God of Second Chances

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from People of the Second Chance

Here I am, spending seven days at home before I'm off to my next adventure: 10 weeks at summer camp in Alabama. And I'm excited for it, albeit a bit terrified. I have hope it will go well and I will learn a lot.

In the meantime, I've been getting up to date on the blogs I follow, and I came across a post referencing the "Purity Culture," that is, something along the lines of True Love Waits with a heavy emphasis on the sanctity of the marriage bed and chastity before marriage. The post (you can read it here) is not only expressing concern over the Purity Culture for keeping men and women from a healthy expression of their sexuality (it's bad and wrong until you get married, but then it's 100% perfect and encouraged), but is also offering up the hope of second chances. Jonalyn argues that much of the Christian community has an inadequate understanding of God's gift of sexuality. I would agree with her. 

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Let's explore that idea of second chances, because I don't yet have an answer for the "problem" of the Purity Culture. My pastor and his wife will have been married for ten years this summer. She was not a virgin when they got married and she told me once told me how heartbreaking it felt that she couldn't give her husband everything. I guess it was the realization that someone else had also known her intimately.

Yet her husband, my pastor, is truly in love with her. He does not see her as damaged goods. He sees her as beautiful. When they first met, he had hope for her. When I look at her now, I see a life changed. She left behind a girl of addictions to become a woman of faith. She shared her story with us on Mother's Day this year and I was reminded that God is a God of second chances.

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The summer after I graduated high school, my oldest first cousin got married at a lovely ceremony I had the privilege of attending. He and his wife moved up north after the wedding and were together for less than a year before separating and subsequently divorcing. When I heard of their divorce, I wrote a painful and probably much-too-harsh post (that I happen to have located) detailing my frustration. I had high hopes for this couple and I felt broken when I learned that my hopes that this marriage would be the one out of our family to last were dashed.

It's been three years this month after that wedding, and I am proud to say that I saw a tweet slide up on my Twitter feed that indicated that my former cousin-in-law is happily remarried to a fellow believer. There was a spark of happiness in my heart when I saw that. What a God of second chances!

Even though this young woman is no longer a part of my family, she is still a member of the body of Christ, and God provided her with the gift of second chances that he willingly provides each of his children.

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As I write this, my great-great uncle is lying on his deathbed. After almost ninety-one years on this earth, he spent his life well and is nearing the end of his time with us. As the story goes, he was in the Navy back in the day and was taken by helicopter off of his ship and out of the war zone for some reason. While he was gone, his ship was attacked and lost, and none of his friends and shipmates survived. The helicopter could not locate the attacked ship, and my uncle's shipmates were gone.

The story has been told to me multiple times, and it always ends with my uncle's feelings of guilt for leaving his crew behind and being the only one who survived. He never talks about it. But yesterday, as I sat beside his bed and stared up at his plaques and photos lining the wall, I came to the conclusion that God gave my great-great uncle a second chance. After leaving the Navy, he went to college and seminary, became a Methodist preacher, got married, and had two sons. He also helped raise my grandmother and her sister, who never knew their father. He wrote and published a little book and was able to move back to the area where he grew up. He and his current wife are presently living in the home where she was raised.

And God gave him another chance. I think the reason God gives us second chances (and third, and fourth...) is because he has something better for us. God doesn't want the mistakes men and women made in their pasts to mar their futures beyond repair. God didn't want my great-great uncle to die that day when he was in the Navy. I believe that God has great plans for his children, and if that means structuring events and circumstances to provide them with another chance to choose good, even another chance to choose him, I believe he will do just that. God is in the restoring business, and that includes second chances.

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Speaking of second chances... I am preparing to move my blogging-self over to http://deannalexis.wordpress.com/, to a blog tentatively titled "Grace Upon Grace." I would love to have your insight into the next stages of my blogging career. If you are able, please take this quick survey and answer how best you can. I appreciate it greatly!

Need that survey link? Click here. Thank you so much!

Turning Twenty... And Other Wrestles

I had a bit of a crisis last night in the library between Charles Dickens’ Best Stories and Europe Since 1715. It had nothing to do with literary and historical classics, but… I’m turning twenty years old this weekend! What?!? Don’t get me wrong, this is super exciting, but it’s a time of transition and change as well. And I usually don’t like transition and change.

I was sitting at my favorite table in the library, filling out an application for a ministry position on campus, when I was just a bit shocked at how quickly I had found myself here. Hasn’t it been less than two years since I cried myself to sleep as a high school senior, wondering what was going to happen when I graduated, moved, and “adopted” an entire stepfamily? Hasn’t it been less than two years since I drove a little red Mercury Cougar with bucket seats? Hasn’t it been less than two years since I was a terrified and naïve eighteen year old with a broken family and a heart yearning for love?

Sometimes I just want to yell, "Look at me now!" I want to find that guy who made fun of me in middle school so I can show him who I’ve become and talk with him about what God can do in people’s lives. I want to remind my dad that I am no longer the eight year old little girl I was when he left and I want to tell him that he can never get back those years of my life. I want to actually do the great and wonderful things that my shyness and insecurities kept me from doing years ago.

One of the things I’ve wrestled with when it comes to my birthday is my singleness. For one, God has been showing me amazing things about singleness and sacrifice since my last post. That’s been really good. The problem, however, is that I honestly have not been living and thinking in ways I know I should and in ways that will glorify God. I mean, I have worked to maintain outward displays of purity and joyfulness in singleness, but I am not living with singleness of heart. My heart is not thinking on that which is noble and pure and true and my mind is not full of the glories of my Savior. It is often on two things: Complaining about being "alone" and dwelling on the "potentials" of a relationship.

This makes me upset. God has specifically called me to singleness for this current season, for the next while of my life, and I’ve discovered my heart is set on anything but Him. That should be my point! When we sacrifice what is good, we do so for the whole purpose of gaining that which is best (namely, God). So, if we participate in something like Lent or a personal sacrifice, we must replace what we give up with God, especially more time in his presence and more time meditating on him.

I guess I had some kind of unspoken plan to date while I was still a teenager. Leaving that behind has been weird. It’s a bit like the first time I realized I wasn’t going to be kissed in high school. I’m saving my first kiss for when I get engaged, so that eliminates that opportunity. It really was not a big deal, but it made me think. Now, I’m wondering how long God’s command that I sacrifice my desire to date will be. At this rate, I’m doing a very bad job at it, and God just might call me to surrender dating for a while. Am I okay with that? Well, when it comes to God, I have to be. Assuming that the Creator of the universe actually gave me life and knows how best to live it, I shouldn’t have much of a problem trusting his plans for my life, my entire life, even my love life.

But I do. I do have problems trusting him.

I have a problem when I see yet another couple is displaying way too much physical affection. I have a problem when I don’t pay attention to God’s consistent pursuit of my heart because I chalk it up to coincidence. I have a problem when I hear stories of the not-so-smart actions of girls and guys when it comes to romantic relationships.

This problem is more like a heart cry of mine, focused on the brokenness between people, especially in male/female relationships. A female friend and I talked the other night, completely broken over the hurt we have encountered in relationships with our dads, brothers, guy friends, and male spiritual leaders. There’s a lot of hurt there. I told her that I was striving with every bit of me to believe that there are strong Godly men who are spiritual leaders. Yet after struggling with the pain of broken relationships, believing that is so difficult.

That’s a problem I encounter when it comes to trusting in God. Now, the good news is that we must give God time to shape our future spouses. We wouldn’t want to begin dating them until God has shaped us, too.

And I think that’s my point.

Are we passionately in love with the God who pursues us and loves us with everything? I’ve come to realize that we cannot and should not begin a dating relationship until we are passionately in love with him. This does not mean that we never date. This does not mean that we are hopeless. This simply means that we get some things straight before we involve other person. We must be able to worship and serve God and love doing it. We must find out some things about ourselves, like what makes us tick and what gives us energy, before we try to find that in another person. We must pray and fast and embrace silence and read the Word and every other spiritual discipline. We must learn to love all our brothers and sisters. We must give and give freely of ourselves and our time and our love. And I believe we must have heartache along the way. No one is ready for a dating relationship unless they have been hurt and caused hurt in the past and have come to terms with it and moved. It’s essential.

Is your faith your own? Is your God your own? Do you love him?

I wrote a fictional (but largely based on actual events) post that was themed like a Q and A session with God. I asked God why I was still single. He asked me if I loved him. I hope and pray that we would dive deeper into him, take our pain and joys to him, and worship him fully. That’s why we’re here.

Even at twenty years old and never dated, that's still why I'm here. A woman's highest calling is the same as a man's, regardless of occupation, station, or relationship status... to glorify God and enjoy him forever.

A Call to Purity

Finally, dear brothers and sisters, we urge you in the name of the Lord Jesus to live in a way that pleases God, as we have taught you. You live this way already, and we encourage you to do so even more. For you remember what we taught you by the authority of the Lord Jesus.

God’s will is for you to be holy, so stay away from all sexual sin. Then each of you will control his own body and live in holiness and honor— not in lustful passion like the pagans who do not know God and his ways. Never harm or cheat a Christian brother in this matter by violating his wife, for the Lord avenges all such sins, as we have solemnly warned you before. God has called us to live holy lives, not impure lives. Therefore, anyone who refuses to live by these rules is not disobeying human teaching but is rejecting God, who gives his Holy Spirit to you.

But we don’t need to write to you about the importance of loving each other, for God himself has taught you to love one another. Indeed, you already show your love for all the believers throughout Macedonia. Even so, dear brothers and sisters, we urge you to love them even more.

- 1st Thessalonians 4:1-10

Okay, I don't know if you actually read those verses or just skipped ahead, but go back and read it. Or, if you did read it, go read it again. I want you to get it.

Got it? Good. Now let's talk.

Because of where we're from or how we were raised, we may have varying interpretations of the meaning of the word "purity". For some, that means no sex before marriage. For others, it means modesty. For others, it refers to wearing turtleneck sweaters and ankle-length skirts and long-sleeve button-up shirts and not being able to stand within two feet of someone of the other gender. But what does purity really mean?

I don't know about you, but I've got a very high standard for purity. We can talk about the specifics later, but in general, I hold purity in a high regard. Purity is to be valued as living a holy life. Verse 3 from Thessalonians chapter 4 says that we should avoid sexual sin, not so we will not have fun or experience pleasure in this life, but so that we will live within God's will for us, which is that we be holy. Holy means "set apart" and refers to us, as Christians, being and behaving differently than the world, so that God can use us for his purposes. Sexual sins are sins against our own bodies, yet God paid a high price for us and desires that we not only honor him with our bodies, but also give him our bodies as living sacrifices (1 Corinthians 6:18-20, Romans 12:2). Overall, I believe that when our hearts and minds are focused firmly on Christ and his love, our relationships tend to model that. Instead of a relationship that is centered on what we desire, or centered on the other person and what they do, our relationships should be wholly about Christ, about genuinely loving those God's placed in our lives, whether friends or boyfriends/girlfriends.

Realistically, there are practical steps to embrace a lifestyle of purity. We see one very evident in verse 6, "Never harm or cheat a Christian brother in this matter by violating his wife...". Few of you are married, but consider the implications of this verse. In most cases, young adults date many people before getting married. It's a little of bit of an imagination stretch, but consider the people you have liked and may date but won't marry. They are someone else's wife or husband. I read a story about a youth pastor who asked a dating couple who had been all over each during youth group to stay after and talk with him. He asked the guy, "Are you ready to marry this girl right now?" The guy responded, "No." And the pastor asked, "So why are you touching another man's wife?" Sure, it may seem a bit extreme. But it's the truth. Until you actually are married, you don't know if you will get married. Why take the risk of giving of yourself too much emotionally or physically before marriage?

The passage in 1 Thessalonians concludes by urging the Christians to love. In reality, we prize purity out of love: love for our brothers and sisters in Christ, love for our friends and acquaintances, love for our future and current dating relationships, love for our future spouses. Love means putting the other person first. It means asking, "What can I do for you?". Paul tells us that we cannot love too much - so keep on loving more and more!

Finally, know that every dating relationship ends. It will not last. (I know it's hard to fathom, but roll with me here.) When it ends, what do you want to be left with? If we maintain purity now, we will be left with purity and some sweet memories, and yes, maybe some heartache. But I tell you the truth, you will not regret maintaining a high level of purity in your relationships even now.

See, the purpose of living a pure life is so that God can use us. Allow me to shake things up for you: Being pure for marriage is wonderful. But it should not be our goal. It should be a by-product of our goal, which is loving God and loving others.

If you keep yourself pure, you will be a special utensil for honorable use. Your life will be clean, and you will be ready for the Master to use you for every good work. Run from anything that stimulates youthful lusts. Instead, pursue righteous living, faithfulness, love, and peace. Enjoy the companionship of those who call on the Lord with pure hearts.

- 2 Timothy 2:21-22

Temple Tuesday

This is a trustworthy saying, and everyone should accept it: “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners”—and I am the worst of them all. But God had mercy on me so that Christ Jesus could use me as a prime example of his great patience with even the worst sinners. Then others will realize that they, too, can believe in him and receive eternal life. All honor and glory to God forever and ever! He is the eternal King, the unseen one who never dies; he alone is God. Amen.

(1 Timothy 1:15-17)

God loves you. If you don't yet know that, I'm going to tell you again: God loves you. And when he looks at you, he sees no sin, he sees no blame. He sees purity and spotlessness. Because Christ died a brutal, horrible death upon a cross for you, so that you could be washed pure from your sins and so that you could have a relationship with God.

But one wonderful thing about God is that he made and is in and fosters relationships. God is all about community. Listen, God freed you from sin and you are pardoned, but it doesn't end there. God uses our sufferings, our triumphs, our tears and joys, our battles and victories, and our stories to build up others. It's like listening to someone give their testimony or hearing a teacher or professor share a life lesson they learned, we can hear and learn from others.

So lose this ridiculous idea that life is all about you. Even the difficult things in life can strengthen others through us. Don't get all depressed that your life is falling apart. See the good that can come out of staying true to God even in hard places.

Also, one of the best witnessing tools is a life changed by the power of God. If people can see that, as a Christian, you are truly different, it will make all the difference.

Don't deny that you're a sinner. Believe me, when God reveals to you how much you need him, it's overwhelming. But don't dwell on that. Instead, dwell on God's love! How great is God's unfailing love that is poured over us every morning! Ask God for the desire and power to love others with his love.

No Matter How Good It Is...

...if it's not from God, it's not for us. See, Satan is in the business of half-truths and little white lies. They seem fine to us if we aren't paying attention, but in reality, they are very destructive.

For example, God gave us the gift of marriage. But Satan likes to twist it, telling such lies like "But it's love", "God is love", and "God just wants you to be happy". And that is where we end up with all kinds of ridiculous distortions of marriage, like homosexuality and polygamy (and even living together before marriage), for example. God is very clear on the fact that marriage is for one man and one woman, but when you're listening to Satan, it doesn't always seem that way.

In the Garden of Eden, Satan twisted God's words when he tempted Eve. He asked her, "Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?" (Gen 3:1). Well, we know that God told Adam and Eve that they could eat from "any tree in the garden" except "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" (Gen 2:16-17). See how Satan twisted God's words to suit himself?

Okay, so you probably fall into the category of lies from Satan on a much smaller scale than something like polygamy. Maybe you are considering whether to pursue a relationship with a girl or guy who isn't a Christian. And Satan's telling you that you should totally be a missionary to them and that a good way to do that is to date them. Dating and relationships are good things from God, but only in the right context. Or maybe you're wondering about something even simpler, like music, which is a gift from God. But let's say you like a certain song and it's not explicit, but it's not clean, either, if you know what I mean. Music is from God, but Satan often uses it in just horrible ways. Keep a lookout for things like that. Do you really want that song playing in your head, on your iPod, in your car?

Another example: There are times when we are vulnerable and need to keep a guard up for safety. I'll explain it a different way: My college has a guard shack at the front entrance. During the day, the guards will wave at whoever comes into the campus. But at dusk, when it starts getting dark and the college itself becomes vulnerable, the guards typically stop cars coming in to make sure they belong here. When are vulnerable to Satan's voice, maybe when we're alone, or around people of the opposite gender, or surrounded by people who seem to have it all together and look like they're models... We must guard our hearts.

Believe me, it's hard to distinguish God's voice from Satan's voice sometimes. But here's something my stepdad taught me: God wants what's best for me even when I don't. In sin, I typically desire what feels good or what makes me look better to others, but God, in his love, desires (and knows) what is the best not only for me and my life, but also for the lives of those around me. And, this is awesome, "the best thing" may not be the easiest thing. In fact, God often uses difficult situations to grow us and mold us to become more like Him. Trust God's timing and God's voice and make those difficult decisions he is leading you towards. You may or not may not see an immediate result, but you will feel peace. Peace from the Holy Spirit.

No matter how good it is, if it's not from God, it's not for us.

For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.

- Ephesians 6:12

Temple Tuesday

Need some encouragement for the journey? When it seems like it's too difficult to live a pure life, keep this verse in mind.

This is from Romans chapter 16, verse 19 in the New Living Translation.

But everyone knows that you are obedient to the Lord. This makes me very happy. I want you to be wise in doing right and to stay innocent of any wrong.