So, as I endeavour to think about the long and hard consequences of my dissertation on dating I ponder this question: "What is the difference between dating and marriage?" And then I think why should I ponder when other people can answer the question for me?
Dating's more expensive
How do you know that marriage is more expensive phil?!!!????!!!
you dont wear a ring on your 3rd finger on your left hand........
*deleted joke about Gareth and Phil, due to Gareth's current work/possible child protection issues*
He doesnt wear a ring, theres just a band of lighter coloured skin...
You've pretty much answered your own question there haven't you?
If you're looking for a theological / 'mystical' distinction, then the Song of Songs should give you a bit of a hint.
Marriage is supposed to be the union of two distinct partners through a conjunction of their wills, thus making marriage into the sacramental figure of a (perfected) human relationship with God. That is to say, that Man and God are united in will and made equal (in regard though not in quality / substance) by and through love.
Marriage then, is supposed to help the believer to apprehend the invisible through his experience of a concrete human relationship. It is distinct from dating in that it affirms the union of the will and not just of the body. What is desired / willed on both parts is a continuation of desire for the other partner, which is supposed to make marital desire self-sustaining. Simple physical desire can, by contrast, be extinguished in its fulfillment.
Hope you don't mind a random butting in.
A tenner says that A. Random stole all that from a text book.......
Stolen from a book or not that the sort of thing I'm after. Maybe it does make sense to look at it from a sacramental (though not in the sacraments sense) perspective. I mean, if that is what marriage is for, (and I think I've heard a john piper talk where he says that's what sex is for as well) then it makes sense to tackle it like that. Hmm, more things to ponder.
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Kerron
What course are you doing exactly? Bit bizarre.
Hmm, I guess that if you were married it is less likely for your partner to go to France and cop of with some random punter then come back and dump you.
But I wouldn't know anything about that. :-(
Or is it that dating generally last longer than marriage these days? ;-)
Call me a cynic.
:-)