Getting To the Point

Let’s just get right to the point:

I’m beginning to think that women and girls are completely oblivious to the feelings and tendencies of men and boys.  We in the male population have certain likings and dislikings when it comes to the opposite sex.  Our preferences are rooted deeply in our character and our very makeup (and not the kind that you put on your face in the morning).  Too often, these preferences go overlooked and unrealized.
Allow me to enlighten you:

First, men are not interested in kissing, smooching, lip-smacking, spit-swapping, or any other sort of passionate nonsense.  We do not fancy sexual advances or touching.  It scares us.  We are fragile and delicate beings.  Instead, we prefer more gentle approaches to intimacy such as cuddling, hand-holding, side hugs, and the occasional peck on the cheek (for when we are feeling extra spunky).
Second, men cannot stand tight clothing.  We cannot bear to look upon a low-cut shirt or short shorts.  Our gentle hearts ache when we catch a glimpse of a mini-skirt or a see-through top.  It’s gross and unattractive.  One might even go as far as to say “yucky.”  Instead, we are much more interested in baggy sweat pants and plain old oversized t-shirts.  We would prefer no makeup and dirty, unfixed hair.  Imagining it now even brings a smile to my face.
Third, men HATE being flirted with or teased.  When girls talk in a sexy tone or gently caress our bulging biceps, we feel a sense of disgust.  We can’t handle it.  Instead, we would rather have a good healthy belch or nagging tone every now and again to keep us on our toes.  We prefer a girl with little interest in admiring us or our bulging biceps. That’s just the way we feel.
Let’s stop right there.  If you are either smiling or laughing at this point in the article and you realize the complete nonsense of the paragraphs you have just finished reading, then you may also begin to realize the difficult position in which the female population finds themselves.  The very fact that one may read the above and immediately realize their falsehood is a testimony to the fact that the female population very obviously knows the basics of what turns a man on and what turns a man away.  If we understand this and desire at all to live in harmony with God’s will for sexual purity and in a guilt-free relationship with our boyfriend or fiancé then we must realize our responsibility to help control the flame of sexuality in a male partner with the choices that we make. Choices of clothing, choices of speech, choices of physical contact, choices of alone time, choices of hangouts, etc.

1 Thess. 4:3-6 says “It is God’s will that you should be sanctified [made holy]: that you should avoid sexual immorality [fornication, adultery and others]; that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him.”

We need to stop asking “how much is too much” or “how far is too far?” A far better question to ask would be “How can I HONOR GOD with my physical relationships?”

When God finished each piece of creation in Genesis, he finished by saying “it is good.”  God determines what is and is not “good.”  For sexuality, he has determined that only context in which it is good is marriage.  However, a word very closely associated with “good” in our culture is the word “love.”  When you tell a guy you love them, what does that mean?  Is it fair to agree that part of love is wanting the best for them?  I think so.  But if so, we must decide what is “best.”  Here’s an English lesson: “best” is a superlative and it is the highest form of the word “good.”  Good, better, best.  So if we want the best for them, we want for them the “highest good.”  And who determines what is good?  God!  So is it fair to say that loving a guy and wanting the best for him is wanting what God wants for him?  If so, we have to draw the line in our relationships between thinking that we love someone by giving our body to them or allowing them to take from our body whatever they wish to take and exercising real love by refusing that position because it’s what God wants for us and the other person.  Guys need help to exercise self-control.  A LOT of help.  A very helpful practice in all relationships outside of making the right clothing and behavior choices that will ease lust is praying and talking.  We need honesty and openness about the fact that you want to help the guy we are with to succeed spiritually and that we want his help for our own spiritual success as well.
Another side of the coin exists on this issue: guys can often be pressuring.  They can be very assertive in order to get want they want when they are thinking with their hormones and not their head.  A large population of girls and women fall prey to the guilt trips given to them by the guy that they are with.  BUT YOU ARE NEVER TO FEEL BAD FOR NOT ALLOWING THE GUY YOU ARE WITH TO DESTROY HIS SOUL AND YOURS.  It just doesn’t work that way.
Try imitating Michelle.  She is a very determined young lady with no intention of ever letting a guy guilt her into any form a sexual activity.  Observe the following REAL conversation:    

Guy: "REAL men are sexually active.”
Michelle: "So is my REAL dog."
Guy: "If you loved me, you’d let me."
Michelle: "If you loved me, you wouldn’t ask."
Guy: "But I want to."
Michelle: "But I don’t!"
Guy: "Everybody’s doing it."
Michelle: "Not true. I’m somebody, and I’m not doing it!"
Guy: "Have you ever done it?"
Michelle: "Have you ever made the wonderful discovery of knowing Jesus Christ?"
Guy: "Don’t you love me?"
Michelle: "Yeah, But I love God more."
Guy: "I won’t get you pregnant."
Michelle: "That’s right, because you aren’t going to touch me."
Guy: "If you won’t let me, I’ll find someone who will."
Michelle: "It was nice knowing you.”      (and my personal favorite part of the conversation)
Guy: “But you owe me!"
Michelle: "Okay, I’ll get you a key chain or something." 

A lot of Christians fall into the trap of trying to gauge “how far is too far” by setting specific, measurable rules for what we should and shouldn’t touch and how many inches is too short on a dress, etc. Rules have their place and value but one point on this needs to be made clear: Christianity is about LIVING, not about RULES. It has more to do with our mindset than perhaps with our ability to keep a list of specific sexuality guidelines.
Matt 5:28 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’  But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

Is committing adultery wrong – yes, Jesus upholds the position of the law, but He says, don’t just limit it to an act of not doing something.  What is important is your attitude. What is in your heart?  Are you trying to figure out how much you can get away with?  Or are you trying to please God?
The question “How far is too far?” anticipates FAILURE.  When we ask this sort of question we focus on failing.  We are trying to push the envelope and we only know we have gone too far when it is too late.  I’m picturing the coyote and road runner now.  How far can he push the limits before he ends up over the cliff?  Is this too far?  No.  Is this too far?  Nope.  Is this too far?  Yep – but it’s too late!!  We need to stop asking “how much is too much” or “how far is too far?”  A far better question to ask would be “How can I HONOR GOD with my physical relationships?”   Or “how can I make sure that I’m doing everything I possibly can to make self-control easier on the guy that I am with?”

Jeremy Hall is a 22 year old from Tom Bean Texas.  He is living in Henderson, TN with wife Sarah.  He currently works at FHU as Retention Coordinator and is working towards a Masters in New Testament. He love directing, composing, writing, and drinking Mountain Dew.

Bored With Life by Caleb Capshaw

I’ve felt it. Chances are you’ve felt it too. Life’s gotten boring. Stale. Stopped.  It’s like everyday you get up to do the exact same thing with no end in sight. You wake up everyday, do a similar routine as the day before, and then go back to bed.  You want to know how to get out of this. You want to know how to put the excitement of living back in your life again. Because inside we all know there is more to living than just breathing.

   God made us to grow.  Growth is the thing that allows us to progress in this life.  It starts when we are born and should continue to happen until we die, but sometimes it feels like we stop growing and begin to feel as though we are wasting away.  So how do we grow? We set goals and accomplish them. Goals that will challenge us and take us to our limits, so we can then expand our limits further.

   The goals we set for ourselves often are just empty words. Humans have the bad tendency of giving up on something they don’t really care about at the first sign of adversity. However, the growth we experience in life is not displayed by the words of our mouths but the manifestations of our hearts. The things that our hearts desire to accomplish are the things that define us most. “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”  So, the things that our heart desires the most are the things we find the most motivation to accomplish.

    As I have said in other notes, to do things it is important to understand that you are in control and capable, and also to have a positive attitude as to not defeat yourself. God gave us the blessing of free will.  I call it a blessing because being able to control our own outcomes in life is one of the most joyful things he could’ve given us. “Being effective-changing things, influencing things, making things happen-is one of the fundamental needs with which the human brain seem to be naturally endowed, and much of our behavior from infancy onward is simply an expression of this penchant for control…The fact is that human beings come into the world with a passion for control, they go out of the world the same way, and research suggests that if they lose their ability to control things at any point between their entrance and exit, they become unhappy, helpless, hopeless, and depressed. And occasionally dead.”

   I say all this about controlling our own life and setting goals because chances are most of the people reading them will have a common goal in life, and that is to be the best Christian we can be and to get heaven.  1 Corinthians 9:24-27 says, “Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win. Everyone who competes in the games exercises self-control in all things They then do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. Therefore I run in such a way, as not without aim; I box in such a way, as not beating the air; but I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified.”  We have to set specific goals to help us to improve our Christians lives. Some long term and some short term.  We cannot run without a distance to run. And we cannot box as to fight air. And just the same, we cannot live to serve God without setting our actions and goals in life to that purpose.

   So if you want life to feel like it means something again. If you want to feel like you aren’t living the same day over and over. If you want to live like you are becoming closer to the person God made you to be everyday.  Then recognize the main goal He has set for our lives. A goal that’s when met will be like nothing you could’ve ever imagined.

The Power of a Positive Attitude by Caleb Capshaw

“The mind is the battleground. It is the place where the biggest conflict is. It is wearing you down. Half of the things you thought were gonna happen never did happen. But if you allow those thoughts to dwell in your mind it will succeed in robbing you of your peace, robbing you of your joy, robbing you of your life, just because you thought yourself into a nervous breakdown.  You thought yourself into depression. You thought yourself into defeatism. The warfare is in your mind. It’s not in your checkbook.  It’s not in your savings account. It’s not in your job. The fight that you’ve got to fight is in your mind.” 

            This is a speech I heard recently that has made me ask myself several questions lately.  What kind of fights am I fighting with in my mind?  Am I fighting the fights that God wants me to fight?  Or am I just letting the negativity of my own mind weigh me down and discourage me from fighting the good fight at all? What are the things that are hindering me from having this attitude to always win these fights?

            I am a strong believer in the power of a positive attitude.   He who thinks he can and he who thinks he can’t…are both normally right.  So many times in life it seems we just let one small obstacle in our path send us spiraling down in a negative direction.  We let our minds runaway and with that comes feelings of sadness, when really there is nothing to even be sad about.  God blesses us all beyond measure everyday, but yet we let small things make us lose our grip on the big picture.

           One of the greatest blessings and abilities God has given us is the power to direct and focus our mind upon a task.  Whatever the mind feeds upon, the mind attracts to you.  What are we focused on?  Are we focused on doing God’s will?  If we are then we know what the battles are we have to win in our head are.  The question is…why aren’t we winning them? 

           One of the biggest reasons I hear that people have trouble with is just thinking that they can’t do something. I believe that to be one of the biggest tools Satan uses against us.   Making us think that we can’t.  That we aren’t good enough. That we shouldn’t even bother making an attempt, because it’s just going to end in failure anyways.  Luckily for us as Christians, God has given us tons of verses to reassure us that not only can we win the battles we face, but he wants to help us win them.             

           In conclusion, we need to have a positive attitude in life.   We need to know that we were made to glorify God and accomplish His will.  We need to understand that we can win the fights that we face every second of every day against ourselves

Does God Tell Us to Do or Try? By Caleb Capshaw

I hate the word ‘Try’.  Try is a word that limits us. Try is a word that points out to us that there a large probability of failure.  Try is something  that keeps us from going all out.  Most people would say that “God doesn’t want us to be perfect, He just wants us to try.”  And while there is a lot of truth to this statement I feel like it can kind of lighten the gravity of our own failures.  James 1:22 says, “But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves.”  It says to be doers.  Not triers (I don’t even think that’s a real word).  God commands us to do things.  The Bible isn’t filled with phrases like “Try to love your neighbors.” Or “Try to not envy.” Or “Try to not murder.”  God gives us direct commands, not suggestions. 

            There is a huge difference in trying and doing something.  If I were to tell you to try and move a wall, you could walk up to it and give it a quick push and say you tried, even though it didn’t budge.  However, if you decided to move the wall, you would probably come up with a plan of action, get the right tools, and move the wall.  Then only question would be where do you want to put the wall. When we have failures in doing God’s will a lot of times we find ourselves saying “Well, I tried and I just couldn’t do it.”  Sometimes I feel like this our own way of comforting ourselves.  This relieves us because it makes us think God expected that to happen already.  However, if we think when we mess up like, “I didn’t do what God told me to do.”  Then it puts a bit more seriousness on us to do something about it. So I guess in conclusion what I’m trying to say is God expects us to do His will for him. Not try to do it.