3 Signs God Is Saying, “You Are Dating the Wrong Person!”

Matthew 22:37-40

Here are 3 indications that God is trying to tell you that you are dating the wrong person.

1. If You Know You Are Forcing It and You Don’t Really Want to Date This Person, This Is a Sign God Is Telling You Not to Date This Person Anymore

There is no command in the Bible for everyone to be married. In fact, when you read 1 Corinthians 7, we see that the Bible highlights the value of both singleness and marriage. But again, neither one is commanded. Rather, both are biblical options which each Christian is free to choose.

This may seem like an obvious point, but it is important to highlight that marriage is not a command in the Bible because we then must apply this truth to the individual as well. Because marriage is a biblical option and not a biblical command, God would never command you to marry someone you don’t want to marry. Because marriage in general is your personal choice, marrying someone specific is your choice as well.

Certainly the choice to marry someone should only be done when you sense God is leading you to marry this person. I’m not saying that we can all do whatever we want even if God is saying, “No.” But God will not tell you to marry someone without first giving you the desire to marry this person. Therefore, if you don’t have the desire to marry someone it is safe to also say God is not telling you to marry that person.

Thus, one sign that God is trying to tell you that you are dating the wrong person is when he is showing you that you are forcing this relationship to work but deep down you know you don’t actually want to date this person anymore.

2. If This Relationship Is Hurting Your Walk with God and Minimizing Your Ministry Impact, This Is a Sign God Is Telling You to Not Date This Person Anymore

Since the Bible does not directly discuss dating, we have to study what the Bible does say and then apply those truths with wisdom to the topic of dating. Since dating is used in our modern culture to take steps towards marriage, it is wise to look at the biblical purpose of marriage to see if this dating relationship is reflective of what God would want if you two did get married one day.

There are many biblical reasons for marriage, but two important goals for a Christian marriage is that it should help your walk with God and it should help your ministry impact. In other words, a marriage should help you accomplish the two greatest commands in the Bible which Jesus said are actually good summaries of all the commands in the Bible:

And [Jesus] said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:37-40)

If you want to know what the Bible says specifically to you, you first need to know what the Bible says to us all. As Jesus said, if you wanted to boil it down really simply, God wants us to love him and to love people. And as we know, love is not just about words and feelings but about sacrifice and actions.

So we know God wants us to obey his commands, and we know his commands are summarized as “Love God and love people.” Therefore, your dating relationship is a biblical relationship when it is helping you love God more and increasing your ministry impact as you serve other people. If your dating relationship is pulling you away from God, it is not realistic to think that this trend would change if you married this person. 

3. If You Are Constantly Asking Yourself, “I wonder if there is someone better out there for me?” This Is Probably a Sign God Is Telling You It’s Time to Move On

We have to be careful when using phrases like this. We don’t want to start rating people like they are material possessions created for our personal pleasure. We don’t want to rank people and think that some people are better than others.

However, I believe this phrase has value when you add the “for me” part. So we are not saying, “I wonder if there is someone better out there.” That phrase will get you into trouble and force you to always be looking for the perfect person. You will always be single if you are looking for perfection because the flawless person does not exist except for Christ himself. But certainly there is one person that will be the best fit for you personally, if indeed you are called to marriage. My wife Bethany is not the best woman in the world and I am not the best man in the world, but she is the best woman in the world “for me” and I am the best man in the world “for her.” 

With that said, this is a normal and healthy question to ask in the beginning of a relationship. You don’t need to know you want to marry someone in order to keep dating them. That’s the point of dating – to figure out if you want to get married one day. But if the relationship has passed into that phase where it would be considered a “long-term” relationship because the two of you are serious and have been dating awhile, those questions about finding someone “better for me” should eventually stop.

You should never marry someone if you are wondering if there is someone better out there for you. When God wants you to keep dating someone in a relationship headed towards marriage, he will remove all those doubts we all have at the beginning of a relationship. But when those thoughts remain and they don’t stop, usually this means it’s time to move on because God does not want you to date this person anymore.