For a year and a half(ish) I dated my now ex-boyfriend. Our story is rocky and parts of it can be put together through many others posts (to love someone unconditionally… and others). However rocky the story, for me it was undeniable. I loved him.
You see in today's society love is translated through sex. You are supposed to lose your virginity to someone you love. The standard is no longer that you have to be married to this person, it's to the person you love because you are "living in the moment." So in a society that translates sex as love, and love as sex, it is hard to determine what love really is.
When I started the relationship with Tyler for the second time, I wanted to show him that I loved him in everything that I did. I would do the little things for him, and rub his back when he wanted. I would call and check up on him, and try to be there for him when he had a bad day, but in modern times that isn't translated as love. The little self-sacrificing things aren't "love" they are just kindness, and generosity.
It seemed that no matter how much I showed him that I loved him, it was never enough. He would come up to visit me on occasion. Quickly things started to slide, but I didn't seem to mind. Even when my best friends knew that things were going down hill, they told me to stop and I just didn't want to. I liked this idea of me no longer being the innocent one, the one that was always asking questions about sex and sexual activities, and as those little idea's popped into my head I just kept questioning "how far is too far?" I knew I had already gone too far, because it was further than I wanted to go when we started the relationship. However, by the time I was done questioning it, I had told myself that actual sex is where I draw the line.
The problem with a line is that it can always be crossed off, crossed out, erased, moved, or just crumbled up and thrown away. This often occurs especially if both of the people in the relationship don't agree on where the line is drawn, or if there should be a line at all. So with my line drawn and his line nonexistent, it was extremely hard to please the both of us. It seemed that every time he came up I felt a little bit more of my purity slide, and for a second I felt bad, but I just thought, "We have plans to get married one day, so what does it really hurt?"
It was about five weeks ago, the last time I saw him. He kissed me goodbye, and it was another day of new experiences. As he was leaving he said, "I will see you in a week!" I yelled back, "I have a gymnastics meet!" So he replied through the closed doors, "Fine then, two!" Over those next two weeks, he ended up being in the hospital for broken ribs and I was stuck at college. He had a lot of down time, not having to work.
Over those two weeks we were apart, I did a lot of thinking. There were a lot of talks about sex. There was one where I had compromised to over the summer, as long as he fit the requirements that I told him to meet. One night in particular, he seemed really disturbed by the idea that he would be coming to visit me, and we would not be having sex. While he was begging, I was saying no, but I was planning something else. I joked and told him that he had to wait and fit all of the requirements that I had mentioned, and he reminded me again, "If we do it, I would be prepared to marry you. Next year, over one of our breaks. We can have it all planned out, get engaged over the summer and then get married next year when you come home." I told him that I would be worried that if we did have sex, he would just walk away after that. But he told me the same thing, that if we had sex, he would be prepared to spend the rest of his life with me.
You see, my excuse for weeks had been that I was not ready to have sex, but after the last time I had seen him, I realized that I did love him, so while I was saying no, I was planning for the following weekend to be "the weekend."Monday after I grabbed lunch and headed back to the dorm. That's when I got the FaceTime call.
He had been distant, but I figured he was going through a phase because of the broken ribs, and the doctors visits. He really just didn't know what to do with himself, but that wasn't the reason why. He had been thinking, which was never a good thing for me to hear from him.
I'm sure in time, he could have changed, and I was hoping that God would change his heart, but he was a Mormon, and I'm a Christian and that was the basis of our problems. It was something I stopped addressing because I didn't want to have those arguments over the phone or FaceTime. But this time seemed to be the breaking conversation. He asked me to convert. I begged, and begged for him to come to my church. He said no, over and over again. He made it clear that he was no longer going to put in the effort for our relationship, when I had been trying to hard.
He had no idea what I had been planning for the weekend. The break hurt, but I kept thinking how lucky I was that this didn't happen the following Monday. After I had given him exactly what he had asked for.
But knowing that he lied about it, knowing that he asked me to do that, to give up everything I believed in for a religion I told him that I didn't understand. One that made no sense to me, and knowing that the last real conversation we had was about sex, and I had told him no… MULTIPLE TIMES… I knew that it was over.
After a couple of days, I knew it was for the best. I went through all the stages, the fighting for it, the saying goodbye and still trying to be friends. The bawling and laying in bed all day. The realizing that you deserve better, the flirting with your best guy friends to not feel the sting anymore.
After a week, I knew it was for the best. I found that my faith seemed to be renewed. Where I had been stuck for so long, I really felt God's loving hands around me. I ended up talking to my best friend about it, and she had told me that she had been praying and fasting for me for over a week. She was praying that God would have his way in my relationship with Tyler.
AND THANK GOD FOR CHLOE!
It was right in time…. So as I tell what happened, and the huge life lesson… there are things I want all young women chasing purity to know…
1.) Guys not all guys keep their promises, but God does.
Guys are human, they make mistakes and whether they mean it or not… they do lie. You may think that your relationship may work out… and it may be a great relationship… but some things just don't work out, and it makes them seem like a liar if you give things up and things don't work out.
"By which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire." 2 Peter 1:4
2.) A ring means nothing… and neither does their word…
You may have a very Godly man, who really is chasing God. They may plan and talk about getting married, but if they are not willing to wait until marriage to have sex with you… they aren't worth putting out for.
3.) It's worth waiting for…
Yes, it felt really great to have someone love you deeply and in that way. However, those are moments that you want to only have to share with one person. You don't want to be in bed with your husband or in the shower with him, you don't want to be thinking about a time that you were in the same circumstances with a different guy. You don't want to think, "he did this so much better…" it's not good. It's not healthy for your marriage either.
4.) Don't date a non-christian…
Sounds like common sense, I know, but I didn't. I don't regret it, but it would have been a lot easier if I had just let myself fall in love with him, but in a completely different way. Like the way you love your best guy friend, not the way you love your first real boyfriend. Dating someone who isn't a Christian does lead to complications, and your friendship may be perfect… but if it something you want to pursue, you have to let him make the changes you want to see in him, for himself. Which leads me to number five.
"Don’t become partners with those who reject God. How can you make a partnership out of right and wrong? That’s not partnership; that’s war. Is light best friends with dark? Does Christ go strolling with the Devil? Do trust and mistrust hold hands?" 2 Corinthians 6:14 (The Message)
5.) You can try to change them, but they won't change… not even for you…
They may really love you, but if you are pushing them to make a change, they won't. They don't want to become something that someone else is making them into. That's why I wanted Tyler to figure it out for himself, and let God do the work in him. That way when he was ready, he would come to me and tell me, "I want to know more, something is missing, help." Although i believe that it may still happen, it will not happen if we ever get back together (which is extremely unlikely) it will be Tyler's choice. Not mine, not anyone else who pushed him… it will be completely his choice.
6.) If they don't seem to be shaken by hurting you once, they won't hesitate to do it again…
This doesn't even mean with the couples who break up and get back together… this is for any guy that constantly cancels, or has started doing things that you are not comfortable with. If they have done it more than once, and don't seem sincerely sorry about hurting you… they most likely will do it again.
7.) If you have already had sex… it's not too late.
God is always making things new, transforming the lives of murderers, addicts, prostitutes, runaways, gays, liars, thieves… the list goes on. Just because you have messed up once, does not mean that our life is over. Sure you no longer have that purity that God will have intended your marriage to have, but that doesn't mean that he can't still transform your life and make you new.
"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." 2 Corinthians 5:17
I was a lucky one, to not have given it all up to a guy who promised that he wouldn't walk away.
No, at first I did not regret having those moments with him. I figured that I loved him and it would be okay. However, as God started to move in my life, I realized that I did regret having those moments, no matter how special they were. Most likely everything he ever told me was a lie and now every time I think about it, I am disappointed that I did give in. All I had to do was say no, and yes it did get tiring. That's why I started saying yes.
The world will tell you that it feels good, and it will… at that time.
You see in today's society love is translated through sex. You are supposed to lose your virginity to someone you love. The standard is no longer that you have to be married to this person, it's to the person you love because you are "living in the moment." So in a society that translates sex as love, and love as sex, it is hard to determine what love really is.
When I started the relationship with Tyler for the second time, I wanted to show him that I loved him in everything that I did. I would do the little things for him, and rub his back when he wanted. I would call and check up on him, and try to be there for him when he had a bad day, but in modern times that isn't translated as love. The little self-sacrificing things aren't "love" they are just kindness, and generosity.
It seemed that no matter how much I showed him that I loved him, it was never enough. He would come up to visit me on occasion. Quickly things started to slide, but I didn't seem to mind. Even when my best friends knew that things were going down hill, they told me to stop and I just didn't want to. I liked this idea of me no longer being the innocent one, the one that was always asking questions about sex and sexual activities, and as those little idea's popped into my head I just kept questioning "how far is too far?" I knew I had already gone too far, because it was further than I wanted to go when we started the relationship. However, by the time I was done questioning it, I had told myself that actual sex is where I draw the line.
The problem with a line is that it can always be crossed off, crossed out, erased, moved, or just crumbled up and thrown away. This often occurs especially if both of the people in the relationship don't agree on where the line is drawn, or if there should be a line at all. So with my line drawn and his line nonexistent, it was extremely hard to please the both of us. It seemed that every time he came up I felt a little bit more of my purity slide, and for a second I felt bad, but I just thought, "We have plans to get married one day, so what does it really hurt?"
It was about five weeks ago, the last time I saw him. He kissed me goodbye, and it was another day of new experiences. As he was leaving he said, "I will see you in a week!" I yelled back, "I have a gymnastics meet!" So he replied through the closed doors, "Fine then, two!" Over those next two weeks, he ended up being in the hospital for broken ribs and I was stuck at college. He had a lot of down time, not having to work.
Over those two weeks we were apart, I did a lot of thinking. There were a lot of talks about sex. There was one where I had compromised to over the summer, as long as he fit the requirements that I told him to meet. One night in particular, he seemed really disturbed by the idea that he would be coming to visit me, and we would not be having sex. While he was begging, I was saying no, but I was planning something else. I joked and told him that he had to wait and fit all of the requirements that I had mentioned, and he reminded me again, "If we do it, I would be prepared to marry you. Next year, over one of our breaks. We can have it all planned out, get engaged over the summer and then get married next year when you come home." I told him that I would be worried that if we did have sex, he would just walk away after that. But he told me the same thing, that if we had sex, he would be prepared to spend the rest of his life with me.
You see, my excuse for weeks had been that I was not ready to have sex, but after the last time I had seen him, I realized that I did love him, so while I was saying no, I was planning for the following weekend to be "the weekend."Monday after I grabbed lunch and headed back to the dorm. That's when I got the FaceTime call.
He had been distant, but I figured he was going through a phase because of the broken ribs, and the doctors visits. He really just didn't know what to do with himself, but that wasn't the reason why. He had been thinking, which was never a good thing for me to hear from him.
I'm sure in time, he could have changed, and I was hoping that God would change his heart, but he was a Mormon, and I'm a Christian and that was the basis of our problems. It was something I stopped addressing because I didn't want to have those arguments over the phone or FaceTime. But this time seemed to be the breaking conversation. He asked me to convert. I begged, and begged for him to come to my church. He said no, over and over again. He made it clear that he was no longer going to put in the effort for our relationship, when I had been trying to hard.
He had no idea what I had been planning for the weekend. The break hurt, but I kept thinking how lucky I was that this didn't happen the following Monday. After I had given him exactly what he had asked for.
But knowing that he lied about it, knowing that he asked me to do that, to give up everything I believed in for a religion I told him that I didn't understand. One that made no sense to me, and knowing that the last real conversation we had was about sex, and I had told him no… MULTIPLE TIMES… I knew that it was over.
After a couple of days, I knew it was for the best. I went through all the stages, the fighting for it, the saying goodbye and still trying to be friends. The bawling and laying in bed all day. The realizing that you deserve better, the flirting with your best guy friends to not feel the sting anymore.
After a week, I knew it was for the best. I found that my faith seemed to be renewed. Where I had been stuck for so long, I really felt God's loving hands around me. I ended up talking to my best friend about it, and she had told me that she had been praying and fasting for me for over a week. She was praying that God would have his way in my relationship with Tyler.
AND THANK GOD FOR CHLOE!
It was right in time…. So as I tell what happened, and the huge life lesson… there are things I want all young women chasing purity to know…
1.) Guys not all guys keep their promises, but God does.
Guys are human, they make mistakes and whether they mean it or not… they do lie. You may think that your relationship may work out… and it may be a great relationship… but some things just don't work out, and it makes them seem like a liar if you give things up and things don't work out.
"By which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire." 2 Peter 1:4
2.) A ring means nothing… and neither does their word…
You may have a very Godly man, who really is chasing God. They may plan and talk about getting married, but if they are not willing to wait until marriage to have sex with you… they aren't worth putting out for.
3.) It's worth waiting for…
Yes, it felt really great to have someone love you deeply and in that way. However, those are moments that you want to only have to share with one person. You don't want to be in bed with your husband or in the shower with him, you don't want to be thinking about a time that you were in the same circumstances with a different guy. You don't want to think, "he did this so much better…" it's not good. It's not healthy for your marriage either.
4.) Don't date a non-christian…
Sounds like common sense, I know, but I didn't. I don't regret it, but it would have been a lot easier if I had just let myself fall in love with him, but in a completely different way. Like the way you love your best guy friend, not the way you love your first real boyfriend. Dating someone who isn't a Christian does lead to complications, and your friendship may be perfect… but if it something you want to pursue, you have to let him make the changes you want to see in him, for himself. Which leads me to number five.
"Don’t become partners with those who reject God. How can you make a partnership out of right and wrong? That’s not partnership; that’s war. Is light best friends with dark? Does Christ go strolling with the Devil? Do trust and mistrust hold hands?" 2 Corinthians 6:14 (The Message)
5.) You can try to change them, but they won't change… not even for you…
They may really love you, but if you are pushing them to make a change, they won't. They don't want to become something that someone else is making them into. That's why I wanted Tyler to figure it out for himself, and let God do the work in him. That way when he was ready, he would come to me and tell me, "I want to know more, something is missing, help." Although i believe that it may still happen, it will not happen if we ever get back together (which is extremely unlikely) it will be Tyler's choice. Not mine, not anyone else who pushed him… it will be completely his choice.
6.) If they don't seem to be shaken by hurting you once, they won't hesitate to do it again…
This doesn't even mean with the couples who break up and get back together… this is for any guy that constantly cancels, or has started doing things that you are not comfortable with. If they have done it more than once, and don't seem sincerely sorry about hurting you… they most likely will do it again.
7.) If you have already had sex… it's not too late.
God is always making things new, transforming the lives of murderers, addicts, prostitutes, runaways, gays, liars, thieves… the list goes on. Just because you have messed up once, does not mean that our life is over. Sure you no longer have that purity that God will have intended your marriage to have, but that doesn't mean that he can't still transform your life and make you new.
"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." 2 Corinthians 5:17
I was a lucky one, to not have given it all up to a guy who promised that he wouldn't walk away.
No, at first I did not regret having those moments with him. I figured that I loved him and it would be okay. However, as God started to move in my life, I realized that I did regret having those moments, no matter how special they were. Most likely everything he ever told me was a lie and now every time I think about it, I am disappointed that I did give in. All I had to do was say no, and yes it did get tiring. That's why I started saying yes.
The world will tell you that it feels good, and it will… at that time.
The world will tell you that by giving things up sexually, that is the way to show someone how much you love them. But it's not… love is doing the little things. Showing that you care by the small acts that you and the way you respond to other people.
"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails." 1 Corinthians 13: 4-8
In everything you do… do it with love. But don't do it by the worlds standards or what the world says. That's what I learned through all of this. I went further than I wanted to because I wanted to show him what love was the way the world does… but that's not the only way to show someone you love them.
Sex is worth waiting for
Your purity is worth keeping
The right guy won't push you to have sex
He will respect you
He will fit all of your standards and your typical idea of what a husband would be
He may not exactly be prince charming… but he will be the guy God has planned
He is worth waiting for
In the meantime… Run towards God at full speed!
I don't share this to get pity… or for anyone to look at me differently. I share this so that young women (and men too) can learn from me, and what I learned. If it weren't for my best friend and God, I would have made a huge mistake, and I don't want young people doing the same thing.
So last thing I want to share…
I don't share this to get pity… or for anyone to look at me differently. I share this so that young women (and men too) can learn from me, and what I learned. If it weren't for my best friend and God, I would have made a huge mistake, and I don't want young people doing the same thing.
So last thing I want to share…
My sister sent me this message shortly after the break up, she said.
"Remember Aunt Pam's philosophy on dating, run as fast as you can towards God, if someone keeps up, introduce yourself…."
