No one ever talks openly and honestly about the physical
side of loneliness.
I used to think I was called to singleness because I didn’t
burn. I didn’t struggle much with self-control. I thought it was a sign. I
assumed God was calling me to a lifestyle of ministry where my singleness would
be a gift. I loved Paul’s passage in 1 Corinthians 7. But that was before my
walls of self-protection came down. That was before being engaged to Aaron.
Before kissing a man.
Then there is now: my hormones respond at the slightest
implication—reading a Christian blog about someone getting married, engagement
photos on Facebook, observing the affection of a husband towards his wife, the
tenderness of a kiss on the movie screen. Suddenly my body is warm and alive
and searching. My physical cells pull my thoughts and emotions into the vortex
until my loneliness is heightened and raging on all sides. I find myself
breathing deep, clamping my mind shut, waiting for the hormones to subside,
rehearsing the reasons why waiting is wise. And suddenly I begin to understand
the epidemic of teen pregnancies and pornography and affairs.
Before I thought—you
fools—don’t you see the brokenness this causes, the disease, the fractured homes and hearts, the fatherless family units, the financial hardship. The
fruit. It’s rotten to the core. And you bit into it? Idiocy.
Which is still true. But I hadn’t yet felt this wild,
awakened dragon inside of me. I hadn’t understood how hungry he could be. I
hadn’t tasted the tantalizing flavor along the perfect shiny skin of that
fruit. I hadn’t let Aaron hold me. Now I can empathize. And I live with
gratitude that the grace of God has been strong, is still strong. I came so close
to a disastrous marriage—and as deeply as this division has wounded my heart, I
can’t imagine the endless depth of it if there had been a sexual connection to
peel apart as well. The last thing I want to do is go to bed with the wrong
kind of man, or to do it outside the safety of a marriage where I am covered by
God and a man who will provide for me and not use me as a means to an end.
And yet, I do want to go to bed with that man. Now. When he
is not here. When I do not yet know his face, his name, or can even say with
confidence he for sure exists at all. And so my body burns, and I turn to the
Lord and say, what do I do?
Solomon, suddenly is yet wiser—I adjure O daughters of Jerusalem, by the gazelles or the does of the
fields, that you not stir up or awaken love until it pleases.
Hell yes. If only we could understand before we understand
and have to live with the aftereffects. It begs questions. Did the Lord use
this first relationship to ready me for my husband? Was this the
Lord saying wake up; it’s time.
That’s what I assumed was true when I was saying yes and letting a man put a
ring on my finger, when I gave him my first ever kiss. So is the right man
coming—soon? Or did I awaken love out of its time? Am I somehow at fault? Am I
reaping the consequences of my fallen nature? Or at least the fallen nature of a sinful world?
And I’m just a woman. From what I’ve gathered about being a
man, this struggle is magnified times infinity, always there, always pulsing
beneath the surface, whether married or not. So to all you men who have walked
this road with integrity for a long list of years—my deepest respect to you. Mistakes
and all. I’m sure in your head you think you’re not doing as well as it looks
on the outside, but I still say well done. And that I’m not doing as well in my
head as it looks on the outside either. Who would know this petite, virgin,
worship-leading, golden girl of a small town community who works in a church
office and has taught sexual purity retreats to young girls would secretly
really love to make out? And I’m not ashamed to want that, or to open a forum
to be honest about it. Walking in righteousness is pitched as such a straightforward,
pristine, beneficiary trek. But few warn us of the wrestling it takes to get
there, the muddied complicated questions you encounter along the way. Worth
it, yes. Straightforward, not so much. Easy--definitely not.
Frankly, it blistering burns.
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