You make much of 'finding out if you are compatible', and scripture makes nothing of it. God created man and woman one flesh. What makes them compatible is their creation and their obedience to their creator… not some vague and unGodly modern standards of 'compatibility'.

And even 'uncompatible' couples (ie those who are unequally yoked) are told, in I Cor and I Pet, that their relationship is to be the same… the wives obedient to their husbands, the husbands obedient to God. In Ephesians 5 we see that husbands are *commanded* to love their wives… nothing is said about only those 'compatible' wives.

Chesterton said:

If Americans can be divorced for “incompatibility of temper” I cannot conceive why they are not all divorced. I have know many happy marriages, but never a compatible one. The whole aim of marriage is to fight through and survive the instant when incompatibility becomes unquestionable. For a man and a woman, as such, are incompatible.”

— G.K. Chesterton

Also, for guys or girls, if you go a dance and stand around in a group of your own gender talking, you make people not want to ask you to dance because it's more awkward to come up to a group than an individual, and it's harder to do if you have to interrupt a conversation first, and people might feel bad asking one person (especially if there are only 2 people in the group) and leaving out the others.

“I noticed somewhere on your blog that you basically said love can be a choice….it can be, but the person you marry should be someone you love. Not someone you decide to love.”

Thomas is right. Love is a choice. I'd much rather have my spouse have chosen to love me than claim that she just drifted helplessly on a current that happened to force her emotions to view me differently than other guys.

The point of all this is if people want to do a home based courtship, they can't do it in isolation. In my wife's culture, the home is the center of courtship. But meeting people is not a problem, because the home is also center of a very active social life. What would happen if families, well before the children reached marriageable age, began inviting other families or singles over for dinner and other activities about once a week? By the time the kids got to a marriageable age, it would be no problem to finding someone. But that takes time and effort to show hospitality and build those relationships.

I wonder if another barrier to successful courtship may be the parents themselves. If the parents come across as harsh, judgmental, holier than thou, proud, ect. , it will repel many good young people. Who would want to be a part of that? Reading some of the blogs and websites on courtship, it seems to be a matter of pride on how many young men the father as been able to chase off. It may be necessary to say “No” sometimes, but it shouldn't be something to gloated over. The interrogation process some are advocating has all the warmth of Spanish Inquisition. I can contrast that with my own experience. My future in-laws built a warm caring relationship with me well before the courtship began. When they approached me about marriage, I was not able to take offense because I knew that they respected and loved me. That care made me consider their advice. The bottom line is that successful courtship is about building sincere caring relationships, not about rules or formulas.

David

For one thing, there’s the church service itself. At my church (Hope in the City, located in Austin, TX), folks of a given demographic tend to sit in the same sections. There’s the college-age kids, and then there’s the parents of young kids (near the nursery and Sunday school hallway!), and then the singles. So in the times right before and after services, I’m surrounded by women in my age range that I can talk to in a casual setting.

And then a group of us will often go out to lunch after church. Also, folks will throw a party and invite people over to eat and chat and watch movies. Then we also do outdoors stuff like hiking, camping, and sight-seeing. So I’m meeting lots of women and I have the chance to talk to them and to observe them in a variety of casual settings. This helps me decide who I might want to approach in order to get to know them more deliberately.

I’ve had at least two people in the past week ask me if I’d like them to set me up with someone, so I know that being “set up” is an option that some people may choose. My personal choice is to work with God on that, but I’ve heard success stories of people being set up.

Well, those are a few thoughts. I’m looking forward to seeing other content on the site.

Tim Stewart,
Austin, TX

“How do you identify what you are looking for in a spouse if you rarely interact with the opposite sex?”

…. is the problem. You can’t be expected to find a lover if you never interact with anyone of the opposite sex…….

Sure, modern dating sometimes results in premarital sex, but so what, if the people involved believe that it violates their personal moral standard, than it is 1) they’re fault, 2) far less likely for them to engage in such acts. It’s a personal choice.

But modern dating is the best way to really find out if you are compatible with someone. There really isn’t any other way to ease into a serious, committed relationship. There’s a reason why most youth do it.

Just because people a long time ago did it one way, doesn’t mean that’s necessarily the right way. The christain church used to burn innocent woman because they had black cats….