For today’s entry in the Friday Five interview series, we catch up with Gary Thomas.
Gary Thomas is writer in residence at Second Baptist Church in Houston, Texas, and an adjunct faculty member teaching on spiritual formation at Western Seminary in Portland, Oregon. He is the author of over a dozen books, including Sacred Marriage, Sacred Pathways, Pure Pleasure, Sacred Parenting, and the Gold Medallion Award-winning Authentic Faith. Gary’s latest work is The Sacred Search, What If It’s Not About Who You Marry, but Why?
Today we chat with Gary about Christian dating, why pleasure is okay, and the challenge of articulating a biblical view of marriage in the 21st century.
Earlier this year you released The Sacred Search, a Christian guidebook of sorts for dating relationships. What makes this book different than what you typically find on this subject in the Christian bookstore?
Most pre-marital/dating books focus on finding “the who.” I suggest it’s important to ask “why” first (thus the subtitle: What If It’s Not About Who You Marry, but Why?). It’s not that the “who” doesn’t matter—in fact, it matters very much. It’s just that asking the “why” question first helps lead you to the right who. I present neurological evidence for how we can responsibly understand and handle infatuation. I make the biblical case that the notion of there being just “one right person” finds its origin in Plato, not Scripture, and that this false notion has led more people into poor choices than wise ones; I’ve worked hard to present a compelling biblical case for what you want to look for in a marriage partner, and why. If singles looking for a spouse don’t know the biblical realities (and limitations) of marriage, they can’t intentionally make a wise choice about who to marry. People who have attended the Sacred Search talks and early readers of the book have been kind in suggesting that this material seems very fresh and helpful.
What does the Christian culture get wrong when it comes to dating and relationships? How can pastors and church leaders help guide young singles?
Though we have worked hard to prepare Christians to face sexual temptation, we have not adequately prepared them to face romantic infatuation. Singles need to understand how powerful it is, and they need tools to manage it. Infatuation isn’t evil—it’s there by God’s design. But it makes a very poor “god” and shouldn’t be treated as one.
Secondly, the myth of the “one,” which we’ve Christianized into this pious sounding, “God created one person just for me and He will bring the right person at the right time if I just wait” needs to be re-examined in light of Scripture. I make the case that Scripture suggests the choice of whether we marry and who we marry is up to us, and our choice is to be made on the basis of wisdom and righteousness (I explain in detail what that means), not trying to second guess “destiny” or even providence. When someone realizes they could have a fulfilling God-honoring marriage with perhaps dozens of different people, it changes the nature of their pursuit considerably.
Finally, I want to create a vision for how wonderful and fulfilling a marriage based on Matthew 6:33 can be. If couples will intentionally join around a shared life of worship, service, and mission, they’re going to be blessed immeasurably. It may not be an easy life, but it will be rich and eternally significant.
A few years ago you wrote a book, Pure Pleasure in which you encouraged believers to “not feel bad about feeling good.” Today there is a surge in books that emphasize radical discipleship—which can seem on the surface like feeling bad about feeling good. Is there in imbalance in current Christian teaching?
The message of Pure Pleasure helps us live out a life of radical discipleship, which should be based in worship. God’s not just our redeemer; He’s our creator, and the good gifts He has given us help us to live a life of service and purpose. I liken God-ordained pleasures to water-stop aid stations along a marathon route. There’s a lot of work between those stations, but the refreshment is essential to keep us working along the way. If we skip too many of those aid stations, we’re liable to break down, quit running, or turn in a sub-par performance. If we don’t view our lives as a marathon, we’re liable to run ourselves into the ground. It takes humility to realize we can’t run without what God designed us to experience (appropriate pleasure). Those who arrogantly think they can do without often crash and burn, and bring much of their ministry down with them. I applaud the call to service; I just hope we recognize our vulnerability, our need for humility, and God’s call to celebrate as we sacrifice. It doesn’t have to be either/or. The complete Christian life is both/and.
In your best-selling book, Sacred Marriage, you encourage Christians to rethink their view of marriage in terms of being “holy not happy.” I’m guessing this has relevance for today’s debate about the definition of the institution itself.
One of the problems the church has gotten itself into is that for a generation we tried to tell the world that if they would just live by a few Christian principles, we could “one up” the secular vision of marriage: we could provide marriages that would be more fulfilling, more fun (thus the teaching of date nights), more sexually fulfilled (thus we’ll have an eight week series on sex), less financial hassles (so we’ll bring in the best teaching on financial management) and happier kids (so we’ll hire the best youth worker we can find). Instead of confronting the selfishness in our thirst regarding marriage, we fed it!
And so, faced with contemporary arguments: “Doesn’t God want us to be happy?” we find ourselves at a loss for words. In the end, it comes down to this: I am married to a woman for life because that’s what God created me to be and what God has called me to do. It’s how I worship Him, and serve Him. I personally believe it’s the happiest life I could ever know, but that’s not why I’m in it. I’m in it as a desire to worship God and to participate in the world as He designed it. Any view of marriage that counteracts God’s creational design mocks Him rather than worships Him, and I want no part of that.
How can church leaders communicate that model of marriage in a winsome way?
First, of course, we need to “communicate it” through our lives. The consequences of pastoral failure in marriage can be severe; I’m seen entire youth groups turned away from (or at least grown significantly colder toward) God as a result of a pastor’s fall. Second, we have to show the joys of spiritual partnership. Selfishness gets boring, so trying to build marriages on self-centered ends won’t work; it’s a short-term fix.
Creating a sense of spiritual purpose, partnership, and connecting marriage more closely to worship should become a part of who we are and what we do before it’s something we say and talk about. But once we are living it out, let’s be bold. I tell young people, “How does Hugh Heffner know that sleeping with hundreds of women is more fulfilling than sleeping with one woman thousands of times? He’s never done it God’s way and doesn’t know what he’s talking about! Instead, he gets in a pathetic, selfish relationship with a woman who could be his great-granddaughter, and I’m so supposed to listen to him about the pleasures of eros? No thank you!”
I think young people respect it when we push back and say that, in the end, God’s way is the best way. We don’t have to be ashamed, because God’s way really IS the best way! Sadly, many Christians DO punt on their long-term sexual intimacy in marriage, and it shows. We need to cultivate relationships of worship and delight so that we can speak boldly out of worship and delight.
