Posted on 08/19/2019 8:08:04 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Early last week found me getting a check-up for the first time in more than a decade. With medical professionals in my family, I can too easily put off those preventative appointments. So, I sat in the olive-green vinyl chair, the sort that populate doctors’ offices across the country. I felt a bit sheepish, like I’d been getting away with something by not going to the doctor for so long. The nurse took my vitals. The doctor asked the routine questions. What medications am I on? None. Do I have any allergies? No. Am I sexually active? No. Have I ever been?
At 34, I don’t always know what response I will get when I describe my sexual history. This was my first time at the clinic, and I wondered what my doctor would think.
I grew up in the ‘90s, when the purity movement was in full swing -- especially within my homeschool subculture. I read When God Writes Your Love Story by Eric and Leslie Ludy. I meditated on Elisabeth Elliot’s Passion and Purity. And like most girls my age, I devoured I Kissed Dating Goodbye, the classic manifesto penned by a young, good-looking homeschool graduate named Joshua Harris.
Like so many other teens during that era, I gave my love life to God and vowed to save myself for marriage. I remained dedicated to the courtship method of dating into my early twenties, even when such conservatism became unpopular among my peers. Things got more complicated once I started putting my theories into practice. My views matured with experience -- but my convictions regarding sexual purity have never changed.
Since its early proponents came of age, the purity culture we all created has received a heavy amount of criticism from within, and with good reason -- it had its problems. Some odd traditions sprang up -- purity rings, purity balls, courtship contracts. Young men and women took the whole thing so seriously that they struggled to even talk to one another. People -- especially women -- were shamed when mistakes were made. Despite our best efforts, so many of us have found ourselves with a string of broken relationships and no marriage to show for it.
And then, starting a couple years ago, our one-time poster boy Harris began rescinding his early teaching on Christian relationships. Last month, he consummated his new position by announcing his divorce and renouncing his faith. While we may all speculate about Harris’ motive for this massive shift in thinking, Dr. Albert Mohler suggested struggles with the Christian sexual ethic were a major factor in Harris’ decision to walk away from Christianity.
I didn’t really believe it when I first heard the news. I took a tour of Harris now infamous Instagram account and was stunned. Then I was sad, and angry, and confused. I offered prayers for both Harris and his family. And I thought about Harris’ legacy, the purity movement, and the way my own life has been affected.
I’ve written elsewhere about some of the hard lessons God taught me through courtship and dating. In the fifteen years since my first relationship, I’ve learned that God’s plan for my love life won’t protect me from having my heart broken. The long years of celibacy have taught me that God doesn’t necessarily reward good behavior the way I once hoped -- being obedient hasn’t earned me a wedding. I’ve come to realize more fully that serving God with my sexuality is about my relationship with Him, not my relationship with a future husband who may or may not exist. These days, I don’t think of myself as “saving sex for marriage,” because that motive misses the point. Instead, I’m honoring God with my body, living in accordance with the natural world he created. The place of sex in God’s creation is between a husband and wife, and I submit to that order by practicing celibacy as a single woman.
Still, I’m grateful I Kissed Dating Goodbye found its way into my hands. At the time, I was a teenager living in a tiny town in rural North Idaho. We had no bookstore, no Wal-Mart, no Amazon (that we knew of yet). I was beyond thrilled when I found a copy of the much lauded book at a garage sale I was visiting with my mom. Harris gave me a vocabulary for taking dating and purity seriously in my own cultural context. He painted a picture of the way relationships could look when serving God was their focus. At the time, that picture was one of the only of its kind. Everywhere I looked, I saw the world’s way of dating. I could see it on the big screen, hear it on my Sony Discman, read it on the covers of teen magazines. In practical terms, Harris gave me a glimpse of what God might mean by romance. As Matthew Lee Anderson wrote in his Mere Orthodoxy piece:
The absence of a script for how to enter marriage was partially a consequence of the loss of a social vision for why one would marry in the first place—and on those scores, Harris offered a picture of a world that in fact might have been better than the Calvinball-like environment surrounding us. It was nostalgic, yes, and was doomed to be distorted in being implemented. But then, every vision is.
Harris’ call to return to old practices helped many families -- including my own -- recover structures to protect the virtue of young people in days gone by. The courtship movement may have been awkward at times, but I think we all took stumbling steps toward something truly good.
All these thoughts shuffled through my mind the week before my doctor’s appointment. As I sat there that day, I squared my shoulders and answered the medical history question -- “No.”
Being a virgin isn’t popular these days. As one writer put it, it isn’t cute anymore -- even among many Christians. Still, my virginity lets me off the hook from several routine tests and procedures, because I am not at any risk. And to my relief, I got a smile from the doctor who told me how “rare” this is. I joked about still holding out hope for settling down. She said she knew how hard it must be these days. I mentioned the recent news: Joshua Harris may have taken back his teachings in I Kissed Dating Goodbye, but I’m still thankful for the wisdom I gleaned and the boundaries I learned from those pages.
A thoughtful and charitable piece.
I was on a third date with a girl when she got really sick in the car and I had to take her to the ER.
In front of me the doctors asked if she was sexually active and/or pregnant.
Quite an eye opener :)
It is very important for a medical professional to know whether a patient is or could be pregnant.
I suppose they ask men now, too.
The world we live in sickens me.
She's cute and comparatively sane in most respects. I hope she figures out the Christian answers on marriage. Genesis 9:7 tells us to be fruitful and multiply. It is God's will that we pass on our genes and the values we received from Him to the next generation. It is not our place to refuse.
LOL
Her answers were no across the board.
Still, I thought those are questions that would be asked privately.
I guess not in the ER
My wife of 20 years dumped me. Kicked me out without cause (which they can do in the US) and just didn’t want to be married to anyone any more. And we had three daughters between 10 and 16 years of age.
Two months afterward, and 10 months before the divorce was final, I went to my 25th high school reunion’s “Friday night pizza get together”. There I talked to a lot of people, but there was one woman that I talked with a LOT. In fact, because of her presence, I went to the Saturday “formal” dance and dinner. Again, we talked a LOT. She lived thousands of miles away and had flown there right after her husband had left the house and took all the furniture with him.
I got her address.
Two weeks later I sent her a very long letter. To hear her describe it, as she read it she had to sit down because she couldn’t stand up while reading it.
We then passed 850 emails back and forth, and I spent $3,500 on long distance calls. She finally flew in to visit and I proposed to her. That was that. And after the divorce we were married.
That was 21 years ago and I had no idea that married life could be this good. No. Idea. Yes, you CAN live happily ever after. In fact, it geets better every year.
And we never “dated”.
RE: That is a great line.
For those who are not familiar with the term: CALVINBALL
Calvinball is a game invented by Calvin and Hobbes (The comics series ).
Calvinball has no rules; the players make up their own rules as they go along, making it so that no Calvinball game is like another. ... The game may involve wickets, mallets, volleyballs, and additional sports-related equipment.
I loved her use of “Calvinball”. :)
“Yes, you CAN live happily ever after. In fact, it geets better every year.”
My wife passed away after 43 years of marriage. I believe one of the key elements of a long marriage is compromise.
I understand MCTOW, but I consider them the Male equivalent of fourth wave feminists. i.e. they basically “hate” the opposite sex.
Again, I can see how they get there, but I think that particular pendulum has swung a bit too far.
So far, I have never been asked. 8>)
I believe one of the key elements of a long marriage is compromise.
MCTOW = MGTOW
That’s not correct. MGTOW men, by and large, don’t hate women. They understand the potential risks of associating closely with women. Marriage is a scam, and children are used as weapons. Who would put half their assets for sale with little to no return?
You have that right.
FYI, Being red pilled is not the same as MGTOW.
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