Lauren Chandler was just 17 years old when she met her future husband, Matt, who is older by six years. She was engaged at 18 and married at 19, when he was 25. Now they’ve been married for 17 years and have three kids, the oldest of whom just became a teenager. The dating worries and anxieties they’ve long since left behind in their own relationship have now hit home for them as parents.
While much has changed in their lives and in the dating scene for Christians in the last 20 years, much more about human relationships remains the same. Many who don’t want to be single are still single. Dating is usually confusing, potentially hurtful, and yet seemingly necessary. Marriage and childbirth may be delayed, but the nuclear family remains a goal for most young adults. How, then, can Christians walk this path with integrity, holiness, and discernment?
Matt and Lauren joined me on The Gospel Coalition Podcast to answer some tough questions on singleness and dating. We talked about various dating scenarios, about women who hold themselves back so as not to be intimidating, and about the emphasis often placed on compatibility, and what that relationship should look like from a gospel-shaped perspective.
Free eBook by Tim Keller: ‘The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness’
Imagine a life where you don’t feel inadequate, easily offended, desperate to prove yourself, or endlessly preoccupied with how you look to others. Imagine relishing, not resenting, the success of others. Living this way isn’t far-fetched. It’s actually guaranteed to believers, as they learn to receive God’s approval, rather than striving to earn it.
In Tim Keller’s short ebook, The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness: The Path To True Christian Joy, he explains how to overcome the toxic tendencies of our age一not by diluting biblical truth or denying our differences一but by rooting our identity in Christ.
TGC is offering this Keller resource for free, so you can discover the “blessed rest” that only self-forgetfulness brings.
