In recent years I went through what seemed like a pre-pubescent stage of thinking that men have Cooties. I would say I’ve grown out of it today as I have a better understanding of God, men, and intimacy vs S-E-X. For some reason my view of marriage just involved sex…I was under the assumption married people just had HOT married sex ALL THE TIME. Laughing…I know this isn’t true…but STILL…it made me wonder what the big deal was about marriage…and why people wanted it sooooo much. I’ve been happily single for awhile now and at times struggle with seeing the benefits of marriage. God’s been taking me through a new season…it would seem like a season of transformation and preparation for SOMETHING…and who knows…maybe it will involve matrimonial bliss…SOMEDAY… in the far off future…I hope…and if not…I’m just glad to get closer to Jesus. The biggest thing God has been teaching me is about intimacy with HIM…which is HUGE to understand why God thinks marriage is such a big deal and should be cherished and protected…I was just clueless.
I’ve been reading a book called Jesus is ______________. One of the chapters talks about Grace as a person…and in the words of one of my teammate’s… Je-susss. In Christian circles we talk about a relationship with Jesus…A LOT…but something I completely overlooked was the “relational” part of the relationship and how sins effects it. If I was in a relationship it wouldn’t be my goal to hurt the person as much as I possibly could with words and actions…unless I’m just super cruel and unusual. I’d want to love that person well, fiercely, boldly. I wouldn’t go around cheating on that person or talking badly about them or misrepresenting them just because they’d later be generous and forgive me BIG…that’s not LOVE…and it’s a lousy way to do GRACE. Sin BIG because Jesus will FORGIVE BIG…I mean He willllll but that’s not the point. When you’re in a relationship with someone you have catch phrases, pet names, inside jokes, share deep dark secrets, and you start to look and act similarly….and not to be sacrilegious…but Jesus is H-O-T-T ….HOT. I want to be like Jesus. I may use Christian phrases…but do I sound like and live like Jesus? Nope, not hardly. I may call Jesus LOVE and laugh at God shining through and reaching my stubbornness or unwillingness. I might wrestle with God…but do I wrestle with Him in prayer on behalf of myself or others and/or in anguish until my body hurts and my heart is changed? Nope, Nope, Nope…not yet. He knows my deepest darkest secrets but am I honest enough with Him and willing to change? Um?
So the first part to failure is admitting it…and I’m there. I stink at intimacy with Christ. I’m really good at doing the standard pre-described way of “quiet” times with God…reading the bible and journaling and thinking THAT is intimacy with Christ…I mean how boring would dates be if you just read a book together and journaled and didn’t make googly eyes at each other, talk, and sip wine for goodness sakes! It is sooooo time to throw EVERYTHING out the window and just start over. God what do YOU want our times together to look like? What do you want “US” to look like? Not gonna lie…kinda excited to learn what INTIMACY without sex looks like and how that might later change my view of that whole marriage business stuff. So MEN may or may not have Cooties…BUT Je-susssss who designed hair, has it counted, and knows how many cooties anybody owns knows me…He’s got this and I just get to sit back and ENJOY the ride. Go God!!!
