More thorough why I may want to join a church (women, churches)

[Peanuttree]

OK, so I appreciate the help with potentially finding a church, but I feel like I want to be more clear with my thoughts and why I might want to join a church, so I'm reposting my more thorough post from the thread:

On matters of the heart, you have to let them happen naturally and on their own timing. It can't be forced. It usually happens thus, that when one stops looking . . . wham! It happens unexpectedly

Yeah been hearing that my whole life. Never actually worked out like that. I'm very bad with picking up women. I've actually had to go out and make myself do it. If I just sit down like a lumpkin and expect it to happen, I'll just die alone. Very depressing. I'm 28 and have barely dated.
One of the reasons I'm interested in a church is they provide structure, actual behavioral recommendations. In a way they WILL try to control you which is a GOOD thing, as long as in the first place you choose to be subject to such control. Our whole society (at least in the blue states) is trying the whole complete-freedom thing, and it isn't working. Freedom is great politically, but not in one's personal life. As a society we've become a bunch of people who suck at life. The simplest truths about interpersonal relationships are amazing surprises to yuppie-culture blue-staters; I remember reading a slew of articles about "maintenance sex" among couples and married couples, and everyone was amazed that this was making their relationships better! Really!?That never occured to these people? And then there were articles about "marriage promises", and how they were helping people by more generally laying out what people wanted and that they were getting results because people were following them and in that way commiting to their partner. Again, Really!? These people are surprised that not being a self-centered flake is an important aspect of a relationship? Geez! And there's other stuff like that, parents who can't understand why their children act out and don't understand they're being bad, when said parent refuses to discipline said child. They'd rather send kids to the psychiatrist than actually deal with them. My young cousin is at some special school and there's really nothing wrong with him, his parents are just weird flakes who don't know how to be level reasonable people and parents.

A lot has been made about our modern culture, and men getting older but not growing up, and young people not moving on with their lives with marriage and child-rearing. Everyone is waiting for some special soul mate or some special job opportunity, but this just ends up removing all motivation. The whole "dating" thing is very much a modern invention, and by its nature does NOT work, at least not the way people now engage in it. Back in the day there were arranged marriages, and nowadays the Indians (the East/Asian ones, Hindi) still do it and have dramatically better marriage and hapiness-marriage statistics than us "daters".

If you don't find any of this to be true of our culture, I would recommend reading various articles, there's one by Jen Doll where she describes how she frittered her time away dating until marriage was a moot point, there's the blog "dalrock" who writes good stuff, there's the article "Why marriage eludes the modern woman" and others, I have a bunch I'm saving in a folder. One particular one that comes to mind is by a journalist who moved from his small town to the city to become a journalist, and was amazed when his sister died and he had to go back to the town, how much outpouring of support there was for his sister, and how genuinely happy the people were. That's the story of blue-state life, we'd rather be a bunch of workaholics with a lot of money to buy a "nice" condo, but completely socially detached, rather than real people living in communities with some sense about the world.

I figure a church is the only place that could maybe provide a cultural backdrop to get married, and raise kids who will also do the same. I say this from a very worldly and practical standpoint, I mean, for example, looking at the website of one of the NJ megachurches, they actually had lawyers or something on staff and offered marriage set-up or prenup counseling or something, which is a necessaru thing nowadays with the way the laws are. I could see myself teaching classes to older adolescents explaing why we value marriage, and how it really works, to fight Hollywood-instilled ideas about completely passive romance. More importantly I figure a church might be the only place where you could learn the cultural values that could eventually lead you to understand you are never going to be happy until you learn that other people are more important to you, that it's not all about you. Our culture unfortunately is the opposite of that.

I figured that a church might not have a lot of young people to meet the future Mrs., but some of the megachurches do have young-adult groups, and if I go through the motions I could worst case scenario use a christian dating site. These things would beat trying to drag a non-church going girl into the church world.

[John F S]

I'm Sorry but a church isn't going to help you. Only YOU can help you.

[Peanuttree]

Care to elaborate, John F S?

[allenk893]

If it's that big of a deal, just go to church online.

[John F S]

Originally Posted by Peanuttree

Care to elaborate, John F S?

He's looking for the pastor and/or the parishioners of a church to solve his problems. He needs to do that himself. He may want to pray for help but he can do that in the privacy of his home.
Thinking that one particular denomination is going to solve his problems is wrong.

[hljc]

Yes go to church and make Jesus your reason for going to church , as He alone can fulfill the destiny in your life , ...See some woman in churches are looking for godly men who know and pray to Lord Jesus , as men in the world without Christ may lack the stabilities of normal life ...... Just never go to church looking for a spouse , as if relationships fail then you could end up going to a different church or leaving church and the Christian life completely which is a disaster .. Take care as all women in the church will consider you as their brother in Christ ....

[Torpedos]

Once you find that special someone, you will have lots of problems. These problems happen in every marriage. You have to work to stay married. Going to church is not going to keep you married once you find that person.
You should not critique parents until you become one. You can say " when I have a kid I will do this it that ", keep dreaming. Once you have a kid life changed. It is like when we are in our teens and say " when I get married , I am gonna have sex everyday" lol. We know that is not true. You must have the proper motives when doing something. And going to church for a happy life is not a reason. What happens when you no longer want to go?

[Vizio]

I actually walked into a church for the first time for about the same reasons when I was 20.

Church is about much more than that, though. I would caution you to avoid going to a mega church just to have more programs. If you want authentic Christianity you won't likely find it in the big box church....you'll find it in the Baptist or Bible church on the corner.

[Peanuttree]

Did anybody really thoroughly read what I wrote?

He's looking for the pastor and/or the parishioners of a church to solve his problems. He needs to do that himself. He may want to pray for help but he can do that in the privacy of his home.
Thinking that one particular denomination is going to solve his problems is wrong.

Never really said that, So I dunno why you're saying that.

See some woman in churches are looking for godly men who know and pray to Lord Jesus , as men in the world without Christ may lack the stabilities of normal life

That's exactly what I'm looking for, people who value stability, commitment, and effort because it was culturally instilled in them. As opposed to blue-state culture, where people are raised on TV, and everyone thinks they can leave their spouse when they get bored, and they have some vague idea they want family life but wait until they're 38 to pull the switch on it (go for it), at which point they're so old their babies will come out dead anyway (biology has a time limit). Frankly, even that's too much, most people value themselves and their own happiness around here and do NOT want to ever make any commitment; no kids, no marriage, they all want to be Miranda or whatever from Sex in The City.

Just never go to church looking for a spouse , as if relationships fail then you could end up going to a different church or leaving church

See, last I checked Christians aren't supposed to be big on divorce, which is half the point. The catholic church won't even let their flock sign pre-nups. Again, I want to get AWAY from blue-state culture, which glorifies immediate personal fulfillment, the fulfillment of every whim, where people divorce as soon as they get bored with a spouse, and I want to instead move more towards real values, values like commitment and work.

Look, anybody can get married, it's beating our 50% divorce rate that's the challenge, and our laws do NOT help. They basically PAY you to get divorced, as opposed to keeping your vows. I can get married all on my own, but I would LIKE to NOT go through a divorce, and I would LIKE to raise my kids to believe in something and eventually make me grandkids. This is pretty par for the course, I THOUGHT, for churches in their social/societal role, I THOUGHT that's the whole idea, or a big chunk of it.

Once you find that special someone, you will have lots of problems. These problems happen in every marriage. You have to work to stay married. Going to church is not going to keep you married once you find that person.

Yeah I get that, that's not what I said. I would LIKE however, to get a spouse who know not to suddenly leave just because there's one problem once. Like I said, I FIGURE I might find that cultural backdrop at church, but the flip side, again. like I mentioned, is I could just find a woman normal, and try to bring her into the church, but if she's not already into the whole church thing, it could be a struggle.

You should not critique parents until you become one. You can say " when I have a kid I will do this it that ", keep dreaming. Once you have a kid life changed. It is like when we are in our teens and say " when I get married , I am gonna have sex everyday" lol. We know that is not true.

Yeah I get that, but I'd like to raise my kids with some cultural training, with specific ideas and outlooks and values. I figure a church community would be the best place to do that. Like I said, I've never heard of an "Agnostic breeder club", so it seems like church is it.
Though, when you're on the subject, it makes a nice example, last I checked, the Bible dictates that a wife should not refuse her husband consort. I wouldn't go so far as to say you owe it every day, however it is an obligation, you know, sort of like how I'm sticking around and working and helping with the kids is my obligation as a man? You know? That whole "civilization" thing? I suppose we could go back to caveman days, and sex and family life could be a free-for-all, and we men could lay with any woman when we want who will have us, and then just leave and never worry about the kids, but I'd kinda like to maintain the whole "civilization" thing. Modern mass-media culture would have us go back to that arrangement, but I'd like to retain the family values of my parents' Christian culture. But, of course,like I said, just not THEIR specific culture and church, just more generally the family values, honestly I'm more American than I am like their weird near-eastern culture.

_____________________________

Does no one find what I'm saying to be true, that
In the blue states, we have a mass-media culture, an entire society raised on TV, where traditional values of work, commitment, obligation, responsibility, are frowned down upon in favor of selfishness, personal freedom, following one's whim in the moment
Does no one find this to be true?
And especially I'd like my kids to learn that life isn't all about you. You have commitments, you have responsibilities, you won't always get to do what you want. Frankly, no one can even live a happy life that's all about only themselves
I truly, strongly, believe these things.

And let's clarify, a LOT of people who go to church are not super-religious, they don't think of everything in terms of Jesus and prayer and god, especially in denominational churches where it started more as a habit from their parents. But they do find some value in at least going to church, being part of a church, and I was hoping it was the reasons I describe above.

So is a church the right place for this?
I want to teach my kids just because Julia Roberts left her husband in that movie, then it looked so glamorous when she traveled the world, it doesn't make abandoning your family OK. I wan them to learn that just because 50-cent says "******* ain't ****", doesn't mean you get to just use them for your sexual needs and leave them, especially if you accidentally create an obligation (pregnancy). I want to teach them that if they abandon their family, "I wasn't happy", or "I fell in love with someone else", is NO excuse. I want to teach them that if they then draw thousands of dollars a month from the person they left, when they have two perfectly capable hands and two perfectly capable feet to support themselves, they're commiting a grave injustice. etc, etc.,
So, is church the right place to grow and nurture these values in my future family, and in others?