How to Pick a Spouse , livre ebook

ENDORSEMENTS FOR
HOW TO PICK A SPOUSE
From Experts on Relationships and Marriage
An amazing book on an exceedingly important subject. I highly recommend it to all single adults.
Gary Chapman, Ph.D.
Bestselling Author, The Five Love Languages
The marriages launched via this teaching have an amazing success rate compared to the national average.
Shaunti Feldhahn
Bestselling Author, For Women Only: What You Need to Know About the Inner Lives of Men and For Men Only: A Straightforward Guide to the Inner Lives of Women
Dan Chun points out that many people spend more time choosing a house than they do choosing a spouse. He brings great Biblical knowledge and personal wisdom and pastoral experience to one of the most important decisions a human being can make.
John Ortberg
Senior Pastor, Menlo Park Presbyterian Church Author, Who Is This Man?

© 2014 Dan Chun Represented by Kyle Duncan, Scriptorium International.
Published by Revell a division of Baker Publishing Group P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287 www.revellbooks.com
Revell edition published 2014
ISBN 978-1-4412-2473-6
Previously published by Regal Books
Ebook edition originally created 2014
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Other versions used are:
THE MESSAGE— Scripture taken from THE MESSAGE. Copyright © by Eugene H. Peterson 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.
NIV —Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version ®. NIV ® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patents and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
NLT —Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible , New Living Translation , copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
RSV —From the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1946, 1952, and 1971 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Used by permission.
TNIV— Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, Today’s New International Version ® TNIV ®. Copyright © 2001, 2005 by International Bible Society®. Used by permission of International Bible Society®. All rights requested worldwide.
To my wife, Pam, the love of my life for 33-plus years: the best decision I have ever made was marrying you.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Foreword by Neil Clark Warren
Introduction
1. The Strange Case of the Menlo Park Singles
2. It Takes a Village to Choose a Spouse
3. Take a Lap Around the Track
4. Sex Before Marriage
5. The 7 C s
6. My Premarital Advice
7. Antivirus Software
8. The Good OS (Operating System)
9. Online Dating
10. What Does the Bible Say?
11. Remarriage—Getting Married Again
12. Epilogue: God’s Grace
Appendix A: A Plea for Churches to Have a Singles Ministry
Appendix B: Premarital Information Form
About the Author
Acknowledgments
I am very grateful for the community of friends, loved ones and relatives who helped me in writing this book. Many thanks to Shaunti Feldhahn, who cheered me on to do the book and to do it right. Thanks to Jim White, who did the heavy lifting in getting my thoughts edited, and to Josh Urich, who made my ideas more articulate. I’m also grateful for Thomas Cheong, my original researcher. For my ohana (Hawaiian for “family”), who read drafts, helped with research, gave feedback and encouragement, I offer a bouquet of thank-yous (and forgive me if I have forgotten someone):
Andrew, Christine and Elizabeth Brackenbury
Mark and Diane Button
Shirley Cavanagh
Craig and Laura Chan
Valerie Chan
Anne Marie Chun
Noelle Chun
Pam Chun
Vincent Daubenspeck
Paul and Jeannie Edwards
Sharon Fan
Carolyn Grossnickle
Jacqueline Hänschke
Carola Hernandez-Pappas
Dave and Shayna
Kusumoto
Kirk Leavy
Scott Makuakane
Arne and Maria Lim
Ron Mathieu
Stella Matsuda
Lauren McCartha
Karl and Sue Miller
Mike Miller
Bob and Patty Moorhead
Darlene Keakalina O’Brien
Vip and Sharon Patel
Ben and Christy Pierce
Elizabeth Pugh
Rosella Shishido
Garrett Sullivan
Susannah Sullivan
Gary Toh
Olivia and Arlin Torbett
Mary Vinson
Kyle Watari
Robin Winterlin
Special thanks to my agent, Kyle Duncan, for believing in me and connecting me with Regal Books. At Regal, I am grateful to Kim Bangs, and a special mahalo (Hawaiian for “thank you”) to Carol Eide and Julie Carobini for overseeing the editing.
I am forever grateful to First Presbyterian Church of Honolulu for the time to write this and to Menlo Park Presbyterian Church for some of my best ministry years heading up its Singles Ministries Department.
Foreword
As the founder of eHarmony.com , I am asked to read all kinds of books on the subjects of dating and marriage. Our organization has been part of over 600,000 marriages, so people think that if I say it’s a good book, then others will read it. I put off reading the manuscript for How to Pick a Spouse as long as I could, because I get asked a lot and I get tired of the requests. But this book by Dan Chun was worth my time—I’m really taken with it. Dan Chun is an experienced, dedicated, unbelievably wise and down-to-earth writer. He knows how to be practical both in his encouragement and in his advice.
Let me get right to the point: If you are thinking about getting married, and if you are a Christian, you need to read this book. It will hold your interest; it will inform you like you have not been informed before; and you will end up saying it’s one of the best books you’ve read on this subject in your entire life.
If you apply the principles in this book, you will be able to master the various stages of choosing a spouse in such a way that the likelihood of divorce will simply have a zero probability. Take your time reading How to Pick a Spouse , answer all the questions that are posed to you, make sure that you get very clearly in mind what Dan Chun is saying to you, and I guarantee that you will find it both exciting and incredibly helpful.
What is the nature of my guarantee? If you read this book and follow its teachings, and your marriage does not succeed, I will give you a free membership to eHarmony.com . This is the best guarantee that you will ever receive because the conditions of this agreement will keep a negative outcome from ever happening to you and the love of your life. And if you go through this book in a group setting, you will get even more out of it. So I encourage this too.
What else should I say to motivate you to keep reading? First, every person I know who isn’t married really needs this book. If you have been married before, and it didn’t work out, then you clearly need this book! But if this is your first marriage, and you are highly unpracticed at picking a wife or husband, you are in great danger if you don’t follow these wise decision-making principles.
Here’s another guarantee! If you read this book and find it uninteresting, write to me. Again, I will give you a free membership to eHarmony.com —but you’ve got to tell me why you find it uninteresting. Why do I say this? Because I found it interesting, and I don’t usually like books like this! So take my guarantee one way or another. Read this book, and become informed in a practical way about how to be highly successful in one of the most important endeavors in which you will ever engage. If you do this before you get married to anybody, you will probably thank me for the rest of your life.
By Neil Clark Warren
Founder and CEO of eHarmony.com
Introduction
A good woman is hard to find, and worth far more than diamonds.
P ROVERBS 31:10, THE MESSAGE
You either break up or you get married. It’s a jarring reality, but once you start dating, those are generally your only two options.
I have a book on my shelf about how to get married within one month; it’s more than 100 pages long. If I were to write that book, I would only need one page with this one sentence: Lower your standards.
There is no trick to getting married in 30 days. If you lower your standards, you— anyone —can get married quickly. Most of us, however, want to get married to the right person at the right time in the right way. Assuming that is what you want, you will need some healthy criteria to help you determine what to look for in a lifelong spouse, so this book is for you.
I want to help people choose the right marriage partner. I want people to avoid divorce. Dating someone and then breaking up is painful and can be scarring; but sadly, breakups are not the only potential for pain. Marriage brings fulfillment— unless you choose the wrong person. A wrong choice in a marriage partner can mean a long, painful, unfulfilled marriage and even, potentially, a divorce. In other words, it can mean hell on earth.
A high percentage of people get divorced today—between 20 and 39 percent depending on the demographic. 1 Would you get on an airplane with your spouse and children if you knew there was a 20 to 39 percent chance that the plane would crash? But what if there were a way to improve your chances and fly without that h