Dating

This is a topic that tends to come to my mind with some frequency; more frequently than I enjoy, honestly. I've wavered, or more accurately, am constantly wavering, about whether dating at this point in my life is worth the time. It has its pros and cons, that's for sure; it's just that the risks seem to outweigh whatever benefits there are at times. I don't see anything wrong with it, so I condemn neither the person who does or does not date at this point in their life, I personally just don't know if it's worth the bother for me.

One of the greatest risks I can see in dating is what it could do to a friendship. If two good friends start dating, then if things don't work out, a break-up can completely cripple not only the dating relationship but the entire friendship as well. Considering that I elect to have few friends and to keep those few friends close, any loss in that area can easily become one of great magnitude that would be nearly impossible to recover from. Both fortunately and unfortunately, I came close to having this happen to me, and while I do have some regrets, in the end I think it was best, for had that not happened, this risk would not have seemed so real to me, and thus I would be less inclined to pay attention to it. At this point, I feel that a girl that I can be close to and can trust completely would be worth so much more than a girlfriend, for there would be a much lesser desire to strive to impress them, if one at all, since I do not live my life aiming to impress my friends. My friends are my friends because I can relax and be real around them and don't have to struggle for their acceptance, but that's getting into another subject entirely. Going back to the benefits of it though, I will say this: the time when I put the most effort into obtaining a girlfriend ((which ultimately failed, but that's irrelevant)), due to some of the ambivalence I felt about what was God's leading and what was my own desires, I more often found myself crying to God for leadership, and thus drew closer to Him and pulled fartehr away from sin than I had in a long time, and since that scene of my life has ended, I unfortuantely have notices that change reversing, and my drifting back to where I was, which quite frankly was not a place I wanted to be in spiritually.

However, I firmly believe that it is a necessity, and can be very beneficial if done for the right reasons. People who date selfishly or just for the fun of it are doing it for the wrong reasons. I don't think anyone should just sit around waiting for God to just drop their soulmate into their lap. You don't necessarily have to go actively pursue a soulmate, but I think one should always have his eyes open for any particular person God might lead you towards. When you feel God leading you, first, be certain it's God and not selfish, sinful lusts that you're hearing, and when you're certain, I think that's when it's time to make an effort for the relationship. As I said, God's probably not giong to just drop a soulmate into your lap; He expects you to put effort into it--you can't get something for nothing. Should the person you dated through God's leading turn out not to be the one for you to marry, perhaps he or she was put into your life to help you in some other way or it just wasn't what God wanted. There's always the chance you could have let your lusts overshadow God's voice in your life, especially if you're not in a tight relationship with Him, so perhaps that could be the problem. No matter the reason, God will still lead you to find the right spouse in His time, or He may lead you to live a single life, who's to say but He?


I think there are alot of good opinions and posts on this subject in this topic at a message board I frequent: http://www.christiananime.net/showthread.php?t=44945 but if you don't want to take the time to read all of it, please do read the two following posts:

http://www.christiananime.net/showpost.php?p=1164615&postcount=17

http://www.christiananime.net/showpost.php?p=1165949&postcount=42


But those are just my thoughts; I'm 16, so what could I possibly know?