Kingdom Focused Courtship

All right, good morning. Welcome, everyone. I'd like to welcome our visitors. Good to see you, especially Quinn and Gabby. I'm glad you guys are able to be here for this. So, as we know, I'm talking about courtship. And I'll just say one thing. When Justin was walking up here, I thought, "Oh, good, Justin won't ask me for my title." And there we go. We see what he did. Anyways, so the reason I've been trying to guard—I was trying to guard—I was not really sharing with people what I was talking about because I wanted to maybe be able to defend myself slightly while I've decided to speak on this topic.

And so the title of my message today is "Kingdom-Focused Courtship." And that's where I got the initials KFC from. And that was really special to me when I saw that. So, first of all, why am I using the word courtship? We don't really use the word courtship too much in our circles.

And the reason why I chose that was just to differentiate between the practice of the world and the way of the Christian. I believe there's people out there that they hear the word courtship, and they hear the word dating, and they, yeah, they associate dating with just what the world does.

But so I'm using the word courtship for this message.

And so why I've chosen to talk about courtship, or at least—oh, let me back up. So recently, in the last several months, I've been thinking about what makes someone—what gives me the credentials to be able to talk on a certain subject. And I've talked to Kevin about this. And I've been thinking a lot about why would anybody listen to what I have to say? And then I've started thinking about why would I listen to you what you have to say?

Just because someone's talking on a subject doesn't mean they're an expert on that subject. And so I've been thinking about this. When I talk on a topic where I'm hearing other people talk, what experience do they have, and what gives them the credibility to be able to talk on a given subject?

So probably my main defense would be that I have a godly wife. And I think that is really—if my wife was a shyster or whatever, I wouldn't be up here talking about how to choose a godly partner. And so I want to thank my wife that I'm able to talk about choosing a spouse and how to choose a spouse because of her godly example.

Right before, it was on Thursday, so our workday was on—it was on Saturday, and I kind of panicked because I was like, "Is it weird for a 28-year-old guy to talk about courtship?" And I asked one of my brother-in-laws just randomly. I said, "What would you think if some 28-year-old guy had a sermon on courtship?" He's like, "That's not a problem."

And I said, "Well," I said, "it's too late now," but I all of a sudden started panicking. And he's like, "Well, better than a 50-year-old who hasn't done it for 30 years." And he says, "Now, if you'd done it—if you just got married six months ago, then I'd probably a little hesitate." So I'm at that sweet spot right now. So I want to take advantage of that.

Okay, so today I'm going to be telling you my story. And along the way, I'm going to stop periodically for some quick lessons on courtship. And I haven't done everything perfectly, of course. And so a lot of these examples that I'm using, I'm trying to give a positive vibe for what to do for courtship. And these are examples of things that I've done that I found helpful that I'd like to share with you for the courting couples and also for the young people that we can set a high precedent standard in developing godly relationships. So I wrote a lot of my story out, and I'll probably just go ahead and read that. And I'm excited also.

The more I get to—I'm in this congregation, the more I realize I don't really know all of you, and you don't really know me. You don't really know my background. I don't know a lot of your background. We come from diverse backgrounds. And so I'm excited to share a little bit more of my story, and maybe you can see a little bit more of the history of how God has brought me around. So here we go. When I first noticed Abigail, I had been living in southern Guatemala for about a year, and Abigail had been working in a health clinic in northern Guatemala for about two years. We both worked for the same organization, so I would see her occasionally.

I had known Abigail was a nice girl, but I did not consider her to be an option. At that time in my life, I developed some strong convictions on how Christians are not to accumulate wealth.

I felt strongly about that, but I didn't know many Christians from the States who believed the way I did. Two criteria for a wife that I had was that she would be willing to go on the mission field and also willing to live a simple Christian life.

I didn't know this at the time, but Abigail had a criteria that her future husband would believe in kingdom economics as well.

Too bad she's not up here for this, but she told me after we were married, she said, "Zach, I had always said I wanted to marry a poor man. You are more than a dream come true."

Anyways, I thought Abigail was just another rich Pennsylvanian girl, so she was off limits for me. The fall of 2016, I was to fly home from Guatemala for furlough. I was at the mission headquarters ready to book my tickets to fly home.

And at the last minute, I decided to check the mission calendar to see if I would share my flight with anyone going back home. Abigail was scheduled to take the same flight that I was ready to book. I did what any brave dashing young man would do. I rescheduled my flight for another day.

When I was home on furlough, I decided to go to the library and do my research. I didn't have internet at that time, so we used the library. I found out what church—I had found out which church Abigail attended, and I went online to see if I could find something about what they believed. To my surprise, they believed in non-accumulation of wealth. This was quite surprising to me as I didn't know many people who believed that way, much less a whole congregation. I took this as a door starting to open.

So point number one that I'd like to share with the young people: choose a spouse that shares a common vision. A great vision for a young couple is to unite over the historic faith. At the time, my focus of non-accumulation of wealth was a desire to radically follow Jesus. I believe that the historic faith gives a complete vision for what I was seeking as a young person.

Sharing a mutual goal will make a couple be united. It will give them purpose that will carry them through the difficult times. And I believe that sharing a mutual goal applies the same as well, even in worldly situations.

It doesn't have to be—it doesn't have to be a Christ-centered goal, but in relationships where people are united in a common vision, they're able to—it bonds them together.

After my one-month furlough was over, I was back in Guatemala, quickly getting used to the idea of asking Abigail out. The only problem was that Abigail's time in Guatemala was coming to a close, which meant she would be going back to Pennsylvania in a couple of months.

She was living north of where I lived, 20 hours by bus with multiple connections. So it was a long journey. It would have been a long trip, and I didn't have a car, so it would have been very difficult for me to be there and without a legitimate reason just to go up there.

I started to feel a little panic, thinking that if I failed to get in contact with Abigail before she went back to the States, I would lose her forever once she set foot in Pennsylvania, Mennonite country. I remember sitting in church, and a brother was preaching on surrendering things on the altar at Mount Moriah. Right there, I lifted Abigail up and laid her on the altar. I surrendered my right to be able to date Abigail or court Abigail, knowing that if it was God's will, I could get in contact with her before she left for the States. I still wasn't sure this was what I was supposed to do, but I didn't want to miss an opportunity.

So point number two: surrender your will to God before you pursue a relationship. I believe that a single person should learn to find contentment and joy in their current situation before they pursue a relationship. Marriage won't necessarily make you happy.

It will make you happier, but it won't make you happy. So you need to learn to be content and surrender to the will of God before marriage. I should say a good marriage will make you happier.

Soon after that incident of surrender, my friend and I were invited to have a Thanksgiving meal with the clinic girls—the girls that it was Abigail and her coworkers—at their house. As I mentioned, it was quite a hike from where I lived, but the opportunity was greater.

During that visit, I found out that the clinic girls would be spending Christmas at mission headquarters. They were then going back home to the States after the New Year. So I conveniently made plans to spend Christmas there as well. In other words, the thing I was scared of was not having opportunity.

I was having plenty—God had given me plenty of opportunities to get and be able to get in contact with Abigail. Over Christmas, I was finally able to privately ask Abigail for her email address, which turned out to be pointless because I didn't think about it till afterwards how weird it would be to email her and say, "Hey, can I talk to your dad?" And so I ended up never even emailing her, but at least I had her email address that I wouldn't lose her.

Anyways, the whole situation ended with Abigail telling her cousin Lauren, "I don't know what's up with Zach, but he's acting really weird."

I found that out after we were married. So after she had gone back, so a couple of months passed, and in April 2017, I was given permission to go back to the States for a month. I had been sick for several months and wasn't much of a help in Guatemala during that time. My Guatemalan doctor couldn't figure out what I had, and the week I was to fly home, my doctor became convinced that I had Lymes.

So he ended up ordering a Lymes test. We got the Lymes test done, and then he started me on a round of antibiotics even before we got the test back because he was so convinced.

And so I didn't get the positive test results until I was back in the States, but by the time I was boarding the plane, I was feeling much better physically. Mentally, though, I was in rough shape, and this was another reason why I felt like I needed to go back to the States to see if I could find some help. And I've shared my story of anxiety with another message, but this is where this story overlaps.

I was going through some really, really difficult anxiety attacks.

So by this time, my parents were aware that I was interested in Abigail.

And after asking me about it, I told them that these things needed to be resolved before I could pursue a relationship with her. These were real issues that I felt were a big hurdle to overcome. And the first one was God would have to heal me from my illness, my mental.

I was so debilitated from my struggle that I knew I would never be able to be strong enough mentally, or I knew that at that time, I was not strong enough mentally to be able to consider marriage.

And by far, I knew this would be my biggest hurdle to overcome. And the other thing I said was I would have to know that I would have a job where I could come back and make enough money to support a family or save for marriage. And at this time, Michigan was home, so there were really few job opportunities. And you could say, "Well, maybe that was a lack of faith. Maybe it was. Maybe it wasn't." But this is what I said.

Also, I told my parents that before I would ask her, I would have to meet her parents. I had no context for Abigail as we had met in Guatemala, and I wanted to see her home environment. And the last one was I said I would have to visit her church. And I told them I wasn't going to randomly show up at her church, drive from Michigan and show up at her church, but I would have to visit her church. And I said, "I don't know how that's going to happen, but this is what I feel needs to happen." And just in my defense, we were in the Anabaptist world. She was on one end of the spectrum, and I was on the completely other opposite end.

And it was a really big—it was a really big jump to consider. Just the differences seemed overwhelming. And that's why I felt like I really wanted to see what was her home life like and where she grew up and all that. So point number three: beware of a situational crush.

And especially, I hope the young people here in our congregation can understand what I'm trying to share because we travel around, we go different places, and especially if you meet someone in another country. And I have no problem absolutely with cross-cultural marriages. I believe there's hurdles, as in any marriage, you need to overcome in a cross-cultural marriage, but I don't have any problem with cross-cultural marriages.

But what I want to caution our youth with is if you are on a mission trip and let's say you meet a potential candidate, since you're having a great time, your judgment can be obscured. What can happen is you go and you fall in love with a culture and the people. You may meet someone, and since you have already romanticized the country, this young person equates that with love.

So a good test that I believe that if you're having a great time in another country and you meet someone, I think a good test would be to consider if you would take that person back to your hometown, and if she was a hometown girl, would it still be exciting, and would it still be something you'd want to pursue? So when I met Abigail, where she was living at—I'll just give you a little bit of a background—where she was living at, the church building had a thatched roof where the missionaries lived. There was a thatched roof. It was right on the river. You'd fire up the boat. You'd go down the river. Sometimes you'd go down the river.

You could take the road. But to pick up the clinic girls to bring them to church, you'd go down the river on a boat. There's alligators, all these wildlife. It was like a jungle type of thing. It used to be jungle, but cleared for cattle. So it was pretty romantic, right? And I met her in that situation.

And so I guess that's what I'm saying is the danger of the situation. Just be aware of that is what I'm trying to say of a situational crush.

And so I don't know if that makes sense, but that's just a good rule to do is to think about if you would end up marrying someone and then moving back to your hometown, would that still be exciting and still be worth it? So point number four: don't tempt the Lord. So one thing I would advise young people, and I would advise anybody, not to lay out the fleece before the Lord. And people use this terminology, laying out the fleece before the Lord.

And there's no really New Testament precedent for this. And what this is, is just—and when I think of when people lay out the fleece before the Lord, it's just some arbitrary sign that you make up that you just maybe hope happens to confirm what you want to do.

And pulling the petals off of a daisy isn't the best idea to determine whether she loves you. It's not the best strategy. But in my situation, these were real hurdles that I felt like I needed to overcome. So I don't consider this to be—I wasn't asking God for a sign. I was more saying, "These are some things that I need to work through." But I would not advise anybody to lay out the fleece before the Lord to determine who you will marry. It's not worth it.

So these obstacles seemed insurmountable, but God quickly resolved each of the issues one by one soon after. So it's either the next day or the day after the conversation I had with my parents. The guy I worked for over furlough and also before I left for Guatemala, I don't know why he called me up, but he decided to call me up and tell me he wanted to pay me, give me a $3 an hour raise. So I felt like that was definitely a move in the right direction with having a better job. Also, I planned a road trip to visit some friends and mission board members in Pennsylvania.

And what I had told my parents is I said, "I know," I said, "I want to meet her parents. I want to see her church." I said, "I don't know how this is going to happen, but I'm going to put myself down in Pennsylvania, and we'll see what happens." I said, "I'll go down there, and I'll at least be available if something works out."

And so I planned a trip to Pennsylvania, and on the way, my first stop was in Ohio to meet with Stan Newswanger. And as I shared in my previous message on anxiety, that's where I made my breakthrough with anxiety was with that meeting with him. And that was incredible when that happened.

Yeah, it was an incredible feeling to be able to be free from that and find the truth to my anxiety issues. So that was the second thing that was resolved. So after swinging down to Harper's Ferry to visit a friend, I was on my way to visit another friend in St. Thomas.

Initially, I was going to go to church with him at St. Thomas Christian Fellowship, but he texted me and said, "Hey, sorry, but our church is canceled at St. Thomas.

Unfortunately, we're going to have to go to Shippensburg because of their Bible school." And Shippensburg Christian Fellowship is where Abigail was going to church at the time. And I was like, "No problem." And anyways, so I was like, "Okay, this is working out.

I can go to her church." I wasn't expecting I was going to go to church with him, but their church was canceled, and we went to the service at Shippensburg instead. So during the fellowship meal that Sunday, randomly, Abigail's parents sat down next to me and my friend. My friend knew that I had served in Guatemala, and he introduced her parents to me. So that was another—we didn't talk much. I just said, "Hi," maybe a little bit of small conversation, but I was at least able to see them and be able to meet them, a little bit more context. And if you've ever been to the meal after the Shippensburg Bible School program, you can imagine the chances of me running into them were pretty slim, lots of people there.

So I feel like God worked all those issues out for me and increased my faith in what He can do in our lives. So I was here at the end of the road trip to Pennsylvania, and the seemingly impossible obstacles God resolved on one trip.

So point number five: young men, don't be a chicken. And I'm not saying if you don't do this that you are a chicken, but I'm just saying this is something that I highly recommend. And I believe that a great way to start a relationship off with a young lady is to talk with her father.

And this may seem like an out-of-date practice, but I recommend it. If you don't know her father, try to get to know him. A week after my trip to Pennsylvania, I knew it was time to pursue a relationship with Abigail. I knew her dad owned a mechanic shop in Shippensburg, so I sent a letter to the family business addressed to him. And that's probably not the most stealthy move because it has to pass through the secretary and all that.

So I stated in the letter that I was interested in Abigail and that I would like to meet him.

The purpose of meeting with Abigail's father was to find out what Abigail's beliefs and her real Christian life was like. I wanted to know what his beliefs and convictions were. And if I could find out what his beliefs were, I would know at least what kind of home Abigail grew up in.

Dallas agreed to meet with me over coffee. Hold on. Notification here. So he agreed to meet with me over coffee.

He told me we could meet for coffee at The Butcher Shop in Chambersburg. Now, love can make you do irrational things. And for me to meet my potential future father-in-law at a place called The Butcher Shop seemed pretty dangerous, but I took it like a man.

I drove down.

I wasn't funny at the time.

I drove down from Michigan to Chambersburg again, and this was only like a week and a half apart. And I had a long talk with him. And I found it to be really helpful to get a peek into Abigail's life and also to establish a relationship with her father. He talked to me straight for three hours, which was good because I would have been hard for me to carry a conversation. I was so nervous.

Point number six: listen to how they chew their food.

So what do I mean by that? I heard someone give this advice to dating couples. Listen to how your partner chews their food. Really, really pay attention and try to hear any noises that they're making. Because once you are married, those noises will be amplified 100 times.

The point is—married people know. I can understand the joke. The point is that during courtship, you naturally ignore and miss the flaws and annoying habits in the other person. And when you are married, those flaws and annoying habits become exaggerated. So this is what happens naturally, is that you just brush over the annoying things and the flaws and all those things. And then when you are married, those flaws and those failures become even a bigger thing than what they really are.

And I believe this is the opposite of how it should be. Courtship is not the time to ignore the other person's flaws, but to seriously consider them. Once you are married, that is when you overlook flaws and failures.

Don't brush things off and think you can change the other person once you are married. That's not what marriage is for.

Another thing I would encourage any dating couple to work through would be to work through their differences while you are courting. It allows both of you to see whether the other person is willing to listen to your point of view.

The important thing is to see whether you are able to work your differences out together. And that's what, to me, matters more than anything, is it doesn't really matter how varied your background is. Can you work together? Can you work out your differences together?

Or do you just push things under the rug and not address the issues? And I want to give a huge shout-out to my wife. I really put her through the grinder when we first started dating. I was still in Guatemala. And so the first email that I sent her once I had asked her out and we were going to email back and forth. Actually, Abigail came to Guatemala.

I forgot to put this part in. But Abigail came to Guatemala for Craig and Audi's wedding. So she was back in the States. She came to Guatemala for Craig and Audi's wedding, and then I was able to personally talk to her then. So that was another thing that—so thank you, Craig, as well, if you're listening.

So yeah, like I said, I really put my wife through the mill when we first started dating. And yeah, one of my first emails was, "So what do you believe about this Christian concept?" And she emailed me back, and then we had—yeah, it was pretty intense.

It was more about what we believed and all that. But at the time, I was determined not to let our relationship progress too far and become emotionally attached too quickly before we were able to talk and discuss differences in our background and Christian beliefs.

So like I said, it was pretty intense courtship in the beginning, or at least emailing each other the first couple of months, but it seemed like that wasn't going to be an issue. So we were able to move on past that.

And I may have taken it a little extreme. So I would say, "Don't pattern your courtship after my courtship, of course." But I think it was really good that I was able to put Abigail to the test because at least I know she was able to—looking in retrospect, I can see, well, Abigail was able to handle maybe my intense extremeness. So she was able to put up with it and didn't just drop me right away.

So yeah, don't become emotionally attached too quickly before you can talk about deeper issues.

Point number seven: who is the woman's head during a courtship? And this is something my wife taught me during our courtship, that her head, that I was not her head. Her head and who she was responsible to was her father.

And courtship is a time for a woman not to submit to her boyfriend, but for a woman to submit to her father. Courtship is a time for a woman to prove her submission to her father, not to her boyfriend. Now, there may be a transition period during engagement or something like that, but in the end, her leader in courtship is still her dad and not her boyfriend.

Point number eight: purity during courtship. There are many things that are understood to be unacceptable in a kingdom-focused courtship: no hugging, kissing, or any other intimate contact. So I'm a big proponent of a no physical contact courtship. There may be nothing wrong if a couple holds hands, but once you hold hands, it makes it easy then to sit close together on the sofa and so forth.

In a kingdom-focused courtship, respect the other person's body knowing that it's not yours. And my wife and I found this out during our courtship, that it's easy to just lean into each other or slide closer together on the sofa or so forth if you give way to a little bit of physical, like holding hands or something like that. And for us, we decided that we needed to make a clean break and that any physical contact was breaking our rule.

And so that if we were sitting close together and touching, that way we had no doubt in our mind when we stepped over our boundary. And this was a battle for us.

And of course, I would make exception for shaking hands as being culturally acceptable as well. So I have no problem with that.

And so all you young people and dating people, and I'm really proud of our dating couples, by the way. I'm not criticizing anyone. I just want to share this with you. When you date, you get lost in your own little world. You think you can be discreet and act casual about how mushy you are. Just because you act casual and act like this is normal doesn't mean you'll fool everyone else. I want to let you know that everyone is watching you.

After courtship ends, either one of two things have happened. After a courtship ends, either one of two things have happened. So number one, the couple has broken up, or the couple has gotten married. Either just one or the other.

So let's look at one scenario. This is a relationship that will eventually be terminated. This couple, throughout their courtship, has not been quite sure of their relationship. So they really don't get into trouble because deep down they know this relationship isn't going to last.

They might still hold hands or they sit really close together on the sofa, something like that. Eventually, their relationship is dissolved. A couple of years later, the young man's best friend marries this guy's ex-girlfriend. Although he didn't commit a sin, I would say this isn't preferring your brother because your girlfriend or boyfriend is not yours yet.

This is the second scenario. This couple is madly in love. They know they will get married and they may even be engaged. So why wait until they are married? So one thing that happens when you defraud your partner is that same action can then make you feel guilty once you are married. Let's say a couple kisses before they are married. That is out of bounds in a kingdom-focused courtship. Guilt then can be associated with kissing. So after the couple is married and everything's above board, they can still have guilt and remorse afterwards. And another thing that I don't think people think about too often is that when you defraud your partner, you are teaching them how to commit adultery on you once you are married.

And what do I mean by that? So I'm not saying that there's—of course, there's forgiveness for sin. Of course, there's forgiveness if a couple does something that is out of bounds in their courtship. But once a pathway to sin has been opened, it's easier to go down that path again than if you had never gone down in the first place.

And in courtship, I think it's helpful to remember that people have always desired the very thing which they cannot have.

And this is like the root of—well, that's what lust is, is wanting something that you cannot have. And this really has been the found where sin was established, is wanting something that you cannot have. Proverbs 9:13-18: "A foolish woman is clamorous. She is simple and knoweth nothing. For she sitteth at the door of her house on a seat in the high places of the city to call passengers who go right on their ways.

Whoso is simple, let him turn and hither. And as for him that wanteth understanding, she saith to him, 'Stolen waters are sweet and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.' But he knoweth not that the dead are there and that her guests are in the depth of hell."

Intimacy outside of marriage is exotic and exciting, but that cultivates an appetite in your partner that you do not want them to have. And my point is you're cultivating an appetite. When you're married, you've cultivated in your courtship, if you've done some hanky-panky or whatever it is, you've cultivated an appetite in your partner. And like I said, there's forgiveness, of course, but that's something in a kingdom-focused courtship we want to steer clear from.

Along with that, it doesn't promote trust in the marriage.

So in conclusion, wrapping up here, I've talked all about how godly and spiritual your potential partner needs to be and how you need to be from the spiritual aspect. But one clarification I want to make is don't marry someone just because they are a Christian.

There are Christians out there you can marry. There's many Christians out there you can marry, but marry the person because you want to, because you want to spend time with that person, because you're attracted to that person. I hear people complaining and saying how picky girls are. Girls and guys, be as picky as you like. It's your choice.

The only thing I would advise you and consider is the more picky you are before you start courting someone, the lower your chances of getting married will be. So that's pretty obvious. But I would say don't be hyper-spiritual to the point where you marry someone and you become a martyr by not marrying them because you love them, so on and so forth, just because they're godly. I believe that a godly spouse should be a given for a Christian. That's just part of courtship. But I would advise everyone to marry someone that you love and also someone that you're willing to spend the rest of your life with. So hopefully that was discreet enough and not too mushy or anything like that.

And hopefully I didn't make anybody feel too awkward. Everything good, Quinn?