of 30. But it's not just that people are waiting longer to marry; it's also that divorce rates are skyrocketing amongst people who are in their 20s and 30s, specifically.

You see, we're living in a moment the experts are calling a romantic recession. Love is on the lam, despite the fact that young people just like yourself overwhelmingly identify as wanting to be in a committed relationship, so many even going to the point of anticipating tying the knot at some point in the future.

So, how can both of these things be true at the same time? How is it that romance can be on the decline, yet everybody wants to find love anyway? I'll tell you how it's possible. We're not very good at dating. That's the synopsis. That's how we make sense of those two realities. We do not know what we're doing. So much so, there's an entire television genre committed to this reality. If you've ever watched Bachelor in Paradise or Love Island or Love Is Blind, what is the basic premise of those shows?

The premise is this. They get together a group of people who deeply want to find love but are horrible at finding it. You see within those shows a group of people who are waiting for a hotter option to walk down the beach. They're playing a mind game so they don't get voted off in some way. They're trying to hook up with someone, yet not learn their last name, because they don't want to get too committed too soon.

You see, they have no idea what they're doing, and we watch them for it. You're not watching because you're anticipating the moment they find love; you're watching them because you're anticipating the moment they don't and spiral into an emotional dumpster fire of disaster. That's what you're waiting for. You want the drama. That's why we watch these shows.

Yet, while it's easy for us, in the comfort of our seats, to point the finger and laugh ("Look at those people; they have no idea what they're doing"), the truth of the matter is we don't know what we're doing either. This moment is a difficult moment. We make dating harder than it has to be. So, my hope is to make it easier over the course of our evening. I want to tell you the dos and don'ts of dating, because when you follow these principles God has given us, the entire process gets so much easier.

These principles are not just some rules for you to know so you can enter them like a cheat code and out pops a spouse at the end of it. A lot of dating damage has been done in the name of a Christian formula where "X plus Y equals soulmate." That's not my hope. I'm not trying to give you a scientific method. Dating is not science; dating is art. Yes, there are colors you must use, but you must also learn from the master artist himself. You must listen to God, for he has built these principles to point to a greater picture, a picture of the love he has for his people.

So, without further ado, we're going to get into these principles. Last week, we went through four of them. I do not have time to unpack those four. If you're interested, they're on the screen behind me. You can also go and watch the message or listen to the audio. I just want to dive straight into the fifth principle you need if you want to make your dating easier.

5. Don't be isolated; do be inclusive. You see, dating is not a static state of commitment; it is a dynamic process of assessment, but too often, we perform that assessment all by ourselves. Last year, I bought a 1991 Ford F-150, which is a dream to me, but the reality is I didn't know anything about 35-year-old vehicles.

So, to help me in the purchasing process, I made sure to schedule an appointment with a mechanic. It wasn't enough for me to just walk up, pop the hood, take a look and say, "Yeah, this thing looks great." No, I knew I needed professional help. So, I took the truck to this mechanic, and he didn't just pop the hood, look at it, and say, "Yeah, man. It looks great."

Instead, he took that truck, put it on a lift, and raised it to the sky so we could walk underneath it and inspect every square inch of the thing, because he wanted to help me know that it was worthy of purchasing, that the value was present. You see, I needed someone else's help to make a good decision.

Yet so many of us settle in the world of dating for making the assessment on our own. "Well, he passes the eye test for me. Have you seen those arms? That looks good." That's often the way we process whether or not we're going to get into a relationship with someone. That's not the Bible's recommendation. The Bible says in Proverbs 11:14, "Where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety." Proverbs 15:22: "Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisers they succeed."

Isolation makes for poor evaluation. There's a reason we say, "You're lost in your feels." What are we communicating when we say that? We're saying, "You're crushing so hard you're just seeing what you want to see." But your friends will see what you need to see. Some of you are in a relationship where your community has raised a red flag. "Man, he is sketchy. He never shows up when he says he's going to show up. He is never arriving when he says he's going to arrive."

Or they've looked at you and said, "Man, she's pretty controlling. Have you thought about that? It seems like she always wants to know where you are and what you're doing." They have raised red flags. Too often, we look at them and go, "But you don't know him or her the way I do." Listen. It is difficult to see red flags when you have on rose-colored glasses. You need help. You need people to speak the truth to you in love.

In the medieval ages, the Anglican church liturgized the phrase, "Speak now or forever hold your peace." The reason they did is they were trying to provide protection from people within their community being forcefully coerced into an unwanted marriage. It was a method for their community to protect their own.

A similar premise must be true in our day. The more community you include, the more safety you invite. When my wife Brooke and I started dating in college, I remember my best friend at the time coming to me and saying, "Hey, man, I'd love to tag along."

"On a date?"

"Yes, on a date."

"As a third wheel?"

"Sure. As a third wheel."

Why did he want to go on a date with us? Not because he wanted to see Frozen. He came on that date with us because he wanted to get to know Brooke. He wanted to see the two of us interact. He wanted to know, "Man, is it easy for y'all when you're together? Does she fit the form of the kind of godly woman you've told me you want? Is there strife, conflict, early in your relationship? Do y'all move through things pretty naturally?"

He wanted to evaluate her for my benefit. As a testament to my bride, she was delighted to have him come. She was so eager to meet somebody from my world, to see someone who had a massive voice and influence in my life. She wanted to become familiar with the people I was a part of.

You see, when Brooke and I were dating, we wanted godly people to watch us and help us, because we needed to be watched, and we needed to be helped. We dated, not just in the context of community but inclusive of our community. It wasn't just that we were content having people around; we wanted people to be involved. There's a major difference in those things.

If you're in a relationship with someone who's trying to isolate you from your friends or your family, or they get annoyed whenever you spend time with your community, or they always want to do things with you in private and are diametrically opposed to ever going out in public, then you need to get away from that person. God saved us into community. His people see the value of it. We do not try to isolate ourselves away from that which God has saved us into.

You need this. You need a community, and not just a community that consists of good friends; you need a community that consists of godly guides. What's the difference in those two things? Friends make for good company, but guides give good direction. You need people in your life who will not simply tell you what you want to hear but will tell you what you need to hear.

You need people who are two things: people who are wise and loving… They're wise enough to know what you need, and they are loving enough to tell you what you need. I'm a firm believer in this. I'll step away from the Book. This is just my personal recommendation. I think you should imbue people within your community who are identified as wise and loving with not only a voice in your relationship but a vote in your relationship.

So, if they look at you, and the majority of them say, "This thing looks toxic," then you end it. If the majority of them say, "Man, we think you should go out with this person," then you should go on at least one date with that person. Why? Because these are people who are wise in God's Word, who love your heart, and you can trust them with your relationship.

The second thing you need in godly guides is people who have walked with God longer than you. There's a saying, "The best teacher isn't personal experience; it's someone else's." I agree with that. I think that saying is spot on. The apostle Paul says he agrees as well. In Titus 2, he gives specific instruction to older men and women about investing in the lives of younger men and women. "But, Kylen, I don't know any older men." Then find some. They're not hard to point out. They're pretty obvious by way of their appearance. It's not difficult to see people who are older than you.

I remember when I was in college, I was absent anybody in my life who was older and wiser than myself. Everyone was my age. It was the blind leading the blind. I wanted someone to speak into my world, so what I did… I remember going to church and seeing a guy who I did not know personally, but he had an amazing reputation, and I admired him from afar. I admired the way he loved his wife and treated his kids and served in his church and somehow, all at the same time, led within his company. This was the kind of guy I wanted to learn from.

So, I went up to him, and do you know what I said? "I admire you for these following reasons. Can I take you to lunch and ask you some questions?" He said, "Yes." Why? Because godly guides are looking for people to give guidance to. This is not hard. If you want to know what to do, ask humbly, buy them lunch, prep questions, listen more than you speak, and then thank them for their time.

Don't walk in and load them down with, "Hey, will you be my mentor?" I don't recommend you do that in a dating relationship. "Will you be my wife?" That's not going to go well either. It's synonymous in terms of its intensity. Don't do that. Walk up and say, "Hey, I would love to get time with you. Would you be open for that? Here are the following reasons. I'll buy lunch, I'll prep questions, I will make sure to listen and take notes, and I will be so grateful for the hour you carve." That's what you have to do.

Dating is hard when you do it alone, but you're not meant to. That's not God's design. The beauty of it is that community actually teaches us how we're supposed to treat our partner, which brings us to our sixth principle.

6. Don't be critical; do be kind. Proverbs 19:22a. Ladies, this is what you want. "What is desirable in a man is his kindness…" His kindness. Which feels obvious. "Yes, yes. I know, Kylen. I'm supposed to like the nice guys. I need to give them a shot." This is so much bigger than that. I'm not just trying to tell you to find a Hallmark hubby you can take home for the holidays and make your parents happy.

That's not what this is about, because that's not what the Bible is communicating. The Bible is teaching something so much more serious in this moment. In the New Testament, the authors of every New Testament letter combine to pull together 50-plus "one another" statements, and those statements tell us how we're meant to treat one another. Why are there 50-plus? Because it's not so obvious how we should treat one another. We're not very good at it.

So, what we see is they unpack 50-plus "one another" statements. While we don't have time to walk through all 50-plus, what we can do is break them down into the buckets they belong in, because those 50-plus statements belong in four different categories. That way, you understand what kindness looks like as it's expressed in your dating relationship.

A. Kindness is peaceable. More than one third of the "one another" statements are about pursuing peace and maintaining unity. Second Corinthians 13:11 by the apostle Paul says, "Finally, brothers, rejoice. Aim for restoration, comfort one another, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you."

Ephesians 4:1-3 says, "I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace."

What are these passages saying? You are going to face conflict in life, and you're going to face conflict in dating. It's coming for you. When you are in close emotional proximity to another person, they are going to say something that gets on your nerves. They're going to do something you can't even begin to explain. They're going to forget something that drives you nuts. How they respond when that conflict comes tells you a lot about their character, which is what you're trying to figure out.

Guys, women are sophisticated by design, and you are not, so you're going to mess up, and you're not even going to understand why. You're not even going to know what you did, yet in that moment, the right response is not to get defensive. "But I didn't mean to hurt her feelings." But you did hurt her feelings. So, you need to understand, "What did I do that resulted in your feelings being hurt, because I don't want that to happen anymore?"

Here's what you do. She's going to use her words, and you're going to use your ears. You're going to listen closely, and then you're going to own as much of it as you can. I tell couples whenever I perform their wedding ceremonies, "Hey, marriage is not 50-50; it is 100-100. 'I am not approaching you today, saying, "I'm going to give you my half so long as you give me yours." No, I'm stepping forward, and I'm giving you the whole 100. I'm giving you everything I have. Everything I offer you today is not conditioned upon what you do at all.'"

Men, that's how you approach your woman in conflict. Ladies, they don't know what you're thinking, so when you think, "He would if he wanted," he doesn't even know what you might possibly want of him. So, what you must do is you must seek to understand, you must use small words, and then you need to be committed to re-explaining yourself, because he's going to need you to do it. Hear me. If you have the right man, he is not just willing to improve; he's wanting to improve. That's the right man. He wants to.

So, when you come to him, and if you have some beef, some issue with what he has done, don't accuse his character. "Well, you just never care about me. You're just not full of grace. I'm always seeking peace with you, but you're never seeking peace with me." Don't do that. Don't make an accusation against his character; make an observation about his behavior. What did he do that made you feel this way? He can address that. He can fix his behavior. Don't write him off before you even give him the chance.

If you want to be with someone who is peaceable, then you're looking for someone who is humble enough to admit they're wrong. Catch me. They're humble enough to admit they're wrong not because they love you but because they love Jesus, and they don't want to grieve his heart. That's what you want. That's what someone who's peaceable looks like.

B. Kindness is considerate. This makes up another third of the "one another" statements we get in the New Testament. John 13:34 says, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another." First Peter 4:8: "Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins." That's the kind of person you want to date. You want to date someone who is considerate of what it looks like to love you, which absolutely rails against the standards of today.

We live in a moment right now where people want to keep their options open, where they'll string each other along, where they're adopting open forms of relationship, because then they are not having to make any kind of commitment. We live in a commitment-averse culture, yet what we hear from this is that is not considerate of someone else; it is considerate of themselves. You don't want to be with someone like that. You don't want someone who considers themselves; you want someone who is carefully considering you instead.

This may sound really silly. When Brooke and I first started dating, I made a commitment that I was not going to "like" another girl's photo on Instagram the entire time, which feels crazy. You're like, "Did she put you up to that?" No. I chose to do that. Why? Because I didn't want to run the risk of her seeing my name "liking" some other girl's picture. That's dumb. That's not worth it.

Even if we were friends and there was a totally plausible reason for why I would do that, I was not willing to risk my relationship with her. I wanted to make sure everything I did was in consideration of her. I wanted to prove "You don't need to worry about me, where my eyes are going, who it is I'm 'liking,' who I might be texting on the side. You never have to worry about me, because I'm considerate of you."

If your boyfriend or girlfriend starts acting all weird when you grab their phone from them, or if they can't seem to commit to your plans for the weekend because you're with your family and they don't really love being around them, or if they're vague about what their weekend events look like with the boys or the girls, then that's a cause for concern. That's not a sign of consideration. We're looking for someone who looks like Christ. What does Christ look like? He was considerate of you at great cost to himself, even to the point of death on the cross.

C. Kindness is encouraging. This comprises about 18 to 20 percent of the statements. Hebrews 10:24-25 says, "And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near."

To encourage literally means to put courage into another person. You don't want a relationship that tears you down; you want a relationship that builds you up. That sounds really nice. Listen to me. If he is questioning something about you that is outside the realm of your power to control, he's not building you up; he's tearing you down.

If he gets on to you about your physical appearance or he's talking bad about your personality, or whatever it may be, that's not someone who's wanting to encourage you; that's someone who's wanting to invalidate you. If she is constantly comparing you to all of her boyfriends, all of her girlfriends' boyfriends, then that's not someone you want to be compared to. You don't necessarily want to link up with someone who makes a big deal out of a really small deal.

If you're perpetually in trouble over senseless things, then you should be concerned. You want someone who is encouraging. Proverbs 21:9 says, "It is better to live in a corner of the housetop than in a house shared with a quarrelsome wife." AKA, if you're around a nagging Nancy, it's like being waterboarded. You don't want that.

Your relationship should be marked by encouragement. It should put courage into you, courage to not just be a good boyfriend or girlfriend but courage to be all that God has made you to be, to live into the body, live into the personality, live into the design he has perfectly imbued you with. That's what he wants.

D. Kindness is humble. That's the last 15 percent or so. Galatians 5:13 says, "For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another." Philippians 2:3-4 says, "Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others."

Put simply, your relationship should be marked by humility. "But where do I find that kind of person, Kylen? How do I know if they're actually humble or if they're just making a really good first impression?" That's a great question to ask, because they should be putting their best foot forward.

Do you want to know where you can look for a genuinely humble person? You look for them where they're not solely humble for you; they are humble without you. You look for them in places where they serve. That's what I tell people. It's not the reason you should, but if you begin to serve, that's a good place to look for her or him.

I remember, when I worked in college ministry, we had team leaders, the very best of the volunteers we had, who always seemed to crush on one another, even though they weren't supposed to. The reason they would crush on one another was because they looked at each other and saw, "You are giving so much of yourself for the benefit of other people," and that is attractive.

I remember, when Brooke and I first met, this is what she was doing amongst a group of people in our business organization. She was playing volleyball. We were all playing volleyball, and she was showing up to play because she's competitive, but she was also showing up because she's kind. She wanted to get to know people. She wanted to ask them their stories. She wanted to make a personal investment.

She didn't need anything from them…validation, approval…but she wanted everything for them. She wanted them to know Jesus. I sat there and watched that, and that was so attractive. It was driving me crazy. "Girl, I need to spend time with you." That was the reaction as I saw her being humble to other people.

Listen. Humility is hot. It is. It looks good on people. So, you should think about looking for it in him or her yourself. You want someone humble. You want someone who observably lives for the benefit of other people, because Christ observably died for the benefit of you. That's what you want. That's what true humility looks like. "I will give of myself for the benefit of another."

7. Don't be naïve; do be vigilant. Be vigilant. We're going to give an entire talk committed to this specific topic, what sex looks like in the lives of young adults, so I'm going to resist the temptation to share more than I should right now, but we do need to answer the question… As we consider what it looks like for us to navigate dating in an easier way, we have to evaluate what it looks like for purity to be in play.

The Bible has a lot to say about this. Just a couple of verses: Proverbs 6:32: "He who commits adultery lacks sense; he who does it destroys himself." First Corinthians 6:18 says, "Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body."

Sexual compromise outside of God's design is dangerous. That's because sex is so powerful. You see, when you have sex with another person, your brain releases dopamine, which activates the reward system of your brain, and it also releases oxytocin, which is the love hormone, as people know it, which is especially powerful when it comes to mate bonding. What happens when you have sex with another person is you are growing attached to them, not just in a casual way but in a chemical way.

As you do it in greater and greater degrees of frequency, that attachment becomes addiction. What a beautiful gift from God when, within the confines of his design…a loving marriage between two people where there is total safety…that bond will never be broken, so we can pour gas on the fire. But when we take it outside of its intended place, it can become disastrous, because when you break up with someone, you not only lose your partner; you lose a part of yourself.

Sex is so powerful. It is so good. It's something worth waiting for. It's something worth valuing. In the same way that Aladdin in the Cave of Wonders had to resist every other temptation and jewel and have only eyes for the lamp, so you are meant to move through your relationship with eyes for that which is most prized of all: purity. I know that sounds so "Christiany," yet it's so good. God is trying to save you from something that can irreparably hurt you in the wrong context.

We must agree with what Paul says in the book of Romans. We should not make provision for the flesh to gratify its desires. Meaning, we don't invite unnecessary temptation into our life. You don't go into her room. You don't stay at his apartment. You definitely don't turn the lights down low way past 11:00 p.m., because nothing good happens then. Don't you dare turn on the R&B, because you know those things are going to put you in a position where you're ultimately tempted beyond your capacity.

You set your boundaries early, you honor them always, and you frequently revisit them. I think I've said this before, possibly on an equipping night. I will charge my son with this. "Nothing below the chin, nothing horizontal, nothing in the dark, and nothing lasts longer than five seconds. You obey these rules from me, my son, and you will be safe." Those are good boundaries if you're looking for some.

Proverbs 25:28 says, "A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls." Would you move into a city that has been pillaged of all its resources, plundered, and left in ruin? Would you do that? Then why are you moving in with somebody, some guy or some girl, who does not have self-control either?

If your boyfriend has convinced you that he just needs a sexual outlet, what you need to be convinced of is he needs self-control. If he's pushing you to send him nudes, if he's constantly pushing the boundaries of the parameters y'all have concocted together, if he's constantly guilting you because you just won't help him…listen…you're not the one who needs help; he is the one who needs help.

Jesus was single and sinless his entire life. If Jesus can do that for 33 years of his life, your man can do that until he either chooses to propose to you or chooses to move on. If he doesn't do either of those, then you probably need to move on. You want a man who's not mastered by his flesh; you want a man who has mastered his flesh. You want someone who, for the sake of honoring God and honoring you, will go to war against that which wants to destroy the very ones he loves. That's what you want.

Now, for fear of the ladies thinking they're getting off the hook, let me speak to you for a moment. In the book of Proverbs, we meet a character by the title of the adulterous woman. There are three primary descriptors of this lady. She has smooth speech, a seductive appearance, and a cold conscience.

Ladies, be careful in the way you speak to men. Be considerate of it. Don't sext them just because it makes you feel secure, it's nice to be liked, and you actually feel wanted. Don't do that. Don't flirt with them just because, "Man, I like having someone on the hook. It gives me some sense of validation." Be careful with the way you speak.

So much is said about modesty in the church, yet you need to be careful how you dress. I am blown away by the things I see girls wear in the gym, not just because that can't be possibly comfortable to lift in but because it's so sad. It's a living testament to the fact that they want the affirmation and approval of a man when they have a God who wants to give them affirmation and approval already. The curves of your body are not meant for us; they are meant for your husband, so save them for him.

Lastly, if you're here and you're prone to preying on innocent men because there's something empowering about showing them the sexual ropes as opposed to always being shown yourself, then be careful, because that is the fast road to deadening your conscience before God. Don't do that.

Now, as I say all of this, here's what I know happens in the room. I can feel the cloud of guilt that hangs over some of you, because you've done some of this. You've done worse than this. Let me just say, not as a preacher at The Porch but hopefully as a pastor to you…I have done things too. We do not regard people in light of what they've done; we regard people in light of how far they've come. That's what it means to have the grace of Jesus for someone.

So, if you're here, and you're like, "Man, when they learn what I've done, when they see the places I've been, when I have to unpack my body count at some point, they're going to run out…" If they run out, then good riddance to them. They don't know the love of God. They don't know the grace of Jesus, which extends to the very worst of you. You're not too far gone.

Christ looks at the adulterous woman and says, "Has no one condemned you? Then do not condemn yourself for what I have not condemned you of." He says you're free. He denied himself so that you might be beloved, and now you get to deny yourself, from this day forward, for the sake of your beloved.

8. Don't be reckless; do be respectful. Romans 12:10 says, "Love one another with brotherly affection." That can also be interpreted as respect. "Outdo one another in showing honor." Matthew 7:12 says, "So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets."

When I was preparing this message, I found it so fascinating. I was doing a little bit of research on toxic relationships, and what I found is that all toxic relationships, early in their existence, share the same primary indicator. Do you want to know what it is? A lack of respect between one or both parties.

Most, if not all, unhealthy relationships are formed under the failure of recognizing the other person's value. Every person has value because they have been made in God's image. They have a God-given dignity. So, in relationship, we should recognize that and treat one another in kind. You see, in unhealthy relationships, instead of being marked by mutual admiration for one another, what you often see is a gradual manipulation of the other, where one person uses the other to get from them what they want.

I was thinking about this as I stood over there before coming on the stage, looking at this room and reeling with the statistics that one in four girls before the age of 18 and one in six guys before the age of 18 have been sexually abused. That is a testament to the fact that we live in a world so comfortable and accommodating to unhealthy relationships.

Yet Christ makes no space for such relationships to exist. He does not want us to have toxic relationships with one another. He wants us to have redemptive relationships with one another where we consider one another rightly and treat one another with respect.

The reason we can do that is because, where an unhealthy relationship will look at someone else and claim some sense of identity over them, we know under God, until you're married, that person…your boyfriend, your girlfriend, or whatever title you want to put on your relationship… That person is not yours; they are God's, and also, they will be somebody's, so as a result, you should treat them with respect.

When Brooke and I got to the end of our dating (42:48) (relationship, by that time I had made a bunch of mistakes over the course of my dating history, yet when we met in college, having learned some of these principles through spiritual mentors, we made a commitment to one another. "We want to do this thing right." I remember the day I went to her father to ask his blessing for her hand in marriage, I could do so with a guilt-free conscience, because we did it. We did it right.

Now, to be very clear, we did it imperfectly, yet we had entrusted ourselves over the course of our relationship to a God who had done all of this perfectly himself. You see, in Jesus, when we were isolated, he was inclusive. He looked upon a people that did not want him, and he said, "I will give myself for your sake to bring you into my family. I want you to be with my people, associated amongst the brothers and sisters in God's name."

When we were critical, we see in Christ one who was kind, one who sought us even when we didn't deserve it. He moved toward us with a kind of steadfast and loyal love that said, "I will go any length to get them. It doesn't matter what they've done. It doesn't matter how far they've fallen. It doesn't matter the gravest, darkest secret in their past. I will lay my life down for them, and I will seek them at every cost, because I am kind to them. They don't deserve my kindness, but I will lavish upon them a kindness they have not known, that once they know it, they might love me and live in light of it the rest of their days."

We see in Jesus that when we were naive, wayward, wandering in our sin, he was vigilant. He gave no ground. He stood right where we meant to stand. He endured our punishment against our sin by absorbing God's wrath upon our cross because he wanted to fight for the ones he loved. That's our God. That's your King. That's your husband. He's one who says, "I will be vigilant in their place. I will fight away that which seeks to destroy the ones I love. I will do so at the greatest cost."

Then we see in Jesus that while we were reckless, he was respectful in that he honored God and fulfilled the purposes for which he was sent. He has honored you in that when you did not deserve it, were not worthy of it, he lavished his love upon you anyway. This is the love of God. If you want to make dating easier, then look to the one who has fulfilled every principle perfectly, for in him, you don't just see the principles themselves; you see that picture, which is most beautiful of all. Let me pray that you would see it.

Father, thanks for tonight, for all of these people in this room as well as those out in the Chapel and overflow. Thanks that you've brought them here. God, I'm grateful that I know full well you know every one of their stories. I pray they would know, God, that you know every inch of their being. While they reckon with that, guilt and shame might arise, yet what they can know is the voice of Jesus speaks into that guilt and washes it away, speaks into that shame and sets it aside, because his voice, a voice of love, says, "I change you forever once you place your faith in me."

There are some here, God, who have come looking for a relationship, how to do this thing right. I pray they would find a relationship with you. Then, God, for those here who know you, I boldly ask, convict where they need be convicted, soften where they need be softened, and compel them to follow you all of their days regardless of their relationship status. We love you. Thank you, God, for this time, for the sufficiency of your Word, and the fact that you love to meet with your people. It's in Christ's name we pray, amen.