Talking About Relationships

Beginning this week, Shannon and I are leading an engaged couple through their required premarital counseling.

One of the most rewarding and challenging parts of college ministry is preparing young men and women to have godly marriages. It is also quite a humbling task, because I never quite feel qualified to give advice on the topic. Shannon and I have a good marriage, but for some reason exhorting a young man to love his wife (or future wife) "as Christ loves the Church" makes me feel just a tad out of my league. Sort of like a junior college basketball player telling a high school kid how to play like Michael Jordan. His heart may be in the right place, but...well, you get the point.

Nonetheless, those of us who work with college students have a responsibility to teach them about dating, sex, and marriage.

Yes, the topic has often been beaten to death by popular Christian writers, as if there were no other spiritual topics worthy of a publisher's time. Yes, some students have heard dozens of "dating talks" and are tired of them. Yes, teaching on the subject can make the university pastor feel a bit cheap, as if he is merely trying to expand his audience by giving them what they want to hear (dating talks invariably draw large crowds).

And of course, feelings of inadequacy go with the territory.

But the truth is that a bad dating relationship or marriage will derail a person's spiritual life. In my ministry, sexual immorality and poor relationships probably distract more students from the Lord than anything else.

So despite the problems inherent to the topic, I do my best to provide students a biblical framework for relational health. The world is working overtime to teach its views on dating and sexuality; why should the church remain silent?