A Woman After God’s Own Heart

We had another relationship night at the Brook. It was pretty much amazing. Four couples from the church talked to us about what qualities you should look for in a partner as well as how to be a Godly partner. It was really neat hearing everyone’s opinions on marriage, and I really learned a lot. Here are the couples so you have a better idea of where they’re all coming from (I included only their initials because I’m not sure if they would want such personal information floating around the internet):

R.V. & R.V: early-mid 20’s; married 3 years

D.M & A.M: mid-late 20’s; married 4 years

B.S & M.S: mid 30’s; married 16 years

J.W & R.W: early-mid 40’s; married 21 years

We split up into guys & girls, and the married women talked to the girls about what they looked for or what they love about their husbands (and the married men talked to the guys about the same thing). Then, we switched, and the married men talked to all the girls about what they love about their wife and, basically, how to be a Godly woman (and the married woman did the same with the guys). Here is what I took away from each person. The information may not seem very cohesive, but it’s good stuff 🙂

QUALITIES TO LOOK FOR IN A HUSBAND:

R.V: (1) Make a list of the qualities that you want in a husband. Then, flip the page over and make a list of the qualities of the woman that would go with that man. Then, work on becoming the woman that goes with that man. You need to become the person you should be in a marriage before you find your husband. (2) Find someone who is passionate about God and helping lost people and who you can share the gospel with. Unless you’re both working for God, it won’t be the marriage you want it to be; you’ll both be going in different directions, and it’ll be very hard for you as a Christian woman to submit to and follow a man who isn’t putting God first. (3) Find someone who has a genuine kindness about them and who has a serving spirit. How do they treat their mother? How do they treat their servers, cashiers, and other people who are helping them? These are all very big indicators of how you’ll be treated after the “honeymoon stage” is over.

A.M.: (1) Look for someone with integrity, who you can trust with big and small things. A man who is willing to lie or neglect to tell you about the small things won’t be easily trusted with the big things. (2) As a Christian, your relationship is something people are going to watch to see what you’re doing; be aware that you’re both very visible. For this reason, let your relationship be a good example for both Christians and non-Christians of what an appropriate dating relationship should be like (i.e., no sex, no sleeping over, etc.) (3) Find someone who cherishes you, loves you, and serves you no matter what. While A.M. was pregnant with their daughter, D.M. would make it a point to bring her flowers & tell her she looked beautiful just as he did before she was pregnant, especially when she was nearing the end of her pregnancy when most women feel far from beautiful.

M.S.: (1) Find someone who will be committed to you for the long haul. When B.S. realized their relationship was headed toward marriage, one of the first things he told her was that divorce was not an option and was never going to be an option regardless of what happened. He expected them both to be in it for life and to keep the promises they made to each other on their wedding day. (2) Find someone who has a desire to grow spiritually & continually improve their relationship with Christ. This does not mean they never have questions, doubts, or struggles. It does mean, however, that they will always fall back on their relationship with God and have an inner desire and drive to improve that relationship.

R.W.: (1) Find someone who will be a spiritual leader; your husband will either lead you toward God or away from God. (2) Find someone who is gracious. No one is perfect; everyone will mess up from time to time, and you need someone who will forgive you, who understands that they should give the grace that has been given to them by God, and who will let you be imperfect. (3) Find someone with an unwavering eye. As mentioned in my last post, a man’s standard of beauty should be his wife; he should only have eyes for you. (And yes, there are men like this out there. They may be few and far-between in some settings, but they are there.) (4) Find someone who will be a missionary to your family (if you don’t come from a Christian home).

HOW TO BE A GODLY WOMAN:

R.V.: (1) Shortly after becoming engaged, R.V.’s wife said to him, “You’re not my God. I don’t have an overwhelming need for you in my life. I’m never going to hold you at a standard you’ll never be able to meet. If you mess up, my world isn’t going to fall apart.” The point is that a guy isn’t the end-all, be-all to a girl; you are complete in Christ. No person will ever be able to fill the need you have for a relationship with God so you should never hold them to that standard. (2) As a woman, you need to be willing to stand up to your husband (respectfully) and be the voice of reason in your marriage. Most men, especially younger ones, have a tendency to let their imaginations run wild and come up with all kinds of ideas that may not be the most practical for real life. When this happens, don’t be a pushover; you should be able to go to your husband and bring him back down to Earth. (3) Make your marriage a ministry for others. This is somewhat related to what (the female) R.V. (:)) was talking about when she said to look for someone who is passionate about serving God and helping lost people. As a couple, you have 2 brains, 2 hearts, 4 hands, and 4 feet to serve. Use those to your advantage.

D.M.: (1) Make sure you are intentional about not manipulating your husband; this means no games, no eye-rolling, no silent treatments, and no working for yourself in the marriage. Women are very good at manipulating men, especially when men are emotionally involved. (2) Don’t be materialistic. D.M. said one of his favorite things about A.M. is that she doesn’t like “stuff.” She doesn’t place too much value in possessions or spending money when she doesn’t need to. She would rather use that money to serve and help further God’s kingdom.

B.S.: (1) Just as M.S. said, be committed to your marriage & raising a Godly family. (2) Try your best to continually improve your relationship with God and to honor God in everything you do; as you work to honor God more, your marriage relationship will automatically improve.

J.W.: (1) Give grace freely, even when your husband doesn’t deserve it; understand that he is only human and will mess up just as you will. It’s inevitable. (2) Fear the Lord. (This does not mean to literally be scared of God. Although His wrath is part of Him, His love far outweighs it.) This is what J.W.’s favorite thing about his wife is. R.W. is constantly pursuing God and showing her respect and reverence for Him by reading her Bible, praying for people, helping with church functions, mentoring young women, and spreading the Word whenever she can.

Proverbs 31:30

Last night at the Brook, we started a series on relationships, dating, marriage, sex, etc. This is probably one of my favorite topics to study in the context of Christianity, most likely because I’ve had so many issues with dating in the past, and dating God’s way is so different from typical dating. In order to get a better idea of how God views dating and relationships, we looked at Song of Solomon 1:1-11. Here is the passage and the notes that I took: Song of Songs

Here are some of the main points of the sermon:

– Women, your heart is more valuable to a godly man than anything else.

– Men, your character is more valuable to a godly woman than anything else.

– There is nothing wrong with wanting to get married, with wanting to have a partner in life. God wired us this way.

– Ask your close friends to be honest with you and ask, “Is there anything unattractive about my character that would prevent me from attracting a godly man/woman?”

– With young couples there is a lot of pushing into the bedroom rather than giving or asking to take. If someone pushes, walk away.

– How far is too far? Don’t do anything in private that you wouldn’t do in front of your parents. Nothing should be unzipped or unbuttoned prior to marriage. This prevents people from going through a world of pain should the relationship not work out. It also keeps your bodies a mystery to each other, and you have that much more to give your husband/wife on your wedding night. And the sex is that much better and fulfilling (i.e., “more explosive”) when you’re married (which is the real reason Christians prefer to wait to have sex 🙂 Just kidding. Kind of.)

– If your boyfriend or girlfriend won’t obey God outside of marriage, (s)he won’t obey God while you’re married.

– Every woman comes accessorized with other women. Men not only have to impress the girl he is interested in; he has to impress her friends too.

– Submissiveness is a very attractive quality to a godly man.

– To a godly man, there is nothing more unattractive than a woman who belittles her appearance.

– It takes a whole lot of man to please a godly woman.

– God wired men to admire a woman’s beauty (Note: This means men are wired to appreciate the beauty that is naturally found in one woman [i.e., his wife]. This does NOT mean God wired men to lust after or behold all women as if they are on display for their sexual pleasure. Big difference.)

– A man’s wife should be his standard of beauty. He should never stop telling her how beautiful he thinks she is.

– It’s natural to want to be close to the one you love. This does not mean you’re needy or weak.

– The lure you fish with determines the kind of fish you catch; if you dress/act/speak like trash, you will attract trash. And trash stinks.

Africa is Calling

I think I need to go to Africa. Why? Because God says so.

I was Facebook creeping a few weeks ago and came across a girl’s profile in one of my friend’s list of friends. (Me = Facebook creep.) She had gone to Illinois State University (where I attended college), and I had not seen or even thought of this girl in years since she was a couple of years older than me. She had pictures up from a mission trip she had taken to Africa. I looked through the pictures and thought about how neat it would be to go there. A day or two later, I was at Wal-Mart when I walked by one of those little stations with the relaxation CD’s. I never stop at those things, but I saw a CD that said something about worship music on the front of it. I picked up the CD and began looking at it. I looked up to see what other CD’s they had, and the first one I looked at was titled something like, “Sounds of Africa” and had a lion on the front of it. I thought it was a little strange, but I didn’t think too much about it. I came home, got on my computer, and went to the website for the company that one of my sisters-in-law works for–Amor Ministries (an organization based in San Diego, CA that arranges short-term mission trips). There was a slideshow on the homepage, and the second slide that came up was for a mission trip to South Africa. Hmm. I told my mom about all of these things, and she kind of freaked out. She thought I was wanted to move to Africa. Anywho.. a couple of days after that, she told me she thought I was right about going to Africa. Apparently she went to a coffee shop and saw a man reading a book about Africa, and he was wearing an African scarf. This may not seem strange to some people, but my hometown is pretty small, surrounded by cornfields, and is not exactly a hub of cultural diversity. God is funny. Then, today I was out to lunch and went to throw away my trash. The TV (which was on a sports channel that happened to be covering the Olympics) was near the trash can, and in the fraction of a second that I looked up at the TV on my way to the trash can, the words “SOUTH AFRICA” popped up in capital letters on the screen. I just kind of smiled and shook my head. Looks like going to Africa may be in my 5-year plan. 🙂

Isaiah 41:13

The fact that my dad and step-dad are not Christians has been bothering me. I’ve learned a lot about Heaven and Hell, and Hell is just not a place I would like either of them to be for eternity.  I’ve been praying that both of them will feel convicted and moved toward a relationship with God (or, for a start, at least go to church). Lately it’s been occurring to me that maybe I’m the person who’s supposed to talk to them about God. Secretly (or not-so-secretly since God just has to know everything 🙂) I’ve been hoping that maybe God will change His mind and just let someone else talk to them. I was at Bible study today when I got a subtle hit upside the heart. The Bible study we’re currently doing is Beth Moore’s Believing God. In the video, Beth said we are always saying to God, “Tell me what to do!” and most of the time, He’s saying to us, “I have told you what to do! You’re just waiting for a new answer!” I thought to myself, “Maybe that doesn’t apply to my situation.” A few minutes later, I received my weekly Bible verse text message. It was Isaiah 41:13. On second thought, maybe it does apply to my situation. As much as I don’t want to, I get it, God. I get it.