Love in Action (seminar on marriage and dating)

**The following post written on Mar 13 2009 at 1:22AM**

Dear all,

It is such a nice thing to have smart friends because... the smarter they are, the less I have to do! ;)

With that being said, I would like to introduce my friends'-- Joy and Greg-- web blogs to everyone. They have done such wonderful job in summarizing the two parts of the seminar that my small group had on Christian marriage and dating that I think it's simply a waste if I don't share them.

Thanks to Xiao-hu and Xinlei's love to the small group, we were able to have Pastor Don with us for the topic. The seminar was enlightening as it provided new insights and served as a reminder to me. It was just such a good time to learn more about God's excellent plan!

Since both blogs are written in Chinese, please bear with me as I try my best and translate the main points into English.

Joy's blog talks about the first part of the seminar-- Marriage.

In her blog, she summarizes three main points from the seminar:

1. Marriage should be pure and sacred because the image of God is created when a man and a woman are united
2. Marriage should be full of Love and happiness
3. Sexual intimacy is only allowed between a husband and a wife

I was utterly amazed when Pastor Don equated sexual intimacy between a married couple to the intimacy God the father and God the son have. He said that God didn't just created sexual identity to unite two separate beings into one flesh, He created it so that the two can physically enjoy the kind of spiritual intimacy that God the father and God the son have.

(Pastor Don went on and clarified himself that God the father and God the son do not encounter intimacy physically; physical intimacy is created because human beings need the tool to be more intimate with the other half.)

Greg's blog (click!) talks about the second part of the seminar-- Dating.

In his blog, he summarizes five main points from the seminar:

1. Only date Christians who are in thirst of Christ (that is, if you're a believer yourself)
2. Only make further commitments--marriage-- to another Christian if s/he shares the same future goals with you (will the relationship glorifies God and reaches its full potential with the kinds of goals and ministries you guys are called to do?)
3. Try to understand each other better while dating; see if the person is suitable for marriage
4. Avoid physical connections during the time of dating because it often times gets in the way of knowing the other person better
5. Focus on the desire for God rather than the desire for this world-- lust, gluttony, etc

It is so important to think about the intentions behind each action of all aspects in a relationship. It is terribly heartbreaking when the perfect picture and the perfect gift are destroyed and compromised due to human desires at the wrong time. I mean it fully.

Pastor Don recommended a book called, Before You Live Together by David Gudgel to the group. I’m looking forward to reading the book, as sharing a roof before marriage is sadly widely accepted nowadays. I hope to write a report on it soon!

To those of us who are unmarried—let us be patient and not to spoil the excellent plan that God has set for us!

Love,
Anna

ps I apologize for all the grammar mistakes that you might have found-- I haven't done the proof-reading yet and it is pretty late...