Born Again Virgin

Does God have a place in our sex?

I started having sex when I was 13 years old.

I lost my virginity looking up at the underside of a teenage boy’s bunk bed. The black metal bars and the ‘pop!’ from pain to pleasure carried much irony in the years to come.

I grew up as a product of parents who were never together and were barely becoming adults themselves. Trying and failing in relationships, all the while surviving and creating their lives to the best of their ability with me alongside them.

Even as a young child, I was boy-crazy and all my mind wanted to consume was love, but all I had seen and known was heartbreak.

I couldn’t pinpoint love.

I couldn’t make sense of it.

I didn’t understand what it could feel like between two adults. What it looked like. All I had was a fantasy. And that fantasy primarily relied on lust - movies, tv, music videos formulated the image of desire and love for me.

[This TikTok, by Jaqueleen, is an incredible depiction of our culture and what it’s leading many young women into today.]

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZPR7QXU5E/

Is me staring up at those black bars making sense now?

I continued into adulthood searching for love and offering my body first. It was a way of saying, “Please love me. Do you see how I’m letting you have me?”

Each time, I trusted the boy I was having sex with to offer a level of protection/emotional safety, and when I began to see that wasn’t happening, I started to imitate them. I thought I  was hurting them, but the only person I was really hurting was myself.

I couldn’t see this then, but I was repeatedly breaking my own trust. I was dishonoring myself.

I was in a dark place, and didn’t even feel deserving of the love I wanted so badly to find. I became angry and cold. I wanted my mother. I was hurting. I didn’t want to be on this Earth anymore. I felt like I was going insane.

After River’s father left, it only added to this complicated mess of unworthiness. And then I met my youngest child’s father, lost 3 babies and birthed one, and I have completely changed as a woman.

To be absolutely honest, it wasn’t until right now in this very moment, that I’ve come into the stark realization that those black bars have stayed with me, ingrained in my subconscious mind as a reminder of what I signed up for each time I decided to lie down for a man that does not truly honor me.

We all know what people in the church told us about sex, “Wait until you’re married.”

But we never understood why.

We never understood that it’s for our protection.

It’s for the preservation of our honor.

Marriage is a sacred covenant. It formally introduces God into the relationship and creates a climate of safety and trust. There’s an equal and intentional level of commitment to the health of the union. There’s order, structure, and an inspired vision. While two become one, devotion to each other comes first and children are the fruit of a vibrant garden.

Without marriage, we bind and expose ourselves to people who do not truly honor us.

No one can honor what they do not genuinely respect. And if a man truly respected a woman’s body, mind, and heart, and saw her as sacred (part of God), he would want to honor/affirm/uphold her purpose. He would show honor by committing his life to her.

When we have sex before marriage (inviting God into our union), we quickly become emotionally involved without truly knowing that person. Other kinds of intimacy fail to blossom. We tiptoe around important conversations because we are already attached. We don’t want to let go. We can’t maturate and step into the roles designed for us to fulfill. We power struggle for years. We don’t feel safe. We sacrifice too much, investing our time, energy, and resources into something that isn’t necessarily long-lasting. We can’t build a family or create a home or pour into a foundation, because there is no HONOR.

There is no permanence.

THE BOYFRIEND/GIRLFRIEND RELATIONSHIP IS A LIE.

Our culture is positioned to seek immediate gratification and cater to lust - to pleasure.

The messaging everywhere is:

“Do what makes you feel good.”

There is no moral code, no order, no rules, no shame, no community, no compass = no protection.

At 30 years old, after two children and a whole lot of heartache and pain, I’ve asked God to release me from those black bars.

To restore my heart and make me new.

I don’t want what this world offers. This world has filled my life with chaos and disorder.

I want something my spirit agrees with and something my God deems worthy for me.

And so, I must first ask the question, “Am I honoring myself?”