God Over > Eve: Dating Choices

I’m re-reading Wild at Heart and needed to stop here to reflect and share something important. Initially, I had in mind some bloggers who might really relish this information especially. I think the audience spans beyond that though. Men and women, I know Covid-19 has got you stirring and perhaps aching to find that someone with whom you will “settle down.” As a married man who did not settle in choosing my wife, I now want to share the worth of such decisions and why men and women cannot afford to settle in this arena. I know there are plenty of singles looking for dates during this time. I applaud the search and must remind you this is not the place to settle. We choose our attire each day, we pick what we want to order on the menu at restaurants and we choose how to spend our time, but when it comes to choosing a spouse to spend your life with, you are going to want to put God, prayer, wisdom, others’ feedback, and knowledge at the forefront. The best part of doing it God’s way, is that He will bring a settled peace in your spirit in you knowing when you’ve found your future spouse. He will usually confirm it in small and big ways. God is SO GOOD!!! This is why Spirit-led Christians often move at a faster pace in their relationship sometimes. If you are reading and do not identify as a Christian or “religious” I have no doubt that you can glean much here too. Men AND women, you need to hear this!

1. Your relationship is bigger than you.

I have counseled many young men to break up with the woman they were dating because they had made her their life. She was the sun of his universe, around which he orbited. A man needs a much bigger orbit than a woman. He needs a mission, a life purpose, and he needs to know his name. Only then is he fit for a woman, for only then does he have something to invite her into.

John Eldredge

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Did you catch that? If a man has not started on the journey to responsibility, responsible job handling, responsible communication, and maturity, what use do you have giving him your time? But stop. It doesn’t end there. Christian women, you need not settle on a man who meet all these qualifications. God has for you MUCH MORE than a responsible man who is mature. He has for you a man after His own heart.
2. “ A man does not go to a woman to get his strength; he goes to her to offer it.” -John Eldredge

A man must get his strength from God or else he will make a mess of trying to prove he is a man everywhere else. You’ve met plenty of men trying to prove they are men. We all have. It’s often overdone. The image. We only see their heart when the pretense drops and man’s heart is exposed. Eldredge says what many men pass off for “manhood” is often a caricature, a cartoonish display that is overblown and overdone. It is driven by fear and insecurity. A real man is assured he is one deep inside. He is assured he is a man by way of God’s affirmation.

Trust me, God has different standards for manhood than the world does. God is not impressed by immature boys who can rev engines, drink a beer in under 10 seconds, and wear cut-off jean jackets. Oh, but how many men are impressed by this! God is committed to growing you UP–As Author John Eldredge has said.

3. The most important part of this message is a man must know God first before trying to get to know you, women.

He must put God BEFORE you. GOD>Eve. He must love God most so that he can truly learn how to lay down his life for you.

Many men have replaced their innate desire for God with their pursuit of a woman. I couldn’t have captured it any better than this author does here:

There was a time when Adam drank deeply from the source of all Love. He—our first father and archetype—lived in an unbroken communion with the most captivating, beautiful, and intoxicating Source of life in the universe. Adam had God. True, it was not good for man to be alone and God in His humility gave us Eve, allowed us to need her as well. But something happened at the Fall: something shifted. Eve took the place of God in a man’s life.

And this is the curse of the fall and the reality of what we see so many men doing today. But for a man to put God first in his life and allow Christ to order his life is counter-cultural but it 110% Biblical. It’s how we were meant to live. By faith!

For the Bible says to believers, “We walk by faith, not by sight.” 2 Corinthians 5:7 ESV

Don’t settle.

June 9, 2020

Alex Oram