Another one of the most popular blogs I’ve posted was called “Sleeping Over: The Latest Trend in Christian Sketchiness.” This particular post has garnered a lot of attention because it addresses a widespread practice that is rarely discussed by Christian teachers. While some people have disagreed with my stance, I have to say that my experience in the last six months of marriage has affirmed my pre-marriage position (I initially wrote this long before I was married). This is a really important topic that I hope single Christians will carefully consider!

I think most Christians would agree that having sex before marriage is wrong. After all, Scripture is pretty clear on the topic over and over again. What is a little less clear is the lines we cross leading up to sex. I can’t count the number of dating talks I’ve attended in which some ambiguously intentioned young person asked, “How far is too far?” For many of us, we feel like we’re doing pretty well as long as we’re not going “all the way,” so prior to that boundary almost anything goes.

Because of this mentality, a new trend in Christian dating has developed: sleeping together but not having sex. Countless Christian couples will share a bed for the night without doing the actual deed, and I’ve done it myself. And on some level, it would seem pretty innocent–all you’re doing is sleeping together. That’s not so bad, right?

Well as a person who has herself engaged in this behavior, let me be the first to say that it’s wrong. And if you’re doing it with your significant other, then you need to stop. I know this is a pretty hard line stance, but here’s my thought process…

First, when you share a bed with someone you are tempting yourself unnecessarily. My pastor always says that if your boyfriend can lie down next to you without getting aroused, then he either doesn’t like you very much, or he’s probably gay. While he is overstating his point in jest, I think there is something to that statement. When you are lying under the covers in a dark room next to a person that you’re attracted to, then it will be extremely difficult to set appropriate boundaries. Your judgment will be compromised be your desires, and speaking from my own experience, my desires win every time.

Even if you don’t start out having sex, it won’t be long until you reach that point. You’ll find yourself needing to go further and further to get the same degree of pleasure, and eventually you will find yourself facing the final frontier. For that reason, don’t put yourself in that position. Even if you’re not spending the entire night together, being in bed is a tremendous temptation, so it should be avoided no matter the circumstances.

The second reason Christians should avoid sleeping over is that it compromises your witness. If your roommates aren’t Christians and they see your boyfriend sleeping over, they will likely assume you are having sex. When this happens, we fail to distinguish Christian relationships from worldly relationships in any substantive way.

But even if your roommates are Christian, you can still pull them down with your example. If, for instance, they are wondering about boundaries in their own relationships, and they look to you for direction, then you will be leading them right into temptation. Even if they know you’re not having sex, they may still come to think that sleeping in the same bed is okay, so don’t set them up for such a fall.

Now if you don’t have a roommate and none of the above applies to you, you can still compromise your witness. If, for example, your neighbors see your boyfriend leave early in the morning, the same perception may be achieved, so it is best to be above reproach in this area.

The final reason that spending the night should be avoided is that it is actually very intimate, and in a way that is not appropriate outside the bonds of marriage. You know, we don’t really talk about sleeping in the same bed as being an intimate act, but whenever I woke up the next morning I always felt like I had crossed a major line of intimacy that I hadn’t intended to transgress.

I think this intimacy stems from a lot of things–One, you are imitating the intimacy between married people. Across time and culture, marriages have been consummated when the husband and wife came together in one marital bed. Conversely, a husband might be kicked out of that bed and exiled to the couch if the couple is fighting. That said, sleeping together in one bed can sympolize the union between a husband and wife. The sharing of a bed represents the sharing of a life.

Two, when we share a bed with another person, we are in close proximity for an extended period of time. This, in my mind, is what separates sharing a bed with a friend of the same sex, from sharing a bed with someone you’re attracted to. When I share a bed with a girl friend, we might as well be sleeping in separate beds. I don’t want her all up in my space, and neither does she. In fact, I had to share a bed with an old friend last week, and I woke up in the middle of the night when I felt her nudge my foot back onto my side of the bed.:)

But when you sleep with your boyfriend, it’s a very different story. He lies close to you with his arms around you, and he can feel your entire body against his. Because of this closeness, sleeping together is very intimate for dating couples in a way that is distinct from same-gender friends who share a bed.

And finally, sleeping together is intimate because we are most vulnerable when we are asleep. In a sense, sleeping with someone in such close proximity is an act of trust and commitment. We can let down our guard and be ourselves, trusting that the person will still be there in the morning. Again, this is a kind of commitment that is appropriate in marriage, but should be avoided prior to that time. In a sense, spending the night with someone can be a kind of commitment in which we feel safe and protected by the person who is next to us (especially for us ladies), so for the sake of guarding your heart and not jumping the gun emotionally, you really shouldn’t do it.

So if you are dating someone with whom you find yourself spending the night a lot, talk to them about it. Make a commitment to one another to stop this behavior for the sake of the relationship. After all, this is not about rules and regulations–this is about honoring God and honoring your significant other. When the physical relationship gets out of hand, then it corrodes your relationship with God and your boyfriend, so we should all abstain from such spiritual poison. And if your roommates are doing this, talk to them about it and figure out how to hold them accountable in a way that is encouraging, rather than judgmental.

And finally, enjoy having an entire bed to yourself while you can! Some people hate going to bed alone, but I say relish in it, because the poor guy I marry is gonna be fighting me for bed space.

As I continue my “Best of She Worships” week I thought I’d include a blog that is in the top 5 for one reason alone: It’s one of the most frequently googled questions that brings people to my blog. This is a big issue for single women who are wrestling with their futures, so I hope it can speak truth and encouragement into your heart if that’s where you find yourself now. And if you’re not one of those women, I urge you to be compassionate. Singleness can be a gift, but it can also be a challenge.

As a single woman, I remember going to Christian concerts or conferences or seminars in which I would watch a young, good looking guy on stage who seemed so in love with the Lord, and so passionate and articulate about his faith, that it made my heart flutter. THAT was the guy for me!

I just knew we were supposed to get married, and I day-dreamed about the way that we would meet–maybe he would see me across the lobby later on that night, be captivated by my beauty and just HAVE to talk to me. Or, he would see me in the audience, and I would look so worshipful and in love with God that he would know we were meant to be together. He’d never seen anyone look so beautiful as she worshiped God!

And we’d get married and travel the world together telling people about Jesus–maybe he would lead worship, and then I would be the main speaker at arena events. Kind of a Chris Tomlin-Beth Moore combo.That is how I knew my life would play out. That is, until I made the horrible discovery. I looked down at his hand, and there it was–a wedding ring.

My entire life plans were crushed in an instant.

As a result of experiences such as these, I frequently found myself asking, “Why are all the godly men already married?” I figured that there must have been some sort of fire sale while I was in college, and if you didn’t snatch up your husband then, the supply ran out. All that was left were the guys that nobody else wanted.

As a single woman, it’s very easy to feel this way, and to such an extent that it feels VERY real. In my more sane moments I knew that there were, in fact, plenty of solid, single Christian guys around, but it was on the lonely days that I genuinely feared there weren’t any left.

So in the face of this fear, on those days when it seems as though all the godly men have gone off and gotten married, leaving an over-abundance of single gals behind, how are women to respond?The first is to open your eyes and look around you. Maybe you don’t know any Chris Tomlin types, and maybe all the pastors at your church are married, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t any godly, single men left. Being godly does not equal being on stage.

I have single guy friends who serve in the youth ministry, the college ministry, the children’s ministry, the new members ministry, organizing mission trips, and teaching Sunday school classes. Their jobs may be less visible, but their commitment to serve, even when it’s not glamorous, says a great deal about their character.

So on behalf of all my single guy friends who are totally on fire for the Lord, I’ve gotta give a shout out to them. Ladies, they are definitely out there, and they are DEFINITELY worth waiting for.

But the second thing you need to consider in the face of this fear is its root. Where is the fear coming from? To become so afraid of something that you begin to think irrationally is a clear indicator of a spiritual issue. Even if you are not controlled by this fear, even if you have only had this thought in passing, you need to take a good, hard look at it.What does this fear say about your belief that God is in control? Are you afraid that God wanted to provide you with a husband, but accidentally ran out of men? Does God only reward those women who go out and hunt for a husband early on? Or another thought I had as a young woman–was I not pretty enough to get married straight out of college?

All of these questions, and there are many more, are rooted in lies and misconceptions about God, and ourselves. We are not trusting that God will provide, and we are wondering if there is something inherently wrong with us. The fear that “all the godly men are married” is just a symptom of this spiritual confusion.

So if you find yourself asking this question, stop yourself and instead reflect upon why you are asking it. No, all the godly men are not married, and even if you don’t know a single Christian man in your entire city, if God wants you to get married then He is certainly capable of making that happen. After all, He pulled a rib out of Adam’s side to give him a mate, so I think God can handle your love life.

So the main question is whether you are being fulfilled in Christ NOW. As long as you allow that void in your heart to dwell, then those fears will continue to creep in on you. But if you fill that void with Christ, then those fears will have no foothold. You will simply have nothing to fear.

*And for further reading on this topic, check out Exodus, and the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000. Both are stories of scarcity, and God’s over-abundant provision in response. It is a good reminder about the character of the God who created you.

In my last post I explained that I’ll be out of the country for the week, so in honor of my new blog design I’m doing a week of Best of She Worships posts. Coming in at #5 is “Everybody’s Poop Looks the Same.”

Right now I am in the throes of a massive head cold, so I’ve decided to depart from my usual quasi-intellectualism and write about something that’s a little bit more at my current functioning capacity. Bear with me.

(And my apologies to those of you who are offended at the use of the word “poop,” or if you’re like my friend Joe, who is utterly disgusted by girls who make any kind of reference to this bodily function.)

As we all know, most dating relationships go through a series of stages of comfortability. There’s the stage in which you will let your boyfriend see you wearing sweats, when you let him see you without make-up, when you let him kiss you before you’ve brushed your teeth, etc.

But perhaps one of the ultimate relationship benchmarks is the Smelly Bathroom stage. Prior to this stage, you will do whatever it takes to fool your significant other into thinking that you simply do not produce the Big Number 2. You will go across the street, find a bathroom in another part of the building, house, or apartment, or if you don’t have that option, you’ll turn on the bathroom fan and run some water. Or for those of us who are really ashamed, we’ll hold it…much to the dismay of our intestinal tract.

But eventually there comes a point at which you quit putting on the charade, and you just go for it. Sometimes this happens with your foreknowledge, other times you are so desperate that you have no choice and mother nature forces you.

But whatever the circumstances, you reach a point at which you are no longer ashamed in the way you used to be. You have now owned up to the reality that you do in fact poop, and amazingly your boyfriend is still attracted to you, so you have a new level of connectedness and acceptance that you didn’t have before.

What is truly ironic about this whole process is the shame and embarrassment that we associate with this bodily function, even though EVERYBODY does it. Why is it that we feel the need to pretend that we are the only human being in the history of time that doesn’t have to do this? Why aren’t we comfortable with the reality that it’s a normal part of life?

When you get right down to it, everyone poops. And not only that, but everyone’s poop pretty much looks exactly the same (unless you’ve had one of those cheesy burritos from Taco Bell…but let’s not make rules based upon exceptions). We all do it, so what’s the big deal?

Well I got to thinking about this, and I had a striking realization–we engage in the same game of pretend when it comes to sin. Just like the inevitability of an occasional poop, everybody sins. With the exception of Christ, there has never been a single person on earth who has lived a sinless life. Yet we carry on these charades, acting as if we don’t sin, and being ashamed and embarrassed that someone might find us out. In the same way that we’ll run across the street just to find a toilet, we’ll go to extreme measures to hide the sin in our lives, even from the people with whom we are closest.

And this secrecy keeps us in bondage. We are constantly trying to position our lives in such a way that will hide the unattractive parts. But that is no way to live, and it only contributes to a much larger trend in which ALL people think they’re the only ones.

So we need to start being honest about the fact that everyone sins. And just like poop, our sin pretty much looks the same. Scripture tells us that we have not endured any temptation that is uncommon to man (1 Cor. 10:13), so while you may secretly believe that you’re a particularly bad person, God would have to disagree. We are all equally fallen, and all in need of grace, so let’s start talking about it.

Once we create a community in which we can be open about our sin, we might just experience an effect that is similar to the “smelly bathroom” stage of a dating relationship–yes it’s gross, but you are still loved and accepted anyway. That’s a good place to be.

Welcome to the new and improved face of She Worships! As my little online ministry has grown I’ve had a number of friends who believe in my writing and offered to help me take my blog to the next level. I’m pretty excited about what they came up with! In particular, I hope you’ll find that this new blog look reflects the voice of my writing, as well as my personality: intellectual and reflective, but also quirky and fun.

This blog is really about my on-going journey as a follower of Jesus. Sometimes it’s contemplative, and sometimes I’m looking for people who can laugh with me at myself. And as the title implies, this blog is also for women, which is why I decided to ditch the gothic black and go for something a little more colorful!

The other day I read a great quote by Elisabeth Elliot in which she said, “The fact that I am a woman does not make me a different kind of Christian, but the fact that I am a Christian does make me a different kind of woman.” In a lot of ways her words incapsulate what this blog is about. It’s not just about being a woman, but about being a different kind of woman. A woman who follows Christ. I hope you will join me as I continue to learn just what in the world that looks like!

Special thanks to Joe Jones and his team at Epic Leadership. They did a really great job honing in on the voice of my blog and designing a look that reflects it. You can visit Joe’s blog at iagreewithjoe.com or you can contact Epic LEadership through their website.

I’ll be out of the country for the next week so in honor of my new blog launch I’ve decided to do a week of “Best of She Worships” posts. These are the posts that I just keep hearing about over and over again, so I hope you enjoy them! Also, this semester I will be teaching my church’s large women’s Bible study on Philippians so I will hopefully be posting lots of audio on my blog in the near future.

Thanks to all of you who have been faithful readers over the past few years years (both my male AND female readers)! I think about you all every day and have been blessed to be a part of your lives. I am so grateful that God has allowed me to have this ministry and I pray He will continue to provide me with the wisdom and the right words to carry it on.

p.s. Because this blog design is new, it will be a work in progress over the next week or two as we iron out the details!

The last couple of weeks I’ve been reflecting a lot on Proverbs 19:13 which says, “A quarrelsome wife is like a constant dripping.” Before getting married my husband and I used to joke about these “bad wife” proverbs and how I hoped to avoid becoming a “constant dripping.” (I also hope I never make him want to “hide in the corner of the attic,” Prov. 21:9)

Well now that I’m married, I’m not really laughing anymore. I think I may have become one.

No woman ever gets married with the intention of becoming a nag. In fact that’s really the last thing a woman wants to be. But it somehow manages to creep in ever so subtly! Like a slowly dripping faucet, you don’t even notice it at first. That is, until you get your water bill. That’s when you realize that that tiny little drip that didn’t seem like much has actually cost you quite a bit. And while a constant dripping costs you money, constant nagging can cost you a healthy marriage.

In just 5 and a half short months of marriage I’ve seen this happen to us. What began as the occasional “question of concern” gradually morphed into full blown nagging. And I didn’t realize it until one day when I noticed the look on my husband’s face. I’d ask him an “innocent” question about why he chose to drive a certain route or why he left a light on in the apartment, and he’d get this prisoner of war look on his face, like a hostage in an unfriendly territory from which he can’t escape. That’s when I knew.

But how did I get to this point? How did I turn into a nag?

Well in order to answer this question I decided to do a little bit of research into Proverbs 19:13. More specifically, I wanted to find out what causes a faucet to drip. Some of you handier people out there probably know the answer to that question but I had no idea. It made no sense to me why a perfectly good faucet would suddenly begin to drip.

So if you’re like me and you don’t know anything about the principles of faucets, let me fill you in. Consider this “Leaky Faucets for Dummies.”

To begin, faucets are built upon the physics of water pressure. Water pressure is what causes the water to flow through your pipes and out of your faucet. That said, when you turn your faucet off, you aren’t turning off the water pressure but simply blocking it. By moving the faucet into the off position, you seal off the water flow with a washer.

Now the reason that faucets sometimes drip is that the washer can get damaged or worn down by all the pressure of the water flowing past it. If the washer sustains some wear and tear, it can’t make a perfect seal. As a result, water is able to seep through, thereby causing a leaky faucet. The only way to fix it is to replace the washer with one that will properly seal the pipe.

So what does this have to do with nagging? Well as I reflected on my own life and my personal patterns of nagging, I noticed a common denominator–my time with the Lord. If I am slacking on my time with God, not making time for the Word or for prayer, not beginning each day centered on Him, that’s when the nagging flares up. There is a direct correlation between my spiritual health and the degree to which I am bugging my husband. Like the faucet washer that allows water to drip through when it gets worn down, I essentially do the same. If I’m not taking care of myself and I get worn down, then the nagging increases. Like a constant drip.

This is a perfect example of the reality that the way you treat your husband, and other people, is usually a reflection of your relationship with God. Those who rest in Him have no reason to nag or control others because God is their peace and He is in control. While a seemingly innocent question about why he’s wearing that outfit or why he left the toilet seat up might seem small at the time, the constant nagging can really add up to a difficult married life.

These last few days I have been heavy hearted as news of the devastation in Haiti continues to filter our way. What is perhaps most difficult to understand about a catastrophe like this is why them? As you probably know by now, Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and one of the poorest countries in the world. As horrible as the pictures on t.v. are right now, the country did not look a whole lot better before the earthquake. I had the privilege of traveling there five years ago and the poverty was mind-numbing. I’ve posted just a few of the pictures I took while there to give you a taste:

The first is a picture I took inside the capitol city of Port-au-Prince. The cinderblock structures you see in the background are people’s homes. The second is an orphanage in the remote city of Fondwa. It was a small, concrete building that sat on the side of a mountain and had been sub-divided into rooms to house a couple dozen children.

It is hard to understand how God could let such a disaster befall an already broken country like Haiti. It does not seem fair and I do not understand. One thing I do know, however, is this: Whenever a tragedy like this strikes a country, there are always some (who shall remain nameless) who are tempted to interpret it as punishment. This was not punishment. This was a sign of the hopelessly broken world in which we live, a world in which dictatorships cruelly oppress their people, in which young girls are sold into the sex trade by their own parents, and in which the earthquakes destroy the foundations of an entire country in a few moments. We live in a dark world.

Fortunately, I am also certain of something else as well. Our God is a redeemer. He cares about Haiti, and He can redeem this. For decades the country of Haiti has existed in abject poverty just a few hundred miles away from the Florida coast while our country has largely turned a blind eye. It is to our nation’s shame that it took an earthquake to wake us up to the needs of the people in Haiti. It is my hope and my prayer that this earthquake will mark a turning point in the nation’s history. Now that the world is paying attention, we will hopefully provide the help that Haiti has needed for decades. God cares about Haiti, and He can redeem this earthquake.

As you pray for Haiti, pray not only for the thousands of people who are injured, dying, hungry and thirsty, but pray for Haiti’s future and how we can be a part of God’s redemptive work there. In a country as dark as Haiti, we can truly shine like stars in the darkness.

I will close with some pictures of the children I met while there. The first three children lived in the orphanage and the last little boy attended a school in Port-au-Prince. I have no idea if any of the children are still alive, but pray for them.Also reflect on your role in God’s redemptive work. Is God calling you to give radically? Is he perhaps even calling you to consider adoption, given the orphan crisis the country is now facing? Ask God to use you as an extraordinary example of generosity and hope, in ways that you may have never dreamed or imagined. These are just 4 of the thousands of reasons why you should:

The tragedy in Haiti reminds us just how oppressive the darkness of this world can be, and how desperately people need hope. How will you give them hope?

Today I was talking to my mom about a tough situation she’s recently found herself in. For the past couple years she’s been helping out a friend financially whenever things got tight, but the situation has gradually started to change. What was once a charitable leg-up from time to time has now become frequent and awkward. Her friend now calls asking for large sums of money to fund dubious needs. And my mom is expected to foot the bill. Her friend needs it, my mom has it, so she assumes my mom will cover it.

I don’t know if you’ve ever been in a situation like that before, but there’s a funny line between charity and entitlement. Sometimes generosity is received as if it were somehow deserved, rather than a gift of grace. And when this happens, the sweetness of the giving is taken away. You feel unappreciated and taken advantage of. You also realize that you weren’t really helping them at all–except to help them form a bad habit.

I talked with my mom about this and the situation frustrated me. But I honestly can’t judge her friend–I do the same thing all the time. For instance, I totally do this to my husband. The guy seriously deserves an award–he does the dishes, cleans the bathroom, takes out the dog when it’s cold and dark and I don’t want to, and he cooks me an amazing pancake breakfast every Sunday morning. He is a wonderful husband! I couldn’t ask for more.

But I don’t focus on those things, do I! Instead, I focus on the fact that he always leaves the pantry light on with the doors wide open, instead of turning off the light and closing them. Or I focus on the fact that he continually forgets to close the shower curtain so that it can’t air out and dry. These are the things I focus on. Why can’t he just listen? Why can’t he do exactly what I want when I want it? Why isn’t he at my beckon call?

Clearly, I have become entitled. Rather than be grateful for my amazing husband’s acts of service and generosity, I am ungrateful that he doesn’t do more. It’s as if he signed on to be my personal slave. And as a result of my entitled attitude, I feel self-righteous and bitter when he does something wrong, rather than humbled and grateful for all the times he goes above and beyond.

Oh but it doesn’t stop there! You wanna know another place I’ve turned charity into entitlement? In my relationship with God. Jesus’ sacrifice was the greatest gift of undeserved grace the world has ever seen, yet I act as if it says more about my own goodness than the infinite grace of the Giver. So rather than take my sin seriously, I become entitled.

This attitude is what Dietrich Bonhoeffer refers to as “cheap grace.” In his book The Cost of Discipleship he describes cheap grace as “Grace without price; grace without cost! The essence of grace, we suppose, is that the account has been paid in advance; and, because it has been paid, everything can be had for nothing. Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession…. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.”

Entitlement results when we have cheapened grace. We bestow grace upon ourselves because we think we deserve it. Little repentance is necessary because there is nothing to repent of. “God’s gift of grace was a reflection of what I deserve, not His self-giving, sacrificial love,” I secretly think. Though I may not openly admit this mindset, my true feelings are betrayed when grace is withheld. I grow bitter because God hasn’t given me what I “rightly deserve.” I shake my fist at Him and angrily ask why, instead of reflecting on that from which I have been graciously spared.

The appropriate response to God’s charity is to acknowledge that His grace wasn’t cheap at all. It was, in fact, costly. The fitting response to such grace is humble, jubilant gratitude, not spoiled entitlement. And the same is true of my marriage. Not everyone has a husband as servant-hearted as mine, and there was nothing about pancake breakfasts in our vows. He gives to me out of the kindness of his heart, a habit that says volumes about him and very little about me. So it is with God.

The following is a post I wrote several weeks ago for another blog to which I contribute: Equip. It’s the blog for my church so be sure to check it out!

Several months ago my small group got so big that we had to make a decision: keep accepting new women, or cap it off? We’d been together for years and intimacy is a tough thing to build, so we went with the latter. Cap it.

Shortly thereafter we got an e-mail from one of the group members. She’d decided to break off from the group and start a new one. If we were turning women away, then clearly the church needed more small groups. That’s what she aimed to do.

I eventually had a chance to sit down with her and hear more about her thinking. I was pretty challenged by it. When she started a new group it almost immediately exploded. So much so that they spawned an additional two more groups in the following months. She explained this phenomenon as follows:

“The girls knew from the start that God might call some of them out of the group to start new ones. We were praying for that. But in the mean time we responded to our numbers by asking for a miracle of intimacy. Even though our group was big and no one knew each other, we asked God to provide.”

This idea of praying for a “miracle of intimacy” totally blew my categories. We think of miracles in terms of an inexplicable healing from cancer, or surviving a natural disaster, not small group relationships.

The conversation made me wonder if our pragmatism makes faith unnecessary. As long as we have a system, we don’t have to rely on God to provide. Or when we do seek Him, it’s more of a “Lord, please be present in this” approach. We may exercise faith by acknowledging the need for God’s presence, but are we making room for the miraculous? Are we allowing for God to move in ways that make our systems obsolete?

Planning and organization should not be under-rated. God calls us to be good stewards of what we have. But we go awry when our systems turn into limits on where and how God can move. God can provide a miracle of intimacy in small groups that are busting at the seams. He can multiply the proverbial loaves and fishes of whatever meager resources we have. So rather than work from a theology of scarcity or a ministry driven by pragmatism, we should work from a theology of abundance. We already have more than we will ever need.

For all you college students and recent grads out there, this post is especially for you…

Last night I had the privilege of catching up with some old college students from my days as a campus minister. These girls are on fire for the Lord and I sat with my jaw hanging open as they told me about a woman they’ve been reaching out to.

By God’s good timing, these students happened upon a woman who was in dire straights. She has two small children who were fathered by a boyfriend now in prison, and she recently suffered a stroke. As a result of the stroke, she has no use of one arm so she can’t hold down a job, let alone provide the care she wants her kids to have. She’s on disability, but the little amount of money she receives each month is hardly enough to live on.

Through a series of crazy circumstances, the students decided to “adopt” this woman and her kids. They babysit for her, clean her apartment, and they raised money to purchase clothes, diapers, a crib, and a mattress. Because she couldn’t afford diapers and barely has the dexterity to change one anyway, the apartment was filled with old soiled clothes. In response to this situation, the students gathered up all the dirty laundry, took it to a 24 hour laundry mat, and did 13 loads from 10pm until 5:30 in the morning.

All in all, the students have given sacrificially of both their money and their time.

As I listened to these two girls beam about the relationship they’ve forged with their newfound friend, I was first struck by their radical generosity. This truly is a picture of God’s design for the church! This is the kind of work we should be doing. The government can’t wash people’s clothes or provide little boys with a solid father figure, but the people of God sure can. These students are not only providing life-changing support, but they are shining like stars in the darkness. They are doing the work of Jesus.

But what also stood out to me about this story is that it was the kind of thing only college students or young singles could do. Adults who are married or have a family don’t have the same freedom to stay up from 10pm to 5:30am doing laundry. Parents can’t drop everything and go help out with a struggling mother’s kids. They just don’t have the same flexibility.

As one of the girls finished telling the story, she ended by saying, “I can’t wait to tell my kids this story!” What a shift in perspective! How many college students do crazy things and make amazing memories going on a spontaneous road trip, driving to Krispy Kreme in the middle of the night, or playing hide-and-go-seek in Walmart? Those are the kinds of hair-brained schemes that we can’t wait to tell our kids about. Those are the life experiences that define our college experience.

But what’s sad about these stories is that as funny and crazy as they are, they’re ultimately a waste of an incredible gift. College students have the most freedom they’ll have in their entire lives, and they use it to toilet paper the quad, put soap in the fountain, or put thousands of pink flamingos in the middle of the school? Yes, those are fun stories, but do you really want that to be your legacy? Is THAT what you want to define your Christian journey in college?

Listening to those two young women gave me a different vision of college insanity. What if college students used their unique freedom, flexible schedule and unbelievable energy to bless the world? Does your church benefit from the gifts that God has given you during this season of life? What about your community? While churches assume that college students can’t give much in the way of finances, they possess something equally valuable: time. So use it well and ask yourself, “What kind of stories will I be telling my kids?” Will you be telling them about the time you ate a live fish on a bet, or the time you pulled an all-nighter doing laundry for a family who needed the love of Christ?

One version makes for a good story, while the other could have ripple effects for generations to come.

For many women, the idea of trusting a man TOTALLY in marriage is a scary thing. It’s not that their husbands aren’t trustworthy or that they don’t trust their husbands in some things. But the idea of submitting when you think you’re in the right, or when something really life-changing is on the line? That can be hard.

And that’s why so many women find themselves wrestling with a tendency to take control. Stasi Eldredge describes this battle in her book, Captivating. She gets to the heart of this ever-raging struggle as she writes:

“Aren’t your deepest worries and heartaches relational–aren’t they connected to someone? Even when things are good, is your vast capacity for intimacy ever filled in a lasting way? There is an emptiness in us that we continually try to feed. And can’t you see how much you need to have things under control–whether it’s a project or a ministry or a marriage? Are you comfortable trusting your well-being to someone else? And haven’t you felt…your vulnerability as a woman to be a liability? Most women hate their vulnerability….Most of our energy is spent trying to hide our true selves, and control our worlds to have some sense of security.”

Control is a major issue that women struggle to surrender in marriage, but as Eldredge points out, this is not a problem that begins in marriage. It begins long before.

Submission is a discipline that you must work on cultivating now, as a single woman. Think about it this way…

It really is no wonder that the transition from the single life to married life can be so rocky–they generally encompass two completely different mindsets! As a single woman, you learn to be independent and look out for yourself. But then you get married and you’re supposed to let someone else take care of you.

You go from being independent to dependent. What was once a virtue becomes a vice. A practice that once guarded your lifestyle can now sabotage your lifestyle. What are we to make of this discrepancy?

The problem here is that the predominant mindset of single women today is in direct conflict with the Christian life. The idea that single women are somehow independent and must fend for themselves is a mindset that conflicts with the sovereignty of God. If we profess Christ, then there is no independent. There is no “fend for yourself.” And there is no “I am in control.”

On the contrary, it is God who is in control. God takes care of you. To be Christian is to be dependent on Him.

An unhealthy independence is easy to hide when you’re on your own, but it quickly becomes apparent when your life is intertwined with another. It is a mindset that short-circuits your ability to trust others because it is founded upon a trust in yourself alone. That said, if you have thoroughly ingrained in your heart and mind a spirit of independence, then you set yourself up for failure in all relationships, not the least of which is your relationship with God.

With all of this in mind, an inability to trust a husband in marriage is not necessarily a marital problem. It is a spiritual one. It comes from years and years of not trusting God to provide and take care of you. When you live in the knowledge that God is in control, it takes a lot of pressure off of trusting others. A trust in God makes all other forms of trust possible.

So if you are single now, begin the hard work of learning submission–submission to God. Regardless of whether or not you get married one day, this is a discipline that will factor into your job, your church, and your family relationships. It is the difference between relating to others in fear, or relating to others in freedom.

That is a struggle that every woman must face and fight, no matter her marital status.