Every week I get on this blog and write in a way that attempts to sound somewhat authoritative and thoughtful. I like to give the impression that I know what the heck I’m doing, but I really don’t. I’m constantly growing and learning about life and God and myself, and this blog is no exception.

As a writer, I’m always working on two key things, and I still have a loooong way to go on them both:

1) Finding my voice. It’s easy to mimic the countless other Christian voices out there that I think sound really great and I want to be like. Every time I read something thought-provoking or hear a great preacher I think, “Hey I should be more like them.” This is always a disaster. I’m not them and I end up sounding fake. That said, I’m still working on figuring out how Sharon says things best, and to stick with that.

2) Figuring out my target audience.

This second one has been really hard for me. Anyone who’s read my blog knows that it’s targeted towards Christians (in case “She Worships” didn’t give it away) but over the last couple weeks as I’ve written a number of posts, I kept having the thought, “How would this sound to someone who doesn’t believe in this?” Will they be totally turned off by all the Christian jargon and insider language I’m using? While I may be encouraging Christians, am I simultaneously turning off many who aren’t? And not because I’m being judgmental, but simply because of the basic assumptions I’m making? This is the internet, after all–it’s not like I’m holding a secret meeting of Christians that’s safe from the prying ears of those who disagree with me.

Yet sometimes I write like I am.

This is something that a lot of Christians struggle with. Some of us have so immersed ourselves in the Christian world that we don’t know to relate, or even talk to people outside of it. We know how we’re supposed to talk to non-believers, ie. be kind and loving, ask them questions about what they believe, listen to them, and then gently direct the conversation towards Jesus. That’s like every Christian’s covert op for being friends with non-Christians. And while that’s not necessarily a bad thing (it definitely beats standing on a sidewalk screaming at people through a bullhorn) it’s generally not very convincing to people, and it overlooks our greatest evangelistic bridge–our humanity.

As humans, we share a lot of things with each other. We face the same fears, struggle with the same temptations, and we want happiness, health and security. God deals with all of these issues through his Son, and that’s one of the reasons why we follow Him. We don’t have to be afraid anymore. We don’t have to be bound by our anxieties and mistakes. Our humanity finds refuge and wholeness in Christ.

But for some reason, a lot of us act like we left our humanity behind when we became Christians. Because we feel so much pressure to make the Christian life appear totally awesome, we don’t talk about our doubts, our struggles, our regrets, or our fears with much openness. Even when we do talk about those things, it’s with a Christian spin or the tag line, “But God is faithful!” Yes, He is, but sometimes things are scary and awful. Period.

Many of us hide the things that make us human. We turn into Christian robots that smile all the time, always have the right answer, and are thoroughly unable to sustain real relationships with people who think God isn’t real.

This is why the Incarnation is such an important part of the story of Christ. God didn’t become man simply so that he could die in our place. He became man so that he could relate to us. He spoke to the world in a way it could hear and understand. He spoke into our humanity, and continues to do so.

That should be our model for ministry: Be human. Don’t act scandalized when a non-Christian (or a Christian) doubts Scripture–that’s human. Don’t judge when a non-Christian sins–that’s human. And don’t be condescending when a non-Christian struggles to have faith–that’s human.

Conversely, don’t act like holiness and purity come easy to you–that’s not human. And don’t act like you figured out God because you’re so smart or good–that’s not human either.

When I write in a way that only speaks to Christians and excludes the average human being, I have failed. Not only as a writer, but as a called disciple of Christ. Given that Christians are humans too, we need to hear the exact same truths as our non-believing counterparts. The language we use should essentially be the same. That said, if I’m no longer writing for the human heart, then I’m not really ministering well to Christians or non-Christians.

With all of that in mind, I’ve decided that that my target audience is human women. Regardless of what topic I’m discussing, I’m going to try harder to frame my language in a way that any person could understand. Obviously that’s a somewhat impossible goal given that the wisdom of God will many times be foolishness to humanity, but that’s no excuse for me to get lazy either.

The Christian in-crowd language is one of Satan’s greatest tools for short-circuiting our accessibility and authenticity. And he is so adept at it that most of us think it’s not a problem for us. I have non-Christians friends, and I know a lot of Christians who are a TON more socially awkward than I am, so until recently I always talked about Christian-ese in the context of “them.” “That’s something that cheesy Christians do. Not me.” But honestly, I think that’s what the majority of Christians do. Christians who act like broken humans are the exception.

Ultimately, our in-crowd language not only shapes our speech, but our minds and hearts as well. In-crowd language is merely a reflection of an in-crowd community. And as Christians, that’s something we’ve got to avoid. It’s hard to break out of the rut that our language falls into, but it’s something I want to work on in my writing, as well as myself.

Actually, my husband is NOT annoying at all. In fact, if anyone in my marriage is annoying, it’s definitely me.

“My Husband is Annoying” is the name of a popular blog that is taking the blogosphere by storm. You can check it out here: myhusbandisannoying.com

The premise of the blog, which you can read in the “About” section, is that it’s written by a newlywed who had never lived in the same city as her husband until 2 weeks before they got married. And while she loves her husband and is grateful to be married to him, she’s also learning about all the “annoying” things that he does–such as leaving all his shaved whiskers in the sink, or forgetting to shower every day.

As simple as the premise sounds, the blog has blown up. The woman who writes it has appeared on Oprah, and she’s received a lot of press for it. Plus, women all over the country are now sending her pictures of their own annoying husbands. On “Photo Friday” she posts numerous comical pictures of husbands acting like dufuses, and women everywhere are bonding with one another over their common plight.

Now I’m not gonna lie–parts of this blog are hilarious. There’s one post that she wrote her husband blaming the dog every time he farts. I was reading it in Barnes and Noble and I was laughing so hard I was crying. The guy sitting across from me probably thought I was having a mental breakdown.

But without making too much out of it, I have to express some concern over the motivations behind this blog. While every woman can relate to the divide between the sexes (I’m certainly learning new and surprising things about my husband every day!) we stray into dangerous territory when we start belittling our husbands.

This blog might be harmless were this sentiment not a legitimate struggle for women. I find in myself all the time a temptation to be sarcastic with my husband. For instance, before the wedding I went shopping with my mother-in-law for her dress, and she found one that she really liked. The dress was pleated and had a pewter color to it, but when we sent Ike a picture of it, he shot it down immediately because “it looked like what Shredder wore.” (In case you missed it, that’s a reference to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) After getting off the phone with him I looked at a sales associate, rolled my eyes and stated, “He’s a guy. What does he know!”

I HATE when I do that! I hate when I talk about my husband like he’s just some dumb guy. He is NOT just some dumb guy. He is brilliant and attentive and funny and he’s got the most beautiful servant heart. He’s the most wonderful man I’ve ever met, which is why I married him. So why am I tempted to say junk like that?

Even in the safest of environments, there still remains in me a competitive spirit, a need to put others down to keep myself on top. And this plays out in my marriage as well. I want to be the sharpest, the wittiest, the winner of every argument, the one with the last word. But this kind of attitude is lethal for a marriage if it’s allowed to grow. These little sarcastic comments and jabs are like the “little foxes” described in Song of Solomon. In chapter 2 verse 15 we are advised to catch “the little foxes that spoil the vineyards.” Those little foxes seem harmless at first–not like a plague of locusts or anything. But after those foxes keep coming back, over and over again, chipping away at the blossoming vineyard, bit by bit–pretty soon there will be nothing left. We’ll wake up one day to find that the vineyard has been ravaged right under our noses.

That is the danger of these little jabs and remarks at my husband. I am chipping away, not only at the health of the marriage, but my own heart. I am assuming a posture of disrespect, teaching myself things about his character and nature that simple aren’t true. If I continue to do so, pretty soon I’ll believe them.

The women who post on this blog have been duped by the lie that our media is selling. Most sitcoms portray a gorgeous wife who is married to an overweight buffoon. Regardless of how skinny you are and how chubby your husband may be, this stereotype is a perversion of the truth. Women are not always right, always smarter, wiser and more attentive. We are all fallen people who mess up, and we deceive ourselves by placing the weight of that brokenness on another person’s shoulders. We are contributing to it just as much.

The little foxes are the ultimate destroyers of intimacy. This is true of friendship as well. If we want to have authentic, self-giving, loving relationships that reflect the heart of God, then we need to guard our tongues and take seriously the jokes that we brush off as seemingly innocent. Not only does my husband deserve far better, but that is the last thing that should characterize the people of God. We should be known by our love, not our sarcastic blogs.

Whenever I hear the term “chastity belt” I always picture the movie “Robin Hood: Men in Tights.” In it, the leading lady, Maid Marian, dons a bulky iron chastity belt that looks like metal underwear, and she dreams of the day when her one true love can unlock it. Truly a love story for the ages.

As hokey as that sounds, I think that’s what most people picture when they think of chastity belts. I always imagined a medieval practice in which over-protective fathers and husbands locked up women against their will.  However, after doing a little research I learned that chastity belts weren’t used for this purpose at all.

(I know this seems like a random topic for this blog, but bear with me…I promise I have a point)

Throughout recent history, most of what has been believed about chastity belts is largely rooted in myth. Until recently, it was commonly believed that they dated back to medieval times. There were tales of Crusaders who forced their wives to wear these belts while they were away to ensure the women’s fidelity. All of these stories are myth.

In reality, the only references to chastity belts prior to the Renaissance were in poetry. The idea of a “chastity belt” was metaphorical, a symbol for a woman who was faithful and pure. A lot of the medieval chastity belts that you may have seen in pictures–they’re pretty horrific looking–are now believed to be fakes. Several museums across Europe pulled them from display because their dating was questionable, possibly having been forged in modern times. The iron work was so crude that no woman could have worn them for any length of time had they actually been used.

Ironically, chastity belts were not regularly implemented until the 19th century, and not under coercion of male family members. As women began to enter the work place, they frequently endured sexual harassment and assault. As a result, these working women wore chastity belts as a kind of protective measure.

This idea that women wore chastity belt’s to guard themselves, not because it was imposed upon them, has captivated my imagination for two reasons. One, I admire these women for taking such measures to guard their purity. While that pre-caution was physically necessary since they could literally have been raped in the workplace, they fought for their chastity nonetheless. Women today don’t typically face the same threat, but we don’t fight for our purity anymore either. Most of us hold onto it by a thread. For these women, purity was not imposed on them by culture or their church–the culture was threatening to rob them of it. So they fought back. I wish we could recapture this fighting spirit when it comes to our bodies. The type of danger has changed, but the attack on our purity remains.

The second thing I like about this story is that these women were likely married, but they still wore “chastity” belts. Chastity is a term that we typically associate with singles, but it’s really a virtue that all Christians should embody, regardless of marital status. While “chastity” can refer to virginity or celibacy, it also refers to the qualities of purity and virtuous character.

I can’t remember the last time I heard a preacher encourage married women to “stay pure.” For some reason that’s a topic that only single women get, but it’s an important pursuit for us all. Even as a young woman, I already have several friends whose marriages ended because the wives were unfaithful. These women weren’t bad people, but they let down their guard and Satan creeped in. It can happen to anyone, so whether you’re married or single you should fight for your chastity. Be modest, treat all men like your brother in Christ, guard your thought life against impurities, and only be intimate with someone to whom you are married. Purity doesn’t suddenly become easy once you’re married–the same Enemy who pursued you as a single person will continue to pursue you as a married person. That’s why Titus 2:4-5 instructs older women to train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure.”

Chastity is a life-long pursuit. There will never come a time when you are safe from this temptation, so be watchful. Whether you are single or married, guard your purity like a treasure. Most of us are fortunate enough to live without the physical dangers that 19th century women faced, but the assault on our chastity is that much more subtle, thereby making it more culturally acceptable and all the more destructive.

Have you ever gone to a Chinese restaurant and at the end of your meal, opened your fortune cookie only to discover that it’s not really a fortune at all? It’s more like a proverb or words of wisdom, something like, “He who laughs at himself never runs out of things to laugh at,” or “Life is not a mystery to be solved but a reality to be experienced.” Whenever I get fortunes like these I always feel sort of stiffed. Those aren’t actually fortunes–they’re just general words about life.

I guess I shouldn’t be too disappointed to receive these non-fortunes, given my theological convictions or whatever. But my experience, my sense of wondering, “Isn’t there more??” is not unique to opening fortune cookies. I get a similar feeling whenever I read Proverbs 22:13. It goes like this:

The sluggard says, “There is a lion outside! I shall be killed in the streets!”

That’s it. That’s the proverb.

I actually laugh every time I read it because it’s so short and seems to give no apparent instruction whatsoever. It’s as if Solomon was in the middle of writing Proverbs when he started to doze off and write random stuff in a half-awake state of consciousness. (Which I actually did a lot in seminary myself. I’ve got some crazy notes about Augustine and grapes)

Fortunately we know that all Scripture is the inspired Word of God, which means we should always dig deeper in the face of Biblical oddities like this one. So to begin, what’s a sluggard? This word appears all throughout Proverbs, but it’s not exactly a word I use all the time, so what does it mean? As the word itself sort of implies, a sluggard is “a person who is habitually lazy or inactive.”

Knowing that, what exactly is going on in this proverb? To understand it, I think you have to imagine this scenario taking place in a quiet American suburb. There are perfectly manicured lawns, children riding their bikes across the street, and the sound of sprinklers gently watering the grass off in the distance. It’s peaceful, and it’s very safe.

Now imagine that your lazy cousin Ricky Bobby is in your house and refuses to go out and get a job. He’s just graduated from high school and had a brief stint working at Hardee’s, but the work schedule of 20 hours a week cut into his video game time, so he quit. Now he’s working hard at carving out a Ricky Bobby-shaped wedge in your couch, and he’s slowly amassing a pile of Cheeto’s bags and beef jerky wrappers all around him. When you try to get him to leave, he distractedly garbles out a response along the lines of, “I can’t go out there it’s not….safe. There’s uh….there’s a pit bull across the street that, uh…. doesn’t like me.” Then he turns back to his game.

Clearly this is crazy talk. But the problem is not that he’s a paranoid schizophrenic–the problem is that he’s unbelievably lazy. And that is kind of logic we see in Proverbs 22:13. It’s about as likely that a lion is lurking outside the sluggard’s house as it is that a pit bull is waiting to attack Ricky Bobby. Neither individuals is truly worried that an animal is out there ready to get them–it’s just an excuse to sit on their butts.

That’s ultimately what a sluggard is–someone who creates excuses out of thin air to avoid doing the will of God. And with that in mind, we can’t be too quick to judge the sluggard. While the proverb is perhaps an extreme example, we come up with similar “what if” excuses all the time. When we consider what radical discipleship to God might entail, perhaps giving our money away more generously, perhaps moving to another country, perhaps loving your husband and being kind to him even when he’s acting selfishly–all of these prospects create “what if” fears. What if we don’t have enough money? What if God calls us some place dangerous? What if he doesn’t change? What if there’s a lion in the streets?

And just as quickly as we ask these questions, we answer them. No, it’s not smart, it’s not safe, and it’s not gonna work. So we let ourselves off the hook, not because God has given us His answer, but because we don’t want to disrupt our comfortable lives. That is what a sluggard would do.

While the concocted tale of a lion in the streets sounds absurd, it’s no more absurd than our ideas of what’s best for our lives. We devise plans for ourselves, what we think is wisest and surest, all for the sake of avoiding those dangers and pitfalls that God has said we need not fear. When we fear the world instead of God, we fear a danger that doesn’t really even exist. And in doing so, we remain in a state of inaction. So don’t be a spiritual sluggard! Examine your fears and ask God if they have any basis in reality. Is it a fear that God has given you, or is it as realistic a fear as a lion in the streets?

The other day I was looking for a book at a Christian bookstore, and whenever I go I like to swing by the “Women’s Interest” section just to see what women are writing about these days. On this most recent visit, I noticed how many of the books dealt with the topic of beauty. A surprisingly large percentage of the books addressed the issue from varying perspectives: what is true beauty, what does it mean to be beautiful in the Lord’s eyes, how to fight for your beauty, etc.

Another large percentage dealt with what I call “survival issues”–healing, managing a busy schedule, overcoming hard times, bad marriages, difficult kids, etc.  Between self-help and beauty, I’d say those topics constituted about 80-90% of the women’s section.

This ratio made quite an impression on me. It also led me to reflect on whether this trend is spiritually healthy, given that it so thoroughly dominates the teaching that is out there. I’ve addressed the self-help phenomenon in previous posts, explaining why an over-emphasis on self-help can actually be spiritually detrimental–the solution is self-forgetfulness in God, not a greater focus on self–but what about beauty? For all the Scriptural interpretations that encourage women to embrace their God-given beauty, is it healthy to be SO focused on it?

To be fair, there is clearly an attack on women’s beauty in our culture. Even after writing a post about airbrushing last week, I still found myself standing in line at Barnes and Noble yesterday, staring at a girl on the cover of Shape Magazine thinking to myself, “She’s airbrushed, remember? She’s airbrushed, she’s airbrushed, she’s airbrushed!” because my body did NOT look like hers. It’s tough out there, and I sincerely believe Satan has a stronghold in this regard. God created women to uniquely reflect his divine beauty, and Satan’s had a field day attacking that attribute. There have been a lot of casualties.

Because of this spiritual war, women have sounded the battle cry. We’ve recognized the attacks, rallied the troops, and fought for our divine image. This advance is definitely a good thing. In a culture where women starve themselves, exercise themselves to death, and hook up with random guys all because they want to feel beautiful, we would be irresponsible not to address this issue. There is clearly a deep need within every woman to feel beautiful, and we ought to take that need seriously.

However, Satan is the great Deceiver. Even in our good intentions, he can creep in and pervert them. Knowing this, I have to ask if, in our desire to address the issue of beauty, Satan has blinded us to a bigger issue. When we focus largely on restoring women to a godly definition of beauty, are we feeding into a culture that ranks beauty, not godliness, as its most valuable currency? I hardly doubt that most of the books in Christian bookstores would argue that beauty is more important than godliness (they likely teach a definition of beauty that equates the two) but is it possible that we’ve allowed our culture to define the terms of the battle, instead of God? We are stopping up holes in a leaky dam, instead of building a dam that will never succumb to leaks in the first place.

Having said that, the real problem is not that “true beauty” is under attack. The problem is that we are not a generation of women who are immersed in God’s Word and captivated by His glory. As I mentioned above, the solution to low self-esteem is not self-help–it’s self forgetfulness in God. We must be so profoundly in love with God and His Son that our own need to be esteemed fades in comparison. My personal beauty only has significance inasmuch as I reflect the beauty of God.

Having said that, I don’t think we need to do away with books about beauty. It’s important to equip women with the tools and knowledge to fight the onslaught of Satan’s lies. However, our primary weapon is not books about beauty. Our primary weapon is God’s Word. We need to cloak ourselves in the truth of Scripture in such a way that makes up impervious to any lie that Satan hurls at us. They’ll bounce off our hearts like bullets hitting Superman’s chest–completely ineffective.

I should also add that I think women like Beth Moore and Kay Arthur strike this balance remarkably well. These two women certainly address beauty and healing, but the bulk of their work focuses on studying the Bible. These women know the Bible, and they’re equipping women to do the same. I applaud them in their Gospel-centered focus, and I pray it is a taste of what’s to come for Women’s Ministry. I hope that one day when I swing by the “Women’s Interest” section I won’t merely see books about overcoming marital problems and rediscovering one’s inner beauty. I hope to see shelves filled with the teachings of godly women about the powerful sword that is God’s mighty, indestructible Word. That is the answer to our beauty problem.

Over the years I’ve posted a number of blogs about body image and how tremendously the images of women in the media shape our understanding of beauty. And while most of us realize that these images represent a tiny percentile of the entire human race–and likely an unhealthy, semi-starved percentile at that–it turns out these women don’t even live up to the images themselves.

Just check out this video released by the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty:

As shocking as this video may be, it documents a practice that is actually quite commonplace today: Airbrushing. The term “airbrush” dates back nearly a hundred years ago when photographs were literally airbrushed with paint to minimize flaws or change details. Today, this term refers to any kind of digital alteration of a photo.

The extent to which airbrushing can alter a woman’s physique, face, or any “undesirable” feature is quite remarkable. Just check out these airbrushed women:

Kim Kardashian is known for her beautiful curves, but they are noticeably minimized here. Apparently she was too curvy.

While Kim Kardashian was too curvy, Keira Knightly wasn’t curvy enough, as this movie poster clearly conveys. Which one is it, people??

And now, the one that takes the cake…

Gisele  Bundchen, international super model, is pregnant in this picture. But you wouldn’t know it. Why? Because they airbrushed out her pregnant belly!

Now I’ll admit there was a part of me that breathed a huge sigh of relief when I realized how thoroughly these beautiful women had been altered before appearing on the front cover of magazines. (and News Flash ladies–those six-pack abs you see on women who’ve birthed 3 children are often airbrushed and touched up as well!) It’s as if we’ve finally admitted that the Emperor isn’t wearing any clothes. These women aren’t real–not on some ideological level in which we mean that real women don’t have time to look that way–but in a very literal sense. The images themselves aren’t real. Those women don’t actually look like that.

My relief, however, quickly morphed into something else entirely. I was deeply disturbed that our culture’s standard of beauty is literally unattainable. In what can only be considered reckless marketing, these magazines are selling an outright lie. We’re not just seeing the prettiest of the pretty–we’re seeing the touched up, doctored version of them. The Father of Lies has found his weapon, and we are the target.

How, then, are we to combat this onslaught? The Dove Campaign for Real Beauty created a second video that offers a really wonderful answer:

“Talk to your daughter before the beauty industry does.” But don’t stop there. Talk to your friends, your family, younger women at your church, and most importantly speak truth to yourself. Our best defense against the lies of Satan is the truth of Christ. And our fellow soldiers in this fight are our sisters. So help them fight, but not by affirming them in areas that the world values, thereby feeding back into this culture of distorted beauty. Instead affirm them in the unfading beauty of their gentle spirit and the adornment of their good deeds. Affirm them in their modesty, their purity, their passion for Christ, their servant heart, and their hospitable kindness. Affirm them in those things which God calls beautiful, not the world. It’s not wrong to affirm women in their outward beauty, but we need to check our priorities. A pretty face is nice and all, but a woman who fears the Lord is truly worthy to be praised.

Before I got married I literally lived off a diet of frozen dinners, cereal, and take out food…unless, of course, one of my roommates cooked real food and I mooched off her.

What’s weird is that ever since I got married 5 weeks ago I’ve been driven by this compulsion to cook actual meals for my husband each week. This has never happened to me before. It’s as if my inner home-maker has been lying dormant for the last 28 years of my life until now. My inner feminist is mortified.

But what’s even weirder is that in spite of the fact that I’ve attained a college degree, a Master of Divinity, traveled the world and accomplished a lot of things, my entire life’s purpose and value on this earth now hinges entirely on whether or not I can cook a spaghetti sauce that tastes as good as my husband’s mom’s. Don’t worry, he hasn’t told me this…I just feel it. Deep within my soul.

As a result of this need to be perfect in the kitchen, combined with a complete lack of preparation, there have been some pretty significant disappointments along the way. Such as the “garlic incident,” in which I thought “clove” referred to the whole head of garlic. No one ever explained to me what a “clove” is (MOM!) so we had some really garlic-y chili one night.

It’s as if my inner desire to cook magnificent meals is some sort of cruel joke by God. He has instilled me with a desire without granting me the ability to fulfill it.

Thankfully a number of my friends have told me similar stories, and they’ve all encouraged me with the advice that I will get better if I keep working at it. In the mean time, I’ve learned how important it is to stick to the recipe. For a novice like me, recipes are clutch because I’m basically like a baby learning to walk. I need someone holding my hand with every step until I learn how much oil is necessary and how much salt is too much. Once I learn these recipes in and out, and once I’ve acquired enough cooking knowledge to understand the lingo and to know what will work and what won’t, then I can start to experiment. Until then I’ve gotta go by the book.

Now the reason I’m sharing this tale of cooking perseverance is that it actually reminded me of some words from C.S. Lewis. In Mere Christianity he writes,

“Until you have given up your self to Him you will not have a real self… Christ will indeed give you a real personality.”

This idea has always been tough to wrap my mind around. The idea that God will give us our real personality, that the Christian life is the key to our true selves–what does that even mean?

Fortunately my little foray into the world of cooking has shed some new light on it for me. Clearly, I was not born a brilliant cook. If my husband sent me into the kitchen and asked me to whip up some pan seared chilean sea bass with a side of braised fennel and gruyere potato rosti, I would immediately crumple to the floor in a pile of sobbing. There’s no way I could begin to create that without a recipe…and several years of cooking experience. And a dictionary.

I need recipes to teach me the basics. I need directions to shape me and mold me into a chef. Recipes teach me the boundaries of cooking, the essentials and the non-essentials. Then, once I’m thoroughly versed in the recipes and rules of cooking, once I know them like the back of my hand, then I can begin to experiment. When I conform my skill set to the rules of cooking, I’m then free to cook recipes that reflect my particular tastes without destroying the food. I couldn’t experience that freedom without first learning the rules. In the world of cooking, rules are a form of freedom.

What does all of this have to do with C.S. Lewis? Well a human being is a lot like a recipe. In the same way that cake needs flour, sugar and eggs before it can even be a cake, human beings have some essential ingredients as well. God created us to be made of compassion, love, patience, and faith, among other things. Without these ingredients, we cannot be truly ourselves. Any attempt to forge an identity without these essential ingredients is like trying to make a cake using sausage and mayonnaise. It might be unique, but it’s not really a cake.

That said, we need to learn the ingredients to being truly human, and then pursue them. And this task is harder than it sounds. The world often teaches us behaviors that are sub-human–it teaches us selfishness, greed, anger, impatience, lust and pride. Because these behaviors are all sub-human, we become less ourselves when we mimic them.

With that in mind, we have to retrain ourselves to be human. This may sound silly, but given the degree to which we are taught otherwise by the world around us it’s an important discipline to undertake. We have to conform ourselves to those attributes which make us the image of God. And after we’ve thoroughly trained ourselves and molded ourselves according to that which makes us truly human, we will be disciplined in a way that sets us free. Our attempts at uniqueness will no longer be mere imitations of something we see around us, human-concocted ideas of being different, but will instead be a natural expression of who God created us to be, free of sub-human distortions.

I know that got kind of deep and theological all of a sudden, but I hope the analogy clarifies Lewis’ words. Right now I’m a terrible cook, so any attempt to make my spaghetti “special” will guarantee it a non-stop trip to the garbage disposal. I’ve gotta learn the essentials of cooking spaghetti before I’ll be free to experiment like that. And it’s the same with the Christian life. I need to learn love, mercy, grace, dedication to God and submission to His will before I can really know what it means to be myself. Only then in that context will my pursuit of uniqueness mirror my true self as God created me, rather than a carbon copy picture of the world.

When I was a college minister I had the following interaction with both male and female students on a very frequent basis:

Emily has been dating a guy for a number of years and they’re really serious. She thinks she’s going to marry him and they have their entire future planned out around one another. But one day Emily’s boyfriend breaks up with her. She is absolutely devastated, feels lonely all the time, and can’t stop thinking about him. It’s as if her entire life’s direction and purpose has suddenly deflated, and she can’t seem to pick herself back up.

When I sit down with Emily to discuss the situation, one of the things we talk about is how God might redeem the situation. Although it seems bleak and hopeless now, God can use her hardship to teach her, refine her, and grow her. That said, I encourage her to embrace her singleness. Don’t worry about jumping back into the dating pool just yet. Take some time to remember who you are in Christ alone. After you’ve had a healthy amount of time to do that, pray about when to consider dating again.

Emily whole-heartedly agrees. “Yeah, I definitely need to be single right now!” she proclaims. “I’m really looking forward to having this time to grow in my faith. Just me and Jesus!”

One month later, Emily is dating Caleb, a guy she met shortly after our conversation. Eventually I grab a chance to talk to her: “I thought you were going to be single for awhile?” And she innocently responds, “Yeah, I was.”

It then dawns on me that my idea of being “single for a while” (ie. 6 months to a year–depending on how serious the previous relationship) was completely different from hers. For someone who has been in a long-term relationship–or has been in lots of consecutive short-term relationships–a month or two can feel like an eternity of singleness. Though she’d only been single for a few weeks, she she felt like she’d been single forever.

The reason I open with this story is that it will help me explain the post’s title. While singleness doesn’t sound like a hard to define category (Some of you are probably thinking, “Geez, I know I’m single! You don’t have to rub it in!) stories like Emily’s lead me to believe that there isn’t a widely held agreement on what it really means to be single. While many people admit that God “is leading them through a season of singleness right now” or that God hasn’t revealed their future to them spouse yet, their lifestyles are sometimes inconsistent with this supposed phase of life. I’m not trying to be sadistic here and tell people who are already struggling with being single that you’re not “single enough,” but there’s a degree to which we need to be honest about whether we are honoring God in the seasons He has called us to. Some people do this well–they are single and they use their time excellently. But others (and I did this myself at times) may be single in name but have multiple emotional attachments that prevent them from ever learning or growing from this time in their lives.

God calls everyone to be single at some time in their life, but a lot of people find ways of almost getting around it. Rather than learning what they’re supposed to from it, namely founding their identity on Christ instead of another person, a lot of people are only quasi-single. They’re single in the most minimal way. And this toe-in-the-water singleness all comes about as a result of 2 main factors:

1. The Way We Define Singleness–For most of us, when we look back over our lives thus far and tally up the number of years spent in relationships, we only count the years in which we had an officially labeled “boyfriend” or “girlfriend.” However, that number of “official relationships” can be deceiving. For many of us, we don’t count the number of people who filled a “boyfriend placeholder” position in our lives, or guys with whom there was a physical relationship but no commitment, or guys that we just flirted with incessantly. Many women have a significant list of men with whom there was never a relationship title, but they either felt like they were in a relationship, or acted like it.

That is not being single. With or without a label, if you are emotionally involved with someone in a way that consumes your time and thought life, or if you’re giving away your heart or your body to another person in an intimate way, then you aren’t really single. What’s more, you’re not being single in the way Scripture envisions this time of your life, a time that allows you to “concern yourself with the Lord’s affairs and how you can please him.” (1 Cor. 7:32) Instead of using your singleness to the Lord, you’re actually finding short-cut ways to avoid it.

2. The Length of Your Singleness–As I described in the opening story, it can be hard to stay single after a break-up. For a lot of women at least, we can lose our identities in the man we are with. It’s like we lose our center of gravity, so we start searching for another guy to take that place. But if you’re single long enough, you will begin to remember what your identity is like apart from a guy. You remember who you were created to be and how God alone really is enough to fulfill you and give you joy. This process usually took me, personally, about a year to work through. It wasn’t until a year after a break up that I fully recovered and remembered who I was again in Christ. That said, when we jump right into another relationship, we make it more difficult to engage this process because we haven’t given ourselves the time we need. It’s not impossible, but it’s very hard.

That said, if you’re the kind of person who bounces from relationship to relationship, or if you’ve never been truly single (no hooking up, no pseudo-boyfriends, no excessive and long-term flirting with that guy you like) for 6 months to a year since you were in 8th grade, then you really haven’t been single very long. You haven’t given yourself the time to heal on the Lord’s strength or build your identity on the Lord alone, without the crutch of a relationship. And the way you measure this amount of time is not how long its been since your last boyfriend, but how long its been since your last emotional or physical relationship with someone of the opposite sex.

So while I’m not going to make a bunch of rules about how long you should be single after a relationship or how long people should experience singleness in general–every person is different and every situation is different–I offer these 2 angles on singleness so that we aren’t deceiving ourselves in a way that undermines this God-ordained seasons of our lives. Again, I don’t want to belittle how tough it can be to be single, and some of you are an example to us all about how to embrace your circumstances to the glory of God! But I fear others of you are short-changing yourselves. Singleness is hard, but it’s also a gift that should not be wasted.

Singleness is a really important phase of every person’s life. For me, it was my chance to learn who I was in Christ apart from any other person so that when I finally got married I wasn’t depending on my husband to fill a role that only God could. So while no one knows when they’ll meet the person they are meant to marry, and no one knows how long their season of singleness will last, I encourage you to live out your singleness with honesty before God. If you’re single right now, don’t hook up with a bunch of random dudes. Don’t hook up with your best guy friend either. Don’t flirt with all the cute guys at church to make yourself feel better, and don’t keep that guy hanging around you who likes you, just so that you don’t feel lonely. If you’re going to be single, do singleness well. Do it in a way that is obedient to God in the season He’s called you to.

Yes, I know it’s not always that simple. You don’t know if that guy or girl you like is “the one.” All I’m asking is that you don’t be sketchy about it, and that you be honest with yourself and with God. Is your dating life motivated by fear, or by a security in the God who has great plans for you? Your answer to this question is likely revealed by your lifestyle–are you doing singleness well, enjoying it and using it to honor God, or are you attempting to minimize the “pain” of it as much as possible?

Last Spring Andy Stanley, Pastor of North Point Church in Atlanta, preached a sermon that altogether encompassed an idea I’ve been trying and failing to articulate over the last several months. He called it the Path Principle, and the idea is simple:

Direction determines destination.

He began by explaining that if you were to get on I-95 and head North, you won’t get to Florida. No matter what your intentions may be, no matter how fast or diligently you drive, you are headed away from Florida, not towards it. With that in mind, destination is not about intentions. You can make a decision with all the good intentions in the world, but if it’s headed in the wrong direction, it won’t take you where you want to go.

Stanley based his sermon off of Proverbs 7, in which Solomon watches a young man as he foolishly steps into the house of an adulteress. In the young man’s mind, however, he thinks this is a fabulous idea! Her husband is away, she has just returned from presenting her sin offering (that is, she paid God off or “got right with God” so that she could go sin without consequences), and she had an intoxicating night of love planned just for him.

And like the “throng” of men who had gone before him, he went inside thinking how lucky he was, that he could somehow pull this off without facing any consequences. He was the “exception” to the rule, he thought.

But Solomon notes that this man is not the exception; he is the rule. And this path that he is on, it’s a highway. Countless men have gone before him thinking the exact same thing. And just like those other men, he walked into his fate as a “an ox goes to the slaughter, or as a stag is caught fast till an arrow pierces its liver; as a bird rushes into a snare; he does not know that it will cost him his life.” (7:22-23)

This young man thought he was making a one-time decision. He thought there wouldn’t be consequences. But this wasn’t just a decision, it was a path, and it placed him in a direction that led toward his personal destruction.

This story, and Stanley’s application of it, have captivated me. The more I read Proverbs the more I see the analogy re-affirmed. All over the place there is language of taking the “path” or “way” of righteousness or death. It places our daily actions within a more holistic framework, giving them the appropriate weight they are due, rather than brushing them off as “not that big of a deal” or “God can use it somehow.”

As a minister to women of all ages, I can’t think of a better strategy for making life decisions. It’s applications are so incredibly far-reaching! When talking to young women about dating or sex, the conversation shouldn’t merely be about what rules they’re breaking, what they can or can’t get away with. It’s instead about the path they are taking. If you date a non-Christian, you’re walking on a path of destruction. If you’re having sex with your boyfriend, then you’re on a path of destruction. If you’re flirting with physical boundaries, or maybe you’re flirting with the attractive married man in your office–these are not isolated actions. Each one of those choices is a path in a particular direction. It doesn’t matter how noble or innocent your intentions, because intentions are irrelevant. And you are not the exception, you are the rule.

Other areas of application…

Parenting–If your destination is to raise godly children, then get off the path of over-scheduling them with so many activities that church is no longer the top priority.

Money–If your destination is to be a good steward of your money, then get off the path of living beyond your means

Healthy Body Image–If your destination is to have a healthy respect for the beauty of your body as God created it, then get off the path of constantly consuming lies about true beauty by reading the magazines and watching the t.v. shows that project them (Side Note: I’m going to write a blog about this whole air-brushing scandal very soon!)

Intimacy with God–If your destination is having a living, growing relationship with God, then get off the path of church shopping, consuming your church instead of serving it, and refusing to make a daily devotion a priority in your schedule.

And the list goes on and on. But all of that to say, examine the decisions you are making right now about your life, and do the math. What path are you on, and where is it going to take you? Not where do you hope it will take you, but where does Scripture say it will take you? That’s your answer.

As a blogger, I sometimes fear that after enough time has passed I will eventually run out of things to say. Thankfully, Oprah has assembled a team of “expert” psychologists who will prevent that from ever happening.

Recently Oprah aired a show covering the topic of how to approach sexually educating your kids. For the first half of this discussion I was totally tracking with her. With the help of sex therapist Dr. Laura Berman, the show revealed how few parents are having this important discussion with their kids, nor are they having it at an earlier enough age. Studies show that 90 percent of O Magazine’s readers (mothers) thought they had had the sex talk with their kids, but when their daughters were asked about this supposed conversation, a large percentage of the girls felt that the conversation had not, in fact, taken place. Another statistic showed that 78% of women think their daughters feel comfortable talking to them about sex, but in reality only 39% of daughters actually do.

The study also revealed that girls aren’t just interested in the dynamics of sex–they want to know about the emotional side of it as well. They want to understand why they are feeling so strongly towards a boy, and why it affects their bodies the way that it does. It is for this and many other reasons that Dr. Berman encourages parents to “arm [their kids] with knowledge that will guide them well into adulthood.”

Up to that point I was TOTALLY with Dr. Berman. She also offered helpful advice about not freaking out over the conversation, not veiling the topic in such intense secrecy that it develops an unhealthy stigma, and other practical tips. I found myself actually appreciating Oprah and the good she was doing for parents and families. Yay Oprah!

Then the show took an unexpected turn..

Dr. Berman explained that only 35% of mothers talk to their daughters about one of the most important aspects of sex–pleasure. She explained, “We need to teach them about pregnancy prevention and STD prevention, but we also have to teach them about the gift that sexuality is.” (Still tracking with her, still on the same page, yes, yes…) So she concludes, “This is why…it’s important to have a big talk with your child when she hits high school about masturbation and orgasms. This is something that’s normal and natural, and if you’re talking to a girl from a young age about this, it’s a natural thing.” (Wait, WHAT?!?)

She later concludes that it’s a good idea to even buy your daughter a vibrator. (Though she qualifies this advice, saying you should only get one that stimulates the outside, not the inside. At this point, I’m not sure why that really matters…??)

So why does Dr. Berman feel that this is an important step for your child? Because “Teaching your daughters to take control of their own pleasure can help them avoid unhealthy sexual experiences. You’re teaching them about their own body and pleasuring themselves and taking the reins of their own sexuality so that they don’t ever have to depend on any other teenage boy to do it for them.”

Now let me back up and say that I agree with Dr. Berman to an extent. Not only should parents do a better job of talking to their kids about sex, but discussing the pleasure aspect is certainly important too. If we talk about sex as if it’s a dark and horrible thing to be avoided at all costs, and then they hear their friends talk about how great it is, who are they going to believe? We risk our credibility when we make sex out to be something that it’s not. It’s enticing for a reason–it feels good, and can be very wonderful. It was, after all, given to us by God.

But vibrators? That’s another matter. The other day I was talking to my pastor’s wife about when she should start having the sex talk with her daughters, and I somehow doubt this is what she had in mind. Now I have heard an argument made for women to explore their bodies (not in a sexual way but in an education way) prior to marriage so that they’re not completely blind-sided on the wedding night, and that makes some sense to me. I can even understand walking your daughter through the parts of her own body so that she knows exactly what’s down there. But teaching her to orgasm so that she isn’t dependent on a man for that pleasure? This is a case of feminism gone completely awry!

It is indeed important for mothers to talk with their daughters–in stages, over time–about their bodies, where babies come from, and the feelings that can arise from sex. It’s also important to explain that that “pleasure” is from God but is designed to occur within the boundaries of marriage. It is then crucial to explain that the reason behind God’s design for sex within marriage is that the “pleasure” of sex can result in emotional attachments that are devastating when they are broken. God wants to save women that heart-brokenness, which is why He wants us to only have sex in marriage.

It is with this God-ordained narrative in mind that Dr. Berman’s advice is clearly destructive. She is trying to help women short-circuit the emotional damage of failed relationships, not by teaching them abstinence or waiting for a guy who respects you, but by avoiding the attachment altogether. If I can get that kind of pleasure on my own, I don’t need a man to fulfill it. This has frightening implications for the future marriages of our country.

Which is why I should also point out that while Dr. Berman’s ideas might work in theory, she speaks as a mother of two very young sons, and not as someone who has seen the consequences of this teaching play out over a 20 year period. It is when these young women reach adulthood, get married, and start families of their own that this counsel will truly be tested. Until then, I would be wary of speaking so authoritatively on an idea that has not stood the test of time. While her intentions are good, and there IS something that mothers can learn from her–namely, that moms need to talk with their daughters EARLY and instill them with a healthy understanding of sex and their bodies–I’m afraid her advice could have devastating long-term effects for the marriages and families of our country.

There is more to abstinence than avoiding pregnancy, STD’s, or merely “staying pure.” In teaching abstinence we instill our children with the principles of faithfulness, perseverance, self-control and self-giving love, principles that enable marriages and families to last. With Dr. Berman’s advice, I fear we will miss the forest for the trees…or in this case, a vibrator.

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