When Is It More Lonely to Be With Someone Than to Be Alone?

This video is being passed around on Facebook...which is kind of ironic, given the subject matter.  What do you think about it?

Note: This video is on You Tube (click here).  If you cannot see it on your smartphone, please check it out from your computer.  It truly is worth a watch.

Look Up Video by Gary Turk

I like it.  I confess, I have been guilty of being the one "looking down."  I have also found myself sitting next to someone who was the one "looking down."  It was a lonely experience. 

I have been told, over the years, that there is no more lonely place than to be in a marriage and feel isolated.  I imagine that is true.  I am thankful that I have not experienced that kind of loneliness.

Have you ever felt lonely in a crowded room?  I have.  And yet, I took a trip overseas by myself and I did not feel lonely.  Why is that?  Perhaps it has to with expectations and focus.

When I traveled to Italy solo in 2008, I knew that I would be alone much of the time.  I embraced it and I prepared myself for it.  It was a wonderful adventure in which I felt satisfied just being with myself and my God.  I reveled in the triumph of it, really.

My travels were in the days before Facebook for me.  I was able to get to an Internet kiosk every so often and send a letter home to friends and family.  The letters are included at the beginning of this Blog, Travelling Solo.  Sometimes, there would be replies waiting for me.  This communication was valuable for me and reminded me that I had people thinking of me and rooting for me back home.  I was thousands of miles away but we still connected on some level.  I guess I wasn't really alone at all.

The times I have felt terribly lonely in a room full of people were times when I did not feel connected to anyone in the room at that moment...times when I felt insignificant.  Times when I was believing lies in my head that said, "No one cares that I am here."  Or, "Everyone else is having more fun than me." Kind of self-absorbed, wasn't I?

I am learning a lot about myself.  Some good things and some not-so-great things.  Information is power.  

I have learned to ask myself an important question, "What do I need?"  The answer is not always the same.  If I put myself in a room full of people when I am sensing the need to be alone, I will not thrive.  I may offend someone.  I won't be the best conversationalist and I may leave feeling more empty and alone than when I arrived.

Conversely, sometimes I need to be around a group of people.  I feel energized in the company of people whom I value.  There is an energy in the room that I pick up within myself.  It's a bonus when I can laugh with others. Laughter is a medicine which my soul craves.  Sometimes I need to be with people so that I am reminded that I am not alone.

I am so grateful for the many friends and loved ones in my life who share moments and memories with me.  I value our conversations and our pondering.  I treasure the times we have laughed together, yes, even when it is at my expense.  Life is rich because of you.

My Friend

Sometimes I hear God 

through the thoughts He plants in my mind

in response to my earnest prayers.

Sometimes I hear Him through your voice.

Sometimes it seems that I am laying in God's 

strong hand at night...

like my mattress is the cushions of His hand.

Sometimes I feel Him through your arms.

Sometimes I see God in the clouds on a sunny day,

or in a breathtaking view of mountains 

or an ocean that spans infinity.

Sometimes I see Him in your eyes.

Sometimes I feel understood by God

through reading His timeless Word

and sitting before Him in silence.

Sometimes I feel understood because you listen.

                                                  JKL 5-7-14

Easter

Miracle for Jen

I am still trying to wrap my head around all that I experienced this past weekend at the Knowing God Ministries conference in Apex, North Carolina.  The weekend was entitled, Making a Difference in my Corner of the World.  

I attended the conference by invitation of a friend who is also an alum of Grove City College (in Pennsylvania.)  Fuller, whose name at GCC was Karen Fuller, was only an acquaintance when we were in school.  We reconnected last year at an alumni event in Cary, NC and have become heart-to-heart friends.  Our faith especially connects us as our life experiences have been very different.  We share a heart for God and currently, the experience of being single gals.

Fuller and me at KGM Conference February 28, 2014

Fuller is on the ministry team at Knowing God Ministries (KGM).  She is gifted in speaking, writing, photography, and I'm sure in a multitude of other ways. I am so glad that I responded to her encouragement to attend this event.  

The main speakers at the conference were Linda and Jen Barrick.  Here is a picture of KGM founder, Tara Furman with Jen and Linda:

Tara Furrman, Jen and Linda Barrick (photo taken by Fuller Harvey)

Where do I begin?  Certainly, the highlight of the conference was hearing Jen's story and witnessing her joy and her relationship with the Lord.  Also, Linda is a gifted speaker and teacher in her own right.  She leads a Bible study in Lynchburg, VA that has grown to include over 600 women weekly.  Her sweet spirit and her openness was refreshing and touching.  I was encouraged by both the simple and the profound reminder that God is near and He wants to be my deepest friend.  

Take a look at this video to get a taste of what we heard this weekend:

What we heard is even more profound if you know the Barricks' story.  They were hit by a drunk driver in 2006, when Jen was 15 (she is now 22) on their way home from church.  Jenn was not expected to live through the night.  She was in a coma for nearly 6 weeks.  When she started to come out of the coma, instead of swearing (as her parents were warned that most people do), Jen prayed, praised God, and spoke the words to praise songs.  

Click Here to watch the short version of her story on You Tube  

Needless to say, I was honored to get to meet these beautiful women and to hear their story.  I was challenged to get back to the basics of my faith...God desires a love relationship with me.  That really is the point of the cross, the reason why Jesus came, the reason he had to die.  My sin does not have to keep me from a Holy God because of His great love for me.  The same is true for you.

In addition to three teaching sessions with Linda and Jen (which were all fantastic), we had the opportunity to participate in three breakout sessions with other dynamic women of faith.  I was blessed and challenged by these sessions as well.

Check out the adorable decorations (I love the "vase" and tulips):

Photo taken by Fuller Harvey for KGM Ministries

Such a fun weekend and impactful on so many levels.  I am so glad that my friend, Fuller, encouraged me to attend.  

If you are interested in reading Jen's story, she has a book called "Miracle for Jen" available at Amazon.  The Barrick family also have a website called Hope Out Loud.  

Finally, I was blessed to watch a two-part series produced by Joni and Friends:

PART 1

PART 2

These videos are free to watch.  If you have some time, they are well worth it.  

Jen signs her books with her favorite Bible Verse:  

However, as it is written, "What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived--the things God has prepared for those who love Him."  I Cor 2:9

Auld Lang Syne, Valentine (To Endings and Beginnings...and Accidental Roads)

When I was a little girl, I went to lots of weddings.  My father had six brothers which means I had many cousins.  We weren't a close family. I rarely saw my cousins.  But we always went to their weddings. 

I loved the weddings.  I especially loved the procession.  I loved the anticipation of the moment we would see the bride for the first time.  I loved the rose petals on the white runners and I loved that all eyes were fixed on the back doors of the sanctuary.  I loved the moment when the doors were opened and the music swelled and the song and the tempo changed.  My heart would flutter in my chest and I would find it hard to breathe. The emotion was so strong...this was it!   There she was, always looking more beautiful than I'd ever remembered...shining eyes gazed upon her groom who waited for her at the altar.  This was her moment. This was what she had waited for all of her life.

I was torn between looking at the groom's eyes as he first saw his bride in all of her glory and keeping my eyes on the bride's tremulous beauty.  I would fight to hold back tears.  It was always hard not to cry.

All I knew in my young innocence, is that surely this is when life begins.

If that were really true, at forty-nine, I am still waiting to be born.

By the time I finished college, I had begun attending weddings of my peers.  One would think that some of the emotion of the processional would have worn off by then, but it had not.  My need to cry seemed to escalate with each passing year.  My belief that life was beginning for these people I knew and loved didn't change.  My heart would swell and I would choke back tears.  And I would wonder and pray for when my time would come.

To make matters worse, or so it seemed, when I was twenty-five I attended a revival at my church where I was told that I would be married very soon.  I had fasted and prayed before this meeting as we were instructed by our Pastor, and I had sincerely asked God for spiritual renewal in my life.  When I went to the altar for prayer by the guest Preacher, he looked in my eyes and told me that God was telling him that He was preparing me for marriage.  He said that I would be married very soon.  And he said that my husband and I would be a healing team together.

I could hardly contain my excitement, I was in awe...God really does love me!  It wasn't my intention to ask for a husband at this meeting.  I was seeking God.  But He was telling me that He saw my hungry heart and that He was working on the details of my love life.  It couldn't get any better than this!

I believed, in my heart, that I wasn't really loved (or lovable) until I was chosen by a man.  Not just chosen to date but chosen for a lifetime.  I dated some and believed myself to be in love a couple of times, but my heart was so hungry and perhaps my desperation showed.  I ended two relationships.  Not because I didn't love them, but because it was clear that they could not love me.  Maybe they sensed that the hole in my heart was too big for them to fill.  My expectations were so high...they could not be my happiness.

I entered my thirties with hope beginning to wilt.  There was no husband in sight.  My peers continued to marry at a rapid pace.  Those years of weddings of dear friends were fun, don't get me wrong, and I rejoiced with my friends.  But inside, there was pain.  The pain of unmet longing.  The pain of feeling forgotten. The pain of feeling left behind.

It was like I was stuck in a time warp, repeating the same grade over and over while my friends "graduated" into married bliss, and then...building families.  Thank God that I didn't also have that ticking biological clock in my head.  I was never sure about having children.  Part of me wanted a little girl who would look like me, but I didn't allow myself to entertain the thought.  I just longed for the wedding first, and I figured that would follow in time.

It wasn't all misery--those thirty-something years.  I am grateful to have been part of a large church with a thriving singles ministry.  We were like a family, with the same joys and dysfunctions that most families have. I did not date much in the group, as the competition was fierce and I was never one to fight for a man.  I didn't have the confidence to flirt.  I had crushes that came to nothing.  But we had great fun together travelling to the beach or to the North Carolina Mountains.  There were Bible studies, parties, dances and just doing life together.  Life was rich, it was just very different from the way that I had pictured it would be.

Valentine's days were always hard.  I would hope and pray each year that the following year would be different, but it never was.  One year, I wrote a poem for a contest on the Christian radio station called Eternal Love.  I didn't win, but it was published the following year in Billy Graham's Decision Magazine.

Then, when I was thirty-six, I became a cancer survivor.  It was a tumor the size of a watermelon...Ovarian Cancer.  After emergency surgery, I was hospitalized for a week and out of work for seven months while undergoing six rounds of chemotherapy.  Here is a secret that I learned about my unexpected single life...I had an army of friends and family who loved me.

God used this unplanned turn in the road of my life to show me how truly loved I was.  I thrived during this trial.  One of my most treasured possessions now is a guest book that I had in my hospital room...eighty-nine different visitors came to see me in the week following surgery.  None of these visitors were related by blood, only by love.  My room looked like a flower shop with twenty-six flower arrangements and plants.  I honestly think some of the nurses thought that I must be a celebrity.  Upon completing chemotherapy, I had a "Celebrate Life" party with a DJ and over two hundred guests. In my singleness, I had time for investment in many people's lives. I had many, many friends. What I reaped during that season of life was far beyond anything that I had sown. It was rich and full and beyond what I could have imagined.

This was when I first started to believe that I was loved, even without a husband and a nuclear family.  It was wonderful.  It was real.  And isn't it just like the God I serve to be creative in His way to answer my need to feel loved?  He takes the ordinary and makes it extraordinary.  He takes tragedy and turns it to triumph.  

After thriving during this trial in my life, I believed I had earned the right to be married.  I was sure that soon to follow my illness would be a husband.  I joined dating services and I waited with anticipation.  But eventually, the disappointment set in again.  Where was he, God?  When does my life start...this life I have been waiting for...this "we" life?

More Valentines' Days came and went.  One year, I cried out to God in the parking lot of my workplace, asking Him for flowers.  You can read about this story here.  

Not long after my cancer battle, I lost my parents within eight months of each other.  And then I turned forty just one month after my mother passed away.  The loss of my father was somewhat expected; my mother's death was not.  She had a massive stroke.  These goodbyes were ones that I had dreaded my whole life.  I used to cry myself to sleep at night as a little girl, counting the years and wondering how old I would be when I lost my parents.  I grieved that they were older than most of my friends' parents and I knew that I would be fortunate to still have them into my late thirties.  I asked God to let my father live to be at least eighty.  If he lived to be eighty, I would be thirty-nine (unimaginably old to a little girl).  He was eighty when he died.  I wish I had asked for more.

I am learning with these losses.  I am learning with every turn in the road.  What I did not know in my tears as a child was the way I would feel when God showed up when I needed Him most.  I didn't know in my fears that He is truly close to the brokenhearted, just like He promised in His Word.  He has met me in the valleys in ways that I would not have ever been able to anticipate while still on the mountaintops.  Nothing is wasted with God.  I don't get the measure of Grace that I will need a minute before I need it...but when it is needed, it overflows.  He is always on time and He is always Enough.  Always.

That doesn't mean this journey is pain-free.  Not at all.  If even Jesus wept, why should I be spared tears? The Bible says, "Hope deferred makes the heart sick.." (Proverbs 13:2).  I can attest to this.  Approaching my mid-forties, I felt heart-sick.  By this time, I had witnessed the weddings and the births of new miracles into most of my dearest friends' worlds.  I was stuck in a "grade" that I didn't want to be in.  I felt like a relationship failure.  I felt forgotten.  I began to feel unlovable again.  I began to be bitter.  

I remember exactly where I was when my attitude began to change.  I had to make a choice.  I was in my living room, tying my tennis shoes before leaving the house to play tennis.  I was about to turn off the television when I heard this quote which I have since discovered was penned by E.M. Forster, "We must be willing to let go of the life that we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us."

I decided there and then, in that moment, that I was going to celebrate my life as it is, instead of continuing to mourn what never was.  I was going to embrace the journey.  I was going to plan some vacations.  I was a family of one and I decided that I was going to have a family vacation.

Within the next seven months, I had not one but two wonderful family vacations.  I chose to go to tennis camps in Burlington, Vermont and Tuscany! If you start at the beginning of this blog, you can read about my trips.  Italy, especially, was a triumph.  Pictures of this adventure grace my bedroom walls and in the offices where I work.  When I look at them, I remember the richness of this time in my life...the beauty in yielding to the life I have been given and in letting go of the mourning of what has not yet come to pass.

How patient and kind God is with me!  I am like the Israelites in the desert...they longed to leave their captivity in Egypt, but then...they grumbled and complained in their journey to the promised land to the point of wanting to go back to Egypt!  I laid down my longings in order to celebrate my life as it is...but like a pendulum, I had swung too far.   The pain of unmet longing was too great to bear.  I began to give up my dreams in my heart. I resolved myself to singleness.  I didn't want to live in the tension of gratefulness and yet longing.  I told myself that the man who spoke into my life at twenty-five was just wrong.  He had not heard from God at all.

Thank God for friends and mentors who aren't afraid to speak truth into my life.  All through the years, I have always had wiser people around me to shake me and wake me up.  Someone dear to me challenged me about giving up...she challenged me to face the pain and stir up belief and trust again.  

Life seems to have a cycle and a rhythm to it.  I can go through extended time with not much change and then whoosh!  Change is happening all around me.  In the past two years, I have experienced the "whoosh!" My head is spinning.  So much goodness.  So many trials.  So many triumphs.

You are expecting me to tell you that I have fallen in love?  No...not yet.  Not with a man, anyway.  But my heart is open again.  My faith is strong.  It doesn't hurt anymore to hope.  Because I know that my hope is not empty, it is legitimate.  It is rational hope.  I am getting to know the Author of Hope better and I am trusting Him more.

I have lost two jobs in the past year, yet I am feeling more secure than ever. Feeling secure because my God is who He says He is.  Feeling grateful because my life is rich and full, even though there is no earthly Valentine again this year...no one to send me flowers or kiss me.  No one to hold me at night.

It just doesn't matter today.  My God is who He says He is and He will do what He says he is going to do.  "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."  Jeremiah 29:11  I am starting to believe that the man who spoke into my life at twenty-five may have heard from God after all.  Perhaps it has taken twenty-five years to prepare me for marriage...to prepare me to be part of a healing team.  Maybe it will take even more years.  I will choose to believe and hope.

So...what am I doing on Valentines' Day?  I am having a slumber party with three teenagers!  We are going to eat chocolate and watch chick flicks and share dreams.  We have been sharing life together for the past year. I have been mentoring them as best I can by sharing my journey with them.  They are the daughters I never had...so sweet.

I tell them not to grow weary in waiting on the Lord.  I tell them to think of me when they grow impatient... I am waiting but not passively so...I am living in the wait.  I am celebrating life in the wait.   I am not waiting for life to begin with that walk down the aisle.  

Well...actually...life did begin for me with a walk down the aisle.  It wasn't on a white runner with rose petals. It was crimson carpet.  This journey of mine began when I walked down the aisle of my Baptist church at nine years old, answering a call to give my life to God.  I remember the rapid beat of my heart as I sensed the Holy Spirit nudging me to leave my pew and walk alone.  I remember my mother's tears as I tugged on her coat to tell her I wanted to go. She said, "We will be leaving in a minute."  I said, "No, I want to go up there," and I pointed to the altar.  I remember I was wearing a red checked dress with white knee socks...a far cry from a wedding gown.  I walked alone, to the swell of the organ and the sound of voices singing.  I walked to the front and I stood. And you know what?  I am still standing.

This beautiful song, Accidental Road by Allen Levi is a theme in my life.  

More music by Allen Levi can be found HERE

He is Jealous for Me

Click on the link below and listen as you read.  This is sung by the author of the song, John Mark McMillan...(most familiar version is sung by David Crowder).  For the poignant story behind the song, click HERE.

Did you know that He is jealous for you?  He is jealous for your affection...for my affection.  That we would have no other gods before Him.  

Gods with a little "g" can be anything or anyone that we would worship with time, talent, money, sacrifice...anything all-consuming that we would put before God.  

He's not jealous in a worldly way...jealous like a abusive husband or unreasonable friend.  He is righteously jealous because He alone is worthy of our worship and devotion.  

This song has helped me to understand His jealous love in a new way.  It's a beautiful, pure love...a love that gives all unto death...a love that bends me and pushes me out of my comfort zone...a love that blesses me beyond my expectations and a love that dares to say "no" to me.  A love that denies me of things I cry for because He knows what I really need...He knows the rest of the story.  His jealous love is worthy of trust.  And complete devotion.

At times in my life I have felt completely broken...broken after the end of a dream or relationship...heart-sick, even.  One of those times, a friend wisely advised me to lean into God like a palm tree leans into the wind.  This song says he loves like a hurricane.  It feels like that sometimes. 

When I yield my "will" and lean in, something beautiful happens.  The winds die down.  The storm passes.  And I am left seemingly with "limbs that are bent but beautiful and often on the ground...but alive."  Not just alive, but with my knees and heart bent and yielded, I become more like who I was created to be...and that is a good thing.

Those bent palm trees by the shore...they know how to bend with the wind.  They aren't in danger of being snapped in half.  They know to yield.  I have learned with experience the same...I am much better off to yield my will and say "yes" to whatever God asks of me. 

It's not nearly as frightening as it used to be...I love that He is jealous for me.  Who else loves me like that?  Who else can I trust blindly with my life? Who else laid down His life, that I might live? 

..if grace is an ocean, we're all sinking...

...so heaven meets earth like a sloppy wet kiss and my heart turns violently inside of my chest...I don't have time to maintain these regrets when I think about the way...

Maybe you feel like running away.  Maybe you know in your heart you just don't love God like that...that you can never love this jealous God.  Don't give up on yourself.  Ask Him today to plant faith in you. Ask Him to show you His love in a tangible way and keep your eyes and ears open.  He is jealous for you.  He won't leave you alone until you are His. 

...Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with god something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death--even death on a cross.  Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.   

Philippians 2:6-11

Love Isn't All You Need

Sometimes love isn't enough.  

Here are some famous lies about love:

• Love means never having to say you're sorry.  
• If I love him enough, he will change.

Remember the famous line in the movie, "Love Story," Love means never having to say you're sorry?  Does anyone really believe that?  Love means learning to die to one's self.  Love is wonderful and incredibly hard sometimes.  Love means having to say you are sorry again and again...love sometimes means wounding the other person...and receiving wounds.

I am not an expert on love.  I am trying to figure it out.  I would love to find a Christian man with whom to share my life and ministry.  Here are a few tidbits of wisdom I have gleaned on my journey.  Feel free to share yours in the comments at the end.  Maybe we can help each other!

1.  I need to be open to change.  Never mind about finding the "perfect" person (as far as I know, the only perfect person who has ever walked this earth is Jesus).  And never mind about finding the "almost" perfect person and trying to change him. What is most important is that I work on changing me.  

2.  I need to know myself.  What are my strengths and weaknesses?  What do I enjoy and what would I like to avoid?  Do I have patterns in relationships that seem to repeat themselves?  Is there a type of person who brings out the best/worst in me?  What is my primary Love Language?

3.  I am not looking for my other "half."  I am a whole person who is looking for another whole person.  I am not half-of-a-person waiting to be completed.  Oh, there's another famous movie line, You complete me.  

4.  Laughter is Medicine for Soul.  Sometimes the search for love can be intense and serious...I don't want to make a mistake.  I want to "get it right."  When it's all said and done, enjoying someones company and laughing together goes a long way.  From what I have observed in the marriages of my friends and family, being best friends and enjoying each other's company is a strong foundation.

5.  Lust and Love are not the same thing.  I think it is important for the attraction to be mutual, however, sometimes the strongest physical attraction doesn't make for the best romance.  The intensity of lust will fade over time.  Is there a foundation of shared faith, mutual respect, shared interests, and pure enjoyment of being together?

6.  Personal boundaries must be respected.  It is healthy to have personal boundaries.  I am suspect if I meet a man who seems to have none.  I run away if he doesn't respect my boundaries.  One huge boundary for me is that I will not engage in premarital sex.  I call it "practicing faithfulness."  I am being faithful to God, to myself, and to my future husband.  If a potential partner cannot appreciate this, then he is not someone who should pursue me.  I don't just want my boundary to be tolerated, I want it to be appreciated.  Doesn't he ultimately want a wife who has proved her faithfulness to him even before he met her?  If he doesn't, he is not the man for me.

7.  It is a deal breaker if he does not hunger for God.  Life is hard.  As we get older, it seems to get harder.  I need a man I can "lean on" in the hard times.  If he is leaning on God, I can lean on him.  The most important relationship in my life is my relationship with God.  He is my touchstone.  He is my all in all.  A man must share this with me.  He can't just give lip service to being a Christian...I need to hear him pray...I need to see him walk with God.  

Okay, I'm sure there are many other things I could say here, but seven seems like a good number for now.  What do you think?  Please feel free to comment and share your thoughts.

1 Corinthians 13

New International Version (NIV)

13 If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. 12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

Although this was written with my younger friends in mind, this applies to older single friends, too, including me!  This is not about a marriage break-up...marriage is a covenant relationship ordained by God.  I don't pretend to know the heartache or complexities involved with the dissolution of a marriage. My experience is limited to dating relationships...and, as I am a Christian woman, I have written from the perspective of relationships with men.  

Breaking up is hard to do.

The beginning of a new relationship can be exciting and intoxicating.  The other person can seem like a "perfect" match.  He likes me; check!  I like him; check! We laugh together; check!  We share similar interests; check!  He says he loves God, too!  Big Check!

What could possibly go wrong?

Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.  Proverbs 4:23

In the midst of the fun and excitement of a new relationship it is important to keep eyes and ears open and the heart slightly guarded.  No matter how much you may try to convince yourself otherwise, the truth remains that it takes time to really get to know someone.  It will take time to figure out if this relationship has potential for a lifetime.

How much time?  That is hard to say.  Enough time for you to really get to know each other and see each other's strengths and weaknesses.  Enough time for each of you to seek God and determine, independent of each other, that this seems right.  Enough time for him to meet your peeps and for you to meet his: friends, family, loved ones. All should have a relatively good feeling about the two of you together.  If they do not, try to listen with an open mind. Sometimes friends and family see things that we are blinded to because of our deep affection for the other person. (They do say love is blind!)  All of this takes T-I-M-E.  If any flags arise, any hints that something may be wrong...don't dismiss them.  Keep them in mind while enjoying getting to know him.  See him in different settings and in different seasons. Do you trust him to make wise decisions? Does he act compulsively or does he take time to make important decisions?  Does he pray and seek God's will for his life?  Is he emotionally healthy?  Does he honor you and help you to protect your purity/boundaries or does he pressure you to have sex with him?  If the latter, does he "really" love God or is he just giving lip service? Actions speak louder than words.  How you observe him living his life will tell you more about him than the words that come out of his mouth.    

I still haven't found "the one" for me.  I am not sure that I believe that there is just one...but I do believe I have freedom of choice in regards to relationships within the parameters that God has laid out in scripture. This blogger sums it up nicely...click here.

What I really want to talk about here is "Breaking Up."  No matter how old I get or how much wisdom I think I have gained, one thing never changes...just like the old song says--Breaking Up Is Hard to Do!

Here are a few things that I have learned over the years:

1.  The more physically intimate we were, the harder to break-up.  Sex was meant to be reserved for marriage.  The Bible talks about two becoming one...this is more than just a physical union.  I think most Christians agree on this.  Okay, no sex--then what is permissible?  

"Everything is permissible for me"--but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible for me"--but I will not be mastered by anything.  I Cor 6:12

...The body is not meant for sexual immorality , but for the Lord...  I Cor 6:13

...Flee from sexual immorality.  All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body.  Do you not know that your your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?  You are not your own; you were bought with a price. Therefore honor God with your body.  I Cor 6:18-20

Some things may be permissible for me, but not beneficial.  I know myself pretty well.  I have learned that I need strong boundaries in order to have a healthy dating relationship.  Kissing is wonderful and fun; however, for me--kissing means "I love you."  Even when I have tried in the past to kiss "just for fun," it really didn't work that way for me. It fostered a false sense of intimacy and made me more committed than I should have been.  It made it harder to break-up when I knew that it was inevitable.  Additionally, it made sexual temptation that much stronger.  Instead of running away from temptation, I felt that I was running toward it.  For these reasons---to be true to my heart and respectful, I have set a boundary in regards to kissing.  I don't want to kiss on the lips until we both can say "I love you."  Not, I love you like I love ice cream, but I love you and I have a level of commitment to you.  

You may feel differently about this.  That is okay.  This is a boundary that I feel I need.  Each person should prayerfully consider what is best in light of his/her own conscience and understanding of scripture.

2.  A cooling off period is needed before attempting a friendship.  Yes, it is possible to become friends with someone I have previously dated, but it doesn't come easily or naturally at first.  I need a cooling off period.  I need time to get over my affections, to break the familiar habits that are "more than friends." Attempting a friendship too soon usually results in regressing into the default patterns of deeper relationship and then having to break-up all over again.  This prolongs the inevitable and makes the break-up more emotionally draining.  It also wastes time...time that could be better spent.

3.  It is best to cut off all communication for a season.   This one is much harder to do if the break-up is with a co-worker or a member of the same church.  I have found it best to limit or, if possible, eliminate all conversation or contact for a long while.  It took time to develop the strong feelings of "more than friendship" and it will take time to get over the familiar feelings.  It is natural to continue to feel affection for a former boyfriend even when I know that it was not a wise or a healthy relationship for me.  You probably know women who continued to go back to abusive relationships.  Even when emotional or physical abuse is involved, there will almost always be a temptation to go back to the familiar.  This attachment has to be broken through separation, time, and prayer.

4.  Praying for a former boyfriend may need to cease.  This may sound harsh, but hear me out.  If feelings are not dissipating and the relationship was particularly toxic, he needs to be off of your prayer list for the immediate future.  Enlist trusted friends to pray for him so that you can stop and know that he is being covered in prayer.  Prayer involves expending emotional energy...it can be bonding.  While attempting to break the emotional bond of a former relationship, prayer for that person may need to cease in your life for a season.  You must get to the place where you no longer feel attached...you are not responsible for his life and you are especially not responsible for his happiness. You are responsible for yourself and your relationship with God.  You are responsible for your happiness.

5.  Keep a short list handy of the reasons the relationship ended.  As time passes, it sometimes becomes easy to remember the good things (that are increasingly missed) and to forget the bad things or the "warning signs" that initiated the break-up.  You may be two terrific people who are toxic for each other.  Or maybe it wasn't toxic..maybe you just weren't compatible for a lifelong commitment.  In either case, remembering why helps prevent going back.  Going back into the relationship because you forgot why it ended is not prudent.  Why waste time and energy?

Or maybe he initiated the break-up.  If so, there is your answer.  You cannot make someone love you. You are not desperate.  You are not a beggar.  You want to be with someone who will love and appreciate you.  Don't spend energy pining for someone who cannot or will not love you.  Trust God to bring someone into your life who can and will love you.

6.  Practice Grace...receive it and give it.  (This has been a hard one for me but I am getting better at it.)  Don't beat yourself up!  Don't beat-up the other person, either!  Dating is about discovering if you are a match for a lifetime. Unless you marry the first person you date, there are going to be times when you discover the answer is "no."  If you have sinned, confess it to God and to the other person and receive forgiveness. Maybe you did nothing wrong...maybe you did everything "right" but it just wasn't the best for you. That is okay.  What did you learn about relationships?  What did you learn about yourself?  These are good things to keep with you.  These are gifts. Nothing is wasted...

7.  Press on and keep your eyes on Jesus.  

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of for me. Phil 3:12

...But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.  Phil 3:13-14

As with any goal in life, I must press on.  Yes, my goal with a small "g" is getting married.  I do desire a husband with whom to share life's joys and sorrows.  But my Goal with a big "G" is to live a life worthy of the calling of Jesus.  My relationships with potential suitors either foster this or they do not. If not, I must move on and fix my eyes on Jesus.  Ultimately I will stand before Him when this life is over.  Even if my once-thought-of worst case scenario happens, and I do not marry in this life, I will be a bride one day.  I will participate in the wedding feast of the Lamb.  And perhaps, I will have another jewel in my crown to lay at Jesus' feet. Nothing is wasted with God...

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.  Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.  Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.  Hebrews 12:1-3

Lust and a Foot Washing

Preparing for a Foot Washing...Wedding of Greg & Allison Miller

A single woman who longs to find love often has little crushes on men in her life.  It is easy to form an attraction to men at work, especially when one works closely with men and develops a camaraderie.  In America, often times we spend more time with our workmates than with our families.  Forty to sixty working hours…that is a lot of time.  It is easy to see how affairs can happen.  It starts innocently enough…shared laughter, a glance, a compliment to a hungry heart.  I am so very grateful that I have not fallen into this trap…but I have not been immune to temptation.

Many years ago, one such temptation almost took me down.  It was lust, for sure, and my hungry heart was oh so weak.  The pull was magnetic.  Looking back now, it seems illogical.  I think that there was something demonic involved.  The Bible is clear that as Christians, we do face supernatural forces working against us.  It is crucial for us to be on guard.  I shudder to think of all that I would have lost if I had fallen.  Many others’ lives would have been impacted as well.

If you are reading this and you are struggling, I understand.  God understands.  You must run for your life!  Run away as if your life depends on it.  You will not regret running.  You will regret an affair.  It can never be blessed by God.  And it will trip you up and set you off course for a season…maybe for the rest of your life.

I was in a small women’s Bible study at the time with three other close friends.  This was critical for my spiritual growth and sense of family.  I entrusted them with my struggle and enlisted their prayers.  I know to-this-day that I was spared, in part, because of their prayers for me. 

One particular week, I was obsessed with the thought of this person.  I felt so frustrated with my thought-life and I was full of shame.  I knew that I had sinned with my thoughts, even though I had never acted on my desires.  At the end of that week, on a Friday evening, I went to a home fellowship meeting.  This was a group of about 10-15 people from my church who met once or twice a month for prayer and bible study.  I was not feeling very spiritual at the time and I had forced myself to go to the group.

It was an evening of prayer and ministry to each other.   The majority of the evening, I was present in body only.  I kept quiet.  These friends did not know about my struggles.   I remember being amazed as I witnessed God working that night.   A decision was made to put a chair in the center of the room and anyone who wanted ministry and prayer was invited to sit in the chair.  At one point, while a woman was sitting in the chair, another woman was praying for her and shared a vision of an envelope burning.  She asked the woman in the chair if her vision had any significance for her.  The woman in the chair began to weep.  Many years before, she had a miscarriage.  She had been so sorrowful and so angry at God, that she could not even bring herself to read the cards and letters she had received after the miscarriage.  The envelopes remained unopened, in a box in her home.  I watched as this woman was prayed over and loved, and she began to work through the pain she had carried for years.  It was a beautiful and hopeful moment.  How much God loved her; to speak to her this way through a sister-in-Christ.

I longed to get in the chair, but I was so full of shame and I felt unworthy.  I couldn’t bring myself to go there.  I sat on the floor, near a wall, with my bare feet tucked under me and my eyes downward.  It was summer time and I had taken off my sandals.

The same woman who had the vision of the envelope burning spoke to me at one point.  She said, “Janice, I think you should get in the chair.”   I was relieved to be invited.  I sat down with my eyes closed.  I heard some movement and some whispering…I wasn’t sure what was happening.  I sat and I waited with my eyes closed.  Then I felt something at my feet and the woman whom God had been using that night said, “Janice, the Lord told me that we are supposed to wash your feet.” 

Basin & Pitcher used when Johns Ellington proposed to my dear friend, Cheryl, more than 13 years ago...and yes, he washed her feet...

They had prepared a basin for me.  It was full of water and some lovely soap that felt silky and soft.  I had never experienced this before.  As Jesus washed his disciples’ feet, so He washed mine through these dear friends.  As they washed my feet, I wept.  And they prayed.  They prayed so many sweet prayers for me.  They didn’t know about my sinful thoughts or my broken heart.  But God did.  And He washed me clean.

When I got home that night and got into bed, my feet were still tingling.  I felt such mercy and love from God.  I was not shamed.  I was forgiven.  And I moved on…after receiving such love and such forgiveness, I had no more desire for the sin that had tugged at my heart.  I wanted God more.

Greg & Allison Miller

Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance? Romans 2:4

Greg Serving his Bride...

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms... Ephesians 6:10-12

Listen to this classic from Leslie Phillips: