5 Paths to the Love of Your Life: Defining Your Dating Style

5 Comments

1. Renea McKenzie says:

   January 2, 2010 at 10:45 am

   5 Paths to the Love of Your Life: Defining Your Dating Style is a collection of essays on Christian “systems” of romantic love. Each essayist outlines the advantages and disadvantages, and the logic and Scripture behind the approach he or she is advocating. So you can decide for yourself which path you relate to most, which enables you to be intentional about biblical, christianly romance.

   Alex Chediak, the editor who compiled these essays, asks the reader to be open minded about each of the different views. I found I needed to be reminded of this several times throughout a few of the essays. But each time a took that deep breath and determined to be open, and with the Lord’s help, gracious, I learned from the views that rub me the wrong way. And Chediak admits this is one of his goals: that daters stop judging courters as repressed weirdos and courters stop judging daters as unbiblical heathens.
   Rating: 4 / 5
2. Peachy says:

   January 2, 2010 at 11:41 am

   I don’t know exactly how to assign this book a number of stars. The book is a collection of five essays about dating and each of the essays takes a very different stand. Lauren Winner’s essay is brilliant, and I think people should buy this book just so they can read it — she manages to both set out a beautiful view of marriage and remind readers that some people are called to singleness. . . (I also love how she uses literature in her essay! She describes a novel by Tova Mirvis that I now want to read!) Jerusha and Jeremy Clark’s essay is also sane and balanced. But several of the other essays–honestly, they seem like they were written for a very small constituency of very, very, very conservative Chrisitans who live in an air-tight Christian bubble and have no contact with the wider world. I am a Christian myself, and I am glad that all of these essays affirm the authority of Scripture. But the perspective that some of the contibutors are taking just doesn’t fit with the world most of us single/dating Christians live in. Many of us cannot, for example, have our parents deeply involved in our dating lives because we live nowhere near our parents, or our parents aren’t believers and really have a very different view of marriage.

   So, the book does what it advertises: it offers five very different perspectives. Some of the perspetives ring true, and others do not.
   Rating: 3 / 5
3. Roger N. Overton says:

   January 2, 2010 at 1:29 pm

   With so many books currently on the market on dating, some might ask themselves why we need another one. Perhaps the greatest attribute of this book is that it explains and advocates five different perspectives, so reading this one will eliminate the need to read many of the others. In 5 Paths to the Love of Your Life, Alex Chediak has brought together a select group of leading thinkers to make the case for their perspectives so that the reader can decide for them self.

   The Counter-Cultural Approach is the first path proposed by Lauren Winner. She calls on couples to counter the culture by shifting the focus of dating away from themselves to Christ. Community also plays an important role in this approach for feedback and accountability. Despite Winner’s excellent writing style (the best in the book in my opinion) and intriguing explanation of the history of dating, I was ultimately disappointed with the position she advocated. For instance, her standard for physical intimacy in a dating relationship is basically to only go as far as you’re comfortable going in public. Unfortunately this principle would lead to sin for some couples.

   Douglas Wilson advocates The Courtship Approach. Fundamental to this approach is the involvement of some sort of parental figure, either the actual parents or the headship of the church. Additionally fundamental is that the courting relationship be conducted with marriage in mind. Wilson also emphasizes the headship of the male in the relationship, which, while not necessary to a courting model, does reflect the biblical order. He does make some comments about platonic relationships being impossible without adequately substantiating the claim.

   The third approach is the Principled Approach by Rick Holland. Distinctive to this path is that the rules of “dating” or “courting” aren’t significant. What is significant are the general principles for relationships given by the Bible, such as each individual being a Christian, each of good character, and each finding contentment in God. Holland’s argument against dating and courting is that the rules for each system distract from the biblical principles. This is a fallacious argument since it presumes that the rules aren’t biblical principles, which is what the advocates of each position hope to convince us of. The pertinent question is whether the rules do reflect biblical principles or not.

   Jonathan Lindvall puts forward the Betothal Approach. There is not dating or courting; when a guy is interested in a girl he seeks the advice and permission of his parents first, then her parents, then asks for her hand. The betrothal period is much like engagement, except that it is a committed covenant that cannot be broken (like marriage) and no physically intimacy whatsoever is allowed. While there are some good qualities to this approach, it an incredibly faulty application of a theological analogy- that Christ is betrothed to the church. The Bible does offer certain principles about how marriage relationships should persist, such as husbands loving their wives as much as Christ loved the church, but to apply these principles to pre-marital relationships is to step outside the indications of scripture and if followed to their logical extent would result in absurdities.
   The final approach is offered by Jeramy and Jerusha Clark- the Purposed Approach. Contrary to most of what the others said, the Clarks are fine with dating for couples who are not likely to pursue marriage any time soon, such as high school students. The key factors are that romantic relationships are pursued within the guidelines of holiness, trustworthiness, and the support of family and friends. Heavily discussed in this approach is dependency on the Holy Spirit, especially by way of listening for his “still small voice. ” Aside from this unbiblical principle, this path seems to approach romantic relationships with too much frivolity.

   Alex Chediak closes the book outlining the major agreements and disagreements between the approaches. Several of the points made in this section are helpful for better understanding the big picture of the book as well as the individual paths.

   My one major disappointment with the book is that the contributors don’t interact with each other, which is usually a feature of books advocating multiple perspectives. I would have really liked to see how Winner would respond to Holland saying that her standard for purity is too subjective, or how Lindvall would respond to Wilson citing the theological absurdities of his position. Defending one’s view under criticism is one of the best tests for correctness.

   Even without interaction between the authors, the book is generally helpful for mapping out the various perspectives with their strengths and weaknesses. For those who’ve been brought up considering only one or two of the perspectives, this will expand their knowledge to some relatively new ones, such as betrothal. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in deciding upon a formal approach for their romantic relationships.
   Rating: 4 / 5
4. Jon Grano says:

   January 2, 2010 at 2:21 pm

   In a Christian dating world marked equally by “I Kissed Dating Goodbye” and “I Gave Dating a Chance”, Chediak does an outstanding job clearly articulating the key distinctives of these and three other approaches to Christian dating. His approach is thorough, fair, illuminating, and practical: Chediak selects a noteworthy proponent of five of the most common viewpoints on how best to find the love of your life, and gives each a forum (entire chapter) to champion their views.

   In those chapters, he includes definition, rationale, benefits and potential weaknesses, scriptural/spiritual implications, and helpful suggestions for putting that view into practice. He also ties the book together well by providing a personal introduction and summary, and by asking each author to provide an overview of how their approach applies to three common dating “case studies”: churchgoing juniors in high school with Christian parents; Christian college students in a state university with non-Christian parents; and a 30-year old business professional active in her local church, but living across the country from her parents.

   As an elder/pastor in my church and father of two teenagers (19 and 17) who are very interested in friendships with the opposite sex, I find this book very valuable in providing a framework to help them think about dating biblically. Chediak not only highlights differences among contributing authors; he also emphasizes the common ground that they share (commitment to Scripture, holiness, families) and in doing so paints a helpful picture on how differing viewpoints can serve the common good and provide a “both/and” view of life much richer and more accurate than an “either/or” approach that sees only one way to date.

   I highly recommend this book!
   Rating: 5 / 5
5. Mickey H. Sheu says:

   January 2, 2010 at 2:58 pm

   1) The book was very informative, and opened up a lot of Scripture and possibility in my mind. It really helped me get a much bigger grasp of the different terms (and I was surprised at some of the stances that people took on things!) It really challenged me to think biblically about what relationships were actually about (which is a very good thing).

   2) The title/cover were. . . interesting. I received a lot of
   interesting glances because I was reading that book, thankfully it opened up the opportunity to share a little bit about what I was reading, but it just felt weird to be reading a book about “5 paths to the love of your life” when all the authors agree that the love of our life is and should be God. =) Just a thought.

   3) Your summary chapters were excellent. They distilled down a lot of the differences and agreements and differences. If your purpose was in not demonstrating a bias towards one or another, I think you accomplished that beautifully (though I think some of the authors had much more compelling arguments than others =p)

   All in all, it was an excellent read. I’ll be sure to share it with friends.
   Rating: 5 / 5