SEX. Seriously, I am not obsessed with it. But it’s hard to ignore and it’s awkward to talk about when you’re a Christian girl with Christian morals who grew up referring to it as “S. E. X-marks-the-spot” and you were raised in a strong Christian family and you dreamed of marrying a virgin Christian man and wouldn’t have to worry about sex until your honeymoon night!
It doesn’t help that when you and your Christian girlfriends get together, it surfaces in whispered conversations while you watch chick-flicks or action films and drool over the Hollywood sex icons. It is hard to ignore it when sex is everywhere, in practically every movie and TV show and pop song and so many women tell themselves that sex=love.
More than any of the above influences, Satan has often gained a foothold in my heart as he constantly dangles sexual temptations in my peripheral thoughts. And when things get a bit steamy when I’m alone with my boyfriend, I confess that it is very tempting not to wait until marriage. I’m not saying that my heart is OK with having pre-marital sex; I’m admitting that it is unbelievable how alive my boyfriend makes my body feel. Until now, I have never known this physical love before but I want it to be ours to share in the God-ordained context of marriage—and I am secretly very excited.
However, the most difficult relationship reality my heart has had to overcome is not the sexual tug-of-war between purity and temptation; it is forgiveness.
For example, when my boyfriend and I were newly friends and the definition of our relationship was on the fence, I didn’t ask if he was a virgin—something I thought would be the deciding factor in choosing a spouse. When the moment hit me that I had feelings for him in return and that I might actually say “yes” to dating him, I still didn’t ask. Even when I agreed to date him, I didn’t ask. Finally, when I voiced the question, I had naively taken the answer for granted. My heart wasn’t ready for his honest response: he wasn’t a virgin.
As a Christian girl who believed she had found the one her heart belonged to and who had assumed sex would be new and wonderful for both of them on their wedding night, and who had never planned on dating someone who hadn’t been equally convicted to wait—my heart felt bruised by this blow. He confessed that he had had sex with an (ex)girlfriend. Actually, two (ex)girlfriends. It had happened two years before I met him—and he thought he loved them, but he was wrong. He was genuinely repentant. Yet, since finding me and loving me for the beauty of my heart he felt even more like a beast.
As the sting of reality burned into our hearts, I felt betrayed. On our wedding night, I would be his “third”. Looking back, I can’t comprehend the fresh stab of remorse he must have felt in that moment, waiting for my reaction, realizing his failure to promise me his whole self.
But I accepted him as broken and I forgave him against my feminine nature’s jealousy. In that darkness, I realized that if God loves my boyfriend so unconditionally that He willingly forgives his sins and remembers them no more, then it was essential that I be willing to do the same if I were to truly love this man.
Although I still experience moments when Satan reminds me that my boyfriend did not faithfully wait for me—moments when he mocks me and calls me “third”—I have replaced that ugly truth with a new promise in my heart: Yes, my boyfriend has had sex before, but I will be the first woman with whom he has ever made love.
Through this relationship with my boyfriend, God has revealed to me a deeper, purer comprehension of “love”. It is not the kind of love that is defined by abstinence or realized by having sex; not the kind of love that is described as “being happy with someone” or “physically attracted to someone”. It is agape. Unconditional. “In-God’s-image” love. The “I-forgive-you-no-matter-what” love. The “key-ingredient-to-make-marriages-last” love. The most difficult and most beautiful form of love. The love I desire to demonstrate to my future spouse through forgiveness that is irrevocable and faithfulness that is immovable—the love that says: “Beloved, I do not see you through the eyes of the world. Look into my heart. I see you through the reflection of God’s eyes—pure and whole.”
Prayerfully,
Grace
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