Dating or courtship should be a time of growing in intimacy – NOT sexual intimacy – relational/emotional intimacy.
To clarify what I mean, here’s how Webster’s defines the word “intimate”:
- belonging to or characterizing one’s deepest nature
- marked by very close association, contact, or familiarity
- marked by a warm friendship developing through long association
- suggesting informal warmth or privacy
- of a very personal or private nature
If you want to grow in this kind of intimacy, without the temptation of falling into the other kind of intimacy, you don’t want to be isolated. By that I mean this: never put yourself and your date in a position where other people are not able to see you or walk in on you at any moment without warning. In fact, don’t even take your date some place where you don’t expect to be seen often and/or without notice.
In our hyper-sexualized society, purity and privacy are often inversely related.
The more isolated you are the more drawn you’ll be to engage in sexual intimacy.The more you stay out in the open, the less sexual tension you’ll have to fight. The fact is, you can have an intimate conversation (about life, family backgrounds, disappointments, hopes, lessons learned) in the corner of a coffee shop or on a park bench with kids playing nearby. Non-dating people do this all the time!
If you know your roommate won’t be home, that’s not the place to take your date (unless you want to get in trouble). Same thing with a parked car or any other secluded place.
I know, this could get awkward. You’re not going to be able to have your date over alone for dinner. You’re certainly not going to be able to travel alone together. DON’T WORRY! YOU’LL BE ABLE TO DO THAT AFTER MARRIAGE!
For now, if you love to cook together, invite another couple to keep you company. You love to hike in the mountains? Take some friends along.
When you’re looking back over your life, the inconvenience of boundaries you established to protect against temptation will be overshadowed by the joy of having lived well.
What a world we’ve made for ourselves where jumping into bed isn’t supposed to be awkward, but setting guidelines to make sure that doesn’t happen is.
Still, you might be thinking, “Hey MJ, what if you have some intense issues to discuss that might illicit emotions (other than romantic passion) which you don’t want to display in public – emotions like anger, anxiety or sorrow?” We’ll address that next weekend as we continue this bit of FMU Date Night Advice. Stay tuned until then… and keep your dating life out in the open.
Date Night Advice (DNA) series: Keep Your Dating Life Out in the Open
Click here for the next post in the series.
Dug this weekend’s Date Night Advice (DNA)? Be a good friend and share with your friends on the social media platform of choice: Instagram, Youtube, Facebook, or Twitter.
Want to grow beyond our DNA blog?
Our LoveEd discipleship series, Beyond Sex & Salvation, will empower you to grow spiritually and date wisely, so you can marry well.
This discipleship series is NOT for couples, but for the wise individual who wants to prepare for their future marriage like a successful career: intentionally, intelligently and IN ADVANCE!
This discipleship series is NOT about dos and don’ts. It’s about learning the life lessons, mastering the life disciplines, and making the life decisions necessary for relational success.
You can walk through it on your own, but it’s more fun with friends, so consider putting together an FMU LoveEd small group study. Even better? And ask a married couple you respect to lead it!
