If you come to our church, it doesn't mean you have to agree with everything that I say.
I am not God, I am not infallible, I am not perfect.
Some things that I preach are just God's word, and then other things are things that I'm
going to state that are my opinion, just like Paul did in 1 Corinthians 7.
He gave some things and he said, this is not the commandment of the Lord, this is my thought
on it.
This is my opinion on it, and I'm going to give my opinion about internet dating or meeting
someone on the internet.
And you know, it's probably going to offend people and make people mad, I'm not trying
to offend or hurt anybody's feelings or make anyone mad, but you know what, I want my kids
to hear this, and I want every single person that's here to hear this so that they can
at least understand that there is a danger in meeting people on the internet.
And let me explain to you what that is, is that people present themselves on the internet
differently than what they're really like in real life.
And this is what you have to be careful of, and what happens is, people will quote unquote
meet on the internet, and then what will happen is, they're already sick of love, right?
They're already, you know, obsessed and infatuated and all head over heels before they've even
met the person in real life.
And then what happens is, then when they meet the person in real life, there are all these
red flags, but it's too late, because they've already decided this person is so wonderful,
this person is so great.
You know, at least if you meet people in real life, you have a better feel for what they're
really like before you just go head over heels, sick of love, infatuated with them, you can
actually get a better feel for who they are.
You can usually know a little bit more where they're coming from, maybe you might know
some of their family or know some of their friends, or maybe they're a friend of a friend,
or maybe they're from church.
There's a little bit more of a background there of who you're meeting.
For example, I know, and I'm not going to reveal who this is, but somebody in my extended
family that basically met their spouse on the internet, and when they met their spouse
on the internet, they said that they were 10 years younger than they really were, okay?
And then once they go on a few dates, they reveal, yeah, I'm actually 10 years older
than what my profile said.
But here's the thing, he already had her on the hook at that point, right?
And they're married to this day, okay?
But you see, he lied about his age on there, and this is the type of thing that I'm talking
about because you lie about stuff like that, and then basically by the time you're already
on the hook, you find out that all these things aren't really quite true or that the person
isn't really quite the way that they presented themselves online.
Now let me tell you a horror story.
Now this predates internet dating, this predates the internet, okay?
But this is another relative of mine, and I've got a story of something that was kind
of like the equivalent back then, just a similar thing that happened, but this girl that's
in my extended family, she one time made a phone call and accidentally dialed the wrong
number, okay?
It was the wrong number, but the person said, oh wait, no, don't hang up, and just wanted
to chat with her, okay?
Just a random person, she just accidentally dialed the wrong number.
So this guy's just kind of chatting with her over the phone randomly, so she chats with
him and then decides, oh, she'll meet him at the mall with a friend, because she figured
that would be a safe place, it's a public place, she's talking to this guy on the phone,
he's a cool young guy or whatever, and she's going to bring her friend with her and meet
him at the mall, this nice, safe, neutral zone.
I mean, doesn't this kind of sound familiar to internet dating?
You're on the internet, you meet somebody, okay, we're going to meet at the mall.
So she goes, her and her friend, and they meet this guy, and they talk to him for a
little while, and the guy's kind of weird.
Oh, do you think so?
I mean, he's just picking up on some girl that just accidentally called the wrong number.
So the guy turns out to be a little bit weird, right?
So she's like, okay, we've got to go, whatever, just kind of wants to get away from this guy
So her and her friend, they go out and they get in the car, and they go to drive away,
and this is like, this is before cell phones, this is before internet, and she goes to drive
away with her friend, and all of a sudden, the guy is behind them on a motorcycle.
And all of a sudden, he just starts ramming his motorcycle into the back of the car, just,
you know, just hitting the back of the car with the motorcycle.
You know, she's scared, she's got no cell phone, she's freaked out, just how do we get
away from this guy, okay.
So that's all there is to the story, you know, you probably thought it was going to go even
worse than that, but anyway, that's my horror story right there.
But the bottom line is that I would say that, you know, it's better if you can just meet
people in real life, you know, and maybe I'm just old-fashioned, you know, because I'm
32 years old, you know, and when I was dating, there was no such thing as internet dating
and all this stuff, okay.
Every girl that I dated, I met in real life, you know, and talked to, imagine that.
But I'm just saying, young people, you need to be cautious and don't be foolish and get
all excited and get all infatuated and get all head over heels over some person that
you're meeting on the internet.
I mean, you might be, you know, you're a young lady and you're talking to some guy on the
internet, you might be talking to some guy that's 50 years old, who's pretending to be
a teenager.
I mean, seriously, you might be talking to some weirdo, some pervert, I mean, that's
just putting up photos of whoever and saying, this is me, I'm this age, I mean, it happens
all the time.
And you, you know, you need to be very careful.
And I'm just going to tell you right now, I will, and again, don't be offended, I will
not let my children take part in internet dating as long as they're living in my house.
They will meet people in real life.
And again, I'm not against anybody who met their spouse that way.
I'm just telling you, I'm going to have that rule in my house, I can make whatever rules
I want in my house.
I don't see the benefit of it, you know, I think it's dangerous, and so that's my rule
in my house.
My children will never participate in it.