Boy + Gal = Platonic friendships?
well, for sometime now the Lord has been teaching me about this topic... here's my stand...
it's best not to open up your heart to a friend of the opposite gender unless the Lord is leading the both of you towards marriage... and as such, spending one on one time is also the exception and not the norm.... i know it sounds a little legalistic, but will explain further.
opening ourselves up emotionally to another of the opposite gender opens up the door to compromises that we may not be equipped to handle, esp if we indulge in our own flesh and lose sight of Christ along the way when emotions are already involved (either mutual or with one party) this is an analogy that I've used... u can walk 5 cm away from the edge of the cliff or walk 1m away... either way, u won't fall, but if u r walking 1 m away, i really believe u can walk more at ease and enjoy the walk a lot more then if u were walking 5cm away and constantly on high alert in case u r gonna fall....
granted that diff ppl have diff characters and some are more secureed in the Lord than others but I still believe that it's good to set the standards higher so that even if you fall short, u won't be as far off as if the standards had been lower... i know it sounds a little legalistic... but it's about how easy / difficult for one to make compromises..... and yet, with all these in mind, it is still by His grace and strength that we can even begin to stick with the convictions that we feel in our spirits.... definitely not by will power or our own strength...
seeing how God instituted marriage and His calling for singles, I believe that emotional support / intimacy with the opposite gender is the special privilege of one's spouse... sure, some ppl have close relationships with ppl from opp gender and the friendships never gets complicated but that doesn't form the basis that such relationships are wise. there are always exceptions to the rule but they are what they are, exceptions.... ( e.g. I've heard of a lady pastor who married a non-Christian having heard clearly from the Lord that that's the way to go and the guy came to know the Lord and ended up having a much more powerful ministry than his wife)
Ultimately, it's most important that God is our source of strength and support... it is too easy to just turn to another brother or sister for help/support when the going gets tough... it's so much more tangible. but even in a marriage, our only true source of strength is the Lord not our spouse.... it is vitally important that we establish Christ as our rock when we are singles so that when we enter into marriage, we can look to Jesus and not at our spouse for support... we are in a marriage to support our spouse but even then i believe that the best support that a spouse can give is to point that person to God. For only He has the ability to meet us at our deepest needs and sustain us in our very areas of inadequacies.....
friends are important, they give us support as the Lord grants us, but they should not be an indispensable source of strength.... without them we must still feel complete for we already have the One that completes us.... as in a marriage... we don't need our spouse to complete us... we are already complete for we have the awesome love of the Father.... no matter where we are, no matter what we are going through, He is more than enough... if we feel something's missing and need anything else besides / more than Him, then I believe we really need to sit down and slow down to let Him minister to our hearts, to meet the areas that are yet to be filled with Him.
one does not become cold-hearted and unfeeling with such an approach... in fact, it requires us to be even more open and vulnerable towards God, and towards friends of the opposite gender such an approach frees us to minister to/ interact with/ love them in a godly manner without selfish human emotions / needs being involved because our motivation is Christ and not our own needs.
that has been my journey thus far, and I believe that the journey towards marriage for many others are not that far off... God jealously guards over us, not in an egotistical way, but out of His love that will not give us anything short of His best... which is Himself.
with all these said, it doesn't mean that I have not made or will not make compromises along the way... but we do our best by His grace, knowing that the Almighty will never forsake us.
my Beloved is mine and I am my Beloved's...
and that my friend, is already great cause to rejoice and celebrate for eternity to come.
nao
it's best not to open up your heart to a friend of the opposite gender unless the Lord is leading the both of you towards marriage... and as such, spending one on one time is also the exception and not the norm.... i know it sounds a little legalistic, but will explain further.
opening ourselves up emotionally to another of the opposite gender opens up the door to compromises that we may not be equipped to handle, esp if we indulge in our own flesh and lose sight of Christ along the way when emotions are already involved (either mutual or with one party) this is an analogy that I've used... u can walk 5 cm away from the edge of the cliff or walk 1m away... either way, u won't fall, but if u r walking 1 m away, i really believe u can walk more at ease and enjoy the walk a lot more then if u were walking 5cm away and constantly on high alert in case u r gonna fall....
granted that diff ppl have diff characters and some are more secureed in the Lord than others but I still believe that it's good to set the standards higher so that even if you fall short, u won't be as far off as if the standards had been lower... i know it sounds a little legalistic... but it's about how easy / difficult for one to make compromises..... and yet, with all these in mind, it is still by His grace and strength that we can even begin to stick with the convictions that we feel in our spirits.... definitely not by will power or our own strength...
seeing how God instituted marriage and His calling for singles, I believe that emotional support / intimacy with the opposite gender is the special privilege of one's spouse... sure, some ppl have close relationships with ppl from opp gender and the friendships never gets complicated but that doesn't form the basis that such relationships are wise. there are always exceptions to the rule but they are what they are, exceptions.... ( e.g. I've heard of a lady pastor who married a non-Christian having heard clearly from the Lord that that's the way to go and the guy came to know the Lord and ended up having a much more powerful ministry than his wife)
Ultimately, it's most important that God is our source of strength and support... it is too easy to just turn to another brother or sister for help/support when the going gets tough... it's so much more tangible. but even in a marriage, our only true source of strength is the Lord not our spouse.... it is vitally important that we establish Christ as our rock when we are singles so that when we enter into marriage, we can look to Jesus and not at our spouse for support... we are in a marriage to support our spouse but even then i believe that the best support that a spouse can give is to point that person to God. For only He has the ability to meet us at our deepest needs and sustain us in our very areas of inadequacies.....
friends are important, they give us support as the Lord grants us, but they should not be an indispensable source of strength.... without them we must still feel complete for we already have the One that completes us.... as in a marriage... we don't need our spouse to complete us... we are already complete for we have the awesome love of the Father.... no matter where we are, no matter what we are going through, He is more than enough... if we feel something's missing and need anything else besides / more than Him, then I believe we really need to sit down and slow down to let Him minister to our hearts, to meet the areas that are yet to be filled with Him.
one does not become cold-hearted and unfeeling with such an approach... in fact, it requires us to be even more open and vulnerable towards God, and towards friends of the opposite gender such an approach frees us to minister to/ interact with/ love them in a godly manner without selfish human emotions / needs being involved because our motivation is Christ and not our own needs.
that has been my journey thus far, and I believe that the journey towards marriage for many others are not that far off... God jealously guards over us, not in an egotistical way, but out of His love that will not give us anything short of His best... which is Himself.
with all these said, it doesn't mean that I have not made or will not make compromises along the way... but we do our best by His grace, knowing that the Almighty will never forsake us.
my Beloved is mine and I am my Beloved's...
and that my friend, is already great cause to rejoice and celebrate for eternity to come.
nao
Labels: Revelations
posted by Nao at 10:35 am
5 Comments:
wat can i say, my dear sis, except this post is awesome & Jesus is awesome.
luv ya sis. i'm blessed.
good post...found your blog from Joshua.
haha... am glad it can be of encouragement... interesting... coz i just bumped into Joshua yesterday.
Good post, although I won't be too quick to attibute the lady pastor's 'revelation' to God.
He can though still will things for His purpose and for that we can be thankful for His graciousnes and that our God is not a god of contradiction.
May we all find solace in the Unchanging in the midst of our changing world.
Well said. God bless.
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