Happy Sexual Wednesday? (Well, kind of)

It seems like everyone in my life is obsessed with sex. Maybe "obsessed" is a strong word, but it sure does seem like it's everywhere. It permeates every form of entertainment: music, movies, TV, advertising. High school and college are always about who's sleeping with who, who's not not sleeping with anyone and who's sleeping with everyone. I learned to have safe sex in school, abstinence at church and home, and promiscuity from my peers. I watched my friends explore (or deny) their sexuality. Everyone had their own way of dealing with it, whether publicly or behind closed doors.

(Just to preface, I'm not discounting how amazing it is to wait. I really truly think that's how it's meant to be. What I take issue with and what this blog is about is how both non-Christians and Christians approach abstinence.)

I've grown up being told that sex is pretty cool, but it's meant for the context of marriage. I've had the once yearly relationship series at youth group, constant teaching in D-Group, and the everyday reminders at home. I've heard everything under the sky about why you should wait:
"Your sex will be better"
"It's your gift to your future husband"
"You don't want to have any regrets"
I wish I hadn't been told these things and I wish we didn't continue to tell them to young girls. You can't promise my sex will be better. That's ridiculous. It sets girls up to idolize marriage. There is no way you can know the sex will be better. You hear those studies that compare the happiness of married couples sex lives between those that had sex pre-marriage and those who waited until their wedding night...they also say so-and-so percentage of couples who waited are happier. What about that percentage of couples who waited, but don't report that their marriages and sex lives are fantastic? It's not that cut & dry. You can't guarantee that it will be all peaches and cream when they walk out of that church. Don't imply that I will/won't have a happy marriage based on my pre-marriage decisions.
Then there's that whole "gift" thing. This one probably makes me the most mad. It made sense and seemed compelling when I was 13 and had never held held hands with a boy, but beyond that it just makes me feel like crap. It implies that I'm only as valuable as my abstinence, that I'm worthless without my virginity, that my husband will love me less if I fail. I have a lot of "gifts" to bring to marriage and I don't consider my virginity the biggest one.
"You don't want to have any regrets."
I don't think that's true. Most people I've talked to don't regret their pasts. Even if they are now in a committed relationship or married, they know how they felt at the time and they don't regret their decisions. (Btws, I'm talking about sex in other committed relationships, not random hookups. I think people regret those more.) I know people who do wait always are glad they waited, but I don't think that it's necessarily accurate to say that those who don't wait regret it.

So what should we tell young girls?
- God intends for us to wait. Sex outside of marriage is a sin...just like lying, murder and gossip. Sex is intended to be the signature on the contract of marriage. So God wants us to be pure. It's not something to give away lightly, but just like everything else, God's grace covers you. And it's okay to long for intimacy, there's nothing wrong with you if you desire sex, but know that a casual hookup or even a relationship isn't going to fill that longing. It can only be filled when you know that you are loved, both eternally by God and completely by your partner.
In a Christian culture that prizes abstinence above all else, I watch Christian couples push boundaries, but don't worry because they don't go "all the way." In a Christian culture where the biggest concern is "How far is too far?" the focus is all wrong. Darkness is the absence of light, but light is not absence of darkness. It is its own entity, with it's own source, not dependent on the darkness. Similarly, having sex may mean the absence of purity, but purity is not simply the absence of sex. It too is its own entity with its own source. I'm a virgin but I have definitely gone through times where I was less than pure. Purity has to be more than physical. Can we please focus less on the act of sex and more on the mindset? Because it's very possible to have had sex and be far more pure than someone who is physically "pure." I'd agree that it's probably harder to be pure after sex, but let's be real...crazier things have happened. So let's stop telling God that he can't forgive and restore people that have sinned sexually. And let's stop telling teens that God can't or won't forgive them.

I think sex is a sin and should be treated as such. But that's all it is. Living a sinful lifestyle is just as easy whether you're sexually active or not.

Finding love

I think I need to admit that I need to be loved. I don't like to admit that. I don't like I admit that I need anything from other people. It feels like such a girly thing to say. That I desire for someone to care about me, to think I'm beautiful. And I hate to be girly.

But I do want that.

So I try to find it in all the wrong places. Guys don't care, or maybe they do, or they could, but I'm throwing a lot of time and energy their way for something they can't give me. It's time and energy they don't even know about. It's time spent worrying and dreaming and feeling something I don't even really want.

I don't know what I want.

Because what I want is not something I or this world understands. It's a longing that can only be filled when I realize that I am loved and I always have been and that it is in fact enough. I think the world tries to tell us that there's never enough. That I'm not smart enough, pretty enough or social enough. No matter who you are, you will never be enough. So I forget that under all of my confusion and pain and longing there is a God who made me, loves me, and will fulfill me if only I'll let him.

He wants me to let go.

Let go of the frustration, the planning, the need and just let him love me. Because only then can I love myself and let myself be loved by others.

Which in the end is what we all want, right?