Why is it that the few men I have chatted with on this site are looking for a marriage so soon before they meet me or get to know me. It has turned me off a little. Don't get me wrong I want to be married, but I want to get to know the guy first before he starts giving me false promises.
There are a few desperate people out there, men and women, but I have found that the majority of people who don't want to wait have just matured spiritually. They know that love is not an emotion, it is a choice. They realize that God will make everything right if you include Him in everything.
What was it you said? Alive, Christian, Unmarried? With the addition of a very few other things, I would say that about covers it. You need to have some of the same interests, same spiritual beliefs, and be about even in your walks. Other than that, everything is a worldly outlook.
We can love anyone we choose to love. When people say the love has grown cold in a relationship, what they mean is, the lust isn't there anymore. That "feeling" is not love, it is lust. We westerners are so worried about being in lust with our spouse that we even make up other names for it. Sparks, chemistry, attraction....these are ALL lust of the flesh. The Bible doesn't say lust is okay in a marriage. We have come to accept it, and look where it has brought us. When our flesh can no longer be satisfied with what we have, we divorce them and start over. One of the definitions of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results.
Quit lying to yourself, just say lust is what you want, and be done with it. That is much more honest than trying to justify it in this way. And stop acting like you are better than those who are ready to get married, they are not the ones playing games. They are the ones who will still be married in 10 years, not divorced again and looking for a mate to lust after.
I appreciate this discussion and I enjoy reading what you have to say.
I want to ask you something that may better help me understand where you are coming from. Is sexual desire an ungodly thing? Does sexual desire = lust in your way of thinking?
Sexual desire is the physical reaction to lust, and is not bad, in and of itself. Lust is in the mind. It can be controlled, but most don't ever try to control it. We instead focus on controlling the results of that lust. This allows us to keep the feeling, but not give in to the action. This is one of the reasons we are so confused about what love is. We attribute it to that feeling.
We are commanded to love one another, men are commanded to love their wives. If we did not have control of it, we would not be commanded to do it. We are not commanded to love our wives IF they do what we want, or IF they look a certain way, we are just commanded to love them.
My apologies for the length of time it has taken me to respond. I was out of town and just saw this.
The reason for my being upset, upon reflection, does appear rather vague. I edited my posting a bit too much it seems.
The aggravation was with stereotypes. People from other countries are all one way, or Americans are another. Stereotypes do not promote Christianity nor Christian love.
Again, my apologies for the ambiguity and tardiness of response.
Sexual desire was God's way of preserving the species. It made us all want to breed. This is a physical reaction to some kind of stimulus. It can be lust or several other things that trigger it. So, the desire by itself is not bad, it is dormant.
With the coming of Christ, the standard was set higher. No longer were we to keep ourselves for just the physical act, Jesus taught that to even think about it is a sin. This actually helps us.
Since thinking about sinning is now a sin, it allows us to stop it before we transgress. We still have to repent of the thought, but we don't actually have to repent of the act, because we can stop it before that point.
In short, we stop it while it is only a thought, and not an action. Eventually, we stop having the thoughts.
