The Meaning of Marriage: Facing the Complexities of Commitment with the Wisdom of God

by Timothy J. Keller

Comprehensive attraction is something that you can begin to sense with people if you deliberately disable the default “money, looks, and polish” screening mode. If you do that, you may find (perhaps to your initial horror) that you have that attraction to persons who didn’t make the grade under your old evaluation policy.

Even idolizing my beloved—certainly a danger for the newly infatuated—is all about me, though it pretends to be all about the other, it is all about me because it does not take my beloved seriously as a person created and redeemed by God but rather imagines him to be perfect, heroic, sublime, and customized to meet my needs.22

When two Christians participate together in the same Christian community, however, there are plenty of opportunities to enter the worlds of one another in the older way. By serving the poor, or going to Bible study and fellowship groups, or attending worship you can come into each other’s “front porches” and “parlors” in a way that is difficult outside a community of faith.

One of the ways you can judge whether you have moved past the infatuation stage is to ask a set of questions.

Put friendship development before romantic development.23

married Christians should look for ways to share their marriages with the singles and other married couples in their community.

Singles must see how hard and how glorious marriage is, not just how satisfying it is. The only way that happens is if married couples share their lives with singles so they can understand what marriage is really like.