Transparent heart icon with white outline and + sign.

Life's busy, read it when you're ready!

Create a free account to save articles for later, keep track of past articles you’ve read, and receive exclusive access to all RP resources.

White magnifying glass.

Search thousands of RP articles

Equipping Christians to think, speak, and act

Open envelope icon with @ symbol

Get Articles Delivered!

Equipping Christians to think, speak, and act delivered direct to your Inbox!

Log In Create an Account Contact Us

Save articles for later, keep track of past articles you’ve read, and receive exclusive access to all RP resources.



News

Saturday Selections – July 6, 2024

How social media keeps you poor (10 min)

Though the two commentators here aren't Christian, the warning they offer may help us better resist social media's siren call.

Spider silk might be ideal for nerve repairs

Spider silk may be a great medium to regrow severed nerves in people, and that's just one of its amazing properties. If Man could make it, he would, but despite all our genius and equipment, we can't duplicate what a spider, with a brain the size of a pin, can make all on its own.

Motherhood myth busting

Feminists have women fearful of having children, with fertility treated more as a problem to be solved than as a gift (or if they deny God, an ability) specific to women. They look to children from a cost/benefit perspective and don't see how the pleasure derived from children can outweigh the bother. And from that self-absorbed perspective, it will be hard to enjoy any kids you might have.

But, "if life has meaning beyond comfort and pleasure, then something can be difficult and worth pursuing at the same time. "

Parents' guide to smartphones (10-minute read)

The folks at Axis cover the highs and lows. It's a longer read but there is so much helpful material in here that this is a must-read for parents with teens.

Communicating about sex in the first years of marriage

"How can you have meaningful conversations about sex with your spouse? You should be sure to address wants, worries, ways, and why's..."

When the government bets your house

Like previous installments in this "Unintended Consequences" series, these are well-intentioned plans going wildly awry. While this is a secular presentation, the lesson being pitched is one Christians can get behind: there is an overall need for humility, because even (especially?) experts can get things really, really wrong.

This humility wouldn't simply mean leaders, and the experts they follow, need to double-check their work. What it means is that our leaders and these experts need to admit to not being able to do many of the things they are currently trying to do now.... and they need to stop meddling in them.

Just consider if, in the Sri Lankan case presented below, only some of the farmers had tried organic pesticides. Maybe they would have tried it as a marketing effort – get your organic rice from us! It would have been an experiment, but the farmers would have been gambling with their own land, money, and work. That's high stakes for them, but they are betting on themselves, their own smarts, and their efforts. And because it is only some farmers, win or lose, it isn't a high-stakes gamble for the whole country. If they had succeeded, they would have gotten the benefit and they would have been an example for others to learn from and copy. And if they'd failed, then others could also learn and avoid their mistake.

However, when the government made the decision to ban inorganic pesticides for everyone, they were gambling with land, money, and work that wasn't theirs. And they were forcing everyone into just the one experiment. If it succeeded, wonderful, but the problem is, were it to fail, they were taking everyone down with them. That makes it a much, much higher stakes gamble. And anyone who has any humility shouldn't even think to bet someone else's house on their best guess.

Red heart icon with + sign.
Interview with an artist

Simone Bos’s calming cubes of color

Ahmic Lake Island II30x40”"This painting features a bird’s eye view of the island just outside of Bells Bay on Ahmic Lake in Magnetawan, ON. This particular island finds itself in many of my lake paintings. The walleye fishing near this island is pretty good too." Thank you, dear readers, for all your suggestions of artists to profile in this column. One name that has been shared repeatedly with me is Simone Bos – a landscape painter from Cambridge, Ontario. Simone Bos has been painting seriously since 2017 and has been showing her artwork in local galleries since 2019. She currently works full-time as an artist, a dream she has had for over a decade. Simone admits that making her dream a reality has also meant accepting certain challenges. Working as a full-time artist involves long hours, significant risks and learning new skills required to successfully operate a business. All this “pushes me out of my comfort zone,” says Simone, “but I am growing and learning!” Simone is also grateful for the meaningful help she’s received along the way. Simone’s parents recently gifted her space in an extra garage which she transformed into a beautiful artist studio complete with plenty of natural light. Her new garage-studio is now used as a workspace, a showroom for her artwork and, at times, a classroom. Like many other Canadian artists, including some of those profiled in this column, Simone has been influenced by the Group of Seven and finds her inspiration in the wild Canadian landscape. She is particularly drawn to scenes in and around Ahmic Lake in Magnetawan, Ontario, as well as the local fields, farms, and country roads near her home in rural Cambridge, Ontario. “I paint places I know/love, which helps me to pull the feeling of the place from the photograph references I work from.” Simone uses “layered cubes of color” to evoke emotion. She explains: “the intentional use of brushstrokes as cubes and shapes gives rhythm and interest to the paintings, and allows for a calming, art-making experience.” Simone follows a rather structured process expressing her understanding of the “Master Artist’s” love for beauty and order. “The finished paintings capture the essence of the landscape featured in a unique, energetic, and yet orderly way. I believe that the viewers who connect with my artwork see this and the sense of calm that comes with experiencing a beautiful scene in nature is evoked also.” How Majestic30x40”"The sunsets on Ahmic Lake are always spectacular, but this one was particularly dramatic. A peaceful lake, with heavy clouds scattering the final sun rays. As the song of the same name by Citizens & Saints recognizes, 'how majestic is Your (God’s) name in all the earth.'” Simone has also been exploring art on a deeper level – understanding the structure and source of beauty and asking what it means to “engage with God in a meaningful way through .” A verse from Ecclesiastes is of particular interest to her. “He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.” (Ecc. 3:11) Simone believes that all beauty is from God and wants to encourage viewers of her work to reflect on this too. “The more I paint, the more my observational skills grow. I am able to notice more and more beauty in the natural world around me, which points back to a detail oriented, creative God. I am also learning to trust that God is the Lord of my business and has full control over it: over my sales, my opportunities, my successes, and failures. He is teaching me to trust Him.” You can see more of Simone’s beautiful work and connect with the artist on her website SimsArtStudio.com, and you can follow Simone at Instagram.com/SimsArtStudio and Facebook.com/SimsArtStudio. If you have a suggestion for an artist you’d like to see profiled in RP please email Jason Bouwman at [email protected]. In the picture above, Simone is displaying "Beauty Untamed" which she details is: "Old Man’s River Falls is a beautiful waterfall in Magnetawan, ON, near Ahmic Lake. In Autumn this scene is particularly spectacular, with white water rushing over black rocks, all framed by orange maples. I could sit and stare at this view for hours!...

Red heart icon with + sign.
News

Saturday Selections – June 22, 2024

What's wrong with marijuana This is the practical case against marijuana. For the Christian case, check out "Is recreational marijuana sinful?". Mothers' milk is amazing If you believe in evolution, you have to credit everything to the interaction of time and chance. That includes something you may never have considered before: the origin of mothers' milk. We know God designed moms to be specially able to care for their babies this way, so Christians shouldn't be surprised to learn that the closer we look at mothers' milk, the more amazing we find it to be. But if you think it evolved from "a glandular skin secretion in synapsids" then you might think that the human-designed substitutes available on store shelves would be the superior product. You might think that; it'd be a logical conclusion based on evolutionary presuppositions. But it ain't so. If Satan was a marriage counselor... ...he'd sound a lot like a newspaper advice column. Your family needs you (and you need them) My kids make me happy, but when they don't, can I abandon them? And what of my parents? If they become a burden or trouble to me, isn't that a reason to cut such "toxic people" out of my life? That's what the world would tell you. But as John Stonestreet explains (in this older piece), God says something very different. Baptists come out against IVF At their annual meetings last week, the US's largest protestant denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, passed a resolution formally opposing the use of in vitro fertilization (IVF). While the majority voted for the resolution, many of the delegates opposed it, and spoke to how they believed IVF was a pro-life procedure, since it created life. But as IVF is practiced, it leads to the creation of "excess" embryos – "excess" children – that will either be destroyed (ie. killed) or frozen, which treats the child as a thing, not a human being. Some of these frozen children will then be given away via "snowflake adoptions" where the embryo is implanted in the adoptive mother's womb. But while the couples doing the adopting are rescuing these frozen children, it is still wrong for the biological parents to have engaged in a procedure that would leave them with "excess" children. Adoption is a rescue, but parents should never deliberately create a situation in which their children would need to be rescued. Homosexuals & some professing Christians redefine "love" It's been said that the opposition shares our vocabulary, but not our dictionary – they define words like marriage, hate, gender, tolerance, pride, and love very differently from how God defines them. With Pride Month in full swing, Christians need to be able to share that it isn't love to celebrate what God hates for the very same reason it isn't love to affirm anorexia – we wouldn't be doing the person any good to affirm as right the wrong they are struggling with. It's for their sake and for their good that we don't want to encourage their rebellious lifestyle. ...

Red heart icon with + sign.
Economics, News

Premier Ford calls on the feds to make EV cars more expensive

Ontario’s premier has asked the federal government to impose a 100% tariff on Chinese electric vehicles, which would make these cars twice as expensive as they would otherwise be. Why would Premier Doug Ford want to so strongly discourage consumers from buying these EVs? Aren’t EVs the way of the future? The premier explained he wants the tariff to protect Ontario jobs. Back in April, he announced he was gifting $2.5 billion of Ontario taxpayers’ money to induce Honda to build four EV manufacturing plants in the province. The federal government added in their own $2.5 billion in tax credits. Combined, this $5 billion would create 1,000 jobs, which works out to a cost of $5 million per job. It’s not surprising then, that the premier wants to protect these positions – they were a very expensive purchase. But why are these Chinese cars so cheap? In an interview with the Toronto Sun’s Brian Lilley, the president of Canada’s Automotive Parts Association, Flavio Volpe, raised the possibility of forced labor – slaves – sometimes being involved. That could be a reason to ban sales altogether, not simply penalize them. Another critique is that the Chinese government is heavily subsiding these vehicles. But The Hub has calculated that overall, the federal, Ontario, and Quebec governments have combined to offer $40 billion in subsidies and tax credits to our own EV industry. Or as Kiernan Green noted: “This represents 15 percent more than the companies themselves have put forward for their investments in Canada’s EV sector.” If subsidization is an unfair business practice, then shouldn’t we should stop it ourselves (Matt. 7:12)? And if it isn’t unfair, why are we complaining? There are other issues involved here: as Flavio Volpe noted, the same federal government that is subsidizing Canadian production is also involved in subsidizing foreign EV production too – the Liberals announced a program this past December that could credit EV manufacturers, both domestic and foreign, with as much as a $20,0000 credit per EV car sold. It is more complicated than that, but the short of it is, the government has gotten itself so muddled up in this market that its right hand is actively working against its left hand. Might that be evidence that it should get both hands, and its nose, out of the business sphere? Taxpayers are shouldering a heavy burden for EV cars. And now, if this tariff goes through, Canadians will be asked to shoulder even more, as less expensive Chinese competitors will be tariffed out of the marketplace. There is a broader lesson here, as this is what tariffs always do, protecting local producers at the expense of local consumers. God calls on the government to administer justice, and one of the first principles of justice is impartiality (Lev. 19:15, James 2:8). What we have happening here is an example of the government picking winners and losers, favoring EV producers over EV purchasers (and all of it done at the expensive of taxpayers). Why the one over the other? What business is it of government to show such favoritism? Picture credit: adapted from a photo by Bruce Reeve/flickr.com and used under a Creative Commons CC BY-SA 2.0 license....

Red heart icon with + sign.
News

Mortgage delinquencies up more than 20%

Increased spending and costs are catching up with Canadian households, according to the latest figures from the credit agency Equifax Canada. Mortgage debt makes up a whopping three quarters (74.4%) of total consumer debt, even though the number of new mortgages hit an all-time low in the first quarter of 2024. More than a third (37.1%) of consumers extended their mortgage amortization as the effects of increased mortgage rates began to take hold. Particularly troubling is the increase in delinquencies, i.e. missed payments. In Ontario, the balance of mortgages in “severe delinquency” – 90 or more days without payment – increased to over $1 billion, or twice the level of severe delinquency before Covid. Rebecca Oakes, VP of Advanced Analytics at Equifax Canada, explained that “mortgage stress testing,” introduced back in 2016, helped prevent even more delinquencies. This “test” gauged whether or not a borrower would still be able to handle their mortgage payments if rates were to take an unfortunate bounce upward. “ has helped to mitigate against the full effect of sustained high interest rates, but we still saw more than 34,000 consumers missing a payment on their mortgage in Q1, which is up 22.7 per cent compared to 12 months ago.” In recent years our federal government has led the charge in running massive debts, with many provincial governments following suit. Although political parties used to campaign on the promise of balanced budgets, Canadians have rewarded parties who promise increased spending and large deficits. And especially since 2020, Canadians have followed their example, racking up massive debt from both home purchases and other big expenses. A few thousand years ago, a wise teacher taught us that “the borrower is a slave of the lender” (Proverbs 22:7). Our government acts as if it is possible to incur debt and not pay for it, but we mustn’t let their example mislead us. Solomon’s ancient warning remains every bit as relevant to today, so take on debt with great caution!...

Red heart icon with + sign.
Book Reviews, Graphic novels

Escape from Mr. Lemoncello's library: the graphic novel

by Chris Grabenstein 2023 / 250 pages In this tween graphic novel (based on the tween novel of the same name), Mr. Lemoncello is a self-made billionaire whose company sells the world's best board games. He's used his money to build the world's most intriguing library, and now he's invited 12 of the town's twelve-year-olds to spend a night there before its grand opening. Mr. Lemoncello's creativity and general quirkiness have some comparing him to Willy Wonka, from Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I get the comparison – both are entrepreneurs, both make something that kids love, and both have kids touring their facility. But Dahl's book had a bit of a dark comic edge, with 4 bad kids on the tour alongside the one good one. And the bad kids get administered swift justice when they misbehave (after one girl, Violet Beauregarde, steals a piece of experimental gum, it turns her blue and round, and she is rolled away, forced to leave the tour). Lemoncello's Library has fewer bad kids and he treats them with a lot more patience. There are also more good kids, and the hero of our story, a boy named Kyle, ends up taking a leadership role in getting the other kids to cooperate together to figure out Mr. Lemoncello's puzzles. That's what this is, a "puzzle book," and more akin to Trenton Lee Stewart's The Mysterious Benedict Society, than Roald Dahl's work. There's a team of brilliant kids working together to solve problems and puzzles. But the puzzles aren't vernally the sort that reader will be able to solve themselves – most of the time we are just along for the ride, but there are a few that we get to puzzle through too. The big puzzle here is, as the title says, to escape from Mr. Lemoncello's library. They have a day to figure out a way out of the library, using all the resources of the library to find clues and win challenges. It's like a mystery, but with no actual villain to fight, or crime to solve. Cautions The book opens with Kyle breaking a window to win a game. Not the best example. But he does have to make it right. I'll also note that with the story taking place in a library, a lot of different book titles are mentioned, and not all of them will be books you'd want your son or daughter to check out. But they are mentioned just in passing. That's more of a problem in the original novels, where several of the books end with a list of the books cited, which might encourage a kid to look them up. Maybe that's related to the more significant warning for this book: it makes a library seem like a friendly, safe place. And it just isn't. It probably wasn't when I was a kid, but with Pride Month invading even the children's section, it certainly isn't now. So kids will need to be taught that you can't just wander the aisles grabbing whatever book you want, as some of them are trash, and some are even dangerous. I'll add also that while this is fun graphic novel, it might create an appetite for the original novels, and because they promote all sorts of unworthy books in a much more pointed way, that might be a reason to skip this book for a school library, even as parents will know if they can hand this off to their own children and stop them at just this one. Conclusion The book's bright colors will catch your tween's attention, and the quickly moving story will keep them engaged. I though it just a tad jumpy, as often happens when a book is adapted to comic-book format, but it wasn't too bad this time. I've been reading the original book this is based on, and usually the original is better than the comic book adaption. I think, in this case, the comic might just be different, and just as good in its own way. The pictures let us see things a little more clearly than the book's descriptions, but I do wonder if, in the book, kids might have more of a chance of solving some of the puzzles before Kyle does. That won't happen in the comic (or, at least, I didn't manage it). But that's fine, as this is just meant to be a light, quick read. It's on the fluffy side, but safe, and fun – I think most any 10 to 12 year olds will want to read it....

Red heart icon with + sign.
News

Saturday Selections – June 8, 2024

Looking deeper at tiny, extraordinary engineers  Hives have been called the pinnacles of biological engineering, and we're only now learning just how extraordinary they are. The Sexular Age never sleeps: 4 stages We've seen the woke advance happen in sports, which the writer calls the West's true religion, in four distinct stages: What you cannot say - first Christian athletes were told to shut up about homosexuality What you must say - then Christian athletes were told to wear the jersey, or patch Who you must not associate with - Christians couldn't be on the wrong organization's board Who you must associate with - don't distance yourselves from men in dresses Why conservative Christian men make good husbands "Many people assume that most theologically conservative men are ...domineering. But sociological studies have refuted that negative stereotype. Compared to secular men, devout Christian family men who attend church regularly are more loving husbands and more engaged fathers. They have the lowest rates of divorce. And astonishingly, they have the lowest rate of domestic violence of any major group in America." Why not private providers? It worked (briefly) in Saskatchewan  When the government is in charge, long waits and high costs don't surprise anyone. And yet, in Canada, most seem to want public healthcare even though they have to wait half a year or more for surgeries. There is an animosity towards private care, in part, because it is thought it might allow richer Canadians to get quicker care than the rest of us. But isn't that akin to being jealous that our neighbor can have sushi when we can only afford hot dogs? Or, to put it in more biblical terms, isn't that the envy God forbids in His 10th Commandment? The lack of private care options eliminates the competitive pressures that could lower costs or speed up wait times for everyone. Even if the government is going to be the universal payer, why does it need to be the universal provider? We have private family doctors, so why not expand the private options to increase the competition? As the Fraser Institute notes in the report above, it seemed to work in Saskatchewan for the decade they tried it. How to ask for a raise Christians are supposed to be humble. But that doesn't mean we should underestimate our value to our company. So what might we keep in mind as we ask for more money? Bubba changed his name to Charlene Ray Stevens is still around, and still making music. Here he is with his latest, about our culture's latest shenanigans. ...

Red heart icon with + sign.
News

Ticked-off hockey fans, and 1.4 billion other reasons to defund the CBC

The CBC got into trouble last week, when it broadcast the finale of the Eastern Conference between two American NHL teams, but not the last two games of the Western Conference Final, which featured the Edmonton Oilers as the last Canadian team standing. That got folks upset, including Conservative Party Deputy Leader Tim Uppal, who tweeted: “The Edmonton Oilers are the only Canadian team left in the playoffs. Despite receiving $1.4 billion in taxpayer dollars this year, CBC decided not to air the Oilers games. Instead, CBC aired a Just For Laughs replay. It's time to defund the CBC. #DefundCBC” It’s not just those two missed games – there are 1.4 billion other reasons the CBC should be defunded. And they’re not the only reporters the government is funding – legacy media outlets like the National Post and the Globe and Mail divvied up approximately $885 million taxpayer dollars over the course of the last 5 years. The CBC took in more than $5 billion tax dollars over that 5-year span, and also more than $2.5 billion in ad dollars. How much of that advertising revenue could online independents like the Western Standard or True North have had coming their way if they weren’t competing against these taxpayer-propped-up giants? We haven’t even gotten into the CBC’s ”Pride” pushing, abortion-affirming, and transmutilation-defending agenda. On these three fronts, and more, the CBC is opposing God Himself. Then there’s the enormous problem of the government subsidizing the very media that is supposed to hold it to account. We can be thankful that some independent outlets do still exist, and the Opposition Leader has learned how to use his YouTube channel to sidestep the media altogether to get his message out. But it shouldn't surprise us if the CBC and the now paid-for legacy media is reluctant to bite the hand that feeds them. So yes, let’s defund the CBC. And let’s do more than that. As the Fraser Institute reported in their “Federal Support for Journalism” study, the government’s attempts to support journalism haven’t even preserved journalists’ jobs. Since 2011 more media outlets have closed each year than new outlets have begun. The Liberals’ most recent “media-supporting” effort, Bill C-11, has hurt rather than helped. It was supposed to support legacy media outlets by squeezing money out of social media heavyweights like Google and Meta whenever they listed a Canadian news article. While the government did get some money from Google, Meta decided that, instead of paying, they’d simply get rid of all the Canadian news off of Facebook. That hurt Canadian news organizations, big and small, by shutting off access to their own social media audience. So the government should defund the CBC, but it shouldn’t stop there. The government needs to stop meddling in the media in every other way too. Who knows what kind of media we might get if only open, fair competition were allowed to exist....

Red heart icon with + sign.
News

Saturday Selections – May 25, 2024

Click on the titles for the linked articles... Annie Wilson: Songs about Whiskey We've all heard country songs about drinking whiskey, but this one is of a very different sort. Why the best gift for your child is a brother or sister God says children are a blessing (Ps. 127:3-5), and, as this secular article shares, that blessing doesn't just extend to their parents. Is the transgender movement collapsing after the Cass Review? Parents with confused boys were sold this bill of goods: "Would you rather have a dead son or a living daughter?" This false dilemma has been exposed with the Cass Review, the world's largest overview of these surgical and chemical mutilations. The Cass Review is good news, but Jonathon Van Maren is more optimistic than I am that the transgender movement might now be collapsing. I am less so because of how the reversal came about – there is no return here to God's Truth and no submission to the reality that He made us male and female. One lie has been toppled, but the world is ready with many more (see Matt. 12:43-45). What the world needs are not more common-sense conservative commentators, but a clear Christian witness. And to turn to God's Truth, they first need to hear it, from us. Why is Canada (and the US) short of doctors? When I ask my kids why this-or-that major problem has occurred, experience has taught them that there's a likely culprit: the government. In both Canada and the US, the government has overseen a deliberate restriction of the number of positions available for medical students so our current doctor shortages can be laid squarely at their feet. The Canadian situation is described above and the US here. So what's the solution? Some might think it a matter of firing the incompetent bureaucrats and replacing them with better ones. But what human being is ever going to be smart enough to know precisely how many doctors we're going to need in 10 or 20 years' time? The problem isn't so much a lack of competence, as a failure to, in humility, acknowledge a lack of omnipotence – we shouldn't expect our government to have this sort of know-how, and they should stop pretending they possess it. Consistency matters on IVF too In the US, after Roe vs. Wade was overturned, the IVF industry was threatened, because if embryos were recognized as precious human beings, then that industry would no longer be allowed to continue their inhuman freezing and disposal of any of the embryos they produce. But with more and more people having fertility difficulties, IVF has grown in popularity such that a very confused, supposedly pro-life senator is now trying to effectively enshrine a right to IVF. But, as Rachel Roth Aldhizer writes, if we are pro-life then that logic should extend to IVF too. What Christians just don't get about LGBT folk (3 min) Rosaria Butterfield: "Being a lesbian wasn't my biggest sin. Being an unbeliever was." ...

Red heart icon with + sign.
Dating

Speed dating night beats scrolling right

Scrolling through profiles on dating apps and websites might be the newest, but it’s hardly the greatest, approach to the dating world, deciding who you’d like to date based on appearance and the briefest of descriptions. Sure, you can change your settings to show only singles who identify as “Christian,” but we all know living the Christian life is a lot more complex than just checking off a box on an app. There, then, are some of the reasons corporate facilitator Kathrina Loeffler started up a Christian speed dating group. “The name is ‘Done With Online Dating.’ It’s because online dating is so cold in many ways. It’s so hard to really get a good picture of somebody online,” Loeffler explained. She says that she's a “romantic at heart” and when she’d seen different speed dating shows on TV, she thought “Why not do something for Christians?” “I think one of the roles of the church is actually to matchmake. If you want to know the truth, I think that the church should be involved in bringing Christian couples together, like really reinforcing Christian marriage so that we can have a strong Christian community.” So far, Loeffler has hosted three events in Ottawa. Participants register beforehand, paying a fee to cover the costs of snacks and rental space. The events follow a structured format with strict rules and pre-screening. Participants then engage in five-minute conversations. There's a list of questions and prompts to help, but participants can feel free to go beyond that. And many do. “They're Christians, they go right to the jugular almost, with the questions like, how many kids do you want? Or, why is it important that you meet a Christian partner? And it's really interesting how that happens.” After the five-minute date, participants have one minute between dates to decide on further interaction via an online survey. The whole event lasts two hours. So far, events have been held for ages 25 to 35, 27 to 38, and 38 to 50. One of the challenges for hosting these events has been trying to get men to come out to the events. For the last event, Loeffler changed the rules so that there was a waitlist for women. “For the third one, we decided that we were going to only invite women to participate as we got male registrations. So we closed off all registrations to women and had only men register. Then as we got men, we would add a woman from our waiting list. Our waiting list for women is huge. It's big.” While Loeffler’s events have been non-denominational, drawing participants from various Christian traditions, there’s no reason her model couldn’t inspire Reformed Christians to do something similar, though more theologically particular. In Ontario, the Fraser Valley, and wherever a number of sister churches exist side by side, this could provide an opportunity for believers to connect on a deeper level. A well-organized speed dating night could contribute to the enrichment of Christian communities and the cultivation of lasting relationships rooted in shared faith and values....

Red heart icon with + sign.
Dating, RPTV

How our friends, and the 'Net, brought us together

TRANSCRIPT Alexandra Ellison: Okay, good. Okay, so if you want to start off, could you guys just both introduce yourselves and then we can kind of get into how you both met. Seth Miller: You want to go first? Zoe Miller: Okay, I guess I'll go first. I'm Zoe, I am married to this guy right here. If you're a listener, you can't see him. But I'm Zoe Miller. I'm 22. And I currently am a part-time journalist, part-time call center agent at a pro-life company. And Seth, and I've been married for one year and one month, coming up on that. But we're at a Presbyterian Church in Idaho. And Seth is the pastor, he can tell you a little bit more about it. But that's currently where we're at. Seth: Yep, and my name is Seth. I'm a church planter here in northern Idaho and the Coeur d’ Alene region. We've been at it for about five months now. And we're seeing a lot of growth and exciting things that the Lord's doing through this church. It's kind of a wasteland as far as Reformed churches go. And so it's exciting to be able to participate in this work. I'm originally from Idaho. I made my way down to Texas. But I've always said that Idaho is the true promised land when it comes to states down here in America. That Idaho is it's a great place. But yep, Zoey, and I've been married for a year, and it's been fun so far. Alexandra: That's great. So maybe if we could go back, I guess to a year and a bit more back to 2022. If you guys could kind of describe how you met. Seth: Go ahead. Zoe: Okay, so you should I'll let you finish off the story, I guess. Okay. Seth: We usually have a plan, you know, though. We've got a tag team story, but... Zoe: Yeah, it depends on the situation, which of us will start the story and which of us will end this story. But I have this very niche little podcast called "Presbygirls" that I do with a pastor's wife who is a friend of mine. And she and I hosted a show where Rosaria Butterfield was the guest. And she was talking about human sexuality issues, which are really popular to talk about in the PCA, which is the denomination that our church is at. And so Seth, all the way down in Texas, his session ended up listening to the podcast episode that we did with Rosaria Butterfield because it was relevant to the discussions that were going on. And so, as I understand it, Seth was in the office with another pastor that worked at the same church that he did. And Rosaria Butterfield, because we were talking about human sexuality and the theology of singleness, she asked me if I was single on the show, which I  did not expect her to do, so kind of the wing-lady of the century, but she did. So she asked me if I was single. And I said, "Yes." And so Seth and his pastor, friend that he worked with were in the office one day, and I guess Seth said... What did you say? Seth: So I said, " Who is this Zoe girl" because I had seen her on Twitter. But I didn't really know anything about her. But her name kept popping up. And then I see her on this podcast. And I was just curious who she was. I wasn't sure even how old she was. I knew she was in college or something like that. Zoe: Isn't it that the first time you saw one of my tweets, you thought it was like 30. Seth: Yeah. So that was just a thought that went out into the ether that then developed into something much more. Zoe: Yeah, your pastor friend, Mark, heard Seth inquire about me. And he basically had it all in his mind that it would be a perfect fit, we would be together. And so he goes to this conference called the Gospel Reformation Network, a conference for confessional Presbyterians to get together. And I happen to know a lot of people at that conference because of my podcasting work. And during the conference, and some of the social times Mark was going around telling people "Oh, yeah, you know, we got this youth pastor down there at redeemer in Texas that's got a crush on one of the Preysbygirls." So I got messages from people that I knew at the conference like, "Oh, there's this youth pastor who has a crush on you." And I thought to myself, he can't possibly be my type, there's no way, I'm an old school girl. And then I'm in this big group chat where we talk about, you know, nerdy Presbyterians stuff. And somebody who knew Seth, a classmate of his in seminary, messaged me and said, "Hey, I know this guy, I think he's great. I feel like you guys actually have a lot in common." And he sent me some YouTube videos of Seth preaching. And so I watched the YouTube videos, and I was like, "Oh, yeah, it's, it's over!" It was pretty much over for me at that point. Then his friend set us up on a group chat with the three of us. And as soon as he saw that Seth and I were getting along, he left the group chat... Seth: Good wing man. Zoe: ...and that was literally when I was at the WORLD Journalism Institute (WJI). The first time that we talked, on Discord, was May 10. And I think WJI started on like, the 12th. Yeah, so it was, it was immediately then, and so I'm going through mind, there's this pastor guy, he's older than me. This is, this is a little odd. You know, my parents thought it was a little, a little odd. They thought I was too young to get married, not because of any serious reason, but they just didn't see it happening for some time. And then Seth and I got engaged in October. And, but from seth perspective, it was pretty interesting as well, up until that time. Seth: Yeah, I was working at that church at the time. And, as a young single pastor, it was common for me to be approached by mothers in the church, inquiring if I would be interested in their daughters. That had happened several times. None of them really worked out. Nice girls and everything, but none of them stuck. And so I was in the place of, I don't want to do this anymore. It's weird dating within the church, you know, from a position of being a pastor. And so, at first, like we said, it was just kind of a curiosity that quickly developed into something much more than that. And that was basically what I needed because I wasn't really all that... I guess, I didn't have too many intentions on and really wasn't trying to get married anytime soon. I knew the Lord would provide a spouse for me. And so, it just created a life of its own. And, part of the reason for it is because the associate pastor that Zoey mentioned, his name is Mark, he is like a second dad to me. And so his interest in making sure I was getting married was, even more of an interest than I had. He thought he saw the potential there. And I mean, I thought Zoe was great from what I knew, but I didn't really know anything more about her. It would have been weird if I would have just gone to her Twitter page and, and DM-ed her. And I was definitely not going to do that. So it was like, it was almost this kind of, I don't know, arranged marriage in the Presbyterian world – all these people working behind the scenes. And that's what I think made it so unique. But it was exactly probably what would have worked best for the both of us where we were at our stages of life. You hear about all the horror stories about meeting somebody online, and as a real person, you don't know what they're really like, you only see some pictures. There was some fear and trembling before we actually met the first time. What's this person really like? So we actually met at the General Assembly of the PCA. So again, this is a very, very strange story that's abnormal for 99% of the population. I don't know if anybody else could write up a story like this. But we met at General Assembly and that was an interesting time. Zoe: Yeah. Because he got to meet my dad for the first time at General Assembly because he was there. So he looked him over. Seth: Zoey had to meet with the two pastors that I was on staff with, and they wanted to know her intentions. And so it was very much like this, courtship sort of. Zoe: Both of us were vetted thoroughly. Seth: Yeah. And, yeah, and then we actually got to talk to each other a little bit during that time. We were both nervous because when you go from online to in-person, that's a totally different dynamic. You know, you can text, you can call, you can FaceTime, all that stuff, but then when you're actually standing in front of each other. I think we were both sweating away – at least I was. Zoe: Oh, yeah. So, that's pretty much how it happened. Then we had a phone call where I was actually working on my broadcast thing for WJI, late at night. And Seth and I were on the phone, because we talked on the phone all the time. And so Seth, called me as I was working late, by myself in the classroom that you're familiar with on this story. Seth calls me and he's like, "Okay, so before we get too emotionally involved, what is the purpose of what we're doing here? Like, what are we doing here? What are we trying to accomplish?" And I was like, "Well, I guess what I think we're doing is eliciting marital compatibility." Those are the exact words! Seth: A little robotic, but good. It was accurate. Zoe: From that point on, it wasn't really awkward to try to figure out like, "Oh, where are we going to go from here?" We got engaged in October of that year. And we got married in March of the next year. I would always be frustrated when I would ask people who I thought had great marriages, "How did you know that you were supposed to marry your spouse?" And they would always say, "Well, you know, when you know," and I would say, "That's not a real good answer!" But at this point, they were 100%. Correct. It's really difficult to convey that to somebody who doesn't actually have that knowledge by experience, but I'm finding out that they were right. Alexandra: You kind of you kind of mentioned this at the beginning. But part of the story is that there's like, been a bit of pushback, you know, within our culture of people getting young. You even see it within the church. I've been in churches in kind of major cities - a lot of young professionals - and they kind of prolong marriage to you know, 30+. So, was there any sort of pushback for you getting married young? It was only, I guess, a few months when you guys got engaged? Zoe: Yeah, We'd only been we'd only dated for like five months when we got engaged. So I think my parents were the ones that were more interested in me having a career before marriage than even me. Seth is pretty charming, though. So I wasn't really sure exactly what I was going to do after college, probably journalism, but I didn't have any job prospects lined up. And as I went into college, I had this idea of being a young professional-like single lady. But because of the churches that I was going to, I sat under really solid, good preaching and teaching. And I got to know a lot of families who, the wives and moms were incredibly capable and smart ladies, but it was just a great service that they did to their family to prioritize that before they, you know, before they went off and had a job. Particular lady who I know pretty well, for my church, when I was going to college, she got married to her husband when she was 18. And he was 21. And she's very smart. She's very pretty, she could have done a lot of things with her life, but she decided that she wanted to have a family instead, and having a family and getting married and contributing to somebody else's life instead of just her own. I kind of conceived of that as something you did if you didn't have any other options, but it's through this experience of meeting her and a lot of ladies like her, I learned that just getting married young is not a waste of time. It's not. It's not an anti-intellectual exercise, it actually takes effort, and a little bit of intelligence – the sprinkling that I still have left – to put effort into your marriage. I think people tend to see it as something that doesn't require hard work. You know, women only do it if they don't really have any skills. But I think that's totally wrong. And just meeting people who made that choice changed my perspective. And by the time that I was through with college, I was thoroughly fed up with the, the caricature of the young professional lady who's on her own and doesn't need anybody. Society just doesn't quite work like that. As I got through college, I got more conservative as well as more serious about theology in my Christian faith, so that contributed to it as well. But yeah, there is definitely that pushback towards Christian women marrying young. I think a lot of people are concerned that they're not ready. But a lot of great advice that I received is, if you have a man who loves the Lord, that's 90%. If he's a minister, that's like another 5%. And if he's older than you, that's a big plus, too. So, beyond those initial objections, once we convinced my parents it was pretty much good to go. But Alexandra: Some of the article I've been doing is trying to get maybe more concrete advice for young woman, and then also for young men. I think for young men, a lot of the advice I've heard is like Kevin DeYoung's book, it's called Just Do Something. Yeah, you can go out and you can, you know, take God's will, and you can just go and pursue a woman that you're interested in, within the church. You can go do that. But I think, as a woman, in some sense, that can kind of be hard, because it's like, "I just have to wait for someone to pursue me? What can I do during this time?" So I guess I'll ask, Seth, and then also Zoe, so what would be your advice for young woman and your advice for young men? Seth: Yeah, I think for young men, and I think this would apply to young ladies as well, the early years in your early 20s, that's a great time to really cement your standing as a Christian, really grow a lot, and get involved in the life of the church. When you're focusing on growing as a Christian, you're focusing on serving in the church, and being a part of the church, a lot of those things just kind of come together on their own. I've noticed with some young guys, they kind of, they'll think of everything in terms of, of getting married and pursuing a wife, having children. I think that's a good God-given natural desire, but at times, everything is so focused towards that, that personal growth becomes a means to an end. They feel like, okay, I've gotten all of the boxes checked, and I have enough income to be able to support a family. And so they get really focused on that, which again, I think is fine. And I think to have that drive is a good thing as a young man. But there's still a point to which you want to make sure that you're, you're pursuing the Lord in that time. And again, you're even as a man, you're still waiting upon the providence of the Lord to bring the right woman in front of you. And so there is a sense of waiting even in that, that you don't want to just go out and, you know, pursue everything under the sun. I've seen guys that do that and it doesn't work out too well for them. So I would just say, make sure you're focused on the right things, prioritizing disciplines of godliness, because you want to be able to lead a family well. And if you have not mastered those things, at least in a small sense, before you're married, it's not gonna go too well when you are married. Zoe: The spiritual disciplines, as far as young women go, it is easy to, especially if you are more conservative, or you are you have more of a traditional desire for a traditional family, which is good, even though you may not be a husband someday because you're a female, it's still good to want to get those spiritual disciplines. You want to be the best kind of Christian you could possibly be, so that you so that you are ready for the solid Christian man that comes into your life. You want to be ready for that in the sense that you take your spiritual life seriously. It's going to be as big a benefit to him as his spiritual maturity is to you in a lot of ways. It might seem kind of counterintuitive to sit and wait but there is a lot of there's a lot of development you can do just spiritually when you are kind of waiting on God's providence to bring the right man in front of you. Something that I have seen and I actually sort of did this myself a little bit when I was younger is, when girls meet guys they expect them to be straightforward, but girls don't have the same instincts to be straightforward. A lot of the times they like to talk to guys and they may be kind of naive about why these guys are interested in talking to them so much. And especially if the guy struggles with being straightforward, you really have to, if you are talking in any kind of way with a Christian man who's around your age, and it's a little more than normal, more than a friendship or an acquaintance, you have to question. Don't stop yourself from being straightforward. Because you don't want to play with him. That's a really strong temptation for a lot of Christian girls, is thinking, "Well, I don't have to be upfront about what are my expectations for the relationship are, what I want out of a marriage and a family, because that's his role." I think it's really good for you to, to just be straightforward. And if he has a problem with being straightforward. Anyway, I've used that word like, fine. But the point is, the point is, you should be upfront about your expectations. Seth: Clarity, right? Zoe: That's not something that's limited to the man's role. And spiritual disciplines as well. But it's not bad to have great expectations and happy expectations of a marriage and a family. I think that's a really important piece of advice, too. Alexandra: And I think my final question would be, how do you think that maybe the church or other people in ministry could kind of help to encourage young marriage because some of the things that I've seen being done is I spoke to one pastor, he runs this conference in Calgary called reformed youth conference. So it's for people, singles, aged between 18 and 30, they all go down to Calgary for a week at night, you know, hear speakers, and then like, the point is not necessarily to get people married, but it kind of just happens, because, you know, you have all of these like minded Christians in one space, I spoke to someone else that does Ottawa, Christian speed dating. So all of these kinds of different events that are just, you know, being set up to help kind of grow those relationships. So I don't know if you guys Yeah, haven't yet other ideas on how we could kind of Seth: Yeah, I think, you know, one of the most helpful things you can do, and I, say this from our limited experience of being married for a year, but also just receiving a lot of good advice and encouragement from older saints, older ministers, is to speak positively about marriage in the first place. There tends to be a lot of cliches in Christian circles that kind of downplay marriage or speak down on "Oh, it's the most sanctifying thing you'll ever do." And even speaking of marriage as almost like a sacramental thing, where it's like, you have to work enough to finally be good enough to get married. I've seen that happen in different church contexts. So, you know, speaking about the goodness of marriage, speaking about as the ordinary way that God grows his church through through families. It's not something that's strange. Our culture is pushing against it that, you know, a marriage between a man and a wife, especially at a young age is odd. Why would you tie yourself down? Why would you commit to uncertain pains for the rest of your life? I think that if we can encourage younger people that marriage is good, you should do it. We don't have to put unnecessary pressure on younger folks to get married, but we can at least encourage that this is a good thing. Especially if you're in the Reformed community – Christianity in the West in general – you know, our circles are getting incredibly small. So if you're at a church with 60, or 70, people, there's probably only a couple of single people left. And so the more and more that we can just have relationships with other churches, and just, what you're describing there of, of allowing opportunities for young people to meet. Online is allowing that – there's limitations to it, there's blessings in it. But, you know, the more that we can actually do this on a kind of a local level, I think the better. Zoe: Yeah, and especially because of the way we met: somebody knew somebody. Somebody knew of the two of us and then somebody else figured out that we might be good for each other just based on common characteristics. But it's all due to just church connections – kind of like Seth was saying – people at other churches who know people at other churches. So it's this big kind of intertwined ball of yarn that is like an arranged marriage almost to a certain extent, like Seth said. One thing that we heard i our premarital counseling, which was honestly great – and I think you don't have to go to premarital counseling to see that this is true – but our pastor at the time, he said, a lot of people ask him, "What are the five easy steps to have a happy marriage or a healthy Christian marriage?" And he said, "The easiest way to sort of understand what a good healthy Christian marriage looks like, is just to find somebody who models that well, and watch what they do." So I mean, as people in the church, it's our responsibility to model as Christ-like behavior as possible to those around us, which you know, I am sure I have a lot further to go than I think I do. Married couples modeling that as best they can. Not necessarily saying that marriage is a standard of perfection that you have to attain or, or that your marriage is perfect. But there is a peace to marriage – a lot of people see it as limiting – but I think there's a lot of freedom with, you know, being united somebody else, that people don't really realize. So couple's in the church just being positive about marriage. It's not that you won't disagree with each other sometimes. But our premarital counselor also told us this, "That if you go into marriage, expecting that, it'll be hard, you're kind of pre-empting yourself into thinking that, 'Oh, it's just going to be really tough. And it's going to be this experience that's so hard. And that's why it's going to be sanctifying.'" But if you trust in the Lord and go in with positive expectations, I think that's something that people should be told. So just a general modeling of Christian behavior on the part of the church. And don't be afraid to tell somebody about somebody else that you know, because that's how we got together. Alexandra: Well, thank you both for just taking the time to tell your story. I think that a lot of people will find it interesting and intriguing. It's a little different compared to the regular, I guess, online dating sense. But yeah, thank you both. Thank you again to Zoe and Seth for joining me on this episode. If you would like to read more about the story then you can check out the May/June 2024 issue of Reformed Perspective. Thanks for watching. Bye!...

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31