How to Have a Passion for Purity

About to enter the dating scene? Already dating but don't want to go too far?  Sometimes it's so hard to know how far is too far, and what rules you should live by. A conference told you one thing, your boyfriend/girlfriend is telling you another. What's a girl (or boy!) supposed to do?

Last night during our Bible study we came across this verse from Psalm 119:9

How can a young person stay pure?

    By obeying your word.

That's it. Those are the rules. Do you want to know how to keep your relationship from going 'too far' then get into God's Word and see what He says. Not only that, but you have to do what He says!

I loved the Joshua Harris books: I kissed Dating Goodbye, and Boy Meets Girl and highly recommend them to those wanting to go a different route than most. However, when it came time for my own love story things didn't go quite according to how I pictured they would. For starters, I was in Thailand, and my then boyfriend was in the States. We didn't physically date until 9 months after we met through a mutual friend on Facebook. This meant that all those 'rules' that the books and conferences suggested had no meaning for my particular situation. What did we do?

I think it helped that both he and I had a desire for purity. If your boyfriend or fiance doesn't have the same desire for purity that you have, then you don't need to be in the relationship. More than likely, he will cause you to do things that you don't want to do, and to go farther than you want to go. So, having a significant other that has a relationship with God (and not just one that says he's a Christian but doesn't live like one) is vital for a pure relationship. 

Second, we told each other that we would put God first in the relationship instead of each other. We then got on the same page as far as once we did meet, what we would do physically. Now, here comes the tricky part, because you have to decide what you will do to keep your relationship pure. For us, we stayed where people were, held hands, but never kissed. Actually, my husband never told me he loved me until he asked me to marry him, and we never kissed until our wedding day. This is what we did, and once we set up those guidelines for ourselves it lifted the burden of knowing whether or not we were going too far. It allowed trust to be built between each other. Since we often skyped while we were alone, knowing each others heart and intentions made it where we never ventured into the 'unknown' (you know, the after marriage stuff) or 'too far' category.

I said all that to say, you have to read the Bible, you have to set the guidelines with yourself and with your significant other. You both need to be in the Word. Because it doesn't matter how many conferences you go to, or books you read, your heart needs to be in the right place. 

Are you ready for the next step?

April is here, and I'm just a few weeks shy of my first wedding anniversary! As my husband and I make plans for a 'second honeymoon' I have been thinking about our first year of marriage a lot, and look forward to sharing with you some of the things I've learned about relationships and marriage. This week, however, I would like to sort of work my way to the actual marriage tips by starting with the question...'I've met the one I think I want to marry, but how do I know he/she is the right one?'

How I knew
You know when you are 'in love' when you see him/her as a flawless person you can't stop thinking about every few minutes, but how do you know if this is just infatuation, or really the person God has for you? Even though I can't answer this question for you, I can try to help guide you in making that decision.
My husband and I spent about 18 of the first 22 months of our relationship (this counts from first meeting via Skype, to marriage) thousands of miles away from each other. Believe it or not, I still caught myself thinking about him all the time, even though I didn't see him or even talk to him every day. I do think that it was God's plan for me to be so far apart so that I could step back and think about the serious questions in a clearer light. For me it wasn't too hard. My husband was in the ministry, which was something that I had prayed for, he was in God's word, and had shown himself to be a godly, spiritual man, we had spent literally hours talking about our views on political, and spiritual topics (when all you have is Skype to rely on, you do a lot of talking!) ect. To top it off, God gave me a peace about it, and on my wedding day, I had no doubts that this was the man God had given me.

How you can know
I have seen countless acquaintances on facebook here lately, of girls who are 'in love' but are sleeping with their boyfriends, and claiming it's God's will for them to be together. After a little while they come back with a shambled relationship, because the 'in love' stage is over and reality has settled in, and those boys are not as great as they first looked like. So when making the big decision to take the next step here are some questions you can ask yourself...

Has my boyfriend/girlfriend and I kept each other from being tempted to sin (to have sex, or other physical touching that you have previously agreed was off limits)
Has he/she encouraged me in my spiritual walk/made me want to grow more spiritually
Have we talked about money/debt, children, family, etc.? (remember, the more you discuss this now, the less you will have to later, and will help reduce future arguments) 
For girls:
Have we discussed how he will lead in our relationship (Ephesians 5:22-24) (for guys, have you made it easy for her to trust your leadership?)
Is he someone I can submit to? Remember, we are commanded to submit, even if we don't like the decisions being made (doesn't mean we can't help with the decision making, but the husband makes the final decisions). Unless the husband is making a decision that is completely against the Bible, we should submit to our husbands. So are you ready to do that?

Here are just a few that I can think of right now. If you think of other questions I've missed, feel free to comment below!  Remember that you can have all the time in the world to physically love on each other after marriage. Talking to your future spouse can make marriage a lot smoother, and helps you feel comfortable talking to that person that you will be with for the rest of your life!