Boy Meets Girl - Say Hello to Courtship (7 page)

How God Guides You
to
the Right Thing at the Right Time

When Claire Richardson found out that David Tate liked her and that he had asked her father for permission to pursue a relationship with her, she burst into tears.

They were
not
happy tears.

Claire was upset. Throwing herself down on the couch, she pounded the arm with both fists and yelled hysterically, "No! No! No! He's messing everything up! I've never thought of him like that. I'm not interested in him! Oh, he's messing it all up!"

Her reaction bewildered her parents. Since Claire and David were good friends, they assumed that she would at least
consider
the possibility of a courtship. But Claire already knew whom she wanted, and it wasn't David. She liked Neil-and Neil liked her. He too had spoken to her dad, but because Neil was several years away from being ready for marriage, Mr. Richardson had asked him to wait on a courtship. So even

together.

In Claires mind, there was no possibility for a romance with David. He was her good friend-that was all. She'd imagined being married to different guys, but never to David. He was like a brother. Now she was sure that their friendship had been ruined. Why did he have to do this? Why did he have to like her?

She didn't even need to pray about it, she told her parents.

"Of course it isn't right."

Our True Condition

What if the girl you like responded to your interest like Claire did to David's? What will you do if the wrong guy starts pursuing you? Or the right guy doesn't?

The questions of when and with whom we pursue a relationship -or in Claire's case, when and whom we allow to pursue
us
-can be confusing and uncomfortable. Most of us would prefer not to face them. Walking by faith isn't our idea of fun. We want the discomfort and risk removed. Before we make a move we want God to make the situation crystal clear.

Do you see the problem? Our mind-set is: "God, tell me
who,
tell me
how,
tell me
when
-and then I'll trust you." What God wants us to see is that if He did this, our trust wouldn't be real. We want a definitive answer so we won't feel vulnerable, weak, and dependent on Him. But guess what? We
are
vulnerable, weak, and dependent on Him. And its only when we realize our true condition that God can demonstrate His strength and love on our behalf.

In this chapter we'll use one couple's story to illustrate prin-

At this point 1 think you'll find the rest of David and Claire's story helpful. Your own experience will probably be different than theirs, but as you read about how God worked in their lives, I hope that you'll be encouraged as you see His faithfulness, His creativity, and His impeccable timing.

Ducks in a Row

David called Claire a few days after her parents talked with her about him. He didn't know about her negative response to his interest, but even on the phone he could tell Claire was less than enthusiastic. He decided to hope for the best and asked if they could get together to talk.

Though Claire politely agreed to meet and listen to what he had to say, she already knew her answer. "I just couldn't see how a relationship with him could be the best thing." She tried to pray about it, but her prayers were halfhearted. "Lord, if this is Your will, please change my heart.. .but
please
don't let it be Your will!"

She felt bad. She knew that David hadn't come carelessly to the decision to express his interest. He isn't the careless type- he's thoughtful, methodical, and steady. Even his appearance reveals it. His black hair is always cut short and perfectly styled; his clothes are neat and ironed. He regrets the day his buddies discovered that he keeps his T-shirts arranged alphabetically. "Hey, David, can I borrow a T-shirt?" they tease to this day "A

66JoshuaHarris

blue one filed under K would be great."

You can imagine that a guy who alphabetizes his T-shirts would be very thorough in deciding whether or not to pursue a girl. And David was. He wanted, he said, "to make sure all my ducks were in a row."

He prayed about it. He evaluated himself and his situation in life. He talked to his parents and his pastor. He even wrote out a list of questions to help him determine whether it was the right time to think about marriage:

1.Am 1 prepared to lead my wife spiritually and serve herin every way?

2.Do I have proven character, and am I growing in godliness?

3.To whom and for what am 1 accountable?

4.How am I involved in the church? What are my gifts andministry areas? What are hers?

5.Are my motives for pursuing marriage selfish andworldly, or are they to honor God?

6.Can I provide financially?

7.What do my pastors and parents have to say?

David prayed over his questions. He thought carefully about Claire. Besides being deeply attracted to her, he knew that she was godly and a woman of character. One by one the "ducks" lined up. David felt confident that God wanted him to take the next step.

David went to Mr. Richardson first. He knew that Claire would only consider a relationship with him if her parents approved of it. She looked to her dad to provide oversight and screen any guy who was interested in her.

Davids conversation with her father had been encouraging,

I

Then Mr. Richardson said something that David would puzzle over for the next two years. "Go ahead and ask her.. .but don't take her first answer."

What was that supposed to mean?

Eight Weeks of Silence

Evidently Mr. Richardson had a hunch that his daughter would not immediately warm to the possibility of a relationship with David. And as her couch-pounding response indicated, he was right.

When David took Claire out to dinner, she listened quietly as he spoke about the qualities he saw in her that attracted him. He knew that she primarily thought of him as a friend and asked only that she prayerfully consider a courtship.

At this point they had their first major miscommunication. For whatever reason, Claire left the dinner assuming David understood that she wasn't interested, while David left thinking she was going to pray about it and get back to him.

What followed was two months of silence between them- eight long weeks in which Claire grew bitter towards David for having "ruined" their friendship and David grew bitter towards her for not "coming clean" and giving him a final answer.

They participated in many of the same church activities, even played in the college worship band together, but they wouldn't talk to each other. David assumed that her answer was no but was upset that she wasn't telling him so. A once thriving friendship was now dead.

It's impossible to know how long this would have continued if God had not intervened. One Sunday at church the sermon was about how bitterness can destroy fellowship among Christians. Claire was sitting in the pew behind David. She knew that God was speaking to her. After the meeting she pulled David aside and made a tearful apology. "I'm sorry for the way I've acted the last two months," she said. "I've been bitter. I have not treated you as a brother. I've not been a friend to you. I've been selfishly ignoring you and running away from this situation. Would you please forgive me?"

David's own eyes filled with tears.

"When I saw that," Claire says, "I realized just how much my sin had hurt him."

David was relieved, but he also was convicted. "As she apologized," he says, "I saw that I had sinned against her in the same way. Yes, I felt that she had left me hanging. But God showed me that I too had been bitter. Instead of going back to her and asking whether or not she was going to respond, in my pride I refused to talk to her. I was no longer treating her as my sister and my friend. I asked her to forgive me too."

David and Claire were reconciled that day. The experience, though difficult, strengthened their friendship.

Though his friendship with Claire was back to normal, the experience of being turned down was still confusing and frustrating for David. Why had God made it so clear that he was supposed to approach her if He knew that she was going to say no? Hadn't all his ducks been in a row? He had a good job, he felt mature enough emotionally and spiritually, and the people around him thought he was ready. He
was
ready! So what was the problem?

David talked to his pastor, Kenneth, who listened patiently as he vented his frustration. "Dave, I think you've made an idol out of marriage," Kenneth told him.

"No, no, I'm past that!" David protested. "I prayed about it. I evaluated my heart. I was content being single before I approached her."

"That's good," Kenneth said. "But look at your response to her lack of interest: you grew bitter; you got angry. That leads me to think that you want marriage too much. It's become a little substitute god in your life, and when you didn't get it, you reacted sinfully."

John Calvin wrote, "The evil in our desire typically does not lie in
what
we want, but in that we want it
too much."
David realized his mistake. Marriage was a good thing. It was good for him to desire it. But God was mercifully using the difficult experience of having this desire
denied
to show him that he wanted it too much. He had been placing his hope for happiness in starting a courtship and getting married instead of in trusting God for his ultimate satisfaction.

Two years went by During that time David prayed about other girls. At one point he approached another girl in his church about beginning a relationship. She also said no. "That was strike two," he says with a laugh.

One girl David wasn't planning to go to bat for again was Claire. Their friendship was stronger than ever, and he didn't want to endanger it. Besides, he assumed that she still liked Neil.

But David didn't know that God was bringing Claire's relationship with Neil to an end. "It was distracting both of us," Claire explains. She and Neil finally talked and decided that being on hold indefinitely wasn't good for either of them. "We decided that we needed to assume that nothing was going to happen between us."

Letting go of the relationship with Neil wasn't easy for Claire. The emotional attachments were strong. "I have all these feelings for Neil," she told Pastor Kenneth. "How can I change my feelings and emotions?"

"You can," Kenneth assured her, "but first you need to change the way you think about Neil. Then your emotions and feelings will follow."

"That was exactly what I needed," Claire says. "For two years I'd been thinking of Neil as my potential husband rather than a brother in the Lord. I had to renew my thinking and release my 'claim' on him. When feelings for him would resurface, I could usually pinpoint the cause as wrong thinking."

Things didn't change overnight, but slowly Claire's feelings for Neil subsided. "God used that time to teach me to trust Him with my heart-to believe that if the relationship with Neil wasn't His plan, He would help take it away and change my