Last night some of the elders (Mark Dever, Michael Lawrence, Scott Croft and I) gave a somewhat annual talk to the single men (women are next week) of Capitol Hill Baptist Church on physical intimacy prior to marriage. We try to give this talk following a series of lectures entitled Friendship, Courtship and Marriage given in our adult education program. The format we typically use is 30-40 minutes of lecture followed by about an hour of questions and answers.

The essence of our talks were captured in a book entitled Sex and the Supremacy of Christ edited by John Piper and Justin Taylor. A new book that does a good job along the same lines published by Crossway is John Ensor's Doing Things Right in Matters of the Heart.

We initially gave these talks because we saw very little difference between the world and the church when it came to dating. Men were painting a picture of marriage in their dating habits and then stepping away (defrauding). Women were being emotionally hurt or wrongly using physical intimacy to draw men in. After giving this talk now for 10 years we have seen a significant shift in the dating culture of our church. And yet there's always young, single men needing to be instructed (last night was our biggest crowd to date!).

If you've never considered such a seminar in your church, I would strongly encourage you to learn more about your singles and their need for instruction. For the glory of God.