As a minister to women, I frequently work with young ladies who suffer from eating disorders. Though I personally have never struggled with this particular issue, it clearly plagues a large percentage or our present female culture. It is almost indiscriminating when it comes to age group–women from the age of 11 to 50 are fighting their bodies as they listen to the voices of an unforgiving society.

That said, I was not at all surprised to learn that doctors have identified a new form of eating disorder. The disorder itself isn’t really that new, but only recently have we given it a name. It’s called orthorexia.

Orthorexia is a term coined by Dr. Steve Bratman, an individual who was heavily involved in the health food movement until he realized it had become an obsession. And that’s exactly what orthorexia is–an obsession with healthy eating.

Orthorexia entails a fixation with food that is so severe it can lead to malnutrition or even death. In its less harmful forms it is still all-consuming–the individual may avoid certain foods, such as those containing fats, preservatives, animal products, or other ingredients considered to be unhealthy. The orthorexic is so preoccupied with food that he or she orders their entire life around meals–they are constantly planning the next meal so as to ensure that anything less than pure and healthy does not enter their body.

To be clear, orthorexia is different from other eating disorders with which we are more familiar. As Bratman describes, “Anorexics seem to always think they’re fat. Orthorexics know they’re thin, but they want to be pure.”

And in this way, orthorexia is very subtle. The sufferer isn’t overtly starving themselves, so the behavior actually disguises itself as a virtue, especially in our increasingly health conscious world.

In reality, the orthorexic is a slave to their diet.

To read more about this issue, click here to check out an article on abcnews.com.

If you or someone you know might be struggling with orthorexia, I encourage you to go see a counselor or a nutritionist. But I would advise you to speak with a church leader as well, because there is more to this disorder than unhealthy eating habits.

What is interesting about orthorexia is that it doesn’t come across as being blatantly harmful since the goal is to be at one’s healthiest. However, this struggle gets to the heart of the term “eating disorder,” because that’s exactly what it is–a disordered view of eating. An individual has an unhealthy understanding of food or diet that negatively influences their lifestyle, as well as the way that they view themselves.

And that’s why I encourage you to talk with a pastor–this is a diet issue, but it’s also a faith issue. In America, we see people bowing down to the altar of diet all the time, and we see it in one of two ways–either by eating too much, or by over-controlling how little they eat–both use food as a source of comfort and security. In both instances, people use food to prop up some part of themselves that is hurting or needy. And in this way, a fixation on food becomes an all-encompassing lifestyle in which diet becomes our god.

For this reason we must always be guarded about our actions and our motives. Even in trying to live a healthy lifestyle, which is a very good thing, it is easy to supplant Christ as the center of our world. In a culture that is obsessed with how one looks and how one eats, it’s easy to join in the worship of healthy eating.

So before you think that this doesn’t apply to you, I want you to ask yourself how often you think about food and eating every day. Then, ask yourself how often you think upon the things of God. Even if there’s a slight imbalance, so little that you alone know the difference, that is still a kind of eating disorder. It may not play out in the form of obesity or starvation, but any kind of mindset that puts diet as a priority over God is, spiritually speaking, disordered.

Today’s blog was originally posted almost a year ago when Ike and I first started dating. The reason I am posting it now is that Ike’s method of courtship was the primary inspiration behind this blog, but I did not/could not reveal it at the time. When I wrote that there were “2 signs” that God was using to teach me about dating, that was only a half-truth–my dating relationship with Ike was the third and perhaps most important sign of all.

As you read this blog, keep the following information in mind: At the time I wrote this, I had been going out on dates with Ike for 2 months, and he had yet to make a single “move” on me. The guy hadn’t touched me! Seriously! So I started to to wonder if he was really even interested at all–I was only used to guys moving in for a kiss instead of manning up and stating their feelings first. Ike was a new breed of man as far as I was concerned, which led me to the conversation I describe with my roommate.

I should also note that Ike read this blog shortly before he officially stated his intentions, so this blog also served as a catalyst to that important conversation.

All of that said, if you’re reading this and you’re single, don’t settle! There are Christian men out there who don’t just say they love Jesus, but live like it. Wait for them–it’s worth it!

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I think God is trying to tell me something. More specifically, I think He’s trying to tell me that the way I have been dating has been really screwed up.

This sinking suspicion has emerged for a number of reasons, the first being a conversation I had with one of my roommates. I was explaining to her that I have never in my life dated a guy who waited to make a move on me (ie. hold my hand, put his arm around me, kiss me, etc.) until AFTER we were officially dating. The “move” usually occurred somewhere in the beginning stages of getting to know one another, and only after it happened did we eventually move into the relationship phase.

Because this was my only experience with Christian guys, I assumed it was the norm, but my roommate assured me that it is not. Or at least it is not the ideal. In fact, it would be a deal breaker for her. Apparently some guys are gentlemen enough to wait until long after the DTR before allowing the relationship to become physical. I just haven’t dated any of them, so I assumed they were little more than Christian urban legend.

The second sign that God was trying to tell me something is that my pastor has decided to preach through Song of Solomon, and during the past two Sundays he has talked about dating. Today’s sermon was actually entitled, “How to Date and Love a Woman,” and he laid out parameters for men in their pursuit of women.

One of those parameters involved the importance of keeping the physical relationship in check. As my pastor explained it, physical touch is an extremely easy way to communicate, which is why we often fall into it first. But, the effectiveness of that kind of communication fades over time in marriage, so you need to found your relationship on the kind of communication that lasts. What’s more, if you embark on physical communication before you have firmly built up your verbal communication, then you will short circuit the entire process. It will be far more difficult to build verbal communication because the physical is what you default to. My pastor therefore urged young couples to abstain from the physical as long as possible, and even then, to be highly cautious.

Well between my roommate and my pastor, I am getting the message loud and clear: Physical intimacy has little to no place in the beginnings of a Christian relationship. If your “gentleman caller” dives into it right away, then it is an immediate red flag.

Unfortunately, there is a problem. The problem is that I have trained myself to look for affirmation in the exact way my pastor warned against. If a guy doesn’t make some sort of move after we’ve been going out for awhile, I start to doubt his intentions–is he not attracted to me? Does he only want to be friends? Is something wrong with me? Am I not pretty enough? It doesn’t matter if he’s being consistent in pursuing time with me–if he isn’t doing the one thing that I am used to guys doing, then I doubt the entire relationship.

What is ironic is that I have always criticized other girls for this very mindset. I once had a guy friend who was dating a non-Christian girl, and the couple began to flounder when she wanted to have sex, but he didn’t. She began to feel emotionally isolated from him because, in her mind, if he didn’t want to have sex with her, then he must not really desire her at all.

When my friend told me about this situation, I reflected on how topsy-turvy our world has become–the fact that a woman would need extra-marital sex in order to know that the relationship is strong, reveals how fundamentally we misunderstand healthy love and relationships. Our world is so backwards that ungodly behavior has become the standard of acceptability, the standard of rightness and goodness!

Well little did I know that I am suffering from the same syndrome. I have become so influenced by what I see on tv and the movies, by the past relationships that I have had, that I don’t recognize chivalry, godly pursuit, when I see it. Instead, I am looking for worldly affirmation, and I am discouraged when I do not get it.

So with all of that in mind, I would like to close with two thoughts, one for the guys, and one for the girls. First and foremost, guys: We need you to be men of integrity, even if we punish you for it at times. Many of us girls have a lot of emotional baggage that we will bring into our relationship with you, but stand firm and treat us like the sisters in Christ that we are. We may even resist it at first, get mad at you when we don’t get the kind of affection we desire, but we will appreciate it in the long run. Even if the relationship doesn’t work out, we’ll be able to look back and think, “At least he always honored me as a woman of God.”

And ladies, if you have found yourself in a similar position to mine, look to Scripture and talk to trustworthy Christian leaders when you need a godly perspective. Don’t listen to the rest of the world, and don’t even listen to some of your other Christian friends, because a lot of us are getting this whole dating thing wrong, and we are pulling one another down in the process. There is a better way, a kind of dating in which we are treated as the precious daughters of God that we are, so don’t settle. It’s out there, and it’s worth waiting for. If we want to recover chivalry, then we must help our brothers to do so.