god, guys, & girls

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.

— 1 John 4:7

Several years ago a friend of mine went scuba diving in the Caribbean with some friends and family. They did one of those crazy-unsafe deals where you get an hour or so crash course on all things scuba, then swim out into the ocean. Before the dive she was paired up with a middle-aged man. They were to be scuba buddies — able to function independently, both had their scuba masks and oxygen tanks, but paired up to enjoy the adventure together and to provide support should something go wrong.

As long as they both had their scuba tanks on, air flowing, they were a real source of life for each other — enjoying the wonders of the ocean together. But then something went wrong with his gear. Oxygen ceased flowing. Panic set in. They knew the emergency protocol — a series of hand gestures, sharing of oxygen, then a slow, calm ascent to the boat above. But as soon as he realized he could not breathe, all of that went out the window. He quickly grabbed her by the shoulders, shaking her and trying to yell. She tried to understand what he was doing but none of this looked like the emergency drill they had just learned! As she tried to calm him down, he suddenly yanked her aspirator out of her mouth. Desperation set in. Where there is scarcity, there's desperation. And where there is desperation, there is exploitation. As he struggled for air, he began to push her head down, almost as though he was trying to climb her like a ladder to safety. Of course, what he was actually doing was drowning her. In return she struggled violently with him in order to get the aspirator back and take a breath. Then, in a final act of desperation, he grabbed her and swam full speed toward the surface. In doing so, he forgot to pause and adjust the pressure, so when they arrived at the top they both got decompression sickness, also known as "the bends." They survived but, needless to say, they are no longer swimming buddies, or any kind of buddies for that matter.

The same principle holds true in all of life. When you have a source of life, you are a source of life. But where there is scarcity, desperation will set in. And desperation can easily become exploitation of others. If you are disconnected from a source of life, your "oxygen tank," then you will attempt to suck life out of someone else. You will be tempted to use people to try to get your sense of self validated. You will, in a moment, become a sucker of life rather than a giver of life. And this is how toxic relationships are born. This is why so many go wrong. When we bring God-sized needs to human beings, they cannot possibly succeed. Nor can we offer them unconditional love on the days they are struggling, because they are our source! If it feels like I am painting this in too dark of colors, let me show it to you in the "innocent" way I discovered it in me. When I was in college I yearned for a relationship with a woman. But I remember when I heard someone talk about how husbands sacrifice their wants and desires for the sake of their wives. This person spoke about how Jesus Christ had sacrificed his very life for the sake of his bride, the church. All of this sounded so heroic. I wanted to be a hero like that, so it seemed good to me. But then he talked about how sex is not the using of a person to meet your needs. The same logic applies. What a wife will need in sexually intimate moments will probably not look at all like what a young guy in his twenties imagines, particularly if he has grown up looking at porn. It was here that my selfishness was exposed. I had always imagined that sex was about gratifying me. I had thought about that aspect of a relationship purely in selfish, self-gratifying terms. I realized that there wasn't much love in my imagery of sex. From there I began to see how in many of my imaginings about romance and marriage, I envisioned me doing things that would make my wife, or others, think that I was heroic, impressive, caring, or otherwise amazing. The endgame was about me. It was an attempt to fill up my ego. I remember weeping thinking about how much selfishness had shot through every aspect of my imagination as it related to romance. I had to take a break from even thinking about a relationship with a girl. I realized I would be looking to her to make me feel as though I was somebody special. Sure, wives should make a husband feel that way, but if I bring a God-sized need for love and acceptance to any girl, no matter how impressive she is, she can't meet a need like that.

We must get a relationship with God right before we will ever get a relationship with a guy or a girl right.

As we look at the Bible, there are certainly a number of sections that address romance, sex, and marriage. We watch the first couple meet in the book of Genesis. We have the romantic songs of Solomon. We have the wise counsel concerning love in the Proverbs. The first letter to the Corinthians addresses single life. Ephesians and Colossians both contain beautiful descriptions of godly marriages. Yet if you were to add up all of these they would constitute only a small sliver of the content of the Word of God. The vast majority of the Scriptures cover the importance of a relationship with God. For some young singles I have visited with, this fact can seem hard to imagine. Dating is the largest issue in their view. What possibly could take precedence over finding the love of your life? I admit, when the desire to date is as close to you as your nose, it looks all-consumingly large. Yet if you can back up from the desire to date for a moment, you will see that there is a greater story playing out in history than the story of romantic love. Your relationship with a guy or a girl, though important, is not the most critical relationship in your life, and it is not the relationship that God is the most concerned with.

In chapter 4 of the gospel of John, when Jesus sat down with the woman at the well, he struck up a conversation with her about thirst and water. Then, in the context of this conversation about thirst, he said to her, "You have had five husbands and the man you are living with now is not your husband." He also said to her, "If you knew who it was speaking to you, you would have asked me, and I would give you living water." What Jesus was saying to this woman was, "You have been looking for satisfaction for a deep soul thirst in the arms of men and you cannot find it there. You have misdiagnosed your need." Many of us...