Dating or Courtship?

This idea has been around some churches for a couple of decades now. I think the idea is to approach mating in a more spiritual way and some would say more Biblical way. From my study tho I don't see God telling us in the Bible this is the way to meet your spouse. So I believe its up to us to do it in a way that honors God. I think we can do that both thru dating and thru a courtship.

Since you are drawn to courtship and most guys around you aren't. I also like things to be open and everyone knows what's going on. I'd say look for a man who you think God might be interested and ask him to talk with you. Say you are going on a quest to learn about courtship and is he interested in talking about what that might look like. That if he is interested you two would talk about it. Once you both come to an agreement about what courtship would look like then you would talk about if you two wanted to court each other. So no commitment will you both had an understanding of what you were going to do.

I don't understand the difference? When I was going through, Christians didn't have sex before marriage. So, whether you called it dating or went with the old-fashioned term of courting, your behavior was expected to be the same.

That's interesting MusicGirl. I've always wanted to get to know people, men and woman, whither I'm dating or not. So I can't imagine not wanting to get to know a
woman I'm dating. I can relate to what you say about guys wanting to get physical.

MusicGirl,
I find that very disrespectful that he wouldn't honor your requests, like letting you out of the car! On that alone, I'd say you already know enough about him
to not date him again.

Ya, a movie isn't for getting to know the other person. So you already have that figured out.

I don't think it's necessary to let one ex (especially one who sounds like kind of a jerk, or at least immature) put a person off to the entire idea of dating. I think there are some good sides to dating. The one that comes most readily to mind is that there's less pressure to be exclusive or be in a hurry to get married before you know the person. Some people I've seen get very caught up in the courtship idea as meaning they will marry their first love (and sometimes that works for some people, don't get me wrong)... but for some people that ideal doesn't work out the way they wanted and too much pressure too fast can be a big part of things not working between two people. No one wants to commit a lifetime to someone they don't actually now. Yet some have a romanticized idea that courtship with no physical intimacy will automatically mean you have to get to know one another better. That is not always the case. For some people, no physical intimacy means no intimacy at all and that is detrimental to the relationship (please understand that does not mean one has to be sexually intimate before marriage, but do realize that God created some people with a greater need for physical affection as their primary love-language and that is not a bad thing).
All that being said, my fiancé and I had sort of a courtship after a period of getting to know one another. But to us, courtship meant mostly that we were seeing each other exclusively as bf/gf and that it was a serious adult relationship having potential to grow into a marriage commitment. We felt that was really the only key difference and to us it was not opposed to or instead of dating, but rather the next stage between dating and engagement. Btw, we set our boundaries early to abstain from sex until marriage whether we were dating or courting, so to us boundaries were not a key difference because they would remain the same due to who we are as Christians.
So to sum up, I would be inclined to advise someone in your position not to give up too soon. To see the good and potentially problematic points of both and maybe see the whole thing as less dating vs. courtship and more dating and courtship as pieces to the same puzzle. I would also be inclined to encourage people to seek their potential mate, but also keep in mind that sometimes things happen when you least expect them to. So be open to both. Pray and let God lead you. Seek and have fun with good and worthwhile people. And take opportunities when they come around.
For the physical intimacy thing, set boundaries for yourself, set them for your relationships, according to your comfort level. But also realize that there's nothing morally wrong with appropriate physical gestures of affection and the guys that would be turned off to not holding hands, cuddling, or reasonable amounts of kissing aren't necessarily bad guys they probably just have touch as a strong love language. That might not be the best kind of guy to match you, if that's not your love language. But it's not all bad either. However, a guy who pressures you for sex when you are not okay with it... Run from him as fast as possible. Men who respect women don't pressure them for sex.

The differences between "dating" and "courtship" exist only in the minds of authors who invent stupid delineations like this in order to sell books. People see some "new" approach that they feel compelled (either internally or through the mechanisms of legalism) to then adopt.

If you want to get to know someone before dating them, then get to know someone before dating them. Either way, it's still dating.
If you want to take the physical aspects slowly, then take the physical aspects slowly. Either way, it's still dating.

I know many young women trust their fathers to help oversee their courtships.

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Regarding this aspect of "courtship," honestly, it's infantilizing and a little bit creepy. Some would probably argue that it's more than a bit sexist, too. IMO, it constitutes outsourcing some of the maturation process that comes with learning about interacting with a partner. Maybe I'm a weird east-coast liberal, but I don't want to marry a child who needs daddy to manage her relationships for her. I'm marrying her, not her father, and I want an independent woman who can think for herself.

I agree that the difference between dating and courtship are pretty much the same thing, just a different set of boundaries. Some people like the idea of calling things something different to feel a sense of eliteness or that they are taking some bold stand.

Whether you want to call it dating or courting, you set your own boundaries. If you only want to do activities where you aren't alone, out in public for accountability and witnesses, and can get to know each other, then let the guy you are interested in know that. You don't have to have it classified as anything special, set apart from dating, to have limits set. If the person you are courting/dating isn't respecting you boundaries, then they aren't worth dating/courting. Although I must agree, it will be difficult to find someone who doesn't want to kiss. Many decent, Godly men kiss their dates and especially fiances. It doesn't have to be sexual unless you decide to make it that way.

At the age of 23, you don't need a patriarchal figure to set it up for you or supervise. You are a grown woman capable of making adult decisions, or should be. If you need wisdom in this area, you could ask the advice of older women you trust. But you shouldn't have to have someone leading your decisions. Ultimately you are responsible for your own choices, regardless of who advises or what direction they lead you in. You already have a strong idea of what you want in a relationship. Just be insistant about that and see where it leads. If it leads no where, then you could reconsider your limits and then either keep them and be patient longer or adjust them to make compromises that would be reasonably acceptable.

If you honestly are not able to do this without someone pairing you up and supervising, then you probably aren't ready for a relationship.

A good resource is a book called Boundaries in Dating by Cloud and Townsend. They are Christian authors and therapists. It doesn't tell you what boundaries to have, but how to set and enforce your boundaries, and how to respect other people's boundaries.