I Kissed Dating Goodbye by Joshua Harris
A New Attitude Toward Relationship and Romance
Every relationship for a Christian is an opportunity to love another person like God has loved us. To lay down our desires and do what’s in his or her best interest. To care for him or her even when there’s nothing in it for us. To want that person’s purity and holiness because it pleases God and protects him or her.
True love isn’t just expressed in passionately whispered words or an intimate kiss or an embrace; before two people are married, love is expressed in self-control, patience, even words left unsaid.
The God who sees all our sin is ready to forgive if we repent and turn from them.
Deepening intimacy without defining a level of commitment is dangerous.
The joy of intimacy is the reward of commitment.
Deciding to do what’s best for others by never asking for intimacy that you’re not able to match with commitment is a practical way to practice the Golden Rule in romance.
The best relationships are between two people who care more about each other’s good than their own momentary pleasure.
Sinful and selfish people are the cause of sinful and selfish relationships.
In a true friendship you don’t feel pressured by knowing that you “like” the other person or that he or she “likes” you back. You feel free to be yourself and do things together without spending three hours in front of the mirror making sure you look perfect.
C. S. Lewis describes friendship as two people walking side by side toward a common goal. Their mutual interest brings them together.
A relationship based solely on physical attraction and romantic feelings will last only as long as the feelings last.
Just because lips have met doesn’t mean hearts have joined. And just because two bodies are drawn to each other doesn’t mean two people are right for each other. A physical relationship doesn’t equal love.
Unless a man is prepared to ask a woman to be his wife, what right has he to claim exclusive attention? Unless she has been asked to marry him, why would a sensible woman promise any man her exclusive attention?
God gives us singleness–a season of our lives unmatched in its boundless opportunities for growth, learning and service.
Being fun on a date doesn’t say anything about a person’s character or ability to be a good husband or wife.
As a single you have the freedom right now to explore, study, and tackle the world. No other time in your life will offer these chances.
If you’re not ready to consider marriage or you’re not truly interested in marrying a specific person, it’s selfish and potentially harmful to encourage that person to need you or ask him or her to gratify you emotionally or physically.
You’ve heard the line “If you really loved me, you’d do it.” In other words, “I don’t care about you, your convictions, or how this could hurt you–satisfy my desire.
Our feelings by themselves don’t do others one bit of good. If a man feels love for the poor but never gives money to help them or never shows kindness to them, what are his feelings worth? They may benefit him, but if his actions don’t communicate love, his feelings mean nothing.
Love is not for the fulfillment of self but for the glory of God and the good of others. True love is selfless. It gives; it sacrifices; it dies to its own needs.
True love is not measured or governed by feeling.
True love always expresses itself in obedience to God and service to others. Good feelings are nice but not necessary.
The danger of believing that you “fall in love” is that it also means you can “fall out of love” just as unexpectedly.
Love must be sincere.
True love waits, but not just for sex. It waits for the right time to commit to God’s brand of love–unwavering, unflagging, and totally committed.
Too often, people want what they want (or what they think they want, which is usually “happiness” in one form or another) right now. The irony of their impatience is that only learning to wait, and by a willingness to accept the bad with the good, do we usually attain those things that are truly worthwhile.
But God wants us to appreciate the gifts of the present season of our lives. He wants to learn the patience and trust necessary to wait for His perfect timing in all things, including our love lives.
Just because something is good doesn’t mean we should pursue it right now.
Before two people are ready for the responsibility of commitment, they should content themselves with friendship and wait on deep emotional intimacy. Exercising this patience will not handicap them relationally. In friendship, they can practice the skills of relating, caring, and sharing their lives with other people. In friendship, they can observe other people’s characters and begin to see what they’ll one day want in their mates.
God doesn’t use our singleness to punish us. He has created this season as an unparalleled opportunity for undistracted devotion to God. And as a time for growth and service that we shouldn’t take for granted or allow to slip by.
Don’t do something about your singlehood–do something with it.
Waiting for God’s timing requires trusting in His goodness and wisdom. We develop patience as we trust that God denies us what we think is good only because He has something better for us–both now and in the future.
God has promised something better. He provides something better now as we take advantage of the unique opportunities of singleness, and He’ll provide something better later when we enter into marriage.
If any man will let himself be lost for my sake, he will find his true self.
Women (and men) should marry when it is plainly the will of God for their lives, not because they can’t minister otherwise, or because of social pressure.
When God knows you’re ready for the responsibility of commitment, He’ll reveal the right person under the right circumstances.
True purity, however, is a direction, a persistent, determined pursuit of righteousness. This direction starts in the heart, and we express it in a lifestyle that flees opportunities for compromise.
The path you take with your feet should never contradict the conviction of your heart.
Kissing and making out mean something very precious and deep to a woman. It is our way of giving our trust, our love, our heart to the man we love. It leaves us very vulnerable.
We can only attain righteousness by doing two things–destroying sin in its embryonic stage and fleeing temptation.
God is not impressed with my ability to stand up to sin. He’s more impressed by the obedience I show when I run from it.
Physical interaction encourages us to start something we’re not supposed to finish, awakening desires we’re not allowed to consummate, turning on passions we have to turn off.
The wrong use of sexuality is like a highway to the grave.
I would be blessed if girls considered more than fashion when shopping for clothes. Yes, guys are responsible for maintaining self-control, but you can help by refusing to wear clothing designed to attract attention to your body.
It’s time to start seeing other people’s purity as our responsibility.
It is only by repenting of our sins and putting our faith in Christ that this substitution can take place. We have a “room” containing all our sinful deeds and thoughts. But just because we admit this or feel bad about it doesn’t mean we’re forgiven. Remorse can’t save anyone. Only faith in Christ can. Only trust in His death and resurrection for us.
When you realize you’ve made a mistake, the best thing you can do is tear down the wall and start over.
Repentance is a change of direction based on a change of heart.
Worldly sorrow is self-centered and leads to shame, but not to change. Godly sorrow recognizes sin as an offense against God, turns to Christ for forgiveness, and leads to a transformed life. This is what it means to truly “clean the slate” and start afresh.
Obedience today will save you a lot of sorrow and regret tomorrow.
You’ll need two things as you live out a new attitude toward relationships: wisdom and accountability.
Just because something is good doesn’t mean we should gorge on it.
Friendship is about something other than the two people in the relationship; intimacy is about each other. In a true friendship, something outside the two friends brings them together. C. S. Lewis writes, “We picture lovers face to face, but friends side by side; their eyes look ahead.”
Pursuing intimacy without commitment is like going mountain climbing with a partner who, once halfway up the mountain face, isn’t sure he or she wants to hold the rope.
Your friendships with other women will provide a unique form of encouragement and support that guy friends just can’t offer.
Produce before you consume; serve before seek entertainment.
Only those beliefs that spring from the heart can ever hope to stand firm against the rushing winds of emotion.
Protect yourself from your heart’s sinfulness.
Something can “feel” right and be completely wrong.
If we fail to keep our hearts clean, the rest of our lives will stagnate and become dirty.
We need to consistently evaluate the purity of our hearts in prayer, asking God to reveal the little things that contaminate us.
We need to avoid those things that encourage wrong desire.
We’ll want to destroy lust…before it destroys us.
Spending my time sighting over what I’ve given up doesn’t impress God; obeying Him with joy does.
Stop basing your happiness on how you compare with other people.
When you feel those old feelings of self-pity rising, redirect them into compassion for others.
Get your focus off you needs, and help meet someone else’s.
Learn to use the feelings of loneliness as an opportunity to draw closer to God.
When I felt lonely, I would think, God is calling me back to Him.
We must police our hearts with “faithful, silent regularity.”
He understands how it feels to face temptation. He will help sustain us as we trust in Him and faithfully guard our hearts.
He entrusted us with gifts and talents, and He expects us to guard and use them wisely.
Our faithfulness in small things today earns us the right to handle bigger responsibilities down the road.
If we’re wise, we’ll see our duties not as unimportant ways to bide out our time, but as springboards, launching us into God’s plan and purpose for our future.
Marriage won’t transform us into new people; it will only act as a mirror, showing what we already are. We have to practice now what we want to be in the future. Let’s look at a few areas we can prepare for while we’re still single.
God has given us families so that we can learn the act of sharing.
Each of us must develop a dynamic, growing, personal relationship with God.
Learn to share with others the lessons God teaches you. Learn to pray with someone else. Be honest about your areas of weakness, and ask God for a trusted person to keep you accountable in those areas.
The best preparation is actually doing it.
Marriage is much more than a wedding ceremony. A wedding is an event, but marriage is a state of being. It’s not a one-time act; it’s a lifelong commitment to be developed and maintained.
Your spouse won’t make you sin. They simply reveal what’s already in your heart. One of the best wedding gifts God will give you is a full-length mirror called your spouse. If He were to attach a card it would say, “Here’s to helping you discover what you’re really like. Congratulations!”
We need to concentrate not only on finding the right person but, more important, on becoming the right person.
Character is what you are in the dark when no one but God is watching.
Your reputation is learned in an hour; your character does not come to light for a year.
As the daylight can be seen through very small holes, so little things will illustrate a person’s character.
Look for, and work on becoming, a man or woman who, as a single, seeks God wholeheartedly, putting Him before anything else.
Look for, and strive to become, a person who respects God-given authority.
The way a guy treats his mom is the way he’ll treat his wife. The same goes for the way a girl relates to her dad.
Seek to find someone (and to be the kind of person) who uses time wisely.
As you seek a mate, look for someone who will listen to and act without hesitation on what God is telling him or her.
Work…is not what we do for a living but what we do with our living…. The opposite of work is not leisure or play or having fun, but idleness–not investing ourselves in anything.
Look for someone who energetically invests his or her life in something important right now.
Look for someone who will light candles, not just curse the darkness.
God help the man who won’t marry until he finds the perfect woman, and God help him still more if he finds her.
We can’t trust ourselves, and we can’t completely know the person we decide to marry, but we can trust God to guide us in our decisions and to help us follow through with our commitments.
Seeking to obey God and genuinely care for others is far more important than whether we use the word dating or courtship.
Terms don’t define us; our lives define our terms.
Godly romantic relationship stages: 1) Casual friendship 2) Deeper friendship 3) Courtship: purposeful intimacy with integrity 4) Engagement.
Every time you feel attracted to someone, keep in mind that you’re involved in three kinds of relationships: your relationship with the person you’re interested in; your relationship with the people around you, including your family and friends; and most important, your relationship with God. You have a responsibility toward each.
Strong marriages are built on a solid foundation of the mutual respect, appreciation, and camaraderie of friendship.
Get to know each other better as individuals–to gain an accurate, unbiased view of each other’s true nature. How can you do this? First, instead of dropping out of your regular routines to spend time together, look for opportunities to include one another in your real lives.
As your friendship progresses, avoid saying and doing things that express romantic love. The context of a deepening friendship is not the time to talk about your possible future together; it’s the time to get to know each other, serve God together in the church, and listen for God’s leading. And don’t encourage your friends to talk about you or to treat you as a couple.
It will take patience and self-control not to express your feelings prematurely, but it’s worth it.
The season of courtship is a time to match deepening intimacy with deepening commitment.
Don’t allow impatience now to rob you of an undefiled, passionate sexual relationship in marriage.
Create your own one-of-a-kind love story by following God-honoring principles for relationships. You’ll never regret seeking His best for you and your mate-to-be.
Write a love story with your life that you’ll feel proud to tell.
My favorite Bible verses in the book:
Philippians 1:9-10, Proverbs 3:3, Proverbs 15:22, Ephesians 4:22-24, 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, John 15:13, John 14:15, 1 Corinthians 7:32, 1 Timothy 6:6, Jeremiah 29:11, Romans 12:10, Jeremiah 17:9, Psalms 86:11, 1 John 3:20, Ephesians 5:15-16, 1 Samuel 16:7, Proverbs 31:30, Philippians 2:3, Song of Songs 8:4, Galatians 5:22-23.
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