Christ's dating advice for college non-Christians

At a public theology seminar hosted by the Charleston Anglican Cathedral Church, I got to encourage non-Christian college students to trade their hookup apps for more friendship and more public service:

Many Christians today idolize romance just as much as the next person. But I want to set aside the problematic ways many Christians are struggling to be like Jesus, and instead, I want to suggest we learn directly from that 1st century Jewish carpenter named Jesus. He was born into a culture that commanded him to marry and have many children. A culture where marriage was the best way to ensure that you wouldn't be alone, that you would be taken care of in your old age, and that you would be remembered. A culture that, in different but in similar ways, idolized romance and marriage.

What did this Jesus guy do?

He personally never dated or engaged in a romantic relationship or married or had sex. He led a movement of calling out the destructive greed and moral legalism of his day. He claimed that there was a Creator God who desperately wanted to make the world right and rescue those who were poor and oppressed. He claimed that he was actually the one and only son of God and that God sent him to begin a process of healing this world. He invited people to recognize the brokenness in themselves and the world around them and to be a part of his family of people making the world right. He performed many miracles to prove that he was who he said he was, including, and most importantly, being killed by way of crucifixion and then rising from the dead three days later and appearing to over 500 witnesses. There's actually more evidence that Jesus died, his tomb was empty three days later, and an alive Jesus appeared to 100s than there is evidence that Tiberius Caesar existed at all, for example.

Ohh, and while he was on earth, what did he have to say about romance and marriage? When asked, he made the radical suggestion that some should choose never to marry and instead take all of the time and focus and energy they might spend on a spouse and children and instead use their availability to address things like wealth inequality, racial division, homelessness, mental illness, and a lack of care for immigrants and refugees.

In another conversation, he said that actually, in the perfect, complete, made-right world that he would eventually bring, we will all be celibate. We will all give up romance and sex because the belonging and friendship we will enjoy in this new place will be better than any romance or sex we've ever had. And he suggested that some of his followers should give up romance and sex now and spend their lives caring for others and enjoy belonging in his family without the need for exclusivity or romance or sex *IN ORDER TO* give people a preview of the made-right world to come.

I think that 1st century Jewish carpenter named Jesus was onto something. Regardless of whether you're a Christian or not, would you give his advice a chance? What if for a season, you set aside romance and sex? What if you focused on cultivating multiple friendships instead of investing in just one lover, and what if you learned how to feel just as connected and cared for by others without hookups? What if instead of spending so much time and energy trying to look like the most desirable person and trying to woo the people you find most desirable and playing the game of going on expensive dates that just end in painful breakups, you instead invested all of that time and energy and money in serving the people in your city who are forgotten and neglected and mistreated by this broken world?

Now you might ask, why would anyone actually give up romance and sex and then spend all of that time and energy and money on people who will give you nothing in return? Maybe that won't make sense to a lot of people...

But it makes sense to me. I've said "yes" to that 1st century Jewish carpenter's call to give up romance and sex to use all of my life to caring for others. In 2016 I private committed to that way of life, in 2019 I made my first public commitment, and in 2023 I plan to make lifetime public commitments. I'm a licensed professional counselor and I help parents and pastors better love the gay people in their lives. And I still need family just as much as the next person, so I helped start a committed intentional Christian community for myself and other guys who feel called to this singleness for the sake of serving others. We've all got jobs outside of our community and we're still deeply connected with friends and biological family outside of our home. And we live together in a house in Nashville, gather for prayer together every morning before work, have dinner together many nights, go on vacation together, and do holidays together. In short, we are real family for each other as we discern whether to make lifetime commitments to each other.

I guess I just really believe that Jesus is who He said He is. And if that's true, it changes everything. If that's true, what could be a better way to spend my life than giving it all for that 1st century Jewish carpenter's plan to make the world better?