Relationships/Courting

[Evangelical]

Originally Posted by A little brother

You might have forgotten the most important romance - Christ and His Church. Christ is not in a hurry and still patiently waiting for His bride to be ready after thousands of years have passed.

You prove my point. He has already chosen His future wife. He is waiting for her readiness not trying to get to know her better to see if she is the right one.

[A little brother]

Originally Posted by Evangelical

You prove my point. He has already chosen His future wife. He is waiting for her readiness not trying to get to know her better to see if she is the right one.

No I didn't.

If even the all-knowing God would be patiently waiting/dating until His bride is ready, why the hurry for the not-all-knowing man to jump into marriage? Why would the elders have a role doing the matching? Why would they think romantic element in a relationship before marriage is unimportant when they know about the divine romance?

[Evangelical]

But there's only one Bride. God is not dating different Brides to figure out who is the right one. Let's use Israel as an example - God chose Israel and remained committed to her, and did not "date" other nations to see who is the best match for him. Your analogy does not really fit.

I believe the bible leans towards the idea of match-making, rather than two people figuring it out for themselves by trial and error ( I don't recall any example in the bible of a man dating different women to figure out who is right for him). Whether it is God, grandparent or parent, or an elder, their wisdom is valuable:

Job 12:12 Is not wisdom found among the aged? Does not long life bring understanding?

So I guess you think romance is about love-heart shaped chocolates and red roses. Read the bible and we see what the bible's idea of a "romantic relationship" between God and His people looks like. It includes, 400 years of slavery in Egypt, a brutal torture, mutilation and death of a man on the cross. Severe persecution of the church and martyrdom of the Bride (see revelation). The "divine romance" is about faith, hope, commitment and sacrifice.

It seems your attempt to argue for modern day dating practices using the bible as support has failed.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Evangelical

It seems your attempt to argue for modern day dating practices using the bible as support has failed.

When and where have arranged weddings (where young people have their free wills taken from them) been the practice of Bible believing Christians in evangelical churches?

[Evangelical]

Originally Posted by Ohio

When and where have arranged weddings (where young people have their free wills taken from them) been the practice of Bible believing Christians in evangelical churches?

You are confusing arranged marriage with forced marriage. If you don't know the difference you shouldn't be commenting. The statistics are on my side anyway:

According to a 2012 study by Statistic Brain, the global divorce rate for arranged marriages was 6 percent — a significantly low number. Compared to the 55 percent of marriages in the world that are arranged, this low statistic shows the success rate of arranged marriages.

http://thedailycougar.com/2015/04/03...-as-you-think/

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Evangelical

You are confusing arranged marriage with forced marriage. If you don't know the difference you shouldn't be commenting. The statistics are on my side anyway: According to a 2012 study by Statistic Brain, the global divorce rate for arranged marriages was 6 percent — a significantly low number. Compared to the 55 percent of marriages in the world that are arranged, this low statistic shows the success rate of arranged marriages.http://thedailycougar.com/2015/04/03...-as-you-think/

And what are the stats for LC marriages?

[TLFisher]

Originally Posted by Ohio

When and where have arranged weddings (where young people have their free wills taken from them) been the practice of Bible believing Christians in evangelical churches?

I believe what Ohio is referring to is when elders interject themselves whether playing matchmaker or breaking up a potential relationship. What this does is remove liberty, will, and choice from potential relationships ending in courting. When removing liberty, will, and choice happens an eventual marriage tends to be one of contract and not of covenant.
What I posted above was not my experience, but experiences of others.

[Freedom]

Originally Posted by Terry

I believe what Ohio is referring to is when elders interject themselves whether playing matchmaker or breaking up a potential relationship. What this does is remove liberty, will, and choice from potential relationships ending in courting. When removing liberty, will, and choice happens an eventual marriage tends to be one of contract and not of covenant.
What I posted above was not my experience, but experiences of others.

In the cases that I saw, the lack of free will and choice was clearly evident. In the LC-style arranged marriages, it might not be something that is literally 'forced' on anyone, but the pressure is enough so that people will cave to what the elders are 'suggesting'.

I had a particularly vexing experience where a leading brother came to me to ask if there were any sisters that I was interested it. I wasn't comfortable with him asking me that, but I sat and listened to what he had to say anyways. Almost immediately, he starts allegorizing the story of Isaac and Rebekah, in attempt to say that it's best to wait for the brothers to pick someone out.

He then proceeded to tell me that young brothers don't have the experience to always pick the right person, that they need a "second pair of eyes." By the end of the conversation, I felt like telling him off and telling him that he had no business talking to me about that. Unfortunately I never stood up to that kind of nonsense, but what I did do is drop all communication with that brother.

I think the fear is what holds a lot of people back. It is not a trivial matter to stand up to a leading brother. Depending on how much influence they have, it is only a matter of time until they can pressure someone into what they want them to do.

[JJ]

Anyone who denies that marriages arranged by the elders is not a common practice in the LC is lying. I witnessed or was told about them by those whose marriages were arranged many times from 1985-2015. In fact it was expected that at the least one seek the elders' blessing, if not arrangement.

My own marriage was not arranged, because I had met my wife-to-be before coming into TLR, and we came in together while we were dating. An elder got involved within a few months to warn us to stop dating or get married. So, we stopped dating, but got married 5 years later after we both had finished college. Our marriage has been great by the way. And, the warning was a good thing at the time because of our young age and temptation.

One of the last things I saw before I left in 2015 was that a long-time and faithful Chinese brother from Anaheim had a big shot elder from Taipai arrange a marriage for his daughter to a brother he didn't know from Taipai. Then when she moved to Taipai to marry the brother they kept her contact information secret from him, so he didn't know how to talk to her in spite of repeated pleas for information.

Evangelical can defend this TLR practice all he wants. It stinks and has done a tremendous amount of damage to unsuspecting dear saints like Awareness and Bradley.

This is another thing that shouts "cult, cult, cult!" to me.