Welcome to The Heart of Dating Podcast. Hey, it's Kate. I'm so glad you could join us this week as we try to entangle the ever-so ambiguous world of dating as a Christian. Over here on Heart of Dating, we get real as we answer some tough questions and uncover transformative ways to approach Christian dating. Oh, and you better believe we have some laughs along the way. Cause last time I checked, the struggle is hashtag real. You know what I'm saying? Now let's get to the heart of the matter.
Hey guys, what's up, it's you girl? Kate here and we are in a Heart of Dating season break. But that doesn't mean that we aren't going to be bringing you incredible episodes these next few weeks while we're on break, relaxing and preparing for season 11. Today's episode is from our Heart of Dating Archives and guess what? This was the sixth ever episode that I recorded for the Heart of Dating Podcast. Thinking about that now, it's actually insane,
you guys. I mean, this podcast has been going for over five years. Thinking back to when I first started was so wild because I truly had no idea how to interview. I really didn't really know what I was doing at all. And I can't believe for our sixth episode ever, I had the honor and privilege of interviewing the one and only John Mark Comer. I just, he is amazing. Now the audio was a bit of a struggle bus on this episode for John Mark,
but he still brought his A game and that really only comes later in the episode. It was so funny. I just remember back to when I was recording this and then doing the edits for it. And I was like, Oh my gosh, we had some audio issues and I kind of freaked out. You just learned so much when you first started podcast. I just have to tell you if you don't know who John Mark Comer is, where have you been? Are you under a rock? You need to follow
him, read his books, listen to his sermons. He is such an incredible leader. He was a pastor that I just so highly admired and I just always enjoy learning from him. He's such a great teacher. I always learned so much and just appreciate the way that he thinks and processes. Recently, I have been loving his podcast, The Rule of Life, where each different season breaks down a different spiritual practice. So things like Sabbath, prayer, fasting,
solitude, scripture, community, simplicity, generosity and hospitality. We actually started or he started his season with Sabbath and, J.J. and I were both so convicted by this, he was so powerful. Also, my friend Bethany is in that season, Bethany Allen and it just shout out to Bethany because I love her so much too. But go check out The Rule of Life podcast.
Now in this episode, specifically, John Mark and I talk about the theology of love. He wrote an incredible book a while ago called Lovology, which is phenomenal, highly recommended for all you guys as Christian singles. And for anybody married to, it's just such a good book.
We talk about the theology of love and guess what? We then also get into boundaries and yes, even the topic of masturbation, which thinking back to the very first days of heart of dating, it is wild to me to think that I brought up the concept of masturbation that
early on. Just very clear that even from the inception of this podcast, the ideas, the episodes were all God's idea and not mine because, man, if you would have told me years ago that I would be talking about masturbation this much, I'd be like, ha ha, that is a complete joke. I would never do that and look at where we are right now. Okay. Now this is truly one of my favorite interviews because I love John Mark so much and it's so rich, but I do
apologize in advance that at times our audio does get a bit spotty. It's still such a good interview and you absolutely should stick it out because John Mark is wonderful. And I bet that many of you listeners have been here, whether new or maybe an old listener, I bet a lot of you guys have never heard some of our episodes from the beginning of heart of dating. Now, give me some grace. Okay. Again, the beginning of my journey of being an
interviewer here, but hey, you probably never heard this episode. So it's basically fresh, brand new content for you. So I want you to listen with open ears. I can't wait for you to hear this and hey, I got one more thing to ask of you. If you would be so willing, would you write us a review and rank us here on iTunes or Spotify wherever you listen, but especially iTunes, it would mean so much. It actually does help us as a podcast. So
if you could do that, that would be awesome. And last thing, if you could share this episode or your favorite episode with a friend, that would also mean the world to us. Okay, let's get on with it with this episode with John Mark Comer. John Mark Comer, I have been looking forward to this day for some time. Thank you for jumping in the boat with me as we prepare to navigate these murky waters of dating. So happy to be with you on a scale from one to excited. How pumped are you to talk about
dating today with me? Oh, yeah. I just got a job this morning and I just thought, man, what I have to offer the world right here. Right here with all the dating knowledge. That's sarcasm. I'm chuckling to talk about dating as a 37 year old very bad. I love it. The irony is thick. And so it's Yorkshire and it will not mind, but here I am.
I still think I just want you to know I really highly respect you. You're teachings and above all, I really do think, despite what you may think that you have an incredible perspective on the concepts of love, sex, dating and of course marriage. You're probably very skilled at that by now. Thank you. Well, you're very gracious. I mean, I do pass church full of you know, 68% single people. There you go. So, pastorally, I mean, the
stonestation nonstop, even though I'm not in it. And I think, you know, what I might might have something to say to is the theology behind both singleness and marriage and sexuality more than the kind of tips for how to be a 30 something single person isn't. I'm not to go to source for that. Yeah. Well, we very much are going to look forward to talking about the theology of all of that. But before we dive in, I just want to say something.
I've heard that we share a really amazing thing in common. We apparently share a sincere love that any gram. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Are you? You can love something that exposes your roots and and share it outside and alter your motivations for everything. If we have love is the word to use, then yes, we share in love. I know. It's like a love hate relationship. But I'm a three. What are you? I am a very. I'll be on the middle type one.
You are. Yeah, everything's about right or wrong, just or I'm just the need to be perfect. Right. And we have a few similar things that threes in the ones because I think we both care about striving for success, right? Yeah. The ones are more perfect. Three of the ones look very similar from the outside, but we are driven by very different motivations. Yeah. And the ones I think they're more like soul connected in the heart.
And the threes are more heart connected, at least from what I've my reading on it in the intelligent centers. There you have it. Yeah. There you go. And you three is supposed to be hopelessly out of touch with your feelings, but you seem, you seem self aware. You seem in touch with. I know. Right. From the brief time you've known me, I'm really in touch with my feelings, John Mark. That's right. My heart. And threes are the most productive
of all the types you people run the world. You get done. So here we are on your podcast in your spare time. Just getting that right. You know, you saying that is like actually feeding my inner need for having affirmation. So thank you for doing that. I'm here. There we go. Yeah. So we have a lot to cover today. I don't want to waste a moment because I just want everyone to be able to soak in all of what you have to say. And so I just want
to start quickly with your marriage. And I know you have a great marriage with your wife, Tammy. She is such a beautiful woman. She's a lovely soul. And I did have the pleasure of briefly meeting both of you guys just a few months ago here in LA. And that was such a treat to me. Y'all. And you know, I've heard you mentioned before and specifically read it in your book, Lovology that you said that in a way when you met Tammy, it was kind
of love at first sight, which is something you don't always hear. And so it brings about some interesting questions for me on the topic of love. So what I want to begin today with asking you about is your knowledge and expertise on, you know, what does being in love really mean as a Christian? Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's a really important question because I think the scripture and the New Testament in particular has so much to say about
love. But if we're not careful, we import our culture's definition of love into it. And we miss the whole thing, you know. And I think we have at least two working definitions of love going on right now, normally in culture at large, especially when we're chatting about romance or marriage or anything like that. When people say love, what we usually mean is overwhelming feelings of affection, warmth, like desire, lust, even, you know, chemistry
toward another person. And it tends to be passive, not active, meaning love is something that happens to you, not something that you do to another person, hence the same fall in love as if, you know, oh, look, I just tripped and fell into love or whatever, which is nowhere even close to what Jesus means when he talks about love or what Paul means when he talks at great length about love, not that the emotional kind of feelings of affection
aren't a part of it. But the New Testament or the biblical word that would be closer to that would be the word compassion. That's the emotional word. So in the New Testament, this idea of compassion is when you look at somebody, when Jesus looks at the crowd, this compassion on them, that's that emotional world is he's moved and his gut and his interior
world is overwhelmed by this emotion of attachment toward another person. When Jesus talks about love that has more to do with will than with emotion, love is the decision of the will and of the heart to put another person's good ahead of your own, to sacrifice your good on the altar of another person's flourishing. So it has more, it is very active, not passive at all. It is something that you're empowered to do by the whole is what? He can command
you to love your enemy. When Jesus says love your enemy, he's to me, you know, have romantic feelings or feel warm as the emotions toward your enemy. He means set your will on their good and flourishing above your own. So I think this of course has preventifications for talking about romance and that's not to disparage the feelings of love and affection.
You have an entire book in the Bible, the son of songs that's written to celebrate them, but the problem is you just can't build any long-term relationship off of that definition of love. Otherwise you'll just get from relationship to relationship, you know, every few years, once the feelings fade and the passive side of love is gone. Do you think that in some ways as a culture we tend to worship love sometimes versus
maybe worshiping God? Oh absolutely, I think that's even a question. You don't have to be abundant or a commonator to figure that out. Just watch TV behind the larger picture of that is our culture has moved toward, you know, in the past, not only in American culture, but in all great societies, the will and the heart, the center of the desire
and the human being. If you had good desires and bad desires in the language of Augustine at fourth century, Fiji, and you had good will, you know, good loves and bad loves. To say that Augustine said the main problem in the world is disordered loves, meaning that we love the wrong things or we love the right things in the wrong order. That was
the core issue of what's wrong in human civilization. So every thriving civilization, Christian or not, including Hindu, Buddhist, Greco-Roman, has always said that the human heart is this mixed bag of good desires and bad desires, good loves and bad loves. And so one of the tearing-pying things about Western culture as a whole in American culture now is we're losing this idea and moving to what this is sociologist, playing in a Charles Taylor,
very influential thinker. And there's done all that kind of seminal work around getting our heads around secularism. And he might have about the move from a authority-based culture where, you know, your vision of reality was rooted in the authority of traditions such as the church and the king and the Bible and the religion to what he called an authentic culture, whereas all about be true to yourself. And so we're really one of the first advanced
societies to say, hey, the human heart isn't that much of a mixed bag. Just be true to yourself, meaning live in line with your feelings rather than trying to temper a lot of those feelings or restrain a lot of those impulses. And so what we call freedom is the ability to kind of do whatever you want. And most of the forest would all say that's slavery, that's not freedom. And the result of that will be misery, not human flour chain. And
I think we're already seeing that. Obviously, you're we're unaware of just what hookup culture is doing with the sexual revolution of the 60s is down with the divorce breakdown of the families. Then it's fracturing the romantic and human soul across an entire generation. Yeah, I heard I think actually I was just about to quote, I think you in your book, you say that at this rate, where we are in culture today is you have like one
in two chances of survival, like as of today, like a 50% chance of surviving. And so much of that also divorce rates are driven from irreconcilable differences and probably just a lack of feeling like in love with the person over time. Yes. So in a relationship where in a Christian dating relationship, let's say, how do we discern in those situations that it's God's voice telling us that the person is for us or comfort, conversely navigate if we are just falling into a deep infatuation with the
person. How do we go about like navigating that? Yeah. And of course, there's no formula to that or you know, acronym to follow. I'm sure there's an acronym out there somehow. But it's the age old time tested wisdom from the way of Jesus. Of course, first you test
everything up against the person and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. Then you test everything up against the scripture and you know, the main point of God's will for relationship is that you go about a dating relationship the way that Jesus would go about a dating relationship, which is obviously a goofy question to ask, but that is the core of apprenticeship in Jesus. You know, we think that what Jesus do and that's not all bad. People push back
on that. But a better way to phrase that is what Jesus do if he were me. So if Jesus were you know, a 37 year old INTJ and the Myers-Briggs introverted father of three living in a city that's post-Christian, as a pastor, as his job, what would he do versus what would Jesus do if he was Kate? If he was single, if he was female, if he lived in L.A.
in 2018, that's a far more helpful way to phrase that question. So I think so back to your thing, you know, you have you have tested against Jesus, tested against the scripture, make it wholly meaning do that dating relationship the way that to the best of your ability you think Jesus would go about dating this person if he was a single woman or man or whatever. And then I think community is massive. That would be the other just no dating relationship
should ever be done in isolation. That's just a disaster waiting to happen because the beauty of life is that we don't seek clearly and the danger of it as well. You need people around you that aren't infatuated with the person that you're infatuated with and aren't
infatuated with you to speak honestly and truthfully in your situation and weigh in. And nobody has like the, you know, inline to the voice of God, but to weigh in and just it can be as simple as I think this is a good fit or I think it's a bad fit or here's three things I think that are greater here's three red flags I have about your relationship
or whatever. Often I think dating is done in isolation and then if we want, you know, others input, it's more and more looking for people to bless what we want to hear rather than we are looking for honesty back from our community that's actually in relationship
with both of us. So you can get anybody to sign off on you doing almost anything to some level, you know, that's different than doing life in community knowing and being known as a couple and then opening yourself up to honest input from any and that community. And even, you know, we believe I have a high high value for community or family's in community and we make all major decisions with their community. So any decision over a
thousand dollars has to be approved by several members in our community. Any work thing or a move or, you know, we would never dream of making that decision without the affirmation and approval of our community, which is about 25 people that we do live with. And I just
think that's how Jesus said it. So that's the other layer and then the final layer is just that inner, whatever you want to call it, still still small voice in the language of the prop it up, a larger story which is that inner witness, that inner sense of the inclination and the movement of God on the heart. And so, I'm going to of course you're looking at circumstances and all that kind of stuff. So it's just almost like I've heard one writer
call it a holy triangulation. You think of like a surveyor, you know, and they get these three points to kind of map something and it's almost that like like a holy triangulation. You're like comparing Jesus and the Bible to what is my community saying to what's my like inner movement of my heart toward and you know what I mean? And you're almost like getting seen if all of these start to point in the same direction at some point, then
you can start to feel really great about your decision, you know. But again, this is not magic. I'm just trying to make wise decisions that are in line with the person in Jesus and the movement of the Holy Spirit in our life. Yeah, I've never heard that before and I love that. I'm really big into graphs and pictures and like I love that picture though of the holy triangulation of Jesus community in the inner small voice and just navigating the
three of those. And I think that I mean, you're right. There is no perfect magic formula but having those just navigating all three of those at the same time. I do love especially what you said about community too because I think often that can be hard because not only do we want people around us to be honest with us, but we have to be honest with people about what's actually going on in the relationship too. Yeah, otherwise they're not going to
give you good input. Right. So being open to be what's really going on. I think as men and women and because of pride, because of so many things, we're often hesitant to actually admit to our friends or in people and community what's really going on. Yes. We just need to be open in general to talking and being vulnerable about what's really happening because if we only give people the perfect picture, then of course, you know, that's
the thing. Yeah, you get them to sign up and that's where it comes down to actually being by each other and with each and time together, you want to spend enough time with your community that you couldn't fake it even if you wanted to. Right. That they're picking on the little clues of what's actually going on that relationship. You know, otherwise we're just curating the little bits and pieces of ourselves that we want to be vulnerable
with to other people than being in community where they see the whole thing. The other thing you have to remember about this conversation around romance and marriage and so on and so on. Follow it. Jesus is I think there's this there's the myth of the soulmate out there that I think is not only out of line with the scripture. I think it's a toxic and unhealthy idea, but it's connected to this myth that there's this perfect kind of scenario out there
that is God's will for my life. This kind of blueprint where I make the right decision and then everything just goes smoothly and that's just not how life this side of the resurrection works. It's not how life is in this age of overlap between this age and the age to come between earth and heaven and reality is messy. There is no perfect scenario. There's no perfect spouse. There's nobody that was custom fit just for you. There's no perfect marriage.
There's no perfect dating relationship. And so I think that the hunt perfect the myth of perfection and the hunt of perfection hold so many singles and couples back from experiencing the relationships that could flourish to thrive. I mean I love Tim Keller. I don't know if he read him. The meaning of marriage. You read that? Yes, of course. That is on my nightstand. How can I have a dating podcast with that? That was it. It's a best thing out
there. Yeah. And I don't appreciate a lot of weddings. When I do, I just have two requirements that it's like a deal breaker. You have to. If I'm going to appreciate your wedding. When you have to write your own vows, because I believe that the vows are the most important part of a marriage ceremony, not the ceremony itself, but definitely not the party. And two, you have freedom of marriage because it's so good. But anyway, he makes his point
in there is a beautiful kind of section where he's beating up. I'm not the myth of a soulmate kind of thing or the one, you know. And he says, beautiful. I could not quote it for a memory, but this thing on how at some level, every other person on this planet is a bad match for you. It's just that some of those people are a lot less of a bad match than others. Yeah. That sounds more cynical. Take them out of context than his heart's not
cynical at all. But I love that. What he's just writing is there's nobody out there that is the perfect match for your personality. Everybody will have things that are imperfect about them. You have things that are imperfect that you. They will rub you the wrong way. You will rub them the wrong way. You can make a list of pros and cons about every other human being on the planet. And every one of them is going to have some cons on their
side. Don't do that by the way, but I'm just hypothetical. Yeah, totally. But the point is there are some that are going to be less of a bad match that are going to have, you know, far more pros than cons, so to speak, and that framework that are going to be far better personality fit with you, temperament, tint with you, life stage, career, vision, heart posture with you. But there is nobody out there that is the perfect match for the
perfect marriage for the perfect life. That life is yet to come at the resurrection of the dead in what Jesus called the kingdom of the heavens. And we need to make sure that we don't fray our hopes into marriage. All right, y'all. Let me tell you about something with all of the things last year that happened with our wedding and marriage prepping and all of that. One thing I wasn't ready for it was really combining everything in me and JJ's life from like finances to also healthcare
options. Hello. I mean, I didn't even really think of that. So with JJ joining the heart of dating business and quitting his other job, I was like, oh my gosh, how are we going to find something with great features that covers him well, also covers me well. That's also affordable. What are we going to do? This is why I'm so glad we discovered Altruha health share. Altruha health share is a membership of like-minded health conscious people who
share in each other's medical costs. They've got a built in office specialist and urgent care visits. They have 24 seven telemedicine counseling services and huge discounts on vision, chiropractic, pharmacy and more. And guess what? Altruha health share also has the country's first dental sharing membership called smile share, which PS I have used. And so as JJ
and we love it, it is super easy. Here's what I love. I have been using Altruha an effort a bit and I go to the doctor and you know, eventually I submit all the stuff because the bill comes back and it's usually pretty high. But then Altruha does its magic. Okay. And then a new bill comes to me and it's like 30 bucks or something really ridiculously small. And it is just so awesome. I'm like, how is this happening? This is just brilliant.
I love it. Okay. So if you are a ministry worker or if you just don't have a great healthcare option or you want something that's affordable, I would definitely encourage you to check out Altruha and you can get a hundred dollars off your enrollment through heart of dating. All you got to do is go to myshare.org forward slash HOD. That's myshare.org forward slash HOD. I really hope you try it. We have just loved it and I think you're really going
to as well. So I want to talk to you quickly about boundaries. And this is a topic that's discussed frequently and it seems that everyone kind of has their own view on what is right and what is wrong. And some ways I guarantee that people are hesitant to admit to a pastor like yourself. What's really going on? But to be honest, we all talk about it and we all struggle with it. And it's different for different people. Some people decide to not
kiss until they're married. Some people do decide that that's okay for them before getting married. How do you feel that we should navigate what is right for us as Christians in physical relations and boundaries within the context of a dating relationship? Yeah. And of course, there's not a right or wrong answer. Some things are clearly sin and other things are, you know, I don't know very few people that would have an issue with handholding or something like
that. There's a whole lot of ground in between sex and handholding. And so I think basic principles, you know, that each couple has to flesh out. There's not a part of the reason there's not an answer for that is because everybody, every couple is different. And a lot of it has to do with the veracity of that person's will or self-control. So like my wife and I had to draw really strict boundaries around us. But that was because of our image or not because of our maturity. It was
because our lack of self-control, not because we were so self-controlled. So if that makes sense, it's much easier to just not kiss than it is to kiss and have to advocate self-control. Does that make sense? Yeah, absolutely. The more self-control you have in theory, the more freedom that you are able to take in your physical expression of relationship together. But I think that my maturity and lack of self-control in that area is not rare. I think that is more the norm than the
exception to the rule. So yeah, but I think as a couple basic principles, one is, you know, your first question shouldn't be, what can we do? It can be how holy can we make this relationship? That sounds cliche, but that should be the overarching philosophy. It's not. What can we get away with without having to repent on Sunday? It's how happy we make Jesus with this relationship. How can we honor Jesus, each other, and our own bodies as created in the image of God,
and holiness through this relationship? That needs to be the question that drives all of this. And then I think, you know, a second kind of rule of thumb is don't do anything that causes a rousal. So if you're doing something and it's causing a rousal, don't. That's just a marriage thing. That's not a dating thing. And that's the beauty of none of this is a don't. It's all not now. It's just a wait, not a don't. And so that to give you excitement and anticipation for the future.
I think anything that leads to a rousal is just taking you down. Bon pack. Third thing I'd say is talk about it openly and honestly, and as non-romantic as it sounds, get it up there and agree to some kind of, to agree to boundaries. Then the guy would have one set of boundaries in mind and the guy on another, you know, and we can stereotype who's going
to say what? But those stereotypes are not all that helpful. But it can be done in a creative, romantic way where you're doing it to honor each other and honor the mystery and keep that mystery alive and the safety of your relationship and your sexuality. And then the last thing I'd say is just once you come up with some boundaries, first off, brainstorm those boundaries with your community and then have your community hold you to it. So have your community regularly checking in,
asking, how are you doing? Are you staying inside the boundaries that you set with our counsel and advice kind of thing, you know. I think if you're asking those kinds of questions, you're going to be doing good for and and then just be really careful. Not the last thing I'd say is just don't put yourselves in situations of temptation. You know, temptation is not a sin, but how
the decisions we make and set us up for against temptation. So you know what I mean? So yeah, it's something tempted, you know, have sex with somebody that you're falling in love with or dating or attracted to. But if you go to your child's apartment, let it lie alone and there's mood lighting on and you know, the audience is playing as a matter of time. Funny there or Beyoncé. Okay, yeah. Okay, we'll go there. You're like, well, I just fell in and like, what you did,
and it walked straight into it. Like that was a series of unwise decisions that created an environment all along the temptation and no accountability. So you don't want to, you don't want to, of your own free will, place yourself in environments, whether it be an apartment alone or whatever, where temptation goes up and accountability goes down. You want to do the opposite. You want to place yourself environments where temptation goes down and accountability goes up. Totally.
Those are really amazing. And it's hard because like, I know you probably get asked that question by people in your church community a lot, but I think us as Christian singles, we still need that direction. So a question for you on that point is, let's say the couple is doing very, they're very best and not cross boundaries. But let's say they mess up, they fall into some sort of sexual sin, or they potentially even end up having sex. What's the recommendation for the couple moving
forward? Because that's a conversation I've also been privy to in so many of my friendships. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, absolutely. Again, there's no formula for any of this. The first thing they need to do is confess that sin. So they can't, if you just keep it to yourself and you say sorry, we'll try harder next time. That's a winning formula to make the same mistake again. And of course, once you've gone down that road, it will be easier, not harder to
go down that road again, or it will be harder to not go down that road than it was before. Not easier. So the formula of, oh, we just feel guilt and shame. Sorry about that, honey. Let's not do that again. Harder. That's a, that is a surfer formula for failure, not for success. And there's no formula, but I think, you know, patterns, healthy parallels would be confession right off the
bat. Confess to your community. If there's a spiritual authority in your life that we feel safe with a pastor or a parent or a mentor, somebody with authority in your life, ideally them as well, bring that out in the open. So confession, repentance, a new commitment to holiness, and then any freedoms that you were taking, I would then suspend those freedoms of your own
free will and religion. So let's say you were allowing yourself to, you know, kiss on the couch or whatever, just take away that freedom, at least for a period of time, because the key thing isn't just not having sex again. The key thing is building a relationship on trust.
That's what's, that's what so many people who are dating forget as non-romantic as it sounds to not have sex or not whatever what you're doing is you're both strengthening your willpower, which is a core aspect of our apprenticeship Jesus, like opening our willpower to the holy spirit to strengthen it as a muscle. What you're, what you're trying to do is build strengthening that
willpower and build trust that you have control over your bodies. And that trust has to be built, otherwise, for the rest of your marriage, anytime one of you's gone on a business trip or conference, there's always that question in the back of your mind. And you know, when you're dating,
you tend to just have all this passion and sexual attraction toward each other. But as the years go by, as children might come and go, your body might be damaged for the woman or for men, there's obviously like the familiarity that comes with relationship sexually, which, which changes the sexuality relationship, doesn't make it worse, just makes it different. And so my point is, you need to know how to have that sexual desire and be in control of it, not controlled by it.
And your partner needs to know that your spouse needs to know this is somebody I can trust to control their sexuality as an act of love. And that's why it's so key. So that's one a couple of months is that it's not just, oh, let's not have sex again, so we don't go guilty. It's about let's lay a foundation of trust in our relationship that lasts a lifetime. It's a married man, you know, I'm not a no-relational guru. So it took me, I didn't go into this realizing that
he trust is. But as a married man, let me tell you, trust is literally the foundation of the relationship. And, you know, and most of us can figure that out. We're only really vulnerable with people that we deeply trust. And it's only when we're really vulnerable that we actually experience real love. Because real love, the kind of love that transforms us, the love of Christ, the love that my wife has for me, it's not a, I think you're hot and I want to have sex with you a lot. And I
really like you. That doesn't transform us. That makes us feel good. It's a contransform us. Love that transforms us is I see everything that's ugly and impure and wrong about you. And I still love and even like you and put your will ahead of my own. That's the love that transforms us. And that requires in order to experience that kind of transforming love, we have to be ruthlessly vulnerable with each other. And that's why trust is that the key part of the relationship.
Oh my word. Okay. Just throwing it down there, John Mark. Just throwing it down. So good. I want to go to another really kind of difficult topic. So I just want to go there with you. Okay. Are you ready to just go there right now about this question? I don't know. I know it's coming, but I have no idea what's coming and you just built it up to now nervous. But all right. No, no, you got it. You got it. Okay. So this topic is frankly not discussed frequently, but
I'm just going to go out and say it. You know, what do you think the boundaries are with with less and then in masturbation? Oh yeah. Nothing to be embarrassed about. I mean, okay. That's yeah. That's just like that's a bit of a tricky one because the scriptures don't speak directly to masturbation at all, but they speak directly a lot about lust. So you know, theoretically,
there's a world where you could masturbate and not lust. In my personhood that I don't see the feasibility of that, but I'm told by other people that I respect that some and I don't know that this is through women, but some men can masturbate without lust. All I can say is there is a time and a place for some people, not for me, where you masturbate without lust, not for the purposes of
sexual gratification, but for sexual release. And I think that's key. If you're doing it for the pleasure of that feeling, then you're on the road to the left if not at the destination. Alternative would be if it's a form of sexual release in order to allow your mind to be more holy and more focused on what God is doing in true life. So I just want to create space for if there's somebody, if there is a man, I don't think this is true. Forgive me, but of the way that
female ideology were different. If there's a man that is able to masturbate without lusting for the purpose of release, not gratification, I think the scriptures don't speak to me. I met the gray area and it's freedom that if you have peace to take, you could take. But I think for what happened in a German, I'm just going to be in majority of men, I don't know if in the majority, 51% or 99% but whatever I'm in the majority here, I think that you can't masturbate without lust
and the line between gratification and release is really fuzzy. So I think my encouragement would be more of a strong warning against that and allow your body to work out sexual release through dreams and night and natural promises as set up by God. But challenge what this is hitting on, a great challenge of our day and age is that human beings become sexual around 13 or 14 and now we
may be in our late 20s or under contacts usually in our late 30s. So, you know, in historic cultures, when you were married by 14 or 15, you know, you might have a year or two which is sexual with this and marriage. Now, that's how most cultures around the world still are to this day.
And definitely, we go down through history and just physiologically, that's when a man and a woman textuality got in most fertile and most edit speak and the body is young, inflectable, and pliable and are physiological factors that are just science that you're just working with. But all that to say, very different than a marry mother of Jesus who maybe was sexualized a year or two before she married Joseph and somebody now who might not get married until
a third date might have, you know, two and a half decades between puberty and marriage. So, it's a whole other and it doesn't mean it can't be done. Jesus was single, Paul was single, and advocated for sinless and celibacy. It can be done and it's a beautiful place for it, not only in society, but in the kingdom of God, but it is an acute problem that I don't do think should lead people to think seriously about marriage, you know, Paul's whole thing in Lithuanian
for the marriage and to burn. If you can't, you know, control yourself sexually if you're better way to say if you're just overrun by sexual desire, then his advocacy is and find a partner as the context for you to enjoy and express your sexual outing. Yeah. So, just to keep you in line with everything we've been discussing in terms of physical relations, boundaries and sex, what do you personally think is an appropriate time to be vulnerable in relationship and talk about
sexual past with the dating partner? Yeah, I don't think there's an exact answer to that. It's different for each person based on their sexual history, the sexual history I like there of, of their boyfriend or girlfriend or fiance, and so there's no answer to that. There's just, you know, do it in community, do it with listening, prayer, open to it with the spirit of saying what your community is saying, wisdom, discernment, obviously too much, you don't want to drop your
whole sexual history on date one, two, three, and an end of honesty. Neither do you want to mislead somebody down a path of a relationship with a whole part of who you are and what's been in part of your past, you know, hidden to them. You want them to see great. So, and for some people, it looks like kind of layers kind of dripping that information over the months as a relationship
progresses, like, you know, maybe letting somebody down the front end. There's a history of this in past that you worked through and moved on and if you continue the relationship, then let's talk about it more down the road kind of thing, you know. But again, that just depends on who the person is, how sensitive, what's their disposition, peppermint, it's a scenario of deep wounding for them where, you know, their father had an affair or their mother had an affair and it broke their
family apart into the deep wound or is it, you know, not in the same way for them. So, again, not a right answer there. I just think that's a wisdom question. Wisdom and knowing when and the right time to be vulnerable, but probably not on date three much more likely. But yeah. Yeah, it's, but it's, it's not a moral or theological question. That's a wisdom question, you know. Totally. Yeah, but it's helpful just to even have your input
on that. It's so helpful. So, John Mark, it has been quite the pleasure speaking to you today. And selfishly, I wish we could continue, but we are out of time and before we go, I ask everyone just a really quick final question. And so, the question is, what is like a top line piece of dating advice you would give just a very quick snippet to our heart of dating listeners? I think make it holy. That might sound cliche. No, it's good.
Constantly ask yourself the question, how would Jesus treat this person, relationally, emotionally, sexually, time wise, if he were me? If Jesus were a simple man or single woman, dating this person, how would he go about it and let that question be your daily question to which your relationship is a search for an answer? I'm okay. So we are going to wrap
up here. And I just want everyone to know, where can they find you or your books? You've authored what four different books, including Levology, which is an amazing book and reference for everyone dating, I think. Yeah, absolutely. And it's all my website, drummarkcomer.com or social media. I'm not hard to find. And you just started a podcast as well, right? Yeah, I mean, I have a podcast. We are churches of podcasts that I teach on most Sundays.
And then yeah, my dear friend Mark Sayers and I, who's an Australian from Melbourne, we just started a podcast of this cultural moment kind of chatting about post-Christian culture and all of the implications for us as we follow Jesus. It's so cool. I've listened to every episode and it's been awesome. So thank you for that. Oh, cool. Love to hear your guys talk. So cool. Don't mark you've been awesome today. Thank you for just blessing us with your time and your wisdom.
I'm so thankful. You got it. Thanks. Great to chat to you all the best. I wish that interview could go on forever. I don't know about you guys, but I could not take notes fast enough. Seriously, I particularly love some things John Mark brought up relating to love. He says that when Jesus talks about love, it has more to do about will than emotion. He says that love is a decision of the will and of the heart to put another person's good ahead of your own
to sacrifice your good on the altar of another's flourishing. So if you love John Mark's teaching today, then I can just about pretty much guarantee you love one of his books. We reference Loveology quite a bit, but he has three other amazing books as well. You can find him on Instagram at John Mark Comer and you can visit his website, Johnmarkcomer.com. And you can hear his sermons
on iTunes as well at Bridgetown Audio. He also has another newly launched podcast called This Cultural Moment with his friend Mark Sayers and they chat about post-Christian culture and it is wildly interesting. Today was so enriching for me. I hope y'all feel the same. Also, if you support this mission, I'd love, love, love for you to hit subscribe on iTunes. Please, please, please. You can also stay up to date with show notes on heartofdating.com
and you can follow along on Instagram at heartofdating. And you know, if you happen to know a friend or two that might need some dating help, I'd love for you to share this with them and get them to also support this. We have some amazing guests coming up in the coming weeks and I am confident you will love it. So stick with me as we journey through this together. Until next time, friends!